#sofa sanitization

[alwaysgreenclean]

The Health Benefits of Sofa Cleaning for Your Living Space

Your sofa is one of the most frequently used pieces of furniture in your home, but it’s also a hotspot for dirt, allergens, and bacteria. Regular sofa cleaning not only keeps your furniture looking great but also offers numerous health benefits for your living space. Let’s explore how proper sofa maintenance can improve your home environment and well-being.

Remove Allergens and Pollutants

Over time, your sofa accumulates dust, pollen, pet dander, and other allergens. These particles can trigger allergies, asthma, and other respiratory issues, especially when disturbed and released into the air. Regular sofa cleaning eliminates these hidden irritants, creating a healthier space for you and your family to relax.

Eliminate Bacteria and Germs

Sofas often harbor bacteria from food spills, sweat, and everyday use. These germs can lead to unpleasant odors and pose health risks if not addressed. Professional sofa cleaning sanitizes the fabric, effectively removing bacteria and leaving your furniture hygienic and safe.

Improve Indoor Air Quality

The buildup of dust and allergens in your sofa doesn’t just stay in the fabric—it affects the air you breathe. Poor indoor air quality can lead to respiratory problems and fatigue. Regular sofa cleaning removes these contaminants, promoting fresher, cleaner air in your living space.

Prevent Mold and Mildew Growth

Spills or high humidity can lead to moisture being trapped in your sofa, creating the perfect conditions for mold and mildew growth. These fungi release spores that can worsen allergies and other health issues. Sofa cleaning removes moisture and prevents mold buildup, protecting both your health and your furniture.

Reduce Stress and Boost Comfort

A clean living space contributes to a sense of well-being. Dirty or stained sofas can create a cluttered and uncomfortable environment, increasing stress levels. Sofa cleaning restores your furniture’s appearance, making your home feel more welcoming and relaxing.

Protect Young Children and Pets

Children and pets often spend significant time on the sofa, making it crucial to keep it free from harmful particles. Sofa cleaning removes sharp debris, allergens, and bacteria that could affect their health, ensuring a safer and more comfortable space for play and relaxation.

Extend the Life of Your Sofa

Regular cleaning doesn’t just improve health—it also prolongs the life of your furniture. Dirt and debris can cause the fabric to wear down over time. Sofa cleaning preserves the material, helping you maintain a comfortable and attractive piece of furniture for years to come.

Choose Professional Cleaning for the Best Results

While vacuuming helps maintain surface cleanliness, professional sofa cleaning is essential for a deeper clean. Techniques like steam cleaning and hot water extraction remove embedded dirt and allergens without damaging the fabric. Eco-friendly cleaning solutions also ensure the process is safe for your home and the environment.

Sofa cleaning is more than just a cosmetic service—it’s an investment in the health and comfort of your living space. From reducing allergens to improving air quality, the benefits of regular cleaning make it an essential part of maintaining a healthy home. Schedule professional sofa cleaning today and enjoy the fresh, clean living space you deserve.

[dwdcleaningservicesuae]

Professional Cleaning Services in Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Keep your home spotless and germ-free with DWD Cleaning Services in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Our expert team offers top-notch sanitizing and disinfection, carpet and rug cleaning, and sofa cleaning services. A cleaner home is just a call away!

[ecoguardians-ae]

Common Furniture Cleaning Mistakes to Avoid: Expert Advice for Dubai Residents

Cleaning furniture can seem straightforward, but many people make mistakes that can damage their pieces or make them less effective. Whether it's your sofa, dining chairs, or office furniture, knowing the right way to clean is essential. This blog will cover common furniture cleaning mistakes to avoid, offering expert advice for Dubai residents who want to maintain their furniture’s appearance and longevity.

1. Using the Wrong Cleaning Products

One of the biggest mistakes people make is using harsh chemicals or products that aren't suited for their specific type of furniture. Furniture comes in a variety of materials, such as wood, leather, fabric, and upholstery. Using the wrong cleaning products can cause fading, staining, or even permanent damage.

Avoid these common product mistakes:

Harsh chemicals: Avoid strong cleaners that contain bleach or ammonia, which can damage fabrics and finishes.

Dish soap on upholstery: While dish soap is effective for dishes, it can be too harsh for delicate fabrics.

Furniture polish on wood that isn’t sealed properly: If your wood furniture is unfinished or not sealed, polishing can cause stains.

2. Over-Wetting Upholstery

When cleaning upholstery, it’s easy to go overboard with water or cleaning solutions, thinking it will remove dirt more effectively. However, over-wetting can cause serious damage. Water can seep into the cushions, leading to mold and mildew buildup.

Here’s how to avoid this mistake:

Test on a small area first: Always test your cleaning solution on an inconspicuous area before using it on the whole surface.

Use minimal water: For fabric furniture, dampen a cloth rather than directly spraying or pouring water.

Dry thoroughly: After cleaning, make sure the upholstery dries completely to prevent mold growth.

3. Ignoring Fabric Care Labels

Many people overlook the fabric care labels on their furniture. These labels provide important instructions on how to clean and maintain the fabric without damaging it. Whether the label indicates “W” for water-based cleaning or “S” for solvent-based cleaning, it’s essential to follow the guidelines.

Don’t make this mistake:

Always read the care labels: The label provides critical cleaning instructions that can protect your furniture from damage.

Understand fabric types: Different fabrics, such as microfiber, cotton, and leather, need different cleaning methods.

4. Not Vacuuming Regularly

Dust, dirt, and debris can accumulate on your furniture, especially in a dusty city like Dubai. Failing to vacuum your furniture regularly can lead to buildup that may cause scratches, stains, and a dull appearance.

How to avoid this mistake:

Vacuum weekly: Vacuum your furniture weekly to remove dust and dirt that can wear down fabrics or surfaces.

Use the right attachment: When vacuuming upholstered furniture, use the upholstery attachment to avoid damaging the fabric.

Clean under cushions: Don’t forget to vacuum under cushions and in hidden spaces where debris can accumulate.

5. Using Too Much Cleaning Product

More cleaning product doesn’t necessarily mean cleaner furniture. Using too much product can leave a sticky residue behind that attracts more dirt. This is especially true for fabric and upholstery cleaners.

How to avoid this mistake:

Follow the instructions: Always follow the recommended amount of cleaning product as per the manufacturer’s instructions.

Use a damp cloth for excess product: If you’ve used too much product, use a damp cloth to remove excess cleaner.

Don’t over-saturate: Applying a little product in a well-spread manner is more effective than overloading a spot.

6. Not Cleaning Spills Immediately

Spills happen—whether it’s a coffee stain on your couch or sauce splattering onto a chair. But letting spills sit can make them harder to clean and can lead to staining that may be permanent.

Here’s how to avoid this mistake:

Blot, don’t rub: When a spill occurs, always blot the stain with a clean cloth to soak up as much liquid as possible.

Act quickly: The sooner you clean the spill, the easier it will be to prevent a stain from setting in.

Use mild cleaning agents: For common spills, use mild soap or fabric cleaner recommended for your type of furniture.

7. Using One-Size-Fits-All Cleaning Methods

Not all furniture is created equal, and the same cleaning method may not work for every type of fabric or surface. What works for a leather sofa might not be effective for a cotton armchair.

Here’s how to avoid this mistake:

Know your furniture type: Always research the best cleaning method for your specific type of furniture.

Use the right technique: Whether it's spot cleaning, deep cleaning, or using a steam cleaner, ensure you're using the method best suited to your furniture.

8. Skipping Professional Furniture Cleaning

While DIY cleaning can keep your furniture looking good, it may not be enough to ensure deep cleanliness. If your furniture is heavily soiled or has been neglected for a while, it’s best to leave it to the professionals.

Don’t ignore professional help:

Furniture Cleaning Services Dubai can provide a deep clean that restores your furniture’s look and extends its lifespan.

For a thorough clean: Hiring professionals can save you time and energy, offering services that may be difficult to achieve on your own, such as stain removal and deep upholstery cleaning.

Save time: Experts have the right tools and techniques to ensure your furniture gets a deep clean without the risk of damage.

9. Not Protecting Furniture After Cleaning

Once you’ve cleaned your furniture, it’s essential to protect it from future damage. Regular cleaning and protection can extend the life of your furniture and keep it looking new.

Here’s how to protect your furniture:

Use fabric protectors: Consider using a fabric protector for upholstered furniture to keep it stain-resistant and durable.

Apply a wood polish: For wooden furniture, apply a gentle wood polish to protect the surface from scratches and wear.

Cover your furniture: In areas with high traffic, use throws, covers, or cushions to protect your furniture from dirt and wear.

Conclusion

Cleaning your furniture correctly is key to maintaining its beauty and longevity. Avoiding common mistakes, such as using the wrong products, over-wetting upholstery, or neglecting regular cleaning, can save you money and ensure your furniture stays in top shape. If you're in need of professional assistance, consider hiring Deep Cleaning Services Dubai to give your furniture the expert care it deserves. Proper care will help you enjoy your furniture for many years to come!

By following these expert tips and avoiding common mistakes, Dubai residents can keep their furniture looking fresh, clean, and beautiful for longer.

[johnypage95]

If you are looking for professional cleaning services and maintenance services then you came to the right page. Klean Casa is the leading services provider of cleaning services and painting services at affordable rates. You can trust us because we provide attention to detail and customer satisfaction. To know more information, visit: https://www.kleancasa.com/sofa-cleaning.html

[rememberwren]

A Complete Set (Whatever That Means) || 2

A continuation of Skin Deep. Part one of this sequel is here.

About this: previous warnings apply, oral sex (f receiving), alcohol, gross imperfections, not a single nipple unfortunately, an eyebrow though. For @/moody-alcoholic, I hope this manages to quench even the tiniest portion of your thirst. 1 more part left. 7k

-

“Simon?” 

“Hm.” 

“Are you seeing anybody else?” 

Simon looks up at you. His hair is getting long, falling over his forehead and looking nearly brunet in the dim lighting. You don’t think he’s cut it since the two of you have started dating. 

He’s been drawing for half the night, hunched over with the sketchpad in his lap, doing terrible things to his own posture and blocking his own lighting all at once. When he answers you, it’s in that dry tone that lets you know he thinks you’ve said something funny or clever: “No.” 

A knot in your chest loosens. It’s hard to believe you worried over such a question for so long just to receive such a simple, earnest answer. He goes back to sketching. 

You content yourself with this and stretch your legs out until your toes touch his thigh at the other end of the sofa. His mouth twitches, but he keeps working. 

-

Six months pass, and how do you celebrate? You climb topless onto Simon’s lap, eager and anxious in equal measure. Your nipple piercing had stopped hurting months ago (save for the time you had snagged it on a cable knit sweater and nearly seen Jesus), but you had read online that piercings heal from the outside inward, and as such you had made every attempt possible to leave the thing alone even when all you wanted to do was play with it. 

In his own way of celebrating, Simon had bought you your first new barbell: a black one with black gemmed studs at each end. You couldn’t help but notice that it looked similar to his, only with a more delicate, feminine touch.

“Will you change it for me?” you ask him. Your hands are shaking.

“Alright. Let me wash my hands.” He shifts you off of his lap and disappears into the bathroom where you hear the faucet turn on. You cross your arms over your breasts, feeling silly being half naked without Simon in the room. Your foot bounces impatiently, but you know that if cleanliness were a love language, it would likely be Simon’s. 

Not that he had told you he loved you—nor had you told him. You had promised yourself that you would wait until he said it first (the only sure-fire way to avoid coming across as overeager and scaring him off). Still, there were a thousand ways in a day that Simon made you feel as if he loved you: the way he would go out to start your car in the wintery mornings when your remote start stopped working; the way he always offered you the first bite of his food if you weren’t sharing a meal; the way he’d crack open your drinks before handing them to you. Was it wrong of you to try to read between the lines? 

Simon comes back and tugs you onto his lap again. His hands look huge compared to the jewelry through your breast as he dexterously works the ball free from the barbell. He has the hands of a surgeon: steady and calm. You close your eyes in anticipation of pain, but there is none; it just feels alien, sensitive whenever his calloused fingers brush over your pebbled nipple, even as he removes the barbell itself. 

