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taeslarityy · 2 months

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outage ༄ joel miller one shot (18+)

-> pairing: no-outbreak joel miller au x female curvy reader

-> word count: 4.3k

-> summary: after a citywide power outage, you're left to deal with the scorching texas heat. until, the well-respected neighborhood dilf — joel miller — lends you a more than generous hand.

-> warnings/tags: sarah is 10/11 so joel had her a bit older, power outage, texas heat, yes this is a warning because its not a joke, reader has a cat!!!, age gap (reader is 24, joel is late 40s), curvy/mid/plus size reader, brief fatphobia, reader has self-image/parent issues + is a lonely gal, fluff, SMUT (18+), unprotected piv, creampie, oral + fingering (f!recieving), squirting, body worship, brief ass play, daddy kink, big ole tits, spanking, spit kink, praise kink, a bit of belly bulge, cockwarming, pet names galore (darlin, sweetheart, baby, _ girl), joel has a huge dick (not canon!)

-> a/n: hi hi! i have been so anxious to begin writing again and currently have some wips that i am just not confident with. so when i saw the lovely @hellishjoel post her #hotdilfsummerchallenge, i was positive i wanted to join in! such a pleasure to be involved in this — thank you kylee for creating such a fun way for this community to get involved! as a curvier woman, i wanted reader to reflect that. because... joel miller is a handsy mf and loves to just grab himself some wide hips, thick thighs and phat tits <3 but ofc, this is can be for various body types. please please please, leave your thoughts and even constructive criticism! <3 DILF NEIGHBOR JOEL, YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS!!!!

You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.

You release a groan of annoyance as the visual of your TV, coffee table lamp and humming of the refrigerator all flicker off into silence. The frills on your throw-blanket settle, as the ceiling fan no longer produces the small gusts of wind that have caused you to be rather chilly on this hot, humid and rainy summer night.

When you made the courageous decision of moving across the country for a new teaching opportunity in Austin — you were never informed on the true brutality summertime unleashed onto Texas residents. More-so, you really had nothing to do but be caged up in the comfortable AC of your home. You’ve been here for roughly 14 months and the only "friends" you’ve made have been the 28 fourth graders you had the pleasure of teaching last school year. Tragic.

Your coworkers, did not handle your arrival pleasantly. Young, beautiful, freshly-educated and determined. That’s what your grandmother referred to you as when you called her sobbing after your first week. Informing her that the seasoned teachers won’t even bat an eye at you, and when they do it’s a look of disgust. Whispering amongst one another. Like you were in middle school again, trying to befriend the popular girls.

“I was foolish to think things could be different for me down here, so stupid of me.”

“Now listen to me, you are the most intelligent woman I know. More than anyone in this family. Bullies like that, it stems from an unknown jealousy and overbearing insecurity. Don’t let a few sour grapes ruin this outstanding career for you. Your students adore you already, and so do I. Just continue to be yourself and if that isn’t enough for them, so be it.”

Your grandmother always knew how to make you feel better. She had been instilling your own sense of confidence since you were a little girl. The only adult in your life to do so. If only her words were enough. Your coworkers just never let up. After overhearing them gossip about you during lunch break, you gave up your attempts indefinitely.

“She really thinks she deserves a place here?”

“Look at her back rolls in that shirt…”

“She really needs to put that sandwich down.”

“Why is she so quiet? It’s freaky, honestly. No wonder she’s always alone.”

You’re not a stranger to being alone. You practically have been your entire life. Your parents never really bothered to form a genuine relationship with you, always so focused on your younger sister. She was the prettier, thinner, more impressive version of you. You have only had one best friend throughout your long 24 years on this earth. She was smarter than you and moved away from the timid small town you shared in Northern Maine, choosing an out-of-state university. So, being alone was a familiarity. You have made peace with it. But being lonely — that’s a whole other ball-park.

The booming thwack of thunder startles you from your thoughts. Your sweet calico boy leaps from your warm lap and scurries under the dining table — tail puffed in fear. “Milo... it’s okay,” you whisper. He just gleams at you with his jet-black saucer eyes. Even you don’t believe your own words. You are not used to storms like this, and you didn’t really prepare. You read some articles online about stocking up: having plently of batteries, candles, non-perishable foods. Yet, you didn’t do any of that.

Rubbing away the moisture from your damp upper lip — the heat inside your home already becoming unbearable. Deciding on a whim, you can head to a nearby hotel for the night. Unsure how long you will be without power and don’t wish to succumb yourself or your cat to the searing temperatures of the night.

The rain has slowed down, as you feel the soft patter on your umbrella. Throwing your purse and water bottle in the front seat, you begin to dread unpacking all this stuff when you get to the hotel. Bags, cat litter, cage — scrutinizing yourself mentally and deciding you better fucking prepare for the next storm.

“Where ya headin’ sweetheart?”

Your heart jumps at the deep smooth Southern voice that fills your thoughts at night. When your hands would find their way in between your quivering legs. Throughout the day. Pretty much all the time.

Joel Miller is the only person in this town that has ever filled the lonely void you can never seem to fill. When you moved to the quiet suburban street, he was the first to come greet you as you struggled to pull your mattress out of the U-Haul. Immediately lending a hand, and proceeding to lug all of your remaining boxes, furniture, miscellaneous items into your new home.

“Pretty lady like you, shouldn’t have to lift a single finger.” He remarked when you you blushed and assured him you could handle the rest, not wanting to be a burden. Even though the sweat dripping down your back was apparent and 5 minutes prior you had no idea how you’d be able to unpack the remainder of the truck. He then assured you — there was no way in hell you were being a burden. Words that were a rarity.

Later that afternoon, he invited you for dinner at his home. You met his lovely daughter, Sarah. Where everyone learned that you were her new school teacher. What were the odds?

Following that, seeing Joel was frequent. From parent-teacher conferences, backyard barbecues for the neighborhood, or even small intimate dinners with Sarah at each others homes. Sarah would even spend the night at yours on occasion. When Joel had a late night at the construction site, or when she just needed some girl time. You adored that little girl, and vice versa.

You also adored the fuck out of Joel.

So when you looked up at his porch, finding him in nothing but a pair of plaid pajama pants.. your throat went dry. His tanned skin gleamed softly from the street light — little speckled freckles adorned his waist in various spots. And that darkish grey hair on his chest and fat of his lower tummy that flowed underneath his pants. Your brain fuzzy at the thought of your face pressed against it as you swallow his cock.

But you were not a fool. Joel would never express an attraction towards you. A man like that? He deserved the perfect woman.

“Darlin’?” He speaks again, a bit louder. Disturbing your wandering thoughts.

“I- I was gonna head to a hotel for the night, my house is too hot already. And I don’t want Milo to be uncomfortable.”

Joel’s eyes wander down your body as you explain — the plush jiggle of your tits in that small tank. Nearly spilling out. Slightly damp from the rain or humidity. The chub of your tummy spills slightly from your leggings. A sight that makes his cock swell unbearingly. An act that occurs more often than not when he sees you or even thinks of you for the countless minutes of his day.

“No way. Not gonna let ya drive in this weather. Plus, most hotels nearby are gonna be overbooked. I got the generator up n’ working, got the spare room too. Your stayin’ over.”

“No! No, Joel. I can’t.”

“N’ why not?” His hands have found his way to his hips, popping a knee out and giving you that classic dad glare. Not angry, but confused as to why you’re even protesting when he’s already decided.

“I don’t want to intrude and I have Milo. You and Sarah are allergic.”

“Sarah left yesterday to stay with her mom in California for the rest of the summer. Besides, Milo loves me. I can handle a runny nose as long as I know the two of ya are safe.”

To this, your stomach nearly flips inward on itself. You’ve never been alone with Joel in his home. Not for this long. The few times you’ve come over to help him with dinner before Sarah got home from soccer practice, have always been excruciating. Staring at him without worry. Watching his muscles flex through his t-shirts. Big hands chopping vegetables and plating food. His hand lightly touching your waist when scooting by.

There’s no possible way you can survive a night in Joel’s home.

But, he’s already grabbing his umbrella and walking over to you. He grabs your stuff from the car and tells you to go grab Milo. So, you do.

Joel slips on a t-shirt after he put your stuff in the spare room, disappointedly enough. You nearly told him to keep it off, but held your tongue. You made yourself comfortable at the island barstool as you typed up some early lesson plans, Milo at your feet.

He patters over to Joel who is now leaning against the counter, brushing against his leg. He then leaps onto the granite and purrs against Joel’s arm.

“Psst! Milo get do-“ you beg, embarrassment coloring your cheeks.

“S’ okay, sweetheart. He’s not botherin’ me,” Joel attempts to settle your nerves. Petting Milo’s soft fur and scratching under his chin, that special spot all cats love. “Can I get you anythin’ to drink?” He nods towards the coffee he’s brewing.

“Coffee would be nice, thank you.” You beam at him. Joel’s heart skips a beat every time your cheeks puff up ever so slightly when you smile at him. It’s something he swears is the most endearing thing about you. Of course, he’s only ever shared that with his daughter. Who begs her father to just take her favorite teacher on a date already.

Joel grabs some sugar and oat milk from the fridge, your favorite. He learned from the few breakfasts you guys had shared. A bit of sugar and a nice gulp of milk softens the dark roast color in the mug, he slides it over to you as he grabs his plain black coffee.

“You remembered!” You giggle slightly at the Number 1 Dad title that adorns the mug, taking a sip. You moan at the taste, exactly how you like it.

“Of course I did, darlin’.” You almost hate how easily those pet names roll of his tongue. You summed it up as his southern hospitality, figured he calls any woman those special names. “So, you ready for this new school year?”

An icky feeling settles in your stomach. The thought of returning to the painful and toxic work environment you can only escape when you’re with your students.

“Not without my Sarah girl,” you swiftly change the subject towards the one person he can talk hours about.

He smiles proudly at her name.

“Ya know, she still all mad that you wouldn’t flunk her so she could have another year with ya.” Both your laughs quickly fill the empty house.

“Well, even if I tried to, that girl is too smart for her own good. She should skip a grade in my opinion.” You state, and you’re truthful at that. Sarah Miller is as intelligent as she is quick-witted.

“Yeah, she gets it from me.” At that you roll your eyes playfully. Typing something up before closing your computer and taking another sip of coffee. “Although I love boastin’ over her, I guess I meant are you excited to go back? They treat ya good there?”

Joel watches the color drain from your soft skin. Realizing he touched somewhere that might be too personal. Too raw. “M’ sorry sweetheart, shouldn’t have asked.”

“No- no uh, you’re fine. Um, honestly? No. I’m not excited. The staff there aren’t exactly the kindest bunch.” You confess, slight unease crawling over you.

Joel’s eyes scrunch in confusion. Mind blank on how the kindest soul he knows, could be surrounded by complete opposite. “Whatcha mean?”

You sigh letting the anxiousness settle a bit before speaking again, “they hate me. I don’t even know why, really? I have tried my hardest to get them to accept me but nothing seems to work. Whether it’s jabs at my appearance, teaching style, they’re never satisfied.” Your eyes are burning slightly, haven’t confessed this burden you constantly carry to anyone. “If it wasn’t for your daughter and my class, and… you.. well, I think I wouldn’t have made it through. I try to be strong, I try to be everything that people expect from me but it’s just so hard, Joel.” At that, the fat tears begin to stream down your face.

Joel was frozen in shock. Or maybe anger. Protectiveness. He wanted to hurt the people who made you feel like this. The least deserving of any pain. He sets his mug down and snatches you in his embrace. Holding your head with his hand, stroking your back with the other. He lets you sob almost uncontrollably into his firm chest.

“I just hate being so alone.” You whisper, clutching onto him. You can’t even be embarrassed anymore, you’re so overthrown by his scent, his comfort. Comfort you’ve not felt in so so long.

Joel kisses your temple softly, "promise you're not alone, sweet girl." He nudges your head to look up at his own sorrowful expression. His thumb running over your full lips, a bit swollen from your teeth biting down on them in an attempt to muffle your sobs. "So beautiful." He murmurs as he leans down to place a kiss on your left cheek, his lips skim over yours before he places another on your right.

Joel just barely hears the whimper from the back of your throat when that feather light skim happened. He leans back half an inch, staring into your glossy eyes. "Tell me not to, and I'll let you go upstairs and get some rest. Tell me, sweetheart."

It feels like a whole minute passes by. The soft patter of the rain, the smell of coffee beans from each others breath, the same slow breathing that overwhelms the little space between you both.

Desperation.

Your fingers tighten on his shirt, "don't let me go upstairs, Joel."

Joel smashes his mouth into yours, his guttural groan flying into your soft whimpers. The softness Joel expressed a moment ago is long gone. This kiss is messy, teeth-clanking, tongue inside your mouth. Like he wants to devour you from the outside in. He releases your lip with a pop.

He threads his thick fingers through the base of your hair and yanks it back gently, tongue on your neck. Biting the skin there. "You're so soft, baby. Just need me to mark ya up, is that right?"

You nod as hard as you can despite his harsh grip on your locks.

"I need you to use your words, sweet girl. Let me know what you're thinkin'."

"Everything you do is okay. I want more. I need it all. Please."

"Oh baby, cm'ere," he wraps your lavish thighs around his waist and hoists you into his arms. Easily. Like you're just the most delicate thing he's ever held.

As he walks to his bedroom, you smile into his neck. Arms wrapped over his shoulders, hand rubbing ever so softly at his greying curls. You bite at the skin under his ear and he gives your ass a huge squeeze. Groaning at how his big hands barely hold all the meat there. He couldn't wait to touch and gnaw at this body he loved.

At the foot of his bed, he taps your leg as if telling you to get down. You stand in front of his massive overbearing figure, staring up at him lustfully. You grab the bottom of your compression tank top and pull it over your head, revealing your unsupported chest. Your heavy tits fall a bit.

"My god," Joel falls to his knees in front of you, face nearly level with your pebbled nipples. Both his hands grab a fistful of each, rolling them in his palm. Your sweet noises fill the room and he swears he might've just came in his pajama pants right there. He takes his teeth and bite at the fat above your leggings, licking and sucking at a sensitive part of you. Literally and figuratively.

Joel abandons your chest to yank your leggings and panties down in one move, coming face-to-face with your prickly oozing pussy. He can't restrain himself much longer, spinning you around he pushes you down into his mattress.

He spreads your ass open with both hands, the chub of your lips open ever so slightly as the slick between them strings together.

"Perfect cunt." That's when you feel the chill of liquid spat right onto your puckered hole, dripping down to your clit. He leans in, tongue catching the tangy mixture of your slick and his saliva, right on your throbbing clit.

You screech into the sheets, so turned on from his actions. As he licks up to dip his tongue into your hole, one hand that's holding you open sneaks up your back, to your neck and yanks your head up.

"Nu-uh, let me hear you, baby girl." He demands as he pauses to throw his shirt off as fast as possible — not wanting to leave your cunt for too long without the warmth of his mouth.

He sloppily makes out with your cunt as it clenches and unclenches under his tongue, his beard prickling at your skin. Like he wants your scent all over him for as long as possible.

"Ohh daddy, more more," you whisper hazily, hand reaching back to grab his head desperate to have him as deep as possible.

Joel stops as he processes your choice of title. "What was that, darlin'?"

You freeze at his serious tone. Just now realizing what you've called the man. "Oh my god, I'm s-" Joel grabs your wrist and pins it against your lower back — thick middle and ring finger hooking into you with no warning. Your wetness aiding in the rapid slide of them.

He spits on your puckered hole again and abandons your wrist to land a harsh smack against your ass.

"Only dirty girls say that word, baby. Are you daddy's dirty girl?" He edges you on as he spanks you again on the opposite side. Hard. Unsparing. A side of Joel you've never seen. And oh, does it make you feel that coil tightening within you.

"Mmmm yes yes 'm your dirty girl, daddy!" You groan loudly, eyes swelling with fresh tears. But not tears of pain from earlier, pleasure.

Joel's fingers fuck into you harder, thumb now rubbing at your clit as he leans forward to prod his tongue at your asshole. "Cum for me, my nasty sweet girl. Drench my face. Let me taste you even more." He halts his fingers knuckle deep, hooked inside your cunt as he presses into that spot on repeat. Like he's stroking it out of you.

That's all it takes for you to silently scream as you squirt all over his lower beard covered face and your thick inner thighs, that nearly squish his head from how hard you're coming. Joel just keeps himself situated, never letting up. Allowing you to completely let go and rut back into him, telling him you need more.

"Thaaat's it, my good fuckin' girl.” He praises as he kisses your cunt and ass, he leans over your face capturing your lips in a kiss so messy and depraved. “Open that mouth.” Spitting roughly onto your tongue with a groan as you taste your sweetness that he knows he will forever be addicted to. No chance of recovery.

He ruts his thick bulge into your ass as you whine needly.

"Really want you to fuck my face, now." You beg, hand reaching down to grope him through his loose pjs.

"Mmmmm," he murmurs as his hips keep rutting into you. "Tonight is about you, baby. M' gonna stuff your tight cunt so fuckin' deep you'll feel it in your throat, don't worry." And with that promise, he releases himself, throbbing cock slapping against his lower tummy. You flip onto your back just to see it and your eyes widen at the sight before you.

You always knew it was huge just from perception, but god. It's thicker than your wrist, and looks like it would prod into your cervix. Painful even. Joel senses the worry on your face as he pushes your legs back against your chest. Admiring the way your stomach folds into itself, soft roll after roll. And the thickness of your inner thighs lays heavy. He just wants to get down and feast on you again but he might die if he doesn't feel you wrapped around him.

"You're in charge here, sweetheart. Understood?" He explains as he rubs his fat cock head up and down your swollen slit — notching on your opening with every downward stroke.

You nod slowly, peeking down at the monster between your legs once more. He squeezes your ankle, subtly reminding you to vocalize.

"Yes daddy, I understand."

"Good." And with that, he pushes into your fluttering hole. Your eyes roll back immediately, head thumping onto the soft duvet. He pushes in deeper, barely halfway in and he sees your feet and eyes scrunch a bit. It almost feels like he could rip you apart. Maybe it's because you haven't been fucked in a hot minute — or maybe it's just that Joel is so fucking hung. More than any guy you've slept with.

“Deep breath for me, sweetheart.” He soothes you, as soon as he sees your chest fall — he slams the rest of the way in. Hips flush with the back of your thighs. Cock fully sheathed in your warm soaked cunt. Heavy brimming balls pressed against your little puckered hole. “You feel so damn good. Dripping for me.” Joel’s eyes close at the feeling of you hugging him so tight. He suddenly forgets the feeling of any other woman he’s pleased. Utterly devoted to you from here on out.

When he pulls out all the way to his fat tip — it notches on your opening. Like he has to put in that extra effort to fully remove himself from you. But he doesn’t, and starts fucking into you fully. Never half way, never pulling completely out.. but always making sure he reaches the end of you.

“Da- daddy oh, harder please.” You plead, squeezing his forearm at the overwhelming feel of him nudging your cervix with every thrust.

That confirmation of pleasure is all Joel needs to push your legs back even more — ankles by your head — and began a brutal relentless pace. Grabbing a fistful of your jiggling tit and messy hair, he pulls your head up so you can watch how he ruins you for anyone else.

“Ya see that, see how swollen your gettin’ already?” Joel questions as he holds your head perfectly to observe the slight lifted pudge on your tummy. Paired with the way his coarse hair rubs against your swelled clit — it’s a drool worthy sight.

“Cus’ your so big, Joel.” You sigh, eyes fluttering from the primal force he’s using on your body.

A smug grin flicks across his face at the view. Mind consumed by the most perfect woman. Eyebrows turning inward, the little lines between them deepening as you try to comprehend all the emotions in this moment. Removing his hand from your head, he finds your clit and swipes it upward. Over and over. Leaning down, he sucks as much of your breast into his mouth as humanely possible. Tongue flicking the pebbled area, coercing your orgasm from you. “Cum with me, baby.” His muffled command shoots straight to your filled core.

As he feels you spasm around his thickness, he stills balls deep. “There it is, baby…” Spilling his cum inside your warmth. Plugging you, keeping you full of him. Joel relaxes his body against yours, finding your mouth to kiss you gently. Sweaty foreheads against one another. Joel goes to push off of you, his comforting body heat about to be ripped away.

"No! Wanna feel you longer, please."

Your protest makes Joel's heart surge. "Of course, sweet girl." Wrapping his large arms around you, he flips you both so that your soft plush body lays above him. The new angle makes his spent cock nudge a bit deeper, you both moan at the faint squelch of his cum overflowing your cunt. "You're so perfect," he mutters.

Smiling into his full chest, you leave a swift kiss. "So are you. Thank you for this. For.. everything."

Joel's hands finds your back as he begins gentle strokes onto your supple skin, his head resting atop your own. "Thank you, darlin'. I want you to understand something, you might just be the finest thing that ever happened to Sarah and I. Y'know, she didn't really want to see her mom. Never had the best relationship with her. She just wanted to spend the remainder of the summer havin' ya over everyday to swim and all. That girl admires you more than anyone."

Eyes foggy, you shift to gaze up at him. "And what does her father think?"

Joel pauses briefly, rich brown orbs beaming into yours. "Think she's damn right. She didn't want me to tell you this, but she left so I could have some alone time with you — take ya out. Scolded me sayin' by the time she's back, we better be together." He laughs at the thought, you join him. Picturing that 4'9 ball of fire lecturing her father on the rules of dating.

"So, you're asking me out Miller?" You question with a heavy hopeful heart.

"Should've done it forever ago, darlin'." He confesses, placing a delicate kiss on your temple.

And with that, you place your head back onto the warm chest of the man you've craved your entire life. Realizing, ever since that day where he first greeted you with that sultry gentleman voice — you were never truly alone.

thank you truly for reading! let me know your thoughts below or in asks!! reblogs are greatly appreciated <3

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kiwi-bitchez · 7 months

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The Girlfriend Experience

Eddie Munson x Reader

Summary: Eddie doesn’t think he’s cut out for dating. Self-resigned to a life of one and done hookups, you’re determined to make him see that he has the capacity to be a worthy companion… for when the right girl comes around. Fake Dating AU, classic corny fic for a fav corny troupe, Stranger Things canon divergent ofc, 18+ smut (see warnings below), big dick energy but also slightly emotionally unavailable!Eddie, yada yada yada, you know the drill.

Content warnings: AFAB reader with she/her pronouns, use of y/n, alcohol, smoking the devil’s lettuce, mention of panty stealing, food consumption, semi-public sex, fingering, PIV, Dom-ish!Eddie, oral (m and f receiving), pierced dick Eddie because I said so!, unprotected PIV sex, hair pulling, mild angst but nothing too angsty just like one heated conversation and Eddie feeling a little worthless but happy ending I promise

Word Count: 20k ahhhhhh!!!

A/N: Thanks to all those who comment and reblog! Your feedback and engagement makes my heart soar and keeps me motivated to write this filth! Sorry for the gargantuan length, in very-me fashion I always ending up writing one behemoth fic every so often rather than just separating it out into chapters. Also, realizing after the fact that I use the brand name ‘Goodwill’ a lot in this fic, which maybe not everyone might know is a thrift store, not sure if that’s just an American thing or not but figured it was worth noting.

“I guess I’m just not boyfriend material, ya know?” Eddie shrugs.

“Don’t say that, Eds,” your eyebrows pinched together, “different qualities are important to different people. Not everyone is looking to date a Steve, or a Brian, or a whoever. I’m sure someone is out there looking for an Eddie.”

“It’s not that,” he shot a look towards Steve, who, despite your analogy, was unfortunately everyone’s type and the textbook definition of boyfriend material.

“I just don’t think I’d be very good at gooey romance stuff, or even like, passable boyfriend behavior. I mean, look at me, I hardly take care of myself, I’m loud, I have no money, I’m basically every dad’s worst nightmare, do I need to keep going?”

“The nightmare thing can actually be a bonus,” Steve chimes in, “the whole bad boy persona can be a huge draw for most girls.”

“Sure Steve,” Eddie’s voice grows exasperated, “I’m the mysterious bad boy until they realize I’m a huge loser who runs not one but two dungeons and dragons groups. Real fuckin’ attractive I’m sure that is.”

“Shows you’re committed to something…” you trail off when his eyes tell you to stop coming up with a positive spin for every excuse he gives.

This whole discussion had started because of something that happened at the bar last night. A small group of you decided to meet up for drinks, your usual group of pals. It was a Thursday, so the bar wasn’t too busy. Your friends all squished into a booth in the corner, chatting and catching up over a plate of shared nachos, when Robin started making frantic gesture at you and Steve.

“Please just say what you’re trying to say instead of this elaborate charade,” Steve makes a few mocking hand signals back at her.

“Okay, one at a time, and keep it subtle,” her voice lowered to a whisper, for some reason, “over at the bar, some girl is totally flirting with Eddie.”

You and Steve both turn around. “I said not at the same time!” She whisper yells.

There was, in fact, a pretty girl with shiny hair and glossy lips doing a half fake laugh and pressing her manicured hand to Eddie’s bicep. You whip back around to find Robin with her mouth hanging open in a “can you believe this is happening” way.

“Good for him,” Steve swivels back around too, “She’s pretty hot.”

You return to your nachos, pretending there wasn’t a ping of jealousy in you. Eddie was your friend, that had been made abundantly clear.

When Robin introduced you to all her friends from high school, you had easily gotten along with all of them. You especially got along with Eddie. He was funny, authentic, abrasive at times, but a truly good person at his core, creative, protective, you could go on.

After getting to know him a bit, and developing a budding crush, you had made a few passes at him. Nothing too forward, just small compliments here and there, open ended offers to hang out that never lead anywhere.

It’s not like he flat out rejected you, but any feelers you were putting out to see if there was potential there were met with him looking past your flirtatious intent and just being his goofy, friendly self. He treated you exactly the same way he treated everyone else, which was awesome, except for when it wasn’t.

“Oh no,” Robin’s gaze was not subtly fixed on the unfolding scene at the bar, you and Steve watched her face drastically shift from confused, to a cringe, to an eye roll.

Still half whispering, as if Eddie could even hear your corner of the bar, “He’s totally blowing it. DON’T both turn around at the same time again.”

“Okay, so,” she starts before either of you can even confirm that you want to know, “she was totally laying it on thick, like you could see it from all the way back here. And he must have said something off putting, cuz all of a sudden she like went cold on him and pranced away. Shhhhh, okay okay, he’s coming back.”

She was acting as if she wasn’t the only one gossiping. You and Steve were innocent bystanders in all this.

“WHAT was that?” She immediately blurts out when Eddie returns to his seat, fresh drink in hand.

You and Steve share a side glance to sigh at Robin’s inability to be subtle, god bless her. Eddie shifts around awkwardly and lets out a forced dry laugh, taking a long sip from his drink before facing the wrath of a curious Robin.

“Oh, that,” he gestures to the bar as if she could be asking about anything else, “some girl. Not sure.”

“Not sure? Eddie she was FLIRTING with you,” Robin all but yelled, causing Steve to scan the bar to see if the girl in question had landed somewhere within earshot.

“I know that,” he hisses, “She just… wasn’t my type…”

“Okay sure, hot girl in a tube top and no bra isn’t your type, riiiiight,” Steve rolls his eyes.

“It’s just,” Eddie was so over this inquisition, “she asked if I wanted to get coffee.”

You, Steve, and Robin all give him a blank stare, trying to decipher what he could possibly have against getting coffee with a hot girl.

“That’s like,” he gets defensive, detecting the wall of confusion facing him, “something people do on a date. Coffee is serious, and I’m not a very serious guy.”

“What do you mean ‘coffee is serious,’ coffee is like, as casual as you can possibly be?” Steve’s tone now emulated Robin’s from earlier, half whispering, half yelling, all scolding towards his friend.

“That’s just not really my speed. Coffee dates and flowers and hand holding and all that,” he was avoiding eye contact with all three of you, “Yeah, she was hot, sure, and maybe if she had been like ‘hey lets go fool around in the bathroom’ then I wouldn’t be here having this lame ass conversation with you three. But I don’t do coffee dates, so I’m not gonna waste her time and pretend like I’m that sort of guy when I’m just not.”

“Well good on you for not leading her on, cuz I’m sure you could have agreed to the coffee date and still gotten lucky in the bathroom,” Steve mumbles, and you smack the back of his head lightly to scold him.

“So you only date girls who’ll fuck you in a bar bathroom the first time you meet?” You redirect your now equally scolding energy to Eddie.

“No!” He runs his hands through his hair, “I don’t date. Anyone, really. At all. Ever.”

“Oh,” you think for a minute, realizing in your few years of friendship you never had seen him with anyone, or heard him mention a romantic interest of any sort.

Leading you to your present conversation, you and Steve continuing to question Eddie on his decision to reject the hot tube-top girl at the bar and why he felt like coffee was such a scary commitment.

“You guys know me,” he continued to defend his stance, “If I took that girl out for coffee she probably would have picked some fancy hoity toity place and I wouldn’t know what anything on the menu meant, I’d probably spill something or like, get crumbs everywhere, and the bill would be way more than two coffees should be. It would have been a waste of both our time.”

He was staunchly refusing eye contact with the two of you, knowing he’d be met with something along the lines of pity.

“Fine, we’ll drop the subject,” you shoot a look to Steve, “but I just need to make sure you understand that not every girl likes expensive coffee, or flowers and handholding, or whatever your expectation of girls and dating is. There’s plenty of girls who have similar interests to you, who feel the same way about PDA and mushy romance stuff that you do. You do know that, right?”

“Of course I do, y/n,” you could practically feel his eyes rolling at you, “but girls like that sure as fuck aren’t here in Nowhere, Indiana. Even if she was, I’m sure I’d still find a way to fuck it up given that I’ve had exactly zero serious girlfriends and the closest thing to a date I’ve ever been on is when you me and Steve pooled our ski ball tickets to win that ugly stuffed turtle.”

The memory of what you had all agreed to be the world’s ugliest stuffed animal caused all of you to crack a smile. Steve had silently agreed to change the subject, not wanting to dig Eddie any deeper into his pit of self despair.

Steve’s mouth was half open, about to suggest that the three of you have a smoke and watch one of the rental movies he brought over, the words just about to escape him when you harshly cut off any chance at ending the pity-party.

“Date me!” You exclaim, without much thought. The shocked look from both boys caused you to rapidly back pedal , “You can date me, as practice!” You said it as if it was the simplest concept in the world.

When met with gaping mouths and confused stares you continue on, “You and I can be fake boyfriend-girlfriend for like, a month, and I’ll tell you everything you do wrong, and like generic do’s and don’t’s, so that way the next time some hot girl hits on you, you can be all like ‘Coffee isn’t really my thing pretty lady, but I’d be down to get drinks sometime’,” you did a silly impression of Eddie’s voice, and then switched to a high pitched one to impersonate what you assumed the girl at the bar sounded like, “and then she’d be all like, ‘Oh yeah that sounds greaaaaat, getting coffee is just like, a generic catch-all thing that most people say when they want to get to know someone better, but you can buy me a drink’ and then the two of you will ride off into the sunset and it’ll be great.”

Still no reply.

“It won’t be all romantic and gooey, I promise I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to. It’d be a way for you to get some honest feedback and catch up with the stuff most people have to learn the hard way.”

“I suppose you are the most brutally honest person I know,” Eddie doesn’t sound convinced.

Steve just looked between the two of you with eyebrows raised, not knowing if giving his opinion on the matter would be appreciated or not. “I guess I would’ve appreciated someone telling me that most girls don’t want to be asked out with a pickup line from a John Hughes movie, would have saved me a few dozen rejections.”

“I’m pretty sure Robin did tell you that…”

“I don’t know y/n,” Eddie scratches his head.

“It’ll be easy. Ask me out.”

“Huh?”

“Ask me out, for practice, ask me out on a date like I’m a pretty girl you met at some metal show or a DnD convention or something like that,” you stand in front of him with your hands out as if to prompt him to say something.

“Will you go out with me?” He sounds more like he’s asking himself if he even wants to be asking the question.

“No.”

“What the hell!” He throws his hands up.

“I said no because that wasn’t a very good effort. Go out where? To do what? You’re asking me, a pretend stranger, out on a date Eddie, not if I want to go have a smoke with you.”

“Ughhhh,” he spun around and tried to get some sympathy for Steve, who unfortunately was on your side with this one.

“A compliment or two doesn’t hurt as well,” Steve added, deepening Eddie’s groan.

“Hey pretty stranger lady,” his voice was laced with sarcasm, but at least it wasn’t disdain, “you seem really…” he hesitated to find his words, “cool? Would you like to come see my band play this weekend at The Hideout? We-“

“No,” you cut him off.

“WHA-“

“Eddie, you can’t ask a girl to watch Corroded Coffin play for your first date with her, that’s like date four or five material, no girl wants to go sit by herself at a bar to watch some guy she just met play an hour of heavy metal. She would have to know you a little bit more for that to feel organic. Pick something more generic, like coffee.”

“I think you seem cool, would you like to get coffee with me?” it all came out as one monotone mumble from him.

“Sure,” you wait for him to lift his head up to make eye contact with you, “But coffee isn’t really my thing, maybe we can go out for drinks?”

“Oh fuck off,” he flopped back onto the couch next to Steve.

“See, now we have our first fake date, and then you can ask me to be your fake girlfriend, and then you’ll be so comfortable with emotional vulnerability that you can find a real girlfriend to take on real dates.”

“Yeah, I suppose it could be beneficial,” Eddie was slowly coming around to the idea. He knew that he was oddly charismatic at times, but he was just always too self conscious to follow through with the whole romance thing.

This maybe wasn’t a bad idea, because he knew you weren’t the kind of person who would make fun of his hobbies, or put him down if he slipped up, the sorts of things he was always afraid of girls doing. Sure, he’ll agree to the girlfriend experience.

After a night of movies and pizza with Steve fake-third-wheeling, you made sure Eddie knew that the fake-date was actually happening, that the two of you would go out for drinks this weekend as your first official practice date.

After giving it a bit of thought, you realized that you and Eddie had never hung out alone. In your feeble attempts at flirting with him all those months ago you had invited him to have movie nights or grab a bite to eat, but he always showed up with Steve and or Robin in tow.

As the night of the fake-date rolled around, you’d be embarrassed to admit it to him, or Steve, who didn’t care to hide how skeptical he was about this whole idea, that you went through your normal pre-date routine. You took some extra time on your hair and makeup, exfoliated in the shower, chose an outfit you felt confident in, added a few spritz of perfume for good measure too.

Eddie rolled up in his van, only a few minutes late, but a few minutes was very impressive compared to his typical chronic tardiness. The two of you agreed to just grab some food and drinks at your usual spot, considering you and Steve openly agreed that it would be a good first date spot in theory.

“Hey,” he reaches across the center console to pop the door open for you, “you look nice.”

It took you a second to register as you settled into the passenger seat, and then whip around with your arm outstretched to give him a high five. He scrunches his face at you.

“High five me Eddie, that was really good! I know you usually open the door for me anyways, but the compliment right away, A+,” you flop your hand down to gently slap his, still gripping the steering wheel.

“Don’t patronize me, y/n,” deep down he knew you weren’t trying to talk down to him, and deep down he hadn’t even given complimenting you a second thought, he really did think you looked great in your date get-up.

On the ride over to the bar, the two of you discuss some logistics. Considering all of this is just practice dating, you don’t expect Eddie to pay for you, but you explain that in theory if he had been the one to ask you out then he should be the one to pay for the first date.

“To me it’s less of a gender thing and more of a who asked out who thing, but I know some people would abide to the stereotypical ‘the man always pays’ standard, which is why you’d just have to be honest on date like two or three about what you enjoy doing and what sorts of things are in your budget. You can still have fun and be thoughtful without spending a lot of money.”

He asked a few questions, like if he should have gotten you flowers for a first date, or what he should do if someone asks to go to a fancy restaurant that he surely couldn’t afford. You tried your best to give solid advice, but always reminded him that every person is different and every relationship is different, so all he can do is be honest.

You take up a spot at the bar and both order for yourselves, splitting some fries and slipping into some easy conversation.

“Am I supposed to, like, beat someone up if a guy tries hitting on you in front of me or something like that?” you nearly choke on your drink at his question.

“Eddie, no,” you answer, also questioning, “why the hell would you ask me that?”

“I don’t know,” he shrugged, “My buddy Jeff was with his girlfriend at this punk show before they were even together, and some guy made a creepy comment to Amanda and Jeff just decked the guy in the face. He say’s that’s what made her want to date him, cuz he defended her honor or whatever.”

“I guess that’s sort of circumstantial, but I prefer my dates to not engage in any sort of violence,” you sip your drink, “even if it’s for my honor. I’d like your face a lot less if you were all bruised up.”

“Well I never said I would get hit,” the two of you were laughing a bit now.

Over a few cocktails you went over some first date etiquette with him. PDA and being touchy, how to follow her lead and gauge if she’s the type who wants everyone at the bar to know you’re together, or keep it strictly platonic to start. How far of a grip on the leg is too far up, that sort of thing.

“So if she does something like this,” you fake laugh a bit too loud and, lean into his personal space, and then run your hand from his slender down his arm, “that doesn’t necessarily mean she wants to fuck you, but it’s pretty close. You’ve at least got a green flag to get a little closer to her, tell her she looks nice, maybe offer to buy her a drink.”

“I know how to tell if someone finds me attractive, y/n, I’m not stupid,” he said casually, “obviously that girl the other night was hitting on me, I’m not blind. I wasn’t going to ask to buy her a drink or try and get lucky in the bathroom because I was out with my friends. I can find a quick fuck in a bar on my own time. I was having fun with you guys, I wasn’t going to abandon all of you to talk to some stranger, even if she was hot.”

“Oh,” you processed his comment, “Steve would be happy to know he ranks above tube-top girl.”

“Steve would be happy to be above tube-top girl in any context,” he jokes.

“You really just find random girls in bars to fuck?” You question, not in any sort of judgmental way, just curious.

“Not specifically, I guess I did make myself sound like some serial bar-bathroom type of guy. I never really had girls interested in me when I was in high school, at least the first four years of it. Then when we started playing regular gigs at The Hideout it was a little easier to find girls who were interested, but it was always that they were more into fucking some guy who could play guitar and was in a band, so it usually just always happened on-site, probably cuz they had an actual boyfriend or husband to go home to. Girls think I’m fun. Which isn’t untrue, I do enjoy a romp in the Hideout bathroom, or the back of my van, or wherever we end up.”

“So that’s what all those blankets are back there for,” you say with a fake scowl, referring to his van set-up.

“Not exclusively! They make a cozy nest for smoking blunts and listening to tapes too!”

You return to your drink, trying not to think too hard about the girls that Eddie brings to bar bathrooms or his van or wherever.

“I just find the energy of those situations very different from like, talking and getting to know someone. Fucking is easy. I’m not interested in ruining that by adding emotions and the looming feeling like sex is contingent on me acting a certain way or checking a certain number of boxes for someone.”

He shrugged, and you could understand where he was coming from, sometimes a quick fuck or hookup could be cathartic and easy. But it also saddened you to think that Eddie believed he had to get in and out before the person on the other end got the chance to know him.

Moving away from the subject of his inability to be emotionally vulnerable, the two of you practice some cheesy ‘first date’ questions as you had called them. As your drinks started to settle into your system you were having more fun being silly with him, pretending to be a stranger on a first date.

“When’s your birthday?” You ask, twirling your drink straw with your finger and making some fake flirty eyes at him to accentuate the facade of asking him a bunch of questions you mostly knew the answers to.

“August 9th,” he flips his hair over his shoulder, joining in on your fake ostentatious flirting.

“Oh my gosh, a Leo! This will never work out, cuz I’m an asparagus…”

The two of you nearly fall out of your bar stools laughing, realizing you meant to say Sagittarius.

“Okay, let’s get you home Asparagus,” he helped you up, having kept his drinking to a minimum so he could drive you home.

“Wait, wait,” you grabbed his arm as the two of you exited the bar, “can we go back to your trailer?”

He raised an eyebrow at you, “that’s a little presumptuous for a first date missy.”

“No, no, this isn’t girlfriend y/n asking, just regular friend y/n, who thinks it would be a lot of fun to smoke and watch a movie without Steve there spewing all his annoying fun facts, like, we get it, you read the little insert inside the tape while you were bored at work!”

Eddie did agree that the idea of packing a bowl and watching a few movies with you didn’t sound too different from what his plans would have been otherwise, so he agreed, as long as you promised not to give him any dating advice while hanging out as friend y/n and not girlfriend y/n.

Although you promised to try your best, you immediately started lecturing him on t-shirt borrowing and the potential weight that could hold in a relationship when he offered to give you some more comfy clothes to change into.

“It’s important to know!” You emerged from the bathroom in one of his oversized shirts and a pair of boxers, “Some girls are very touchy about it. Any shirt you lend her to sleep in, you have to be willing to sacrifice for life.”

“For life?!” Eddie finishes making a bowl of popcorn for the two of you, swallowing his words when he sees you in his clothes, an unidentifiable emotion rising in him at the sight of you so cozy and integrated into his space.

“Well maybe not life,” you plop down onto the couch, “but do NOT ask for it back. Most girls will give it back once it stops smelling like you.”

“If she gets my shirt, can I have her underwear?” He asked without thinking, the weed he had just smoked with you hitting him a bit too hard in that moment.

“Oh my god,” you squeal and bury your face into a pillow, “la la la la, pretending like I didn’t hear that!”

“I’m just saying!” He laughs at you, now curled up into a ball, “fair is fair, right?”

“I guess it depends on the girl,” you mumble.

“So I’m guessing not you, by your reaction.”

“Eddie!” You smack him with a pillow, “I don’t know, no one’s ever asked!”

“If my girlfriend isn’t going to ask before stealing my shirt for an indefinite amount of time, I think that gives me panty privilege.”

“Wow Eddie, if I had known you were such a perv I would’ve reconsidered being your fake girlfriend,” you say sarcastically, with no real judgement behind it. The idea of him wanting to steal your underwear dampens them ever so slightly.

“Don’t worry babe, I won’t do anything pervy to you unless you ask nicely,” he shoots a wink at you, which you meet with an eye roll and a turn away to hopefully hide the heat rising in your cheeks.

The two of you carry out your platonic movie night as planned. You suppressed any urge to note on his actions from a romantic lens, and he ignored the itching desire to sling his arm around your shoulder or pull your legs into his lap to get more comfy on the couch.

“Can I sleep here Eddie,” you ask after movie two, “too sleepy to move.”

“Sure, I can take the couch and you can have my bed. It’s been a minute since I washed the sheets but it shouldn’t be too bad…”

“Nonono,” you mumble, “Your legs will totally hang right off the end of this thing. I’m conked out anyways, I can crash right here I promise.”

“Ignoring that you’re my fake girlfriend, I’m not letting you sleep out here on this lumpy thing. You’re taking the bed, no arguments.”

He helps you up from the couch, letting you keep the blanket that’s wrapped around you, snaking his arm underneath it and pulling you from the couch by your lower back. You were slightly taken aback by his assistance, body still limp from your relaxed state, your torso easily arching into his. Your arms fly up to grab his shoulders, steadying yourself with an awkward giggle.

“In the real world, a time like this would be good for a first kiss,” you make note of your closeness, the way he swept you up off the couch and held you steadily as you made your way to your feet.

“I know that, y/n,” his face was closer to yours than it had ever been, making your words hitch in your throat.

“Well, I’m just saying,” you turn your head to avoid the tension, “I’m sure the way you kiss your bar-hookups isn’t the way most girls who’re looking to date you long term want to be kissed for the first time.”

‘Oh yeah? And how do you presume that goes?” He kept his hand planted on your lower back.

You pretend to act wildly drunk, throwing yourself at him and letting your limbs go a bit heavier than they already were. “Ohmygod guitar man, I’ve had like, six dirty Shirleys, please finger bang me in the bathroom,” you slur your words and let your tongue loll out the side of your mouth as if to lean in for the world’s sloppiest and most uncoordinated kiss.

“First of all,” his voice was very serious, “I don’t hook up with girls who are too inebriated to stand, let’s get that straight. As a matter of fact, I wouldn’t even have our first fake kiss like this on account of the drinking and smoking, gotta make sure you’re in the right headspace. Secondly,”

He spins you around and quickly backs you up against the wall that stood a few feet behind the couch. His hand sliding up in between your shoulder blades, blanket now slumped around your waist, his other hand suavely cupping the side of your cheek, His hips angled into yours, pinning you back against the vinyl, almost collapsing back into it.

