#sorry for the annoying kind of addition to reblogs

[lightboundpunkz]

*jesse voice* that’s a common misconception mr white; you can’t cook empathy, but you can cook sympathy and compassion. there’s no way to artificially create empathy, you either have it or you don’t, and if you don’t, that’s not a bad thing, it just means you can’t feel others feelings. that can’t be taught, but you can be taught to better understand others feelings through sympathy, and strive to do what you can to help those in need through compassion. bitch.

[clitorphosis]

REAL MUSOR

Leon S. Kennedy x reader | 18+ MDNI. DEAD DOVE: DO NOT EAT, NON CONSENSUAL SEX, STALKING, SOMNOPHILIA, SMUT, female reader, Leon is a cop and a little bit obsessive, breeding, he is icky, mutual masturbation (reader isnt aware of it btw), unprotected sex, creampie, vaginal sex, fingering, oral sex, entering and breaking, forced exhibitionism I guess?, dirty talk, pet names, light gaslighting, non consensual voyeurism, use of spycams, police corruption, non consensual drug use.

Summary: dating isnt really Leon's thing, to waste his precious time and money over a woman that may refuse to have sex with him at the first date isn't worth it. Sure, putting cameras in your apartment to jerk off of your body and breaking in to fuck you are considered much better ways to get what he wants - quicker too.

notes: Musor is a derogatory slang term for a cop (=pig), also it means "trash" :3 I don’t condone anything here in real life. :3 uhm, reblogs or comments and any kind of feedback are really appreciated!

tags: @withonly-sweetheart

Leon has a problem and it started many years ago. Not his alcoholism, no, that can be put aside as something to indulge when life hits hard. Guilty pleasure one would call it. Not his job too, he likes being a cop - it comes with its own advantages. His problem is much simpler and it also got nothing to do with his dick.

Dating apps. They aren’t his cup of tea; meeting new people is hard and nowadays most of them try to find someone on dating sites or apps. Wasteful, he is an employed man with a big responsibility so to court a woman that may be a gold digger would be foolish. Also, unluckily for Leon, one date is not enough to bring most women into bed and the prices are already too high so risking to find a parasite without any payback isn’t something straight out of his dreams.

Also, women don’t get wet if you are a cop unless they have a cop fetish. Apparently, uniforms and handcuffs are only cool in the bedroom. Not like he minds that, cause with time Leon found other ways to enjoy his women. Much more preferable ways.

Two or three knocks on the wooden surface with his knuckles, fingers ran through his blonde locks so they wouldn’t dangle in front of his eyes. Your door opens wide with your confused eyes set on his frame, not expecting any guests, especially a cop. A bad omen.

“Good afternoon, I am here to check. Someone complained about noises coming from your apartment at this hour, miss” Leon explains, showing a pearl-like smile. Too perfect, too cheesy, but attractive appearance always soothed people’s worries, being easy on the eyes makes things uncomplicated. Who doesn’t trust beautiful people? “It won’t take too long”

A pensive hum escapes from your tensed lips, but there is no other choice other than accepting this - you nod, letting him enter inside without any additional questions. Like taking candy from a baby. And you were dumb, which ended up playing nice for him.

The apartment is a studio one, not expensive too. That was expected, you look young, but not enough to have your own place. Renting at a cheap price in not notoriously good neighborhood suits you better.

When the checkup is finished, you seemed so worried to hear his eventual words or clear bullshit. Not every person is used to a cop’s presence in their own cozy little place. Suspicions are natural reactions, but not for you, still believing in that little story that he told you before. A blatant lie, only the dumb bitch would have believed that. You.

“Oh my god, I am so sorry—“ you were apologizing almost every time he would appear in front of you. And even now. Annoying, but also hearing your words filled with so much anxiety made him feel good. Really good. And any wrong word would make you cry easily. Which would be nice to see. He cut your quick rambling, waving a hand mindlessly as his eyes travel to shelves.

“Yeah,“ Whatever. Leon nods absently, finally crumbling to the urge to glance into your almost glossy eyes - with great pleasure enjoying his own reflection in them. His mind wanders to possible images of your face filled with tears underneath him, easily making his pants feel tight around his cock. He can’t help himself. “Maybe someone holds grudges against you, be careful”

Another bullshit, but still you appeared unsure and at the edge of his presence until he was out of your apartment. There should be kept a count of his successful lies. As a respectful man, it was hard not to thank you and wishing well-being before leaving. After all, it would be a bad touch to leave without a gift, right? Leon hadn’t actually thought these little cameras would be used today, but fate had other plans for you. In his defense, it was really hard not to set those little cameras in your apartment while he was ‘doing’ his job. Especially when you were so sweet to him. Weirdly enough, installing them was an easy and quick task, even simpler was to find crannies or shelves to put in these little cameras he had bought or confiscated. After all, it would have been a big waste to throw them away, right?

So sweet. You were asking for it.

An easy target too. And now many rooms were under his watchful eye; bathroom (the best view is there), bedroom and also in living room too. In a little time, Leon got to know your schedule, it wasn’t hard to remember - a simple routine, even a kid would be able to memorize it. Like a little TV show, he enjoys watching after work or during his rare vacations. Whatever you do on Friday morning, when you return home, and when you usually go to sleep. Or when you have your private time, masturbating in bed alone and filling his ears with your moans. Or even better, showering or resting in the hot tub, your tits and body exposed to him - like a nicely wrapped present that he needs to open one day.

The best part is - you aren’t aware of this.

You aren’t aware that many evenings when your fingers creep their way down to your pussy to part its lips and rub slow circles on already swollen clit under the sounds of cheap-acted porn actress’ moans - these evenings were shared with Leon. There is that arousing wet sound when your fingers stroke your leaking pussy. His attention easily glues to the screen, out of habit freeing his hard cock from the pants - it bobs and twitches in the air with already formed beads of pre-cum on his aching tip just begging for any kind of attention. Your lips would be nice, but a tight pussy even better. His fist cups it in a tight grip, slowly pumping his cock while watching the sight of your trembling and parted legs. And your moans, little breathless whimpers - his favorite. Sadly, this gets muffled by his moans, as his own strokes become rougher and quicker trying to keep up with your fingers. Leon knows the signs of your approaching orgasm, he knows everything about you too well. Watching like a possessed man as your toes curl from the growing pleasure, thighs snap closed around your wrist as your back arches while making more sweet noises.

He cums with you too, at the same time. His body tenses and his hand grips tighter around his hard cock. Eyes rolling back. Mind blank, intense orgasm hits him hard as usual. No other thoughts other than how good you are for him. And pretty. His breathing is hard and heavy, feeling his cum sticking to the skin of his hand and stomach.

The best porn he can ever see - special too, only for him. Putting such a show for him to enjoy after a hard day of work.

Feeling the stickiness of his cum on his palm and not being able to avert his eyes from your spent body. This brings him to his senses like an apple falling onto his head, a sweet idea. He needs more of you.

It has become a routine at this point.

Did he abuse his authority? Yes. Does he care? He doesn’t, because in other circumstances he would do that again.

Watching your body and getting off from this little show isn’t enough anymore. Doesn’t hit the same. Like a drug addict, searching for another dose and something stronger one can offer. He needs his hands on you. Going further, exploiting every opportunity his job gave him - it wasn’t hard to start breaking in without any traces.

Leon can’t be reckless nor impulsive, but to keep his hands to himself and not give in to a sweet fruit was hard.

Your sleep is short, he noticed that soon. You wake up at every little noise coming from different sources. That won’t do. This is not good and can’t be healthy for a young woman. On one of many visits to your empty apartment, to take a little present for himself or to adjust cams, an idea popped into his mind: why not put something in the bottles of water? The dose would be light anyway, this drug can easily knock out a big, burly man and Leon is here just to take care of you, in a boyfriend-like way. Not to overdose you.

Your apartment feels homely to him already, kicking off his shoes before walking freely around the place. He may be a cop, but not a pig. The anticipation was insupportable, months of waiting for your body, many concerns - not being really sure about the method and the dose. What if it wasn’t enough, what if it wouldn’t work, and many-many ‘if’. Leon had waited enough, there was a limit to his patience and it was already tearing apart with every passing second.

The mattress beneath you dips softly with his added weight, in the dark room the outlines of your figure are still visible, and the edge of your shirt is rode up and shamelessly exposes the flesh of your stomach - what a tease you are and you don’t even realize it. Your unconscious body, deep in the sleep, and he probably has all night to enjoy you. This heightens his arousal, not daring to touch you for a solid minute - not believing how lucky he is right now. Blood buzzes in his ears, hearing his own thoughts now: you, fuck you dumb, and need to cum in that pussy.

“I know you so well,” Leon whispers, his voice comes out shaky. What a man wouldn’t do to stuff a pussy. His lips carefully kissed yours, not being able to pull away his eyes from your peaceful face. Tracking out every little twitch in your features, but you are in a deep slumber. “like a book that I learned to remember. By heart. Inside… and out”

His hand lightly touches your neck, giving a brief squeeze, watching you gasp when he lets it go. Still asleep. Leon is testing the waters here.

“Oh, it’s alright, sweetie ” Leon whispers, not being able to hide his fascination towards your state. Cupping your jaw and tilting it to the side, like a doll to play and move around as much as he wants. “We are on camera, this is so important for both of us. Something to remember, right?”