Taking the sanitized jewelry, he carefully puts it in and screws the stud in place. 

“That didn’t hurt at all,” you say, reaching down to tug softly on the barbell. Still, no pain. 

“Great,” he says, eyes on your breasts. He grips your hips. “Up, now. C’mon, up.” 

He tugs you up onto your knees so that you’re the perfect height for him to take your nipple into his burning mouth. You shiver, one hand gripping his shoulder and the other burying itself in his hair, gripping softly to keep his mouth in place. If you had worried that getting the piercing would make you less sensitive, you were wrong. He tugs on the jewelry gently with his fucking teeth and God, holy shit, fucking hell, definitely not less sensitive.

“Been waiting to do this,” he says, nuzzling the skin between your breasts as he gives you a moment to catch your breath. “Six months of hell.” 

“Yeah?” You pant lamely, chest heaving. 

He hums. His thumbs stroke beneath your breasts along the sternum tattoo he gave you—a favorite part of you for him to touch—as his lips find your nipple again, lashing softly with his tongue. His hands have begun to tremble where they slide down the curves of your sides and to your hips, touch soft and worshipful as he brings you down to rest your weight against the hard line of his cock still confined in his jeans. The shaking says more than a thousand of his words ever could. 

“I want you,” he mutters. “Say yes.” 

“Yes, God, yes.”

Simon guides you off of his lap, kneeling down into the space between the couch and the coffee table. He pushes the table backwards with a little more force than is necessary when there isn’t enough room for his long legs and accidentally sends a cup full of charcoal pencils tipping over onto the carpet. You snort with laughter. He peels your leggings and panties off and drags you to the edge of the couch, pressing your thighs open wide. 

Getting head from partners in the past had been a fraught, mostly unenjoyable experience. Even your first few times with Simon had been tense, with him quickly moving on to something else after noticing your inability to relax. A less eager man might have counted his blessings and moved on, but Simon’s gentle persistence had gone a long way toward reassuring you that he truly wanted to please you this way. It had gone a long way toward reassuring you that you could let him. 

He spreads you apart, thumbs slipping against your slick folds, heated gaze pinpointed on your most intimate parts before he leans in and licks a broad stripe over your entrance and up to your clit. You shut your eyes (and cover your face for good measure). His warm breath fans against your pussy as he laughs. He could be mean and pull your hands away, but he lets you hide this way and you are grateful for it. 

Simon takes his time mapping each part of you with his mouth, nose brushing your clit whenever he doesn’t have his lips sealed over it. Your thighs shake, toes curled, as he pulls whines and choked gasps from your throat. 

You peek through your fingers when you feel him shifting beneath you to find that he’s worked his cock from his jeans and is jerking off, only noticeable by the tell-tale rhythmic motion of his arm against your calf. 

“Jesus, Simon,” you whine. 

He makes a little sound of acknowledgement in the back of his throat, shifting on his knees to change the angle of his mouth against you. Something about him so unashamedly enjoying himself makes it easier for you to enjoy yourself too, to let your hands come away from your face and thread them through his hair. 

“Can we fuck?” you breathe, aching inside deep where his tongue can’t reach. 

He nods against you and kneels up to kiss you. You still aren’t used to the taste of yourself in his mouth, but it’s growing less foreign—and nothing could ever make you turn away from one of Simon’s kisses. 

He pulls you off the couch onto your knees, his legs spread to either side of your own. You arch your back, feeling his cock brush against the back of your thighs. Two of his thick fingers slip inside you, testing your give and your wetness. He twists them; turns to hook them against that soft, vulnerable spot inside you that makes your legs shake. Simon works a third finger into you, a stretch that your body struggled to take before but which it accepts eagerly now, the sting welcome and familiar.

��Fuck. I need a condom,” he rasps. 

“Just pull out,” you say. 

You can sense him rolling his eyes. Your fondness for the (dangerous) pull-out method had been formally noted by him and thus far rejected at every turn. 

“Don’t insult me,” he mutters. He grabs your hand and guides it between your own legs. “Be good and keep yourself warm. I’ll be right back.”

He’s barely gone long enough for you to stroke your fingers through your folds, but when he returns (flashing the intact condom package at you like he always does), he watches you for an endless, lingering moment.

“I like that,” he says at last, taking his spot behind you again, condom in place. 

“Like what?”

“Watching you touch yourself.” The head of his cock nudges your entrance. He finds the right angle and slips inside you, stretching your walls to make room for himself. You groan, your fingers digging into the couch cushion. It stings a little, right towards the end, but he just softly saws himself in and out of your pussy, soothing the ache with pleasure. His words go completely over your head. 

He reaches so deep inside you, like with his every thrust his cock bullies the air out of your lungs. The slick sounds are lewd, keeping time with your moans and sighs as his fingertips dig into the flesh of your hips, manhandling you further onto the couch to the perfect height for him to fuck into you, your knees barely skimming the carpet.  

Your hand ends up crushed between your pelvis and the couch. You let your fingers find your clit and the touch reminds your body of how close it is, that coil deep in your belly stretched tight and ready to release. Your fingers trail down to where his cock pistons in and out of you, and at your touch he groans, slows to a smooth drag, his length slippery with your own arousal. 

“Touch yourself, not me,” he chides, his voice rough. “I’m close enough.” 

“I’m close enough,” you say.

He flops against your back, nearly crushing you with his weight to hook his chin over your shoulder and ask: “Then what the fuck are we waiting for?”

You can barely draw in the breath to laugh, and it’s only worse when you cum. You bury your face into the couch cushions, giggling, fingers rubbing a gentle, hectic rhythm against your clit as your pussy spasms around him. He snorts at your laughter, a soft quiet exhale against the back of your neck. Then he cums, his thrusts sloppy and hard, turning his head at the last moment to bite your shoulder lazily. 

“Sex makes you so weird,” you pant. Your face hurts from smiling. 

“You like it?”

“Yeah. I do.”

He ties off the condom and throws it away. The two of you sit naked on the couch together, curled up. It’s a little alien to be this open about your body with someone and to have them be so open about their body in return, but it’s a good strangeness. So much about loving Simon is. 

“I need to get the other one pierced now,” you mention, toying with his unpierced nipple. “Have to complete the set.”

“I never did.”

“You’re incomplete. Don’t you know?” 

He snorts. “I feel quite fulfilled, thanks.” 

“Please Simon?” you ask. “I want to.”

“Don’t ever say please. I’ll text Soap in the morning,” Simon says, trailing his fingers up and down the length of your arm, making goosebumps appear. 

You hesitate. Should you tell him what you’d been thinking about for the last several months? Would it offend him to know that you didn’t want to go to Johnny for any more piercings? 

Whether it offended him or not, your pride couldn’t rest easily going back to the tiny room behind the curtain in Skin Deep. While there had been only a few other tense interactions between you and Johnny since Simon’s birthday (and usually he seemed to favor outright ignoring your existence), the situation had not improved. 

“Simon—I think I’d rather go somewhere else for my other nipple. To someone other than Johnny, I mean.” 

Simon frowns. “What’d Johnny do.” 

He phrases it like that—more of a statement and less of a question, immediately assuming that Johnny is at fault. 

“It’s just—it’s like I said on your birthday. He doesn’t like me much.” 

Simon turns to look you in the eye. When your gaze tries to skirt away, he lets out an irritated breath through his nose—but doesn’t fight you. Simon always lets you run. Maybe because he knows his legs are long enough to catch you. “You really feel like that?” 

“You’ve never noticed?” 

“Thought it was in my head,” he mutters. Then he says the most dreaded words he possibly could: “I’ll talk to him.” 

“No!” you nearly shout. You struggle to lower your voice to something more appropriate for indoors, your heart tap-dancing to an anxious beat inside your chest. Just trying to picture Johnny’s irritated expression at any of Simon’s potential efforts to talk to him made your stomach turn over. “I mean—don’t. Really. It’s fine.” 

“It’s not. I need you two to get along. You and Johnny—you’re the most important people in my life,” he says baldly. His honesty does something to your lungs—empties them, crushes them. You only just realize the position that you’re putting Simon in, and it makes you feel about two inches tall. How could you let your petty problems with Johnny potentially get in the way of their longtime friendship? Their brotherhood?

“I’m begging you, Simon,” you plead. “Promise me you won’t talk to him. Just, give me more time to get to know him or something.” 

“Can't promise that.” He stands up and stretches, joints popping as you stare at him, your stomach tearing itself to pieces at this knowledge. This is not how this conversation was meant to end. But he disappears into the bedroom before you can gather your wits enough to say another word.

-

There is nothing like sleeping beside Simon, his arm beneath your head, your body turned and cradled against his side, a leg thrown over his thighs. His heart is as slow and steady as his breaths, his calloused thumb tracing a line back and forth on your naked side, a line which grows slower and slower as he drifts closer to sleep. 

You ruin it like this: “Simon?” 

“Hm.” 

“Can I ask you something?” 

“If you got’a.” 

“On your birthday, you said that women meant for you sometimes ended up being Johnny’s. What did you mean?” 

He’s quiet for so long that you mistake him for falling asleep. You’ve resigned yourself to asking him another night when he speaks, his speech is slow and thoughtful, like it is hard to put it into words. 

“When Soap and I are in a room together with women, I’m like a ghost. He’s a fucking human being. Flesh and blood. Alive. People want to talk to him, to know him, to laugh with him, to have a drink with him. I’m not like that. I haven’t ever been like that. More than once Johnny would try to get me together with a woman who would end up falling for him instead. Eventually I convinced him to stop trying.” 

“Were you jealous?” 

He makes an ambiguous sound. “It’s hard to be jealous of Soap.” 

“Not impossible, though.” 

He rolls you over onto your back, coming to rest over you, your legs a tangled mess beneath the sheets. The darkness lengthens the shadows of his eyes, but you can still feel his gaze, tangible as any touch. He braces himself on his elbows over you and lets his forehead rest against your own. “I just wanted someone who was mine,” he says. 

It’s on the tip of your tongue, those words that are building inside of you and growing harder to withhold by the day. But you say it like this and hope he can translate: “I’m yours.” 

He ducks his head and kisses you. 

-

In the morning, Simon has slipped a piece of paper just beneath the edge of your mug of tea. When you look at it, written in charcoal pencil is DARCELINA: Dream City Tattoos and Piercings XXX-XXXX. 

-

It’s one for the record books: the rain. Thick pregnant clouds carry more than eight inches of rain to your city in the course of a day. The last time it rained so much was apparently during the Civil War era. The city floods, including the basement of your apartment building, which leads to a building-wide power outage. 

Simon has you pack a suitcase, junk the majority of your refrigerator and freezer, and come stay with him. You’re giddy, feeling like it’s a semi-permanent sleepover when he gets the call that Skin Deep has flooded as well. 

Then things take a turn for the worse. Simon is gone for nearly 36 hours straight making endless calls to attempt to clear the water and begin repairs, and sometime in the midst of that, the fight with Johnny happens. 

It’s an ugly one. 

Simon comes home in the foulest mood you’ve ever seen him in. It turns him positively stony as he moves around the apartment making himself a hasty meal, avoiding your eyes every chance he gets. After he eats, he sits heavily on the sofa, pulls out his sketchpad, and trashes no fewer than six entire pages before you get the nerve to ask him what’s wrong. 

“Soap,” he mutters, crumpling a paper in one strong, dextrous hand. He throws it toward the small garbage can beside the telly and misses. “He’s looking for other locations to pierce at.”

“Is the building that bad?” you ask. “You guys will have to find a new place?”

“Soap is looking for a new place. One without me.”

You gape, the shock of this news reaching all the way to the core of your being. 

“You don’t think it’s because of—?” Me. You can’t even finish the sentence, the thought upsets you so much. You tuck your legs beneath you on the couch, curling up, seeking to become small and harmless as grief and horror wash over you in wave after wave. 

“This is my fault. I tried to talk to him but he’s so fucking—he gets under my goddamn skin like he was born to do it.” Simon pauses heavily, before adding: “I need to tell you something about the night Soap pierced me.” 