He pressed against you, not aggressively, but enough to let you know that if you were to try and squirm away he had the capacity to keep you right where he wanted you. He accomplished this all in one elegant motion, leaving you a bit dazed.

As you started to snap into reality, he moves his hand from your cheek down to grab your chin in between his thumb and the knuckle of his pointer, angling your face directly up at him.

“If you were some girl in a bar, it would be like this.”

The moment before your brain turned to absolute mush, you silently cringed at the thought of what you must look like, mouth hanging open, eyes glassed over, body instinctively sinking into his touch. Pathetic, you were sure of it.

Sure, Eddie did think you looked a little helpless, but he also thought you looked perfect. Exactly as he had imagined you to in this situation. Of course he had thought about you before, like that.

Of course he had felt an immediate spark with you when you had first met. But he never flirted back, or lead you on, because as much as he was attracted to you and enjoyed your company, he knew that it wouldn’t work out. He wasn’t relationship material, and you were the picture perfect girlfriend that he didn’t deserve.

He spoke directly into your parted lips, mouth hovering just far enough away to toe the line of ‘holy shit, is he going to?’ But no, as he made very clear, he wouldn’t kiss you under these conditions. He had made his point, and slowly backed off and let you find your footing.

As soon as he was sure that you were steady, he backed away and started down the hallway.

“I might have an extra toothbrush stashed away somewhere, let me look…” he ducked into the bathroom, leaving you stunned in the kitchen, head swimming and your stomach traveled up into your throat.

He was teasing you, he must be. That was his little way of getting back at you for thinking you could give him dating advice. If he was unsure about his capacity for romance, he was going to make sure you knew he was more than capable in other ways. Understood.

You shook your head, weeding through your inner monologue of how he could possibly look at you like that and then just walk away. Your shock gave him just long enough for you to to not notice him splashing cold water on his face in the bathroom while he “looked for a toothbrush.”

The two of you decided to ignore the lingering tension from the events in the kitchen, not a peep of fake-girlfriend talk from you for the rest of the night. He did find you that toothbrush, and the two of you moved through a too-easy domestic routine of getting ready for bed.

You told him that you wouldn’t be able to sleep if you knew he was cramped on that couch, and that you were fine with sharing a bed. You mumbled something about getting around to bed sharing etiquette at some point anyways, and sleepily pulled him into being your little spoon.

Eddie lay there, trying not to twitch or fidget, relaxed as best he could into your cuddled form thinking about how horrible of an idea all of this was. He was convinced all it would take is roughly ten more minutes of you burying your face into his hair and making cute little sleepy noises for him to fall irreversibly in love with you.

But what was he supposed to do? Move and wake you up? Never.

You rolled around enough in the night to wake up in a less intimate position than when you had fallen asleep. You knew Eddie was a deep sleeper, and took it upon yourself to creep out of bed and back into your day clothes, make a pot of coffee, and watc a bit of TV before he roused and joined you in the living room.

“Why didn’t you wake me?” He rubbed the crust from his eyes and was pleasantly surprised to see you had brewed a whole pot of coffee to share.

“You looked so peaceful and cozy,” he shook his head at you, as if that was no excuse for letting him sleep an extra forty minutes.

After a slow morning, he agrees to drive you home.

“So this is the part where I say ‘Eddie, I had such a wonderful time on our date. I’d love to do it again sometime.’ And then you agree and tell me when you’re free. It’s best to be super direct and make plans to get together again soon, cuz then it’s not an awkward who’s-gonna-call-who-first sort of thing.”

“Uh-huh…” he stares at you blankly.

“But for our sake, let’s just agree that I’m in charge of planning our next date. Okay? I’ll do it from the perspective of what I think most girls would enjoy, so you can steal it for the future. I’ll call you later.”

You hop out of his van before he can agree, and leave him with a “Thanks for letting me stay over!” As you bound away from his view.

He squeezed his eyes shut the moment he caught himself checking your ass out as you walked away, and let his head rest down on the steering wheel. He was fucked. How the hell was he supposed to tell you that you needed to stop being his fake girlfriend without disrupting the homeostasis of your friendship?

On one hand he could lie and say he doesn’t want your advice, making you think he didn’t enjoy your company, which was entirely untrue. On the other hand he could tell you the truth, and you would never be friends the same way again.

He drove home with the music too loud, and patiently awaited your call later that evening to iron out the details of your second fake-date.

Per your instructions, he let you pick him up this time with the argument that you were the one taking him out this time. He didn’t know what you had planned, but let himself fall to the mercy of whatever you had decided was an exemplary date fore him to ‘steal in the future’.

You picked up two coffees and rolled up to the trailer park, popping a mix-tape he had made you ages ago.

“Hey, I thought we said no paying for each other with fake-dating,” he objects to the coffee sat in the passenger cupholder, some abomination of mostly cream and sugar, the way you know he likes it.

“Yes, that’s true, but you smoked me up the other night, and this coffee was like a dollar fifty, so don’t worry about it,” you give him a look that tells him to drink the damn coffee and not sass back, to which he complies, even though he smokes you up expecting nothing in return about every other weekend.

The two of you sip away and listen to Eddies ‘must-know-to-be-my-friend’ mixtape and arrive shortly at the strip mall across town. This was a regular weekly stop for both of you, the strip of connected stores containing the Goodwill, a pet store, the pharmacy, and grocery. A pretty mundane collection.

“Okay, what are we doing at Greg’s?” Eddie gestures to the grocery store, the back of his mind running through the grocery list he’s been making for this week anyways.

“What’s the perfect date?” You ask, and answer for him, “a romantic picnic. But gathering supplies is half the fun. Picnic food supplies at Greg’s, some pills to get fucked up at the pharm, some turtles or something to let loose into the wild from the pet store, and then hats, cups, blanket, etcetera from the Goodwill.”

He turns to you with the most bewildered stare, which sends you into a fit of giggles.

“Okay, I’m joking about the pills and the turtles,” you nudge his arm, “but won’t it be sweet to get together some picnic supplies and then drive out to lookout point? We can still swing by the pet store to check out the ferrets though.”

To Eddie, the idea of a date involved him doing something he didn’t want to do, some awkward small talk, and spending money on shit he truly thought was useless. This didn’t sound half bad. You would “work backwards so the food purchases come last” according to your reasoning, and he followed you in tow without any arguments into the Goodwill.

“So I’m thinking…” you start to wander into the aisles of used clothes and knick knacks, “maybe a blanket? A basket would be sort of corny, but if we find one for cheap I don’t see why not. Surely two glasses for drinking, and maybe some sun hats?”

Swiveling back around to see a half stunned Eddie, who was still processing how in the hell this was your idea of a romantic date, you grab his hand and pull him to the bric-a-brac section.

After it got through his thick skull that the same place he had uncomfortably tried on new pants throughout his growth spurt, and picked up his daily-worn leather jacket, had the same potential to provide some silly, cheap, used items to add some flair to this picnic.

Silly and cheap was right up Eddie’s alley. The two of you picked out mismatched champagne glasses, one with the engraved name of a couple who got married in 1943 and the other a flashy rose color with baby angel carvings dancing around the sides.

You luckily find an on sale beach blanket, and the two of you pick out some very goofy sun hats. A floppy farmers hat for you, and a bedazzled trucker hat spelling ‘hot mama’ for Eddie.

Through the midst of your giggles and debate on whether you should buy a wooden bench to bring out to your picnic destination, Eddie found himself having a really good time with you.

As promised, you visited the pet store and checked out the ferrets and fish and geckos.

“If you could have any pet, what would you want?” You asked him, noses pressed against the chinchilla enclosure.

“Jaguar,” he said, a little too quickly.

“For real, dummy,” you knock your hip into his.

“I don’t know, we never had enough space or extra money for pets growing up, so maybe someday if I had enough room for it to run around I’d like a dog or something,” he tells. Eyes still transfixed on the chinchilla behind the glass.

“I can see that,” you imagine Eddie with some mutt from the shelter, wrestling around and giving it lots of scratches behind the ears.

Skipping the pharmacy, you pop into the grocery store and assemble what may be the world’s most eclectic picnic.

“That’s the definition of a picnic, I’m pretty sure,” you explain after Eddie insinuated that the gingersnap cookies you grabbed, along with grapes and a block of cheese, wasn’t exactly a meal, “you know, just a smorgasbord of whatever we want!”

Admittedly, Eddie had considered a handful of pretzels and a beer to be dinner on more than one occasion, so he couldn’t argue with you. Quickly catching your drift, the two of you picked out an assortment of snacks and some ingredients for pb&j sandwiches.

“I thought picnics were supposed to be classy?” Eddie holds up the Wonder bread and bag of potato chips with a look that suggested his question was rhetorical.

Your response was simply to raise the, admittedly cheap, bottle of champagne you grabbed to accompany with your meal, more for the irony of drinking the bubbly liquid out of your new used glasses with your sticky sandwiches than anything else.

You pack your supplies into a tote bag, not having found a suitable basket at the thrift store, and drive across town to a dirt paved road that leads to a nice lookout point with a view of the lake.

“Let’s walk down the path a little bit, but not too far,” you grab the blanket and tote bag from your trunk, motioning for Eddie to put on his ‘hot mama’ hat and carry your other auxiliary supplies, “I do not fuck with bugs.”

“I’ll protect you,” Eddie puffs out his chest, making you both giggle.

“From bugs?”

“Yeah, I’ll punch a mosquito right in the face, to defend your honor and all that.”

“I know I told you not to do that, but a mosquito might be the exception to the rule.”

You found a nice little clearing not far from the car, a spot that still had a nice view but was a bit more secluded. Eddie sat pressed right up next to you, making your sandwich ‘to be a proper gentleman’ but simultaneously spilling a glob of jelly onto your leg.

“Shit,” he doesn’t think twice before leaning down and slurping the grape flavored blob off of your bare knee, tongue poking out and licking the spilt jelly from your skin.

“Eddie!” You squirm away, barking out a surprised laugh.

“What! Your knee is clean, wouldn’t want to waste perfectly good preserves, or a napkin.”

You feel your skin tingle where his lips had touched you, for only a moment, but you still felt it. He was so confident and casual in his movements, not having any hesitation to grab your hand or brush your hair out of your face. It wasn’t under the guise of fake romance, he had always been like that. Not touchy, per se, just sure of himself. You’d never seen Eddie do anything half assed, that’s for certain.

After the conversation you shared the other night, you were unable to stop your mind from wandering to thoughts of what Eddie does with those girls in bars, if he touched him with the same confidence and sureness he put into everything else he did.

It was wrong to let your mind go to such dirty places about someone you considered a friend, but you couldn’t manage to feel any guilt. He had offered that information freely, so who were you to punish yourself for staring a little longer at his fingers, conjuring up the context in which he’d bury them inside you against some grimy bar bathroom.

The date was all peanut butter smiles and bubbly laughter that floated up into the trees. Silly, yes, but neither of you could deny there was something sweet, maybe even romantic about it. A cheap meal in the woods shared between two friends in ill-fitting fifty cent hats, but an undeniable touch of romance lingered nonetheless.

Eddie started to realize that maybe the whole dating thing wasn’t as uptight and scary as he had initially thought. It could be easy and fun, with the right person. And fuck, if he could even imagine doing this with anyone but you.

Like most things Eddie did, he did not consider any potential consequences before acting. You looked so pretty sitting there in the sunshine, sipping from your cheap ‘Martha & Dave ’43’ glass, a few sandwich crumbs dotting the corner of your mouth.

What else was he supposed to do other than lean over and wipe them away with his thumb, stroking your soft cheek and feel the warmth of your skin beneath his palm.

“You had some,” he uses his other hand to motion at his own mouth, “and I suppose this is the sort of moment where I’d ask if I can kiss you.”

You find yourself a bit dumbfounded, his big stupid hand on your cheek and those big stupid puppy dog eyes unrelenting in making everything he says seem so genuine.

“Are you?” You find your voice, only half embarrassed at how shy it comes out.

“Am I what?”

“Are you asking me?”

“Yeah,” his answer comes out in a way that insinuates that he never meant anything other than that, that he was always asking to kiss you, he wasn’t asking in theory, in another universe, in the context of advice.

“Okay,” you found yourself behaving like Eddie, not really thinking of consequences before your words and actions spoke on behalf of your instincts.

Everything so far had been so easy. Your fake first date at the bar, curling up next to him in a haze, making up stories about what sort of people donated the fake palm tree or the Garfield mug at the Goodwill, imagining Eddie running around a yard with a puppy, lounging in the grass and eating your assorted picnic snacks. It was all effortless.

Suddenly, being kissed by Eddie sucked the ease from your lungs and sent your mind spiraling into a cacophony of bells and whistles and giant swirling red flags. If this is how he kissed you, casually across some half eaten peanut butter sandwiches, you’d spend the rest of your days yearning to know how he kissed someone with true intention.

Of course, his intentions were all there, but the lingering knowledge that all of this was happening under the umbrella of “you giving him advice” or “helping practice for the next girl” poisoned any true feeling he poured into it. He cupped your cheek, soft, let his lips press into yours delicately for a moment before he felt your breath hitch, opening his mouth just enough to deepen the kiss and capture your lower lip fully.

He was more careful, gentle, methodic with his movements and so receptive to every little signal your body gave him, it was unlike any first-kiss, heat-of-the-moment-kiss, in-the-throws-of-passion-kiss, any of it. Like hell you’d ever tell him that, inflate that big ego that fuels his snippy comebacks at you, but Jesus, was it remarkable.

While at war with yourself internally, your heart was on the precipice of exploding in your chest from the way he snaked his hand into your hair and pressed his forehead against yours to catch a breath. You suck in a sharp breath and feel that stupid cocky smirk creep up onto that pretty mouth of his.

“’S that sufficient for a first kiss?”

“Fuck offfff,” you were still a little out of breath, smacking his chest and flopping back down onto the picnic blanket, throwing your arms up and rolling your eyes at him, “if you’re so damn confident, maybe we just should fake break up, cuz you don’t seem like you need my advice.”

“Nooooo,”he slumps down next to you, burrowing his head under your arm so he can pop up right next to your face, “I’m learning a lot, I promise! This date was so fun, and cheap! I would have never thought any of this could be remotely romantic. I’m hopeless, y/n, look at me.”

He wriggles around and gives you a big fake pout, “If left to my own devices I would probably do something horribly embarrassing or off-putting, like…” he digs his head into the crook of your neck and blew a fat, wet raspberry right into your skin, making you yelp and squeal, but his position half on top of you pins you down.

“See!” He pulls up for air, you were in a fit of screaming giggles, “I’d go right in for a kiss and just,” and he does it again, leaving you gasping for air, trying your best to tickle his ribs to get him off of you, but not minding the close contact by any means.

“Now I’m not so sure,” he pulls back to give you a minute to catch your breath, “it seems like you enjoyed that, so maybe survey says I should pull that move on the ladies.”

Your airy laughter subsided, but he stays half pinning you down to the blanket and the lumpy grass underneath.

“I didn’t mean to give you the impression that I’m not grateful for your help,” he says earnestly, catching your gaze, “it’s just… this isn’t what I need help with.”

As his statement is processing, you find his lips back on yours, his torso pressed flushed with yours and his wild mane of hair coming down to curtain around your head. He doesn’t take it too far, but kisses you as earnestly as he had before, giving your lip a slight drag with his teeth and running his hand up from your hip up the side of your ribcage, leaving you arching slightly into him by pure instinct.

Before your head got too dizzy again, before you could really throw yourself into it and say fuck it and kiss him back the way you secretly wanted to, he pulled back.

“That.” his voice was even, you hated how needy you felt and how even keeled he could be milliseconds after stealing the air from your lungs, “It’s the rest of it,” he threw his hands up and gestured to all the food and knock knacks around you, “it’s this stuff that you make seem so easy, so forgive me if I lay it on a little thick when we get to the parts I’m actually good at.”

“Just,” you sat up a bit, grounding yourself and formulating a response despite your brain looping the past twenty seconds back infinitely, “don’t do that again.”

“Okay,” he sat back and popped a grape into his mouth, “sorry.”

“Don’t apologize,” you knocked his knee with yours, struggling to articulate how you felt without showing too much of your hand, deciding to just be candid, “I just- I liked that a little too much if you know what I mean. And this is strictly business, or education, maybe?”

“You liked it when I pinned you against the wall the other night,” he said matter of factly, “I think you liked that a little too much too, and you still took me on this fake educational business date.”

“Yeah, well, you caught me,” you threw your hands up in defense.

“Which one is it though?” He asks and you don’t quite understand, “are you a sweet kiss on the picnic kind of girl, or an up against the wall kind of girl?”

“That’s none of your business, as far as fake-dating is concerned,” you say a little too quickly, “and no you can’t have my panties.”

You say it with a smirk, but he doesn’t press any further. He turns and does that Eddie-thing he’s so good at, just changing the subject and shifting the vibe completely away from what might have been a stale moment or awkward pause. He starts asking if you like green or purple grapes better, going off about how he used to put them in the freezer as a kid.

The remainder of your date went without a hitch, of course. You picked away at your picnic until the sun started to set, and once the sky started turning purple you made your way back to the car. The drive home consisted only of easy conversation and no further mention of the kiss, well, kisses that had transpired. He hopped out of the passenger seat with a ‘thank you’ and a ‘see ya later alligator.’

A scalding hot shower, a restless night of sleep, and too many cups of herbal tea the next morning did nothing to quell the noise in your head that blasted those moments over and over. You couldn’t stop picking apart whether he had thought about it for even a millisecond, and felt embarrassed that you could think of nothing else.

It was simply an amplified version of what your whole friendship had been up until this point. You silently admiring him and wishing he would look at you the way you looked at him, and settling for friendship over heartbreak.

Pushing it aside to the best of your ability allowed you to get through your week, but you had the lingering feeling that the next time you saw him would strike you with warm cheeks and a scrambled mental state.

Guilt had started to seep in at the corners of your mind, but you reminded yourself that you shouldn’t punish yourself for having romantic or sexual thoughts about someone you simply found attractive and compelling, it was your actions that would determine the validity of your guilt.

“Long time no see, loser,” Robin hollered from the pool table across the bar, where she was likely kicking Steve’s ass.

“Yeah, yeah, sorry,” you shrug off your coat and plop down at their regular booth, knowing her jabs were entirely empty. You notice Eddie’s leather jacket hung up by the wall, and scan the bar to find him ordering a drink.

There was a silent mutual understanding that you’d keep the fake dating thing to a bare minimum when out with your friends like this. Even though Steve was well aware, and therefore Robin was too, you figured tainting your social time with the performance of romance is the exact reason Eddie turned down the girl at the bar in the first place.

“For the lady,” Eddie waltzes over and hands you a drink.

“Oh, thanks,” you take it with a confused smile, “you didn’t have to do that.”

“You bought me coffee last weekend,” he sat across the booth from you, “plus I’m trying to get better at buying drinks for pretty girls, right?”

You remind him that he doesn’t have to keep tabs on things like coffee, but you appreciate the gesture regardless. As per the past few times you’d been out with your friends, you expected him to put a pause on the flirting, but it seems to be bubbling over tonight. You weren’t complaining, but admittedly the arm around your shoulder or the noticeable way he checked you out when you got up to refill your drink took you by slight surprise.

Sneaking in to claim the always occupied dart board for a challenge against Eddie while he uses the restroom, you keep your eyes on the corner of the bar to signal him over once he returns.

“You need a partner?” A man suddenly appears behind you, a little closer than you’d like but the bar was crowded, so you’ll let it slide.

“Oh, I was just waiting for-“

“Let me fill in until your friend gets here, we can get you warmed up, yeah?” His tone wasn’t too pushy, but you didn’t love the look he gave you when making that comment.

Awkwardly staggering for a second, unsure weather to just agree or tell him to fuck off, “He really should be just a minute-“

“Or maybe less,” Eddie comes up right behind you and pulls you possessively into his side.

Your head whips up to see him with a devilish smile, his hand on your waist and the fire behind his eyes telling his guy to get lost.

“Oh, sorry man,” the guy starts backing away with an apologetic look.

“Yeah, better luck next time, pal,” Eddie snakes around to take the guy’s spot in front of the dart board.

He had his darts in hand and took his stance to start the match, gesturing for you to do the same.

“What was that,” you ask with a slight joking tone, but seriously curious.

“What?” He doesn’t make eye contact and instead throws the first dart, “I’m not allowed to get fake jealous?”

“You’re allowed to feel any fake emotion you want, I guess,” your tone is somewhere in between a joke and a question.

“You’d feel fake jealous if I was getting blown in the bathroom by some chick rather than playing darts with you, I bet.”

“Okay,” your tone shifts to defensive, “getting blown is very different than some guy asking to play darts with me.”

“I didn’t like the way he was looking at you,” Eddie turns to face you, having thrown all his darts, “for real.”

A moment lapsed where you didn’t register that your mouth was hanging open in disbelief, the look in your eyes Eddie immediately clocked as lust and bottled up to store away for a later time.

“I knew the scary dog thing would work,” his ‘i-told-you-so’ tone rubbed you the wrong way, but he wasn’t wrong, “you said girls weren’t into that, but you totally looooove that I defended your honor.”

“Don’t give yourself too much credit, I said girls wouldn’t be into it if you punched him,” you rolled your eyes.

“I don’t know, babe, I think you liked the whole ‘back off of my woman’ act.”

You mumble out a ‘whatever’ and let him have this win, which he was clearly reveling in, trying to focus instead at beating him at darts.

“Just don’t pull shit like that on a first date, acting too possessive off the bat is a huge red flag for a lot of women.”

“I thought we weren’t doing dating advice tonight?” You don’t even have to look at him to know he’s got that stupid sarcastic smile.

“Yeah I thought so too,” you fail at your attempt to beat him in darts, as well as your attempt to not flirt back with him.

He insists on collecting all the darts, picking up the ones haphazardly strews across the floor from failed attempts to hit the board.

“I’m no pro or anything, but I think you’d hit the board a lot more if you fixed your stance.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” you flip him the bird and take back your red tipped darts.

As you steady your arm to aim your first shot he comes up behind you and grabs your hips, causing you to let out an unexpected squeak. He adjusts your stance, not aggressively, but with some force, twisting your hips and using his big combat boot to sweep your foot around so you stood more sideways.

“You’re standing straight on,” he backs up, allowing you to secretly catch your breath, “and all your shots are veering to the right. If you plant your feet more angled you’ll hit the board.”

You wanted to roll your eyes at him, miss on purpose to show him he’s full of shit. You flippantly toss the dart, not trying particularly hard, and it hits. Not a bulls-eye or anything like that, but a lot closer than your previous attempts had been.

“Good girl,” he comments, leaning in to breech your personal space just enough to make your blood boil.

You drop the remainder of the darts in your opposite hand onto the floor and whip around to face him, half jokingly smacking him on the shoulder.

“Oh my god, fuck off!”

You’re met with his trademark shit-eating grin.

Truthfully, Eddie hadn’t been able to keep his eyes off you all night. He’d spent the night after your picnic date with his hand in bis boxers, squeezing his eyes shut and remembering the little gasp you had made when he grabbed your waist, the hum in your throat that bubbled up when he kissed you pinned against the blanket, that night and every night since.

“Oh, you don’t like that?” that joking tone he uses to cover up what he actually wants to say.

“Shut up, you know I do,” you didn’t even try to stifle your reaction, knowing it was his intent to get under your skin.

“How would I possibly know that,” he playfully looks up at the ceiling and around the bar, hands clasped behind his back now, rocking back and forth on his heels.

“You better cut that shit out, unless you plan on doing something about it,” you manage the most assertive tone your wobbly insides could muster, a little shocked at yourself for actually saying what you were thinking.

“I’m not much of a planner,” he gracefully takes a stance next to you and rips all three darts, not great shots, but all hitting the board, “I’m more of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of guy, you know that.”

“Well your pants better make up their mind if you’re playing boyfriend tonight or not,” your insinuation was heavy but you had fumbled your hand, and he had already seen all your cards at this point, so there was no reason to bluff.

“The real question is,” he leans in, his imposing figure crowding your space in a way that made your head spin, “do you want me to play boyfriend? Or do you want me to play guy who fucks your brains out in the bar bathroom?”

Your eyebrows pinched together for a millisecond, and before he could decipher your expression you grabbed his hand and started storming through the crowds hoarded by the bar. Why the hell a seedy downtown bar has a single stall family bathroom with a changing table is beyond you, but you drag him inside and slam the lock down behind you.

“You’re not allowed to treat me any differently after this,” you start to fall into the sinkhole of oh my god what the hell is about to happen, but are cut off by him pressing you against the closed door the exact way he had handled you against his kitchen wall that night weeks ago.

“Not unless you want me to,” he doesn’t hesitate to get his mouth on yours, immediately pulling your mind from wondering what the vague sticky substance on the door pressing into your back could be.

“I mean, you’re not allowed to fuck me and then never talk to me again,” you say in between moving lips and tongues, giving him a moment to bury his face in your neck, "Promise me."

“Oh don’t worry about that,” he pulls back, “we can go get coffee tomorrow and you can give me a full performance review. Promise.”

Your annoyed eye roll quickly turns into them fluttering shut as he licks a stripe up to the junction behind your ear that has you melted into a boneless puddle between his pressing hips and the door. He drags his teeth across your lobe while leaning into you with a black denim clad thigh.

“Why don’t we make a deal,” you let out, voice breathy and unfocused. Before he can even pull back to reply you continue, “if you’re half as good at this as you claim to be, and can make me cum in this dingy bathroom, I’ll let you take me back to your trailer and you can do whatever the fuck you want to me.”

He was leaning in to seal the deal with a kiss before he could even process your request, because yes of course, a million times yes he’s taking this deal. Despite the rouse of you playing bar hookup for the night, and despite the idea of bringing you back to his place and finally doing what he’s wanted since the day he met you absolutely terrifying him, he nods and kisses you.

It’s electrifying. His confidence only spurs you on to kiss him harder, grip his hair a little tighter, say the things you would only imagine in the deepest parts of your mind. The feeling of his grin against your lower lip and his fingers quickly unbuttoning your jeans fuels your fire.

“You sure you know what you’re getting into,” he mumbles playfully, pulling you away from the wall with a gasp and leading you over to the tiny built in counter against a mirror by the sink.

“Well I’m certainly not letting you fuck me against any of these sticky surfaces,” you note as you’re lifted onto the counter covered in mystery substance, “and I think you need to earn it.”

Of course it was no surprise to you that Eddie was good with his fingers. You probably could have told anyone that long before this impromptu bathroom hookup. Egging him on and challenging him in a way you were sure he wasn’t used to was well worth abandoning your assumptions.

“Oh yeah? I think, if you’re lucky, I’ll earn it more times than you can count before the night’s over,” he positioned himself in between your legs, pressing your torso into the mirror behind you as he leaned in for another heated kiss.

He pulled your ass to the edge of the counter, and looped his thumbs into the waistband of your unbuttoned pants. You were quick to assume that he’d yank the fabric right off your legs, preparing to lift your ass from the counter to assist.

Eddie paused, pulled back and gave you a look that asked ‘you’re sure about this?’ and when a dreamy smile spread across your cheeks he melted into you with a kiss that turned your stomach inside out and made your pussy flutter.

He snakes a hand from its grip on your torso down into your unbuttoned pants. You arched up into his touch, wanting to urge him to get on with it and get your pants and underwear out of the way, but appreciating how much he seemed to be reveling in feeling you for the first time.

“So fuckin wet,” he mumbled against your lips, his fingers only feeling up your cunt from outside your underwear. He pressed the fabric into your slick center, following the path up to your clit and then teasingly back down to where your panties were soaked through.

“You weren’t lying when you said you liked this a little too much,” he’s rolling his hips ever so slightly against your spread thigh as he rubs your clothed pussy, his teeth sinking into your lower lip as he moves the material aside and sinks two fingers right into your wet cunt with ease.

You were sure that you’d retrospectively have a million quippy compacks that come to mind, but in this moment it was impossible to come up with words when his fingers were buried inside you, still, just letting you squeeze around them, and his hard cock straining against his jeans nestled against the inside of your thigh.

He slowly drags his finger’s up from your hole to your clit, and you let out a whine of desperation as he fully removes his hand from your damp underwear.

Before you can manage the breath to tell him to please, for the love of god, get on with it, he brings his fingers up to his lips and gives them a long suck, never breaking eye contact with you.

“Yeah,” he sighs out and presses his forehead against yours, “I might like that a little too much too.”

Protests and urging words catch in your throat as he yanks down your pants and underwear with one quick pull, not even needing you to lift your ass off the counter more than it already was. He was methodical and moved with intention, folding up your pants neatly and shoving your soaked panties into his back pocket, shooting you a wink.

“Eddie, please,” your overdue complaints are finally bubbling over. You hardly finish your plea before his face is buried in your neck, and his fingers are sliding right back into your needy hole.

The top of your head rests against the mirror behind you, exposing your neck and arching your back into his touch. He sucks and nips at the soft skin between your collar bone and ear, all while letting his two middle fingers pump slowly into you.

“Mmmm,” he mumbles into the crook of your jaw, “such a good girl for me, perfect pussy squeezing my fingers so tight, can’t fuckin wait to feel you soak my cock.”

Nearly orgasming at his words alone, your eyes flutter shut and you let out a moan of his name as he lets his thumb drag circles across your clit. “Eddie, please, just like that, I-”

“Oh, suddenly she’s not questioning my abilities?” he says with a biting smirk, “What was that about me not being half as good as I think I am?”

“Fuck,” you want to raise an eyebrow and shoot something back, hold out and make him work for it, but after hardly two minutes of his fingers rolling inside you, hooked up to drag along that perfect fucking spot, you had no choice but to feed his ego and let him win.

“You wanted to make your little deal,” he pumps a little faster, making your head loll to the side and mouth hang half open, “I’ll sweeten it for you, babe. I say we can get this pretty pussy to come twice all over my fingers before anyone even knocks on this door.”

“Yes,” is all you can squeak out, “yes, please.”

If Eddie was being honest, he was a few half-thrusts into your thigh short of coming in his own pants from how hot you looked. Your eyes glassed over, pretty lips parted and gasping his name, perfect cunt sucking his fingers in.

The hand not occupied by your gushing cunt slid up to cup the side of your cheek, forcing you to look into his fiery eyes. “Feel’s good?” he questions, knowing the answer and not expecting a verbal response.

He drags the pad of his thumb up to your parted lips, running it along your plush bottom lip and dragging it down a bit, relishing in how under his spell you were. His thumb slips into your mouth and you immediately wrap your lips around it and suck.

“Good girl,” his thumb on your clit is rubbing more focused circles, “suck on that and keep your voice down, don’t want the whole bar knowing what a good little slut you are for me.”

Jackpot.

A muffled moan around his thumb and the spasming of your inner walls signaled that you were hitting your peak. He drags the spit slicked digit from your lips and quickly replaces it with his lips and tongue, kissing you with fervor as he feels you ride out your orgasm on his hand.

“Mmmmmmm” you moan, somewhere between a pleading whine and a sigh of satisfaction into his lips as his fingers don’t let up.

Under different circumstances you would tell him to slow down, give you a minute to catch your breath. Eddie was stubborn, this you knew, and he had already made it abundantly clear that one orgasm wasn’t going to be enough.

He pulls back from your lips, loving the sharp intake of breath you swallow as your cheeks continue to flush and eyelids keep fluttering.

“So fucking good, came all over my fingers,” his gaze locks in on where his hand was buried into your cunt. “Gonna give me one more?”

Of course you would, whether it was up to you or not. He did slow up for a second, just enough for you to regain your grip on reality before he started curling them up again.

“Eddie,” you whine out, eyes nearly crossed and unable to focus your attention on his face, hands, anything other than his boner poking into your inner thigh, “wanna feel you.”

The hand formerly gripped tight onto the edge of the counter snakes forward and pulls his hip into you, a permanent indentation of his stiff cock molding against your skin.

“Not yet baby,” he rolls his hips forward, giving you a delicious feel of how it would be if he was inside you, but instead pushing his fingers a touch deeper and then pulling his hips away, “one more and then I’ll take you home. You’re gonna let me ruin that perfect little cunt, right? That was the deal?”

“Yes,” you gasp out, his other hand moving from your hair down to rub fast tight circles on your clit, the other hand still pumping steadily inside you.

“That’s right, I know this pussy is gonna take me so well. You’re already drooling for my cock, so fucking perfect.”

You feel it building up again, that sacred double orgasm that only ever came during your alone time in the shower or when you were so desperate for release that your hand didn’t stop after the first, but never with another person, never like this.

His smile nearly touched his ears at this point, pulling back to take in all of you as your eyes screwed shut and thighs threatened to break his wrist at how fast they snapped together.

Hitting you like a punch to the gut, your abdomen tightened and released rapidly, air sucked from your lungs and his hand working you through it between your clenched thighs.

Yeah, maybe this was a bad idea.

If you were in a cartoon, stars and chirping birds would be swirling around your head as you slowly came back to reality. He gave you some space, and begrudgingly gave you pack your panties after you hand out your hand and gave him a stern look.

“I’m gonna go tell the others that you aren’t feeling great and I’m taking you home,” he makes sure you’ve pulled your pants back up before unlocking the door, “Take your time, and I’ll meet you at the van, okay? I’ll grab your stuff.”

“Yeah,” you still feel a little flustered, looking back into the mirror and smoothing down your hair, “thanks.”

He shoots you a wink before slipping out, giving you a moment to collect yourself and splash some cold water on your face. Okay, so you’re doing this.

Any nagging feelings that this might ruin things or that he’s only teasing you because of your arrangement are quickly squished down into a deeper compartment of your brain, overtaken by the post orgasm bliss and wandering thoughts of what might happen next.

You peek your head out of the bathroom door, and slink your way to the back door without passing your group table or a stray Steve or Robin. The fresh air equalizes your buzzing thoughts, and you spot Eddie, already in the driver’s seat of his van.

“You good?” He asks as you hop into the passenger seat. You won’t let him have the upper hand, just because he made you come twice in under ten minutes.

“Yeah,” you gather as much assertion as your voice will project, “You good?”

“F’course,” he starts backing up, you internally roll your eyes at the way his outstretched arm muscles and curved neck make your stomach flutter, “Just wanted to make sure I passed the test.”

You sit in silence, not wanting to give into the cocky game he clearly wants to play, yet know that he’s entirely correct in his assumption that he’s driven you completely crazy. Once he’s on the main stretch of road, finally rolling to a stop at a red light you let your hand migrate across the center console, dancing its way into his lap.

As you hoped, his cock was still half hard and apparent underneath his jeans. You let your hand draw circles next to it, loving the little twitch you get when you run your nails against his thigh.

“Easy there, tiger,” he lets out a huffed laugh, with just an edge to his tone that suggested you were getting yourself into something you’d soon regret.

“C’mon Eds,” you let your head fall on the corner of the headrest, gaze angled over at his tight grip on the steering wheel while your hand dancing around the bulge in his pants, “you’ve been pushing this thing against my thigh for the past twenty minutes, forgive me for wanting a better feel.”

You put on a pretend pouty face and flash him your best puppy dog eyes to ward off any incoming snippy comments from him. He rolls his pretty eyes at you and silently bites the inside of his cheek as you feel up and down his lap, grazing his growing cock with each pass.

“Forgiven,” through gritted teeth, he squeezes his eyes shut as your fingers circle around his head, now taking visible form beneath his black jeans. He internally reprimands himself for losing focus on the road, and zeroes his concentration on getting back to his trailer as fast as this van can take him.

You have your fun watching him wiggle in his seat, feeling his thigh muscles clench under your palm every so often. You weren’t full on jerking him off over his pants, but you were certainly relishing in the feeling of his dick getting harder and harder with each occasional pass of your hand.

He parks diagonally across the lawn in front of his trailer, not giving a shit where the van ends up as long as it’s stopped. He wanted to dash around the vehicle and scoop you out of your seat, throw you over his shoulder and take you inside to continue with whatever this evening had in store for you.

The second his hand stalled on the clutch, shifting the van into park and taking a moment to let his mind wander to what would happen once he got you inside, you were already halfway out the van and skipping up the steps to his front door.

Entering his trailer, you start taking off your coat and shoes, trying to act as normal as possible. Your facade of keeping it cool entirely shatters when he enters behind you, calmly clicking the door shut and patiently waiting for you to finish unlacing your boots.

You remain crouched down, darting your eyes up at him, deciding against being a brat and undoing your laces as slowly as possible to keep him waiting. Any caution you had was long swept away by the wind, and he’d taken control in your little bathroom tryst, so it was your turn to say fuck it and just do what felt right.

And in this moment, there was only a few quick movements and about six inches of space between you and Eddie’s semi-hard dick. One shoe was only half off, haphazardly kicked behind you as you pivoted onto your knees and had your hands moving eagerly up his tensing thighs.

“Can I?” Your question was half formed and he was already nodding.

You’d teased him enough on the ride over, you wanted him, now. Pants quickly unbuttoned and blue checkered boxers pushed down to his knees, and you were about to go feral and just go for it when a silver glimmer adorning his thick cock caught your eye.

Your mouth was already half open, but your jaw nearly unhinged and hit the floor when the pierced head of his dick falls out of his boxers and lands at your eye level.

Unmoving, mouth agape, you look up to make eye contact, ripping your eyes away from the shock of two silver balls on his cockhead. He knew it was nice, he wouldn’t have bedazzled it if it wasn’t, but the look you were giving him sucked all the unwavering confidence from his body for a split second, suddenly feeling weak in the knees at the sight of you slowly sicking your tongue out, not making any contact but waiting.

He took the base of his dick in his hand and gave it a few precautionary strokes before angling it down and slapping your wet tongue with the tip a few times.

You were two and a half seconds away from being entirely fucked out. If he pulled away and asked you to crawl on all fours to him, you’d do it without a second thought.

You let him slide his cock gently against your outstretched tongue a few times before coming to your senses and wrapping your lips around him, moving your hand to replace his and move against the length that your mouth couldn’t yet reach.

All it took was a few steady bobs of your head, hand twisting and eyes still focused upwards on his face, to have him biting his knuckle and looking up at the ceiling to ground himself to try and not bust on the spot. You love this, of course, seeing him visibly spiral paired with the salty taste of precum already leaking from him.

The hand not jerking him off comes up to the back of his hip, gently pushing against him in tandem with the movements of your head, encouraging him to shallowly thrust into your mouth.

“Jesus fu-“ he grunts out, not wanting to overestimate your encouragement, but unable to keep his hips from rolling forward slightly with the push of your hands and the bob of your lips.

After an unexpected snap of his hips that sent his cock sliding into the back of your throat, making you gag slightly, a pang of guilt struck through him for pushing too hard. That was, until you let your head pull back a touch to catch your breath, but a long string of spit connected your lips to his cock, and a wild smile broke across your face that nearly sent him to the moon.

You dove back in and pushed his cock all the way into the back of your throat, going so far that your nose pressed into the patch of dark curls that sat above his perfect dick. Focusing your breathing through your nose, you make a point to constrict your throat a few times until you feel him twitch inside you.

Pulling off with a gasp for air, you notice his eyebrows pinched together and gaze locked on you.

“I like how these feel,” you comment, letting your pointed tongue dance around the metal balls on his tip.

He shudders and you clench your thighs at the sight of his stomach muscles tensing up when your tongue makes contact with the underside of his head, right where it meets the shaft.

“If I let you fuck my mouth until you come, are you still going to be able to give it to me in a bit, or are you a one and done kind of guy?” You ask with a playfully teasing tone, but genuinely want to know if you suck him off to completion if the night will be over or not.

“Fuck,” he spits out, more blood rushing to his cock at the idea of coming down your throat, “I’d fuck you all night if you’d let me babe.”

Half a second doesn’t pass before his cock is back in your mouth, hips shakily moving forward with your movements, gaining confidence as you flicker your eyes up at him through your lashes, the glimmer in them telling him he can take what he wants.

“Fuckin’ look at you,” he comments to himself, “takin’ it all.”

“Mhmmm,” you hum around him letting your tongue roll around his tip each time before he pushes his cock back down your throat.

“You think you can get away with teasing me like that? That shit you pulled in the van back there, you think it’s cute to try and get me all riled up?”

You nod, tongue out and saliva coating your lips and chin. You could tell he was close by the way his words came out staggered, and his hips started snapping towards you in a new tempo, like his body was chasing it.

Grunts and moans pulled from his chest fill the space mixed with the hums of satisfaction you let out while you take him deeper and faster. Moving in for the kill, you carefully slip your hand up in between his legs, cupping his balls, trying your best not to startle him.

“Oh fuck,” it was a pitch of his voice you’d never heard before, a new tone especially reserved for the moments before orgasm, “you’re gonna make me fuckin come, y/n, y/n, I’m…”

The feeling of his balls constricting in your hands cues the warm wash of come sputtering down into your throat.

Getting the feeling he’d appreciate a bit of a show, you continue to jerk him off and pull off his cock slightly, letting the tip balance onto the tip of your tongue and the rest of his load spills out into your open mouth, some landing around the corners and onto your lips.

“Christ, y/n,” his chest is heaving, his eyes finally pulling from you to squeeze shut for a moment.

Once you’re sure he’s looking at you again you swallow down the salty white substance and lick the excess off your lips. You take his head back into your mouth, sucking just enough to clean off the tip and lap up any stray drops. He’s sensitive, you can tell, so you stop torturing him and place a final kiss right in between the two metal balls.

You thought of asking him if the piercing hurt, or maybe make a comment about the two matching tattoos on his hipbones, ink of his you’d never seen until now. Before your brain can jump from swallowing his come to making post-nut chit chat, he’s yanking you up off your feet and wrapping you in a searingly passionate kiss.

In your past experience most guys wanted you to drink some water or brush your teeth after they came in your mouth, at least before kissing you. Not Eddie. The way his tongue immediately slipped into your mouth, you almost believed he was trying to get a taste for himself.

“C’mon,” he whispers in between slotting his lips with your, “Bedroom. Now.”

He takes your hips in his hands and spins you around, causing a surprised yelp to bubble up from you, making him chuckle behind you as he walks you down the hall, keeping his hands on your sides.

You knew where you were going, there were only so many doors in his tiny trailer, and you’d been here plenty of times before, but you liked the feeling of his hands pushing you forward, guiding your movements and steering you down the hallway into his room.

Before your knees can hit the bed he spins you back around and captures your lips in another heated kiss. His hands trail up your sides, letting his fingertips slide beneath the hem of your shirt and push it upwards until your ribs were exposed. He pulls away from your face, leaving you leaning back into him, not wanting the kiss to end.

“Up,” he pinches the sides of your shirt in his hands, and signals with his chin that he wants you to lift your arms, which you comply.

It slides up and off of you, his hands quickly darting back to unclasp your bra, seemingly without even trying. This makes you roll your eyes, but the realization that you’re bare before him eclipses the thought of making a snippy remark about what a man whore he is.

Flat palms caress your sides and move up to cup your breasts, his tongue pressing into the side of your neck.

“These too,” his thumbs dip into your pants, managing to wiggle under the waistband of your panties as well. You’re going to do it yourself, but he gently pushes you back onto the bed, letting you flip back into the unmade blankets.

“I wanna see you,” he pops your pants button and waits for a nod before sliding your pants and underwear down your legs.

In between the blowjob and now, he’d tucked himself back into his pants, pulling his boxers and jeans back up, still unbuttoned, but covering him back up as his cock returned to a half hard state, unlikely to stay that way for very long considering how things were going.

The scene of you now sprawled out onto his bed, naked and needy for him, and him standing above you, basically fully clothed, had a flood of lust traveling south between your thighs.

“So fuckin’ gorgeous,” you burned under his intense gaze, raking down your body and soaking in the image of your skin laid out against his flannel plaid sheets.

He crawls over you, letting his body melt into yours, the center seam of his jeans pressing against your soaking core, just as it had when he had you pressed up against the door of the bar bathroom.

Rocking gently against you, you feel his cock already starting to harden again. His tongue moves against your neck, hands roaming freely against your skin, arching into his touch.

His breath was heavy against your lips, he was already starting to lose himself, and he knew he wanted to make you come with his tongue at least once before his dick came back out, but it was already pulsing between his legs, growing rock solid with every little whimper that came past your lips.

Your fingers intertwined themselves into the tresses of his long, messy hair. You use your new grip to pull his face as close into yours as your bodies will allow, smushing his nose up against your cheek and foreheads plastered together. The weight of his body on yours, and the lovely rocking motion of his hips against yours stopped as he pulled away and hooked his arms under your knees.