This is wrong, of course, in the back of his mind someone whispers that Leon shouldn’t enjoy this so much - you are unconscious, not aware, but that’s the thrill. In any other circumstances, he could pull out a gun to force you, but the idea was pulled aside as the sight of your malleable state is much better. His fingers rubbed your thighs, pushing them apart easily so he could position himself in between. So soft, he can’t help but enjoy the sensation of your skin, his hand impatiently slips to push away the fabric of your underwear, to get a real glance and close of your not-so-aroused pussy. Too bad, but this is easy to fix. A mouthful spit of saliva would be quick and nice, a way to avoid a headache, but he changed his mind - your pussy is shaved. Leon whistles lowly, what a good girl you are. To bury his face in your pussy would be a nice start, after all, you have shaved for him, no? He is nice enough to reward you for this.

Shifting a little bit, easily manhandling your legs and placing them on his shoulders. Leon spits down a mouthful of saliva on your cunt, before leaning down with a long and broad stripe across your pussy, parting the lips with his tongue, groaning against your slit. Tongue glides across the folds, slowly warming your body up, like a hungry man trying to relish in the taste of your pussy so sweetly lingering in his mouth.

“Such a good girl, letting me play with you like that” Leon groans against your clit, it sends a pleasant vibration across your limp body. His hands grip tightly the flesh of your thighs, a normal person would have woken up to push him away, right? His mouth sucks on the clit, giving light bites with his teeth and your hips naturally try to ride him, messily bucking into his face with every rapid lick of his tongue across your sensitive bud.

Fuck, your reactions are cute, he wants more. His two digits push inside your hole, starting to move in and out of you shortly - making your body flinch again and a soft moan draws from your lips. He kept lapping across your slicked folds, his teeth nibbling on the sensitive nub, but not enough to hurt - his tongue laps away that bite anyway, not forgetting to suck your clit in between his lips too.

Your cunt gushes wetly around his fingers, they curl up against your walls, with the rough pace pumping and press on the velvety and wet skin, until he finds the spongy, sweet spot that made your hole clench tighter around his fingers. Soft and weak moans escape from your now parted lip, chest raises up and down rhythmically with every thrust. That’s a good sign. The taste of you and your natural body reactions entrances him, making his cock throb more in his pants, straining so hard and uncomfortable against the fabric. Leon pulls away from your now-soaked slit, impatiently freeing his cock from the jeans. It would be a waste to finish this so quickly after just getting a taste, fingers pull out of your hole roughly with a wet pop, your cunt left dripping, wet, and cold now like he took all the heat with it. Frankly, Leon does not care about your pleasure. Unlikely he will any time soon.

“Huh, you like this” Leon mumbles out slowly to himself, his hand gripping his cock and it twitches in his fist as Leon began slowly stroking it. Thumb presses on its tip, stimulating more pleasure through his body and letting out a breathless moan as his blue gaze surveys his work; your warmed-up pussy, more aroused than before. It glistens with your slick and his saliva on it. What an addicting sight. A light feeling of pride rose in his chest, as his hand flexed again and more beads of pre-cum formed on the tip, quick strokes smeared it along his sensitive and hard flesh. His cock throbs and aches to be inside you. Hell, Leon needs to stop before he cum over your unconscious state. Impatiently not noticing his own heavy breathing filling the air, he positioned his cock to your pussy.

“Who would have known you would be so fucking wet for me” he cooed huskily, rubbing his cockhead against your slicked folds, bumping against your clit. Your arousal is mixed with his saliva, it spreads easily on his veiny and hard cock - to use it as a lube. Easy and free, he doesn’t bother to buy one after all. His free hand grips your hip tightly, angling it to finally guide his cock into your neglected hole. “you really waited for me to use you, right? Just dying for more.”

Deep down, like every man, Leon prioritizes his pleasure. Who doesn’t actually? Good women should be eager to please and look nice for him. Attractive even. Unfortunately, your state isn’t the one to expect the eagerness. But there are advantages to this too: unconscious girls are much easier to enjoy. But still, giving a free pass to you isn’t something that will please him, no matter how good your pussy is. His pleasure has been always the most important element in the sex. Would not be fair to his former lovers too. He is so nice after all, any other man would have pulled out a gun to threaten you after breaking in to fuck you without putting a substance into some of your drinks. That’s an idea to keep for next time.

Your pussy feels so nice, your walls stretch around his length slowly. Leon imagined it differently, not so tight, but tighter it is, better for him. Warm heat envelops him almost in a vice-like grip, forcing a low groan coming from his throat. Maybe this wouldn’t be pleasant for you if you were conscious. But also, aren’t you so sweet and nice? Of course, you would have let him do that over and over. And if you wouldn’t - again, Leon doesn’t care. Your pussy engulfs him in so addictingly warm and to make this even better, your walls clench ridiculously tight around his cock. For a moment, Leon was not sure he would have been able to last long enough for him. Your pussy makes him dizzy, so much that he needed to take a pause, keeping his cock halfway through.

Leon slowly pulls out, leaving inside you just the head of his cock, his gaze is not on you anymore. He couldn’t care less about your state, but the sight of your pussy stretching around his tip is the one he can get drunk on. Popping it in and out, over and over until all he can hear are wet and filthy noises - and his own moans mixed with heavy breathing, while more slick gushing and now sinking his cock into you deeper and so easily. That didn’t last long, he hates denying himself what he needs. What he craves and now he craves to fuck you. And cum. Inside you. And he will.

“Taking me so right… fuck” Leon groans, burying his cock deep inside you, his hips meet flat against your ass. Slowly starting to roll his hips back and forth, deep and slow thrust, hitting his cockhead against your cervix.

This is addicting to him, worse than any kind of drug. Mindlessly mumbling out senseless praises, while his hips rock into you in quick thrusts, heavily breathing and not being able to look away from your leaking cunt. God, the images of you waking up and begging to stop fill his mind in a suffocating manner - his cock throbs inside you, another slam of hips. A hard gulp.

A man should be careful with his own wishes. Nails weakly dig into his biceps, not enough to leave half-moon marks. Even a kitten would have been able to leave a deeper scratch on his skin. But still, Leon’s hips stutter, realizing you shouldn’t move. In the dark, your eyes are half open, clearly fighting with the grogginess of the drug in your system and trying to orientate.

“Shhhh… easy there, sweetie. Be a good girl, get back to sleep” The tone of his voice is sweet and whisper-like, but the breathless lilt is still there. Your back aches weakly again, feeling him hitting your g-spot in slow and agonizing thrusts, but this isn’t enough to pull you out of your state. God your head is dizzy and the man in front of you is so blurry too. Heavy breathing escapes from your lips, swallowing hard the excessive saliva pooling in your mouth. It is hard to squint, hard to focus on anything. A side effect he didn’t know about, still not his fault.

“Not real, just a bad dream” Leon adds, his breath fanning across the side of your head, watching how your expressions shift weakly and eyelashes flutter as he slowly drags his cock out to bury it back in the same pace into your pulsing pussy.

“No…uhh…-not a dream…” your voice is so weak, meek, his dick fills your pussy entirely, every drag of it makes your body tremble and tighten around it more. You are easy to play though, mind is so fogged by the drug it would be easy to convince you.

Blue eyes almost spark in the dark, looking down at your confused and groggy state, his hand covers your mouth - he doesn’t need any noises other than moans and whimpers coming from you. Too distracting. You are clearly not aware of what’s happening, feeling the heaviness of your body dragging you back into the intoxicated slumber.

“…Just a dream. ” Leon repeats, enjoying watching you trying to push him away, your hands ghostly pressing against his chest in a weak protest. “Be a good girl, nothing bad will happen”

And these struggles make his cock throb in your pussy. So addicting to watch how the drug in your system is still kicking strong making your limbs return to being limp again, God, he was so close to just busting a load in you.

His pace quickens, becoming more ruthless and messier than before. He can’t stay here forever, unfortunately, but god he wants to fall asleep on you with his cock and cum buried inside you - to watch your reaction in the morning. All he can hear right now is the flesh-hitting sounds mixing with wet ones too. Your lips twitch, heavy pants and whimpers drawl out of them, while your pussy clenches tightly in a silent plea to fill it, not only with his cock, but sperm too.

God, and if you aren’t on the pill? What a nice present he may give you after this night. Getting you pregnant was enough for his hips to stutter in their pace for the last time, before shooting a hot load of sperm inside you. Burying deep inside, the warm cum fills your pussy almost to the brim, his mind is blank - focused how his cock pumped rope after rope inside you. When he is all spent, Leon slowly pulls out of you, and a disappointed whimper escapes from you too - too bad, he is not going to let you get your high. Too much work. His blue eyes watch how the cum oozes out of your hole for the last time.

The lights of the morning are particularly blinding, you’ve never noticed that before. Dryness in your throat. Like needles pressing inside every time you swallow down, aching for a gloss of water. The urge to throw up and to hide away from the rays of sunlight is overwhelming, not stronger than the heaviness in your body though. You force yourself out of the bed, dragging yourself to the bathroom was so hard, like a heavy bag instead of your body - it is already almost impossible to wake up and get your things done. Washing away the exhaustion from your face with the chilly water from the faucet. Your mind is foggy and not catching on to sticky feeling in your panties. Nonetheless, your body screams at you - your stomach feels turned inside out, messy, and used. And unsatisfied. Like you had the worst sex in your life, without getting your own high.