Story time. Alright. You uncurl your legs, choosing to sit with them criss-crossed, your body turned toward him, giving Simon your entire attention. It’s been months since you found out that Johnny had been the one to pierce Simon, but you had been no closer to getting the story from either of them. Your curiosity was a dangerous, corrosive thing, eating away at your insides. 

“I’m listening,” you say, hoping you don’t look as eager as you feel. 

Simon looks to be at a loss for words, running his tongue along the sharp edge of his teeth. When he speaks, it’s hardly the lengthy story you had been anticipating: “We fucked.”

You blink. “You and—Johnny?”

Simon sighs and shrugs a shoulder. 

“I didn’t know you were…” Simon stares, waiting for you to finish your sentence. “…interested in men.”

“You are. Why can’t I be?”

You feel a chilly pang of horror, like someone has slipped a dagger between your ribs. You rush to assure him: “You can! You—“

Simon’s mouth twitches as he rubs at the crease of one eye, and your panic fades. He mumbles: “I’m just fucking with you.”

“So you’re bisexual.”

“I’m… I don’t fucking know. I’m attracted to who I’m attracted to. I never named it.”

“Okay,” you say gently. “We don’t have to. But what does that have to do with now?”

“The day after we—y’know. Fucked. I told him it was a one time thing. Maybe it’s in my head,” says Simon, frowning. “Maybe I’m crazy. But sometimes he looks at me or says something to me and it makes me think it’s not over. Not for him.”

“Is it really over,” you ask, “for you?”

Simon looks at you, quiet. He says: “I want you.”

And you are so relieved by the obvious honesty in his answer that it never crosses your mind to think that’s not what you asked. 

-

Simon is uptown at a café holding consultations while Johnny directs cleanup efforts at the shop, and you think that now’s the perfect chance. 

Your hands shake against the steering wheel the whole drive there, nerves less like butterflies and more like great winged moths in your belly. A part of you says that this is a mistake, you should turn back and let Simon and Johnny work it out on their own. But another part of you feels personally responsible—even if Simon says you aren’t. All your life you have taken things too personally, shouldered burdens which were not your own, bent over backwards to solve problems that weren’t yours to solve. If there was any chance that you could resolve this, you would put your pride on the line to do it. 

You park alongside the street and are thrilled to find the front door unlocked. The entire place smells musty, like a basement. The wooden floors have warped a little under your tentative steps, announcing your presence sooner than you’d like. 

Johnny sits in the chair where Simon tattoos clients. Sunlight streams in through the blinds and lights him up like some kind of punk-rock angel, his mohawk freshly clipped, dark finger nail polish chipping. Sometime between now and the last time you’ve seen him, he’s pierced his eyebrow: a black barbell with studs that reminds you a little too much of the one through your nipple (and Simon’s. Was that intentional? Did Johnny pick jewelry to match Simon’s? To match yours? For some reason just the thought makes your nipples tighten). In his hands is one of Simon’s sketchpads, and he’s flipping through it leisurely. 

He glances up toward the sound of your footsteps. 

“If you’re here about the water—“ his words die out on his pierced tongue as he stares at you, gobsmacked by your appearance. 

“Hey,” you say lamely. 

“Where’s Simon?” he asks, eyes flickering toward the protective spot where Simon usually hovers just over your shoulder. “He said he wouldn’t be in today.”  

“He’s not. It’s just me. I thought maybe we could talk.”

Johnny openly grimaces. He shuts Simon’s sketchpad and sets it down (hopefully where he found it). Standing from the chair, he takes a few casual steps away from you, clearly heading towards the curtain that leads to the back of the shop. “Really cannot think of anything we have to talk about.”

You square your shoulders, fighting down that instinctive urge to make yourself smaller, to give in and be manageable. “I think we do.” 

“You should go.” 

“Not until we work this out.” 

“There isn’t any this, alright, just—does Simon even know you’re here?” Something guilty must splash across your face because Johnny gives a mirthless laugh, reaching up to palm at his eyes. “Tha’s great. Just great. Could you be more incriminating?” 

“Incriminating—? Look, Simon told me about the night you pierced him.”

“Oh he did, did he?” Johnny says flippantly. 

“About how you two slept together.” 

Now that stops Johnny in his tracks. It’s clear that he didn’t expect Simon to really tell you about that night all those years ago. He looks at you with a fresh caution, waiting to see how exactly you’ve taken this news—what you plan to do with it. “Aye, then. I guess he did.” 

“I’m not trying to take him away from you.” 

Johnny makes a derisive sound. His words are well-rehearsed, like he has said them to himself a hundred-hundred times: “Cannot take what isn’t mine.” 

“He was your friend first,” you say, aiming for conciliatory and gentle the same way you might approach a feral animal. Johnny stares at you with flat, suspicious eyes. They’re so fucking blue—so different from Simon’s own dark ochre ones. “He told me that you’re one of the most important people in his life.” 

Johnny’s face softens. He says: “You shouldn’t tell me that. He wouldn’t.” 

“He’s not always good with words. Please don’t leave the shop, Johnny. I think it would break Simon’s heart.”

“I didn’t know he had a heart to break,” Johnny mutters. He leans against the wall beside the curtain and sighs, lips pressed into a thin line. “I’ll think about it. Now out. You shouldn’t be breathin’ in this air.” 

Johnny ushers you to the door, hand hovering just above your back, careful not to touch you. Once you’re out on the street, he shuts the door and locks it audibly. Then he leans in and huffs a heated breath beneath the “NO WALK INS” sign. In the fog, he adds: “No GFs!”

You flip him off. 

He flips you off. 

On the way back to your car, you find yourself smiling. You force yourself to scowl. It’s a more appropriate expression. Giving one last glance back toward Skin Deep, you find him still standing there, watching. 

Likely just to make sure you’re really leaving. 

-

Not long after you are moved back into your apartment, you find that Simon stops sleeping. 

You’re ashamed to say that it takes you a while to notice; nothing changes on your end of things. Anytime you are sleeping over, he lays down with you, tugs you up against his chest, and holds you for ages, his body still and breathing even. But one night you wake to a cool, empty bed. And later in the week, it happens again. Until more often than not you realize that any moment when you expect Simon to be sleeping, he isn’t. 

Usually you find him sketching, shadows like charcoal smudged beneath his eyes. He doesn’t meet your gaze and tells you to go back to bed, that he’ll be there soon. Sometimes he even does come to lay back down beside you—but only long enough for you to convince him that you have fallen asleep again. Then he is shifting away from you, disappearing into the other room, shutting the bedroom with the quietest click behind him. 

You know that he’s busy. His schedule has been booked—and with deposits nonrefundable, people more often than not kept their appointments. He’s been working with a client on mock ups for a sleeve, and the various pieces and the way they all come together around the contours of the person’s body are very delicate. Johnny’s threat to find a new job doesn’t help, either. Have they talked and resolved things yet? Simon never says so. 

You can’t imagine the stress that he is under, and you’d do anything to be able to shoulder a fraction of it for him. 

That’s how you end up with drunk Johnny in your car. 

It starts with Simon falling asleep before you—for once. You can tell he is well and truly asleep by the sheer weight of his arm over you, the soft snores that he gives out against the nape of your neck. After so many nights of sleeplessness, his body has finally given in. You’re about to slip off to sleep yourself when the buzzing of a phone startles you back into wakefulness. 

Not your phone—Simon’s phone. And it goes off again. And again. And again. Who the hell could be sending so many messages at midnight?

You know you should leave it alone—if it was urgent, they would likely call—but curiosity gets the better of you. Carefully you slip out from under Simon’s arm. It’s a testament to his sheer exhaustion that he doesn’t wake as you jostle him. In sleep, he looks painfully young and relaxed, and it makes you long to reach out and brush back his hair that has fallen onto his forehead. But not at the risk of waking him. 

Sure that all you are planning to do is shut Simon’s phone off so that he can get some restful sleep, you are surprised to see that Simon has his text notifications visible on the homescreen, so all it takes is a simple tap to open them up. 

Johnny. All Johnny. 

Ghost. 

Ghost

Are you uo? 

Up* fuck my fingers 

I need a ride home

Simon

I’m at that bar on… The text is cut off. To see more, you would have to open his phone. So Johnny is stuck at some bar, drunk more than likely. Well good riddance, you think to yourself, the hurtful way he treated you still very much fresh in your brain. But then you remember your talk at Skin Deep, and your traitorous heart softens. Could you really just put the phone back now and pretend you hadn’t seen the messages?

Simon doesn’t even have a password; that’s how much he trusts you. Would he still trust you after this, if he knew that you had gone through his phone, even if it was for a good cause? 

Making a spur of the moment decision, you could only hope so. Your conscience wouldn’t let you wake Simon, and as much as you disliked him, it couldn’t let you leave Johnny stranded at some bar either. 

You open his phone as quickly as you can, swiping so that it goes straight to Johnny’s texts and nowhere else. The name of the bar is right there, and you scramble for your own phone to type it down in Google Maps. He’s not far. Probably would be within walking distance, if he weren’t drunk. You could be there and back before Simon ever knew you were gone—you hoped. 

As Simon, you send back to Johnny a simple OMW. 

There is no hint of spring in the frigid March air as you slip outside into your car. The parking lot is dim and quiet, and traffic is minimal as you follow the GPS on your phone to Johnny’s location. The pub nightlife spills out onto the pavement and you struggle to find a place to park, grimacing at the knowledge that you will have to get out of the car and go inside to find Johnny, considering you see him nowhere on the street. Leaving the warmth of your car is the hardest thing you’ve ever had to do, especially in just a thin tank-top and a pair of leggings. Gathering your coat more tightly around yourself, you rush out of the car and through the people on the sidewalk and into the warmth of the pub. 

You keep your eyes peeled for Johnny, but can’t spot his silly haircut anywhere. What if he’s gotten a ride home from someone else? What if he’s decided to walk, or found someone to go home with? You shift up onto your toes, looking over everyone in the bar when you spot him in the corner at a table with a few other men. 

Johnny doesn’t even recognize you at first—either a testament to how unexpected your sudden appearance is or how drunk he is based on how difficult it is for his eyes to focus on you. When he realizes who you are, his mouth drops. He points. 

“What are you doing here?” he asks, accent so thick and slurred that you can barely understand him. 

“Picking you up. You said you needed a ride.”

“Aye but not from—oh, Jesus make me still. Yer not wearing a bra, are you?” 

All the men at the table turn to gape. You snatch the sides of your jacket closed where they had loosely fallen open, your face flushing with warmth. The table roars with laughter, but Johnny in his drunkenness doesn’t seem to notice your embarrassment. 

“That was mine!” Johnny shouts, elbowing the man next to him. “Did you see that? That was my work!”

“We get it, bruv,” the guy says with a roll of his eyes. “She’s no ten.” 

“What’d you fuckin’ say?”

The table laughs. 

Johnny grabs a fistful of the guy’s shirt and drags him nearly clean out of his seat. “I said, What’d you fucking say about her?”

The table stops laughing. Johnny cuts an impressive figure even when drunk; he’s easily the largest guy of the group. Your stomach drops and lands somewhere between your shoes. This is not going to plan at all. Reaching out, you try to insert yourself physically between the two of them but can only wrap your fingers around Johnny’s wrist, feeling the strength poised in the tendons. 

“Johnny,” you say, loudly to be heard over the sounds of the pub. “Come on. Let’s go, yeah? Simon…Simon’s out in the car.” 

“Simon?” Johnny let’s go of the guy’s shirt, his bad mood evaporating as quickly as it had manifested. He nudges his way out from behind the table, all politeness. Once free, he stumbles into a woman in a slinky dress who gives him a look that could melt glass. 

“I’m so sorry,” you apologize to her, wrapping an arm around Johnny’s waist and doing your best to keep him steady. “He’s an idiot, and he’s drunk. You look amazing by the way—“

“Control your boyfriend,” she snaps. 

“I will,” you promise, guiding Johnny away from her and into the crowd. 

His nose brushes the shell of your ear, breath fanning across your neck as he says with a laugh in his voice: “I’m not yer boyfriend.” 

You flush. “Thanks for letting me know, Johnny. I had no clue.” 

He says something back, some Scottish phrase, his accent so thick you couldn’t understand the words even if you knew them. 

“English, please,” you mutter. 