He slides off the side of the bed, feet returning to the carpeted ground and yanking your body to the edge of the mattress. You let out an unexpected giggle, body limp like a rag doll, moving wherever he wanted you.

He leans back over to give you another deep kiss, teeth dragging against your lower lip and tongue sliding gracefully against yours, before he slides his mouth down, stopping to lap up at your nipples for a moment, not letting any part of your skin go untouched as he takes his time moving down to where you want him most.

Wiggling around on his mattress, your body is begging him to get on with it, but he loves to make you squirm. He takes his time licking up your hip bones, kissing from the innermost part of your thigh all the way down to your knee, and then back up the other side. He even takes a long moment to suck a dark purple bruise into the meat of your thigh, biting down on the flesh and licking over the skin to soothe it, noticing how your back arched a little when he bit down harder.

“Please Eddie,” your voice is hardly above a whisper, whimpering and whiny.

“All you had to do was ask nicely,” he has that too-cocky tone again, but it’s long forgotten once his tongue is buried in between your thighs, lapping up the excess of wetness already pooled there.

“Ohhh,” you let out a moan, sucking in a sharp breath and allowing your body to relax under his focused touch.

His hands push up from your ass to the crooks of your knees, moving your legs back to either side of you, strong palms finding their resting place on the backs of your thighs, keeping your legs spread wide open for him while he buries his face deep in your cunt.

“You-“ the start of a compliment, or maybe a request, escapes your lips but the sudden harsh suck of your clit into his mouth has you speechless and moaning, “Mhmmmmm, uhhhhhhh.”

The sloppy wet sounds of him making out with your pussy are enough to drive you wild, your hands originally balling his sheets in your fists quickly move to the top of his head, resting atop his mop of messy curls.

“Y’can give it a tug,” the first half of his statement spoken directly into your pussy, “I don’t mind a little pain.” He shoots you a wink and keeps his eyes locked on you as he lets his tongue lap a fat long lick up your slit, and then leaning back down to encourage you to tangle your hands into his hair.

Coming to either side of his head you grab two points of purchase, locking your fingers in at the roots and feeling him hum into your cunt when you grabbed it a little tighter.

Your hips start to quiver, so he brings one hand from your thigh up to your lower stomach, pinning you against the bed, and still keeping you spread open with the other.

Working a steady rhythm against your slick center with his lips and tongue, he can tell he’s found the spot you like most by your open mouth and tight eyebrows.

“Ohmygod,” your chest starts moving with heavy breaths, you can’t bear to keep yourself up any longer and flop back down flat onto the mattress, eyes screwing shut in pleasure. He lets go of his anchor on your tummy and returns his hands to your thighs, allowing your hips to wiggle and wriggle against his face to chase after your own pleasure.

“Pleasepleaseplease,” one glimpse of his big brown eyes looking up at you and his nose pressing deliciously into the spot above your clit has your head reeling, “please don’t stop, fuck.”

Rather than reply, he just continues to devour you at that steady pace, your thighs almost snapping shut around his head .

“Uh huh, right there, oh fuck Eddie I’m gonna-“

A strangled moan rips from your throat and your back arches off the mattress, his hands quickly come to wrap around your thighs and keep your center held closely against his face. He’s pulling your hips flush with his face, despite your spasming torso and gushing core.

As your orgasm peaks, your hips angle themselves to push up deeper into his face, and he uses his leverage against the backs of your thighs to lift your ass, the entire lower half of your body now off the mattress and sliding backwards as he keeps his moving tongue glued to your clit.

He climbs up onto the mattress as you slide back, the grip he had on your legs was sure to leave a sore memory of him unwilling to let your coming pussy away from his face.

When he finally pulls away, your hand pushing at his forehead to prevent overstimulation, both of you gasping for air, his knees are propped under your thighs, and your hips are propped up right at perfect level with the bulge in his pants.

“Fuck me,” you say through catching your breath, not as an expletive but rather a demand, “Eddie, I need you to fuck me,” your voice was whiny and desperate.

“This okay?” he starts pulling his dick from its constraints in his unbuttoned jeans, not even shoving them halfway down his thighs before he had that pretty pierced dip dragging through your open and ready folds.

“Yes, inside, please,” you were chasing after his length, while he tossed his shirt off. He teasingly ran it up and down your slit before sinking into you, collapsing down to press your lips into a kiss to swallow your moans as he slid the whole thing in slowly, making sure to take his time and fuck you right.

He grabbed the back of your neck and pressed his forehead to yours, finally sheathed all the way inside you and stilling for a moment to relish in the feeling. Pulling back so he can watch your face as he pumps his first few thrusts, he knows he’s beyond fucked.

“So fucking good,” you slur out, eyes almost crossing from how deep his cock was hitting your insides.

“Yeah? This pussy’s god damn perfect, fucking made for me,” he articulates each thought with a snap of his hips, “suckin’ me right in.”

“Wait, can we,” your voice had a little more weight behind it unlike the airy moans he’d grown obsessed with in the past forty minutes.

He pulls back, and rather than finish your thought you slip him out of you and roll over, shuffling up the bed and positioning yourself face down ass up, knees spread and back arched.

“You think you can handle it?” he asks jokingly, swatting your ass playfully and then landing a second, harder smack on the flesh when he notices you pussy clench around nothing at the sensation of him spanking you.

“Want you to fuck me hard,” you mumble into his pillow, wiggling your hips a little bit to jiggle the fat of your ass, “I know your cock is gonna feel so fucking good in me this way, wanna feel that fucking piercing back in my throat from the other direction.”

“Jesus Christ, y/n,” he was genuinely a little shocked at your words, slowly learning that your freak side might match his.

You expected to feel his cock slam into you once his hands came to spread your ass apart, but instead the mattress dipped and he was licking another fat stripe from your clit all the way up past your second hole, running this back a few times until you were moaning into the pillow and thighs were tensed up from the attention he was giving you.

“Sorry babe, just needed another taste,” he pushed the head of his dick into you, and moved the first few inches agonizingly slow into your soaked hole.

“Eddie please, need it, need you,” he loved that his sheets were balled up in your fists, using the tension of the material to bounce yourself back onto him. You only manage to slide back down about three quarters before he’s tightly gripping your hip and pulling out half way again.

“Tsk tsk tsk, you need to learn to be patient, pretty girl,” he’d thrust it an inch of so, and then slowly pull back, making you whine and start to feel tears bubble up in the corners of your eyes.

“Want it so bad,” your cheek laid flat against his pillow, and you could catch a glimpse of him behind you out of the corner of your eye if you craned your neck a bit. You sounded so desperate, but you knew he liked it, liked hearing how badly you craved him.

He starts moving in and out of you, firm grip on your ass never wavering. Restrained grunts left his mouth as he fucked into you, causing your eyes to practically roll into the back of your head. He leans down to place a soft kiss on your shoulder blade, despite how viciously he's pounding into you. His head cranes down to your shoulder, his hand coming up to brush your hair out of your face.

As his long fingers move your hair away from your eyes, you push your head back into his hand, not wanting to lose contact. He tentatively runs his hands up into your hair, taking a soft grip on your roots.

“Is this what you want?” he whispers, “you like it rough?”

“Yes,” you manage to squeak out, “fuck, pull my hair, spank me, do whatever the fuck you want to me, please.”

His vision practically goes black with this new unrestricted passion, allowing himself to thrust into you as hard and as deep as his hips would propel him, twisting your hair in his grip and pulling you up from your laid position, quickly letting your hands jump to his headboard to support you as your head was pulled back.

You tried to bounce back onto his cock, wanting to feel him as deeply and wholly as your bodies would allow, but you could hardly keep up with the pace he had set.

Your ass bouncing against him and the occasional glance he caught at your fucked out expression spurred him on to fuck you even harder. He had your hair pulled back so tight that your back was pressing flush up with his chest every so often, and he took the opportunity to snake an arm around you and hold your chest up flat, his other hand moving down to rub frantic circles on your clit.

“You’re gonna make me come like this,” you manage to croak out, voice hoarse from the harsh bend in your neck.

“Nuh uhh, no,” his voice was gruff and commanding, right into your ear and sent a shiver down your spine.

He pulled out of you fully, and had you flipped around flat on your back again before you could even open your mouth to complain.

“Need to see that pretty face when you come on my cock,” he lines himself up with you again, pushing into you and making a mental note of how the bulge of his cock looked pressing up from the inner part of your lower stomach.

And of course, your face screwed up in pleasure, puffy lips and sweaty brow, slack jawed and panting his name would be something Eddie wouldn’t be able to forget even if he tried.

His thumb found its way to your clit to pick up where he had last left you, steadily building to an earth shattering orgasm. Talking you through it, knowing you were close by the vice grip your walls had on his dick, in between grunts he spilled out some “good girl”’s and “right fuckin there, that’s it.”

When he felt your thighs tense up, and the muscles in your neck strain against the soft skin he’d previously had his lips all over, he knew you were nearing the finish line.

“So fucking perfect, feel so good wrapped around me,” he managed to sweet talk you without altering the pace of his hips, “That’s it, come on my cock, give it to me.”

With that, your body can’t help but throw itself over the edge of pleasure. A deep grunt rattles in your chest, and you lose all sensation other than the wild pulsing in between your legs. You can’t be bothered to worry about what your face looks like, or if your thighs are squeezing him too hard, you only feel the riptide of an orgasm shattering through you.

The animalistic noise that Eddie grunts out, his wild gaze locked on your face only makes your body shake with pleasure even harder. He had that instinct that most men lacked, to keep the exact pace and motion when your orgasm hit rather than speed up or slow down, it was a gift, a talent.

Of course he wasn’t going to change a thing about what he was doing, look at you. You were so fucking perfect, shaking and coming all over him, those sweet noises and the beautiful squelching between your thighs. He’d rather die than change a single thing about this moment.

He stilled only when you paused to catch your breath, and within seconds was flipped over by the power of your thighs onto his back.

Unexpectedly, you began to ride him, trying to match the pace he had earlier set. The aftershocks of your orgasm still washed through you, but you seized the moment to get him right where you wanted him. This angle was different, deeper and more connected. You roll your hips and bring your hands up to his hair, foreheads pressing together once again.

“You’re making me feel so fucking good,” you manage to breathe out into his lips, he quickly comes to the realization of what’s happened and shifts the angle of his hips to hit you even deeper.

“I’d give you everything, if you’d let me,” he doesn’t let a single thought pass in his mind before the words slip out, “always.”

Your lips capture his in a kiss that has far more emotion behind it than two friends play-dating and fucking for fun. His hands come up to grasp your cheeks, your hips continue to roll down into his with purpose.

“I’m- Where-“ his words are hardly intelligible in between breathless kisses, but you know what he means.

“Inside, please, need all of you inside me,” you try to keep your voice steady so he hears you loud and clear, wanting to give him the exact attention he had paid to you, “Please Eddie, come inside me.”

His hands travel down and guide your hips to fuck down onto him one, two, three times before he’s groaning in your ear and letting out the prettiest and most vulnerable sounds you’ve ever heard form him.

The swell of his cock inside you makes you drape your head into his neck, focusing on riding out his orgasm and making sure he was twitching in the aftershocks of his orgasm before you let up.

When you felt his grip on your hips tighten, signaling that he’d had too much, you sink all the way down one final time and let your body lay limp on his, pulsing cock still filling you up.

His chest rose and fell harshly with his recovering breaths. You could feel his heartbeat pulsing up through the spot on his neck where your ear laid on his sweaty skin.

Silently awaiting the inevitable tap on the shoulder, the slow pull out and post-sex cleanup process, you try to savor every passing moment. But it doesn’t come. Eddie wraps his arms around your midsection and holds your limp body close to his, letting his cock start to soften inside you.

You nearly fall asleep like that, all wrapped up in him, until you recognize that you should pee and clean up to avoid a UTI. You slip off of him, and hear a disappointed groan from him. He makes cute grabby hands at you as you cross the room, making you roll your eyes, but something deep inside you flip flops with how sweet he’s being, so caring, so unlike the picture of himself that he had painted for you.

You give him a wet hand towel to clean up the remnants of your activities, and slip back into bed with him per his insistence. You doze off for a while, until the rising sun peeking through his blinds catches your eye, striking you with the sudden decision to stay and face the music or leave and let it settle.

You’d already regretted it, but weren’t ready to have the “hey, so I know we had fake boyfriend-girlfriend sex, but I actually really like you so what should we do about that?” conversion with him, so instead you take the cowardly path and tiptoe out of his room in the early morning hours, leaving behind your underwear on his nightside table with a scribbled note saying to call you. Hopefully that was enough of a signal.

Apparently not,

Days pass, and no call.

It was all starting to get to your head. While you had gone through the stages of being nervous that you had done something wrong, that he was avoiding you to spare you the rejection, thinking he regretted what had happened and didn’t want to face you, who was so obviously into him it was painful, you’d just now turned a new leaf. Fuck that. If he was too much of a coward to call you, you'd hope he'd at least give you the decency as a friend to tell you the truth, you deserved to be angry, and you deserved a response.

After stewing in your feelings for longer than felt healthy, you just get in your car and start driving to his trailer. If this all blew up in your face at least you wouldn’t have to keep biting your nails and waiting for the phone to ring.

Three deep breaths, and a quick moment to gather your thoughts, and suddenly your body acted on instinct, putting the car in park and walking up to pound three concise knocks on his trailer door.

“Just a second,” he hollered from inside, giving you a few seconds to be stricken with regret for showing up unannounced without a plan on what exactly to say.

“What do you- oh, y/n,” he was in a pair of plaid pajama pants that hung low on his hips, shirtless and hair still damp from a recent shower, “uh, hey?”

“Oh, hey,” your tone was laced with annoyance, “I left something here last week and I’m here to get it back. If you don’t mind.”

“What- oh,” he’s a second too slow to realize you mean the underwear you had purposefully left behind with that note. The note telling him to call you. Which he never did.

You were left standing on his porch steps, arms crossed and shooting daggers out of your eyes while he stood there in the doorway, an apparent guilty expression plastered on his face while he rocked back on his heels to buy some time to figure out what to say.

“You don’t have to invite me inside, if you can just grab them and give them to me, and I’ll be out of your hair,” you say flatly, recognizing if he does as asked then this might be the last time you speak to Eddie Munson.

“No, no, uh, you should come in,” he steps aside to let you in, “we probably shouldn’t have this conversation on my front steps.”

Avoiding eye contact, feeling an overwhelming mix of anger, confusion, and betrayal, you step inside and don’t make any effort to move into the space. You just stand by the door and give him an expectant look. Either he could go get the underwear, or he could grow a pair and say something to you.

“I, uh-“ he looked so defeated you started to feel bad for using such a pointed tone, but then you remembered the days and days that passed without hearing from him, “I’m sorry, that I, y’know…”

“Yeah, well I don’t really care if you’re not looking for any post sex recap conversations, because you’re obviously pretty sure of yourself in that department,” the words flew out before your mind could even conjure them up, “but you fucking promised me that you wouldn’t do this, so can I please just have my underwear back and I won’t bother you again.”

He runs a hand through his hair letting out a deep exhale and searching the ceiling for words, “I know, I-“

You cut him off, your thoughts were ripping through you now and you were going to say your piece whether he asked for it or not, “You said you wouldn’t pull this shit with me, but I guess our friendship isn’t substantial enough for you to see me any differently than you do every other girl you throw away after you’ve gotten what you want. You clearly don’t want any more advice and you clearly don’t want to be my friend, so please, just give me my shit so I can go.”

“That’s the fucking thing y/n, of course I don’t want to be your friend,” his gaze still fixed on the ceiling.

At this point you were seconds away from just storming out, letting him keep your underwear as some twisted little trophy for breaking your heart.

“Yeah, crystal clear Eddie.”

“Being your friend is already hard enough, and I knew this shit was a bad idea, the whole trial-girlfriend thing. But how the fuck was I supposed to say no to that? The girl of my dreams offers to do all this no-strings-attached romantic shit, I’d be the dumbest man alive to turn that down.”

You just give him a blank stare, your scalding anger twisting into a more confused frenzy of bees swarming in the pit of your stomach. Eyebrows pinched together, you just stare at him until he finally makes eye contact with you.

“And yeah,” he goes on, letting all his words out like a big exhale in the same cadence that you had just hurled all your angry words at his, but his tone was filled with guilt as opposed to rage, “maybe we let it go a little too far, but I would never say no to you, I couldn’t. I’m sorry I didn’t know what the fuck to say to you after, but that’s exactly the reason I’m not good enough for you. The more we kept that fake dating shit up the worse it was gonna get, so I’m sorry, but I can’t keep spending time with you like that, because it’s starting to fucking hurt.”

“Hurt,” you say with a dry laugh, which almost scares him, “YOU’RE hurt? Give me a fucking break Eddie. I know you don’t see me that way. So what, you’re too scared to hurt my feelings? You’re doing a wonderful job, keep it up.”

“What the fuck do you mean, not see you like what?”

“Don’t pretend to be dumb Eddie. When we first met I tried so hard to get your attention, asking you to hang out, and you always blew me off. It’s fine that you don’t want to date me or whatever, but at least just tell me that, don’t fuck me like I’m special or something and then toss me aside. I deserve better than that.”

“Yeah, y/n, you do,” his voice was no longer guilt stricken, and was on the same straightforward plane as your last responses, “you deserve so much fucking better than me, that’s why I could never let anything between us happen. I don’t call girls back. I’m rude. I don’t take care of myself, let alone others. I like to smoke, and drink, and get head from girls in bar bathrooms and never learn their names, and that’s not the kind of person that a girl like you dates. I’m a fun quick fuck. You’re the kind of girl that after three dates he’ll already have a ring picked out. You’re everything, and I’m nothing, so forgive me for sparing you of that.”

Your bones are frozen and the beat of silence gives him the opportunity to spin on his heel and start down the hallway, presumably to get your panties.

Snapping back into it, you let out a louder than expected, “Hey,” and you start following him, not taking long to catch up to him in his bedroom.

“You,” you point a finger at him, and start to feel the rage bubble up again, “don’t get to decide that you’re unloveable. And you don’t get to tell me what kind of girl I am. Have you ever considered that maybe the reason you’re so lonely and miserable is because you choose to be? You don’t get to decide what I deserve, I do. And I really fucking like you Eddie, so forgive me for acting like it.”

You snatch your underwear off his bedside table, and give him a look, not fueled by anger or resentment, but empathy.

“I’m going to leave. And if you don’t want to see me again, that’s fine, but if you do, you can call me. Goodbye Eddie.”

You feel out of your own body, floating above it all and rewinding the conversation over and over, body on autopilot taking you home while your soul stayed behind and relived his words over and over, unsure if you feel better or worse than when you showed up.

Days pass by again, and you take his silence as more of a response than anything he had said to you during that conversation. You try not to wallow, but you feel scattered and distraught, at both the prospect of losing Eddie and having to deal with your shared friends, would they allow you to dance around each other, or would they flat out choose him and shut you out? Would group nights out bowling suddenly just turn into the occasional one-on-one coffee with Robin?

Until suddenly, on a random Tuesday afternoon when you've gotten home from work and are relaxing on the couch in your pajamas, three knocks are at your door.

At this point you figured it was over. He hadn't called and he'd made no effort to continue the dialogue. So a thought of Eddie doesn't even cross your mind in between the couch and opening the door.

And there he is.

In a suit, slightly descheveld in Eddie fashion, and holding a slightly wilting bouquet of flowers. Posture straight and brave face, but expecting your brutal edge upon answering the door nonetheless.

"Hey?" you're somewhat at a loss for words answering.

"Hi," he seems like he's running lines of a play in his mind, "I was hoping we could talk."

You reluctantly let him in, and he hands the flowers to you, as if it was a normal occurrence for him to bring you such a gift.

"First off," he starts, hardly breaching your living room entrance before starting his apology, "I regret the way we last left things, and I'm sorry for leaving you waiting for a response."

He flicks those big brown eyes at you and you can't help but give him the benefit of the doubt, he always was so sincere with his words.

"You're amazing. And although I'll remain adamant that I don't deserve someone like you in my life, I've been thinking a lot about what you said, and I'm sorry that tried to tell you how to feel."

You remain stoic at your seat on the couch, watching him shift his weight and bare his soul to you.

"You're perfect. Nice, funny, sexy, brave, all of it. And if you're willing to give me a chance, I don't know why the fuck you would, but if you are, I want to put aside all my bullshit and try this out, if you'll have me."

He stood there for a moment, letting you take in his request, bouquet in hand and suit adorned.

"And I owe you a few dates, for real."

As hard as you want your exterior to be, a smile cracks through.

"Okay, but know I don't fuck until the third date, at best," you jab, breaking his nervous exterior and visibly relieving the tension from his shoulders.

"I'm somewhat of a refined gentleman myself, so that won't be an issue," he bows and extends a hand to you.

You pull him down by the hand onto the couch with you, wrapping him up in a deep kiss. He was worth it, and you both knew it was worth the shot to try.

#eddie munson smut #smut #eddie x y/n #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson #eddie munson imagine #Eddie Munson smut #eddie munson fanfic #stranger things smut #eddie munson fem!reader

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flamingtouya · 7 months

Text

𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐤 𝐢𝐬 𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐩 (𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐬𝐨 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐞) —

pairing: dabi + f!reader

word count: 4381

cw: getting to know each other (against your better intuition), flirting, bad flirting,some explicit language but nothing too bad, no quirk AU, dabi commits a crime or two

summary: In which Dabi meant to text Toga instead of a random stranger. But these things happen, and you were never one to shy away from troublesome men. This whole thing is told entirely through text messages.

a/n: check out my AO3 for different formatting! :)

Mar 02 10:07 PM

Unknown: Grab bleach while you’re out Unknown: And paper towels

You: who is this??

Unknown: So funny

You: u got the wrong number my guy

Unknown: Shit Unknown: You don’t happen to have some bleach at your disposal rn?

You: try the convenience store You: where’s the body at, anyways

Unknown: Ohara street by the fitness park, you should come check it out

You: sounds enticing You: i’ve always wanted to be on a true crime podcast

You: sort of expected myself to be the alive one though

Unknown: I was taught that women tend to be smart about stranger danger and stuff Unknown: You're out to prove me wrong

You: how’d you know i’m a woman? 🤨

Unknown: U sound cute Unknown: And men don’t listen to true crime

You: that’s so sexist You: and correct You: you'd do numbers on reddit

Mar 03 00:16 AM

You: hey don’t leave now

Mar 03 00:34 AM

Unknown: Had a body to take care of

You: you didn’t wait for me? :(

Unknown: … Unknown: Are u fr

You: ofc not You: i don’t hang out with edgelords

Unknown: Whatever u r probably boring anyways

You: entertaining enough for u to keep texting me

Unknown: We all have our moments of weakness

Mar 03 01:09 AM

Unknown: So wyd

You: you don’t have anybody else to bother?

Unknown: I do Unknown: I want to bother you tho

You: damn, what’d i do to deserve this

Unknown: Is that a complaint

You: i have uni tomorrow and ur buzzing keeps waking me up

Unknown: Mute your phone, stupid

You: can’t mute unknown numbers

Unknown: Save this one then Unknown: Or block me idc

You: what name should i put it under

Unknown: Dabi

You: lmao i knew you were an edgelord

Dabi: Stfu

You: good night to you too

Mar 03 07:58 AM

You: fuck

Mar 03 3:56 PM

Dabi: Did you miss me that bad

Mar 03 4:32 PM

You: i overslept and am blaming you entirely

Mar 03 5:19 PM

Dabi: Sucks to be a useful member to society

You: why what do you do

Dabi: I'm actually a bit of a part-time freelancer, you regular uni folk just wouldn't get it

You: freelancing around ohara at 1 in the morning sounds like the truly fulfilling purpose we all long for You: did you just get up

Dabi: Hey now Dabi: Yes Dabi: I’m still in bed technically, looking at the ceiling fan is so interesting when I don't want to move a muscle

You: you are everything I am jealous of

Dabi: I promise you it’s not that good

You: first time a guy’s been honest right away. i applaud u

Dabi: Omg no way

Mar 03 5:40 PM

You: no way what

Dabi: No way you said something witty

Dabi: Maybe you’re fun after all

You: i’ll have u know that deep down, i’m just a fragile being trying to make it thru this bitch of a world, running on fumes and caffeine all while chasing a childhood dream that i'll never be able to reach anyways because of my parents' expectations of me crushing my soul

Dabi: Damn, being vulnerable already

You: your turn

Dabi: I’m not sad. My life is great and my parents never expected anything of me

Dabi: That was a lie

You: so you’re a liar

Dabi: I suppose I might be

You: that counts as being vulnerable. i’m so proud of us. <3

Mar 03 9:12 PM

You: you probably have daddy issues

Mar 03 11:34 PM

Dabi: Mind your business

You: so i’m right

Dabi: Nosy sounds more like it

You: that’s a yes then

Dabi: When I tell you he SUCKS so bad

You: LMAO You: i’m guessing you don’t particularly like your family then

Dabi: It's not the type of stuff I'd tell anybody, especially not to some nosy individual whose number is one or two digits off

You: alright i’ll stop digging You: wait how old are you You: am i talking to some 50 y/o dude You: please no

Mar 04 00:02 AM

Dabi: Chill I’m 48

Mar 04 00:06 AM

You: say sike right now You: if u rly are then i’m half your age

Dabi: You thought Dabi: Are you actually 24 tho

You: give or take a few days lol

Dabi: When’s your birthday

You: do you want my social and tax numbers while we’re at it

Dabi: Stfu I wanna see if I’m older

You: 🤨 You: it’s at the end of this month

Dabi: Baby

You: are u flirting with me or insulting me

Dabi: Can’t I be doing both

Mar 04 06:30 AM

You: love me a guy who can multitask You: did you ever get your bleach and paper towels

Mar 04 11:11 AM

You: it’s 11:11 make a wish

Mar 04 2:02 PM

You: my wish is that you’d commit to a humane sleeping schedule

Mar 04 2:59 PM

Dabi: Anybody hear sum

You: i heard you’re a lazy bitch You: who doesn’t even do his own grocery shopping

Dabi: Maybe I do. Maybe I got the bleach all on my own like a big boy

You: X

Dabi: What's that mean

You: X for doubt You: it’s a meme

Dabi: Here I thought we were about to get spicy 😔

You: ew

Dabi: I was joking Dabi: …unless

You: has anybody ever told you that your flirting is immaculate

Mar 04 7:10 PM

Dabi: What do you study

You: are you trying to find out my location

Dabi: Let it be known I’m terrible at geography and if I wanted to stalk you I'd already be on it

You: that’s a consolation You: forensic science You: i actually can’t wait for the semester to be over bc my professor is one of the most annoying individuals i have ever had the displeasure of meeting

Dabi: So you do have bleach

You: never said i didn’t

Dabi: What do I have to do to make the list of annoying individuals. What's my current score

You: we haven’t met You: and i’m not sure if i’d survive u

Dabi: You have a point, I'm super nice tho

You: bet You: are you handsome You: asking for a friend You: the handsome ones are usually more annoying

Dabi: I'll say I’m frighteningly unique-looking

You: ...well played

Mar 04 10:09 PM

Dabi: My boss is making me do errand work in the morning like I'm some kind of functioning human being with principles Dabi: The next piercing I’m getting is a lobotomy

You: thought you were “freelancing”

Dabi: Freelancing only gets you so far. You'll understand when you're my age

You: can't imagine what the back pain must be like You: do you have a tongue piercing 👀

Dabi: Perhaps I do

You: u r so mysterious You: tell me an opinion

Dabi: Mint ice cream makes my teeth feel weird

You: that’s not an opinion

Dabi: Alright, more foods should have mint in them. And coriander. I want to make things inedible for 80% of the human population

You: nvm keep your opinions to yourself

Mar 05 02:26 AM

Dabi: I've gotta burn this number. Txt u in a few

Mar 05 05:16 AM

You: what are you, some kind of druglord This message could not be delivered.

You: I knew it This message could not be delivered.

Mar 0512:03 PM

You: ayo are you still there This message could not be delivered.

You: this is only funny if you come clean right now This message could not be delivered.

Mar 05 4:16 PM

You: "text you in a few" minutes? hours? days? This message could not be delivered.

You: just know that if it takes to long i'll forget about u This message could not be delivered.

You: won't even miss u This message could not be delivered.

Mar 06 09:00 AM

You: hello is this thing on This message could not be delivered.

Mar 07 3:15 PM

You: my social security number is 6007 0023 6799 0324 This message could not be delivered.

Mar 07 8:46 PM

You: eggs, vinegar, panko, sprite, sliced ham, parmesan, deodorant sencha if they have the good one ground pepper, lemon juice This message could not be delivered.

Mar 08 04:44 AM

Unknown: Am I still the man of ur dreams

You: I'm killing you You: violently

Unknown: I was hoping softly Unknown: With your song

You: are these messages being monitored You: am i a suspect

Unknown: If they were, could I write that I'm a ruthless baby killer anti-government fuck the police pro abortion the prime minister is an idiot bomb. bomb at the airport, terrorism, detonate Unknown: I guess now they are

Dabi was added as a contact.

You: just when i thought i'd have to find another witty asshole with a tongue piercing

Dabi: Aw you missed me Dabi: Does my tongue piercing make me hot be honest

You: what are my chances of getting an explanation for the past few days You: are u a murderer fr, that would be so cool You: i totally didn't use our abandoned chat as a grocery list btw

Dabi: The only thing I slay is pussy 😎

You: somehow i have doubts about that statement You: animal abuse is no joke

Dabi: I'm thinking of a number between 1 and 100, if you guess it correctly I'll tell u everything

You: 69

Mar 08 08:21 AM

Dabi: It was 72 Dabi: Because you were so close I'll give u one free question. But I want another one in return

You: you're a dirty little gremlin who plays dirty little games You:: do i get to ask a follow-up question

Dabi: No

You: in that case You: which of the following activities did you partake in? 1.) vandalism 2.) drug dealing 3.) drug trafficking 4.) violent crimes 5.) violent crimes that resulted in the death of one or more individuals 6.) assisting someone in a violent crime 7.) assisting someone in a non-violent crime 8.) theft 9.) robbery 10.) hate crimes against a minority 11.) politically motivated acts of defiance 12.) consumption of illegal substances 13.) running and/or hiding from law enforcement 14.) domestic terrorism 15.) human trafficking 16.) money laundering 17.) having a good time

Dabi: What the fuck Dabi: What is this, a multiple choice? Dabi: 1, 4, 6, 7, 8, 13 Dabi: My turn Dabi: What's your favourite food

You: fr, just like that You: that's your one question out of everything you could ask? am i really that boring

Dabi: I ask what I ask

You: spicy miso ramen with minced pork You: can we go back to the part where you ran from law enforcement

Dabi: Don't we all have demons that we run from Dabi: Mine are just a bit more persistent

Mar 08 10:52 AM

You: i want another question

Dabi: If you come up with one that's not related to the past few days, go ahead

You: fine i'll take it You: have you ever been caught and gotten in legal trouble for one of your… dubious activities

Dabi: Yeah

You: …and?

Dabi: That's another question. Gonna trade?

You: fine

Dabi: When I was 16, two Officers Of The Law 🐷 caught me dumpster diving behind a 7/11 Dabi: The dumpster diving wasn't the crime but because it was on private property they charged me with trespassing

You: damn, that's a lot of truth from u in just two sentences You: i wanna know ur tragic backstory so bad

Dabi: You could try to get me all sentimental for the 6 minutes after really good sex before the post nut clarity sets in

You: uh huh, taking notes You: anyway. you get one question. think hard

Dabi: If you couldn't have minced pork on your ramen, what would your second topping choice be

You: you're impossible

Mar 08 1:27 PM

You: tori karaage or extra ni-tamago i guess

Mar 08 2:23 PM

Dabi: Doesn't the Karaage lose its crispiness if it's in the broth for too long Dabi: I wouldn't know

You: please let me recommend you a good ramen place, you seem like you'd need it

Dabi: You have no idea. Take me out

You: like romantically? or are you asking me to murder you

Dabi: I love surprises

You: i just laughed out loud in the middle of my lecture

Mar 08 7:18 PM

Dabi: Need your forensic expertise for a sec

You: …oh no

Dabi: It's a purely hypothetical scenario

You: alright lay it on me big boy

Dabi: If a 176 cm tall and 67 kg heavy person were to climb over a 4,60 meter high fence that has electrical wiring on it Dabi: What would the most likely way for them to die be?

You: this is not forensic at all You: how strong is the electricity You: is there a way to shut it off You: where would you hold onto the fence You: can it be damaged

Dabi: Not me, a 176 cm tall and 67 kg heavy person

You: where would THE 176 CM TALL AND 67 KG HEAVY PERSON HOLD ONTO THE FENCE

Dabi: The only points that provide decent grip surface are the hooks holding the wires in place

You: so the most likely way to die would be electrocution You: will that be all

Dabi: How would one determine whether the electricity has been properly shut off Dabi: In the theoretical scenario that you couldn't get close enough to hear

You: the 176 cm tall and 67 kg heavy person should tap the wiring from the bottom with the back of their hand You: that way their fingers curl downwards and not around the wire You: so the person won't DIE from ELECTROCUTION

Mar 09 00:08 AM

Dabi: Excellent Dabi: Gonna do some field research Dabi: Will report back in maybe a day

Mar 09 08:01 AM

You: i'm gonna be so mad if you die before you've had decent karaage This message could not be delivered.

Mar 11 6:10 PM

Unknown: So it turns out that the person did not have to climb the fence after all. Pliers are such useful tools Unknown: Thanks for the electricity tip tho

Mar 11 6:39 PM

Dabi was added as a contact.

You: you're so hot when you're alive

Mar 11 9:14 PM

Dabi: Do u think I'm a catch 😏

You: judging by the way law enforcement is trying to get their hands on you, i'd say you're pretty slippery

Dabi: The slipperiest Dabi: You couldn't handle me

You: i'd trap you using cheese and a paper box You: put you in a jar and turn you into spicy miso broth

Dabi: Would you hold the jar tight at night and tell me everything's going to be okay

You: of course

Dabi: I'm liking this scenario

Mar 12 01:07 AM

Dabi: Ever thought about what Mint Karaage would taste like

Mar 12 01:23 AM

You: i need u

Dabi: Tell me more

You: to shut your mouth

Dabi: Are you trying to romance me

Mar 12 07:15 AM

You: i'm actually so upset right now You: can i vent

Mar 12 07:27 AM

Dabi: Listening Dabi: Am I gonna have to get the tissues out

You: you're not empathetic enough for that

Dabi: How would you know

You: call it a woman's intuition You: i just need someone to bother about my hot girl troubles

Dabi: Let's hear it girl Dabi: Men ain't shit 💅

You: damn right they aren't You: but unrelated to that You: i ran out of my medication a few days ago and thought if i stretched the remaining 3 pills to last me 6 days i'd be able to make it till the end of the week You: now my doctor's office is closed and i can't seem to get an appointment anywhere You: and i'm super jittery and on edge and almost had a panic attack just trying to make coffee

Dabi: What type of medication

You: Ativan You: it's prescription only

Dabi: Nothing is ever "prescription only"

You: i'm not gonna try some experimential backalley drug You: just feel like dying rn

Dabi: Who said anything about backalley? You actually came to the right guy for this Dabi: What's the name of the nearest druggery

You: ...fukuju pharmacy

Dabi: So I've been talking to a Setagaya girl

You: only moved here for uni, hate to disappoint if ur expecting a wealthy maiden

Mar 12 10:02 AM

Dabi: Don't you feel like getting a snack from the vending machine Dabi: Specifically the one next to the pharmacy Dabi: A bag of skittles sounds nice, doesn't it?

You: ? ? ?

Mar 12 10:34 AM

You: did you commit a crime for me You: how did you get your hands on actual fucking Ativan this fast

Dabi: I don't kiss and tell

You: did you follow me home You: is this how i die

Dabi: You make it so hard to be nice to you Dabi: What do you think I am, a creep

You: if you were here i'd suck you off so good rn

Dabi: Whore Dabi: (Respectfully)

You: lmao ur right You: thank you for real though

Dabi: Stfu

Mar 12 1:33 PM

Dabi: Do u like cats

You: yes

Dabi sent an image.

Dabi: Noodle thieving menace

You: 🥹 You: that has got to be the fattest street cat i’ve ever seen

Dabi: He’s hella fast

You: how does it feel to be the one chasing the culprit for once

Dabi: Not nearly as thrilling as being the one committing the crime

Mar 13 00:00 AM

Unknown: Congratulations! You have been selected as an eligible member for a free trial of Osaka Daily Post. Unknown: If you would like information about your benefits, reply 'BENEFIT' Unknown: If you would like to stop receiving these messages, reply 'STOP'

You: i know it's you shithead

Unknown: Your message could not be processed.

You: this is the unfunniest you've ever been ngl

Unknown: Your message could not be processed.

You: you're truly one of the most annoying individuals in my life

Unknown: Your message could not be processed.

You: STOP

Unknown: LMAO you thought

Dabi was saved as a contact.

You: i'm reconsidering if the tongue piercing is really worth it 😤

Mar 13 04:55 AM

Dabi: Any particular reason why you chose forensics

Mar 13 06:09 AM

You: i've always admired criminals but been to scared to become one You: and if i know about psychotic assholes it might help me to steer clear of them, or so i thought

Dabi: Is it working

You: evidently not

Dabi: Use me in ur thesis Dabi: I'll be your lab rat

You: nah you're more beneficial to me when you're not stuck behind bars You: what do you have me saved as in your phone

Dabi: I don't save contacts Dabi: Especially not yours Dabi: You mean nothing to me

You: aww do you know my number by heart, that's adorable You: i'm kinda genuinely impressed at how persistent you are at bothering me, it's almost like you like me or smth

Dabi: No fr though lmao if anybody finds my phone you'd be on a list

You: do u delete these chats

Dabi: Always

You: that's so romantic You: admit it you're actually a softie

Dabi: Would that make you more interested in me Dabi: Then I'm the softest

You: what do i need to do to make you the hardest

Dabi: ... Dabi: There's absolutely no correct way for me to respond to that Dabi: You've left me speechless

You: 🥵🥵

Dabi: What's your worst quality Dabi: Besides being an irresistible smartass Dabi: *irritating

You: was that a freudian slip You: you're so obsessed with me it's adorable

Dabi: Proving my point so diligently

You: you don't seem like the kind of person who would use words like 'diligently' You: i'm rather talkative at times You: to the point where it gets unbearable to listen to me

Dabi: I never would've guessed

You: what's yours? You: besides the obvious

Dabi: Still putting up with you

Mar 13 7:45 PM

Dabi: Wyd

You: i burned my rice a little You: but it's edible

Dabi: Don't you have a rice cooker? Who raised you

You: my very strict but sweet and committed grandmother who made the best teriyaki salmon in the whole world You: i'd kill another human being to eat her home cooked food one more time

Dabi: So your parents ain't shit either

You: eh, they're alright You: they're Business People overseas and aren't around a whole lot, means i get my own place though You: so i can have visitors at any desired hour 😏

Dabi: Omg sick Dabi: Me next

You: it was implied

Mar 13 11:11 PM

Dabi: Ok but do u actually wanna meet up sometime Dabi: No strings attached ofc

You: i'm down

Dabi: What if I'm a creep after all

You: if anything, it means i won't have to attend my lecture about carbon dots tmrw

Dabi: I can't tomorrow Dabi: What about the day after Dabi: I'll give u my credit card info if it makes you feel more safe, don't bother trying to buy anything with it tho, you'll be disappointed

You: you may not show it a whole lot, but are you actually a considerate person? You: the day after sounds good

Dabi: Preem

You: oreryu shio ramen, right by harajuku station You: about time you had some good karaage You: my treat You: unless that's too far away for u

Dabi: I would fly across the world for u Dabi: Yes Harajuku works fine

Mar 14 08:49 AM

You: how will i recognise u You: what do u look like

Dabi: As my dad once said. I'm impossible to miss

You: i laughed

Dabi: Guess it was all worth it then Dabi: Do tattoos scare you

You: i was gonna ask cause there's no way you got only a tongue piercing and nothing else You: stand there with your tongue out

Dabi: Shouldn't we at least get to know each other before 😳

You: don't get any ideas You: i don't intend to fuck u You: ...for now

Dabi: That's a relief, I thought I might have to file a restraining order afterwards

Mar 14 1:42 PM

Dabi sent an image.

Dabi: If u see this guy u can still run the other way

You: hhh fuck You: are u trying to intimidate me You: how do you have so many tattoos but no bedframe

Dabi: Cut me some slack, I just moved into this place

You: fair warning i'm not as hot as u

Dabi: Bet

You sent an image.

Dabi: Why do women always lie. I thought you were better. I thought you were different

You: 😳 You: i'm actually worse

Dabi: We're such a good match

You: don't get ahead of urself. u r still a guy with no bedframe

Dabi: Please shut up

Mar 14 4:16 PM

Dabi: To be clear I'm not bringing flowers or anything Dabi: And I'm actually willing to let you pay this time lol

You: you have such a unique way with words

Dabi: A bit tight on money rn but I'll pay u back some other way

You: can we make that the first line in our sextape You: dw i said it's my treat and i mean it You: does that make you feel emasculated

Dabi: Who would I be to say no to free food tf Dabi: If there's a next time I can take you out for drinks Dabi: Nothing fancy but an old friend of mine owns a bar downtown and his girlfriend mixes a killer mule

You: if you're gonna poison me after gaining my trust over my favourite food i will be incredibly sad

Dabi: Give me some credit here. I'm trusting u to not rat me out to law enforcement

You: you're giving me ideas You: is there a bounty on your head

Dabi: I'm not that important

Mar 14 9:44 PM

You: so you're just too good to get caught

Dabi: Both flattering and factually correct Dabi: For the record I've never harmed anybody that didn't deserve it

You: thanks for clarifying You: i feel so safe now

Dabi: Anytime Dabi: If you're having second thoughts lmk before 10 am so I won't spend time getting ready for nothing

You: 10 am is crazy You: u r so vain

Dabi: Alright then I won't 😔

You: i take it back You: be pretty for me

Mar 15 5:30 AM

You: can't sleep

Mar 15 7:12 AM

Dabi: How the turntables Dabi: Are you alright

You: yes You: it's the good kind of sleepless

Dabi: It's fine if you're having second thoughts, I won't hold it against you at all Dabi: Just texting like this is nice too

You: fuck no i wanna meet the man behind the screen You: the myth, the legend, the crimelord himself

Dabi: I'm never showing consideration for ur wellbeing ever again

You: should've ghosted me before i got attached

Mar 15 9:54 AM

Dabi: Last chance to bail gracefully

You: you make it so tempting

Dabi: Getting out of bed then

You: it's not a bed if it doesn't have a bedframe

Dabi: Shut, and I mean this in the gentlest way possible, the hell your mouth

Mar 15 12:08 PM

Dabi sent a location pin.

Dabi: Is this the place

You: that's the one You: be there in a few minutes

Dabi: I'm waiting outside

Mar 15 12:13 PM

You: omg i think i see u You: im shy

Dabi: U literally have so much blackmail material on me

You: give me a second You: alright I'm coming over This message could not be delivered.

#dabi #dabi x reader #touya todoroki #touya c reader #todoroki touca #bnha #dabi x you #touya x you #bnha x reader #todoroki touya x reader #todoroki toya x reader #league of villains #league of villains x reader #bnha x you #i hate that there are so many tags #my writing #(sort of?)#this was honestly super fun :>#x

1K notes · View notes

hausofwoo · 2 months

Text

when in berlin | jung wooyoung

pairing: jung wooyoung x afab reader

word count: 5.1K

summary: you move to the big city, yearning for a big change in your life, only find yourself feeling stuck all over again. that is, until you meet wooyoung, a perfect stranger who leads you on an unforgettable night of adventure and self discovery.

warnings: 18+, minors do not interact, non-idol au, strangers to lovers, alcohol consumption (but nothing crazy), unprotected piv (wrap it up!), use of a petname (baby), feat. work bestie!giselle.

author's note: i wanted to make a cute lil fluffy fic (with smut ofc) for my ult and this is what happened :-O i wanted to go a lil harder for him but i decided to save that for my next fic of him hehehe ALSO for reference, i imagined the club remix of umbrella to sound similar to this song, hope it captures the vibe. thank u to @hausofmingi and T for proofreading as always ♡

being new to the city was taking a toll on you.

you left your small town on a whim, eager to go out in the world: to experience something new, to get a bit of culture, to really find yourself. but all that you’ve found so far was a shitty low-paying job and a (suspiciously) low rent apartment on the east side. no one could blame you, you had just arrived and were still finding your footing.

you needed to get out; all you’ve really done in the past month of living here was work, eat and sleep. you desperately needed to socialize. so when your coworker invites you to go to a nightclub with her, you remind yourself that you’re here to try new things, and agree to go.

the line for the club is long. you expected this, it is a saturday night after all. you just weren’t really prepared to stand in line for half an hour. you’re dressed for the occasion, for in the club at least. it’s just outside the club that’s the issue, with cold air biting at your thighs in your all-too-tight dress. you check the time on your phone.