Your memory tries to flash out the sight of the dark room and blue eyes, being filled and hearing his voice whispering heavily, but you shake your head - pushing it away in your mind. Hiding it in imaginary drawers, - just a dream. Nothing more, you check your door every night. It is always locked.

Yes, a bad one, explains your state too. The nightmare does exhaust you easily after all.

[thetravelerwrites]

Yew (Part 1)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences  Relationship: Male Centaur/Male Centaur  Additional Tags: Exophilia, Centaurs, MLM Content Warnings: Amputee, Amputated Leg, Prosthetics Series: Part 12 of Monster Lovers: Shelter Forest  Words:  4,101

Yew finally gets his own fic! Yew makes his very first rescue: a surly centaur dumped on the side of the road. Please reblog and leave feedback!

Ethari was losing his vision rapidly. He hadn’t eaten in days, the fever was taking over his entire body, and the blood loss had rendered him extremely frail. The ranch hands had dropped him on the side of the road somewhere, but he wasn’t sure where. He kept trying to stand, but in his delirium, he forgot that his left foreleg up to the knee was now missing and unable to take any weight, so he continuously stumbled and fell into the mud of the roadside.

He fell for a final time, completely sapped of strength, and as he was losing consciousness, he heard a voice call out.

“I knew it! I saw someone! Mama, hurry!” 

In his dimming perception, he saw a dark face with green-blue eyes and a fluff of white hair haloed around their head. 

“You’re gonna be alright,” They said softly. “Everything’s going to be alright.” 

And Ethari passed out.

When he awoke again, he was inside a stall lying on rough burlap cushions instead of hay or straw and was covered with several blankets to guard against the winter cold. Panicking, he began kicking the walls with his back legs. He had been conditioned not to scream or yell, so kicking was the only means of rebellion or dissent he was capable of. So he kicked hard over and over, making a lot of noise in the process.

“Oi, oi!” A voice called. Ethari saw the face of a handsome man look into the open upper half of the stall door. He had blue eyes, tanned skin, and dark hair. “Could you keep it down? My wife is resting.” 

“Who are you?” Ethari asked aggressively, his voice raspy and harsh to his own ear. “What’s going on, where am I?” 

“Ugh, I hate dealing with pissy, angry males. Yew! Would you come and deal with this, please? I need to look after Hazel.” 

The handsome face disappeared momentarily, and the full door swung open, revealing that the handsome face was attached to a brown centaur body with black socks and a black tail, which flicked back and forth in agitation. He wore a bright red winter coat on his upper body and a matching riding blanket on his back. 

Seeing one of his own kind, Ethari relaxed slightly without realizing it.

“I thought she was feeling better,” Said another voice, almost chirpy sounding, and a beautiful, slender, black-and-white piebald centaur entered Ethari’s vision. Ethari recognized him as the person he’d seen when he was blacking out on the roadside. The skin of his upper torso was so dark that it was nearly black, contrasting starkly with his pale eyes, curly mop of white hair, and long, feathery lashes. He wore a black winter coat and riding blanket, both with intricate white stitching.

“She still needs rest,” The other centaur said, annoyed. There was a knock that came from somewhere in the building, and Birch’s head swiveled sharply to look in that direction. “Keep this guy quiet, would you? If she takes a bad turn, I’m taking it out on him, I don’t care how hurt he is.” 

“Yeah, yeah,” Yew said, waving him away.

The brown centaur dashed off, disappearing from view, and the black and white centaur came into the stall, which was spacious enough to allow him inside with Ethari comfortably. 

“Sorry about him,” He said, and it was then that Ethari realized he was carrying a tray with fruit and vegetables on it on one arm and a simple brown wool coat in the other. “He’s really touchy when it comes to Hazel. You shouldn’t move around so much, you know, since you were a proper mess to clean up. You've lost a lot of blood; it took my mother ages to stop the bleeding. There were bone fragments in the stump that had to be removed, too, and you’ve got a nasty infection. You’re gonna feel like pounded garbage for quite a while, so try not to reopen the wound and make it worse.” 

“Where am I?” Ethari repeated. “Who are you?” 

“I’m Yew,” The centaur said, setting the tray on a low table nearby. It was one of several items of furniture that seemed designed with four-legged folks in mind. “You’re in a guest stall at my parents’ farm, the barn specifically. You’ve been out for a couple of days. Mama was worried you’d starve. Here, put this on. It’s cold.” 

He held out the coat for Ethari to take, which he did, snatching it out of his hands roughly. Once he had shrugged it on, Yew reached out to touch Ethari, and Ethari flinched, slapping his hand away. 

“Relax, I’m just checking your temperature,” Yew said, knocking Ethari’s hand aside and placing his palm on his forehead. “You’re still feverish, but you’re not boiling like you were two days ago.” 

Ethari swiped at him, his anxiety spiking. “Get off me! What are you people going to do to me?” He asked indignantly, trying to back away from Yew but not getting far. 

“Nothing?” Yew replied, tilting his head. “Other than overfeed you, maybe. My papa is always encouraging people to eat more. Speaking of which, you must be hungry, right? Eat.” Yew motioned at the tray. “Don’t try to stand up yet. We’ve contacted my brother, Cetzu; he’s really good at carving. He may be able to fix you up.” 

“What are you talking about?” Ethari said distrustfully. “What do you mean? What do you people want from me?” 

“Like I said, nothing,” Yew said, moving toward the door. “Eat your food before you pass out again. Keep the noise down, though. Birch’s threats aren’t empty. If you disturb Hazel at all, he’ll knock you on your tail.” 

“I’m already on my tail,” Ethari said sarcastically. 

Yew laughed good naturedly. 

“I suppose that’s true. Eat.” And with that, Yew closed his door.

As soon as there was no one in sight, Ethari began wolfing down the food that was offered. He knew he would make himself sick doing that, but he couldn’t control himself; he was literally starving. Thankfully there wasn’t too much on the tray, perhaps because they knew he would have gorged himself if there was, so he wasn’t grossly over-full. There was a jug of water on the table and he drank deeply from it, not even bothering to use a cup.

After he finished, he made an attempt to stand, only to stumble and fall immediately. Groaning in frustration, he thumped his hands against the floor. Unable to move and suddenly exhausted, despite his anxiety and fear, Ethari passed out once more.

When he woke up again, it was dark. His stall door was open and there was a candle burning on the frame of the door. Yew was kneeling on his belly just outside of his stall door, knotting cord by candlelight. 

“What do you want?” Ethari snapped. 

Yew looked up. “Ah, you’re awake.” He set the cord aside and got to his feet, bringing in another tray of food and taking the empty one. 

“Why didn’t you just let me die?” Ethari asked. “What do you get out of helping me?” 

“Why would we need to get something out of it?” Yew asked, tilting his head again as if he didn’t understand. He reminded Ethari of a puppy he once knew, ages and ages ago. “That’s not something we care about around here.” 

Ethari grunted distrustfully. Yew knelt down next to him and regarded him thoughtfully. Ethari leaned back, glaring at Yew.

“Am I allowed to leave?” Ethari asked. 

“Well, sure,” Yew said. “If you really want to leave, we won’t stop you, but I… can’t imagine you’d get far at the moment. You can’t even stand up yet.” 

Ethari couldn’t argue with that, but he wasn’t about to say it out loud.

“You’re from a ranch, too, aren’t you?” Yew said suddenly. 

Ethari blinked. “Too?” He echoed, surprised out of his wary demeanor. He didn’t need to ask what kind of ranch Yew meant.

“Yeah,” Yew pulled his curly hair aside and showed Ethari the ear with the puncture hole in it from where the cattle tag had been. “My brother, Birch, and I escaped from one years ago when I was seven, from the big continent north of here. Did you escape too?” 

“I don’t know you. I don’t have to tell you anything,” Ethari said hotly.

“No, I know that,” Yew said, but he waited expectantly, his expression open and curious.

“I didn’t escape,” Ethari said eventually, if reluctantly. “There was… an accident.” He shifted his missing leg, and then stopped and winced when the pain got worse. “I couldn’t work anymore, so they were sending me somewhere, but I don’t know where. When they realized I was dying, they dumped me on the road.” He peered at Yew. “How did you know?” 

“You don’t have a tag like Birch and I did, but I can tell. You’ve got whip marks on your flanks and I saw what seemed like shackle marks on your back legs. I’ve seen enough of those in my youth to know exactly what it means.” Yew sighed despondently. “I didn’t realize there were slave ranches here.” 

For the first time, he looked sad and disheartened. It didn’t suit him, Ethari thought. He looked better when he had that big, dopey smile on his face.

“Officially, there aren’t,” Ethari told him. “It’s operating illegally, I gather. That’s why they were sending me away. I heard that legal ranches have to report accidents to the local lord, for compensation. I can’t collect compensation as a slave, and the owners can’t report and out themselves for owning slaves illegally. So they had to get rid of me. I don’t know what their original plan was. I shudder to imagine, though.” 

“Are there others? I mean centaurs, like us?” 

Ethari shook his head. “Only me and two others. They’re still there. They were sold to the ranch from the colosseum in the big city, what’s it called? Dunmountain? Around there. They have debts to pay, so they’re indentured. My mother was also enslaved there, but she died four winters back. I think she was indentured, too, but we never talked about it. She didn’t like to bring it up. But when she died, I inherited her debts, so…”

“Are there others besides centaurs? How many?” 