“Je-sus,” he groans, dragging the words out into multiple syllables. He takes your chin in his hand and squeezes your cheeks a little. “You’re just like him. ‘English, MacTavish’. Ha!”

You bat his hand away. 

“He’s been rubbing off on you,” Johnny mutters, laughing a little. Beneath his breath (though far more loudly than he likely intends), he adds: “In more ways than one, I imagine.”

Your face goes hot. “Johnny, stop talking.” 

The two of you exit the pub out into the cool night air. It seems to sober Johnny some, as he takes in deep, gulping breaths. He walks a little steadier as the two of you cross the street, and by the time you’ve made it to your car, he has shrugged you off altogether (even if he is still a little unstable on his feet). He stands outside the car for a moment before opening one of the rear doors. 

“What are you doing?”

“Rather sit back here.” 

“I’m not your cabbie.”

“Strange manner of dress if you were,” he says snidely, slipping into the backseat. 

In the driver’s seat, you let yourself have a small breakdown. You grip the wheel tightly, taking a few deep breaths of your own, searching for inner peace. You thought that you and Johnny had a tentative truce after that day at Skin Deep, but clearly he is still holding some grudge. Your search for peace turns up empty. 

“Sorry I lied about Simon being here. I just really needed you to leave the pub,” you explain politely. 

“Knew you were lying,” Johnny says from the darkness of the backseat. He sounds remarkably like Simon: brooding and irritable. “He’s got no idea you’re here, does he? He’d never let you come alone.” 

You frown. “No. He doesn’t. He’s sleeping and I didn’t want to wake him.” 

“Nightmares?” 

“Huh?” 

Johnny leans forward. You glance at him in the rear view mirror. “I said, Has he been having more nightmares?” 

You didn’t know anything about Simon having nightmares. That sour feeling in your belly was back, the one that made you feel like you would never truly know Simon, not the way his friends did. 

“No,” you say, a little defensive. “He’s been working on this sleeve for a client. Staying up way too late to finish it on time.” 

“Aye. Nightmares. Anything else is just an excuse he’s telling himself—and you.” 

Done with the conversation, you turn the key in the ignition and pull out into the street. “What’s your address?” 

“Doesn’t matter.” 

“Why’s that?” 

“Left my keys at the bar.” 

“Goddamnit.” 

You turn towards Simon’s apartment. “Then you’re staying with us—with Simon. You can sleep on his couch and get your keys in the morning; I’m sure he won’t care.” 

“Are you staying there?” 

“Yes.” 

Johnny mutters something under his breath. You consider yourself lucky not to have heard it. For a while, the two of you drive in silence. Then Johnny says: 

“You never came for your second nipple.” 

“It’s only just been six months.” 

“So you’re due for an appointment then, aren’t you?” 

You steel yourself, gripping the wheel tightly at ten-and-two. “Actually, I’m going to someone else.”

Johnny’s seatbelt unclicks. He hovers at your shoulder bringing with him burning warmth and the scent of whisky. When he talks, his breath brushes your neck, fury tangible in every syllable. “Who is it? Who the hell is he taking you to? Darcelina? Astrid? Dusty? Whoever it is, consider the appointment canceled. No one is piercing you but me.”

“You don’t get that privilege,” you grit out between your teeth. “Not anymore, not after the way you’ve treated me!”

“Oh, did I offend you?” he breathes, clutching one hand at his breast. “Not falling down at your feet? Not worshippin’ the ground you walk on?” 

“Fuck you, Soap! I wanted to be friends.” Your voice cracks embarrassingly. Suddenly the road goes blurry. You blink rapidly, forcing yourself to calm down—you’re driving for fuck’s sake. You swallow past the lump in your throat, the silence interrupted by rustling as Johnny leans forward again in the backseat, trying to get a look at your face in the passing streetlights. 

“Fuck,” Johnny groans. “Are you crying?”

“No!”

“You are. Fuckin’—pull over, before you get us killed.” 

Keen embarrassment only has your eyes watering more, until you have no choice but to do as he asks, pulling over to hastily parallel park and throw on your hazard lights. You let your elbows rest against the steering wheel, face in your hands. His words echo in your head, said in that stupid Scottish brogue: not falling down at your feet? Not worshippin’ the ground you walk on? Are those really the things he thought you wanted? Is that the sort of impression you gave to Johnny, to Ghost’s other friends? 

The backseat door opens and Johnny climbs out. A small part of you hopes that he will walk himself home—and good riddance. But he horrifies you by walking all the way around to the driver’s side of the car and tugging on the door handle until you begrudgingly unlock the doors. 

“C’mon,” he says, trying to pull you out of the car with your seatbelt still on. 

“What’re you—?”

“Just—wouldya—so stubborn—“ he drunkenly leans over you and mashes his fingers against the button of your seatbelt until it releases. For that brief moment, he is a warm weight across your lap, bringing with him the scent of cologne and whisky. Then he pulls you out of the car—and into his arms. It’s a tight, full hug, chest-to-chest, not bone crushing per se, but all-encompassing. 

You don’t realize how badly you need it from him until you’re getting it. 

“You’re such a dick,” you groan against his shoulder, sniffling.

“Aye,” he says, swaying a little on his feet, like the two of you are dancing. “But I’m right. We cannot be friends. So you’ve got to let this go, alright? Just breathe out 'n let it go.”

“I don’t understand,” you mutter. “He wants us to be friends.” 

“He doesn’t know what he wants,'' Johnny says, one hand rubbing gently at your shoulder blades. “No more crying. It’s out of your hands. Aye?”

You shake your head, hands gripping his shirt. 

But your tears slow and eventually stop. Cars pass occasionally. One of them honks at the sight of you both entwined on the side of the road, rolls down their window to let their passenger yell something suggestive, and it makes your face go hot. Johnny pulls away, nearly stumbling out into the road to give the car both middle fingers as it peels away. He slips on the damp asphalt and goes down hard on his side, taking the skin off his elbow and palm. 

“Fuck, I’m hammered,” he laughs. 

“Clearly,” you say, struggling to help him up and into the backseat. 

Once in the driver’s seat again, you feel exhausted, emptied, like a washcloth wrung out and left to dry. The drive back to the apartment is silent, and when you’re in the parking lot, neither of you make a move to get out of the car. 

You warn Johnny: “Simon’s asleep, so be quiet inside.” 

Johnny warns you sleepily: “Ghost is right there.”

There’s a tap on the glass of your window. It nearly makes you shriek—but it is only Simon, half-smoked cigarette in his fingers, bundled up outside the car door. You roll down the window sheepishly. 

“Need a little help?” he asks, taking a drag and turning his head so the smoke doesn’t touch you. His eyes are on Johnny in the backseat. 

You hold up your fingers with just a smidge of space between them. 

[dazzlingjaeyun]

𝐛𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐚𝐢𝐝𝐬 - 𝐬𝐢𝐦 𝐣𝐚𝐞𝐲𝐮𝐧

boxer!jake x nurse fem!reader

genre: exes to ??, mostly angst, a little fluff

warnings: mentions of bruises, blood, heavy injuries and surgery, probably poor medical references (i googled but in the end i have no clue, pls bear with me lmao)

word count: 5.3k

↝ dazzlingjaeyun's bookshelf

"can we get a nurse to the ER immediately, please?" you heard the charge nurse's firm demand through your communication device. you exchanged a quick glance with your colleague, and with a slight nod, she indicated she could handle the task alone. without hesitation, you used your pager to notify the ER that you were on your way, then dashed through the hallway and down the stairs to reach the emergency department.

"sorry, we're completely short-staffed," the charge nurse murmured in apology, ushering you toward a room. "male patient, twenties, just some bad bruises – likely needs stitches. we just got a family from a car crash, and we can’t tend to him right now."

with that, she left you at the door and hurried down the hall toward another room.

you pushed open the door, heading straight to the sanitizer dispenser. you rubbed it into your hands, then pulled on a pair of gloves from the box beside it, and added another layer of sanitizer.

"hello, my name is–"

the words caught in your throat as you turned around. the sharp scent of sanitizer seemed to sting your nose, burning your airways and stealing the breath from your lungs.

you froze, staring straight into a pair of familiar brown eyes – eyes you had learned to both love and hate. once filled with warmth, they now held an icy coldness, mixed with a flicker of surprise at the sight of you. just like you, he was sure you'd never meet again.

"y/n," he finished your sentence.

your throat tightened as your name rolled off his lips. you gulped down the lump in your throat as if you could swallow the whirlwind of feelings right down with it. you shook your head slightly, trying your best to focus on the situation at hand and staying professional.

"yes. i'll be your nurse today," you finished the rehearsed introduction you'd used at least a thousand of times during your two years at the hospital.

with another shaky breath, you slowly stepped closer to where he was sitting, waiting for any type of response from him but there was none.

"can you take off your hood, please?" you asked in the most professional tone you could muster. you nodded slightly when he pulled down his hood and leaned a little closer to examine his face. a pang of hurt rushed through you seeing him in the exact state you'd found him in many times before.

you were sitting on the sofa in the tiny apartment you shared with jake, your knees bent and pulled to your body as if that state could hold together the feelings that dared to overflow. you checked your phone again and again. nothing. as your head started to spin, wondering if tonight would be the night that he wouldn't come home, the sudden creak of the front door finally pulled you out of your daze, and you immediately shot to your feet, rushing toward the door. jake stumbled inside, his gaze on the floor and his hood hiding what you expected to be another field of bruises. "jake..." you whispered, your voice trailing off in a lack of things to say. you carefully took his shaking hand in yours and guided him to the bathroom, where you gently pressed down on his shoulders to make him sit on the edge of the bathtub. "i'm fine," he tried to reassure you the way he always did when he looked anything but fine. you stayed silent as you started cleaning up his bruises. the only sound breaking the silence was jake's occassional hiss when he clenched his fists as the antiseptical burned on his wounded skin. "you don't have to–", the words stuck in his throat with another sharp intake of breath as you cleaned up his bleeding lips with a cotton swap. "i can take care of it," he mumbled, and although he avoided your eyes, you could see a hint of regret flashing through his. "if you took care of yourself, you wouldn't keep coming home like this in the first place," you replied, your voice laced with a mixture of anger and frustration. you threw away the tissues and cotton swabs he'd bled through and faced him again to apply ointment to his bruises and patch them up if necessary. "what if one day you come home and i can't fix it, jake?" you asked, your voice barely louder than a whisper. for a second, you stopped your movements, just standing in between his legs and looking at his battered face. "what if one day you don't even come ho–" "shh," his whisper interrupted you, "that won't happen, baby." jake raised his hands and brought them to your hips, pulling you a little closer to him. you wrapped your arms around his shoulders and just held him close until your thoughts quieted down. for tonight, he was safe, you thought. you let go of him and took a step back, gently running your hand through his silky hair and examining his face one last time. then, you reached for the chapstick that you kept on the sink, gently applied it to the ripped skin on his lips, and softly brushed your lips against his. after you pulled away from his lips, you cupped his chin between your thumb and index finger and leaned down to press a gentle kiss on each of his bruises. "you need to stop this, jake," you whispered later when the two of you had gone to bed and he was holding you tightly although every muscle in his body hurt. he couldn't not have you close to him.

"you won't ask what happened?" he suddenly spoke up, breaking your thoughts and pulling you back to reality.

for a second, you tensed again. then, you sighed almost inaudibly, lingering by his face for another second before taking a sudden step backwards and turned around to gather all the things you'd need to treat him. you could practically feel the intensity of his gaze, although you had your back to him.

you turned back around, your face as nonchalant as you could manage as you shook your head.

"i don't care what happened," you replied shortly.

his lips twitched into something resembling a smirk, though it was faint and visibly pained him. “still bossy,” he said under his breath.

you clenched your jaw at his remark, but sat down in front of him and ran your hand through his hair in the gentlest way possible to get his bangs out of his face.

"and you're still reckless. now, hold still," you ordered.

for a while, the room was silent except for the occasional sharp intake of breath as you cleaned his cuts. you tried to focus on the task, but you couldn’t ignore the feeling of his heavy gaze on you.