“giselle, it’s already 11:30,” you groan. “should we just go somewhere else?”

“but we’re so close to the front!” she quips. “just a little longer?”

giselle had been telling you all about this place, berlin. it was a club hidden in a basement in the heart of the city. apparently it plays all the hits, the actual good ones. and then at midnight, they always play some club remix of “umbrella” and bubbles descend from the ceiling. it sounded fun when she told you about it, but in this chilly air that’s only getting colder, you start to wonder if it’s worth it.

“fine,” you say, rubbing your arms to try to produce some sort of heat. “but if we miss umbrella then you owe me.”

giselle examines the long line ahead of you. “maybe we can get in with someone near the front?”

“giselle, no-” but before you can finish, she’s walking towards the front of the line.

you stay in your spot, feeling frozen in place. you watch her approach a group of men that seem to be around your age. you can see her nodding and smiling. since you met her, she’s definitely had a way with words. then, she looks back at you and points. suddenly feeling eyes on you, your face flushes in embarrassment, bringing heat back to your cheeks. you can’t really see the men, it’s dark and they’re a bit too far to see the details of their faces. giselle motions you over, and you’re hesitant, but you force yourself to be brave and cut the line.

as you make your way over, you can see the men getting their IDs checked and stamps pressed to their hands. you catch up to giselle, who’s fishing through her purse for her wallet.

“that was easy,” she giggles. “meet our new friends.”

you both turn to see the men being ushered in, not even getting a moment to introduce each other.

“oh. maybe we’ll catch up with them later,” giselle mumbles, swiping her ID from her wallet.

you shrug to her with a chuckle, ready to hold your hand out for a stamp.

following giselle down the stairs, the dark caverns of the stairwell were dimly lit with red lights. you can hear the music bumping distantly, and you wonder how much longer this set of stairs is. as soon as you reach the bottom, you realize it’s just a floor for the bathrooms and you have a whole new set waiting for you. the music grows louder and louder, and you start to feel the bass in your chest, or maybe your pulse is just beginning to rise in excitement for what’s to come.

a man that seems to be a bouncer guards the door leading to the actual club. as you both approach, he nods and pulls it open, unleashing the blasting sound and the heat of dancing bodies. you and giselle look at each other, smile, and rush right in.

you try and navigate your way through, opting to get drinks before anything else. you finally squeeze through the sweaty bodies to reach the bar, and giselle requests two tequila shots.

“tequila?” you repeat to her, struggling to yell over the music. “so it’s that kind of night?”

“oh yeah,” giselle says, grabbing the shots from the bar and paying her tab. “it’s that kind of night.”

you look at each other, doing a quick cheers and laughing almost out of giddiness. here’s to new experiences, you think to yourself.

slamming her empty glass down, giselle grabs your arm and starts leading you to the crowded dance floor. “now let’s fucking dance!”

swiveling through the crowd, you eventually land in the perfect spot right in the middle of the dance floor. the speakers are thumping some charli xcx song you know every word to, and the lights are flashing around you as well as the glistening bodies surrounding you. the crowd is jumping, singing to the song, dancing like no one is watching. you realize that you’ve been so tense all night, so you finally allow yourself to let loose.

you sing along with giselle, screaming the lyrics to each other and dancing to an unknown rhythm. but you don’t care how stupid you may look, you’re having way too much fun to think about the strangers around you. the alcohol slowly seeps through your veins, your head feeling lighter and your body more relaxed. with each song, you somehow don’t grow tired, only more exhilarated.

“i’m so glad we did this!” you attempt to yell to giselle.

“huh?!” she replies, not hearing you.

you brush it off with a laugh, continuing to jump along with her. the music switches to a song with a heavy bass, and you begin to feel the beats in the pit of your stomach. you melt into the music, letting every beat dictate your movements. the energy in the room changes, as if the pulsing sound awakened something in the crowd. you glance around, as if you’re trying to locate the source of the energy, before realizing you felt a pair of eyes on you.

there, across the flashing lights and moving bodies, you lock eyes with a stranger. despite the chaos around you, the stranger is standing still, maintaining eye contact with you. you feel a magnetic pull towards him, curiosity overcoming you. but before you can do anything about it, giselle pulls you deeper into the crowd. you can’t help but look back, searching for the eyes of that mysterious stranger.

“i think i’m gonna grab another drink,” you lean into giselle to say. “do you want anything?”

“i’m good for now!” she replies, continuing to dance.

you nod and try to part through the crowd, getting bumped and pushed a little too much for your liking. you escape the crowd only to another bustling one waiting around the bar. you sigh and run your fingers through your hair. this is gonna take a minute.

“you want a drink?” a man next to you says.

you prepare yourself to reject the man, having no interest in flirting with some random guy at a club. but when you look over, you notice it’s the man who was gazing at you across the dance floor. up close, he’s even more captivating. his dark hair is perfectly tousled and long strands of his tresses hang a bit over his face. his eyes contain a glint of curiosity, enhancing his mysterious demeanor. you catch yourself staring, and resort to nodding to him.

“what do you want?” he leans into your shoulder to murmur in your ear.

“uh, i think i just want a water,” you say, feeling yourself getting dizzy. you only had one shot and it’s wearing off quickly, and you realize the source is from a sudden wave of nerves.

you watch as he’s able to make his way to the edge of the bar top, not even needing to push and prod around the shifting bodies. in no time, he’s turning around with 2 waters, handing one to you. you take a big sip through the straw, trying so hard to maintain eye contact as he does the same. but his sharp brown eyes start to make you feel like jelly. how does he have this effect on you?

“i’m wooyoung,” he smiles, playing with his straw.

“hi wooyoung,” you say with a smile, telling him your name as well.

before you can continue, the song switches to the one you’ve been anticipating all night. umbrella. the crowd erupts in energy as the line around the bar immediately retreats to the dance floor. everyone knew what was about to happen. you look back at wooyoung with a smile on your face.

“let’s dance?” he says, grabbing your hand and steering you straight onto the dance floor.

you let out a giggle, seeing him holding your hand and looking back at you as pulls you in deeper. he pulls you into a spot big enough for the both of you, albeit very close. your faces are only inches apart, and you both gaze into each other’s eyes with growing interest. he then unleashes a sly grin, pointing to the ceiling above you. you look up to see a black metal box hanging from the ceiling.

“what is it?” you ask.

“wait for the chorus,” he lets out, slowly wrapping his arm around your waist.

you melt into his touch as the music pulses through your ears. you wrap your arms around his shoulders and let yourself sway to the rhythm. the lights are flashing blues and greens above you, glimmers reaching onto wooyoung’s face. you’re completely taken over by his trance, your eye contact persisting. his eyes break away to look up, watching the bubbles descend from the ceiling. you’re in awe from the whimsy around you, watching the bubbles fall onto the crowd.

it’s so silly in hindsight, the little light show and bubble machine. but with the way you feel the bass lines run through your whole body and the bubbles falling softly into your hair, you start to feel euphoric. wooyoung’s body melds into yours, grinding against you as he holds the small of your back. the bridge lifts the music to the height of the song, causing the bubbles to unleash tenfold.

“it’s so pretty!” you yell to him, attempting to catch them. you look to him smiling at you in admiration.

“oh my god,” you yelp, coming to a sudden realization. “giselle!”

you look around the crowd, searching for your friend. your eyes finally lock with hers, all while she’s dancing against a tall man.

“you okay?” you mouth to her.

she just nods eagerly, pointing behind to the man grinding against her. “I’M GOOD,” she mouths back with an OK hand signal.

you sigh in relief and turn back to wooyoung. a new song begins playing, but your focus is on him.

“wanna get out of here?” he says in your ear, before pulling back to see your expression.

you nod and allow him to pull you out of the crowd, weaving through the mass of people. he continues holding your hand all the way up the red stairwell, opening the door for you at the top of the stairs. as soon as you exit the building, you let out a big sigh.

“that was so fun,” you let out, smiling ear to ear. “now what?”

“i’m starving,” wooyoung says. “food?”

after getting something to eat at a food truck open a couple streets over, you and wooyoung arrive at a nearby park you found to sit in the grass. in the middle is a huge pond, with the moon reflecting along the soft ripples. you have a perfect view of the city, buildings looking massive and lights shining bright in the evening sky.

“it’s so beautiful,” you say under your breath, gazing at the sight before you.

wooyoung looks over at you. “yeah, it is.”

“you know, i just realized,” you start. “i’ve been in this city for a whole month and i haven’t even explored any of it yet.”

“why’s that?” wooyoung asks.

“i want to make the excuse of working too much, but it feels like a cop out,” you admit. “i’m just… completely new to this kind of lifestyle. this place has definitely been a culture shock.”

“so why’d you move here?” wooyoung shifts to face you more.

“i got tired of the monotony,” you say. “i wasn’t going anywhere back home. i felt so… stuck.” you run your fingers through your hair, and let out a dry laugh. “i thought maybe if i throw myself in an environment i know absolutely nothing about, i’d learn something about myself. that i’d figure out what the fuck i want to do with my life. but living here so far has only made me realize how scared i am.”

“what are you scared of?” he asks.

“that i’m way in over my head,” you sigh, half-joking. “do you ever feel that way?”

“all the time,” he says. “but i try to ignore it. we have to take risks, embrace the unknown. that’s the only way we can actually find ourselves.” you nod, and he puts his hand in yours. “it might feel scary right now, but you’ve just made the first step.”

“you’re right,” you saying, turning to look at him. “it’s funny, this is probably the biggest risk i’ve taken so far here.”

“ditching the club to go to a park?” wooyoung asks. “"we definitely need to get you on some more adventures." he stands up, extending his hand out to you.

“what, right now?” you ask, grabbing his hand to lift yourself up.

“the night is still young,” he smirks at you. “i know the perfect place to start.”

the park you were at was big, but you didn’t realize how big. wooyoung guides you through the expanse of it, finally reaching to one end with a large unlit building. you can’t make out what it is at first, until reaching close enough to realize what it is.

“a carousel?” you ask. wooyoung is ahead of you, leading the way. “but it’s closed!”

“does that matter?” he says mischievously, running to the side of the structure.

you linger behind, nervously scanning the area to ensure no one is around. if you get caught, you could be in a huge trouble. you’re not sure what kind of trouble, but you didn’t really want to find out. but before you can continue spiraling, the lights of the ride blink on and starts slowly spinning.

“how the hell…” you say to yourself.

you slowly approach the ride, feeling the anxiety slowly dissipate from your mind as you watch the lights illuminate before you and faint carnival music plays. as the carousel turns, you see wooyoung already on board, seated on an ornately decorated white horse.

“are you getting on or not?” he waves his hand, beckoning you over.

you clench your fists, taking a deep breath. before you even realize it, you find yourself hopping onto the ride, claiming the horse next to his.

as the carousel begins to pick up speed, you felt a surging sense of exhilaration running through your body. you watch the blurred city lights spinning around you in streaks of color, wind brushing through your hair. it’s dizzying, but somehow felt good. wooyoung’s laughter is contagious, and you catch yourself laughing too, the sound weaving into the faint carnival music. you look back at him, still smiling along with you.

“this is amazing!” you shout over the music, holding the pole tighter as the horse moves up and down.

“i knew you’d like it!” he says, voice filled with warmth.

wooyoung leans closer, your eyes locking onto each other. your breath hitches, the music and lights fading into the background. a gentle smile plays on his lips as he reaches his hand out to hold your cheek, starting to close the distance between you. just as your lips were about to touch, the machine starts to shut down, and a flash of light hits your face. you bring your hand up to shield your eyes.

“hey!” a man’s voice yells out. “you can’t be on there!”

shit. you’ve been caught. you look over to wooyoung, who promptly grabs your hand and starts running. the last bit of momentum of the ride boosts you off and you trip over yourself.

“hey! get back here!” you see that it’s park security yelling, and they’re starting to run towards you.

wooyoung lifts you up from the ground, and as soon as you regain your composure, you start bolting. you both run hand in hand, laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation. wooyoung looks back, the security guard still on your tail. you reach the edge of the park, not sure which way to turn. wooyoung steps in the street, waving his hand out for a car. you look back to see the guard nearly caught up to you.

“wooyoung, we gotta go!” you yell.

he lets out a loud whistle, prompting an almost-passing taxi to halt a few feet in front of you. you both hop in, wooyoung telling the taxi to just start driving. the driver follows, continuing down the street.

you’re both out of breath, heaving from the sudden running. you look at each other and laugh.

“well…” you say. “what next?”

“oooh, i like it,” wooyoung teases. “you almost get caught and you’re already ready for more?”

“shut up,” you say, shoving his shoulder.

“mind telling me where to go?” the driver says.

“oh, sorry,” wooyoung chuckles, pulling out his phone. “can you take us here?” he shows an address to him. the man inputs the directions and reroutes.

“where are we going?” you ask.

“just a little party,” he says.

you arrive to the address, staring at the building as wooyoung pays the taxi. it’s a high-rise apartment building, and it looks nice—like, your entire salary worth for one month nice.

“um, wooyoung,” you say hesitantly. “who’s party is this?”

he wraps his arm around you. “it’s some famous DJ.”

“do you know this famous DJ?” you ask, almost not wanting to know the answer.

“nope,” he replies, walking you both through the tall glass doors.

“then how the fuck do we plan on getting in?” you whisper-yell to him. “this is an apartment building!”

wooyoung takes his arm off of you and points to the front desk. “well for starters, there’s no doorman.”

“that’s only half the problem!” you say as you step into the elevator.

he puts his hand under your chin teasingly, forcing you to make direct eye contact. “just trust me.”

the elevator doors open to a huge hallway, white walls covered with lavish paintings and the floors a shiny marble. near the end of the hallway, you can see a couple people loitering around the entrance of an apartment. there’s a man guarding the door, most likely security. wooyoung starts walking confidently towards the door, you following behind wondering how the hell he’s gonna pull this off. he approaches the guard and nearly grabs the doorknob.

“name?” the man says flatly, holding his arm out.

“oh yeah, i’m—” wooyoung starts, then stop when the door swings open to let a few people out. he takes a glimpse inside, then suddenly seeming like he sees someone he recognizes. “oh, hey chris!”

a man inside waves back, although looking a bit confused. the security guard sees the exchange, momentarily taken off guard.

“mind if i go join my friend?” wooyoung says, trying to continue his ruse. “he’s been waiting for us all night.”

the guard remains skeptical, causing wooyoung to lean in closer to him. “look, he invited us personally. if we don’t get in, it’s on him. you know how these things go.”

not wanting to cause a scene, the guard hesitantly nods and lets you both through. as you walk into the lavish space, you can’t even wonder how the hell that worked. all that matters is that it did, and now you’re here, in this huge place swarming with undoubtedly rich party-goers and music blaring in your ears. you follow wooyoung as he makes his way to the kitchen island, grabbing drinks for both of you.

“what should we cheers to?” wooyoung grins, handing it to you.

“maybe our new friend chris?” you say, giggling.

“to chris!” he says, clinking his glass to yours. you both take a sip.

“you’re crazy,” you say to him. “i can’t believe that actually worked.”

“confidence is key,” he winks, taking another sip. “should we explore?”

you nod, turning to trail him as you head towards a hallway of doors. unsure which one to pick, you look at wooyoung.

“one of these doors has GOT to lead to something cool,” he says, already walking up to one of them. he opens the door and promptly closes it with a surprised look on his face.

“what was it?” you ask, curious as ever.

“let’s just say some guy is getting very lucky tonight,” he says, holding back a laugh. “maybe i should’ve knocked.”

you put your hand over your mouth in an attempt to hold back a laugh, but seeing wooyoung’s shocked face sends you over the edge. you let out a muffled cackle, causing wooyoung to crack up too.

“shhhh!” he says, still laughing with you. he walks up to the next door. “let’s try this one.”

he opens the door to a dark room. you can’t really tell what it is, until walking in and letting your eyes adjust.

“they have a fucking movie theater?” you say, looking at the plush red couches around you and huge screen before you. “how famous is this DJ?”

“i don’t know, but i’m gonna need chris to introduce us,” wooyoung says, plopping down into a seat. he pats the spot next to him, prompting you to join.

“how did you find out about this party anyway?” you ask, getting comfortable on the couch.

“a friend of a friend saw a story and blah blah blah… does it matter?” wooyoung says, chuckling.

“you must go on a lot of adventures,” you say.

“i guess so,” he says, shrugging. “you know, i was kinda like you when i first moved here. it felt like i was just living like a zombie… wake up, go to work, come home exhausted, fall asleep, and the cycle starts all over again. i didn’t even realize i was avoiding what i was meant to do when i moved here.”

“and what’s that?” you ask.

“same as you,” he says, leaning his shoulder against yours. “same as everyone who moves here, to find myself.”

“and?” you ask.

“and did i find myself?” he says. “no clue. but at least i’m having fun.” he breaks into a smile, eyes meeting yours. you can’t help but to smile back.

“i guess having fun is a good start,” you reply. “maybe that’s exactly what i need.”

“i can help with that,” wooyoung whispers with a smile, leaning in towards you. your eyes flick from his eyes down to his lips, feeling the magnetism between you pulling you closer.

the theater door swings open behind you with two men charging in.

“yeah man, i don’t fucking know this guy!” your used-to-be friend chris says to the security guard approaching you.

“alright, you two,” the guard huffs. “party’s over.”

wooyoung and you immediately jump up, running to the opposite side of the theater to loop around and push past “chris” to escape out the theater door. you run together, attempting to open each door in the hallway to find some sort of place to hide. when one of them leads to a bathroom, you both rush in and slam the door behind you to lock it. wooyoung presses you against the door, his hand resting just above your head.

your breath trembles as you look up at wooyoung. he places his hand on your cheek, examining your face before closing the distance between you in a hungry kiss. he presses you close against his body, moving his other hand to hold your waist. the kiss was all-consuming, finally allowing all the built up tension to finally release between your bodies. your lips meld into his as you card your fingers through his long hair, not wanting to let go.

a knock shakes the door against your back as a man yells for you two to get out. but the threatening voice is just another sound in the background, your mind is only on wooyoung. you separate for moment, foreheads leaning against each other.

“let’s go somewhere more private,” wooyoung whispers. you smile and allow him to lead the way.

as you arrive at wooyoung’s place, you cling to him, allowing his lips to meet yours in a passionate embrace. you stumble over each other as he moves you backwards toward the bedroom, giggles escaping both of you. your clothes fall to the ground in the process, nearly ripping them off each other. you fall back onto the bed and wooyoung hovers over you, continuing to kiss you ravenously. his hands roam up and down your body, almost as if he wants to feel every inch of you—as if he wants to worship you. he slots between your legs, grinding against your core as he begins kissing your neck.

your body is aching for him, it’s been aching for him all night. the moment you saw him, the energy between you felt electric. and even now, with his body pressed against yours, the undeniable chemistry flows among you. your moans are inescapable, with the desire building in your stomach. wooyoung lifts himself slightly to move a wandering hand down to your heat, pushing your underwear to the side to feel your dripping core.

“so wet,” his muffled voice against your skin, before moving to meet your lips again.

he gathers your wetness upwards, beginning to rub circles around your clit. you moan into his mouth, relishing in the agonizing stimulation. he dips his fingers back down to your hole, entering his two middle fingers slowly. as he inches in, you clench around him, eager to take them. he thrusts his fingers in and out, progressively reaching deeper inside you. when he starts curling his digits to reach your g spot, you break away from his kiss to let out a wanton moan.

“wooyoung, i need to feel you,” you murmur, urging him to take off his underwear with you following suit.

he guides his cock to your entrance, dragging upwards to stimulate your clit. he drags back down and pushes his cockhead against your fluttering hole. your legs tangle around his waist, squeezing as if to tell him please, please fuck me. he pushes into you, causing you to release a sharp gasp at the size. he holds the side of your face, caressing gently as he gradually begins thrusting.

the sounds of your strangled breaths fill the room as he continues his movements into you. waves of pleasure ripple throughout your body, making you dig your nails into his shoulder blades. his body moves in perfect harmony with yours, emitting a raw, unspoken passion. your legs wrap around him even tighter, your heated bodies melding into each other even deeper. the connection between you feels magnetic, and it only grows stronger with each thrust. his gaze meets yours, eyes filled with lust.

“you feel so fucking good,” he says between breaths, and places tender kisses along your jawline.

“please, don’t stop,” you manage to reply, pleasure taking over.

he lifts his body up to piston into you, hips snapping against you. his moans are unrelenting, the grip on your thighs tightening as the heat in your stomach begins to grow. he feels the way your core contracts around him, causing him to release one hand from your thigh to now focus on toying with your clit. this increases the clenching, nearly taking his breath away in pleasure. his thumb’s pace quickens, bringing the tension in your core to an unbearable peak.

“wooyoung, i’m gonna cum,” you moan, feeling the cord in you ready to snap.

“cum with me, baby,” he replies, his pace persisting. you can feel his grip start to tighten as he angles himself just right in you, causing you to completely come undone.

the room around you fades away as pure ecstasy overcomes you, not even holding back the straight up pornographic moans each of you are letting out. the tightening of your core around him makes his hips stutter, filling you completely with his release. the rolls of his hips begin to slow, fucking the last bit of his cum into you. he lets out a satisfied groan, falling on top of you while still inside.

your chest rises and falls in staggered breaths, finally coming down from your high. your run your fingers through wooyoung’s hair as he nestles in your neck. he hums against you softly, sending vibrations against your skin.

you wonder if this will be a one time thing—if he was just the perfect stranger you needed to meet in order to discover yourself. that he was just a stepping stone to urge you forward on your path, soon to be left behind but never forgotten. your heart sinks at the thought of it. you didn’t want that to be the case, because what you felt with him felt too real. that there’s this undeniable intense pull that made you crave more, and you ache at the thought of letting this go.

wooyoung gently holds the side of your neck, soft breathing tickling at you as his thumb slowly caresses you.

“sooo,” he starts. “what are you doing tomorrow?”

a smile spreads across your face as you realize that this perfect stranger won’t remain a stranger for long.

a/n: yeah so this was very self-indulgent but i have no regrets. i'm defo gonna make tonssss more woo fics, especially sub!woo, so stay tuned for that. 3rd fic ever so plz leave feedback and reblog to support me! thank uuuuuu ✧*

✰taglist✰ @skz1-4-3 @oddracha @luvbit3z

#jung wooyoung #ateez #ateez fanfic #ateez x reader #ateez smut #ateez fic #wooyoung #wooyoung smut #wooyoung x reader #ateez one shot #wooyoung fic

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hwallazia · 3 months

Text

SIREN – 최산

synopsis . in which too many words aren’t needed to get laid with your dream man.

pairing . choi san & fem!reader

genre . smut (mdni!), strangers to lovers ??? (or smth like that), tooth rotting fluff at the end (ofc, it wouldn’t be a hwallazia work otherwise), non idol!au

taglist . @bro-atz @purplenimsicle @vampzity @iykyunho | apply to join my taglist ♡

word count . 4,1k

DISCLAIMER! sub!san (in the beginning he acts all tough but he’s just a shy man who needs to be taken care of), dom!reader, unprotected sex (wrap before tap fellas), dirty talk, lots of teasing (reader taunts our poor needy sannie way too much), dacryphilia?, overstimulation, cowgirl position, blowjob, dry humping?, begging oh so much begging, creampie, squirting, petnames (sannie, baby, love, darling & more), softest!dom san at the end ((⁠╥⁠﹏⁠╥⁠))

NIC’S NOTES this is totally inspired in bruno mars & cardi b’s “please me” music video (song rec for the fic ofc!). firstly, i thought of writing this for yunho, but the idea of submissive san is just... *sighs* makes me go feral. i have no more words. so well, i hope you enjoy reading.. whatever this is <3

laughter echoing, heels clicking against the ground, and jewelry shining with the intermittent city lights. the night out with your girls was a total success, with a couple of boys dripping over themselves from just the look of your slim, god-sculpted figures and playful, perfect grins, teeth white as pearls. of course, a few sluts jealous of all the attention you and your crew were receiving —you think that one of the boys who asked for your number was some plastic blondie’s boyfriend. saying that you felt absolutely unreachable was an understatement, your red lipstick sticking perfectly to your desirable lips, your not-so-covering outfit fitting your body just right and your siren-like eyes making the legs of every man you ever landed your gaze quivering in anticipation. the effect you had was supernatural and the smooth masculine attention made your stomach jump in excitement and narcissism, your mind clouded by a god-complex fog.

even though some of the men who approached you with clear second intentions were hot and you’d understand if he had a queue of girls who wanted to get laid with him, you didn’t find any of them good enough for you. it’d be just a one-night thing but still, you wanted to look for a man that made your heart flutter just with the sight of him. unfortunately, that didn’t happen in the club, so you and your girls retired once the clock hit 4.

you all were still too hyped and too beautiful to go to your houses, so you decided to go to a taco place since your friend, mia, was craving some good tacos. with a fifteen-minute walk, you got to the restaurant. as your friends kept laughing loudly over something you wouldn’t understand even if you were sober, you pushed the door open, the bell above it making an annoying sound for your intoxicated brain. you analyzed the place: cookers doing their thing behind the counter, being the ones to blame for the fire coming from pans and the toe-curling smell of meat and fried condiments; a lovey-dovey couple sitting in the table of the corner, way too far from your location; and a few tables full of people of all ages. but there was this one table that your group couldn’t help but watch intently: four gentlemen talking about god knows what and drinking their “corona” brand beers occasionally. one of them noticed how his intense and siren-like gaze was above them, his legs sloppily kicking their friends under the table.

“ow! wooyoung what was that f—” the tall, bulky-figured man called san whined before he turned around and saw you and your group still standing right next to the entrance. holy fuck, he immediately thought. he had never seen a woman as flawless as you, your curves making his hands itch from the solely and uncontrollable desire of touching them. he licked his lips in anticipation.

“fuck, look at that girl.” who kicked his leg, wooyoung, expressed out of breath the moment his eyes landed on your friend, hana. heat suddenly running up his neck and ears, the same happening to the tallest of them, yunho, when he fixated his black orbs on hana’s sibling, yoona. “finest woman i’ve ever seen.”

“same here.” the second tallest sitting at the table, mingi, agreed as well as he analyzed mia’s figure; his bottom lip caught between his perfect white row of teeth, eyes telling not very biblical tales.

“i think i got hard,” wooyoung said and lowered his head to meet his non-erected crotch, earning a slightly harsh fist landing on the side of his shoulder, courtesy of yunho.

“how old are you, man? really” san spoke hypocritically. his dirty mind was playing the same or worse scenarios wooyoung’s had been thinking of with hana but with you. he was already picturing you naked, bent over his kitchen counter, your notorious plump ass completely under his mercy, drawing all the faces you could possibly make as his cock rammed roughly inside you, the flesh of your ass bouncing every time his hips met yours. even though he hasn’t heard your voice yet, he can imagine the divine, cute moans you would mutter with his cock still pistoning against your wet and incredibly tight—

“san? you good, man?” mingi swung his hand right in front of his reddened face, a laugh coming from his friends the moment he slightly shook his head, waggling the sinful thoughts away.

“someone was fantasizing” wooyoung teased in a singsong tone, mingi and yunho chuckling as well.

“hell. we gotta take those ladies home.” san uttered rapidly before his mind could process his thoughts. the men’s eyes fixated on your group, which was already sitting at a table near them, mia and hana enjoying two tacos each while you and yoona kept drinking a cocktail. they didn’t know what you and your friends were laughing about, but they desperately wished they could be part of the conversation. and they would.

“okay. fellas,” wooyoung started, his friends turning their heads. “follow me and my charm.”

san, mingi, and yunho sighed in unison. they didn’t know when the day would come when they would put up with at least half of the narcissism of their friend who was standing up, by the way, drawing hana’s attention, who had been watching him since he entered that restaurant. he made his way to your table, the rest of his friends following his steps like a toddler looking up to his older brother. although the boys would never have wooyoung as a role model.

“well hello ladies,” he pulled out the most charming, gravel-like voice he could, his friends choking a laugh since they perfectly knew that wooyoung was overdoing it. but if it gets them the results they’re expecting then they’d let him be. “do y’all mind us sitting here?”

the eight of you weren’t stupid, you knew what you wanted. and you and your girls, especially, were desperate for those men’s attention. dancing and twerking over completely random strangers just to get their cocks hard and leave was exhausting and unproductive since none of them were good enough for y’all. so the four of you didn’t waste another second and stood up from their places, each of you approaching your desired man: yoona with yunho, mingi with mia, wooyoung with hana, and you with san.

you grabbed his wrist, guiding him to a different table, far from your and his friends’ location, your unfinished drink left on the table. you sat first and san did the same thing, making himself a place next to you, his gaze locked with yours still without saying a word. you both just let your eyes talk for you, a fire ignited inside san’s dark orbs.

you both turned your heads to the exit door the moment you heard the ringing of a bell, wooyoung and mia disappearing behind it. before he could totally abandon the place, he looked at san and gave him a thumbs up holding a champion grin drawn on his face. once the door clicked shut, san chuckled deeply, your skin trembling just from the sound of it.

“hah, wooyoung really knows how to play.” he exhaled looking down for a bit but not doubting a slight second to return his eyes to yours, your absurdly captivating eyes.

“oh so wooyoung is his name?” you asked, a hint of seduction hidden in your voice.

“yes, why’re you asking?” he replied hiding his nervousness in fake bravery. aren’t you interested in him? why’d you ask for his friend? his best friend?

“he’s cute.” you smiled as if it wasn’t a big deal.

san’s insides were hollering with your response. “cute?!” his desperate mind screamed. he cleared his throat for a second before responding what moments ago he thought he wouldn’t be able to answer. “then why’d you come up to me instead of him?”

his little jealous act made your heart tender. was he already jealous of you calling other men “cute” when he doesn’t even know your name? adorable.

“’cause you’re cuter,” you said leaning close enough to him to pinch the tip of his nose, you didn’t miss the little scrunch he did. oh, this man was going to be the death of you. you pulled away with a grin before continuing. “so...” you trailed off, expecting him to complete your words with his name, still unknown to you.

“san.”

“san,” you repeated in a velvety tone that made san’s ear and belly tingle. “where do you wanna take this?”

san’s nervousness was quickly replaced by all the thoughts he had earlier when he first saw you. now he was the one who smoothly bent his figure over yours, cornering you between the wall and his bulky body. “as far as you allow me” his honey-dripping, but still sinful voice rang inside your eardrums, making you want to hear it all night long.

you smirked at his complete willingness and couldn’t help but kiss his lips. san hummed in the kiss, feeling relieved since he had been wanting to devour you the moment he saw you come through that door. his excitement won over his conservative side so he acted accordingly, his right hand made its way up to your jaw to insert his hot, skillful tongue inside your cavity; a soft whine from you was heard. you didn’t want to wait for his other hand to grab your waist, so you straddle his lap, your tiny skirt lifting up consequently, almost revealing your lace panties. san, like the gentleman he is, let you settle comfortably on him before reaching your skirt and pulling it down, so it could at least cover the important parts.

you finally broke the intense, breath-taking kiss just to mutter right on his lips. “let’s get out of here, hm?”

a few minutes passed and you both were already abandoning the place, getting in san’s car. you had agreed to go to san’s place, and san was more than pleased to take a woman like you home. the ride to his apartment was full of lingering touches here and there that were more than just skin-to-skin contact. your hand caressed his thigh dangerously, your long nails faintly stroking his hardened bulge. the self-control that san had to not jerk his hips upwards was supernatural, and you found this very amusing and hot.

you straightened your back and leaned over him, one of your breasts touching his arm faintly, which was gripping the gear lever with all the strength he had. “you’re very good at keeping it cool. let’s see if you still can when i suck your cock.” you sentenced, finally stroking his tight crotch, the hiss coming from his lips only feeding your eagerness to keep touching him, apparently, the way he likes.

“ugh, please” the fact that he was driving prevented him from shutting his eyes and throwing his head back, the feeling being too good to be true. what were you doing to him? you didn’t even have your hand wrapped around his dick, so why was he already panting like a bitch in heat? “p-please, i can’t—ugh—”

“don’t tell me you’re gonna cum with just a couple of strokes?” your teasing tone made his body shiver even more, this action not going unnoticed by you. a smirk was drawn on your lips, the effect you had on this man was even hot for you.

“n-no, i’m not.. ’s just that—hmph!” you grasped his cock tightly, his eyes rolling to the back of his head in satisfaction.

“eyes on the road, sannie.” your velvet voice enveloped him even more in the cloud of your attracting effect. something inside san, warm and glowing at the praise, made his hanged-open mouth to let out the most precious mewl you’ve ever heard. you touched him three times more before releasing your grip on his cock, the silhouette of a slightly wet tent made your pussy clench.

“w-why’d you stop?” he whined at the loss of contact, his leg bouncing up and down in desperation.

you smiled, fingers brushing over the soft skin of san’s cheek. “let’s get home first, cutie.”

and he didn’t have to be told twice, his feet stepping harshly on the accelerator, your back hitting the car seat in consequence. “so desperate” you muttered under your breath, san being unable to hear your words.

finally, you made it to san’s place. he urgently rummaged through his pockets, looking for his apartment key. he inserted it on the lock and twisted it, opening the door. behind it, a dim-lighted, minimalistic, and quite spacious studio apartment was hidden, you entered before san did, looking all around you. “well uhm. this is my—mph!” he spoke while turning around to face you, but he was suddenly interrupted when you threw yourself at him to kiss him once again. you had become addicted to it on such short notice. you walked forward so he was walking backward, your eyes opening a little in the middle of the kiss to locate his bed. the moment you introduced your tongue inside his cavity, he knew it was over. he definitely wasn’t going to be the dominant one tonight. you guided him into his own bed, and when his calves hit its frame, he knew he could sit. you analyzed him before straddling his lap. god, san must’ve been sculpted by the heavens, all broad shoulders and chiseled muscles and a tapering waist that you had been a little obsessed with from the moment you landed your eyes on him.

you finally settled just fine on his lap, already making yourself a home in it. san instinctively grabbed a few handfuls of your ass before getting rid of your annoying top, your bra being the only piece of cloth attached to your body. but san was growing impatient, his lips desiring more than anything to suck your breasts. and fortunately, no words were needed since you could read him like a book. your hands reached your back and unhooked your bra in an instant, giggling at san’s excited mouth which didn’t waste much time before wrapping his lips around your nipples. hips stuttering at the feeling.

eventually, san included teeth and tongue to his ministrations, your back arching in response. “oh fuck, sannie. keep going,” you stroked his locks of hair and his nape tenderly. you continued speaking, “sucking a nameless woman’s tits. what does that have to say about you, darling?” you teased.

oh fuck you were right. you had asked him for his name, but he didn’t even bother, way too desperate for your body to even start with the formalities. he stopped his movements and unattached his lips from your nipple, it became erected when the cold air of the room passed through it, a shiver running down your spine. he stopped pleasuring you, but your hips were still rocking against his bulged cock, pants leaving his and your mouth. “i-i’m sorry. what’s—hah—your name?”

“yn, love.” you simply answered and brought your lips closer to the curvature of his ear, continuing your words in a faint whisper. “but you can call me whatever you want tonight” you tilted your head to the side and attached your lips to his neck, spreading sloppy kisses and licks all along it.

he was getting more and more excited as the minutes passed, which seemed to pass tortuously slowly. your bouncing hips placed significant pressure on his crotch, making his insides scream for relief. whines started to leave san’s mouth.

“a-ah, stop please.. it hurts” he pleaded with a broken voice, his aching cock begging for release. you stared at him from above, his sparkling eyes melting your heart.

“need something, baby?” your teasing tone was driving him over the edge. he didn’t want, he required your mouth on his cock. and now, otherwise, he’d explode.

“touch me, please” he whined. “i can’t take it.”

you were starting to feel sorry for the tightness you felt perfectly underneath you, but a small part of you wanted to keep messing with him for a bit longer. “but i am touching you, dear. need you to be more specific.”

he let out a shameless mewl at your words, closing his eyes for a second. suddenly, san on the verge of tears “just touch my cock! suck it, or fuck me. i don’t know, whatever you please but do something! please..”

a loving sigh left your lips as you caressed san’s cheek tenderly. “aw, baby. i’ll give you just what you want.”

you promised and complied. you moved off his thighs to get on your knees, shyness not being a feeling. the perfect fit of your figure between san’s toned legs made his cock twitch. your manicured hands trailed their way up to his pants, your fingers unbuckling his belt and pulling them down in a fast movement. you were desperate too, you had been craving his touch —and other prohibited things— all night. and finally your wish would come true.

you stroked his exposed member before running your tongue all over it, still not putting it explicitly in your mouth. his angry, reddened tip leaked drips of pre-cum, making it look like tiny pearls. you were impressed by the length and girth of it, the sight being completely mouth-watering. you didn’t make the poor man above you wait any longer, so you opened your mouth widely to finally dive in, enveloping his cock with your welcoming heat.

the sensation was overwhelming for san since his cock was sensitive from all the teasing you had done before. then he was forced to put all his weight on his arms which, located at his sides, tightly gripped the white sheets that would soon be soaked.

“oh my—fuck—” he choked out, sweat running down his temples.

your head bobbed up and down his length, what you couldn’t fit inside your mouth was being attended by your skillful hand. san’s high-pitched and breathy moans started to get louder when your nails caressed his balls gently while you took him all the way down, his cockhead hitting the back of your throat.

“close.. ugh, so fucking close” he exhaled, still grasping the sheets underneath him. because he couldn’t bring himself to touch, like you’re fragile, and everything will shatter if he does. even though he was the openly desperate one, he’d let you go at your own pace, politely petting your hair. “i—ah—i’m gonna cum, wait” he warned frantically and breathlessly, his hand pushing your shoulder gently, he didn’t want you to get dirty with his cum. such a gentleman even in a situation as lewd as that.

but you didn’t seem to care, way too immersed in his throbbing, addicting cock. you were committed to making his cum. and you did, a broken holler leaving san’s lip, swollen and red from biting them so harshly as your cavity was filled with hot spurts of his cum.

but that wasn’t enough for you. so you kept pumping his dick slowly as you got up, san’s hips jerking underneath you, shrieks coming from his mouth resonated across the room. after getting rid of your skirt, you resumed your initial position and placed your knees at his sides, his tired hands immediately resting on the outer sides of your thighs. you didn’t give him much time to recompose as you aligned his cock to your wet, unattended entrance.

“uh—wait yn, i just came. give me just a min—ahh!” he begged the moment he saw your body lower on his sensitive member. but it was too late, you had already pushed your panties aside and started bouncing up and down his length.

once again, the overwhelming sensation overcame san, and he surrendered, collapsing onto the mattress. a rush of coolness ran down his spine as the cold sheets met his sweat-drenched back, sending shivers through his entire body. you took advantage of his vulnerable position, resting your hands on his firm, plump chest. you began to bounce even harder, determined to milk every last drop of cum from his cock, feeling the tension build with each movement.

at that point, san was only blubbering nonsense underneath you, delirious, fucked out of his mind, his eyes glassy and lewd whines leaving his slick lips. “fuck—’s too much, too much, ahh!” he shamelessly moaned, not caring even a little bit about how loud he was. he’d probably lots of complaints from his neighbors. but he’d take care of that tomorrow, right now all he could this about was you and your wet, warm, and pulsating cunt squeezing his cock divinely.

“keep screaming for me, pretty boy” you expressed, unashamed as well. “make the whole building know who’s making you feel good.”

san whimpered even more loudly in response. “fuck—yn, please”

“who’s making you feel good?” you repeated just to get another couple of whispered ‘please’ as a response. but those weren’t the words you wanted to hear. “answer.”

your stern tone sent a warmer heat down his belly. “you, yn” he managed to respond but in a faint murmur. and still, that wasn’t what you were looking for. in consequence, you lifted your body up to only envelope his red tip with your walls and squeezed them on purpose, earning a loud, prolonged cry. “ah! yn, please!”

a smirk was drawn on his lips, satisfyingly going down him again. “please what, love?”

“make me cum! please, make me cum again” he mewled, a couple of tears streaming down his cheeks.

“isn’t that too greedy from you? you came not long ago.” you taunted him for the last time in the night.

“yes, i’m greedy! i just—ahh! i need to cum, pleasepleaseplease” he whimpered, repeating his prayers like a mantra.

you, enlightened by his begging, smiled sweetly and trapped his right nipple between your index and middle finger, playfully twisting them. “then cum, sannie. make a mess inside me.”

and those were the only words he needed, his cum even spilling out of your ravished cunt, mixed with your warm, clear juices. a sigh left your lips, your insides filled to the brim. “ahh, good boy, sannie. goood boy.” you trailed off your words as you fondled his cheeks, covered in sweat and tears.

your tired state made your body move faster than your mind could process and you laid down next to him. a few minutes of silence were necessary to stabilize your breathing and regain a normal body temperature. the cold night began to show its effects on each other’s skin, both suddenly feeling your hair stand on end.

“ooh” you uttered at the rushing cold breeze that ran through your legs up to your spine. “it’s cold.”

san didn’t say any words and just stretched his arm to reach the least dirty blanket and cover your bodies with it. he brought your figure closer to his as he enclosed your shoulder with his strong arm. a weird feeling of safety drowning your insides. it was such an intimate and loving moment even though the only thing you knew about each other was the other’s name. still, you didn’t want to move, you strangely enjoyed his company more than you expected.

san, after moments of complete silence, spoke, “wanna go out tomorrow?”

“mm? go out?”

“yeah. even though i only know your name, you’re the most beautiful, breathtaking woman i’ve ever seen in my life. and don’t get me wrong, i loved this, i think i might have an obsession with your body now.” you both chuckled, “but it’d be my greatest pleasure if you let me take you out on a date tomorrow.” he stared at you for a moment before continuing, “wanna know more about you.”

your still dumbfounded mind didn’t let you think clearly, so you could only mutter a few words, “apart from my name?”

he giggled softly, your heart melting as the sound reached your ears. a warmth spreaded through your chest consequently. “apart from your name.” he confirmed.

you didn’t have much to think about. this had never happened to you with any of the guys you had slept with, and it had always been your dream to find the one. the one who, in addition to your body, is interested in your soul, what you have to give. and it seemed like your dream man was right next to you, wrapping you with his captivating, safe arms. then your response was automatic, tenderly silent. “yes, i’d love to.”

san smiled fondly. “it’s settled then.” he brought his lips to your forehead to place a short, sincere kiss. “thank you, princess” he whispered in a low, sweet tone. your cheeks and heart warming at the sound of it. “let’s get some sleep, hm?”

you hummed lowly in response, nestling comfortably in his chest. reality hadn’t hit you yet, but it would soon. tomorrow! more specifically. but, for the moment, you just dedicated yourself to sleep soundly, trapped between the love of your life and wet sheets.

| masterlist

#© hwallazia #ateez #ateez smut #choi san #choi san smut #san smut #san x reader #choi san x reader #san one shot #choi san imagine #ateez scenarios #ateez x reader #ateez imagines #ateez fanfic

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daydreams-after-dark · 4 months

Text

What's your fanfic fantasy? part 4

Chapter Contents.

Part 1 // Part 2 // Part 3 // Part 4 // Part 5 // Part 6 // Part 7 // Part 8 // Part 9 // Part 10 // Part 11 // Part 12 // Part 13 // Part 14 //

Chapter summary: chan helps you fulfil a fantasy of sensual sex with a stranger.

Premise: OFC + Chan + Jisung 18+ fanfic. This is an AU story about Chan bringing your fantasies to life... but what happens when boyfriends Chan and Han fall in love with you?

Content Warnings: nudity, anonymous sexual encounter, blindfolds, anal fingering, blow job, angst, p in v unprotected sex.

You look out to the ocean from your balcony window. You're trying to calm your nerves and simultaneously build up the courage to go downstairs to make yourself some breakfast.

Why oh why did you send Chan that message last night? Admittedly, it was a very impulsive thing to do, and in hindsight you should have thought it through a bit more.

You hadn’t even considered what Chan might have thought. What if he doesn’t feel comfortable approaching a band member and saying “Hey do you wanna fuck y/n - and oh yeah, she won’t know it’s you?" Maybe he doesn’t want to make it look like you sleep around (not that that is even a bad thing)? Or what if none of them want to do it.