“A dozen, I think? There could be more I don’t know about, I was confined to the fields and the barn, so there were places on the ranch I’d never seen or entered.”  

“Where is it? The ranch, I mean,” Yew asked, a strange glint in his eye. A hint of anger, perhaps? Another emotion that didn’t suit his face.

“I don’t know,” Ethari admitted. “I was born and raised there. This is the first time I’ve ever been off the ranch in my life.”

“It feels weird, huh?” Yew said with a sad smile. “Like you should be doing something. You’re not used to sitting still in one place, right?” 

Ethari paused and nodded, grimacing. “I feel… off. Out of place. The ranch was terrible, but… it’s familiar. I know what to expect there. All this…” He waved at the stall and gestured at Yew. “I don’t know what any of this is.” 

Yew nodded. “It’ll feel strange for a while. Don’t worry. Everything will be alright.” 

Ethari couldn’t help but allow the corner of his mouth to go up slightly.

“You sound so certain of that.” 

Yew grinned. “I am.” Yew got to his feet and made to leave. “Eat and rest. Don’t worry about a thing. Mama will be in in the morning to check on you, but don’t be rude to her; she saved your life.” He pointed a finger at Ethari in warning, but Yew looked so unserious that Ethari nearly laughed. “One thing you gotta know about me: I’m a mama’s boy through and through, so don’t you go disrespecting my mama.”

Ethari snorted. “I’ll keep that in mind.” 

The next morning, Ethari was awoken by the door of his stall opening and an older human woman with greying hair entered, wearing a blouse and sensible trousers and carrying a bag.

“You’re not a centaur,” Ethari said. 

“Well-spotted,” She said with a lilt in her voice. “You’ll be hard pressed to find many of your kind on this continent. There are only a handful or so that I know of, besides my boys, and that includes you.” 

“You’re Yew’s mother?” 

“The very same,” She said, reaching out her hand for a handshake. “I’m Ryel.” 

Ethari didn’t take her hand, simply glared at it distrustfully, and she eventually dropped it. 

“I’m here to change your bandages,” Ryel said. “Are you gonna let me do that?” 

“Just don’t do anything funny,” Ethari said, leaning a bit so she could get to the stump. 

“I don’t have a funny bone in my body, child,” She said with a chuckle. Ethari suddenly saw where Yew got his sense of humor. 

“So, Yew’s adopted, then?” 

“Of course,” Ryel said, pulling off the dirty bandages. “All of my children are adopted. My husband and I can’t have children, so we opened our home to the ones who need one.” 

“How many kids do you have?”

“Certainly more than most, but we like it that way. There are always more kids that need homes, and we like being that home. We’ll likely be taking them in until we die, and our kids will continue the tradition. That’s why we started this place.” 

“Hmm,” Ethari hummed, and then winced when she began cleaning the wound. “Is that big brown asshole yours, too?” 

Ryel laughed. “Oh, yes, he’s mine. Don’t take his current attitude to heart, child. He and Hazel got married recently, and Hazel’s been in delicate health lately, and he’s a little frazzled. He’s normally more level-headed.” 

“I don’t care,” Ethari said. “I’m not going to be here long enough to find out.” 

“If you say so,” Ryel said. She began rewrapping the wound. “Although, I’d wager you’ll be here for quite a while. Cetzu, another of my sons, will be here in a few days. He runs an orphanage in Coleville and he hates leaving it for too long, but he’s agreed to help fit you with a prosthetic. You’ll have to wait a few months for your stump to heal before you can even start to get used to using it, but there’s no reason not to start making it now. It can be adjusted once you’re able to wear it.” 

“And how much is that going to cost me?” Ethari asked bitterly. “What am I going to have to do to pay you back?” 

“Well, that’s not necessary, but hands are always helpful,” Ryel said. “Besides, it’s the chilly season, so there’s really nothing to do at the moment. All the canning and jarring is done, and there are only a few winter crops out in the fields right now which they don’t need much tending to and pretty much grow on their own, so there’s not really any need for you to do anything besides recover.” 

He grunted, not sure if he believed her. 

“And more to the point,” She continued as she packed up the medical bag. “You’re not in any condition to be doing any paying back, as it is.” 

“I’ll accept that,” He said begrudgingly. “I guess I don’t need to worry about it for a while, then.” 

“No reason to worry about it at all,” Ryel said with a laugh. “Listen, son, I get why you’ve got misgivings, but really, we don’t expect anything from you beyond getting better. Whatever you want to do once you’re up and about is your prerogative.”

“If you say so,” He replied. 

“You don’t have to believe me, child,” Ryel said, standing. “Rest. Yew will be in soon with your breakfast.” 

“Why him?” Ethari asked peevishly. 

“I suppose he feels responsible for you, having been the one to find you. You’re his first rescue, after all.” Ryel sighed. “You don’t have to like him, you know, but he’s just trying to help.” And she left. 

It wasn’t so much that Ethari didn’t like Yew, it’s just that Yew… was too perceptive. He saw more than Ethari wanted him to see. It made him uncomfortable. And he was too… happy. Ethari was used to being surrounded by those who were beaten down by their lives and circumstances, so he assumed most people were like that. He’d never met anyone who could brighten a room just by walking in it, the way Yew could. It almost hurt to look at Yew. He was like sunlight, but the kind that suddenly flooded a darkened room that light hadn’t touched in years, blinding and painful.

Soon enough, Yew arrived with another tray, just as Ryel said, but Ethari was squirming by the time he showed up.

“What’s up with you?” Yew asked, noticing Ethari fidget. “Did you eat something bad?” 

Ethari growled. “I… have to…” 

“Hmm? Speak up, I can’t hear you.” 

“I need the privy!” Ethari said loudly, embarrassed. 

“Oh!” Yew said, seemingly unfazed. “No problem, I’ll help. Here.” Yew held out his hands. “Stand up. You can lean on me.” 

Still distrustful but slightly desperate, Ethari took Yew’s hands and, after some struggle, managed to haul himself unsteadily to his feet. Yew swung around and used his own body to support the length of Ethari’s body. Slowly, with a lot of help from Yew, Ethari was able to limp out of the barn. Some of the other stalls also seemed to be occupied, but the doors were closed so Ethari couldn’t see inside. 

“Are there other four-legged folk here?” Ethari asked. 

“There’s Reed. He’s a deertaur, really rare. He’s smaller than centaurs, but he’s got antlers, so he needs as much room as we do. I’ve never even seen another person like him.” 

“Neither have I,” Ethari said, surprised. “I wasn’t even aware there was such a thing.” 

“There’s one more, I fibbed. Reed’s daughter is half-deertaur, but she takes after him and has four legs. She got her own stall recently, just turned thirteen. She’s at that age where she doesn’t want to share a room with her parents anymore, you know.” 

“I don’t know, actually.”

Yew laughed. “His son, River, has two legs, like his mother, but he’s got hooves, too. He’s really unique. Lymera has hooves too, but she’s a fawn, so that’s not unusual. She used to stay in the barn, as well. She liked it better than the house.”  

Ethari made a face. “Why are you telling me all this?” 

Yew laughed again. “Because you asked?” 

“I didn’t ask for the roster of your family, I just asked if there were four-legged folks besides you and your surly brother.” 

“True, but it doesn’t hurt to know. Besides, talking takes your mind off the pain. Hurts more when you’re quiet, doesn’t it? Talking distracts you.” 

It was excruciatingly slow progress, but finally they reached the latrine at the edge of the treeline. It was far enough away that the smell didn’t reach the house of the barn, but that meant getting there was an undertaking for Ethari. He was exhausted by the time he got there. He was able to enter by leaning his body against the walls of the latrine and limping inside, but once he had finished his business in there, it took all his strength not to collapse. 

“I need to rest for a moment,” Ethari said, breathing heavily. 

“Here, let’s get away from the latrine first,” Yew said, swinging around to support him again. Yew managed to get him to a patch of moss before Ethari practically fell. 

“I feel like I’m gonna hurl,” Ethari said, his upper torso bent and resting against a nearby tree. 

“Try not to, it’s not good for our kind to vomit,” Yew said, holding Ethari’s hair. “We’re too similar to horses like that.” 

“I’m fully aware of that,” Ethari snipped. “But that knowledge doesn’t help me in this situation.” 

“You want a beer?” Yew asked. “Birch always drinks when he feels sick. Counter-intuitive, I know, but it seems to help him.” 

“A beer would be amazing right now,” Ethari admitted. 

“Be right back,” Yew said, and dashed off. 

Ethari tried to breathe through the nausea, willing himself to keep his breakfast in his stomach, and heard four legs trotting up. 

“I had to fight Birch to get it,” Yew said, handing Ethari a wooden cup. “He really doesn’t like you.” 

“I don’t like him either,” You said peevishly, taking the cup and gulping swallows of the beer slowly. “Don’t you drink? I’ve never met a centaur who doesn’t drink. We were allowed beer even on the ranch.” 

Yew shrugged. “It’s just not for me. I can supplement what I need from alcohol with other things. Besides, I prefer wine, but it’s hard to store wine here. I get it every once in a while as a treat, but I don’t need it all the time.” 

“And you call yourself a centaur,” Ethari said, snickering.

“Hey, don’t tease, I already get enough of that from Birch.” 

You drained the cup and handed it back. “Is Birch the only one who drinks around here?�� 

Yew nodded. “Afraid so. If you need more, you’ll have to go through him.” 