"this one needs stitches," you said, tapping carefully on the skin next to one particularly deep bruise on his cheek, "it might hurt a litte."

as you began stitching the bruise, his hand moved slowly, almost tentatively, to brush against your wrist. the touch was light, but it still sent a shiver through you. you glanced up sharply, but before you could say anything, he caught your hand.

“jaeyun,” you said, a warning tone in your voice, but he didn’t let go. instead, he brushed his thumb across your knuckles. then, in a gesture so achingly familiar it nearly shattered the walls you’d built around yourself, he pressed a gentle kiss there.

your breath hitched. “what do you think you're doing?” you asked, your voice so barely audible that you hated how vulnerable you sounded.

his eyes met yours, and for the first time since you'd stepped into the room, they softened just a little. “trying to remember what it felt like,” he said, his voice low and hoarse, “to have someone who cares.”

the words hit you like a punch to the gut. you pulled your hand back, your heart racing, but despite everything, you mustered the courage to reply. “i don't care. this is my job, not…” you trailed off, unable to finish the sentence.

you wordlessly finished stitching up his wound, grabbed his chin in between your thumb and index finger like you'd done countless of times before and turned his head to both sides so you could examine his face.

your eyes trailed to the bruise marring his lips. they were as plump as you remembered, but the familiar softness was gone. they looked slightly rougher now – chapped and marked with faint remnants of past bruises.

you reached for a clean cotton swab, dipping it gently into the antiseptic. his gaze stayed fixed on you, the weight of it almost making your hands falter. carefully, you dabbed at the bruise on his lips, the antiseptic gliding over it. his lips parted slightly at the touch.

the bruises on his lips were always the hardest to see. he was already struggling with sores from time to time, and every other day, a new bruise was added to what had become a painful collection. but jake loved to kiss you. your lips, your cheeks, your knuckles, your forehead, the tip of your nose – he'd kiss you everywhere, again and again, no matter how much it pained him. only once had he not been able to kiss you. and, of course, it had to be your anniversary. he had promised you to not go that day – had promised you to be home for dinner that you'd prepared so lovingly, cooking all his favorite dishes and even bringing out the nice plates his parents had gifted you when you'd first moved in together. the ones you usually only used for guests. but as time passed, and the blue sky outside your kitchen window slowly turned to black, you knew he wouldn't be home before midnight. you tried to be angry, really, but you couldn't stop the waves of worries from washing over you again and again. with shaking hands, you grabbed your phone to call him, certain he wouldn't answer. but after only two rings, you heard his voice. "babe? i'm on my way, i–" "are you okay?" you interrupted, your voice trembling slightly. just hearing him eased the twist in your stomach, but not fully. jake swallowed hard on the other end, the lump in his throat making it hard to speak. "i'm sorry," he replied after a while. "i know i promised." he sounded guilty. "you did," you replied quietly. "please... just come home." the line went silent except for the sound of jake's breathing, and you knew he was searching for the right things to say, but you still hung up. the dinner you'd put so much effort into had long gone cold, yet you couldn't get yourself to empty the table. you waited silently, eyes fixed on the clock on the wall, until the door clicked and jake's footsteps echoed through the hall. "princess?" jake's familiar voice called, a little unsure but loud enough to hear. he kicked off his shoes and rushed to the kitchen where you were sitting in your chair. you looked at him, your heart aching at how tired his eyes looked – at how his face was covered in fresh bruises; one on his jaw, one right below his temple, and a fresh one on his bottom lip. your eyes filled with tears that you quickly blinked away. he didn't say anything as he stepped closer, pulled you to your feet and embraced you in a tight hug, although it made him flinch. you buried your face in his chest, inhaling his scent as you tightened your arms around him. “i’m sorry,” he murmured into your hair, “i should’ve been here. i shouldn’t have–” you pulled away and looked up at him. jake hesitated, his eyes scanning your face. then, he leaned down and kissed your forehead. it hurt him – you could see in the way his jaw tightened and feel it in the way he pulled back immediately. "i'm sorry."

jake's sudden hiss broke the silence another time. "ah– y/n–"

you quickly pulled back the cotton swab from his lips, only realizing then that you had kept it on his wound while deep in thoughts yet again.

"sorry," you mumbled, blinking quickly as if that could erase the image your mind had just replayed, "did it sting?" your eyes flicked up to his.

"a little," he admitted, his voice low.

you pressed your lips together, focusing on your task as you cleaned away the faint streaks of dried blood and dirt clinging to the cracks. for a moment, your thumb brushed the edge of his jaw, steadying his face as you worked.

your hands were itching to pull out the chapstick you kept in the pocket of your coat and soothe his lips with it like you always used to do after cleaning up yet another bruise.

"you used to just kiss them better," he mumbled, more to himself than to you, but his words still made you freeze for a second.

"are you hurt anywhere else?" you asked, avoiding his eyes as you took one of his hands in yours and silently cleaned his bleeding knuckles.

his eyes traced down from your face to his hand in yours, slightly bigger, probably a lot rougher. it reminded him of how you'd often cleaned the blood off of his knuckles before, but also of how you'd loved to play with his hands when you were cuddled up against each other on the sofa or in bed. or how you'd always let him take the leftover lotion from your hands whenever you'd applied too much again. he was sure your hands were just as soft as he remembered them underneath the thin plastic gloves.

"jake?", you asked again, reminding him of the previous question he'd left unanswered.

he hesitated for a second, before slowly pulling his hand out of your hold, internally forwning at the loss of your touch, and reaching for the hem of the shirt he wore underneath the zip hoodie.

he slowly pulled it up until you could see a dark red bruise blooming on his ribcage. you winced slightly at the sight but still leaned in a little closer to get a better look, bringing two fingers up to the bruise and carefully letting them ghost over his skin.

"there's not much you can do for a hematoma. ice packs and... rest," you said, your eyes flicking up to his at your last word. jake lowered his shirt again and just nodded wordlessly.

for a moment, neither of you spoke. you just stood in front of him, not close enough for your legs to brush against his knees but not far enough to feel entirely out of his reach. his eyes met yours and for the first time since you'd seen him sitting in the ER, you didn't look away.

secretly, you hoped he'd see the hurt somewhere in your eyes. that he'd somehow understand how badly he fucked you up, even now that you supposedly didn't care about him anymore.

jake's hand was itching to reach for yours, to graze his fingertips over your knuckles again. hell, maybe to take your hand and pull you into a tight hug – knowing damn well every muscle in his body would hurt too much – but still, holding you so close you'd never leave him again.

but just as his hand moved forward the tiniest bit, you broke eye contact and took another step back, bringing more distance between the two of you.

"you're all patched up," you said sternly, "you'll get your papers and instructions in a few." with these words, you walked toward the door, yet you hesitated to leave.

you turned around to look at him one last time. "take care, jake. seriously, i don't want to see you here again."

.｡*ﾟ+.*.｡

the flourescent lights softly buzzed above you as you rushed from patient to patient. your feet were hurting at this point, but you knew you'd only have two more hours left until your shift was over.

you had picked up extra shifts, not entirely voluntarily due to the staff shortage, but you honestly didn't mind. keeping yourself busy kept any thoughts about your encounter with jake almost three weeks ago in the very back of your mind.

you'd be lying if you said you weren't worried deep down, but he hadn't made another appearance in the hospital since the last time, so at least, he was dealing with less severe wounds now.

you were finishing a report on the patient you'd just treated when the charge nurses firm voice made you flinch.

"incoming male patient in his twenties with suspected head trauma and possible internal bleeding. ETA three minutes. notify surgery – likely immediate intervention."

you looked up from the paper, focusing your attention on her and waiting for further instructions.

"y/n, you're prepping," she said, giving you a short look. you nodded, put down your clipboard and followed along as the team moved toward the ambulance bay.

"paramedics said he got injured in a fight," the charge nurse informed. you nodded again, mentally going through the steps you'd have to take now, until you really registered what she'd said.

suspected head trauma. possible internal bleeding. injured in a fight.

the combination of the facts she'd thrown at you and your colleagues so professionally started to ring in your ears like a deafening alarm.

jake.

you felt your heart starting to pound violently in your chest and your airways seemed to swell with every step you took toward where you'd await the ambulance. every worst-case scenario ran through your mind, each more terrifying than the last.

only when you tripped over your own foot, stumbling forward just slightly before catching yourself, you snapped out of it and managed to gather your thoughts again. countless of people got into fights every day. it's not him.

when the double doors of the ambulance burst open, you caught sight of the stretcher, slightly shuddering at the sight of the motionless figure laying on it. it wasn't your first time seeing a patient like this, but that didn't make it more pleasant.

"he's stable for now," one of the paramedics announced, "caller said he hit his head on the floor after a punch. unconscious when we found him. nose bleed, slight swelling of the head, pupils unequal," he rattled off the patient's symptoms.

"we managed to stabilize him, but his vitals dipped twice."

your heart was already in your throat, but when you stepped closer and got a clear view of the patient's face the world seemed to stop.

he looked battered, but you'd always recognize him – in every state, in every lifetime. his skin was pale, sickly so, and blood stuck his bangs to his forehead. a deep gash stretched over his temple, still leaking blood. dried red stains under his nostrils, on his cheeks – everywhere. so. much. blood.

you tried to stay calm but the walls were closing around you, squeezing you tighter until you couldn't breathe anymore. your vision started to blur as you reached for the handle of the stretcher with termbling hands.

"y/n," someone called, but the sound was muffled, like it was coming from underwater.

"jake," his name slipped past your lips in a whisper. you felt your head spinning, every late night thought that had plagued you for so long before you'd walked away from him crashing down on you – revealing reality in its ugliest form.

you didn't realize how much you were shaking until one of the other nurses grabbed your arm to gently guide you away. "i don't think you should–"

"no!" you exclaimed, pulling your arm free and stepping closer again, "i n-need to–"

“y/n,” the charge nurse’s voice cut through, snapping you out of the haze. “step back. now.”

the tone in her voice left no room for argument, but your feet still felt rooted in place. it wasn’t until the stretcher began to roll toward the operating room that you finally stepped back.

the outline of jake's body, all blurry from the tears in your eyes, was the last thing you saw before the doors swung shut behind him.

the charge nurse started to say something, but every noise around you shut down except for the sound of your own heartbeat pounding in your ears and your breath coming ragged.

jake.

you hated him. you loved him. and now, he felt like he was slipping through your fingers for good.

your legs felt numb as you paced up and down the hall, not able to stay still. your body felt exhausted after pushing through your intense 10 hour shift, but you felt restless. time seemed to extend forever as you kept waiting for an update. you didn't know how long the surgery had been going on when the doors finally swung open and revealed the surgeon.

you quickly approached him, although you didn't know if you were ready to be confronted with whatever news he had. his expression seemed calm, but he might as well have looked horrified – you wouldn't breathe until you'd heard the confirming words.

"he's stable," he said finally, and as you hesitated to reply, he added, "he'll be fine. he'll take some time but–"

"can i see him?" you interrupted.

the surgeon furrowed his brows slightly. "he's not awake yet. he needs rest now, y/n."

you should have felt relieved but your terror wouldn't ease until you've seen him with your own eyes.

"please," you pressed, your voice barely louder than a whisper.

he hesitated for a while. your stomach started to drop another time until he gave in and sighed. "i guess you can help out in the recovery room," he mumbled, clearly not fully happy with the idea. you paced off before he could change his mind, only stopping to hesitate for a second once you reached the room. you took a deep breath before opening the door.

your eyes fell on jake immediately, he was lying in bed and although the sight of him wired to all types of machines and with a bandage around his head was worrying, you let yourself breathe for the first time since his arrival. he looked almost peaceful.

your vision blurred as you stepped closer and pulled a chair to his bed to sit down for the first time in hours. you reached out, your hand hovering slightly over his before you pulled it back again.