Oh my God. What if none of them want to fuck you? You shake your head. Get a grip.

Eventually, your hunger becomes too much and you head downstairs to the kitchen.

The kitchen is one of those gorgeous gourmet ones you see on Pinterest, and looks out onto a large living area that has enormous sliding doors, which opens out onto the ocean. It’s an absolutely gorgeous space, perfect for a creative getaway.

You hope that no one will be in there since you had waited well past what would be considered “breakfast” time to make your way down.

You tentatively peek your head in, and to your relief no one is there. Thank fuck. You survey the kitchen counter to see what you should eat, and see a cloche covering a plate with a note on top.

“Please eat me!”

You lift the covering to find fresh brownies underneath. Felix must have arrived. Felix isn’t in the band but he manages their tech. Plus he’s known the guys forever, and he makes the best brownies.

“Hey there.” you turn, startled, your mouth stuffed full of brownie.

It’s Jisung.

“You look good with your mouth full.” He teases and raises an eyebrow.

You manage to swallow your mouthful and stick your tongue out at him.

“Oh you want something else in you mouth do you?” he chuckles. “Actually, y/n. You’re not avoiding us this morning are you?” his tone turns serious. “You didn’t come down for breakfast.”

You shake your head “I was just tired.” you reply. He doesn’t believe you. You can see it in his face.

“You are… you’re okay with what happened yesterday then?” He looks at you intensely.

“Yes. Yes. Yesterday was fucking incredible.” you assure him, truthfully. It was incredible, but it’s the aftermath that has you confused. Confused about your feelings, your desires, about Chan and Jisung, and what they might be feeling.

“But?” he pushes.

“But nothing.” you respond more hastily than you intended.

He leans in “You weren’t freaked out when Chan fucked me were you?” he whispers.

Your breath hitches and your core aches at his words. “No! Everything is fine.” you reiterate.

Jisung nods. “Okay.” He seems reassured enough for now. “So, what about this blindfold thingy?” He changes the subject.

Your eyes widen. Of course Jisung would know about your message to Chan, but it doesn’t make you any less embarrassed.

“What did Chan say?” you ask with too much enthusiasm.

“He said-” Jisung begins.

“Jisung, y/n.” Chan is standing at the door, wearing grey sweats and loose t-shirt, but you can’t help picturing him shirtless and thrusting into Jisung. Oh God. You steady yourself.

“Hey babe!” Jisung skips over to him and plants a sloppy kiss on his cheek.

Chan ushers you both over to the couch where he and Jisung sit across from you and you sit there nervously playing with the fabric of your shorts. You feel like you're about to be scolded by two parents.

“So y/n. I suppose we owe you an explanation?” begins Chan.

You shake your head. “Not really - ”

“We do. You see Jisung and I…” Chan pauses. “We're together. In a relationship. Boyfriends.” He continues matter of fact. Jisung squeezes Chan’s thigh and smiles at him. Jisung is so fucking in love, you can see it on his face. Why hadn’t you noticed this sooner?

“Okay.” you nod.

“Only the band members know.” adds Jisung, and you catch his smile falter ever so slightly.

“Well, that’s wonderful that you are both together. And I am glad that you are okay with me knowing.” You're genuinely happy for them.

Chan’s expression turns serious, pained even. “We also need to know if you have any concerns about yesterday? If we need to do anything...Fix anything?”

You can’t stop thinking about yesterday. You couldn’t stop thinking about it last night when you were alone in your bed. Jisung had certainly succeeded in his mission, and now you really can’t get him out of your head.

“Yesterday was great. I thought we all had a good time? Didn’t we?” You're really worried that they regret it.

“Oh y/n, we did! Didn’t we Chan? Y/n you were so- ” Chan raises his hand to cut Jisung off. “Jisung, calm yourself or you are gonna get yourself horny again, and I don’t have the energy.”

Jisung’s phone beeps. “Shit, it’s Binnie. I’ve got a training session with him. Leg day.” He gets up to leave and Chan gives him a love tap on the way past.

“Hey! Don’t touch my butt!” he cries, “Unless you’re going to fuck me!” he adds as he bounds out of the room. Chan smirks and you hide a giggle.

It’s just you and Chan now. The room is silent.

“So," Chan scratches his head and grins nervously. “You want to talk about this blindfold fantasy?”

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

Later… (a/n: some of you may recognise the following scenario as a standalone oneshot, but this where I wrote it originally. I apologise in advance if that makes this installment underwhelming. the chapter ends a little differently to the oneshot too.)

You walk down the dimly lit hallway towards one of the unused bedrooms. You've decided this scenario will take place in a space that no one is using, to really maximize the mysteriousness of it.

Butterflies are going absolutely crazy in your stomach, and you tug your satin robe tighter around you trying to settle them down. You feel very sexy and feminine wearing nothing but the robe. The cream floral print against a gold background makes you feel like a queen.

You approach the designated door and knock.

“Come in.” Chan calls from within the room.

You swallow hard and push open the door.

You're immediately taken aback. The room is stunning. The décor is dark and moody, with the walls painted a dark grey blue, and the furniture looks as though it’s antique. Paintings of abstract naked women are hung around the room.

There are various stained-glass lamps, emanating a seductive glow, and there is music playing low in the background. It sounds like French music. A woman’s voice seductively fills the room.

Then there’s the bed. Huge, King sized, so plush and high set. Chan is laying propped up against the dark timber headboard, he almost looks lost leaning amongst the generous number of over sized plush pillows. He’s wearing black tracksuit pants and a muscle tee. It looks out of place in such a sensually styled room.

“What do you think?” Chan gestures around the room.

“Th-this,” you stammer. “It’s amazing Chan.” You move towards the bed, stretching out your hand to touch the dark green quilt. It’s luxurious on your fingertips. You run your hand along the fabric as you move closer to the head of the bed. Someone’s going to fuck you on this.

You perch on the side of the bed facing away from Chan. Your feet barely reach the floor, and you notice the black blindfold laid out neatly on the bedside table. Next to it is a bottle of coconut oil.

“How are you feeling? Are you okay?” Chan reaches out to touch your hand that’s resting beside you on the bed.

You inhale deeply and then slowly release your breath. How are you feeling? It’s a mixture of feelings really. You're so very nervous. That, you already know. But, you're also… excited. The idea of what’s about to happen is truly thrilling to you. You hope Chan doesn’t think you're too much. You don’t want him to judge you.

You turn to him. “You don’t think badly of me do you?” you ask him.

He looks surprised and squeezes your hand. “Of course I don’t think badly of you, babygirl.” He gazes deep into your eyes. “I just want to make you happy, and to feel good.” He sits up. “Y/n. I was worried you think badly of me! I was worried I might’ve pushed into something you didn’t really want to do.”

You shake your head profusely. “No! I loved yesterday.” you assure him. You sigh. “You seem so confident, and sure of things… you’ve got yourself sexually figured out and not ashamed of it. I feel like I don’t know anything about myself. I never imagine in a million years I would be living out a fantasy like this…I would normally be too ashamed to ever voice such a desire.” You say shrilly.

He laughs and goes quiet. “Well Jisung thinks I’m ashamed, ashamed of him, and that’s why we haven’t come out.” He sighs, a pained look in his eyes, “But it’s not that at all. I’m not ashamed of him… it’s just the world isn’t a very accepting place. I don’t want Jisung to get hurt.”

You reach up and cup his face. “This is why I love you. You are just too caring. We all love you for it.”

Chan smiles and then his focus switches like a light switch. “We gotta get you ready!” He practically jumps off the bed and moves around to the side of the bed you're sitting on. He takes your hand and you slide off the bed.

You'd already discussed the details of how you were going to do this, covering safe words and safe gestures, what positions you are going to be in, and these had been relayed to whoever was going to be participating.

You stand in front of Chan facing away from him. There is tension in the air. Your breath feels wobbly. He steps closer to you and you can feel his breath on your neck and a pang in your chest. You really wish he’d kiss you. He slowly reaches around, careful not to touch you too much, Why doesn’t he want to touch you? and pulls at your robe’s tie belt.

It comes loose easily and allows your robe to fall open. Chan delicately pulls it off your shoulders letting it drop to the floor. You were now standing completely naked in front of Chan, and only Chan.

He had seen you naked only just a day ago, but that was in the throws of lust. It wasn’t planned. This feels more intimate and you're feeling self conscious. He hasn’t been this close to your naked body. Goosebumps form on your skin. It isn’t cold in the room, Chan had thought of that too and had made the room a comfortable temperature. He’s so fucking considerate. You smile to yourself.

You close your eyes in a bid to compose yourself. Fuck. You're really doing this.

Chan takes your hand again and grabs the blindfold in the other. He steadies you as you climb onto the bed where he resumes the position of laying down but propped up against a pillow and headboard. He directs you to sit between his legs facing away from him, and carefully places the blindfold over your eyes and securing it at the back of your head. Your senses immediately heighten. This feels so erotic.

“Lean back on me.” He whispers as he guides you to lean back onto his fully clothed body. You can feel his hard, toned muscles flexing underneath you, and his breathing is strained. Is he nervous? You can feel an erection beginning to dig into your back. Is this turning him on?

You imagine what this must look like, your exposed, naked body with Chan’s strong legs on either side of yours. You don’t know what to do with your hands so you rest them on your stomach. You don’t know where Chan’s arms and hands are, only that they aren’t touching you. You wish he’d wraps his arms around you. You wish he’d caress your body.

For a moment you try to imagine what it would be like if he did touch you. The sensation of him squeezing your breasts, pinching a nipple, sliding his hands over your body. Then you remember why you're here. For a mystery fuck. A small moan escapes you. Did he hear you?

Chan nuzzles his face into your neck, resting his chin on your left shoulder. It’s the closest he’s been to you. “You already imagining a stranger inside you, hmm?” he whispers. You whimper. His voice turns you on beyond belief.

You don’t have chance to answer because there is a knock on the door. You suck in a breath. This is actually happening.

“Come in.” Chan calls out. You hear the door creak open and then close.

“Are you ready to begin?” Chan whispers in your ear.

“Mmm hmm, yes.” you reply.

“Good, because I think you are going to really enjoy this.”

He takes hold of your hands and places them on the bed either side of your body, using his hands to hold them down out of the way so you can’t go ahead and touch your anonymous lover. You had requested this. It makes you feel like you're being forcefully held in place, although you know you can change things if you want.

You feel the mattress dip slightly. Someone is climbing onto the bed near your feet. Who can it be? Is it Changbin? Or could it be Minho? Felix? Could it be Jisung?

A hand touches your ankle. You shudder, then very slowly and delicately it makes it way up to the side of your knee. Their touch is light and feathery. You swallow.

Then you feel a mouth, a moist, plush mouth just above your knee. You think he is about to take the kisses up your leg, but instead takes his kisses back down, making his way down to your ankle. It feels so sensual. Who do these lips belong to?

Chan releases your arms for just a moment so he can lift your legs over each of his legs, which are spread out wide on the bed. Then he goes back to gently pinning your hands to the mattress.

You sense the other man moving closer and a mouth reappears on your skin. This time it’s your inner right thigh. He drags his tongue from inside your leg near your knee all the way up your inner thigh, sending tingles through your body, but he stops before he gets anywhere near your pussy. He does this again, and then mirrors the action with your other leg.

His hands try to push your legs a little wider and Chan assists by moving his own legs wider, forcing your legs to part just a little more. You are ready, wide open for whatever you're about to receive.

The touching stops, but you can feel him kneeling in front of you. Your chest is rising and falling rapidly in anticipation.

You're pleasantly startled when you feel a warm liquid landing on your breasts. The oil, Chan must have warmed it up somehow in preparation. You moan at the sensation of the oil dripping down around and between your breasts. You suck a breath in a sharp breath when you feel a pair of hands cupping your breasts, then squeezing and massaging the flesh in slow, but firm circles.

His hands slide easily over your oiled skin, and you squeal slightly when he squeezes your nipples. You imagine Changbin before you and that it’s his hands pinching your nipples. But you don’t believe it’s actually him. Changbin is a guitarist, with callused fingers. These hands a soft and smooth. That leaves Jisung, Minho and Felix.

As the pinches and flicks become more aggressive you can’t help but arch your back and rock your hips at the sensation.

Chan shushes you. “We need to stay still and take it, remember what we agreed to?” That’s right, part of this was you needed to stay as still as possible, it was all part of being restrained. You compose yourself and stop moving. It’s so difficult but you're determined to play the part properly.

“Good girl.” Chan growls low. Good girl? You love those words.

More warm oil is applied to your stomach. There is so much that it coats your entire abdomen and runs down towards your pussy, and trickles down between your folds. You feel bad for the bedding, it’s probably going to be a mess.

It feels so fucking sexy with your body being this slick and slippery. You feel like a goddess being cherished and adored, yet at the same time you feel like a dirty whore who doesn’t care who fucks her.

You wait for the hands to return to your body, anticipating them all over your stomach and you moan and pant with the need to be touched now. You are so desperate and on the verge of begging.

“Pl-please… please touch me.” you say.

“He wants you to call him ‘Sir’." Chan whispers.

“Please touch me again… Sir.” you pant.

You release a long low moan as he pours the oil at the top of your pussy now. It runs down through your lips and onto your asshole. You wriggle with pleasure and frustration. Chan squeezes your hand, a reminder that you need to stay still. You don’t know where his hands will land next and the anticipation is pure agony.

The stranger lifts your legs up bending them so your knees are up near your chest. Chan releases one of my hands to grip under your knee to help pin it against your chest, whilst the other man pins your other leg.

The heel of a hand presses firmly against your clit and begins to move in circular motions, much like they did with your breasts. It provides a grinding sensation that shoots pleasure deep inside of your core.

“Fuck that feels so good… Sir.” you whimper as his hand swirls and presses on you for what feels like and eternity.

He then drags two fingers beginning at your clit all the way down to your ass, dragging the oil and your own slickness all the way down. Your pussy clenches as his fingers pass by your entrance, not stopping to explore.

He presses a finger to your asshole.

“Aaaah!!” you gasp at the sensation of the pressure.

He massages his finger against your rim, and you know you're going to open up easily for him. You're so aroused and so slick from the oil that it doesn’t take much for the tip of his finger to breech the entrance. You grip the sheets with your hands as his finger slips in slowly. Deeper, deeper, all the way in.

“You’re being so good for him.” Chan’s words of praise in your ear make your melt around the stranger’s finger and it isn't long until you're ready for more.

“Sir… please.. I need… can you put in another finger?”

He slowly removes his finger and you feel two fingers at your hole now. He pushes them in, going ever so slowly. It’s a stretch but he’s moving slowly enough that you're adjusting along the way, making the stretch feel achingly good. He must be experienced at this sort of thing. He knows exactly what to do.

You reach up and wrap an arm around Chan’s neck. He whispers words of encouragement in your ear.

The volume of your moans and whimpers grow so loud now that it’s drowning out the sound of the French woman’s singing. The man moves his fingers in and and out of your ass maintaining a relentlessly slow pace. The burning sensation with every drag of his fingers makes your cry out in pleasure.

“Faster… harder… Sir I need… more.” you whimper.

He quickly builds up the pace. Chan brings his hand to your neck, wrapping it around your throat and squeezing slightly but not enough to cut off the air. Then he brings his thumb up to your lips. You open your mouth allowing him to slip his thumb inside. You pull at the hair on the back of his head and he pushes his thumb further into your mouth. The other man continues to fuck your ass with his fingers.

A mouth lands on your pussy. His tongue swirls around and through your lips. The tip of his tongue slides inside of you. Chan starts to fuck your mouth with his thumb, pushing it deep inside roughly. You want him to ruin you.

You're practically screaming from the glorious agony, your senses are on overload.

Chan removes his thumb. “Is this okay?” he checks in with you.

“Yes… But… I want his cock now.” you pout.

“Ahhh yes, I bet you do. Let’s sort you out huh?”

The fingers inside your ass are removed and you feel the man shift his position.

His thighs press against the underside of yours. Then…you feel the tip of a cock. He pushes it against your entrance. You make a pathetic whiny sound. Your body is begging for him to push his cock in.

Moments pass and nothing happens. What is happening? A sense of panic makes it’s way into your body. Has he changed his mind?

Another moment passes.

“He wants to know if we can take the blindfold off?” Chan asks.

You pause. He hasn’t changed his mind. You quickly try to decide what to do. Whoever it is wants you to be right there with him, making this moment together. Not him fucking fucking, but you fucking each other.

“Okay.” you say shakily. Your breath quickens at the thought of coming face to face with the man who has been pleasuring you so amazingly.

Chan takes over holding both your legs up, and two hands come to rest on the sides of your blindfold, the tip of his cock slips into you slightly as he leans in towards you, giving you a tease of what’s to come. You can’t wait until he is all the way inside.

Your blindfold slides off but your vision is blurry. You blink to adjust your eyes and the man before you becomes clear.

Minho.

He is looking at you expectantly, nervously, like you might run away at the sight of him.

You reach up and cup his face. His cheeks are flushed and lips pink and swollen. He isn’t even being the one fucked right now but he looks like he is.

“Hey.” you say with a dazed smile.

“Hey.” He replies. “Is this okay…do you want to keep…”

You wrap an arm around his waist and pull him down on top of you. His hands reach around to your ass, lifting your hips up and pushes himself all the way inside of you.

Minho is finally free to make noises now and he makes long low moans as he rocks his hips into you. He looks down between the two of you to watch his cock glide in and out.

You still have one arm wrapped around Chan’s neck, your other explores Minho’s body. His toned body undulates like some sort of exotic python. He’s even more skilled with his cock than with those magic fingers. He brings his mouth down onto yours mirroring his tongue with his thrusts. He is such a skilled, diligent lover.

You melt together as his long, languid thrusts become deeper and you are being pressed against Chan’s hard cock.

Without warning, Minho pulls out of you and flips you over in one fluid move so you're on all fours.

You look down and see Chan’s hard erection inside his sweats.

You're about to reach for it when you're dragged away further down the bed by Minho. You look into Chan’s eyes longingly as you're being pulled out of reach while he just stares back at you. You want to please him so badly.

Minho pushes his cock back inside you, causing you to cry out. Pleasure washes over you, mixing with the angst of yearning for Chan.

He slides his thumb over your asshole and presses it inside. “Ahhh.. Yes, Minho.” you cry.

He pushes it in all the way and rests his palm and fingers on your tail bone. His grip is perfect to rock you on an off his cock. You love feeling so filled up, and you're about to come any minute.

Chan looks fucked out, like he’s on another planet. His engorged, swollen red cock is now out of his pants and in his hand but he’s not doing anything with it. He’s just holding it absentmindedly. His eyes are glazed over as he stares at you.

Minho must notice him too. “Kitten?” he asks. “Do you want to help Chan out? Make him come?”

Oh fuck yes! You look at Chan eagerly. You're practically salivating.

“Come over here Chan. It’s okay.” Minho encourages Chan over, but doesn’t move.

“Before I come.” He adds hoping that will spur him on.

Chan, as if possessed, gets up onto his knees and crawls his way towards you. Once he is close enough he offers you the head of his cock. You eagerly take hold of it with one hand and guide him into your mouth. Chan whimpers at your touch. You lick your tongue along his shaft and over the tip before taking him deep into your mouth.

“Oh fuck!” Chan whines high pitched.

“Y/n, don’t use your hands. Make him work for it.” Minho growls as he fucks you from behind.

You do as you're told and release your grip but keeping him in your warm, wet mouth.

Something in Chan snaps. He grabs the back of your head and starts plunging his cock into your mouth relentlessly. He tangles his fingers in your hair as he fucks your face without restraint. You gag. It’s hard to take him and your eyes water.

You look up at him to find him staring at you while he fucks your face. Having Chan using you like this while Minho pounds you from behind and fingering your ass is all to much. You cry out around Chan’s cock as your legs shake and your cunt clenches around Minho. Your arms and legs buckle underneath you, but Minho is there to hold you steady. He wraps and arm underneath you, keeping you in position. He pulls out of you painting your back in his cum.

Chan growls and moans, and pulls his cock out to massage his release into your waiting mouth and tongue. There is so much. He leans back onto his heels, shaking as he watches you swallow every drop. He looks horrified and startled. Oh shit, have you done something wrong?

Chan quickly gets off the bed and pulls up his sweats. “Fuck y/n. I'm so sorry.” He says flustered.

“I’ll get the towels.” Minho announces and hops off the bed.

“Chan?” you whimper. He doesn’t seem to hear you. You can tell he's freaking out. “Chan!” you repeat, “I need you to hold me.”

Chan looks down at you, as though he is scared. What's going through his mind? Cautiously, he edges closer to the bed and sits beside you. You're still in an all fours position waiting to have your back wiped, but you kneel up to let Chan wrap his arms around you. You nuzzle into his chest. Why is he so upset with you?

You feel him relax against you and he strokes your hair. “I shouldn’t have done that to you.” He whispers over and over. You don’t understand. You fucking loved that he did that to you.

Minho returns to wipe you down and to remove the excess coconut oil that had made its way to the strangest places.

Suddenly, Chan gets up and turns down the bed, gesturing for you to hop in. Then he goes around the other side and offers that side to Minho.

You and Minho look at each other. This seems like really odd behaviour, but you oblige and both get into bed as directed, even though this wasn’t part of the arrangement. You don’t say a word as you watch Chan slip his shirt back on and leave the room.

Next Chapter: you role play with Minho and learn more about the man on his mind.

taglist: open

@rylea08 @channieandhisgoonsquad @noellllslut @itsseohannbin @weareapackofstrays @kangnina @3rachasdomesticbanana @palindrome969 @xxkissesforchanniexx @chuuchuu1224 @fun-fanfics @wolfennracha @rhonnie23 @jisunglyricist @strayywayy @rixenluv @piscesrising01 @lunearta @shltsnglggles @lilbabiebunni @jiminssluttyminx @armystay89 @krayzieestay

#skz smut #chan smut #chan x reader #han jisung smut #lee know smut #lee know x reader

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sarahowritesostucky · 8 months

Text

📖"Temporary Custody"

Rating: Explicit

Pairing: Steve x ofc x Bucky; Steve x Bucky

Word Count: 3720

Tags: Dom/sub, bdsm au, dom Bucky, sub reader, hurt/comfort, enemies to lovers, gay sex'n'stuff, straight sex'n'stuff, Steve being a literal Golden Retriever, mental health issues, dub-con, forced submission, referenced childhood abuse and resultant mental health issues, bakery au, m/f/m, gentle domination, total power exchange

Summary: The stigma and shame of being a submissive has kept Mary unfulfilled and in the closet her whole life, until an inciting incident leads to Bucky and Steve taking her in and giving her everything she was always too afraid to ask for.

Trigger warnings: This story contains themes of eating disordered behavior, body image issues, childhood abuse, self-harm, and alcohol abuse.

Wait! I haven't read an earlier chapter of this fic! Story Masterpost

4. Cake Doughnuts (shitty non-doughnuts)

This is not the way Mary expected her life to go. Divorced at 29, probably unemployed, and now declared mentally incompetent and legally attached to some stranger? Ew.

At least when the cops had dragged her into the ER, she’d been drunk still. But she’s sobered up a lot since then, and ever more so during the drive from the hospital to back to Brooklyn. It’s the most awkward car ride of her life. Steve’s the one who drives. Mary doesn’t know why that surprises her, but it does. And he’s the one who leads the way into their building and up the stairs. It’s an older building with character but no elevator, so they make the three story climb on foot. Another resounding Ew.

Mary walks silently around Bucky’s (and Steve’s—because of course he’s gay and married) apartment, feeling shy and hesitant and all the things she just really doesn’t want to be feeling right now. She stops when she gets to the second bedroom, stares at its pristinely tucked-in sheets and neutral tableau.

“You can bring over any stuff you need from your place,” Steve is saying gently from behind her, where he and Bucky are lingering in the hallway. “It’ll be your room. We won’t bother you in there.”

She whips around. “How long do I have to stay here?” Better to figure it out now. Make a plan. She glares at Bucky, since he’s the one in charge of this disaster. “I’m not staying here forever.” Steve looks even sadder at her words than Bucky does, kind of like a kicked puppy. It’s disconcerting, so Mary keeps her attention on Bucky instead, forcing herself to make eye contact. “Well?”

“Until I feel like it’s safe and healthy for you to be on your own,” he says, not a hint of sympathy in his tone. That’s disappointing, and it pisses Mary the hell off.

“Screw you,” she says, not particularly loudly, but definitely full of all the contempt she feels for this guy. “You think you can just—”

He’s got her pushed up against the wall faster than she can track with her eyes. One second she’s standing feet away from him, and the next she just … isn’t. He’s in her space and against her body, one hand at the base of her throat and a thigh pressing forward, holding her to the wall. It’s terrifying and shocking and …

“Oh I know ‘I can just’,” he says darkly.

… She’d rather eat glass than tell him what else it is. “Let go of me,” she grits out.

Disappointingly, he does. Steve is just standing there like a big idiot, blinking wide eyes at the scene. Bucky takes a full step back from her and says, “Don’t curse at me, Mary. It’s disrespectful.”

She wants to ask him exactly what he’s done to earn any respect from her. She grinds the words into her teeth instead while Bucky watches her knowingly. She hates that look almost as much as she hates the way he says her name, as if he’s known her for years rather than a millisecond.

“House rules,” he says calmly. “The practicalities of what’s going to happen. We should discuss that, don’t you think?”

Steve places a hand on Bucky’s shoulder, comes up beside him and wraps an arm around his waist in a way that reminds Mary that the two are a couple. “Hey,” he says softly, speaking in Bucky’s ear. “Why don’t we let her get some rest before you go asserting your dominance, huh?” Mary wrinkles her nose at the word, and Steve regards her kindly. “You’ve gotta be tired,” he says. “You want to sleep?”

Bucky looks like he’ll protest, so Mary nods quickly. “Yeah. Yeah I’m tired.”

She watches as Steve squeezes his husband’s shoulder. “Come on, Babe. Let’s leave her to get some rest. She’s been up all night.”

Suddenly, Mary realizes that she has been up all night, and it’s almost comical, how fast the exhaustion hits her. Her throat starts to ache with a yawn that she fights not to let out in front of them. “Yeah,” she says again, this time thinking less about Bucky and what he wants or doesn’t want, and more about the bed that Steve said was reserved for her. She remembers that she feels like absolute shit, and probably looks it, too. “M’gonna sleep,” she says, turning away from both of them and heading for the bed.

The door ‘snicks’ shut softly behind her, and she assumes it was Steve who closed it. The two men's muffled voices fade off down the hallway, and even though it’s probably naïve to trust them so easily, Mary believes what Steve said about them not bothering her in this room.

She collapses on the bed that is exactly as soft as it looks. The sheets are tucked with military precision and smell like no one’s ever used them before. Mary grinds her face into the cool pillows and briefly wonders if Steve and Bucky have never had any company over to use this bed, before falling into one of the deadest sleeps of her life.

She wakes up feeling much, much better. Steve and Bucky’s guest bedroom has an en-suite, so she goes in and does her best to freshen up with the toiletries she finds stocked there.

There are three Advil Liqui-gel capsules sitting on the bedside table when she comes out. Mary regards them sharply and glances back to the door, but it’s still closed, no sign of life heard from outside in the hallway. Either the pills were there earlier and she just didn’t notice them, or else Steve is a lot stealthier than he looks. Twisting her lips, she scoops the pills up and tosses them back to fend off the headache she can already feel brewing behind her temples.

A quick search of the room’s dresser drawers yields nothing, and she’s forced to face the fact that she’s going to have to do this confrontation dressed in only her huge tee shirt from the night before. No matter, she thinks, squaring her shoulders and reaching for the doorknob. She’s got a new strategy in mind.

“I’m sorry,” she says, when she ventures out to find Bucky and Steve sitting in the living room.

Steve reaches for the remote to mute the tv, and Bucky sits back with a doughnut that he’s just plucked from a box on the coffee table. He bites into it, looking only vaguely interested "Want one?"

She spares a glance at the box. "Are they yeasted?"

"What's that mean?" Steve asks.

Another glance reveals that they're not, and Mary turns her nose up at them. "It means you're eating shitty, overbaked cake, not a doughnut," she says snottily.

Steve just blinks and looks back at the box with a little frown. Bucky takes another huge bite of his doughnut and chews it, maintaining eye contact with her and speaking around his mouthful, "Weren't you sorry for something?"

Mary purses her lips and starts over with her contrition act. “Yes. Look, I know you guys are just trying to help me. And I know I probably seem like such a hot mess to you right now.”

“Cause you are,” Bucky drawls.

Mary quells the urge to go over there and slap the doughnut straight out of his hands. That won’t help her with this new strategy she’s decided on. ‘Honey versus vinegar’, and all that. “Yeah,” she says instead. “So I’ll admit, my life hasn’t been going very well lately. And I really did need some help.” She forces herself to give Bucky a friendly smile. “So I’m glad you were willing to step in and help me. Thank you.” Bucky is looking at her way, way too unimpressed, and Mary squirms in place, thinking that he should be looking happier at what she’s just said. “Well?” she says.

He chews another bite of doughnut for a solid five seconds, swallows, then says, “How much did it hurt you to spit that out?”

She scowls. “I was trying to be nice.”

“Mm hm.” He pats the couch beside himself in a clear invitation. “Come sit down. Have a doughnut.”

She’s obeying before she even thinks about it, though at least she has the sense to take a seat on Steve’s side of the L-shaped sectional, and not Bucky’s. “I’m not hungry,” she says, just as her stomach gives a small growl.

“Well clearly that’s a lie,” Steve chuckles.

Mary glances over at him, peeved, but decidedly less so than she is at Bucky. Steve just seems less … threatening, maybe. Whatever it is, Mary pushes it from her mind.

“Look, I’ll stick around for a few hours or something if you really want to make sure I’m okay,” she says, attention back on Bucky, because she can already tell that he’s the one she’s got to convince. “But then I have to get back to my apartment.” She sees Bucky’s expression shutter at this and quickly adds, “I understand that you’re responsible for me, temporarily, technically. And I appreciate what you’ve done. I don’t want to cause you guys any more trouble than I already have. I’m going to take steps to take better care of myself now. And we can … we can keep in touch if you want. Just so you don’t ... you know … worry.” By the end of her speech she’s lost confidence, as she can see from Bucky’s expression that this is not being received well.

"Is that all?" he asks, eyebrow arched.

“Bucky,” she complains, floundering. “Come on. This isn’t … I mean you can’t just, adopt me, or whatever. I’m not some stray dog. You don’t even know me!"

He nods. “Yeah, you’re right. I don’t.”

For one brief, overly-optimistic moment, she thinks that she’s actually going to get out of it that easy.

“But I’ll get to know you. Because you’re not leaving here anytime soon, Honey.”

All of that optimism tanks straight into a sour pit of disappointment. Mary shoots up to standing, startling Steve a bit where he's reaching for the doughnut box. “Don’t call me that,” she snaps.

Bucky takes another smug fucking bite out of his doughnut. “What?” he asks. “‘Honey’?”

“Yes! I’m not your ‘Honey’. I’m not your anything.”

He licks the sugar off his lips and stares her down. “You like it when I call you that.”

“No, I hate it,” she sneers. “Just like I hate your smug, self-satisfied face. I hate men like you.”

Bucky relaxes further back into the sofa, gesturing at her with the last of the doughnut before he stuffs it in his mouth and eats it. “Men like me, huh?” he asks once he’s swallowed, infuriating in his nonchalance.

“Yes.”

He chuckles and starts sucking his fingers clean one by one. “And what would that be?” he drawls, letting his legs splay wide on the couch cushions, thigh muscles straining against the denim of his jeans. He sees her getting distracted and hums. “Hm? Pray tell, Little girl. Do enlighten me. What are 'men like me' like?”

For one, airless second, all Mary wants in the world is to drop to her knees right between his legs, put her face at the seam of his jeans and rub her cheek against his thigh, against his …

Her thoughts go unfocused, fuzzy at the edges, static in her brain. She licks her lips absentmindedly, unable to tear her eyes away from the sight of how he’s positioned himself …

“Mary.”

The sound of her own name draws her out of it, like a slap. She meets his eyes and juts her chin out, half dizzy from the effort. “Men like you think they know everything,” she grits. “Think that they’re the end-all-be-all. Men like you don’t feel any compunction about stepping on everyone around them. Men like you think you’re so fucking smart, that you can’t even fathom the likely alternative.”

“And what would that be?”

“That you’re actually just a cocksure moron,” she hisses.

Bucky tips his head at Steve. “Stevie tells me I’m a moron every other Tuesday, don’t you Babe?”

Steve shrugs a little from where he's leaning forward, holding the lid of the doughnut box open while he tries to choose a flavor. “Well, yeah.”

Bucky smirks, so unaffected that Mary just wants to scream. “So," he says. "You ‘hate men like me’, huh?”

“Yes. I do."

“That’s why you’ve spent your whole life around them, then?”

“I …" She falters. "What?”

Bucky glances over to Steve, and the two of them have some sort of silent exchange overtop the lid of the doughnut box, wordlessly communicating in a way that evidences a years’ long relationship. When they both look back to her, it’s Steve who speaks first.

“We got to read up on you a little, while you were asleep,” he says. He nods to the laptop and packet of papers on the coffee table. “Did some research. Learned about what led up to this.”

“'This'? What are you talking about?”

“You’ve been under the control of domineering men your entire life,” Bucky says, interjecting more forcefully over Steve’s gentler tone—Mary feels like she’s getting whiplash between the two of them. “First it was your father, out in Bumfuck, Nowhereville,”

“Indiana,” Steve mutters.

“Whatever,” Bucky snaps, zeroing back in on Mary with glinting eyes. “And he was ‘that sort of man’, wasn’t he?”

Mary feels a little like she’s been punched in the gut. “So what?” she says. “So you looked me up? Hospital gave you info on me and now you think you know me? You don’t know shit.”

“Your whole life, he said jump and you said how high, right?” Bucky asks, clearly not wanting or needing an answer to the question. Maybe Mary’s expression is answer enough. She’s not quite sure what she must look like right now. Horrified maybe. Or furious. “And then you latched onto the first jerk who’d give you a ride out of town.”

“Shut up.”

“Married him, too. And that worked for you alright ... Until it didn’t.”’

The backs of her eyes are starting to feel hot. “I said: shut up,” she whispers.

Bucky nods and leans forward on the couch, as if her anger and humiliation mean nothing to him. And damn him, maybe they don’t. Maybe he likes this, the sick bastard. “If he hadn’t hit you so bad, you would’ve stayed. Right? He met your needs in every other way.”

Mary shudders. “What are you talking about?”

"I'm talking about self-medicating, Honey. It's what you've been doing. Probably since you were a little girl."

She's disgusted with herself for the tears that break through, unmoored by how Bucky knows all of these things about her, and that he's able to fill in the gaps so easily. “What the hell is your problem, huh?” She swipes angrily at her eyes. “What does any of that have to do with anything? Except for that it’s none of your goddamn business?!”

Bucky softens a little. He glances at Steve, who gives him a warning look. “Sweetheart,” he says, looking back at Mary plaintively. “The drinking and the cutting, the feeling miserable and being sad all the time; that all started after your divorce, yeah?”

That … is not what Mary expected him to say. She’d been expecting more insults, more heartless jabs at her past. “I … What?”

“Answer the question,” Steve urges gently. He looks like he’s in on some secret with Bucky, something only Mary doesn’t know.

“Yeah,” she admits warily. “I mean, divorce is … well it’s divorce. It sucks. Of course I wasn’t happy about it.” She scowls and crosses her arms. “What’s your point?”

“My point is that, dysfunctional as they were, you had very specific relationships with very specific types of men, until what, like a year ago?”

“... Year and a half,” she mutters, unease creeping up her spine at where she thinks this is going.

“Right. And that’s when all your troubles started. Because let's be real: you weren't hurting yourself before then." He tilts his head, feigning curiosity. "Why do you think that is, Mary? Why weren't you falling apart before? When you had a father touching you wrong, or a husband putting holes in your drywall?"

"Stop," she breathes.

He nods sadly. "It was was after, when you didn’t have those people in your life anymore, structuring it, telling you what to do. Once you were alone, that’s when you started to fall apart.” He levels her with a pitying gaze. "Now why do you think that is?"

Oh, hell no. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Mary says. She actually takes a physical step back from where she’s standing. “You think what? I was using my douche ex-husband as some sort of a … a dom? My freaking father?!”

“Mary, calm down.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down!” She jabs her finger at Steve, who’s spoken. If she thought she’d been angry at these two before, well now she’s just … she’s just … “You’re fucked up,” she tells them, voice full of quiet fury. “And you,” she points at Bucky. “You might be diagnosed with some freaking mental disorder or whatever, but that doesn’t give you the right to put that fucked up psychology onto everyone else!” She jabs her thumb at her own chest. “I’m normal! I’m not like you. I don't–I don’t have …”

“Mary,”

“No! I don’t. I–I didn’t …” Vaguely, she starts to recognize that her pulse is pounding in her ears, that it’s getting harder to draw breaths. “My f-fa, my, my f-father…”

Bucky stands up and comes towards her. “Mary,”

“No!” She makes to push away, to leave the room, but he closes in too fast and before she knows it, he has one hand on her throat and one at the base of her skull, gripping her hair. And it’s not mean, the way he’s holding her, but when she jerks away it tugs her hair unpleasantly and she whines and stills. “Let go,” she gasps, terrified by the way his hands make her feel.

“Steve, a little help?”

Her heart lurches as she hears Steve move, sees him getting up off the couch and coming over. “Wait,” she whispers, afraid and not understanding why. Not understanding why she’s even whispering in the first place, instead of screaming like she should be. “No, wait, wait—”

Steve is behind her, and even though he’s hardly even doing anything, just has his hands resting on her lightly, Mary still feels a tremor run through her whole body. She feels so trapped. Fixed in place and terrified, but not because she thinks they’ll hurt her.

Because suddenly she can draw a deep breath again.

And she can see the look in Bucky’s eyes, can see how he knows that. “Please,” she whispers, closing her eyes when tears well to the surface. “Please, just, I just need to …”

“You’re okay,” Bucky soothes. “You’re okay, Mary. Just breathe against my hand. Breath against me, against Steve.”

She shakes her head, even though she knows what he means. With her eyes squeezed shut like this, she can feel both him and Steve so solidly, can feel the points where their bodies connect with hers. When she inhales, she feels them there. “What the hell?” she winds up whispering, more to herself than to them.

“You were starting to have a panic attack,” Steve murmurs. He hugs her from behind, and Mary shivers but doesn’t try to shrug him off.

“I don’t have those,” she says. Even to her own ears, it sounds weak. “I don’t,” she insists.

“First time for everything,” Bucky says.

They stand there for a long minute or two. Hell, maybe it’s more. As long as Mary keeps her eyes shut, she can at least pretend that it’s only a minute. It’s only once she opens her eyes that she has to face reality. When she does, she sees that Bucky’s watching her keenly. He looks … sad.

The thought that the man with one hand fisted in her hair and another wrapped around her throat is concerned for her strikes Mary as almost comical. She doesn’t laugh, but she also doesn’t feel close to crying anymore. “I’m okay,” she rasps, swallowing thickly. “I’m okay now.” Shaky maybe, but better. She can breathe again. “Really, I–I am.”

“Yeah?”

She nods, and the motion makes her all the more aware of his hand on her throat. She has to fight back a pleasured sigh at the feeling of it, fight to keep her eyes from fluttering closed.

Bucky shifts in, sandwiching her even closer between their bodies. “So what?” he murmurs. “You want me to let go of you now?”

“Yeah,” she says, not feeling like she wants that at all. “Please.”

He hums. “You’re very good at saying ‘please’,” he observes. “And at telling me you’re not submissive.”

“M’not,” she insists, trying harder to make her voice firm, or at least more than a pathetic, breathy whimper. She looks him in the eyes again.

When had she stopped looking him in the eyes? She can’t remember. She feels like she’s watching this all happen through the lightest sort of fog, or maybe in slow motion, like a videotape playing at only 70% speed. Something like that, she thinks dazedly. She doesn’t feel like she has to worry about it, though. It's warm and heavy and nice here; like being under bathwater.

Bucky’s not looking at her in concern anymore. He looks more relaxed now, nicer, his eyes softer around the edges. And he hasn't let go of her, either.

“She down?”

That’s Steve’s voice, coming from right behind. Mary likes the way she can feel the quiet rumble of it where he’s pressed to her back.

“Mmhm. Waay down.”

“Is it normally that easy?”

Bucky chuckles, it's a nice sound that Mary likes, the richness of it making her want more, like how chocolate makes you want more.

“No, it’s not. This is deprivation, right here. Poor thing.”

“Is she gonna be okay?”

“Oh, sure. We’ll just stay like this for a minute. She needs the contact."

Something about the two of them talking about her like she’s not there is … well it multiplies the bathwater feeling. She hears Steve asking a question, and Bucky making an unhappy noise and answering,

“It should never be this easy. Right now she’d go down for anyone, for even the smallest thing.”

“And she was working in the service industry?” A huff of breath hits Mary’s ear. “Jesus.”

“... Hey,” Mary says, sure that she should protest somehow.

But Bucky’s hand tightens just the barest bit on her throat, and he shushes her sweetly, tells her she’s a “good girl,” and kisses the top of her head.

And Mary pretty much forgets what she was going to say, after that.

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Square N5: childhood trauma

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tasteleeknow · 2 years

Text

HELLO STRANGER. PART ONE.

pairing: minho ft. hyunjin x fem!reader genre: smut, angst, fluff, soulmate!au. enemies to lovers. jealousy. pining. unrequited love. content: 18+ minors dni. word count: 7k

summary: after watching everyone around you pair off with their soulmate, you finally get your turn. a slow burn strangers to enemies to lovers soulmate!au with jealousy and angst and smut and suffering (and softness ofc).

series masterlist & taglist ♡ pt.1 | pt.2 | pt.3

♡ series masterlist

mention of death (a recurring theme, not a main character). mc has anxiety. mention of body insecurity.

“I’m so happy for you, Mina. I-I really am.”

Your roommate was engaged to her soulmate. She’d woken you up at 2am, flicking your lights on and jumping up and down on your bed until you’d roused enough to comprehend what she was saying. A little over a year ago she’d gotten a notification—the person that suited her more than anyone else on earth had been found.

“She’s been trying to do it for weeks, apparently. She kept chickening out,” Mina giggles as she fiddles with the ring on her finger. “Isn’t it pretty?” she says, holding it out for you to inspect.

She’d shown you many times in the 20 minutes she’d been sitting cross-legged on your bed. You indulge her, taking her delicate hand in yours to take another look at the admittedly very pretty ring. Her joy was a little overwhelming, you’d been so low for so long.

It was only a few months after Mina met her soulmate that your boyfriend met his. He’d lied to you, signing up for the matching service behind your back. When he’d left, you’d signed up yourself in your anger—as if it could do anything to hurt him back. He didn’t care.

Neither did you, not anymore. You watched the people around you pair off, so distracted by their own joy not one of them had asked you about your lack of it. Then, a few weeks ago you’d received your notification. You’d stared at your phone screen, trying to comprehend the reality of it. All you had to do was acknowledge the match and agree on a time to meet. Then… you’d be one of the happy ones? You’d thrown your phone onto the bed, ignoring it until you were forced to pick it up again. You hadn’t told anyone since.

You look up at your friend again, her cheeks rosy—likely from a mixture of wine and excitement. “Mina?”

“Mm?” she responds absentmindedly, not looking up from her ring.

“I-I got my notification…” Her eyes snap up to meet yours. “...a few weeks ago,” you finish.

“What?! Who are they?!” she squeals, falling forward to grab your hands in hers—flapping them up and down.

“I don’t know, I didn’t respond.”

She drops both your hands onto the bed, eyes wide. “What? Why?”

“I…don’t know. I’m scared, I guess.”

She shuffles up to sit beside you against the pillows. “Ya know, I was scared at first too.”

You look up to her face, she’s looking at her ring again. You remembered the first week after she got her notification. She’d been so bouncy and overwhelmingly happy, you don’t remember her being nervous at all. “You were?”

“Mm, I know the whole idea is that you are supposed to be perfect for each other. But… what if I was the exception? What if I wasn’t enough for her? It felt…like such a huge thing to live up to—being someone’s perfect person. I just wanted to be enough for whoever it was I was going to meet.” She reaches over to take your hand. “Then I met her…and that all felt so silly. She was everything and I knew that even if I wasn’t enough for her yet, I'd do everything to make sure I was. She made me wanna be the best person I could be and it…was a lot—but in the best way.”