“Can’t I just go through you? Wouldn’t he give you some if you asked?” 

“Well, sure, but he knows I don’t drink. You might want to work on getting in his good graces.” 

“Ugh,” Ethari grunted. “I just can’t wait to kiss that guy’s ass.” 

Yew laughed. “All you gotta do is be nice to Hazel. That’s his softest spot. He really loves her.” 

“Hmm,” Ethari hummed, pensive. “I wonder what that feels like.” 

“Me too,” Yew said wistfully. “I’m kind of jealous of them, to be honest.” 

“You’re too young to think that way.” 

“Am I?” He said, tilting his head again. “I don’t think so. I think it’s normal to think about things like this. Being in love with someone is nearly impossible in a place like a ranch, where people are just trying to survive, so I think it’s normal to wonder about what loving someone feels like. Didn’t you just say that?” 

Ethari snorted. “I guess I did. You’re still too young. You’re not even twenty yet, right?” 

“So what?” Yew said, shrugging. “I’m old enough to get married, so I’m more than old enough to wonder.” Yew looked up toward the house. “Ah! Cetzu is here. I expected him to take longer, but he probably just wants to get back quicker. He’s another one who’s a fool for his family.” 

“The orphanage director?” Ethari asked. “And wood carver?” 

“He’s really a jack-of-all-trades type. He’ll fix you up. Do you think you can make it back to the barn?” 

Ethari sighed heavily. “I’ll try.” 

“Let me know if you can’t. I’ll get the boys to lift you like we did the day we found you.” 

Ethari grimaced at the thought. “No, on second thought, I’ll make it. If it kills me, I’ll make it on my own.” He peered up at Yew in an unfriendly way. “Well… help me up, would you?” 

Yew laughed again. “Yes, yes, come on.” 

With Yew’s help, Ethari managed to return to his stall in the barn, though he was so exhausted that he hit the ground as soon as he entered it. He was breathing hard, his heart beating out of his chest. He was in immense pain from that small amount of physical activity.

“I think I’m dying,” He wheezed. 

“No, you’re not dying,” Yew said, helping him out of his coat and covering him with blankets again. “But maybe we should see about fashioning you some sort of bedpan, so you don’t have to move again.”

“That sounds like a nightmare, but let’s do that,” Ethari said. “I don’t think I can move again for a while.” 

Yew laid his body down next to Ethari, covering him with blankets and using his own body to warm him. 

“You’ll be alright, Ethari,” Yes said softly, patting his back. “Don’t worry. I won’t let you die. You’ve got your whole life left to live, now that you’re out of that place.” He pulled Ethari’s sweat drenched hair away from his face. “Don’t worry,” He repeated. “I’ll take care of you.” 

Ethari lost consciousness, the last sensation he felt were Yew’s fingertips against his forehead.

Since my work is no longer searchable, please do me a favor and reblog this story if you enjoyed it. Help me reach a wider audience! To help me continue creating, please consider buying me a Kofi, becoming a Patron, or donating directly to my PayPal!

Thanks for reading!

My Masterlist

The Exophilia Creator’s Masterlist

[popp1nstaxr]

❝My Doll❜❜ BG

Content: Smut, nsfw, sexual content, profanity, enemies to lovers, fem! reader, about stimulation.

Preview:

«You and BeomGyu have been something like enemies, you can't stand each other and every interaction ends in a fight, strangely, many believe that you really have something in common, more often than not as simple nonsense, your surprise will be great when you realize how real all those rumors that run about both are»

My first language is not English, I'm sorry if there is any mistake in the writing <3

Reblog and Like for more!! >.<

This is definitely not what I had planned for today.

I had decided to go out with my friends to the cinema. It was a sunny day according to the forecasts, and I hoped to have a good time and forget a bit about the tough times and stress of University. But to my surprise, around noon, it started to rain, and the intensity kept increasing. Can the forecast be wrong...?

And everything just got worse from there. My parents called saying they couldn't pick me up, and that's fine, but I hate taking the bus when it's raining. Waiting at the stop wasn't exactly pleasant; if you weren't careful, you could end up completely soaked in dirty water because of reckless drivers speeding through the wet streets, causing the huge puddles by the side of the road to splash onto you, and it's not, precisely, pretty.

I sighed as I waited for the bus, cursing myself for believing in the "nice weather" and not wearing weather-appropriate clothes. If I had known, I would have even brought a coat for the cold.

I watched as an elderly lady stumbled on the wet pavement, and almost immediately, I ran to prevent the accident. While helping the old lady, I saw the bus pass right by me.

I said goodbye to her and nodded as she thanked me, immediately running after the bus, "Wait! Please!" I shouted, hoping to make it stop in the pouring rain. But my shouts were in vain, and I soon stopped, completely drenched.

My blouse clung almost instantly to my body, and I cursed myself for wearing a black bra underneath it. It was clearly visible, in addition to the raindrops trickling down my bare legs and how much my skirt clung to them.

I wanted to cry.

That's when an expensive blue car stopped beside me—or rather, it was moving slowly along the road, as if strolling with me. The window rolled down, revealing a smirk that was both mocking and charming, oh, of course, I should have expected that it would be Choi BeomGyu, the only jerk who loves to show off his father's money from that company.

I completely ignored him, rolled my eyes, and kept walking.

"Hey, gorgeous. Are you sure you don't want to get in? I don't think rain is your strong suit," he said, laughing a bit as I heard him unlock the car.

I had two choices: to get in and dry off or to die of hypothermia from the cold.

Certainly, I'd prefer to die of hypothermia, but BeomGyu's annoying insistence, constantly chanting "get in, get in, get in, get in" while honking the horn from time to time, was getting on my nerves. So, I decided to get in the car.

Once inside, I observed him in more detail: his long hair and those few blonde strands made him look quite attractive, not to mention his penchant for wearing oversized hoodies from some rock band—My Chemical Romance, to be specific— and blue jeans, sometimes ripped or normal but equally baggy, adorned with chains and some rings on his hands.

Shit, if he weren't such a jerk, I'd let him mistreat me in five different ways.

"I see that today definitely wasn't your lucky day. Thank the universe that such a kind guy like me decided to save a damsel in distress like you," he spoke and smiled, glancing briefly at my legs, something I obviously noticed.

I raised an eyebrow, curious about that, and chuckled softly, but I didn't say anything about it.

His perfectly defined, pale, and large hands adorned with some silver rings and others with chain rings were expertly handling the steering wheel with incredible agility; you could tell he was a guy with skilled hands.

"Ugh, I only agreed because you're annoying, otherwise, I would have preferred to stay on the street," I replied, looking out the window. I heard him laugh ironically, but he didn't say anything.

"Yeah, whatever. Take my phone and look up your home address. I decided to be kind just for today, so don't provoke me, sweetheart," he said, his voice becoming more serious. I just rolled my eyes; he always tried to act superior to everyone, which was quite irritating.

But I didn't say anything and decided to obey, taking his phone and unlocking it for him. "Password," I said, and when he stopped at a red light, I saw him smile and chuckle a bit. It was almost as if he enjoyed the fact that I had obeyed him without complaints.

He snatched the phone from my hand and used his fingerprint to unlock it, opening the GPS app, then handed it back to me.

I searched for my home address and handed it to him.

He nodded. "Hold it for a bit, doll, so I can see," he said. I nodded and complied again.

Maybe it was fatigue, but all of this was quite strange. I feel like something was missing between us, something that never fails whenever we talk.

Oh, right, the fights.

Half of the journey was in silence. I don't know why, but I truly believed it would be annoying, as it usually is back at the University. However, I don't complain about the tranquility.

Suddenly, I glanced at the GPS and realized that BeomGyu had taken the wrong turn. "Oh, BeomGyu, you're going the wrong way. My house is that way..." I spoke to him, and he just nodded.

"I know, it's just that there's a store nearby, and believe me, I can't stand seeing you in that state anymore. I need... to cover it up," he said. His voice sounded a bit husky, and then he cleared his throat.

I looked at him, confused. "That state?" I repeated, puzzled, and then I observed myself. Of course, I'm still drenched... this, certainly, amused me. Who would have thought that Choi would succumb so quickly to temptation? I really wouldn't want to sleep with him, but it would be fun to tease and provoke him a bit.

When he parked the car and I saw him taking out his keys, I decided to act. We were in an underground establishment, and there weren't many cars around. I suppose it would be fun to play a little with his desires.

I let out a sigh and walked as quickly as I could to sit on his lap, BeomGyu seemed surprised and confused "What the fuck are you doing...? Get off" he spoke with a frown, I just nodded, but I ignored him, even climbing higher on his legs, riding his member almost as if it belonged to me.

"What will you do if I don't want...?" I murmured while I began to leave playful little kisses on his neck, that's when I felt one of his hands brush one of my thighs, a very light touch that spoke volumes.

"Trust me, for your sake, come down now." He ordered, his voice hoarser and more demanding than before, I ignored him again, continuing with my lips on his neck, beginning to slowly move my hips on his member, creating an exquisite sway, I allowed myself to let out a sigh against his skin when I could feel almost immediately his member under my butt and smiled, I had achieved my goal.