"i swear to god, jake, i–" a soft sob escaping your throat cut you off.

minutes passed, maybe an hour. you were just sitting next to his bed, blankly staring at him while the tears rolled down your face until you didn't have any left to cry.

when jake's eyes slowly fluttered open, the bright lights above forced him to squeeze them shut again immediately. his head was pounding, the almost unbearable pain forcing a quiet groan out of him.

he took a deep breath and forced his eyes open again, slowly taking in the environment in an attempt to make sense of his whereabouts. as he slowly came to his senses, he started feeling the even rushes of air against his arm.

jake forced himself to move his head to the side, although that only reinforced the pain he now felt in his entire body.

but all the pain melted away when he saw you – your head placed next to him on the matress, your soft breath brushing against his skin. your eyes were closed, your lashes wet and your cheeks slightly flushed. you had been crying for him. and you were here. even after everything he'd put you through.

it was only a few weeks after the ruined anniversary dinner when jake couldn't hold it in anymore. "there's something i haven't told you," he stated when you were cuddled up against him on the sofa. his heart was pounding violently in his chest when you sat up and swallowed so hard that he could hear it. "what is it?" you asked and jake swore the anxiety in your voice nearly shattered his heart into a million pieces. because it wasn't the first time you'd sounded like this, not the first time he'd made you sound like this. and the worst part? he couldn't blame you. when had all of this gone so wrong – when had he stopped being a safe place for you? jake took a deep, shaky breath before he continued, his voice careful as if it could break you. "you remember how i... worked hard, right?" your expression stayed blank, except for the crease that formed between your eyebrows. jake took your wordless nod as a sign to go on. "last week, after one of my boxing sessions," jake began, pausing to gather his courage, "there was this scout. he said he’d been watching me for a while... and that he liked what he saw." your lips parting slightly as you processed his words. "he offered me a chance to go pro." there it was. the sparkle in your eyes. the one thing he wanted to see the most, and the one thing he'd extinguish yet another time. "that's amazing, jake," you said, the relief in your tone only pressing down harder on him. "that means... proper guidelines, more safety?" he nodded slowly, avoiding your eyes as his gaze stayed fixated on the cushions of the sofa. "so...?" you continued carefully. "i turned it down," jake said quickly, as if saying it slower would take away the courage to say it at all. he didn't look at you. couldn't get himself to see the announcement crashing down on you in another wave of disappointment and worry. "you what?" you asked. your voice sounded so unsure – as if you'd only misheard – and jake's heart cracked when he repeated his words. "i turned it down," this time slower. "jake, you said–" "i know what i said, y/n. that i'd take the chance immediately if i got it. but this is not who i am, this–... i don't want to play by other people's rules and–" "do you even hear yourself?" you interrupted. your voice was filled with both anger and frustration and even though jake hated it, you were right. "play by other people's rules? you turned down the chance to do what you want to do, but safely. you've been coming home looking like hell for months. i don't care if you win or not, a body can only take that much," you continued, growing a bit louder with each word. jake knew you were right, and he knew it was wrong when he raised his voice back at you. when he shoved your feelings aside for his pride. "i don't get why you care so much. it's not like you're getting hurt," he replied, his tone agitated. "you're my everything, jake, don't you get that?" you almost screamed, tears of frustration daring to fall from your eyes. the sight of you like this deepened the crack, finally breaking his heart. but he just gritted his teeth, his jaw visibly tensing. you blinked a few times before standing up. "but you're right," you said in a stable voice although jake could see your hands slightly shaking, "i can't keep caring about you when you don't give two shits about yourself." and with that, you left the room – and a few minutes later the apartment.

another low groan stirred you awake. you slowly opened your eyes, blinking away the sleep, and then straightened your back almost immediately when you realized you'd fallen asleep.

your eyes immediately fell on jake and you felt like the weight of the world lifted from your shoulders when you saw him looking back at you. he was awake.

you immediately shot to your feet,."are you hurting?" you asked in an almost alarmed tone, turning around to provide him with painkillers, but the weak grasp on your wrist stopped you.

you slowly turned back around to face jake as he raised your hand to his lips and weakly brushed an attempt of a kiss against your knuckles, just like he'd always done.

"why are you here? i thought you hated me" he said, his voice so faint that it was almost inaudible.

you looked at him blankly, "i... do hate you."

jake didn't reply. the silence between you stretched. you wanted to say it, to admit it. to tell him that you didn't hate him. that you were still so fucking in love with him. that you'd always been, even when his reckless behavior made you lose your mind. that you'd never stopped caring about him.

but you just stared at him, your throat tightening with the words you didn’t know how to say. jake’s eyes, even though they were filled with exhaustion, never left yours.

he broke the silence first, although with only a whsiper, “i’m sorry.”

your breath hitched, and you blinked, unsure if you’d heard him right.

“for everything,” jake continued. “for all the times i didn’t listen. for making you hate me.” his lips curled into a faint, sad smile. “and for breaking every promise i made to you.”

your heart ached at his words. you searched his face for a hint of insincerity, but there was none.

“you’ve got a lot to be sorry for,” you said softly, sitting back down in the chair.

“i know.” he shifted slightly on the bed, wincing at the pain but refusing to break eye contact. “at some point, i didn’t care what happened to me because…” he trailed off, his gaze leaving yours for the first time.

“because...?”

his eyes returned to yours. “because i knew i was losing you, y/n. i know it sounds stupid," he hesitated, "but losing you already felt like i was dead. so i didn’t care what happened.”

the words hit you like a wave, knocking the breath out of your lungs. your fingers twitched, and before you could stop yourself, you reached for his hand. his skin was rough, but the way his fingers curled around yours was heartbreakingly gentle.

"every time you came home like this, i thought i’d lose you, " you said, your voice shaking, "and then i guess i finally did.”

jake shook his head, despite the new jolt of pain that rushed through him. “you never lost me,” he whispered.

the walls you’d spent so long building crumbled, piece by piece. you wanted to hate him, yes. but you also loved him – so much it felt like your heart had never been ready to let go, even when your mind had told you to.

“i don’t hate you,” you murmured. “i never did.”

your eyes met his again, and for the first time in months, it didn't feel like drowning – it felt like coming home.

just as jake was about to bring your hand up to his lips again, the door swung open to reveal the surgeon. you quickly pulled your hand away and straightened your back.

"mr sim?" he asked, to which jake looked at him expectantly.

"i'm sure you've heard this before," the surgeon continued, his eyes flicking to you, before focusing back on jake, "but you need rest. that means no boxing for now. you got severely injured and it will take a long while to heal fully."

your eyes went from the doctor to jake, and as you saw him swallowing, you absentmindedly took his hand in yours again, his fingers gently curling around yours.

jake nodded as best as he could and the surgeon left without another word. as you looked back at jake, you opened your mouth to say something, but he beat you to it.

"no boxing at all anymore," he said softly, causing your eyes to widen just slightly, "i'll stop if it means i'll get another chance to be with you."

© dazzlingjaeyun, 2024. please do not copy.

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[darylsgarden]

Pairing - Daryl Dixon × Bimbo reader

" In an out in 10 minutes. Got it?"

You nodded

"Only medicines, food if we can find any and clothes if there's time left"

"Got it Daryl"

Daryl knew it was not the best idea to send you off on your own in the other direction, because the last time he did this, you had spent most of your time finding "the perfect pair of heels" which you could use nowhere in the apocalypse. The time before that you had busied yourself in trying out the cutest little pink 2 piece top you could find and when he had questioned you regarding it your only explanation was "But it's pink Daryl 🥺🩷" Well he couldn't really be mad about the pink top because to cool of his anger you had let him fuck you stupid in the said top adding onto the precious time he had lost to that top.

You really did not plan on straying away from your list this time.

Antibiotics - Check

Gauze pieces - Check

Sanitizer - Check

Empty syringes - Check

And a whole lot of other stuff that wasn't yet expired you filled it in your sac.

Then on the way to the food mart there was a store. Well a clothing store. And the mannequin had on the sexiest dress.

*Daryl said clothes in the end* you repeated to yourself several times, but it was almost that the dust clad dress was calling onto you.

"Ughh Daryl's gonna be so mad" you said to yourself as you entered the doors of the brand store that was once considered luxury.

Some of the dresses were in their plastic bag coverings so you didn't really have to worry about the dust. After a bit of searching you found a dress similar to the one on the mannequin. It was magnificent. Straps so delicate, a low neck that wouldn't cover much and it was perfect around your waist, highlighted your curves just the way you wanted. You had 2 choices - 1) to quickly shove it in your bag and run towards the food mart, 2) Try it on and look pretty and pray and hope Daryl didn't find you wearing it. You chose the second 🎀

--------------------------------------------------

Daryl had finished off clearing the top floor and now he was on his way down, hoping to find you by the food mart. The moment he entered the food mart and couldn't pick up on a single sound he knew you weren't there yet because honestly you were clumsy as fuck. So he began walking outward when he saw the clothing store and it didn't take him a lot of time to figure out where you were. He swung the huge glass doors only to find you admiring yourself in the mirror. The tiny thing you called a dress barely covering anything, and the heels with white bows that you had picked to go with it, making you stand almost as tall as Daryl.

"Dary...Daryll"

"Shut up"

"I'm sorry"

"I hope ya know yer punishment"

You nodded

"Mmhm go on then" he said motioning to a flat sofa in the store

"Go on now, Ya know, how I like ya"

" The dress is delicate, don't be rough🥺"

"The dress will be fine sweetheart, the only thing I'm gonna be rough with is ya"

________________________________________

Part 2 ?

[brainrotandbedrot]

i have a cold and feel like a victorian child with tuberculosis so here’s this

(yeah yeah i know it’s been done before but my bursts of creativity are rare these days)

price is the one who won’t come near you with a ten-foot pole. yeah, maybe it’s a controversial take, but that man has responsibilities. and while he loves and adores you, he unfortunately can’t abandon them to sit with you and wait for you to feel better. so instead, he makes sure you get anything you want delivered to the front door. he puts medicine next to your filled water bottle, alongside your fully-charged kindle, a full box of tissues, and the tv remote. by the time you shuffle downstairs, all hacky and achey and tired, the sofa is a little haven of everything you could possibly need. everything’s within reach, there’s a blanket tossed over the couch, and a mug of tea is keeping warm in the microwave. just remember to text him when you’re awake, honey.

simon has an immune system made of steel. he could probably take on the black plague and survive unscathed, considering how many times you’ve had a stomach bug and he’s just totally unaffected. despite that, he’s also a germaphobe. the second you get the sniffles, he’s disinfecting every surface and giving you cup after cup of emergen-c. or anything he can find that has vitamin c in it. sorry, love, but you’re in separate rooms until you recover. that doesn’t mean he abandons you, though — he just brings you everything with a face mask on and gloves, then makes you sanitize your hands after you touch him. he’s an acts of service man: while you’re down for the count, he takes a few days off and cleans the house, takes care of chores, and makes sure there isn’t a thing you need to worry about.

johnny is the one that acts like you’re one foot in the grave even though it’s just a fever. he senses you’re sick before you do — he can see the slight glaze over your eyes, the way you’re drinking more water than usual, the way you seem to be just a bit off. as soon as you’re actually running a fever, he’s right there next to you. lazes on the couch with you, hand-feeds you, takes a swig of your electrolyte drink right after you. even though he’s a very dedicated attendant, handling your every need, it’s really not a shock that he ends up in the same predicament a week later. but he doesn’t mind it. he’d rather catch a bug if it means he gets to take care of you. and with all the naps you’re taking — the fatigue hits hard — he gets to be your pillow. he doesn’t see any downsides, really.

kyle is an angel. he knows you’re not feeling good. he doesn’t hold anything against you when you snap at him — you can’t help it, baby. it’s not your fault you’re sick. just let him take care of you, yeah? he’ll sit you down in the bath, keeping the water lukewarm so it can be made hotter or colder depending on what you need. he’ll wash your hair, scrub all the sweat away, and make sure you feel a bit more like yourself as he rubs in your lotion and dresses you in one of his big shirts and a pair of boxers. anything you ask for is acquired within minutes. you want water? already taken care of. ibuprofen for your sore throat? open up. jello or pudding? already in the fridge. just don’t forget your protein and greens, love, they’ll make you feel better. he’s fixing an omelette for you with all the nutrients you need to shake the little bout of flu off, and he’ll even blend it all up if you don’t like the texture of having everything chopped.

[lisenberry]

Haven't done a Feral Friday in a while, and I'm a bit stumped on the current chapter of BDSM Price.

So, let's skip ahead to a bit I was able to write that comes further along in the outline. Just a tease at where we're going.