“I don't… know if I’m ready to be the best version of me.”

“That’s the point, even if you aren’t. They’ll help you. Besides, what if they need you to help them be the best version of them?”

“I’m not sure I could help anyone with that…”

“Just try? Yeah? I’ll be here,” she says, squeezing your hand gently.

You look over to your nightstand where your phone is charging. You couldn’t really bear to look at it these days. Mina nudges your shoulder. You reach over to grab it. She’s quiet as you open the app. Your heart races as you enter times you are available to meet, hesitating over the final button that confirms your agreement. You look down to Mina’s hand on your leg, the delicate ring catching your eye. You take a deep breath, then hit confirm.

Three weeks and they haven’t confirmed a time. Whoever they were, they clearly didn’t want you. You knew it was silly, to be upset about something you’d done yourself. Maybe they just had the same insecurities you did? Mina was busy with wedding preparation, you didn’t blame her for being distracted. She was happy and you were happy she was happy. Everything was fine.

“What about these?” Mina says, pointing out some blue carnations. The only other time you’d been in a flower shop like this was when you’d bought some roses for your anniversary with your ex.

“They’re pretty, are you definitely going with blue then?”

“Mm,” she confirms, “blue and purple.” She wanders away again and you trail behind, fiddling with the chain dangling off your phone case. “Haven’t heard back?” she asks. You pause briefly, it’s the first time she’s asked in over a week.

“No.”

“They’re probably panicking like you were.”

“Yeah,” you mutter.

You’re a little out of it as she leads you around the store—fiddling with the chain the entire time. The loud ring of a notification startles you, a small squeak leaving your lips. Mina looks up at you as you flick your phone to silent, you must have absent-mindedly flicked it while you were fiddling. You look up to meet her eyes.

“Check it,” she prompts.

“It’s probably nothing.”

“Check it,” she repeats. So you do. He’s confirmed to meet the next day. Just like that. Mina snatches your phone from your hands.

“Tomorrow?! Oh my god,” she says before shoving your phone back in your hands. “Confirm you’re going.”

“I’m going…” you mumble, staring down at the screen—attempting to process it.

Mina’s laugh breaks you from your daze. “Yes, you’re going. Come on, let’s go pick your outfit.” She grabs your arm, pulling you from the store.

You hardly sleep that night, spending the entire next morning cleaning your apartment—attempting (and failing) to distract yourself from the anxiety stirring in your chest. Your small cat brushes against your leg as you bend down to clean her tray.

“Hey, baby. You might meet a new friend soon, hm?” She meows at you. “Mm, I know. It’s scary for me, too. We’ll be okay, I'm sure they’re nice.”

A clap of thunder makes you jump. It had been storming all night. Usually storms relax you but apparently not even that could calm you now. “Gonna shower now,” you whisper to your cat, stroking her fur one last time.

You’d been putting it off, showering. You didn’t feel like looking at yourself. You didn’t consider yourself a particularly insecure person, most of the time you managed to stay pretty neutral about how you looked. You were fine. Right now though? Every negative thought you’d ever had was stirring to the surface. You couldn’t help pausing just before stepping into the shower, twisting back and forth to inspect yourself in the mirror. You’re fine.

You struggle to close your umbrella, shoving the handle into your stomach so you can push it down—eventually managing to collapse it fully. It’s still pouring. You’d closed your eyes the entire bus trip, listening to the rain and attempting to settle your nerves. You weren’t particularly successful. You rest your hand on the wall, steadying yourself—your empty stomach growling as you gather yourself. This is fine.

You look up at the revolving door. A girl walks out with a huge grin on her face—giggling to herself as she passes you. Clearly her meeting went well. You suck in a deep breath, the fresh air helping a little. Then, shoving the umbrella in your bag, you head inside.

The receptionist hands you a clipboard and a pen and asks you to wait for someone to collect you. It makes you feel like you’re at a dentist appointment. Not great for your nerves. You settle yourself in the corner to read the forms. You expect a disclaimer to cover the company's ass; terms and conditions. It’s a little more than that. Your leg bounces as you scan the pages, pen tapping against the clipboard.

Customers retain the right to withhold personal information from partners and discontinue communication at any time. Security is present on the premises. You read a paragraph about a wristband each person can use to signal for security discreetly. Why would anyone need that? You realise you're chewing on the pen. Crap. You look up to see if anyone has noticed. You can’t read anymore. You feel like your entire brain is consumed with trying to keep it together. You scribble your name at the bottom of the last page and head to the desk to hand it back.

“I’m—I’m done with this.”

“Oh, good. Felix will take you through now,” the receptionist answers, pointing to the blonde man holding a door open for you.

“Thank you,” you say quietly, adjusting your bag on your shoulder and heading over. This is fine.

“Good morning, I’m Felix” he greets. His voice is calm and his face bright. You can see why he has this role.

“Morning.”

He holds the door for you as pass then leads you down a long hallway, turning to speak to you. “Nervous?”

“A little,” you say, offering him a small shaky smile.

“You’ll be fine, promise. I’ve worked here awhile and never seen anyone leave without a big smile.” He stops at a cupboard built into the wall, pulling the door open. “Could you hold your hand up for me? Just wanna check your size.”

You offer him your arm and he wraps a small smartwatch around your wrist. “Perfect,” he mutters to himself.

“This is to call for security?” you ask.

“Yeah, just press this button on the side. It won’t make a noise. They won’t know you’ve called.”

“Why…why would I need this if everyone always leaves with a smile?”

“I’m sure it was suggested by a lawyer at some point, just a precaution.” Your hand shakes a little as he secures the strap for you. “You’re okay,” he says, obviously noticing your visible nerves.

You’re okay.

“I’ll take you to your room now, okay?” he asks, voice gentle. You look up to his face, counting a few of his freckles as you take a few slow breaths.

“Okay,” you say after a few seconds. He smiles then turns and leads you through a door to another long hallway. This one has many doors along each side, each one numbered. You count them as you go. He finally stops at door 14. “This is you,” he announces. He doesn’t open it, just turns and looks at you—clearly waiting for you to prepare yourself.

“Are they… in there already?”

“Mm, we stagger arrivals. He’s been here about 30 minutes.”

“He?”

“Oops, spoilers,” he says, offering you a playful smile.

You offer him a weak smile in return then turn to the door only to freeze, staring at the door knob like you had never seen one before. Felix waits patiently at your side. “What if he doesn’t like me?” you mutter under your breath.

“You know how long I’ve worked here?” Felix says in response, apparently ignoring your question. “4 years,” he continues. You look from the doorknob to his face. “I’d say about 80% of the people I lead to one of these doors ask me some variation of that question.”

“And they leave happy?”

He smiles and nods. “Mm.”

You grab the doorknob, ready to get on with it. “Felix?”

“Yes?”

“Thank you, really.”

“No worries,” he says, “you’ll be fine.”

You smile at him one last time and take a deep breath, pushing the door open. A chair scrapes across the ground and you look up to the man standing at a table in the middle of the room. You suppose, he’s yours. You wonder if he thinks you’re disappointing—if you’re not what he expected, what he hoped for. Felix places a gentle hand on your shoulder, helping you enter the room—the door closing behind you.

The man holds his arm out, gesturing to a lounge along the wall. You suck in a breath, only just realising you’ve been holding it.

“I saved you a seat,” he says, the first to break the silence. You suppose that was something like a joke, you’re too nervous to offer anything playful back. So instead you hurry over, dropping your bag to the ground as you collapse into the soft couch cushions. He sits himself at the other end, space for another two or three people between you. There’s two water bottles on the table. You should say something. Your name. Name’s are good. You fail to meet his eyes as you introduce yourself, reaching for the bottle instead.

“Minho,” he offers in return. You look up at him, a nervous smile on your face. He’s pretty, too pretty for you. He’s wearing a black t-shirt and jeans. You’re overdressed.

“Hi,” is all you manage.

“Hi.”

“Have you… been waiting long?”

One corner of his lips curves up. “No, not long.”

He doesn’t seem nervous at all. Why had he waited three weeks to respond if he wasn’t at all like you? “Ah, that’s good.”

“Nervous?” he asks, nodding to where you were twisting the cap of the bottle on and off repeatedly. You place it back on the table.

“Yeah, sorry.”

“Don’t be.” He stands, walking over to a bookshelf. “Do you wanna play a game?”

“A game?”

“They have a bunch here. Uno?”

“...sure.”

He pulls the deck from the pack as he makes his way back over. “You know how to play?”

You huff out a half laugh. “Uno? Yeah.”

He smiles. “Just checking. The only thing I know about you is your name and that you like yellow.”

You look down at your yellow sundress. You had stood out amongst the crowd on the bus, everyone in dark raincoats and jackets. It wasn’t cold, just wet. Your cardigan was enough. “I… It’s my favourite colour, yeah.”

“It suits you.”

You look up. He’s focused on dealing the cards. “Thank you,” you say, just above a whisper.

He flips a card over on the small coffee table and grabs his cards. You exchange small talk as you go. Your ages, what you do for work, if you have any pets. You talk about your cats a little, the first commonality you’ve discovered. You figure you’ll latch onto them whenever any come up, maybe more so than with any other stranger. The unspoken knowledge that you are supposed to be ideal for each other makes it feel like more is at stake. Instead of risking merely an awkward interaction with a stranger, you are both risking… well… your future happiness together.

He seems kind. Maybe a little reserved, but so were you. You get the feeling he’s holding a lot back, like he’s not entirely here. You wonder if his anxiety just presented differently to yours.

“Do you live alone?” he asks, slapping a pick up 2 on the stack. You slap one on top, looking up with a small smile. “Got me,” he says, returning your smile and then picking up 4 from the deck.

“I have a roommate: Mina. What about you?”

“Hyunjin. Met him at dance lessons years ago, he stuck to me like a leech.”

“So he loves you?”

He looks up from his cards, eyes flicking across your face for a moment before he answers. “Mm, I guess he does. Are you close with Mina?”

“I’m gonna be her maid of honour.”

“Ah.” He moves a few cards around in his deck. “Is she… with her—I mean did they meet through this?” He gestures to nowhere in particular with his cards, like he can’t speak the word soulmate.

A small knot of anxiety reappears in your chest. It had eased without you realising, returning now.

“Yeah, they met a year ago,” you answer.

“A year? That’s quick.”

“I guess.” You watch him continue to fiddle with his cards. “It’s your turn,” you prompt.

He looks up at you. “Right.” Then leans forward to grab a card from the deck.

“Is Hyunjin… has he met his?”

He places a colour change card down gently. “Green,” he announces quietly. You expect him to answer your question, but he doesn’t. So you take your turn. It isn’t until you’ve both had two more turns each that he speaks. “He hasn’t.”

You get the feeling you’ve said something wrong. You fiddle with your cards, realising you’re guaranteed a win. You look up at the man next to you. Is he a sore loser? You know nothing about him at all. You finish the game, looking up at him to see his reaction.

“Well done,” he says calmly as he begins to collect the cards, stacking them into a neat pile. You tuck away another tiny puzzle piece you can use to put together this person who was supposed to be your soulmate.

You look around the room, desperate to find another activity to save you from any awkward lulls. A big wooden chest catches your eye. You leave him to finish putting the cards away, wandering over to the mysterious chest. It looked like something that would be full of pirate’s gold. You bend down to lift the lid, conscious of the man appearing at the bookshelf next to you. It’s heavy and his hand appears to help you pull it the rest of the way up.

It’s full of clothes. Costumes and props. You pull a witches hat out, lifting it onto your head and smiling at the man next to you. He smiles back then retrieves a big sunflower hat. “Put this on, it matches your dress.” You drop the witches hat back in the chest. Then, before you can take it from him, he gently lowers the sunflower hat onto your head. You readjust it, feeling your cheeks warm as he bends down to search through the chest again.

When he stands he has a big red clown nose on. The serious expression on his face makes it all the funnier, drawing out a small laugh from your lips. “Try squeezing it,” he says stoically. You reach up, squeezing the red nose between your fingers. It squeaks, a lot like a dog toy. His mouth curves up a little in one corner then he pulls it from his nose, holding it out to you.

“You try.”

Your fingers brush together as you take it from him, a shiver running down your spine at the contact. His eyes on you as you attach the nose to your face makes you nervous. When you look up he wastes no time squeezing it, the high pitched squeak pulling the first actual laugh you’ve heard from him. You join him, the contagious quality of his loud laughter getting you more than anything else.

By the time you’ve exhausted the large chest of its treasures your stomach hurts, collapsing onto the floor as Minho pulls a big pink bow from his hair. “No, leave it!” you gasp out through your laughter, reaching out to wrap around his wrist before he can drop the bow into the chest. He joins you on the floor, his leg brushing against yours pulls your awareness to your hands. You pull back quickly.

He stretches his legs out, leaning back on his palms as you both catch your breath. It’s quiet for a moment. It doesn’t feel awkward. Your mouth tugs up at the corners at the revelation. “Why’d you take so long to respond?” he asks, bringing you back down to earth. A heaviness settles over you immediately.

“I uh…just wasn’t ready,” you answer, pulling a flower crown off your head. Your heart races in your chest as you prepare your next words. “You…took awhile as well.”

He pulls his legs to his chest, arms resting on his bent knees. “I wasn’t ready either.”

“You’re ready now?”

He’s quiet, eyes flicking between yours. Then he stands, offering you a hand up. You make sure your dress stays down as you let him pull you up, his hand warm in yours. He pulls you up effortlessly, fingers brushing together as he releases you. “Would you like to come over for dinner?” he asks.

“I… Yeah, sure.”

He walks over to a backpack under the table, pulling it over his shoulder. “Great, I think Hyunjin might be home tonight but he’ll probably stay in his room.”

“Tonight?”

He looks up at you. “Yeah… that alright?”

“Ye-Yeah.”

“Did you drive here or…?”

“Bus.”

“I can give you a lift home?” He says, eyes dropping down to his phone as he types something quickly. “I’ll pick you up later. Gotta get a few things for dinner.”

“I can get the bus.” You’re not sure why you turn him down.

He looks up at you, brows furrowed. “You sure? It’s probably still raining.”

“I like the bus.”

He steps towards you and you hold your breath as he reaches towards your hair, picking out a pink feather—a remnant from your dress up session. “I’ll pick you up at six?” he asks, close enough that your eyes fix on the freckle at the end of his nose. Your soulmate has a nose freckle. Soulmate.

“Six,” you confirm, voice a little breathy.

“I…told Hyunjin you were coming and he showed…a lot of interest. He might hang around, sorry.” Minho warns as he steps up to his door.

“I don’t mind.”

“He’ll keep you company while I finish up with dinner, anyway.”

“Alright.”

You follow him into his apartment, taking in your surroundings as he leads you to the living room where a boy with short blonde hair sits at a small table on the floor. He jumps up as you enter, a wide grin spreading across his face as he approaches.

“You’re here,” he greets you like you’re old friends, like you were here for him and not the man standing beside you. You offer him a friendly smile.

“I’ll leave you two to chat for a bit, i’ll be done soon,” Minho says before backing up towards the adjoined kitchen. You catch him giving his roommate a pointed look and then he turns, leaving you alone.

Hyunjin gestures to a cushion on the floor by the table, sinking back down to resume his position on the other. He pushes aside a notebook and as he closes it, you catch a glimpse of some sketches. “Can’t believe you’re finally here,” he says, propping his elbows on the table to gazing at you like you’d put the stars in the sky.

You drop your eyes to the table, feeling a little overwhelmed by his intensity. “Uh, I—I can’t really believe it either. It’s a lot.”

“Did it go well today?”

“Um…I think so. Minho hasn’t said anything?”

He looks to the kitchen then leans over the table so he can lower his voice. “He’s not particularly talkative. You may have noticed.”

“He…seemed a little reserved but so am I. I don’t mind.”

His plush lips curve up in one corner. “So it was a quiet session then?”

“Not…exactly. We played dress up.” You look down at the table, smiling a little to yourself at the memory. Hyunjin is quiet and when you look up at him again he has a soft smile on his face. You drop your gaze to the table, his closed notebook catching your eye again. “Do you draw?”

He sits back, pushing the notebook in front of you and flipping it open. “Mm, you can look if you want.” You flip through the pages as the boy across from you sits quietly. They’re mostly sketches of people, a few watercolours scattered in. You pause on a page of a silhouette, turned away—hair falling over their face. It makes you sad. You close the book, sliding it gently back across the table.

“They’re…really good.”

“Thank you. Do you like art?”

“I like it. I can’t do it.” You look over to the kitchen, wondering if Minho was an artist. You hadn’t asked.

“He’s not an artist,” Hyunjin says, like your thoughts are written across your forehead. “I know how it feels…all of this—it’s terrifying.”

“You—You know?”

He smiles sadly just as a loud crash comes from the kitchen. “I’ll check on him,” he says, standing and leaving you there at the small table. You take the opportunity to wander around the room, attempting to gather as much information about the man who was supposed to be yours. A small jingle draws your attention to a cardboard box in the corner of the room. A small cat is curled up inside, lazily licking at his paw.

“Hello baby,” you coo, crouching down to stroke his soft fur. “I have a friend at home who’d love to meet you.” You scratch his chin, the cat lifting his head so you can get a good view of his collar. No name tag. “What’s your name, baby? Which one are you?”

Minho had mentioned his cats earlier. You’d forgotten their names, too anxious at the time to retain information properly. You look back to the kitchen. Hyunjin hadn’t returned. You lean down to kiss the purring cat on the head and then head towards the kitchen, freezing when you hear the two men arguing—clearly attempting to keep their voices down.

“I did this for you,” Minho’s anger comes through his voice clearly, despite it being practically in a whisper. “I could lose Sana over this.”

“Shhhh, keep your voice down,” Hyunjin scolds. “Why are you acting like this?”

“Like what?”

“Angry.”

“Because I’m working my ass off to cook for a stranger when I’d rather be with the girl I fucking love.”

You stagger back a step, kicking a cat toy across the hardwood floor. The men go silent, alerted to your eavesdropping. Hyunjin appears in the doorway, catching you as you take one more step back.

“I’m—I—” you stutter. “I’m sorry,” you blurt out, spinning and rushing for the door.

In your rush to snatch your bag from the small table your shin comes into contact with the sharp corner. The pain snaps you out of your panic as you drop to the floor, clutching your leg tightly against your chest as you rock back and forth. He loves someone else. He didn’t want you. He loves someone else. He lo—Hyunjin appears in front of you.

“Show me,” he says gently. You shake your head, squeezing your eyes shut. You wish you could pass out, just leave the next hour of your life to a clone of you. You can’t do this. You need to get out. You stand abruptly, grabbing your bag from the table and rushing for the door. Hyunjin hovers around you as you shove your feet into your shoes, heels hanging over the ends. “Let me drive you home,” he says, the gentle touch of his hand on your arm snapping your eyes to his. You’d felt comfortable with him since the moment you’d met. He felt safe. You don’t look over his shoulder properly, merely glimpsing Minho standing silently out the corner of your eye.

“Okay.”

“Okay,” he says, offering you a small smile. He opens the door for you and you fight the voice in your head that tells you to turn around, to take one last look at the man you’d thought was yours.

Hyunjin is quiet as you both walk down the stairs. He’s quiet as he unlocks the car and hands you his phone with the maps app open. He’s quiet as he drives you to your apartment. When the car is parked and the engine is off, you’re almost afraid to break the silence. You do it anyway. “Thank you. I know–I know we just met but you’ve been…very nice. I’m—just thank you.”

“Can I come in?”

You turn to look at your door, then back to him. “I—”

“Just wanna make sure you’re alright…and explain things a little.”

You’re not sure if you want things explained. You feel like collapsing into bed and crying until you pass out. The adrenaline has well and truly worn off, you're too afraid to look at your leg. You’re sure it’s bleeding. “Alright,” you mutter, opening the car door and stepping out on your good leg. You start hobbling towards your door as the sound of the car locking goes off behind you.

“Can I help?” Hyunjin asks.

“I’m fine. It’s fine.”

Mina isn’t home. You’re not sure if you’re relieved or disappointed. You’re not sure about anything. Hyunjin digs out your first aid kit after listening to your directions and joins you in the living room. He’s quiet as he cleans you up. It’s only when he closes the first aid kit that he speaks. “I don’t know how to say this without… without sounding like I’m trying to say I have it worse. I’m… just trying to explain this whole thing. Okay?”

You nod, emotionally drained.

“She died. My soulmate. I don’t know if Minho said anything,” the corner of his mouth pulls up into a sad smile. “I can’t imagine he would.”

“You don’t have to do this.”

“I do. Just… let me, please?” You sit back, giving him a slight nod. “She—It was… it was the day we were supposed to meet,” he stands up, placing the first aid kit on the table and then sitting next to you on the couch. You don’t know whether to turn your body towards him or give him all the space you can. You stay completely still. “I’m telling you this because I want you to understand why I did what I did. I… encouraged him because I love him like a brother and I want him to be happy. I need him to be happy and you’re—you’re the thing he can have that I can’t. I need him to have you.”

You can’t help looking at him, turning your body slightly as you try and find a position for your leg that doesn’t hurt. “He doesn’t want me.”

“He doesn’t know you.”

“I don’t think he wants to know me. He loves… someone else.”

“He’s infatuated with a girl he’s known for years. She doesn’t feel the same way. She sleeps with him because it’s easy and he’s there. It’s not… it’s not love.”

“I’m sorry. About what happened to you. I—I can’t imagine…” you stand, forgetting about your leg and stumbling a little as you catch your footing. He stands quickly, arms outstretched to attempt to catch you. “I can’t be with someone who doesn’t want me. I can’t—” you cover your mouth as your voice wobbles, not wanting to cry in front of someone who was essentially a total stranger.

“Can we exchange numbers?” he asks. “If you ever want to get coffee or… anything…”

You collapse back onto the couch, digging through your bag so you can hand him your phone. Part of you wants to send him out the door and never see him again, breaking off any connection to Minho entirely. But then, the other part… it wants to hold on, to take Hyunjins hand and beg him to keep you. To help you convince Minho to want you, to love you. When he’s finished he hands it back, a heavy silence falling over the room.

“I’m not sure… if I'll want to keep in touch,” you say eventually.

“I won’t contact you. Just… message me if you ever want to talk or meet, yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“You have to tell me… please?” Mina says as she lays a blanket over your lap. She passes you the mug of coffee she’d made you. “Please?” she asks again.

“He didn’t want me. That’s it,” you say before blowing over the surface of your coffee and taking a small sip.

“It doesn’t make sense. Why wouldn’t he want you?”

You shrug. “He found someone better.”

“It doesn’t make sense.”

“You said that.”

She’s quiet for a moment. You imagine what she must be thinking. Pity, probably. Her poor friend. Dumped by her boyfriend and then dumped by her soulmate. “You can’t give up. He’s—He’s yours.”

You lean over to place your mug down on the table. “What am I supposed to do? Bother him until he decides to give me his attention? I’m not begging someone to want me, even my soulmate.”

“Just speak to him. You haven’t even given him a chance to talk about it.”

You pull the blank up over your shoulders, tucking your chin into the soft warmth. “What if I cry?” you whisper. “I don’t… want to cry in front of him.”

Your friend leans against you, laying her head gently against your shoulder. “You’re brave. You’ll be okay. If you do cry and he judges you for it then he’s an ass.”

“I don't… think I can. Not yet.”

“Alright,” Mina whispers, pressing a kiss to your cheek. “Mario Kart?”

“Morning,” Hyunjin greets, a warm smile on his face—like you were two friends meeting for a casual chat. You look around you, at the other people sitting around engaged in their own conversations. You wonder if they have their soulmates.

You’d given in, messaging your Minho’s roommate only a week after rushing from his apartment. Minho hadn’t contacted you at all. You wished you were strong enough to let him go, but you weren’t. So here you were, attempting to form a connection with his roommate because you were too cowardly to message the man himself.

A hand waves in front of your face, snapping you out of your trance. “How have you been?” Hyunjin asks.

“Is that a polite ‘how are you’ or are you actually asking?”

His plush lips curve up into a small smile. “I’m asking.”

“I miss him. I don’t even know him and I miss him.”

“Mm, I get it,” he says, tipping sugar into the iced coffee you’d ordered for him.

“Has he.. said anything?”

He wraps his hands around the cup, tipping it back and forth a little. “We’ve… not really been talking. We had… a conversation that night and not much since then.”

Minho was really that angry at his friend for making him meet you? You look down to your empty cup. “Right.”

“He’d like to meet you.”

“Would he really or is this another set up?” you mumble.

“I didn’t force him. To meet you.”

“That’s what it sounded like.”

“I think… this is something he should talk to you about.”

“Alright.”

“You’ll meet him?”

“Not yet.”

Hyunjin twirls his straw around, playing more with his coffee than actually drinking it. “Would you like to come to a gallery with me? There’s one near here.”

“I have to go to work soon,” you say, watching as he drops his eyes to his lap. “But I can tomorrow?”

His eyes meet yours, one corner of his mouth lifting a little. “Alright.”

It becomes a regular part of your schedule, visiting galleries with him. Once a week, at least. He gives you a tour around the entire city's art scene, opening your eyes to a whole world you’d never bothered to explore yourself. He’s kind, easy to open up to and he doesn’t bring up Minho unless you ask first. It’s nice. It’d been weeks since you’d seen Minho. He hadn’t said anything.

“She was an artist, apparently,” Hyunjin says suddenly, eyes fixed on the large portrait you’d been appreciating. You think he means the woman in the painting at first but when you look at his expression, it’s obvious he means his soulmate. He hadn’t brought her up since the night in your apartment, after he’d finished cleaning your blood from your leg.

“Do you know much about her?”

“Her family invited me to the funeral. I kept in touch with her brother. He… told me about her,” he says, moving each arm behind him so he can lean back on the long bench you both sit at. A couple walks past you, more engaged in each other than the artwork around them. You’re both quiet as they pass. “If she was here, and I had the chance to know her—”

“I know,” you say, cutting him off. “I know. But… what if it’s not… everything people say it is. What if it’s a placebo effect? We all think this other person is perfect for us and so they are. We convince themselves they are.”

“Maybe. Does it matter?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because clearly it isn’t working on him.”

He turns his body towards you, leaning closer. “Will you talk to him, please?”

You sigh. “Okay.”

“Really?”

You lift his hand from where he’s gripping his own thigh, intertwining your fingers. “I like you, Hyunjin. I like spending time with you and… if this will make you happy… I’ll do it.”

“It will.”

“Is he home now?”

He grins, pulling you up from the bench.

“You warned him?” you ask, fiddling with the hem of your shirt.

“Yeah.”

“He… he wants to meet?”

“Yeah.”

“Promise?”

He huffs out a light laugh. “I promise.”

“You’ll be nearby?”

“Cafe across the street,” he says, pushing you gently towards the steps to his apartment. “Now go. You’re okay.”

You trudge up the stairs, begging your body to be calm—to hide the anxiety coursing through your entire frame. You knock on the door before you can change your mind, sucking in a deep breath as it swings open.

“You came,” Minho says, brushing his hand through his damp hair. He stands to the side, holding the door for you. He looks calm, as always. His lack of anxiety during your first meeting made sense now. He didn’t care like you did. He was doing a favour for a friend. You hesitate, turning back behind you to the coffee shop where Hyunjin waits. This is fine. You step through the threshold.

“Do you want a drink?” he asks as you sit down on one of the cushions at the small table where you’d first met Hyunjin. He’s hovering by the kitchen, looking like he’d rather be anywhere else than here with you.

“I’m fine.”

He rocks back and forth on his heels for a moment then joins you at the table. You wait for him to speak; to explain. He taps his nails on the wood, the only sound in the room for a minute or two.

“I didn’t… want to hurt you. You seem nice,” he says, still tapping on the table.

You seem nice. Not exactly how you expected your soulmate to feel about you.

He flattens his palm against the surface of the table, then continues. “Has Hyunjin told you about… what happened? With his—”

“Yes.”

“He’s been here for me through a lot. I owed him this.”

You clench your fists in your lap, struggling to contain the sharp anger that bursts in your chest. You take a deep breath before speaking. “What about me?” you say. His brows furrow, like he doesn't understand what you have to do with any of this. Your nails cut into your palms. “You did ‘this’ as a favour to him. What about me?”

His palm curls into a fist on the table. “I don’t… owe you anything.”

“You don’t?”

“I don’t know you.”

“That’s the thing though, isn’t it? You don’t know me and you never wanted to know me. Hyunjin wanted you to try. That’s what he wanted from you and if you didn’t want to do that you owed me the courtesy of telling me. Instead you strung me along for weeks and then when we met didn’t say a thing about being there against your will.”

He’d taken 3 weeks to agree to meet you. You’d done the same, but he’d done it because he didn’t care. You did it because you cared too much.

“I had… to sort some things out before I could agree to meet you.”

“What things?”

His eyes drop to his phone, sitting on the table between you. “I needed to explain it to someone.”

He means the girl. The girl he loves instead of you. "That's what you were doing for 3 weeks?? Fucking her?!"

He looks up at you, brows raised. He scoffs, snatching his phone from the table and standing. "So what if I was? And don't act like I fucked you over, you took just as long."

You grab your bag, jumping to your feet. "I was questioning if I was good enough for you! I was sitting around feeling shit about myself and the entire time you were fucking the girl you love."

"You're acting like I was cheating on you,” he throws his hands up in the air, then points his phone at you. “I had no fucking clue you existed."

"You did though, you knew I existed. You just didn't know my name or my face."

"Same thing."

"No, it's not. You knew I was waiting for you. That I was thinking we were it. That we were meant for each other—”

"Maybe we're not,” he says quickly.

Both your chests are rising and falling rapidly as you catch your breaths. You step around the table slowly, moving closer towards him. He takes one small step back as you press your finger to his chest. It’s still rising and falling quickly, his breath mingling with yours. “You’ll regret letting me go. You don’t deserve me,” you warn, just above a whisper. His warm breath brushes against your skin and then his eyes drop to your lips. He takes a large step away from you, mouth pursed tight.

please reblog and share your thoughts. caption, tags, replies, or ask box, i read it all. feedback is what motivates me to write more!

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itzsana-kiddingmenow · 5 months

Note

I CANT BELIEVE REQUESTS ARE BACK:33 anywaysss!! i had an idea for a lee!han and ler!chan. its a bit silly but it sounds super funny.. so yk how chan chose han first as his first child??? well imagine like there were multiple people waiting to get chosen by chan and he tickled them all the find out which was the most ticklish so they could join. (ofc the most ticklish was han) SO YEAHHH

𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙩𝙞𝙘𝙠𝙡𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙤𝙧𝙮:

𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙙𝙨: 1.4k

𝙖/𝙣: omg i know there is a 0% chance this would ever happen irl but JUST IMAGINE OKAY also anon i changed it a bit if you don’t mind 😭💔

𝙩/𝙬: mentions of anxiety, temporary anxiety, rough tickling, strangers AU

𝒍𝒆𝒆: jisung

𝙡𝙚𝙧: chan

𝒕𝒂𝒈𝒍𝒊𝒔𝒕: @someone-who-loves-kpop-saranghae @jeonginsdiary @leeknowstan33 @v--143 @wereallgonnadieonedaybutnottoday @inkytornpagess @lajanaa @a-wild-seungberry @channieissocute125 @soap143 @seungsluvv @skznccmlee @moony-9

𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐟𝐢𝐜 𝐢𝐬 𝐚𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐤𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠! 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐞? 𝐤𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐬𝐜𝐫𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐛𝐮𝐛s 🐾

“Okay, bring in the next trainee.” Chan sighs, watching a smaller boy timidly enter the room, bowing once he caught sight of the older trainee.

“What’s your name?” Chan asked rather quickly, not realizing his tone sounded harsh.

“I-um…my name is Han Jisung, and I’ve been a trainee for three years.” The boy introduced himself quickly, biting his lip probably out of nervousness.

Chan noticed how quick Jisung was breathing, clearly scared out of his wits but trying to hide it.

After Jisung had finished his showcase, he bowed again and waited for the older trainee’s comments.

Chan was surprised to find that Han Jisung was a talented singer and dancer, and he seemed to be interested in producing as well. “You’re quite good.” Chan followed by providing his advice and criticism.

He watched as Jisung took in all of his comments thoughtfully. “Okay, thank you.”

“You seem talented. I’ll keep you in mind. Now, come and sit down, you look really scared.” Channie giggled; he was glad to finish the showcase so he could perhaps make friends with the quiet trainee.

Han timidly walked over and sat next to Chan, crossing his arms and gulping.

Chan decided to test a small theory out; perhaps he found the perfect idol in the quiet, composed Han Jisung.

“Why are you so tense, huh? Come and sit next to me.” The older trainee patted the area beside him with a warm smile, and Jisung obliged.

“You know who I am?” Chan asked, Jisung nodding his head quickly. “I’ll introduce myself properly.” He took Han’s hands in his own to soothe the younger trainee.

“My name is Bang Chan, or Christopher in English, and I’ve been training for about seven years.” He explained. “I’m trying to form a group of idols, named Stray Kids.”

Jisung nodded tensely. Chan frowned but continued. “Let’s get a little personal. My friends, they like to call me the tickle monster. Wonder why?”

He watched Jisung flush a little before replying. “Do you like to t-tickle people?”

Channie giggled. “Yeah, I enjoy it. I love getting people who have cute laughs, you know?”

He watched Jisung turn a deep red in real time, the boy seemed to get increasingly flustered the more the older trainee talked about tickling. “Y-Yeah.”

“I like to tickle people when they’re nervous or upset, because then they’re the cutest thing.” Chan continued to speak, grinning when Jisung squeaked while nodding.

Jisung tried to pull his wrists back, but suddenly realized the older’s grip of his wrists had become tighter the more they had talked.

“You’re so tense, Hannie.” Chan whispered. “Is it okay if I call you that?”

Jisung nodded meekly.

“Hmmm, you’re still being quiet. Guess I have to loosen you up a bit.” Chan smirked before yanking Jisung’s arms up, the frail boy was so easy to pin, weak to surprise and pure strength.

Han squealed in surprise, eyes widening. Clearly, he didn’t expect the older to do that. Chan pushed his arms back so he was lying on his back on the soft couch.

“What a cute sound~” Chan cooed, “You’ll have to make some more for me, yeah?”

Hanji turned beet-red, flustered. “H-Hyung! Why…what are you doing?!”

Chan’s finger was tapping his side. “Oh…? Now you can talk?~”

“Move your finger!” Jisung pleaded, biting his lip desperately when the digit dug softly into his side.

“Are you ticklish, perhaps?” Chan whispered quietly in a teasing tone, his hand tracing around Jisung’s left side.

“N-No! I’m not ticklish, hyung—DON’T!!” Jisung yelled suddenly, Chan’s finger stopping at the hem of his shirt.

“That’s the loudest I’ve heard you.” Chan laughed.

“Do you want this, Hannie? Do you want me to make you laugh? I bet you’re so cute underneath all that nervousness, aren’t you?” The older cooed in a baby voice, Jisung giggled breathlessly in anticipation.

Han was sure his face could be compared to a tomato, but he nodded anyway, freeing his hands to cover his face shyly.

“Aweee~” Chan smiled sweetly at the boy beneath them. “You’re so cute…maybe I should tickle you, hm?”

Jisung squeaked and smiled softly underneath his hands in anticipation. He only then realized how badly he really wanted Chan to attack him, to make his hands flutter all over his body to make him laugh freely.

“Please?” He whispered. “Hyung?” He looked up at Chan, and the older hummed in response.

“What are you doing?” Jisung was still laying on his back, and he looked around to try and catch what Chan was whipping his head around for.

“Nothing. Let’s start, shall we?” Chan asked. “Can you be a good trainee and keep your hands up?”

Jisung flushed again. “H-How will I do that?”

“Try for me?” Chan asked sweetly, and how could Hannie say no?

“Okay, I’ll try.” It took a few tries, but Jisung managed to fully outstretch his arms after giggling and pulling his arms to his sides when Chan wiggled his fingers in front of his face.

“Hyuhung!!” Jisung whimpered when Chan massaged his sides gently. His arms shook with the effort of keeping away.

Hannie bit his lip and twisted to the left, the tingly sensations shooting up his nerves and leaving him snickering through his teeth.

“I thought you weren’t ticklish?” Chan asked with a happy grin, moving to the quokka’s lower belly.

Jisung laughed gently, the soft sensations making him happier than he had ever imagined. “Hyuhuhung plehease!”

“You’re so cute, Hannie! You’re perfect.” Chan decided, continuing to gently tickle the boy beneath him before moving his hands up his shirt gently. “Is this okay?”

He continued when Hannie nodded softly, massaging the quokka’s soft tummy before moving to his ribs, digging in harshly.

Jisung let out a loud shriek, cackles pouring from his lips as his hands shot down immediately, gripping the older’s hands and kicking out behind him.

“OKAHAHAY OKAY OKAY!! AAAHAHAHA!!” Jisung squeezed his eyes shut, smile wide and cute, making Chan practically melt above him.

Channie gently pulled Han’s hands back above his head to gently remind him to keep them there, tickling around the soft sides of his chest.

“NOHOHOHOHOHO!! AGH IHIT TIHIHICKLES!!” Jisung screeched, keeping his arms up and resorting to gripping his hair tightly on top of his head.

“Does it really? I’m not even doing much.” Channie gaped with delight. “You’re so ticklish!”

“AHAHAGH SHUHUHUSH!!” Hannie demanded, cheeks turning red in embarrassment.

“Okay, okay. Flustered baby.” Chan scratched around the quokka’s armpits gently with his longish nails, watching the boy beneath him scream and fall apart, arms trembling.

“NAAAHAHAHA!! STAHP!! STOHOP IHIHIT!!”

“Little break for quokka~” Chan sang, letting up and slipping his hands out of Hannie’s shirt.

Jisung panted and rubbed at his torso, out of breath from his constant torment.

Meanwhile, Chan turned and adjusted to sit facing the younger’s legs, which kicked out lightly under his attention.

The older trainee used his knees to separate Jisung’s legs, thighs trembling in anticipation.

“Hyung…” Jisung warned, gasping when Chan slid a finger up his thigh. “I really can’t handle it there!”

“But I really want to!” Chan whined, pouting. “Please?”

“No!! Hyung!! Please, don’t!” Jisung pleaded desperately, squealing loudly when Chan scribbled up both inner thighs at the same time.

Channie thought for a second. Hannie’s thighs were like a blank canvas for him to scribble and scratch on, probably sensitive enough to send him ballistic. How could he miss this chance?

“Eh. I’m doing it anyway.” Chan shrugged.

Jisung opened his mouth to protest, the sound leaving his throat in a strangled scream as Chan grabbed his left knee with one hand and raked up and down his left thigh with the other.

“AGHHHAHANOHOHO STAHAHAP STAHP STOP!!” Jisung squealed with laughter, Chan’s fingers tickled so torturously along his left thigh, causing him to let out boisterous bouts of hysterical cackles.

“Nah. You’re too cute to.” Chan deadpanned, switching sides and relishing in the quokka’s drawn out screech to let up.

“PLEHEHEASE HAHAVE MEHEHERCY!! I CAHAHANT AHHAHA!!”

“Oh? But you can…” Chan switched to scribbling over both thighs, watching them tremble under his touch while Jisung tossed his body around behind him, pounding the couch with his fists and screaming his head off.

Jisung panted, breath suddenly taken from him as he felt tired and exhausted. He pounded three times on Chan’s shoulder to signify defeat; the older letting up immediately and smiling down at him.

“You are the most ticklish person I’ve ever met. And the perfect idol.”

Jisung nodded while gasping for breath, eyebrows furrowed in a confused manner.

“Welcome to Stray Kids.”

for @sungsbunny

#kpop tickle #midzywannabeitzy #stray kids #skz tickle #skz #ler chan #lee han #lee jisung #EEE I LOVE THEM AHH

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pjmparadise · 1 year

Text

3:23 am (don’t go, stay) Pt 1 || JJK

Pairing: jungkook x f! original character

Word count: 12.1k

Genre(s): fluff, romance, strangers to lovers, slight angst if you squint; neighbor au, pre-debut Jungkook au, pre-debut au, comic book artist Jungkook au, apartment au, neighbor au

Warnings: cursing, mentions of jungkook’s penis (yeah yeah... he sleeps naked ofc), brief injury (jk hurts himself bc he’s a dork); descriptions of anxiety and fear (jungkook is scared for a sec, oops); nudity mentions, jungkook is a little horny (what can I say....), jungkook gets a hard on lol; he’s also down bad pathetic crushing and is super clumsy, and brief mentions of home robberies (lol this feels random, but it isn’t I swear), very heavily dialogue based

Audience: 18+ (minors, DNI!)

Summary: Jungkook has had a couple of awkward run-ins with his pretty upstairs neighbor, who he may or may not be secretly pining over, and one night, she pays him an unexpected visit.

“My patio, though. Did you fall? I heard a thud.”

“Are you flirting with me? I’ve heard that pickup line before, but yours sounds a little different.”

He smiles. “I wouldn’t use pickup lines like those with you.”

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯ ⋆✦⋆ ⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

A/N: WOOO! my first jungkook fic!! We recently got his birth time, and thus this title was born lol! I’ve been working on this baby for a few months now, and it’s finally finished!! After a long time of contemplating, i decided to make our female character an original character, and i know it’s kind of a rare thing in the community, but i felt it worked best with my story. It’s been a bumpy ride with this one since it’s my first lengthy fic (over 12k words... sheesh!) that will be a part of a short series. I’m very excited and a little nervous, but if you’re here, I’m glad to have you here. Thank you for giving my work a shot <3 (ps. italics indicate jungkook’s inner thoughts as well as flashbacks)

a big thank you to my lovely beta’s: @cherrysoulth @the-boy-meets-evil and @jeonjcngkook you’ve all helped me shape my fic and have been so helpful, and I am so so grateful. truly. seriously. thank you for brainstorming with me, for reading my work, and for being so sweet and so supportive.

a special thank you to @itaeewon for the lovely banner! I love it so so much <3

Jungkook is awake to hear the sound of a muffled thud nearby.

His bedroom is dark and silent save for the alarm clock resting on a bedside table flashing bright red numbers at him. ‘It’s late, it’s late, you should be asleep,’ the time says. Jungkook shuts his eyes, groaning and rubbing a hand over his face. “I know, fuck, I know,” he mutters. He’s fully naked, lying on his back, eyes wide open and boring into the ceiling, blanket kicked off to the side, and arms folded behind his neck–still remembering a phone conversation with Namjoon earlier in the day.

“So she walked toward the elevator as it closed, and you didn’t open it for her?” Namjoon scoffs over the phone, shaking his head and clicking his tongue to show he’s disappointed. He knows Jungkook froze, Jungkook already told him he wanted to reach out and push the button for her, but Namjoon asked again anyway—he likes to give him a hard time. “Every time you see this girl, things just kind of go wrong. I’ve noticed.”

“Yeah,” Jungkook says with a sigh. “I’ve noticed too. Is it a sign? Should I give up?” In his apartment, he sat curled up on his couch, his chin on his kneecaps. He’s fallen silent in thought.

“No, nothing like that. Maybe she didn’t get to see it was you, so she thinks it was someone else, or maybe she doesn't even think about it anymore. You know, like things that happen in your day you forget about later unless something reminds you of it?”

“Yes!” Jungkook relaxed, falling back against the couch with a hand over his forehead. “That probably is what’s going on. She went on with her day; other things have to happen, right?”

Namjoon was quiet. In his apartment, he was opening mail and reading over a proposal he was meant to sign soon. A project he hasn’t mentioned to anyone else, Namjoon folds the letter and sets it aside. “Sorry, yes. Yes, don’t worry too much. It will ruin your day. I mean that. Sorry for the pause. I just opened some mail.”

“Ah, okay. Well, you’re right.” Jungkook rose from his seat then. “Namjoon-hyung?”

Namjoon nodded even though he couldn’t be seen. “Yeah?”

“Thank you. I don’t know if I say that enough, but you’re always helping and guiding me when I don’t even realize I need it.”

“Thank you, Jungkook. Finish your comic tonight, and submit it tomorrow. I know you’ll place in the contest and do well. You haven’t scrapped it have you?”

Jungkook sighed. Rubbing his eyelids, walking distractedly around his living room, he spoke with his eyes closed. “I have it. I finished it; I just don’t feel too good about posting it, even with the pseudonym; it feels like too much. Too much with what we already have going on as a group even. We’re trying to do something together, and the comic stuff is just… I don’t know. I don’t want it to distract me.”