I stopped my movements and tried to get off his lap, but I felt his big hands hold my hip tightly, preventing him from trying to move if I wanted to. my hips on his member, making the movement from before even more exquisite "Now you have to take care of what you woke up princess, and I don't want to see complaints because then it will only make you worse, hmm?" I heard him speak against my neck, his voice was completely demanding and I shuddered when he let a slow lick from my shoulder to my jaw, his hands released my hips to almost immediately take my thighs and squeeze them with some force, spreading my thighs even more. legs as if he wanted to make way for his cock to be between my pussy still with clothes on. I could see how his fingers left small purple marks on my thighs as he moved his hands up to my rear and squeezed lightly.

I couldn't help it, in less than seconds I was already a mess of sighs under him and he hadn't even touched my most sensitive points.

I heard him laugh hoarsely "You totally fell for my game, Y/N. I really could have left you at home to avoid my temptation, but I didn't resist and I needed to test you, making up the cheapest excuse. This store is closed on Fridays and the store they leave it open to the public, so, darling, you didn't play with me, I played with you and believe me, I'll take all of you right now" he spoke as he massaged my buttocks and then gave a slap that made me cry slightly "but, Shh, it's okay. Silent beautiful, I wouldn't want them to take us out of here in the middle of the act because you can't contain your dirty slutty sounds" he added later to start leaving hickeys on my neck, while his hands went up my entire uniform skirt and cheekily touched my behind, while another of his hands went straight to the buttons of my blouse.

He was already letting go, he sighed with each touch and bite he gave, I tried to hold back the little cry that threatened to come out of my throat when I felt his hand squeeze with tortured exquisite delicacy as he unhooked my bra.

"Move your hips" he ordered seriously and with his hoarse voice, with one hand taking my hips and guiding my movements while the other played with my breasts, he brought his mouth to one of them and began to suck and play with his tongue on the tip of my nipple. "G-Gyunnie..." I whimpered his name at the pleasant sensation, but I couldn't be satisfied, I wanted more, I needed more from him.

He separated his mouth from my chest and made a few hickeys under each of them, before licking his lips and looking at me with a leering smile "Yes, Baby Doll? Remember to be silent my love, I see you completely a mess and still I haven't been able to try my fingers on you..."

I nodded, and released a content sigh "I need... I need more" I barely murmured, and stopped the movements that guided my hips. "Further..?" He asked smiling and I nodded.

"Fine, but for this I need you to be obedient, yes my love?" I nodded. "Let's go to the back" he ordered him and I without saying anything went to the back seats, BeomGyu followed me and sat on the seat. "Get on your knees in front of the glass, don't worry, they're tinted windows" I nodded and obeyed, I appreciated that the back seats were quite wide "place both hands on the glass my love" He ordered again, his voice strangely sweet.

And in that position, I heard how BeomGyu removed all his rings from his hands and left them on the front seats of the car, to then feel how his hands slowly went up behind my thighs towards my butt, then lowering my panties and raising all my skirt, exposing my entire ass to him, he hit him and I let out a small moan between pain and satisfaction "Shut up, little dolls don't talk" and automatically bit my lips to make silence.

My breath quickened when I felt him play with the entrance of my butt, brushing his fingers there "Be quiet" he asked sweetly again and I nodded, when I felt two of his fingers penetrate my butt without warning, stimulating there by removing a Little his fingers inside me, I bit my lip so hard to avoid moans of so much satisfaction that I drew a little blood, soon he began to penetrate me with his fingers and my already wet pussy felt it throb, while my behind it tightened around his fingers, damn it, he needed his cock.

He chuckled "look, how needy you are of me, isn't this beautiful doll?" I heard him say when he took his fingers out of my butt. "But... we'll leave this here for today, you still don't deserve my dick"

I widened my eyes in surprise, was he really going to leave me like this? No, no, no, you can't, he refused me.

I immediately settled back and watched him, noticing that he was cleaning the liquid that I left on his hands to put the rings back on "W-will you leave me... like this?" I asked with some disappointment, he just laughed and winked at me.

"I have to go buy things, you fix yourself up. But it was fun to see you so... miserable in front of me, my marks are now all over your body..." he spoke and smirked.

"You said it was closed on Fridays" he accused, annoyed, he really couldn't be more of a son of a bitch.

"Oops, double deception cutie" he said with amusement and got out of the car, leaving me there in my mess.

This was a fucking robbery.

[crystallizsch]

Hi...I'm new to the twst fandom, and i saw you help out someone else with recommendations so i was hoping you could help me tooo? 🥺 I'm worried about bothering people with asks and stuff, so i was wondering if you had any recommendations for blogs of nice/welcoming people in the fandom? 👉👈 It would be nice to make some friends...

You seem really friendly and welcoming, which is why I managed to send this...I just don't want to annoy anyone...💔💀 Thanks!!!!!!!!

AWHH HELLO HI WHAT THANK YOU SO MUCH??

i sometimes worry that i may be too overwhelming (if that’s the right word for it???) to even approach so that means so much to hear 😭💖💕

also i MAY have rambled too much,,, i ended up giving (unsolicited) advice as well im so sorry but i just wanted to say some additional things too about making friends in the fandom in general 🤧

anyways anon it’s all right under the cut 💖

AAGH FIRSTLY welcome to the twst fandom!! so glad to see you joining in!

i’ve only been in the fandom since the beginning of this year actually! and so far as my experience goes it’s been so fun!! people create amazing things and share amazing ideas with one another so i hope you enjoy your stay!

ALSO it makes me happy that you even think i’m approachable enough for recs 😭💖

i'm admittedly very biased though because a lot of the blogs i consider nice/welcoming are already mutuals/friends of mine 🤧

and i’m lowkey highkey kind of shy mentioning them again ahglsjdlsalk so i’d like to point you back to that original post here even though im assuming that you literally just came from there 😭

im so sorry i couldnt be more helpful with recs 😭💔 but all of them i do consider pretty nice blogs!!

ANYWAYS PLEASE DONT WORRY ABOUT “ANNOYING” ANYONE YOU ARE NOT A BOTHER most people love receiving asks/interactions!!

i really understand the feeling though!! it’s hard making that first move sometimes,,, and honestly (i know it sounds incredibly cliche but) you’ll never really know if you’ll click with someone here until you try!!

and i'm not sure if you post or not but! it's definitely how I've met the people i’m mutuals/friends with here!

i’ve made friends with others who regularly/every now and then reblog with nice tags or comments on my posts ;;; and i do the same on my main blog! i tend to leave a lot of tags when i reblog posts that i like

and sometimes it just,,, happens??? especially if you and the other person have a shared interest in the fandom!

anyways,,,

send people asks!! reblog with nice tags!! comment!! just let other people that you're there!! the right people for you will reciprocate 💖💖💖 (also this is in no way being against people who just prefer to silently lurk/interact btw i still appreciate you guys 🫶 this is just for if you want to interact more and make friends in the process!!)

but that's just me!!

similar to what i said on the original post i encourage you to find and interact with other people that you think you would vibe with!!

there's a lot of different corners in this fandom that are into way different things about the game than me. and the people that i vibe with might not necessarily vibe with you which is not anyone's fault!! it’s just the way it is 💖

(also i forgot to mention this in my original post --- i'm not sure if you're a minor or not so make sure if you decide to check out some blogs allow minors to interact 🙏 ) (and a lot of blogs outline their boundaries and rules on their intro posts that are pinned so keep that in mind!)

i have no idea how to end this hsjshsjs but generally just find others who like the same twst things as you and interact with them!! it’s okay to do little by little until you’re comfortable, there is never any rush 🫶

AGAIN i hope you have fun here and i wish you the best!! 💖💖💕

[abyssalzones]

I think seeing a liveblog from you would be fun!

hmm. perhaps. part of me feels like it would be a weird priority shift after loudly rolling my eyes about the book and being visibly anxious otherwise due to how it seems to attract annoying people to my blog like flies. like it's conflicting because I want to talk about it but then I get people who think they're in on a joke with me reblogging my posts with weird additions. and then people see me continue to post anyway despite the attention it attracts, which kind of just makes me feel like I'm asking for it. such is the nature of the social media beast, I guess! but then I Also feel like manifesting my manic frustration on the dashboard about this thing might alienate mutuals I genuinely respect 👍

I was thinking about it a lot last night and I might put something more eloquent together in a larger text later but I often feel very conflicted about trying to talk about something like this sincerely, because I'm stuck between People I Care About The Opinions Of (who likely don't want to hear about my thoughts on this stuff in depth) and People I Really Don't Care For (who are happy to eat their garbage and hear someone analyze it but won't put the effort in to change their own thinking or behavior. and also think abuse is toxic yaoi or whatever). so any audience for my thoughts as someone genuinely very interested in topics like, the avenues in our society through which abuse is normalized and trendified, or the fictional iconography of The Abuser, or "the victim" vs "the survivor" narratives... dwindles to none.

okay sorry big paragraph answer for a 10-word ask. I think it would be fun too! maybe!

[nekoannie-chan]

Misunderstood instructions

Title: Misunderstood instructions.

Ship: Steve Rogers & New!Avenger!Reader.

Word count: 421 words.

Square: I1 “Misunderstood.”

Rating: Teen.

Summary: Steve said the wrong directions, or maybe he didn’t.

Major Tags: Misunderstood, mission gone wrong.

Additional tags: This my entry to @cabottombingo Captain Bottom Bingo round 2. CABB2024.

Links: Wattpad, Ao3, Spanish version.