MDNI/18+/NSFW

CW: Dom!Ghost, nonparticipating Dom!Price, bondage/rope play, temperature play/wax, spanking/pain play, angst, sub drop.

Was this his way of apologizing?  Or was he trying to put you back in your place?

“Don’t look at him.  Look at me,” Ghost demanded, bringing you back to your center.

And John didn’t look at you, not when Ghost tied you up and hung you from the hook in the door frame, or when you sucked his cock hands-free while he lazily dripped paraffin wax between your shoulder blades. 

“Bloody hell, Cap.  Is she always like this?  This is what I’ve been missing?  Taught her to give a good head, did ya?”

No, John didn’t look up once when his friend took turns warming your ass and pussy with a crop, as strings of drool and slick soaked the floor from both ends of you.  There was no vibrator this time.  John never used one, didn’t have one in his box of tricks, so Ghost sloppily worked you over with his fingers and his tongue before slipping himself inside.

You were used to the stretch of John, but it was something new and different from Simon.  Far from the cold and sanitized nature of your previous encounters at Life Connect 141.  He barked out oaths and moaned praises like he’d been given a gift so exquisite, he would hide it under his pillow.  Carry it with him everywhere.  Wear it into the ground.

“I knew you’d be a gem, dove.  Such a sweet little toy,” he muttered, as he pulled harder on the rope that held your hair, arching your back even further.

His enthusiasm was so contagious that you came just like that, on his cock before he pulled out and painted your blistering ass with his spend.  You could tell the skin was split in places by the way the salt in his seed stung and burned as he spread it around like a salve.

If he touched your clit again, you wondered if you could come a second time at the fresh sensation of it.  But you were too tired to ask.  Too drained to speak.  Wrung out and soiled like a mop that had scrubbed the floor.

It was everything you’d wanted...once. 

And yet, it was John who reached out to hold you up, while Ghost carefully untied you.  Finally showing some notice, some attention.  Too late, you thought.  Once freed, you turned into Ghost instead, on wobbling ankles and numb knees.

“I’ve got you, dove.” 

He carried you to the sofa, wrapped you in your robe, and traced circles on the back of your head as you slowly came down.  You laughed into his shoulder as he joked about being ruined for the 141 for good after that and lit a cigarette.

But before long, he looked at his watch and kissed the top of your head. 

“That’s my time, hon,” he mumbled, lifting you up gently and helping you sit on your own.  The ache along your backside was not nearly as strong as the one in your heart.  It never was. 

“It was good to see you again, Simon.”  You smiled and squeezed his hand once before letting him go.  For good.

You sat there, awkwardly, in the living room you’d come to know so well while John followed him out to the hallway.  Their voices were too low to hear what they were exchanging.  A sudden, frigid dread crept along the back of your neck, despite the coziness of your thick robe. 

The chill turned to a quaking, as your teeth chattered, and you fought to still your hands.  An adrenaline crash, you recognized.  A sub drop.  You’d heard about them, but never had one.  Not with Ghost before, and never with John.

And now you were alone, with tears streaming down your face, and uncontrolled panic in your chest.

Before John could come back and see your sorry state, if he even came back at all, you fled to the shower and turned on the stream.  Willed it to heat up faster while you tested it with trembling hands. 

“You need any help in there, sweetheart?”  His voice was too soft, too concerned.  You couldn’t take it.  Not from him.  Not like this.

You didn’t want to think about what had just happened.  The consequences.  Why he’d done it.  Why you’d agreed to it.  You just wanted to go home. 

How’d things get so wrong?

It was you, you realized.  It had always been you. 

[ariseur]

childhood friends and reward kisses with cloud strife ❤️

cloud didn’t mind the silence so much, especially considering his chest was not filled with words but with a quietude that only the sound of a quickened heartbeat thumping between his ribs could interrupt. he almost savored it at times, knowing he couldn’t be annoyed with something that didn’t exist.

this wasn’t one of those moments. you patching him up from his recent scuffle with an abundance of shinra’s lackeys and advanced machines. cloud could have easily done this himself, you know that, yet you insisted to do it for him anyways. he didn’t say much in return besides a small, ‘thanks’ as he limped over to your sofa.

it only wasn’t a moment because cloud didn’t mind you, whether you talked or not. although, even if he wouldn’t outright say it, he did find it a little sweet that you still remember small bits of your childhood together that you still recall to this day.

and yet your soft laugh breaks him out of his reverie, a chuckle escaping you and into the air — which almost makes him forget about the dull stinging echoing on the epidermis his jaw while you pressed alcohol soaked cotton balls against it.

you start up again as you brain whirs in search for more memories. “do you remember. . .” you trail off, lips twisting as you try to think of a funny moment. cloud watched for a second or two before your eyebrows raise with newfound idea. you smile again, “when we found that cat in the alleyway? the one that tifa gave some bread to?”

“oh, yeah,” he says in response. he remembers trailing after the two of you, hearing the distant cooing of your voices as you had crouched down to see a small kitten hiding away in the dark alley.

cloud couldn’t help but let a small amused huff of air puff through his nostrils at your antics. he had to give it to you, you were pretty good at taking his mind off of the pain.

“ginger,” he said blankly.

you looked up at him — slender, mako eyes already glued on you. quirking a brow, you waited for him to give you more context. “ginger?”

“ginger. that’s what you had named the cat,” he added. your mouth form a small ‘o’ shape with the realization. you softly laughs. “right, it had a bright orange mark on its forehead.”

he hums in agreement. at times like this there would be some memories he couldn’t remember, even when you blatantly described them with such detail. it was nothing if on the horizon, only blurry shapes and sounds that came with these memories. he was glad you still recall them, though, a greater comfort than you’d think.

“this might hurt a bit,” you say. his eyes flit down to where your hands roam over his arm, the thick laceration evident in the flesh of his arm as you hover a needle and thread over it. “do you want some—“

“you didn’t want to let go of the cat when we had to go home, even when your parents wouldn’t let you keep it,” he keeps going. you notice how his eyes clench shut with a furrowed brow as he cuts you off.

you cock your head.

and it’s almost like he senses it, because when he opens his eyes, he squints at you. “keep going,” he mutters, before closing his eyes again. you realize what he’s doing; keeping the conversation to take his mind off the sting of the sanitizer and the prick of the sterilized needle.

cloud hears you chuckle again. “yeah, said the cat carried diseases.”

he huffs, “it just wanted a home.”

the rest of the time is spent with mindless chatter, you both lose track of how long the procedure goes on. talking about tales of what he remembers back in nibelheim, talking about how different things are now — and before he knows it, you squeeze his hand reassuringly and gently tap his knee.

“we’re all done,” you say. “do they feel alright?”

he lifts his leg and moves it around, craning his neck and checking the rest of his injuries to ensure that there’s minimal pain left behind other than achy bones. “yeah, it’s fine.”

“look at me, don’t even know how to stitch someone up yet i got it perfect the first try,” you grin.

“you didn’t know how to—“

“don’t you think i deserve a kiss for how amazing i did?” you beam, half hoping that he’d forget about the fact that you know little about stitches and medical assistance besides fundamental healing magic.

he pauses, making a small, choked sound of surprise at your proposal of a reward. you tilt your head with a smile before puckering your lips out dramatically — making cloud scoff. hesitantly, his head leans forward as his eyes flutter closed. he can hear his heartbeat thump in his ears as a gloved hand comes to grasp the underside of your jaw, a soft gasp escaping you when he leans in and pressed a quick peck to your lips.

it was only for a second, but when he pulls away, there’s stars in your eyes and he can’t help but huff amusedly at the sight.

his eyes fixate on your figure even when you get up, skipping away to put the medical supplies back in their proper cabinets in the bathroom — leaving him to sit in silence as he waits for you to come back.

cloud enjoys his own company more now that he can include another, the quiet no longer so comforting unless you’re in it. he is on the cusp of insensibility and it only fills him with confusion. maybe you use magic or maybe you’re somehow manipulating him. he doesn’t know. cloud doesn’t know anything anymore except that he cannot sit on your sofa the same way he did before without feeling the phantom warmth of your hands lingering on his.

𐙚 dottie’s 500 event — 🍡 ( action ) prompts !!

𐙚 taglist ; @ch3rryfiles @alieeelinn

𐙚 non-500 requests are closed — august eleventh, 2024 ( 4:24 pm )

[theodorequartz]

[ His Companion] Hazbin Hotel Various x Male Reader

Part 6: The Red Demon

______________________

Once upon a time... Where there was nothing but darkness

______________________

You smile as he turns around to face you with a bright smile on his face. One that can light up the world.

Warmth engulfed your body as he ran up to you and gifted you an embrace.

__________

You blinked back to reality as you hear the sound of knocking at the hotel's front door. You have been sitting in the lobby in the sofa beside Angel dust who threw himself in you as you absentmindedly combed his hair between your fingers.

As Vaggie ran to follow her girlfriend to the entrance hallway of the establishment, you held Angel's waist softly and sat him up steadily. Angel pouted at this.

" Aw toots, come on! It's probably nothin'."

You sigh as you fixed Angel's ruffled clothes and brushing off  any dust from his body.

" I still have to see it, Hearts. I'm part of the staff now after all. "

Angel dust grumbled and sighed as he let you go. His heart warming just a tad bit from the nickname you gave him. You started calling him that after seeing the heart marks on his body when you were working for Val as his make-up artist.

You volunteered to be one temporarily as the current make-up artist at the time was killed off. You did so as to calm Val down from his angry tantrum.

You were assigned to be Angel's personal make-up artist since then.

You could've just stop being his make-up artist after a new one came but with his connections with a mafia family and Husk. You were bound to get use of him. Every little pawn is of use to get your lord's desire.

Speaking of the charming devil..

" - My, I haven't been that entertained since the stock market crash of 1989! Hahahaha!! Ohh... So many orphans.."

Your lips twitched to a small smile before disappearing. You walked towards where the commotion is.

" Charlie? Vaggie? What's with the commotion? "

You asked your new companions as you neared them, visibly tensing up as Alastor caught your sight. Your hand immediately grabbed the dagger in your hip and rushed to pull Charlie behind you, Vaggie following you and taking her stance beside you.

You glared at the demon in red, guard visibly up.

" My my! No need to be on guard pretty fellow!"

The staticy voice was filled with amusement as he pushed away the spear Vaggie pointed to his throat. His gaze looking straight at yours.

You gave a look at Vaggie and being a bright little angle she is, she new to keep Charlie in her protection as you slowly took your hand away from the hilt of your dagger.

Though not so bright enough to see your facade

You took a step forward and held your hand out, initiating the radio demon to do the same.

" My name is M/n, no need to introduce yourself to me. I know who you are.."

His grin grew more amused than ever.

" Won't it be rude, though?"

He, Alastor, said as he held your hand to shake.

" It won't, as I've already insisted."

You said, taking your hand off his hold as you gave him a look of distrust. He merely grind in return.

He then proceeded to speak of why he is here as Vaggie took a hand sanitizer out of nowhere and sprayed a lot to your hands and scrubbed it with tissue which was immediately thrown away to the fireplace.

This and that happened... And now there's a drunken gruffy angry old cat behind the newly made bar stand.

Which Angel was totally simpling for, of course.

And a little ball of bouncing scurrying cleaning crazy roach catching lady.

Everyone just seem to accept her existence.

Whilst Alastor started to sing,  the cat looked at you meaningfully and you stared back at him reassuringly, promising him to tell everything later.

Not really everything...

A loud crash startled all of you as the music stopped and the wall bursted open, you gasped as Nifty was hit with a large peice of the wall.

You immediately came to help her as the rest went outside to look. You lifted the rubble off her and she just smiled and thanked you before following the rest outside, seemingly fine as if she was not hit in the fist place.

What an invincible little lady...

You stood up and followed to go outside too.

You saw all of them huddled in the opening of the wall that was broken.

...

You walked right outside to the front door, where the hole in the wall was next to.

You followed their trail of sight to see a snake in a battle airship of some sorts

Both of you made eye contact and the snake immediately froze. You held a finger against your lips whilst looking at him in the eye.

He gave an unnoticeable nod in response, letting out a shaky breath.