Namjoon was on his back patio, leaning over the railing and looking out at the park across from him. “Jungkook, I’m going to tell you something and think about it however you want to. I respect your life, but I think—and these are just my opinions. I think you doubt yourself too often and need to take some chances. Luck turns out; it does.” Namjoon folds his arms over the railing, leaning his body against it. “No rush, bro. At all. The music we’re trying to pursue, it’s not going anywhere, you know?”

Jungkook nodded from his living room.

“Like, okay, look.” Namjoon fixed his gaze on a flock of birds rising from the trees. “The guys, we all have our passions. Yoongi with his piano, Jimin is passionate about his dancing, Taehyung with his instruments, Jin and his gaming, and Hoseok he’s been designing his own clothes lately; with me, you know I like poetry and painting, but we all share music. That is for the team, for a part of us, but we each have so many parts. You like art and storytelling; your comics are so cool, bro. You love watching Taehyung practice the trumpet, and Jimin dance after practice. We like to see you pursue your other dreams too. Pursue it, and don't worry about the group, is all I ask.”

Jungkook almost cried. He stopped pacing. His heart was racing; it was all he had heard momentarily. If Namjoon were there in front of him, he’d hug him. Maybe he’d even cry. “Ah, Namjoon-hyung…” he swallowed hard at the saliva in his throat, blushing. ‘Namjoon always knows what to say,’ he thought. “I will think about it. I will set an alarm, just in case. I’ll decide in the morning, you know it’s my style to do that the day of. If I think about it now, it will be like this all day, and I’ll stress too much.”

“Good, then. Just think about it.” Namjoon smiled.

Jungkook lies motionless with his eyes shut, eyebrows furrowed in concentration, mouthing along to Namjoon’s words. “We like to see you pursue your other dreams too. Pursue it, and don't worry about the group, is all I ask.” He sighs. How could he not worry about the guys? He’s twenty-five. Most idols start out much younger, and the mandatory enlistment is already so near for his hyungs. It’s bad timing, is all. My comic book can wait.

He wants to sleep, so he turns over, laying flat on his stomach, facing his wall. Resting his full body weight on his flaccid penis is slightly uncomfortable, but he ignores it. It’s the type of restless night that he has no chance up against, and even with his eyes closed, he feels painfully awake. Jungkook is thinking of her again—her pretty smile, the pink sundress she wore in the elevator, her ability to look him in the eyes and not shy away—and it’s almost like she's here, in the same room with him. He pictures the sundress again, the way it clung to her frame, highlighting every curve. Man, I want her. He shifts his hips around, surprising himself with a massive erection.

The thud strikes again suddenly, and he sits up, alarmed. Shit, is that here? Like outside my apartment? Jungkook squints in the darkness, bringing a hand to the nightstand to fetch his glasses. Any sign of arousal is now extinguished.

“Bam?” He calls out in a sluggish voice. The clock beside him flashes bright red numbers at him. 3:23. “Ah, shit,” Jungkook mumbles, turning the clock away. A sound he can’t distinguish comes from his left, directly outside his bedroom. “It’s like home alone,” he says to no one.

Jungkook rests his head against the wall, the texture cold against his feverish face. He can hear the sound of a muffled conversation. “Shit, that’s right here, right outside,” he mumbles, stepping back. He reaches over mechanically to switch on the lamp beside him.

Now, Jungkook is painfully aware of his nakedness and frenetically searches for bottoms to change into. He’s thinking about how his legs don’t feel like his own as he walks to the chair by the door, where he sees basketball shorts. It’s like sleepwalking. Even though he’s awake, Jungkook feels as though he might’ve actually fallen asleep, and this is some strange anxiety dream he’s creating to cope with his qualms about submitting his comic. Still, he goes along with it, quietly changing into the shorts, walking out into his living room, and ducking his head when he passes the glass patio door.

Cursing under his breath, annoyed at himself for forgetting to throw on a shirt, Jungkook shakes his head at himself. I don't want to fight an intruder shirtless and commando in basketball shorts, damn... A part of him feels a rush of adrenaline as he crouches behind a potted plant and, chewing on his lower lip, fantasizes about a robbery gone wrong, one where he puts his boxing skills to the test—the other part of him wants this to be a dream, a sign from the universe that he ought to submit his comic. I’ll fucking do it if I survive this.

Jungkook stays like that for a while until he hears a sound again. Rising from his crouched position, he walks toward the back patio window, pulling back the curtain to peer out. He feels a tightness in his chest, and his hands tremble slightly. A shameful part of him is relieved that he’s alone and no one is around to see how shaken up he is.

He whistles quietly, calling to Bam, forgetting his brother is watching over him tonight. Craning his neck, he glances around his balcony patio and sees nothing. “Bam, come here,” his whispering is frantic. He whistles again, patting his leg lightly. Nothing. You’re okay. It’s nothing. It’s probably the cats again tipping over the plants. Just fix it tomorrow. Now, go back to bed. You need it. Jungkook is about to whistle once more when he remembers. His eyebrows knit together; shaking his head, he places his fingertips on his eyelids, murmuring a lamented, “Ah.”

Thinking better of it, he draws the curtain back again and sighs with relief before taking note of a figure crouched behind a chair with a hand shooting up to rub their head. Panic washes over him. His inner monologue consists of a string of every curse word he can think of as he ducks out of view. Fuck, fuck, fuck, that’s a person. If he’d been scared earlier, now he’s downright petrified.

Desperate, he begins to look around the room for a weapon. Anything. Jungkook stands still, breathing in heavy gulps of air, cradling his head as he adjusts his vision to the darkness of the living room. ‘Can’t even turn a fucking light on,’ he thinks as he drops to the ground and crawls around his living room. His home’s silence unsettles him. Jungkook can hear the nothingness aside from his ragged breathing, so he pinches the skin on his arm and hisses at the sharp pain. Okay, real life it is. His bare knees skid against the hard flooring, and his clammy palms slip beneath him; his heart is thudding hard and fast, the blood pooling between his ears. He’s scowling, chewing his lower lip, his chest heaving as he fumbles a hand under the couch; he fingers a cold object and remembers what it is. Aha! He comes up with a golf club Taehyung left behind a few nights ago. I love you, Taehyung!

Jungkook grips the golf club until his knuckles take on a pale color. Having a weapon gives him a newfound sense of security, and like before, he’s fantasizing about kicking someone’s ass. “You come to my house at three in the morning? My house?” he says as he walks through his living room, rolling his shoulders.

He draws the curtain again, allowing his eyes to adjust to the darkness; he sees the figure facing away from him and hunching over, a phone glowing against their face. He can call the police, and he almost wants to, but to avoid the drama of a police visit at three in the morning, he decides against it. Imagine the guys find out I called the police? He shudders at the thought. The stranger looks small anyway.

Jungkook reaches for the doorknob and pulls back the door. It’s a lot chillier than he’d anticipated. He folds his arms over his bare chest instantly, the skin covered in goosebumps—his teeth chatter of their own accord.

“Don't move!” He raises the golf club in a mid-swing position, ready to strike. The person shifts around, holding up the hand with the phone. “I said, ‘Don’t move’!” He sounds ridiculous, but he doesn't care. In the shadows, he watches the phone’s glow shut off. “I called the police, so don’t try anything. They’re on the way.” His voice doesn't even sound like his own. He takes a few steps toward the stranger, his grip tightening around the golf club. His heart feels heavy in his chest.

It’s hard to make out the features of this person, but they rise, walk toward the dim light spilling from the neighbor’s window, and he can see them now. The stranger looks straight at him, and he’s met with wide eyes staring at him. She’s standing, squinting at him with a hand on her hip, and she smiles wide. Damn! If this were an animation, she’d have a halo effect.

Jungkook has seen her a total of seven times—he can’t help it; he likes to keep track of these things. It’s his upstairs neighbor, their interactions before tonight being brief and in passing (the most recent engraved in his mind and tormenting him), and he’s thought of her tirelessly and has fantasized about a time they should meet, and things go well for a change.

Jungkook doesn't know her name, but he could recognize those beautiful dark eyes anywhere. He’s looking into them now, his body anchored, mouth turning into sawdust.

She’s talking to him; he’s just not listening. Not really. He can't grasp the reality that it’s actually her, and she’s standing on his patio, and she looks so beautiful. Should he be thinking that?

Her long black hair is in a loose ponytail, her eyebrows arch as her deep dark eyes blink at him, and her lips move. “Please tell me you didn't really call the cops,” she says, bursting through his trance.

Damn, I sounded so stupid! Jungkook blushes. He hopes she can’t tell from where she stands.

“I was trying to call my friend; I swear I was not snooping or breaking in.” She smiles, but her voice sounds worried. Her eyebrows furrow like she’s trying to read him. “Honest,” she says in a small voice as she leans on the railing and raises her hand with the cell phone for emphasis.

She’s wearing a dark gray sweatshirt twice her size and sandals with white socks, and he can’t tell if she’s wearing shorts or if the sweatshirt is all. He can feel his face reddening just from the possibility of her nakedness underneath the sweatshirt, so he decides not to focus on that.

Jungkook rubs the nape of his neck, abashed. The cold air surrounds him, and he folds his arms across his chest, remembering his exposed chest. His empty threat echoes and bounces around in his head, and he looks away from her. “I didn't call the cops, sorry. I didn't know what else to say. It’s what they say in movies.”

“You would be right anyway; this is your patio.” She laughs a little at that, and his heart rate picks up. She pushes herself away from the railing, smiling, and walks toward him with an outstretched hand. Her nail polish is glittery, and he doesn't notice, but this small detail makes him smile. “I’m Rei. I live upstairs. Maybe you’ve seen me before.” There’s a coy look on her face as she says this, and it makes him nervous.

So her name is Rei!!! Fireworks set off, exploding behind Jungkook’s wide eyes.

“Huh, maybe,” Jungkook lies. He shakes her hand slowly, his hand enveloping hers entirely, the contact sending a warm shock through his body.

“Maybe a few days ago,” she says, with a finger to her chin, like she’s thinking over something. “Oh, yes, have I seen you on the elevator?”

“The elevator?” He feigns innocence as he tongues his lip ring anxiously. “That’s strange. Every day is a blur for me.”

“For me, too,” she replies. She’s almost smirking, watching Jungkook lie. He can tell she’s caught him. “You just look sooo familiar.”

“That’s a first.” Still, he denies it.

“Maybe you just look like someone I’ve seen,” she says, looking into his eyes as if searching for something she placed there. “You have one of those faces, you know?”

Jungkook raises his eyebrows, lips parted to speak, but nothing comes out.

Is she flirting with me or giving me a hard time? DAMN!

“I have an ordinary face?” Jungkook wonders after a moment.

“Either that or my memory is failing me,” she says, sighing and shaking her head. “Which do you think it is?”

“I don't have an ordinary face,” Jungkook says in a small voice, “I have piercings on my face.”

“That’s true…” she’s watching the ground and suddenly looks into his eyes again. She holds his stare unblinking, and then her lips pull back into a big smile showing off cute bunny teeth. Just like me. “I’ve always had a good memory; I was just kidding.”

“Oh,” Jungkook says, blushing.

He can smell her perfume when a cold breeze blows past him, carrying her real-life presence and enveloping him in it. It’s sweet and mixed with a scent of detergent he recognizes, and he’s watching how strands of her hair float beside her face. She’s so cute. Damnnnn.

“You should open the door for the ladies,” Rei says, raising an eyebrow, and stepping closer, she says, “Just harmless advice. Stranger .”

“I will consider that,” he replies, avoiding her fixed stare, attempting to ignore how she’s riled him up with a loud clearing of his throat. But his chest is on fire, his heart thudding hard against his rib cage at her closeness. “My patio, though. Did you fall? I heard a thud.”

“Are you flirting with me? I’ve heard that pickup line before, but yours sounds a little different.”

He smiles. “I wouldn’t use pickup lines like those with you.”

She laughs, and he internally swoons. If he were a cartoon, his heart would burst out of his chest in comical dramatic thuds, his pupils heart-shaped.

“I’m kidding. I know I’m giving you a hard time when I’m on your patio at three in the morning, but I can explain why I’m here,” Rei mimics Jungkook’s movements by crossing her arms across her chest, her lower lip trembling, “but can I come in? It’s cold out, and I'm in the worst attire for this weather.” She gestures vaguely at her exposed legs, and Jungkook’s stare lingers before she notices—so he responds with a nod as he gestures for her to follow him inside. “Though you might have me beat. You came out here without a shirt, damn.”

Leading the way, he blushes at her comment and gives his head a light shake. She’s so talkative! Yoongi was right about her.

With a dreamy air about him, he remembers Namjoon’s words. Except now, all he remembers is: “You need to take some chances. Luck turns out; it does.”

Inside, Jungkook excuses himself to his room to change into a shirt. He reaches for his glasses beside his bed and goes to the closet. “Shirt, shirt, shirt,” he mutters as his hands sift through empty hangers. When was the last time he did laundry? He groans. “Shirt?” he reaches to pick up a heap of white clothing in the deep corner of the closet. He brings the shirt to his nose, sniffs, and walks back into the room, raising an eyebrow and nodding with approval. His hands are shaky as he maneuvers his head through a t-shirt sleeve in a panicked rush. He yanks the shirt off again, the t-shirt now inside out and knotted up in his grip; he groans as his fingers work the fabric. What if she’s gone when I go back out there? Agh, what if I’m dreaming all of this up, and lack of sleep is finally getting to me?

Rei’s voice comes through the walls, and though this is their first official meeting, he knows she’s smiling as she calls out to him. “You okay in there?”

Smoothing out the wrinkles on the shirt, he glances at his reflection behind the bedroom door before stepping out, his chest heaving and his nostrils flaring. “I’m okay; all is OK. Sorry.” He offers her a thumbs up and a big goofy grin that makes her laugh.

“Did you go on a hike without me?” She asks from her seat on his couch. She rests her face on her palm, looking up at him as he walks past toward the kitchen.

“Hike? I just put the shirt on; it was fighting me, though.”

“No, I meant,” she shakes her head, laughing. “I meant that as a while for changing into a shirt. Bad joke, sorry.”

“Ah,” Jungkook says.

“You’re wearing glasses,” she comments, her eyes looking over his face.

“I am,” he says, glancing her way.

It looks like she wants to say something else but doesn't.

He raises his eyebrows, nodding and tonguing the inside of his cheek. It doesn't happen often, but he doesn't know what to say. He walks into the kitchen with his hands in his pockets. “Do you drink tea?” He wonders as he fills a kettle with water and sets it to boil.

Rei nods, stretching her legs before her and craning her neck back to look up at the ceiling. “Chamomile or whatever you have, I’m not picky.” She points a finger above her head, motioning for him to look. “Those are stars. Is this wallpaper? It looks pretty. Is it glow-in-the-dark?”

Jungkook is in the kitchen, his eyes watching how her finger moves in a swift motion of the length of the ceiling. He thinks about how her hand felt in his grip and wishes he’d been more present. “It’s… I don’t know, actually. It’s not a wallpaper; it’s carved into the ceiling, and yes, it glows but not like the bright green; it’s softer.” He looks at her, and she scrunches her eyebrows in confusion. “Want to see?”

She twists her body to look at him, her smile so big he can’t help but return the affection. “Yes. Show me.”

“Grab the remote beside you; turn off the lights with it.”

She clicks the lights off, and the gasp she lets out makes his heart flutter in his chest. Aside from the hard thudding in his chest, the only sounds nearby are the buzzing of the refrigerator, the ice machine rolling out handfuls of freshly carved-out cubes, and the bubbling water in the kettle. Jungkook doesn't dare disturb the quiet; he’s leaning against the kitchen table, wanting her to stay. He looks for her in the dark, his eyes finding her silhouette on the couch, his lips pulling back into a smile. She’s better than in his daydreams; she smells sweet and of detergent, and she feels like a real person just like him, so near but out of his reach. And here, in the same room as him, so close to him, Jungkook realizes she could’ve left by now but hasn’t.

“I’d love it if I had this on my ceiling,” Rei pouts, “want to trade?” She clicks the lights back on, and Jungkook blinks, slowly adjusting to the brightness.

He pretends to mull it over, humming and tonguing his cheek. He puts on his best-thinking face. “No way, but you can come over and look at the stars when it's overcast or raining outside.” He walks toward the stove, where the water boils in the kettle. With his back turned to her, he’s hiding his blushing face as he sets two cups out before him.

“I think that sounds nice,” she replies, surprising him. “So what, I walk outside sometime, see a gray sky, and come downstairs to see you? ‘Hey, neighbor, can I see the stars?’ and you say, ‘Come in, I’ve just made cocoa, would you like some?’ and I say, ‘Thank you, are you sure?’ and then you say, ‘Sure’ except I never leave because I like the stars so much and you don’t know how to tell me I should go home.”

“Oh, that’s a good conversation. Is that what you’d like me to make? I like hot cocoa,” Jungkook says, brushing the hair out of his eyes. “You think I'd want you to leave?”

“Well, if I were here all the time….” she looks at him through her lashes, and he catches her eyes and raises an eyebrow at her, a playful smirk on his lips. And she shakes her head, laughing. “Do you mean it, though?”

“About you coming to see the stars whenever you’d like?” Jungkook asks, leaning against the kitchen island. She nods at him in two slow motions of her head. “Yes, I mean it.”

“The skies are unusually gray these days, aren’t they?”

“I’ve noticed that too,” he says, opening the fridge. He grabs a box of cherries and shuts the door with his elbow. “But no rain.”

“Exactly, I told my friend Kimi; she lives with me upstairs and is almost a sister to me, except we have different parents. Well, I told her, ‘Haven't you noticed how it looks like it’s going to rain every day, but it never does?’ and she says, ‘Rei, it rains. It just happens to be when you’re asleep,’ and can you believe it? I woke up yesterday, and it was early, not like tonight, but early for me, and I looked outside my window, and there was dew sticking to the glass, and it was all sweaty when I touched the windowpane, and I realized she was right, it rained during the night, and I just missed it. Isn't that something so lame?”

“Huh,” Jungkook says, chewing on a cherry and offering the box to her. She shakes her head no and mouths a ‘Thank you’ to him. “So we’re off asleep and just missing the rain, so it always works out that we’re missing out on something during the day. It’s always like that. Kimi sees the rain, and you’re off sleeping, but you probably get to see other things I miss when I’m taking a nap and on and on.”

“That’s true. But I thought about catching it tonight. When I went to bed hours ago, I kept thinking about the rain and wondering if I stayed up, I might see it, and it wouldn’t just feel like I kept missing it and living the same gray day.”

“It’s like Santa Claus,” Jungkook says, scrunching his nose as he tongues a cherry stem in his mouth, “waiting up all night for him to show up just for you to see your dad dressed up as Santa and realize he’s been putting the presents down there for years.”

Rei laughs at this and covers her face with her hands like she’s protecting her laugh from anything sharp. “Your dad did that? For real?”

Jungkook scrunches his eyebrows and pinches his nose bridge, and with a tone of feigned affliction, he says, “Yeah, he did. I knew the truth before a lot of my classmates.”

“How old were you? When he ruined Santa Claus. Do you remember a thing like that, like how old you were?” She rests her chin on her palm like she’s weighing her head. He thinks she looks cute like that but doesn’t say anything.

“I don't know exactly, but I was in the third year of school,” Jungkook says, suddenly thinking back on his infancy. He chews his lower lip when the answer suddenly comes to him, and he remembers the conversation he had with the guys a while back. They’d all taunted Seokjin when they found out Seokjin didn't know the truth about Santa until he was thirteen. “I was seven. I can't believe I remembered that. I was seven….” His mouth hangs open, and he remembers what he wore when he first saw his dad hunched over behind the tree with a gift in hand— a white flannel pajama set and his mother’s slippers. Where has this memory been hiding? “Damn.”

“I was six,” she says, smiling. “My childhood was ruined a year before yours. Or wait, are we the same age? I just assumed we were.” She laughs again, bringing a hand up to her face to hide her smile.

“I assumed the same thing,” Jungkook admits, feeling his cheeks redden. “I’m twenty-five.”

“Oh wow,” she says, almost to herself. “Me too.”

He doesn't know what else to do but clear his throat and nod. He never imagined getting this far (whatever that means). He’ll struggle to explain this later when Namjoon asks—Jungkook knows he’ll ask.

The kettle begins to whistle, and he’s reaching for the two coffee mugs as she says something behind him he doesn't catch. And he turns his head over his shoulder and nods at her. “What happened? Sorry, I didn't catch that.”

“I said, ‘You don't have to do that for me.’” She turns her head away as she says this, her long hair cascading along her profile, hiding her.

“I have a visitor,” he says, turning over to look at her with a grin. “I have good manners.”

“Oh, sure, manners,” she replies, rolling her eyes at him like a friend he’s known for years. “Is that my tea? It smells amazing.”

“It is, but it’s hot, so let’s leave it here.” Jungkook offers her a tight-lipped smile, shyly making his way toward her. “Mind if I sit next to you?”

“No, not at all; come, sit.” She pats the spot beside her and scoots over to make room for him. “Thank you for the tea and for letting me in. I know it’s late.”

Jungkook glances at the clock on the kitchen stove. 3:55. “It’s not that late. I was awake anyway, so I didn’t mind.” He’s toying with his lip ring again. “Why were you out there anyway?”

It’s been some time since Jungkook’s been this close to a girl. He feels his heart thudding away in his chest, her presence stirring up a desire that’s been dormant. Loose strands of hair frame her face, and his eyes follow her movements as she brushes the strands away. She looks embarrassed, her cheeks reddening. Still, he finds her so cute. “Truth?”

“Yes.” He scrunches his nose when he smiles at her.

“I locked myself out of my apartment. Before bed, I stepped out into my patio for a smoke and to read more of my book. I was also trying to test my rain suspicions to see if I could catch it while it happened. So, I’m out there romanticizing my life, pretending I’m in a movie; you know how we act when we’re alone and suddenly want to be poetic?” She looks at Jungkook, and he nods lightly. “That was me, except I got cold right away and said, ‘Oh fuck this, I’m going to bed,’ and that’s when I realized I’d locked the back door, and I was so mad I almost cried.” She places her fingertips against her forehead, continuing her recounting. “So, of course, I get the idea of calling a locksmith, but they’re closed; I don’t know what people should do if they need help during the night.”

“Most people sleep, I think.”

She clicks her tongue. “Right, some people do, but you and I are not those people, right?” She draws an imaginary line with her forefinger from her chest toward him. He nods and feigns oblivious as his leg brushes against her bare thigh as she shifts in her seat. “So, not only is every locksmith not available, but my service is horrible, so I am standing on my tiptoes trying to get a bar, and my phone slips. My heart almost burst.” She brings a hand to her chest for visual effect, and his eyes watch her chest as it rises and falls with each breath. He’s smiling at her—a wide smile that hurts his cheeks. “If it weren’t for your patio, my phone would be shattered to hell on the ground. I look over my balcony, and for the first time, I notice how close our balconies are.” Rei presses her hands over her thighs, leaning forward in her seat and fixing her eyes on the glass patio door across from her. “I mean, I’m sure you’ve noticed, but I don’t go out there much. Anyway, I’m rambling. I noticed I could jump directly into your patio because there’s a mattress out there, and well….” She makes a motion with her hands that says: ‘ Ya know?’

“You weren’t scared of jumping? The balconies are close, but we’re still six stories up.” Jungkook rests his hands on his knees, fully invested in this story; his eyes never leave her. She forms a tight line with her lips and gives him a serious look that makes him laugh. “Ok, so you were scared.”

“I was scared! But there’s a mattress out there, you know,” she says in a small voice. She’s blushing and scratching at the side of her nose to avoid his eyes.

Jungkook notices this and clicks his tongue, leaning back in his seat. “So it was not an accident, then?” He raises an eyebrow at her, sucking his teeth in feigned disapproval.

The truth is, he’s not mad about it; he wants her here. He almost feels like he is in a dream.

“Not entirely. Don’t ask me how I thought about returning to my place after retrieving my phone because I didn’t think that far ahead.”

“Oh, there’s a mattress out there. You could’ve just slept there; no big deal,” Jungkook says with a laugh. Rei brings a hand to her face to hide behind, making a groaning sound. “I’m sorry; I don’t mean to laugh at you. I just don't know what to think— this has never happened before.”

“And it won’t happen again; let’s hope.” She laughs, and it’s different from before; it sounds deeper like she reached into herself and decided to really show him. And Jungkook likes the sound of her laugh but does not comment. She moves a few strands of hair from her face and rests her cheek on her hand, leaning on the couch's armrest. It’s slowly dawning on Jungkook how badly he wants her. What am I supposed to do with her this close to me? Damn. “So, what’s your name? You didn’t say when I told you mine.”

He rises from the couch, remembering their tea.

“Jeon Jungkook,” he says as he pours the tea, “I guess I forgot to introduce myself. Huh.”

Rei’s looking at him with her chin in her hand and a serious look on her face as he’s walking toward her with an outstretched hand in offering. “It’s chamomile,” Jungkook announces.

“Jeon Jungkook,” She repeats with a light smile. “I like it. I don’t know any other Jungkooks.”

“Yeah? I’ve had this name for a long time. I like it too.”

She takes the cup and brings it to her face, inhaling the scent and shivering, and says, “Thank you again. This tea smells sweet. It reminds me of this tea my grandmother used to make my sister and me when we were kids. She would put a little bit of honey, the real kind, and peppermint leaves; it was….” She sighs longingly. “I miss that tea; this smells like home.”

Sitting beside her, he takes a sip of tea, his gaze on her unmoving. Her lips part as she blows gently, the steam rising from the cup in lazy strokes. Jungkook’s heartbeat quickens when she matches his stare with her deep dark eyes that seem to look for something in his.

“This tea has honey, but I doubt it’s the real kind you mentioned, but I still think it’s good.” He clears his throat, looking away as he adjusts his glasses on his nose bridge.

“I like your glasses. I wanted to say that earlier,” Rei comments, taking a sip of her tea, “I don't know why I didn't say anything.” She moves around in her seat, tucking her legs beneath her, then asks, “Can I wear them? Are they prescription?”

“They’re just reading glasses. You can wear them. I put them on sometimes just because they suit me,” he pulls his glasses off, wipes the lenses on his shirt, and hands them over.

“Ah, so you like how they look on you,” she says, her eyes gleaming as she takes the glasses from him and sets them on her face. “How do they look?”

If he were a cartoon character from one of his comics, he’d have melted into a puddle, exploded like dynamite, turned into stardust, and returned to his original self. Except, she’s a real person just like he is, flesh and blood and so beautiful, and he’s off in space being reborn.

“Look at me,” he motions for her to turn his way. She looks straight at him, wearing his glasses and blushing at his attention. She begins to unfold in front of him, her playful demeanor softening. “You look pretty. If they weren't my prescription, I would give them to you.”

“Here, they’re hurting my eyes,” she says, laughing. She removes the glasses and starts rubbing her eyes with closed fists. “You’re sweet, though. I couldn't take a guy’s glasses. How will he go on drinking his tea and letting me in to watch the stars?”

Jungkook feels a warmth spread in his chest. God, how is she real? He runs his fingers through his long hair and coughs once, then again. His nerves are getting to him. She’s too close to him, her bare thigh soft against his leg. He begins to count backward in his head.

“Were you really awake already, or did I wake you?” She asks him all of a sudden. Her eyes stay on him as if waiting for him to say something else.

“You don’t believe me? I was awake. Swear.” He raises his free hand at his side.

She appears to mull that over for a bit, bringing her cup of tea to her lips but not taking a sip. “What were you doing?”

Jungkook is silent, and she sits unmoving until he speaks.

What was I doing? Besides dreading another deadline? Thinking about a comic I might not submit or thinking about not having a shot in hell with a girl like you? Images of the times they’ve run into each other flick by in his head like a slow PowerPoint slide. The registration office, desolate stairwells, crowded evacuations, elevators closing, Rei standing in front of him in a summer dress with a strange look on her face; Rei on his back patio, hunched over with a phone near her face; Rei in his apartment, on his couch, next to him. He feels the adam’s apple in his throat rising and falling. He’s been quiet for who knows how long.

“Thinking, I guess.” He breathes out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding. “I don’t know why I took so long to say that. It sounded boring in my head, so I had to think if there was something else I forgot about.”

“That is pretty boring, just thinking. But that’s life, though, isn’t it? Kind of boring sometimes.”

Jungkook nods, blushing and avoiding looking at her. What if she can read minds? He straightens his posture and runs his fingers through his hair again, his eyes fixed on the ceiling of carved-out stars. It’s OK. It’s OK. She’s still here.

The living room is almost dead silent. Jungkook notices how Rei sips her tea and looks over the area. It’s neat, for the most part. Bam’s toys lay scattered near the laundry room entrance, along with some of Jungkook’s dirty socks the dog likes to chew on, and Bam’s food bowls are resting up against the wall beside his doghouse. The potted plants Namjoon gifted Jungkook are still alive and pop against the beige coloring of the walls in front of them. The TV is massive, his Playstation console resting on its side. Her eyes find the corner shelf where Jungkook’s Marvel figurines are on display behind glass doors, and she turns to look at him with a sparkle in her wide eyes. “Are those yours?” She gestures with her thumb. He nods, chewing his lower lip anxiously. “Can I look?” She rises from her seat when he motions for her to go on. Like standing in a museum, she silently peers into the display with her hands clasped behind her back.

“I just got that case a few days ago when I got that plant next to you,” Jungkook remarks, joining her.

“I remember,” she says distractedly.

“You remember?” His eyebrows raise, and he looks at her fixedly, bringing a fingernail to his mouth. He scrunches his eyebrows, rubbing at his forehead with his fingers; he remembers, too.

He’d bumped into Rei on his way upstairs, both arms holding the bonsai trees obstructing his view, taking long strides up the stairs, chanting to himself and grunting in rhythm. He was on the 50th stair.

“Hey!” A voice shouted at him. “What the hell?”

Jerking to the side of the staircase, flattening against it, Jungkook jumped at this voice. “Sorry! You’re okay?”

The voice struck him as familiar, but mostly, he was surprised he wasn't alone on the staircase. The person laughed a lively laugh, and he felt his chest tighten. He lowered the plants, meeting her eyes. “I’m okay,” she said, shaking her head. She grinned at him, and his heart gave a squeeze. “These things happen. I should take the elevator next time.”

“The plants, I mean. You walked past me going up the stairs and hit me on the head with it.” She glances to her right, catching his eyes briefly. He groans, nodding lightly. She continues, voicing their shared memory, “You were carrying two pots of plants that day and lost your balance or something like that.”

He nods with his eyes closed, his eyebrows drawn close together as he tongues his cheek. “I remember, too,” he opens his eyes to look over at her as he continues, “sorry again. My friend told me not to do that, and I didn’t listen.”

A Spiderman figurine holds her attention, and she’s smiling. He feels his cheeks burn at her sincere gesture. She pretends not to notice and says, “You like running into me like that, then?”

“Like how? It was an accident,” Jungkook says, standing beside her and stretching his arms behind his head.

“Riiiiight,” she says, smirking. “Accident.”

“I didn’t know you were in the stairwell. No one takes the stairs,” Jungkook counters, his voice taking on a defensive edge.

“I take the stairs, I like the exercise, and it’s less embarrassing for me,” She admits. “Running in front of people just looks so stupid. I get too worked up about it and think people are just laughing at me, and they might be, but this way, I can do it in private.”

“Running across the street when cars let you pass is very embarrassing for no reason,” Jungkook says with a laugh. “And okay, fair. I took the stairs that time just because the wait for the elevator was so long. I didn’t mean to hit you that time either.”

“Jungkook, we have to stop meeting like this.” She gives her head a light shake and looks down at her hands. She picks at the glitter on her nails distractedly. “So many accidents. We’re too clumsy.”

“I know what you mean. Namjoon told me to leave one of the plants in the lobby, but I was too impatient. I’m like that sometimes.” He can’t seem to stop blushing.

But Jungkook has to agree. There have been too many accidents in their run-ins with each other, and he remembers each encounter with extreme detail.

Jungkook saw her for the first time when he moved in and face-planted into her back as she stood by the entrance of the registration office. But it didn't happen right away, at least.

The office was big and bustling with sounds. Jungkook walked in, asked out loud if there was a line, and someone nearby replied that yes, there was a line, and he was right at the tail of it. He bounced on the heels of his feet, humming a melody to himself, tapping his fingers against the sides of his legs. A TV across from him played a K-Pop music video of a group he’d never heard of. Beneath the TV was a table with a Terra Kaffe espresso machine accompanied by a spread of dan-pat bbang, songpyeon, bingsu, and reusable cups. His stomach grumbled, but he kept still, willing himself to look away.

Rei stood in line, a foot or two in front of Jungkook, sporting her hair pulled back, secured neatly with a clip the shape of a butterfly. She wore casual clothing: a black long-sleeve sweatshirt, baggy pants, and white Nike shoes. She had earbuds in, and he could hear the muffled sounds of a guitar, and though he did not fully understand why, he smiled.

“Next in line, please,” a woman behind a glass window called out, taking an uninspired sip of her iced coffee as she waved a hand toward her. “Come on, next in line.”

Jungkook wore a black t-shirt, navy plaid bottoms, and socks with slides, though standing there, he began to regret his attire. His eyes looked over the office, and mentally, he tallied the number of girls he spotted. Nine. He felt his cheeks warming up, his neck growing hot, and when he looked over to his right, a girl waved at him, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. He blushed, nodding at her. Why hadn’t he worn something nicer?

He was adjusting his sock, balancing on his right leg, when a dog ran past him, toppling him over. He hopped on his right leg, his arms flailing at his sides, and his face instantly smashed into Rei’s back. If he had a chance to do it over, he wouldn’t have cried out so loud. Even now, months later, he cringes at the memory. He’d turned away, cupping his aching nose after she whipped her head over her shoulder at the sudden impact. Their eyes met briefly, her pupils dark and wide; she mouthed something to him, his ears ringing, all of the sounds around him muddled into incoherence.

“I’m so sorry. Excuse me,” Jungkook mumbled, turning at his heel and speed-walking past a group of girls that giggled when he passed them.

Jungkook thought about her all day after that first day. While he unpacked, walked Bam, and cooked for himself later in the evening. She was pretty, sure, but there was something else. Something he couldn’t break apart and understand— it was new and brought on a strange sensation and desire to know her. He didn't know it then, but he’d see so much of her it would become nearly impossible not to think of her.

And here they are, five months later.

“You agree, don't you?” Rei prods. “Maybe you’re the clumsy one, Jungkook. I was just standing there.” She says that like she knows what he’s thinking. That first day they saw each other. She’s thought of it too.

He swoons at the sound of his name escaping her lips again. “Jungkook,” he mouths, taking it in—not wanting to forget how it sounds when she says it.

She turns on her heel, returning to the couch and fetching her phone from between the cushions. Her backside faces Jungkook, and he shyly lowers his gaze when he catches a glimpse of her ass in shorts that do a poor job of hiding anything. “I’m impatient too, as you know now,” she offers, looking down at her phone, her face illuminated with the screen's glow. She reads something and has a serious look on her face. “It’s getting late, isn’t it?”

He squints at the clock on the stove. 4:27. “Yeah, I guess so,” he replies, trying to hide his disappointment.

“Your figures are cool, by the way. They look like the real deal. Are they?”

He nods silently, tonguing his lip ring. Jungkook watches her with a gut-wrenching desire to step forward and take her face into his hands and kiss her.

“You’re a Marvel geek. I'm guessing,” she says, staring down at the ground. It’s like she’s suddenly shy. Her voice is quieter. “I like some of the movies. I saw the new Spider-man with my friends last week. I’m late, I know.”

“I have Disney plus,” Jungkook says, his eyes looking her over. “And I’m not trying to say anything like the ramen stuff, you know, all that stuff people say to each other recently to get together. It’s a real offer.”

Rei laughs, bringing a hand to cover her face. “So you don't want to get together?” She looks at him with a deep intensity in her eyes and smiles coyly, making Jungkook swallow hard.

“I said that, didn't I? That’s not what I meant. It’s just that nowadays, words have different meanings. Let me rephrase-”

She takes a step closer to him, and his chest feels ablaze. She’s so close he can smell the fragrance of her clothing much clearer than before. We use the same detergent.

“I’d like to come by sometime,” she says, her eyes lingering on his hands holding his cup, “for a movie, no ramen.” Now she smiles warmly and takes a step back.

She likes doing this to me. It’s torture.

“Really?”

“Yeah, why not? You seem nice. I don’t think you’d be a freak, right?”

“Right,” he says, nodding.

“I know we’re technically strangers, but you have a good vibe,” she says, shrugging. “I show up here so late, and you serve me tea. You’re a nice guy.”

“Am I?”

“I think so. Are you?” She quirks up an eyebrow, twitching her lips between a smile and a laugh.

Jungkook smiles at her. He feels his cheeks growing warm. “I am. I don’t know why I challenged you about it.”

“Because you like to flirt with me, I think,” she retorts, crossing her arms across her chest.

“I’m just a nice guy,” he says as he places his palms against the kitchen counter for balance, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Uh-huh.” She glances at her phone screen, reading the time, and Jungkook does the same with the time on the kitchen stove. She's going to leave. I can feel it.

“I guess I should get going…”. Rei looks apologetic for some reason. A pink shade colors her cheeks, and she brings a hand to her forehead and lets out a deep breath as she says, “Kinda hot in here, no?”

Jungkook wants to tell her she doesn't have to go and that he doesn't want her to, but he only offers her a timid smile and looks away, nodding in agreement. “A little. I’ve been feeling it too,” he says, looking at her and catching her eyes.

Should I move now? Is it now? My move? Will she kiss me back?

Still, he brings his cup of tea to his lips as she stores her phone in the pocket of her hoodie, and she pauses as if remembering something. “And why is there a mattress outside?”

He’s drinking his tea and begins to choke. Coughing, his chest on fire, and his throat closing in, Jungkook rushes to double over his sink, and she’s standing behind him with a wrought-up look.

“Are you okay?” She steps closer to him, lightly touching his arm.

Jungkook coughs, clearing his throat; he can feel the blood rushing to his face as his eyes instinctively shed tears. The feeling of her touch on his arm feels like fire. “Sorry, I don’t know what happened. The uh, the mattress?” He looks toward his patio, a panicked look in his eyes behind the tear-stained glasses. He pauses, looking down at the floor. “I have them all over, so I can nap when I feel like it.”

She throws her head back and laughs, not taking him seriously until silence hangs between them. She raises an eyebrow. “Wait, really?” With that, her phone goes off in her pocket, and she reaches for it. “Sorry, one sec.”

He leaves her to talk on the phone with whoever and walks over to pick up Bam’s toys and dirty socks to throw in a hamper. Jungkook can hear the muffled phone conversation a room over, so he hums a song. She speaks in a hushed voice, but he hears his name mentioned.

He coughs before he reappears in the kitchen.

She’s humming to herself, lingering by the door, and his heart squeezes. ‘Don’t go,’ he wants to say. ‘Stay.’

“I should go…” she says, not budging from where she stands, chewing her lower lip, looking at Jungkook through full eyelashes. Almost as if waiting for him to interject, and him, not knowing how to.

“If you want,” Jungkook says. He swallows hard at a lump in his throat. The plead to have her stay pushed down into his chest.

DAMN!!

A look he can’t decipher takes over her face, and then the next moment, she’s smiling at him, reaching for the doorknob just as he does. They share an embarrassed exchange of looks when their hands touch, and he shakes his head, an anxious chuckle escaping him. His face feels warm as he pulls the door open for her. Rei steps out into the hallway, turns over her shoulder, and raises her hand to wave at him slowly.

Again, he yearns to kiss her and again lacks the courage.

“Bye, it was nice meeting you, Jungkook.”

“Goodnight, Rei,” he replies, leaning on the doorframe, his heart sinking into his stomach.

The next day, Jungkook is cooking for himself. He submitted his comic in the morning and has endlessly replayed last night’s events in his head.

“I should’ve kissed her,” he says to Bam.

Jungkook’s phone pings a few times and is followed by a call. He answers, distracted as he serves himself bibimmyeon and pork belly. He props the phone between his chin and ear, tilting his head comically as he walks back and forward to the table, setting down a steaming bowl of sticky rice. “‘Ey, Namjoon-hyung!…” He drags the chair out from underneath and settles in front of his plate. Jungkook reaches over the table, yanks a paper towel, grabs his chopsticks, and begins digging into the rice. “Wait,” he glances at the clock on the wall. 6:47. “It’s almost seven,” Jungkook says, confused. “Your meeting with the record executive started at six… it ended that quickly?”

Namjoon smiles. “The meeting was quick. I have really good news.” He pauses for effect. He’s in the studio, eyeing the email on screen. “Hold on,” he says, placing the phone on the desk and turning the speaker on.

Jungkook is chewing his cheek, the chopsticks loosening in his grip. He lets the silence exist for a few seconds, then he rubs the back of his hair, leaning back in his chair, his spare hand fisted over his mouth. “What?” He grumbles into his fist.

“He liked my demo. He had some comments about it but said it would do well. He said everyone else liked it; whatever that means, we’re in. He said we can come in for a group meeting where we introduce the guys, and that way, we can all talk about what we want to do going forward.”

Jungkook is speechless; they’re in. All seven of them. He can’t believe it. He stares wide-eyed at Bam, who tilts his head quizzically. “No way. No way. Is this for real?” Jungkook’s heart is thudding so hard he can see it beneath his shirt.

“I swear, Jungkook. It is.”

“Do the guys know?” Once more, Jungkook meets the eyes of his dog, and he’s smiling so hard he feels his nose scrunch.

“Some of them do, yeah. I was with Jimin earlier.”

“Yoongi,” Jungkook says, bringing his palm over his forehead. Smiling with his eyes crinkling, he feeds himself rice. “Yoongi will be so happy. We all are, you know but him .” Jungkook makes a sound with his teeth. “He’ll be so proud of all of us.”

“I know, I know. Yoongi hasn’t slept well since we first submitted our demos, and when I mentioned I had a meeting with an executive, he grabbed his jacket and took off to the studio. I don’t know what he’s been doing when he comes in, but I know he might cry.”

“I might cry too,” Jungkook admits in a hushed voice.

Namjoon wipes at his eyes, and a silence hangs between them. They’re both sniveling on the receiving end. After Jungkook clears his throat and allows himself another sniffle, he starts eating again.

“What did you make?”

“I have a lot of rice left. I made bibimmyeon and pork belly, but I have some noodles, too, if you want me to make them. Come and eat with me if you’re free. Let’s celebrate.”

“Can I leave my bike outside?” Namjoon asks. Namjoon shuts off the shared laptop in the studio, grabs his puffer jacket and the book he’s been reading, heads over, and flips off the light switch. His phone remains on speaker as he locks the door and shoots a glance down the hallway. From a distance, Yoongi does a quick two-finger salute in passing. Namjoon’s heart gives a squeeze.

Jungkook thinks it over. He’s never seen anyone leave a bike outside. “I don't know, honestly. Bring it to my apartment; it’ll be fine. I have something to tell you, by the way,” he says, referring to the previous night.

“Just saw Yoongi,” Namjoon says, jingling the keys on his finger and making his way out of the building. “I have to tell him, but I think he’s already in his studio locked up. You know how he gets.”

“He won’t let you in,” Jungkook says, scrunching his nose and stifling a laugh through a mouthful of steak.

“Exactly. And what is it? I’m bringing my bike, I thought about leaving it chained, but it’ll stress me out.”

“He’s almost done with his demos, Hobi said the other day,” Jungkook replies. “But it’s about her, bro. You won’t believe me.”

Namjoon laughs through the phone. “Mystery-neighbor-crush her, you mean?”

“Neighbor stuff, am I that annoying? Don't answer that. I’ll leave the door unlocked for you; just come in because I have to wash Bam.”

“All right, bro, give me twenty, and I’ll be there.”

Jungkook is sitting across from Namjoon, who raises an eyebrow at him as he chews on his steak. “So she came in here,” he swallows his bite and continues, “was on that couch?” he signals with his chopsticks, “and she went home after that?”

Jungkook nods. The moment he’s been dreading: admitting he chickened out. He’s not proud of himself and debates whether to omit a few things.

“Yeah, what else could’ve happened?” He takes a drink of his water, avoiding Namjoon’s gaze.

“So many things, bro. But, the very least that should have happened is that you got her number or something like that. Did you ask?”

Jungkook is quiet. His cheeks are flushing with heat. He’s chuckling at himself, remembering how he clammed up around her.