@saiyanprincessswanie

My native language is Spanish so I wanna improve my writing skills in English if you notice any mistakes, please let me know and I will correct them.

I don’t give any kind of permission that my fics to be posted on other platforms or languages (I translate myself my work) or the use of my graphics (my dividers are included in this), I did them exclusively for my fics, please respect my work and don't steal it. There are some people here who make dividers that anyone can use, mine is not this type, please look for the other's people. The only exception is the ones I gifted 'cuz now belong to someone else. If you find any of my works on a different platform and are not one of my accounts, please let me know. Reblogs and comments are always welcome.

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Marvel's characters (unfortunately), except for the original characters and the story.

Add yourself to my taglist here.

My other media where I publish:  Ao3, Wattpad, ffnet, TikTok, Instagram, Twitter. 

If you like it, please vote, comment, and give me feedback to improve my skills and reblog.

Tags: @sinceimetyou @unnuevosoltransformalarealidad @navybrat817 @angrythingstarlight @shield-agent78 @charmed-asylum @pandaxnienke @real-fbi @smokeandnailz @white-wolf1940 @tenaciousperfectionunknown @xoxonotme @bluemusickid @leyannrae @harrysthiccthighsss @marvelatthisonee @caplanbuckybarness @sapphire-rogerss @lizzieolseniskinda @notyourtypicalrose @hallecarey1 @nana1000night @talia-rumlow @writingshae @alexxavicry @azulatodoryuga @daemonslittlebitch @chaoticcollectivenightmare @endlesstwanted @chemtrails-club  @marigoldreamer @whiskeytangofoxtrot5555 @here4thefanfics @theestorm @patzammit @kmc1989 @somegirlfromasgard

The city lights flickered as Steve and the team prepared for their most important mission to date. The tension in the operations room was palpable as the heroes reviewed plans and prepared for action.

That night, the team infiltrated a suspicious warehouse in the heart of the city. Steve was leading the operation, followed closely by you, the new agent who had joined less than a month ago. The mission was simple: infiltrate, disable the weapon, and capture the enemies. But things rarely went according to plan.

As you and Steve were walking into the warehouse, you and Steve found yourselves in the middle of a firefight. Gunshots echoed through the air, and lights flickered as you moved quickly for cover. Amid the confusion, a misunderstanding arose when you saw an armed individual who appeared to be aiming at Steve. Without hesitation, you made a quick decision and fired, neutralizing the attacker before he could reach Steve.

They then managed to get to the machine room and began to search for any information that would be useful to them, although you had understood otherwise, so you erased all the information from one of the USB sticks. As soon as Steve realized this, he became enraged, and they began to argue.

While they were arguing, the enemies took advantage of the confusion to activate the weapon, triggering a series of explosions that shook the warehouse.

The team rushed to evacuate the building. Steve approached you.

“Why did you do it?" Steve asked, extremely annoyed.

You looked at the floor and then tried to explain what had happened, but the words caught in your throat.

“I'm sorry. It was a mistake; I had understood that we had to get rid of all the information and evidence; that's what you explained, so I assumed."

Steve sighed. He always said it was a bad idea to accept more agents and personnel into the team, and maybe he had been right; they had just had a catastrophic result.

“Forget it. We can't afford mistakes like this," Steve said, his voice firm but with a hint of hatred in it.

Steve decided to conduct a thorough review of the mission to analyze what had happened and what they would do next, although it seemed like everything was going against him.

Maybe you should go back to your old organization; maybe you were wrong to have joined, although you still had another option, somehow, without anyone noticing, to take revenge for the humiliation they were putting you through.

[spiribia]

there should be some kind of Im Sorry you can give to the op of a post that you reblog when someone else interacts with it from you with an annoying addition

[n3ssier]

Hi! I just read your other works and their super good :o

I know that you have written about these so sry if ur tired of them. But can I request a kapkan and echo x female reader where they have a crush on her? And they not really confess but like kind of a "youre really cool" in their own language and super quietly, but jokes on them, reader speaks their native toungue, and begins flirting with them and they just turn into a tomato. Tysm!!

SORRY I TOOK LIKE 3 WEEKS TO RESPOND NGL I FORGOT I HAD REQUESTS😭��🫶🫶 I HOPE YA LIKE IT, IM USING GOOGLE TRANSLATE SO THIS ISNT GONNA BE GREAT, also, requests are open again!! reblogs VERY appreciated, like i’ll give u a smooch fr fr

echo

much to your dismay, you and masaru's bond had been nothing more than a close friendship ever since the first mission you two had went on together, you spent time in the workshop, going out to small cafes near the base, and sharing your opinions which you felt were too blunt for the rest of rainbow together.

it was great and all, but you couldn't help but yearn to hold his hand when you two were headed anywhere, or to rest your head on his on the trip to your next missions. masaru being the lowkey inexpressive guy he is, he was giving you major mixed signals and you spent your nights stressing over what to do over this childish crush.

the clock read 22:17 and you were spending your night with masaru in the workshop, working on your gadgets together after a tiring mission.

his gun lay on the left side of the table while he attempted to fix a problem in his gadgets. you had finished everything you needed to do by now, and were just waiting on him to finish. you study his concentrated face as strands of his dark, nearly black hair fall forward and cover his forehead. boredom sinking in, you then tilt your head and take a look at your surroundings, shelves, saws, worn down work desks, and to your surprise, a little dumpling charm on your friends gun.

"awww, i never knew you had this on your gun" you chirped as your heart melts at the small addition to his equipment "it's so cute!!!" this causes masaru to turn his head over and see what on earth youre freaking out over, before turning back to his work and muttering something so hushed that you nearly miss it; “あなたも、あなたが知っている”😮. (you too, you know)

without really thinking, a response in the same language slips from your mouth; “なぜありがとう、私はあなたについて同じことが言えます” (why thank you, i could say the same about you) 🤭 masaru’s head snaps over to look at you, as you smile at him, not realising that he never thought you would understand. you admired him, feeling fuzzy as he stammered a “uhh n- no problem, never knew you spoke japanese.” awkward for him, but a dream come true for you!

kapkan

maxim isn't very talkative, he doesn't really see the point in chitchat, and he doesn't wanna make himself vulnerable in that way if ya get what i mean, and you know this, yet still put in the effort and managed to befriend him. it was difficult, of course, but it was worth it in the end when you got to uncover the sweet man he really is.

he could be cold, but you knew he never meant it, and you could always tell when he was secretly enjoying the supposedly 'annoying' rants you have would have with him on late nights after a mission in an attempt to converse with the russian man.

fast forwarding a wee bit, the cold and hard seat welcomed you inside of the helicopter. it was a fairly easy mission you had just been on and only 2 operators were needed so you and kapkan had went together. it was now time for the journey back to the base.

you knew maxim was tired, but you wanted to help him destress and loosen him up from the recent action he partook in.

"hey, can you believe the alexsandr (tachanka) called me a loser earlier!! i was outraged! i know he never meant it but still!" you began, slightly sarcastically, as you weren’t actually offended by the title

"what? why?" his tone was more inquisitive than usual, maybe because it was his fellow spetznaz member committing such atrocities, or because he wasn't his usual self that day for some odd reason. you appreciated the fact that he was definitely listen though. despite this, your response of “i dunno” didn’t answer his question well.

“Я не думаю, что ты неудачник, я думаю, ты довольно крут, ты знаешь” (i don’t think you’re a loser, i think you’re pretty cool, you know)

you feel your cheeks radiate a subtle warmth as you raise your eyebrows slightly in surprise at his sweet yet unexpected comment. “спасибо, максим, хотя если я крут, то какой ты?! ahа” (thanks maxim, but if i’m cool then what does that make you? aha) your response made his ears go red and his eyes widen, which you could see through the gap in his mask. maxims eyes being ever so slightly more exposed to the sunlight leaking into the helicopter. his eyes met yours and a simple smile was exchanged, one that would be the start of something

[softranswolves]

In the Teen Wolf fandom, it seems like peeps only love the big-names, the ones who regularly return to post content versus people who joined in the last few years.

As someone who has been here a while, what's your take on this? Should new people stop trying? Because that's what I'm feeling.

Hey friend!

I just wanna say, before I really get to my answer, I'm kind of touched that you see me having been around for a while!! I'm definitely not what I'd consider a big-name and I know my blog is mostly just my little corner full of stuff I curate with my own creations or reblogs of other people's but you see me 😊 I'm also for sure not tapped into the fandom itself like some folks I follow. I just doot my snoot in my little archive of teen wolf shenanigans and try to maintain friendships with anyone who wants to interact with me (via asks, messages, or tags, good golly I wanna hug anyone who interacts in tags lol and I for sure recognize when ppl come back).

I typed a way longer response that you may not have wanted, all to just say I would hate to see new people stop trying!! I adore that teen wolf is still pulling people despite it being off air and potentially not getting more movies (whether or not that's what most people want). I think fandoms need fresh air continually too. No two people will experience the show or content 100% the same way and have every single response be the same. Just with the two cakes mindset of creation, there are multiple cakes for how we all digest the show and they're all delicious. I carved out my own little corner here because I wanted organization for myself, and I create largely for myself. Any interaction I get, I fucking adore, I cannot impress that enough lol. I just never really expect it bc I know I do my own thing here with stuff like Multiamory May moodboards. Rarepairs and polyamory and trans headcanons just aren't everyone's cup of tea and I stopped trying to be recognized for what I "target" when I know my quality isn't 100% and I'm just vibing to my own weirdness instead of being super put together about it. I've definitely flickered in and out of the fandom when it comes to engagement too - like how last year (or year before? idk, time is confusing) I was running regular events but currently I just don't have the energy/passion in the same way.