He's face was slightly flushed.

He was immediately attacked by large black tentacles from the ground, destroy his aircraft.

You looked at your lord.

Alastor has a sadistic look on his face as he finished off destroying every part of the machine, making sure to grind extra hard with each hit.

My... how jealous...

" Well I'm starved! Who wants some jambalaya?"

______________

_________________

An entity was born to rule the empty land

________________

You laughed as he pulled and twirled you in joy.

" Did you like my present?"

You asked as you took hold of his hand gently.

" Yes! "

He replied brightly.

Oh... How far would you go to protect that light.

[fairyhaos]

seventeen and being sick

how seventeen will act when they're ill

notes: brief mention of (a fear of) a coma

masterlist

seungcheol:

complains if he's not been given attention for more than two (2) minutes. coughs so pathetically and obnoxiously loudly that you can hear him in the hallway even with his door closed. has to be spoon-fed chicken broth by mingyu. is only Absolutely Terribly Ill for a few days tho, and then he's bustling about trying to get stuff done while sniffling rlly badly and trying to insist he's fine

jeonghan:

is acting like it's the end of the world (1). somehow always manages to get a sore throat n croaky voice every time he's sick??? one time he had a stomach bug which made him lose his voice for three days. dokyeom blames it on jeonghan's croaky cough habit. comes home from work and just collapses onto the sofa like a puppet having its strings cut. refuses to move, has seungkwan bring a glass of water and paracetamol to him

joshua:

eyes get all puffed up n his face goes all pink bc of his fever and basically looks like a baby :( tries to shuffle around the dorm insisting he can function, is shoved back into bed by seungcheol bc a) he looks really ill and b) he doesn't want joshua's germs all over him. sleeps through the worst of his fever, wakes up to drink like three glasses of water n falls back asleep again. gets up w his eyes still super puffy but he's smiling so it's obvious he's feeling better. essentially gets rid of his sickness in two days

junhui:

doesn't get sick. like ever. sometimes he gets a sniffly nose but that's about it. brings hot water bottles to the other members when they're sick, offers to cook them spicy food to make them sweat off the illness. sits in front of their bedroom door while they're resting in their room, yells questions about what they want to eat, when they want to eat, how bad their pain is on a scale of 1 to 10. gets told to go away bc his yelling is giving them a headache </3

hoshi:

is acting like it's the end of the world (2). you can tell when he's sick or coming down with a sickness bc he starts swaying on his feet and is slow to react to things that the others say. bedridden for at least two days. whispers back forlorn messages when junhui comes yelling at his door, tells him to give his love to the other members before he succumbs to his illness. is screaming and running around the dorm not even a week later

wonwoo:

gets really drowsy. tbh it's kinda worrying for them to see wonwoo ill bc he gets rlly pale and starts sweating really badly n can barely keep his eyes open. gets through the worst of the illness in a few days but is holding tissues to his nose for like two weeks afterwards. refuses to go lie down in bed to sleep off the sickness, saying it's not that bad. sneezes so hard that seungcheol swears the whole building is shaking

woozi:

just has a really runny nose and a slight stomach ache, tbh. powers through it by taking a bunch of meds. manages to convince himself that illness isn't real and humans made up the concept of sickness and in fact, he is actually God. sometimes manages to focus so hard on his compositions that he forgets he even felt unwell in the first place

minghao:

the most hygienic about it. carries around hand sanitizer with him, disappears from the room to wash his hands every fifteen minutes, has his pockets stuffed with those little tissue packets. tbh he probably doesn't get sick that often either, due to a rlly good immune system or something. voice goes all croaky n he sounds more sick than he actually is, but it's not as bad as jeonghan

mingyu:

is coughing over every single surface in the house. either is confined to the bed for his sickness or is wandering around insisting that he is definitely not unwell in the slightest. has minghao following his every move with a disinfectant spray and a cloth. gets scolded by everyone when he sneezes into his hand and wipes it on his jeans, is confused why they're all so annoyed about it bc at least he didn't wipe it on them

dokyeom:

nose starts running so badly and has such a terribly high fever. his temperature is so high it's like he's going to burst into flames any moment. is speaking in a teeny tiny whisper the entire time, thinks he's speaking loudly bc his head is throbbing so bad. keeps telling everyone that he feels fine, but "junhui hyung did you get a twin or something bc there are two of you standing next to my bed—"

seungkwan:

is acting like it's the end of the world (3). has a fear of overdosing on paracetamol and accidentally sending himself into a coma, and so refuses to take medicine. drinks the herbal tea that minghao recommends, drinks the chicken broth that mingyu makes whenever anyone is sick, attempts to drink the sauce of some spicy food that junhui offers, almost chokes. he's feeling all better in a week tho, and vows not to fall ill again. that is, until he falls ill once again

vernon:

gets all flushed up bc of the fever. is almost permanently holding tissues to his nose, bc he was an unfortunate witness to that one time that jihoon yelled at mingyu for not wiping his nose properly after sneezing all over the dorm and hansol does not want that to happen to him, thank you very much. still sounds all bunged up even though it's been three weeks since his fever has gone down

chan:

tells the other members immediately when he's not feeling well and that he's going to have a lie down. ends up not emerging from his room for a whole fourteen hours, coughs so loudly and with so much force that his entire bed vibrates. is better by the next day tho, and emerges from his room like nothing happened. minghao tells him he needs to clean his room after staying in there while ill, but keeps forgetting to follow his advice

currently taking requests

[cuddlecow]

Hiiii! I've got kinda a weird request. How do you think Franco would react to the reader asking if they can use his pacifier. I'm wondering if he would be protective of it or something. Sorry if that's too weird or anything 😅

Oh my gosh, nono, this isn't weird at all! I get curious about this too, especially if reader is sensory, has a fixation, or does it as a nervous habit! I feel like this is another one where it could have it's own story or slightly NSFW themes. I hope I did okay on this one! My brain was running 90 miles per hour while I was thinking about this, so I'm sure I didn't write it too well.

Reader Asks Franco Barbi To Use His Pacifier

At first, I feel like he would be super cautious and protective of his paci. He's scared that once you get up close to it that you might yank it off or cut it away from his bandolier and throw it away.

Even though he's paranoid about that, I feel like he would let you at least put it in your mouth for a few minutes.

If he sees that it seems to soothe you, he'll let you have it for a little longer than he originally would've.

He thinks getting you one of your own pacifiers would be a cute little present for you. He might even hand decorate it with stuff he finds lying around!

If you seem to float off into a different headspace, I feel like he'd be absolutely clueless on what to do, so he'd probably just stare at you or go do something else for a while.

BONUS:

Cleaning. That's all you seemed to do during the day when Franco was out running his trials. You kept his room tidy and sanitized. You were pretty much Franco's handler at this point by proxy. This particular evening when the Barbi had come back to his room, he was actually in a decent mood. You, however, were going around his room organizing, then putting everything out of order, then re-organizing it.

For some reason, today was a stressful day. Easterman and the other Murkoff staff were harping on you earlier in the morning for no apparent reason. You were now in your compulsive cycle, until someone in particular softly swung the door open.

"Baby's baaaack!" Franco said in a sing-song voice before he trailed off a little. You had just finished the 4th round of taking everything down and then re-organizing. You walked over silently, taking a breath to regulate yourself. You had seen Franco do it before when he was stressed, but you wanted to try it for yourself.

"Love, I've got a really.. odd question to ask you." You asked, turning your head away slightly. Franco looked at you, thinking your behavior was extremely off from normal. "Whad'dya want, Sugar?" He put some of his stuff down on the main table that you guys always sat at. You just stood there silently, your face heating up with embarrassment. The silence kept getting thicker, and his big blue eyes kept staring you down.

Nervously, you pointed your little t-rex arm towards his pacifier that was dangling from his bandolier. Franco looked at you, grimacing slightly. Hesitantly, he spoke, "Yeah, sure.. Just be gentle with 'er, will ya?"

He untangled it from his bandolier as you anxiously waited. Once he got it free, he handed it over to you carefully. You took it, putting the cord around your neck before resting it in your mouth. You gently bit on it, gnawing on it shortly after. Franco had gone around a corner of his large room. He thought about it, realizing that since he usually sucks on the pacifier, and now you were, that you had indirectly kissed him.

He peeked around the corner after about 7 minutes, seeing that you had passed out on the couch with the pacifier in your mouth. He waddled over to you, crawling atop your form splayed across the large sofa. He thought you looked rather sweet like this, so gorgeous with your chest rising with every inhale and softly coming down with each exhale. He wiggled the pacifier free from your maw, giving you a quick peck on the lips before he sucked on the paci himself, leaving the cord around your neck.

[blkkizzat]

It's sheet changing day and is this adulthood? Being excited by getting to change your sheets? Thinking of the jjk men sleeping in your bed for a week straight and finding out your little cleaning quirks.

Gojo, when he finds out you do your dishes by hand instead of using the dishwasher cause you don't trust it. At first he's exasperated cause why are you over there cleaning when you could be in his arms. Then he kinda likes it and starts doing the dishes with you cause he's needy and likes being in your space.

Geto, when he finds out you clean your own tub instead of hiring a maid. You make more than enough to hire one at least once a week. Why do something so demeaning. But he gets to stare at your ass while you do it. So who is he to complain?

Nanami finding out you change your sheets every 2-3 days. He's confused cause didn't you just change your sheets on Monday? It's only Wednesday. And you're so diligent about it. He thinks at first it's him. That you're uncomfortable sharing your space but he soon learns you just like the feeling of clean sheets fresh after a shower. Especially on days where you shave.

- 🧠

🧠 nonnyyyyy seeing u is always a treat babe 🥹🥹

EDUIHFIAHDSFKUHSD omg the situation with gojo is definitely me because the dishwasher is to SANITIZE not to clean!!!!! it irks the essence of my soul when food clumps be left on plates and shit going in there because theres always specs of it still on. LOL i was about to say if this man isnt doing dishes right next to me theres going to be problems djhkskfhds.

Geto, LOL nah I'm with him I hate bathroom cleaning so I'd definitely hire a maid (tbh id get one now but i also feel its a waste of money when i could just stop being lazy fdhfkdjhfdsj) but if he was paying for it then FUCK YESSS! LOL I'll bend over for him in the bedroom while the maid cleans the tub fjhdksbfjskhfas.

ooh the Nanami one, ideally I'd like to do this too at least twice a week but it ends up being a week because im lazy djkhsfkjfhsd.

hmmm lemme seee....

Toji would definitely have trouble with the no outside shoes on in the house. Even though its common in Japan not to bring outside shoes into the house (every entrance to a home/apt usually having some enclave/foyer to put them) since he'd live alone after his wife he just kinda stopped caring and walked around inside with them, not kicking them off until he was on the sofa. LMFAO you definitely would have to nag him a few times before it sunk in. And he'd NEVER tell you but he thinks the fuzzy matching slippers you for the both of you are super cute.

True form Sukuna doesn't wear shoes so you wouldn't have to worry about him not wearing them in the house but thats the thing, he ain't wearing slippers neither. you cringe when your plush cream moroccan rug is quickly turned a greyish brown from the grime on his feet. his answer to that though is to destroy it entirely saying you wont need the rug nor your silly little apartment because its time for you to move into his palace. in fact, he doesnt even tell you this, he just destroys it and snatches you away... you'd figure it out eventually lol.

Choso is an angel. Yet he has alot of trouble with the no outside clothes on the bed rule. When he gets home late from fighting curses he wants nothing more than to dive into bed with you. But ick! He needs to remove his clothes and take a bath first. You help him out by making sure there is always one hot and ready for when he gets home. And he is so eager to peel off all his clothes and relax with you in the tub. (lol fun fact i didnt know until i studied abroad there that since the japanese technically wash with soap etc, before they get into the bath and the bath is for soaking, that in lots of homes they typically dont dump the bath water until after a few uses. this also was a water conservation tactic back from wwii that just stuck. so because of that most of their bathtubs have a warming feature. so it really would be easy to keep a bath warm for someone until they got home. also omg imagine just being able to sit in there forever too cause the tub keeps the water warm djhksdsdjvsd, i miss those japanese tubs mannnn)

xoxo!