“You just let her leave, right? She walked out, thanked you, and you probably made her a tea she didn't drink.” Namjoon is laughing when Jungkook groans and shakes a fist above his head. “Ah, Jungkook!”

“I know!” Jungkook shakes his head. “But I got a name. I got a name; that’s something, isn't it?”

“Well?”

“It’s Rei. I don’t know where she’s from and all that, but that name just suits her, doesn't it?”

“It does, it does. But come on, bro! This girl lives so close! For starters, she stuck around. She could've just left after explaining herself. Instead, she sat down right where you’re sitting and stayed .” Namjoon feeds himself rice as he shakes his head and continues while he chews, “She looked at you the last time we evacuated; I saw her. And how many times have you bumped into her already? She probably thinks you’re out to get her.”

“I know. I kept thinking the same. I thought: ‘She could've left by now, but she hasn’t. I don’t know, hyung, I just froze. I just kept nodding; it was so stupid.” Jungkook closes his eyes and places his fingertips over his eyelids, shaking his head in lament.

“Not stupid, bro,” Namjoon offers, swallowing his bite. “I’ve seen her around too, and she’s really pretty, but it’s a weird sensation when she’s nearby; it’s like her beauty is different. I don't mean it like I want her now, nothing like that, but it sort of feels like I am stuck too. Like, what can I say right now?”

Jungkook nods, understanding the sentiment. “It knocks the wind out of me sometimes when I see her,” he says, reaching for a napkin. “I wanted to say so much more, but I couldn't. It was different being close to her like we were. This girl is killing me, Namjoon-hyung. You said she looked at me?”

Namjoon smiles warmly. “She did, at the evacuation a week ago. Was it a week now?” He wipes at his mouth and looks at Jungkook expectantly. Jungkook nods at him. “Well, a week ago, I went out last and caught her looking your way. She had her hand like this,” he brings his hand up to shield his eyes against nothing, “and she was smiling. She didn't see me noticing.”

Jungkook scoots closer. He rests his chin on Namjoon’s knee, looking straight at him until he’s cross-eyed. “At me?” he asks, loving that this happened.

Namjoon shakes his leg free and takes a sip of his water. “I think she likes you. She was looking at you the same way I’ve seen you look at her,” Namjoon reaches for his phone, checks a text, and continues, “so she would’ve been into you. Did she flirt with you?”

Jungkook mulls it over. He doesn't want to read too much into it, but he thinks she did flirt. “I could be wrong, and I’d hate to be wrong,” he says, “but I feel like she was into me, like, actually into me, and I thought about kissing her. Would that have been too forward?”

“Hmm,” Namjoon says as he chews his food. “Maybe. I have to see you two in action, to say. I think you can trust your gut, and if you felt that way, maybe she was giving you those vibes on purpose, you know? Sometimes girls are so forward that it's confusing. Like, ‘am I reading this wrong?’ When the whole time there was only one way to read it.” He gives his head a light shake.

“She was talkative like Yoongi predicted.”

“Oh, was she now?” Namjoon looks surprised. “I sided with Jimin when he said she seemed shy and kind of mean. Not mean, but you know the mean look girls have that makes them look kind of cool?”

Jungkook nods with a mouthful of steak.

“That’s actually interesting that she was talkative. That’s good. I think you’d do bad to get with a shy chick again.”

Jungkook once dated a girl in high school he didn't know how to talk to, and when he meant to break things off, he’d just ignored her for the entire year. She was too shy, too quiet, too reserved. He was everything else but.

“I agree with you on that,” Jungkook says honestly. “Back to Rei, she’s even prettier up close, hyung. I thought I was in a dream, that sounds so cheesy, but it’s true.”

“It was, what, four in the morning?”

“Three. Close to four.”

“Exactly. I would think that's a dream too. Seems like it. Are you sure you’re not messing with me?” Namjoon elbows Jungkook lightly.

“I want her. Is that so pathetic?”

“A little bit,” Namjoon teases, bringing his thumb and pointer finger to a slight pinch. “Like this tiny little space right here is where you live.”

Jungkook rolls his eyes as he walks into the kitchen for a beer.

“Honestly, Jungkook, I think she likes you back. Pass me the rice. Want some of the steaks?” He shows Jungkook his bowl, and Jungkook accepts, opening his mouth to be fed. “You can feed yourself.”

“Ah,” Jungkook says, mouth agape. “Just one piece.”

Namjoon is feeding Jungkook rice when the doorbell rings. The two exchange bewildered looks, and Jungkook shuffles from the ground, sliding on the flooring with his socks as he peers through the peephole. He falls to the ground as if shot, crouching with a deathly look about him.

Namjoon shifts in his seat on the floor and, stretching his neck, asks Jungkook who it is. Over and over, quietly, he’s asking who’s at the door.

Jungkook doesn't answer until Namjoon stands. He shoots a hand up to grab Namjoon’s sleeve, motioning him to crouch beside him. Whispering, he says, “It’s Rei; what do I do?”

“Get up!”

“I can't. I can't. I don't know what she wants. What if she knows?”

“Knows what? Get up; I’m opening the door in 3, 2,...”

Jungkook stands. He can feel his heart beating viciously, and his hands are sweating. He glares at Namjoon, raising his hand and motioning for a cutthroat. “I’ll kill you,” he mouths as his friend walks away.

Jungkook peers into the peephole and sees her turning away. He pulls back the door quickly, causing her to turn around. She smiles, and he wants her all over again. His relaxed demeanor vanished. “Hey, what’s going on?” are his first words.

Rei laughs, and he can feel himself blushing. He drops his head when he remembers Namjoon is a witness.

“Hey, neighbor,” she says, smiling the same coy smile she lent him last night. She pulls a paper from her pocket, extends it to him, and says, “It’s an invite to my birthday party this weekend; if you don't have any plans, I thought it would be nice to hang out and see you again. I’ll have friends over, and of course, you can bring yours.”

A party? Wait, see me again?? “I will be there. This weekend. I’ll make an appearance.” He stops talking when she laughs. He can feel the blood boiling on his face. What the hell is going on with him? “Sorry, yes, I mean, thank you.” Jungkook can feel Namjoon’s burning gaze behind him—he can picture how his friend stifles a laugh into his fist.

“No problem. Who’s that?” She points inside the apartment.

Namjoon waves when Jungkook turns around to see him standing behind him, a smirk tugging at his lips. Jungkook widens his eyes at him, mouthing for him to stop laughing. Stepping aside for his friend’s introduction, Jungkook signals toward his friend with a swift movement of his hand. “Namjoon, this is Rei. Rei, this is Namjoon, a good friend and gifter of bonsai trees.”

“I’ve seen you, no?” she talks to Namjoon, who nods, flexing his pointer finger, indicating that she has. He’s chewing cheese puffs, and Jungkook raises an eyebrow at him, silently questioning him: ‘Where did you get those?’ His stare says.

“At the evacuation, I was there.”

“Ah, yes, you had bright green hair like a highlighter pen then.”

He laughs. “That was me, yeah! You were with that girl, the…one with the red hair in pigtails.”

“Ah. That’s right! You have a good memory.” She sounds impressed.

Jungkook tongues his cheek, shaking his head beside them unnoticed.

“You too, you too. Cheese puff?” Namjoon offers a bag of cheese puffs.

“You’re tempting me, but I will have to decline. I just had lunch.”

“Your friend, the one with the pigtails, will she be at this party?”

Namjoon is nervous, but he plays it off well. Only Jungkook can tell.

“I think she can be there,” Rei replies, her eyes shifty and full lips pursing. She seems to think it over, anxiously looking at Jungkook and chewing on her lower lip. It’s as though she’s waiting for Jungkook to glance her way. Only Namjoon is seeing this.

Jungkook is annoyed. They’re talking so easily. He shifts uncomfortably, his fingers gripping the door. He watches how Namjoon chuckles and how she timidly looks down at her hands. The glittery nail polish made his heart feel like a stone in his chest. He wants to interject. But how?

“I’m sure the guys will be free this weekend too; we might celebrate our little accomplishment here sometime soon, so Jungkook can tell you about that and invite you when the time comes, right, Jungkook?”

Jungkook only nods. That’s all he seems to be capable of when she’s around. He feels so strange around her. He feels the same way each time, like he’s coming down with something suddenly. Didn’t it just get so hot out here with the door open like this? He wonders. Is anyone else sweating?

Their voices continue around him. He nods a few times when the conversation shifts toward him, but he feels lightheaded. He wants her so badly.

He doesn’t mean to, but he clears his throat, turning the conversation around him to a simmer.

“So, Jungkook, Namjoon told me he’d come this weekend and bring your other friends. There’s a theme, by the way.” She pauses for dramatic effect. “It’s fairytale-themed!” She raises her arms above her head like a big reveal and holds her pose, awaiting their reaction.

Namjoon laughs, turning away; he says: “I’ll give it good thought! Thank you for the invite, Rei!”

“And you?” She looks at Jungkook.

“Me?” Jungkook swallows hard at a lump in his throat. His brain seems to forget how to form sentences when she’s around.

“Yes, you. Do you have any ideas, JK?” she smiles, lopsided.

Is she flirting with me? Here? Namjoon-hyung! Come back!

“I have to rewatch all of my favorite fairytale movies to have an idea,” he says, bringing a hand to his head. He feels the heat emitting from his forehead. “I’m kidding. I think something cool like Dracula.”

“Is that a fairytale?” She laughs.

“Define a fairytale. Isn’t it just make-believe?”

“You don’t think vampires are real?” She raises an eyebrow at him, but he can tell she’s intentionally giving him a hard time. Her smile is surfacing and betraying her.

“I do, actually. Ah, okay. Give me time. I’ll think of something. What about you? Who are you going as?”

She pretends to think it over even though she already has an idea. “I won’t say; you’ll have to see.”

He’s fully leaning against the doorframe, his foot slipping under him, and he almost falls over. He mutters something to himself, and she’s biting back a laugh. “You want tea or something before you go? If you’re not busy.”

“Ah, I want to say yes, but my friends are upstairs; I just stopped by real quick but thank you.”

He nods. “That’s okay, next time.”

“I’ll catch you two later,” she says, waving.

She turns to walk away, and Jungkook doesn't know what takes over him, but he shouts after her: “Thank you!”

He’s too embarrassed to see if she turns around. He closes the door immediately.

He doesn't even want to look at Namjoon. He stands facing the door for a while, his head hanging low, eyebrows scrunched up in physical anguish. He chews his lip and winces at himself, remembering.

“I said that out loud,” Jungkook says, incredulous with himself.

“You said that out loud,” Namjoon reiterates from somewhere in the room.

Sighing, Jungkook turns over, and flinches at a grape Namjoon tosses at him. His nose scrunching, he catches another grape mid-air and chews noisily. “She wants to know me properly,” he says, with a dreamy air.

“So be her prince charming,” Namjoon jokes, plopping down on his couch, busy on his phone.

“So I will be,” Jungkook says, tilting his head back to look up at his ceiling. She’s up there, walking around, talking to her friends, and he’s beneath her, dreaming of the weekend. “What day is it?”

“Wednesday.”

“Let’s go; I need an outfit.”

“Now?”

“Now, get up! Get up!”

“Let me finish my grapes; I just washed them,” Namjoon whines, still not glancing from his phone’s screen.

“Okay, but after, we’ll go.” Jungkook walks into his room, grabs his glasses, and steps back out.

“You’re serious, aren’t you?”

Jungkook nods, biting the corner of his lip distractedly. “Oh, I’m serious.” He reaches for the car keys on the table beside him. “I’ve never been more serious.”

And he is. He’s never been more serious about anything else. He wants Rei, but he wants her to want him, too. He can’t help but feel as though his luck is turning out.

taglist: @vsualitae

A/N: thank you for being here! I hope those that looked forward to the full first chapter have enjoyed this! It's my first lengthy fic, as I've already stated, so any feedback is greatly appreciated! reblogs, comments, and anything that lets me know you've enjoyed this will make me the happiest writer :') I appreciate you for giving my work a shot <3 Let me know if you'd like a second part, what you liked, etc. I'd love to hear from you, reader >.< until next time!!

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eleni-cherie · 2 months

Text

a thief's origin✨ || bts • kth - chapter 0.7

"you're afraid I won't wait." "I'm afraid you will."

a criminal and a doctor should be as different as the sun and the moon - but unexpected things happened every day. like him finding his safe haven in her.

»»»

masterlist: here

— genre: thief au, gangster comedy, adventure, romcom, humour, angst, fluff, sexual tensiON, slowburn, mutual pining, strangers to friends to lovers s2f2l

ALTERNATIVE UNIVERSE. CHARACTERS NOT NECESSARILY LIKE THE REAL PERSONS. ALSO VERY UNREALISTIC PLOT LOL - JUST PRETEND READING A MANGA/COMIC OR WATCHING A FILM, REALLY.

SUGGESTIVE THEMES. MENTIONS OF VIOLENCE & BLOOD (BUT NOTHING TOO GRAPHIC, IT'S STILL A COMEDY!)

»»»

30th December Barcelona, Spain

There was no trace of snow in the foreseeable time and Cassandra's already gloomy mood only dropped more as she averted her eyes from the grey buildings outside.

If it was cold, it should at least snow, she believed. But she knew something like this was impossible for a city right at the mediterranean sea. The only thing they got there was humidity and gusty winds.

It was the day before New Year's eve. The second-last day of the year. One day and eleven hours more and it'd be the next year already.

It was a strange feeling considering to her it didn't feel like a year had passed already. The only evidence it did being the coldness outside that had suddenly picked up in the last two weeks.

She returned to study a patient's file. Today would be another double-shift. Could be worse, at least she wasn't working the next two days.

After asking one of the nurses to give the patient 150mg codeine, she finished her round right on time for her lunch break. Already spotting Stella and one of the assistent surgeons and Stella's on-off-crush, Julio, sitting at a table in the far back of the cafeteria and bickering over something as usual. And Cassandra gave them a quick wave, signalising she'd seen and would join them, before going to pick her lunch. Her stomach was already rumbling when a different kind of buzzing caught her attention then. It was the phone in her pocket.

doc (6:30am): happy birthday, wherever you are :)

cool guy (1:12pm): you remembered! cool guy (1:12pm): thanks :P

Her lips instinctively curled up. It was Taehyung.

It had been a week since they'd last spoken, which wasn't surprising considering he had a different kind of busy life.

At least he took time to ressurface at all. Kind of like a penpal, where she had to wait for his letter to arrive and respond before having to wait yet again. Especially since they were indeed one-sided penpals with him sending her postcards from all the places he visited.

She was used to it, but that didn't mean she wasn't worrying a little whenever a longer period of time passed with no trace of him. Unpredictable things could always occur, despite him and his friends being unmatched in what they did.

doc (1:14pm): ofc i did :O

After typing in her quick reply, she shoved it back into her pocket when it started buzzing again. Perplexed by the unexpected incoming call, she hesitated for a moment before eventually accepting it.

"Hey."

She inhaled with a smile. Something about his smooth voice greeting her so cheerfully always making her a little weak.

"Hey, your timing's as great as ever," she giggled when the line moved and she took a step forward. Hearing his surprised 'Oh?'.

"To what do I owe the honour of this call?"

Taehyung could hear the smirk all the way through the line. Laughing under his breath.

"What do you mean? It's my birthday after all. So I deserve actually hearing your birthday wishes."

She bit back a laugh, having missed his silliness. "Happy birthday, cool guy. Was that all you called for?"

"Almost," he said, his tone turning gentle then,"I also wanted to hear how you were doing."

"Well, I.." she began but paused. 'Fine' was her first instinct, however, she concluded he'd most likely see through her blatant lie, because in all honestly she wasn't doing fine at all. So she settled for a more vague response. "..I'm a little tired. But otherwise everything's fine. How's it there?" She knew he'd never tell her where exactly in the world he was currently at, so she didn't even attempted to find out.

"It's.. yeah, it's great. We're working on something.." His voice faded then and Cassandra was about to carry the conversation to the turn of the year, when he spoke up again. His concerned tone taking her aback."You sure everything's fine?"

She swallowed. No matter how hard she tried, she'd always be an open book to him it seemed. Even when he was miles away.

No, she thought, nothing's fine. I almost lost a patient because of bureaucracy, almost messed up a chest tube on another one, haven't properly slept in days, I'm gonna spend the turn of the year all alone and I'm an idiot because I miss you.

She couldn't bring herself to let any of these words slip from her lips though. She didn't feel like making him feel bad and pity her when he was who-knew-where in the world right now and couldn't do anything for her misery anyway. Besides, she also didn't want to embarrass herself.

"Yeah, it's just, you know, work. It's not always that easy." This wasn't even a lie. But she felt he still wasn't completely sold on it.

"Hm, you sure that's all?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Because work's always tough for you but you sound more distressed than usual."

She froze. Did she? She didn't even notice anymore, but others obviously did. Or at least, Taehyung did. So with a sigh she gave in, elaborating more after all. "It does take a toll on me. And tomorrow's New Year's eve, which I can't celebrate with my family and I have no plans, which could be regarded as sad and pitiful by some, but hey! At least I'm not working like some colleagues, so can't complain." Her casual laugh to gloss over her gloominess probably sounded forced. And she licked over her dry lips. "I just didn't want to dump everything on you.. I know you're busy with your own work." Another small giggle getting automatically added at the last words, another poor attempt to save her pride. "Anyway, it's also a shame you can't see your birthday gift, you know? It's pretty mad after all."

"A mad gift, huh?" He played along with her sudden change of topics. Although he could sense there was more to her previous words. "And what gift?"

The line moved and it was almost her turn at the registry, "Never heard of a surprise? You've got to wait until coming here again."

Taehyung scoffed playfully on the other line. "Oh, that's how it is?"

"Of course."

"Alright. I'll hurry up then, I guess."

»»»

31st December

Cassandra usually celebrated this day by playing cards and drinking with her family. Since it wasn't possible this year, she settled for eating a whole pizza by herself and watching one of her comfort shows. The perfect plan really.

It was past 10pm on New Year's Eve now and she was in the middle of her little rewatch party, when the sound of the door bell startled her and she paused the episode.

Cassandra didn't expect seeing anyone that night. Especially since there were barely any hours left till the turn of the year.

A knock at the front door followed then, causing her to tense up even more. She wasn't a particularly fearful or easily scared person. However, due to the late hour and randomness her first instinct was to switch off all lights and remain quiet. Only when an annoyed and whiny: "Cas, open up already! It's cold!" was heard from behind the entrance door, her tense muscles finally relaxed.

The last person she had expected seeing standing in front of her door was Taehyung and yet, there he was. Doing just that with furrowed brows and an amused laugh.

"Were you hiding from me?"

"Wh.. no. No. Well, yeah, but I didn't know it was you," she defended herself with a small pout.

His cheeks were slightly flushed and raven hair tousled due to the harsh wind outside, hands shoved deeply into the pockets of his dark brown coat. He looked quite cuddly and inviting.

She instantly shook that thought away, though. Eyeing him suspiciously when also spotting the bare neck and open collar.

"And since when do you feel cold?" she sarcastically snorted then. A knowing smirk on her lips as she let him enter. Meeting his wide boyish grin.

"Maybe I fibbed a little there."

She laughed under her breath, shaking her head. "What are you even doing here? Thought you were working on a job."

"Well.." He let out an awkward laugh when a shiver crept up his skin. He might not freeze, but that didn't mean he wouldn't feel the coldness at all. Especially with the temperature difference inside there. "I don't know actually."

She took a step back to narrow her eyes at the taller man. A puzzled smile tucking on her lips as she tilted her head. "So did you just randomly come here all the way from wherevever you were?"

"It's just.." It sounded too silly, thinking about it now, but frankly, he simply had a feeling of her needing him. And he realised how completely irrational and odd it must sound if he said that out loud. So he stick with another excuse. "We were done with the job earlier than expected and wanted to take a little break, so.. might as well come to collect my birthday gift."

Cassandra blinked. Somehow she wasn't quite buying it. He never struck her as a guy who'd travel countries just for a simple gift. Especially since he should know it wasn't anything of value compared to the actual treasures they were hunting.

"Hope you don't have too high expectations of that gift, though," she mumbled with a coy smile as he followed her further inside, "Might get disappointed otherwise."

Taehyung shrugged with a cheerful, almost childlike grin. "A gift is a gift. I take what I get."

He observed her crunching down at other side of the living room to pick up a rather big square, wrapped in fancy paper, from her desk. She felt her fingers trembling all of a sudden, not having expected to see him this time around after all, so she hadn't had any time to mentally prepare to get embarrassed yet. And the few steps she walked back to him clearly weren't enough.

"It's nothing special, really. I mean, what do you get someone who can literally get anything he wants? But I hope it's not too terrible."

Cautiously, he accepted the object from her with a scowl. Her intention was to lower his expectations but all it did was hightening his curiosity, especially since he didn't have any clue what it could be. He'd appreciate it either way though, whatever it was.

"Happy belated birthday, Tae."

He tried not to rip the paper when opening it, but as it accidentally did, he gave up midway and just tore it off making Cassandra laugh amused at his childish eagerness. Only for her to bite down on her bottom lip and avoid his glance when he finally unwrapped it.

His expression softened, brown eyes grew round in astonishment.

"A painting." He looked up at her in awe. "You drew this?"

She shrugged nonchalantly, still not daring meeting his eyes. "You said you liked my drawings and.. you also said you'd like having one of yourself like, and I quote, 'one of these sleazy rich guys'," she added air-quotations for the dramatic effect. Her hands dropping to the side then. "I know considering you travel around from hideout to hideout, it's not practical, but.. I don't know, maybe if one day you do get that house of your own, you'll find some space for it."

He hummed, his eyes preoccupied with the painting in his hands.

The detailed strokes, the soft-coloured paint. He wondered when she'd even found time to create it in between of sleeping and working. What amazed him the most, however, was the expression on his painted face. The look in his eyes. It tucked on something in his heart, the way she captured this brief moment of tranquility in them. He wondered if anyone else had ever noticed this kind of expression on him when not even he himself had.

That painting was how her eyes saw him. The way she saw him. And it was beautiful. It touched him how someone could see him like this. So.. human. Not a thief. Not a gunman. Just him.

He swallowed. His silent gaze wandered back to her then, catching her impatiently peeking at him as he was taking quite some time to silently gape at the present, increasing her insecurity about it.

He didn't understand why she was belittling herself so much when she didn't have to make him a gift in the first place.

"Thank you, Cassandra," he breathed eventually. His voice unintentionally cracked at the end as it came out hoarser than expected. She had almost missed it, so quiet that it was. But when she realised, her eyes slowly met his already smiling ones and all the nervousness she had felt before was suddenly swept away when seeing the sincerity in his face. He meant it.

She gave him a small nod in acknowledgment.

"Say.." he said then, taking another glance of the painting in his hands, "You said no plans tonight, right?"

»»»

"Should you not avoid such crowded spaces?" Cassandra yelled over the loud background chatter of half-drunks. One of them bumping into her shoulder, his red glittery party hat slipping from his head and almost poking her cheek.

Spending the final hour of the year at platja del Somorrostro, one of Barcelona's busiest beaches, surrounded by a New Year's crowd of strangers brimming the entire area wasn't where she had expected to find herself at.

And all because of Taehyung.

His dark waves peeked out from between a couple of people in front of her, him clearly not hearing her nor noticing her absence beside him and she squeezed herself through to reach for his sleeve not to lose sight of him again. He paused when feeling the tug and looked over his shoulder, catching Cassandra puffing out her cheeks. "Hey, wait for me!" she pouted and he laughed.

"Sorry, did you say anything?"

"Yeah, I asked if you shouldn't be avoiding such crowds."

They pushed through the mess and Taehyung made space for her to follow behind him as he navigated them to a low pavement wall, seperating the sand from the street.

They reached the uplifted sea promenade soon and he climbed onto it when spotting a gap between some chatty teenagers. Holding his hand out for her which she accepted, letting him pull her up.

"More the opposite," he clarified then as he let his eyes wander over the sea of funny party hats, chaplets and woolen beanies. He could bearly spot where the actual sea began and where the crowd ended. His eyes then returned to her with a cheeky grin. "The more people, the easier it is to get lost in the shuffle."

Cassandra could only smirk at this. "I assume that's your go-to tactic at heists as well?"

"Hm, maybe. Who knows," he reciprocated her smirk. Knowing exactly how riled up it'd get her whenever he stayed vague and not providing more info. He simply enjoyed teasing her too much to ever let go of it, besides the obvious benefits of her not knowing any details for her own safety.

To be fair, this New Year's Eve was also quite different from what he'd originally planned for it to look like. The original plan foresaw him and the guys to sneak into a yacht party at the coast of Alexandria - something he wouldn't tell her though.

Partially because he didn't want her to ask why he was missing it out, partially because he couldn't let her know any details.

Furthermore, he'd never been a man of big parties and celebrations anyway, everything always seeming shallow and blown-out-of-proportion to him. And that sense only intensified when sneaking into some fancy party to steal idiots' jewelery and money. So in a way, he also did it for himself and not only for her. Besides, if he acknowledged the influence she had on him to just ditch anything at the mere feeling of her needing him, he'd need to apologise to Jimin for all the times Taehyung had scolded him for doing the same exact thing for Arabella.

"I hope we can see the fireworks from here."

Her words interrupted his train of thoughts and he watched her tiptoeing beside him before setting her heels back down and taking a sip from the mojito bottle she'd bought at a convenience store earlier. Cheeks already rosy from the alcohol in her system due to being a light-weight.

He took a swing from his own bottle of red wine. "Don't worry, we got a clear sight up here."

Cassandra hummed, getting tired of standing she decided to sit down on the cold stone next to a woman with a blue wig. Wrapping her arms tightly around her angled legs and bringing them close to her body. The midnight air making her shiver under her coat.

"Oh!" she exclaimed then, holding her phone up.

He narrowed his eyes at the dim display. The clock said six more minutes to midnight. He glanced at his wrist then, making sure his watch said the same. It was precise after all, something necessary when doing a coup. And indeed, six more minutes.

Explained why people around them became more jittery.

"Do you have any New Year's resolution?"

He mused for a moment over her question. Flashing her a grin then. "Not getting caught. You?"

The red-head lightly laughed at this before shaking her head. "No, don't think I got any."

"Huh, didn't expect that," he blurted out and felt her inquiring eyes on him.

"Yeah? Why not?"

He shrugged. For a moment he contemplated how to phrase his disbelief, licking his lips shortly which had become dry in the low temperature. "You striked me like the kind of person who'd have a whole list of resolutions to be honest. That's all."

Cassandra blinked, taken aback as she indeed used to always have some kind of resolutions while growing up and this might've been the first time she didn't. Perhaps she was more obvious than she liked to admit after all. A dry laugh left her lips then.

"Well, I used to -"

"Knew it," he grinned triumphatically and took another sip from his drink, "What happened?"

"Nothing. I just realised none of my wishes or resolutions ever came true. So I stopped."

Four more minutes.

"But if you would have to do any, what would it be?"

She took a moment to genuinely think about it and hummed while doing so. Only obvious ones popping up in her mind. "I guess.. to successfully complete this training year, not lose my mind in the hospital and.." Her eyes lowered and she paused, smiling to herself in a sheepish manner. "The last one is a secret."

His brows arched, but he didn't press considering it must be private.

He looked down at his watch again.

Two minutes.

Somewhere in the distance behind them someone had already started blaring firecrackers. The loud cracking roaring over the drunk slurring, yells and chatter of the people scattered around them on the sea promenade. As far as the eye could see, streets were completely filled with people choosing spending the turn of the year outside among strangers in the cold. Most didn't seem to mind, Cassandra being the only one shivering.

And Taehyung noticed, scooting closer to her in a poor attempt to shield her body from the wind which had pushed its way through after all.

It was quite unfair, she pouted to herself when leaning into Taehyung's shoulder, how she, with her onion-layers of clothes, thick coat, scarf and beanie, was still freezing while he was out there with nothing but a sweater and a thin coat doing just fine.

"Thirty seconds," he announced when looking at his watch again.

Cassandra tilted her head to take a glance as well. "Twenty."

He sensed her warm breath brushing over his exposed skin. The pink-tinted tip of her nose and cheeks contrasting her pale skin which was faintly glowing under the yellowish streetlamp's light further away.

Everyone around them began counting down at the top of their lungs then.

"Ten!"

"Nine!"

"Eight!"

Taehyung searched her eyes, seeing she was already smiling at him. And they held each other's gaze while continuing counting down with the crowd.

"Seven!"

"Six!"

Their smiles widened.

"Five!"

"Four!"

"Three!"

"Two!"

"One!"

Fireworks errupted from the main square in the distance, splashes of colorful lights painting the black sky and illuminating the crowd with loud popping sound of explosives. The hooting party horns and cheers from the crowd jarred into a deafening wave and everyone fell into each other's arms.

And yet, despite the commotion by the boisterous mass of people, all Cassandra could see was the curve of Taehyung's bright smile. Losing herself in the glittering sparkles in his irises. Just for that moment, it felt as if it was only the two of them there.

"Happy New Year, Cassandra"

"Happy New Year, Taehyung."

They laughed lightly, breaking eye-contact and instead decided to watch the rest of the elaborate fireworks show and its golden rain when some odd - to him at least - customs caught his attention then. "Why're so many people kissing or eating grapes?"

Cassandra tore her eyes from the colourful shapes to briefly glance at him, redirecting them to the night sky again. "New year's traditions. People eat twelve grapes for each month for good luck. Or kiss to save themselves from a year of loneliness."

He seemed intrigued by this. "Are there more?"

"Not sure, I don't believe in this superstitions."

He huffed a laugh at her bolt claim. "Says the girl who bought a lucky charm to a heist with her."

Gasping, she averted her eyes from the fireworks again only to face his shit-eating grin. "T-that's something different. It was my emotional support!"

Taehyung only arched a brow, continuing giving her a doubtful look. Much to her annoyance. "No, I mean it. I don't believe in these New Year's traditions. Or at least I try not to but, who knows.." A rueful smile ghosting over her lips. ".. maybe that's why none of my New Year's wishes ever comes true."

Taehyung looked at her indeciphable expression before looking back at the firework.

"What about you?" She assumed to already know his answer but she was still prying to know.

"I'm superstitious. A little bit at least."

She smiled softly, somehow not being surprised at all. "Oh yeah?"

"I need to, sometimes it's a matter of luck. Especially in what we do." He threw his head back in gleeful joy as another set of fireworks was fired. A cheeky smirk gracing his lips then. "And don't they say luck and timing is everything you need?"

She agreed. Even in medicine where everything was scientific and empirist, they still often had to rely on luck and hope. When it came to a therapy or medication to work or when the surgeons needed to wear their own lucky charms to boost their confidence and succeed in a difficult surgery. But it also depended heavily on the patients themselves, if they believed in it or not.

She laughed under her breath. It was a laugh of self-pity as she felt she neither had luck nor timing. At least not in the way she wanted to. And she emptied her bottle in a swing. A feeling of fizziness and light-headness overtaking her mind.

"You know what?" she blurted out after a short while and giggled highly bemused, "We should kiss for good luck!"

Usually she'd know despite the bubbling feelings for her criminal friend, which she still tried convincing herself didn't exist, that kissing him while being tipsy probably wasn't a good start for anything. But any rationality was clearly last seen 0.5l of mojito mix prior, the very few enzymes she apparently had to break down alcohol, already saturated awhile ago. So her intoxicated mind simply found that sudden idea marvelous and entertaining. She'd never get a proper kiss from him anyway - or any guy in the forseeable future with her work schedules - might as well make him her platonic and amicable New Year's kiss in a desperate attempt for any kind of good luck for that upcoming year.

Taehyung, however, only chuckled when seeing her flushed red cheeks and the empty bottle. Not taking her random request seriously until he saw her face turning into an offended sulk. Bottom lip sticking out. "Wait, really?"

"Yeah, it's the tradition!" she pouted, "I don't want a year of loneliness. So you gotta kiss me!" She had an adorable, almost naive giggle decorating her puffy lips. And for a second his eyes lingered on them before eventually shaking his head.

"I don't think -"

"Then don't think," she grinned. "Let's just do this. Just a quick peck."

"Okay, fine," he dragged a sigh, surprised at himself for giving in so quickly when he and Yoongi always accused Jimin of getting easily wrapped around pretty women's fingers. "O-only 'cause I really don't want you to end up a lonely cat-lady though."

Rolling her eyes, she puffed out a snort. "Thank you. That'd be very kind of you!"

She turned her body fully towards him then, head getting dizzy at her abrupt movement.

Why was he even considering this? Oh yeah, to do her a favour.

Emptying his own small bottle of wine, he also shifted in his seat before taking a brief look around them.

Kissing in public usually wasn't his style, but this could hardly be considered public as they were practically unnoticable in the amount of people around them. And besides, there'd been several others, whether friends or couples, who had exchanged pecks at the stroke of midnight.

So he exhaled and placed his hands on her arms, holding her in place so she wouldn't accidentally lose her balance as she was already swaying with a silly smile.

"Alright."

"Mhh, do it."

"I-I'm doing it."

"Fine, then do it."

His skin felt on fire. He shouldn't have drunk that much. He might not be a light-weight like her, but he wasn't a big drinker either.

"Just kiss me already," she began whining impatiently, wiggling under his grip. A couple of loose curls falling from the side and framing her face while doing so. "Or I'll be a bigger loner than I already am."

He frowned with a snort. "That's emotional blackmail," he deadpanned then in an attempt to distract from his irrational nervousness.

But Cassandra immediately paused staring at him wide-eyed as if someone had slapped her and she only now realised where she was and what she was doing.

With an awkward laugh, her eyes fell to the space between them. Perhaps the buzz was beginning to wear off or it was a moment of clarity, but she realised it was pointless if she had to force him. Perhaps that would even give her bad luck in the end. And she already had enough of that.

She shook her head, embarrassed of her tipsy self. "Y-you're right. Forget it. It's a stupid tradition anyway. Can't remember the last time I kissed anyone on New Year's."

His brows furrowed at her sudden change of mind. "No, it's fine. I'm gonna do it."

"No, seriously. We don't have to," she ensured him, her words muffled from her woolen scarf as she tried burying her face in it. Cursing herself from minutes ago for even speaking out that rash nonsense.

However, Taehyung's grip around her upper arms only tightened. Making her grow stiff under his stare.

"I said I would and I keep my word." His voice was calm yet determined, which surprised him considering his hesitation and she dragged a breath, straightening herself under his hands.

Was it weird that she didn't feel nervous despite it all? Probably. She blamed her low cogitation and the knowledge it wouldn't have any romantic significance anyway. Just friends following a tradition like many others around them.

"Fine, let's go."

He swallowed as he met her warm orbs. And he began fidgeting all over again. "Alright, okay, great. That's what I'm gonna do."

"All right."

His hands left her arms, instead placing themselves around her delicate neck and caging her velvety curls in his palms. A light shiver ran down her spine and she wasn't sure if it was the coldness of his fingers or the warmth of his touch. It was firm yet tender and she sensed her pulse picking up in rate with each passing second.

"Okay, ready?"

Cassandra only nodded, unable to speak all of a sudden. Maybe she wasn't drunk enough to stop her feelings and thoughts taking over her senses after all.

Her eyes flicked to his heart-shaped lips before making the stupid mistake of glancing back at him and meeting his eyes. His face was open and vulnerable in the streetlamps and fireworks above them and she caught a hint of wonder on it as they stared at each other. Slowly, he began leaning closer. And she swallowed down the tiny gasp that dared escaping her lips.

"One, two.." He paused then, scowling at himself. "No, wait. I'm not actually gonna count down."

"O-okay."

"That's not my style when I kiss."

"Okay."

"I don't count d-"

"Tae, it's fine," Cassandra giggled, interrupting his ramble. She'd never seen him ramble before. Was he.. flustered? She'd always imagined him kissing lots of women in disguise. Even if he always claimed not even Jimin, the actual flirtatious among them, did that.

The thumbs on her cheek gently brushed the stray strands aside then. His eyes shifting to hers again. The last fireworks sparkled in them and for a moment his heart forgot how to beat.

"R-ready?"

"Yeah," she breathed.

He closed his eyes, his face coming close. A deep crease set between his brows then, making his face look rather angry for a kiss. And her tipsy mind ultimately lost focus upon that hilarious realisation.

"What's this face!" she bursted out laughing, unable to contain herself and he backed off, irritated about her laughing fit.

"W-what face?"

"You can't make that face when you try kissing someone," she choked out in between of laughs while pointing at him.

"Oh, so you say something's wrong with my face now?" Taehyung only scoffed, somehow glad about the interruption though. He wondered if his fingers were actually shaking or if it was from the vibrations of her laughter.

"No, idiot! You're handsome and you know it!"

Startled at the unexpected compliment, a timid smirk tucked on his lips at her drunm words. His chest warming despite him downplaying the muddled feeling that was raising. "Oh, so you think I'm handsome now?"

She groaned in annoyance, lightly hitting his chest over the coat. "Don't pretend."

"So, do you want me to kiss you or not?" His teasing smirk returning.

"Maybe if you didn't make that face."

"That's very nice of you considering I'm doing you a favor here," he laughed under his breath. Not remembering any woman having ever made him laugh so much despite complimenting and confusing him at the same time.

Cassandra inhaled and exhaled deeply, calming himself again somehow. "Alright, let's do this already. No big deal," she nodded to herself, sternly, "Just kiss me."

"Nope."

She gasped at his evil grin. "You were about to, though!"

Taehyung only shrugged unimpressed and abruptly let go of her. "Yeah, before you bruised my ego," he retorted simply, causing her to huff.

"C'mon," she nudged his arm, "I'm sorry. I promise I won't laugh again."

"Apology accepted. But I'm not gonna kiss you." His lopsided smirk torturous, making her frustration grow.

"You're making such a big deal out of it, just kiss me already!"

"I'm not gonna kiss you!"

"Kiss me!"

"No! Not like this!"

Cassandra paused. Her parted lips, ready to counter something back in their bickering, abruptly pressed together into a thin line when processing his last words. She stared at his now bewildered face when he also realised what he had just unintentionally confessed.

"What?" she blinked confused, "What does that mean?"

Taehyung's eyes were wide, panic clouding his mind. "No. No-nothing. I just, I didn't mean it like that," he began with a terrible stutter the longer he looked at her inquiring eyes.

It didn't make sense. He was always capable of staying cool-headed even in stressful situation. It was inevitable in heists and when being in diguise. Then why did he totally blank out with the way her warm bambi eyes were digging daggers into his as the seconds passed. "I just, I mean we can't like that because that's not - it's very - like, you don't.. That's not what -"

But Cassandra didn't even seem to be listening anymore, staring absendmindedly up at the sky instead, being clearly still tipsy and all over the place - he could tell.

Taehyung stilled then. The beanie was pulled to her brows, scarf hiding half her face. Only her round eyes peeked out, holding a lovely innocent wonder in them.

It was irrational. It was scary. How it was more thrilling celebrating with her and cheap wine from a 24/7 store at the beach, than being in an expensive smoking on a yacht surrounded by millionairs while drinking the most expensive champagne.

Cassandra abruptly shook herself out of her short abstraction then and flashed him a smile.

"Come, let's leave or you wanna get hypothermia?" She was joking, but he noticed her anew shivering and he realised she must still be cold.

"Y-yeah, let's go."

»»»

The new year was only a couple of hours old. Quite early to go home for most, but Cassandra felt exhausted despite having completely sobered up by now. Much to her own dismay, she wasn't the night owl she'd used to be anymore.

The air felt colder when she turned into her street. The way home taking longer than expected due to what it seemed half of the city being out on the streets and traffic jams everywhere. Lines of cars, impatiently honking and only moving for a few centimetres before having to stop again.

Taehyung followed behind her, wanting to fetch his gift before leaving the city again. It wasn't unusual for him to only stay for a day there before having to move again, but somehow she'd hoped he'd stay longer.

The night breeze hit his warm cheeks as they reached the front door and she fumbled with the keys in the dark. Eventually finding the right one and unlocking the door, allowing them both to enter.

The painting was on the coffee table where he'd left it. He picked it up, examining it one more time in silence before tucking it under his arm and heading back to where she was in the hallway. Still busy taking off her shoes and jacket.

"Thanks again for this," he smiled gently and watched her lowering the beanie, ruffling through her curls to give them some of their lost volume back. "I'll make sure to store it in a save place." His voice was almost a whisper when he attempted to open the door, only to sense her tugging at his coat.

"Wait, I-" She pursed her lips, gaze falling as she saw his questioning glance. "I wanted to say thank you for spending the turn of the year with me.. I appreciate you coming all the way here so I wouldn't be lonely tonight."

His lips parted, taken aback. Had it been so obvious after all? However, he chose to pretend being confused and not knowing what she meant instead. "Who says that was my reason?"

Cassandra shrugged, lips curling into a rueful smile. "Maybe I just wished it was.. Whatever it was, still thank you. And I'm sorry."

Taehyung frowned. Gaze falling as well. "No need to apologise," he muttered, instinctively knowing what she was referring to. He swallowed then, shoving his free hand into his pocket.

In retrospective, it hadn't been such a big deal and yet, he was glad he hadn't proceeded to kiss her like that. He knew he'd have regretted in the long run.

"I feel like it, though," Cassandra continued then with a sigh, "I feel so stupid. I shouldn't have insisted on keeping a tradition. Especially since I don't even believe in supersticious stuff."

He eyed her with a doubtful look, making her roll her eyes and sigh in defeat.

"Fine, I do. Sometimes. Some stuff. Not all."

He chuckled lightly making her smile.

Truth was, Cassandra was disappointed in herself for getting so weak and desperate, putting him in such a position and creating this awkward tension between them.

"Tae, you didn't have to kiss me." She felt like she needed to underline this. Her voice small and filled with guilt and shame. "Please, don't feel bad."

"I know, don't worry," he reassured before they grew quiet.

In times like this she really disliked his withdrawn and secretive personality. Usually his aloof and coy aura intrigued her, but right now she needed him to speak to her. And the fact he didn't, made her fidgety.

They stood there for a second longer.

Faint music was echoing from somewhere in the building while the piercing sound of lonely firecrackers was heard from the streets.

"Well, okay good then.. goodnight. And Happy New Year again." She tried sounding cheerful, masking her regret of screwing things over in her irrational state.

She wouldn't see him again for an indefinite period and that was how they'd be parting ways now. She hated herself from two hours ago.

Dragging out a breath, she reached for the door handle to let him out when a grip on her elbow prevented her from doing so.

Taehyung grabbed her arm and in a swift move, pulled Cassandra into his chest. Strong arms catching her, wrapping around her smaller figure and before she could even properly react, his lips had already engulfed hers.

That was it. All the self-control she'd exerted over the past months went straight out the window in that moment. Her neurological system completely shutting down by the overload of neurotransmitters, hormones and endorphines, simply swiping her mind blank with the only remaining thought being how incredible his warm lips felt against hers.

Her arms instinctively found their way around his neck to pull him even closer. Feeling the cold metal of his necklace against her fingertips. And she kissed him back fiercely, Taehyung wounding his hands more into her long hair at this. It curled around his fingers, silky and fluffy and for a moment he lost any sense of time or his surroundings when all he could feel was the vibration of her skin against his and the bewitching rum-lime taste of her lips full of unspoken feelings and endless promises.

Their lips moved, molding, melting into one another. Whatever logic and reason there had been, had long gone away. There was nothing left but their intertwined lips and breaths.

Eventually, they slipped from each other after what felt like an eternity but could have only been a minute. Panting against each other.

Their eyes remained closed, not daring opening and letting that moment ending in smoke so soon. Taehyung rested his dazed forehead against hers and leaned in. Planting one last kiss on her lips, this time less heated but rather tender and mellow. Savioring the last bit of the sour-tasting liquor mixed with his sweet wine. And Cassandra leaned into him more before they let go of each other at last.

Her eyes fluttered open immediately, dark lashes lining against her pale skin in a state of surreal haze. He wasn't sure if she'd ever looked more beautiful as in that moment, right after he'd kissed her and he felt the urge to do it again at this sight.

"I meant something like that."

With that, he stepped back and picked up the painting from where he'd set it on the ground. Brushing past her. And he left without saying anything else.

Cassandra stood there in the empty hallway, stunned. Everything around her was spinning and she feared she was intoxicated all over again.

Her fingers slowly rose then to touch her numb lips. Ensuring they were still there. Along with the lasting sense of Taehyung's touch.

Her New Year's wish had finally come true.

»»»

next chapter: 0.8 here

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