If you really want to be seen more, esp if you make your own posts/content, utilize tags, even if you're hella lazy with it like me. I try to always use #twedit no matter what, in addition to #twfemslash and #twrarepair when applicable. Those go on the radar of people who fill the queues of some "big" blogs that do a bunch of reblogging just to have continual content out there. I also feel like I got a foot in via a couple of my discord servers, mainly Teen Wolf Legacy, and making a couple too (one for Scott shipping, one for teen wolf femslash; others i know of included pecific Derek-positive ones, a Stiles shipping one). That absolutely increased my reach, because I could share my stuff with people who specifically wanted to get pinged for, say Allison/Stiles content as an example. Idk that my following blew up or anything, I'm still a relatively small teen wolf blog. But it did make it easier to grow into my niche here. It also made me realize how big the fandom is. Some might only watch for or engage with a particular ship or character, while others like me do so for pretty much anyone.

This was still lengthy, I'm sorry. You caught me after work when my brain is like solely focused on decompression via fixation and tumblr is often a source for that. Please don't be discouraged from trying, and if you feel comfortable coming directly to me I could possibly point you in the direction of some other teen wolf blogs with similar interests! Big-names are hella daunting and it still blows my mind some of the ones I always sort of looked up to also just have some nerd behind them that I can talk to (even if I feel like im annoying them lmao). Feel free to talk with me more either on or off anon too, I'm pretty much always here to some extent. I love new people so fucking much, I'm just not engaged enough to always see you 💜💜💜💜

[realredbanana]

I know I reblogged this earlier, but I’ve since done some research and I’m actually surprisingly impressed with the Young Royals team for Simon’s fishtank. It’s definitely better than quite a few other fishtanks I’ve seen in media.

(warning, sorry for bad quality photos, I was just using my phone to take pictures of my ipad because netflix is annoying)

First of all, I believe Simon has (orange) mollies, which require at least a 10 gallon tank (+3 gallons for every additional fish past 4 fish). From what I can gather, Simon does appear to have a 10 gallon tank (this shouldn’t impress me, given that it’s the bare minimum, but so many fish get put in tiny bowls or tanks in media). So, for the first 2 seasons he did, in fact, have a correctly sized tank (in s3 I counted at least 8 fish, meaning the tank should’ve been 20 gallons at the absolute minimum (and even then that’s a few gallons short)).

The tank did, understandably, change a bit between seasons, and personally I think it peaked in s2.

In s1, it’s good, but the tank is like 70% plant making it look kinda cramped. It’d probably be great if either the tank was bigger or there were slightly less plants. On the plus side, the plants do provide the mollies with plenty of hiding spaces which, given that they’re naturally more timid fish, they will appreciate. The tank is also not overstocked, with 3 fish.

In s2, there’s enough plants and some kind of artificial hiding place (I can’t quite tell what it is) for them to hide in that they’ll definitely appreciate. Additionally, it seems less cramped than the tank from s1, so there’s more open space for them to swim, which is always nice. Once again, like in s1, the tank isn’t overstocked.

In s3, if they’d have kept the same amount of fish, it would’ve been great. There seem to be plenty of hiding places (plants, artificial, and (I believe) a piece of wood). Only issue is that there’s at least twice as many mollies in there as there should be, with at least 8 fish.

Additional photos (one from each season, in order):

AU where Wille has a crush on his friend Simon and he's not entirely sure what to do with those feelings but in his efforts to get to know Simon better and spend more time with him, he starts to bring over "gifts for the fish" - plants and stones and castles for Simon's fishtank. After weeks of this Simon teases him that he'll need a bigger tank before long. So of course Wille shows up with a new tank a few days later, and Simon laughs at him, demanding where exactly he thinks this giant thing will fit, and what is actually going on, and after Wille admits his feelings, they kiss sweetly. And then Simon gestures to the fish and says, "Wait til I tell the guys it wasn't actually them you've been coming to see all these weeks. They'll be devastated"

[soupforstars]

🌂 - singletsona?

📍- funny story that happened in source memories? (If u have any)

:] (from antis-hell, ty for the ask also!!)

ACK sorry we got to this late- but thenks for the ask guys :D ( @antis-hell )

🌂

Our singletsona is basically just me (🌒 Oliver) if i was a singlet, named Oliver and also less explicitly eldritch coded >w<

this is partially because i look closest to the body in headspace and because one half of me (💜 Abyss) has almost never been able to leave front so it just made sense tbh.

----

📍

Can't say much for the Abyss side of me since they're not an introject to our knowledge. For the Marvin (✨️) side of me, memories of source are very blurry but I do remember a time where i fucked up brewing some potions. It wasnt catastrophic thankfully, just really cartoony in how it frazzled my hair and blew smoke into my face. I find that was quite humerous!

- 🌒 Oliver

god... genuinely funny memories were few and far between. there was a lot of cruelty i found funny back then but less so now, knowing the kind of effects that would have.

i guess a nicer one was from just fucking with Chase, but not in a malicious way. just like an annoying ghost who would spook you to then have a laugh with you about how it looked. i cant remember which timeline that might have been from (my source had a lot of time loops and resetting and whatnot) but i do know it happened and i think it mightve genuinely paved the way for me realising to be ACTIALLY nice. so yeah

- 🔪 Anti

----

i think that might be all we have on those asks for now, though we will potentially reblog w additions if anyone else in the system have anything they wanna share!

thanks again guys, this was nice to do! ^w^ /gen

[bioswear]

i dont mean this angrily at all but i think it would be good to consider why u feel irritation first for people helping to ur art accessible. it takes a lot of energy to write these and it feels disrespectful to look at people who want to share ur art with those who couldnt see it otherwise and be upset that they dont always leave commentary. is it not an act of admiration and love in and of itself to enjoy ur art so much that people take the time to carefully describe it for people who cant see it? anyways i hope ur having a nice day (:>

You’re missing my entire point.

It takes a lot of energy to draw what I draw and how I draw and I think it’s disrespectful to the artist who put HOURS if not weeks or months into a piece to not at least put your own thoughts on the piece or in the tags, in ADDITION to an ID.

When someone just slaps an ID and then just tags it as “CR” or whatever, it seems empty and soulless, and it comes off to ME PERSONALLY, like “this bitch forgot an entire wall text ID so I’m adding and fixing it for her” - unless there’s something in the tags that reflect the id posters own thoughts then it does feel deeply impersonal and like a correction, not an addition to something I’ve spent hours on.

This is not annoyance about making my work more accessible this is literally and has always been a PERSONAL annoyance about how people who have done this have very rarely ever added their own thoughts. Maybe it’s a twitter mentality but it feels almost akin to a Quote Retweet that gets more notes than the original tweet. It’s not the same concept but it FEELS like it.

Only until people who can’t seem to read or discern my actual meaning came along was I having a nice day.

[tenderlyrenjun]

Married

re:preview no. 1 and no. 2

minors + bots do not interact; fic rec blogs without comments do not reblog

A/N: from a joke idea to a poor fic preview to a final fic ... here it is! and it took me a little less than 2 weeks to write this, so please take it with a grain of salt. also, ik that i said i hate childhood friends to lovers (for psych reasons), but jeno is just so friend shaped.

summary: you take jeno to be your lawful wedding date, in busan.

includes ... girl/afab reader, porn with feelings, mutual pining, strong!jeno, they’re both government officials with the city planning department, jaehyun (127) marries mingyu (svt) btw ... smut warnings ... sex dreams, lingerie, oral sex (f + m receiving), masturbation (f + m), fingering, spanking, 69ing/ish, big dick!jeno, choking/breath play, edging (kind of but not really), praise during sex but not like a kink, unprotected sex, and so, so much consent ♡

wc: 25,9k (again, i am so sorry)

again, minors + bots do not interact

“Hey … hey, wake up. The conductor hasn’t come by to punch our tickets yet, and you’re sitting on them.”

You gently pat Jeno’s face where the 5:30 sunrise glows, barely seeping down the half-shielded window; he immediately closed it, about five minutes ago, once the night ended, more irritated by the sun waking him up than moving beds from his apartment to train, but he still kept a small part cracked, as if wanting to relive the road trips home during Seollal, when you two, excided by leaving college at the earliest moment, would book the cheapest rides and get picked up before rush hour. Your long sleeves scratch along his freshly shaven jaw, like scrubbing pillowy softness into his cheeks, and he tries to ignore it – tries to ignore you, except you become extra annoying, squeezing his face harder until he has to slap your hands away to avoid sleeping on the empty hard seat beside him, the last one in this connected row, where his blazer, a less comfy pillow than your narrow shoulder, takes residence. Jeno slides his palm across yours, enveloping your wrists like handcuffs, fixing them on your thighs. You have to take a moment, tongue weighing heavy and dry. He never really lets you forget how strong he is, oblivious to it all.

Even last night, when you helped him last-minute stress pack (a.k.a. the real reason you stayed at the 00-Line apartment), you hopped on his overflowing luggage, complaining that one clap from him would snap it shut (or completely break it, but you felt optimistic!). Granted, your shoes sat on top of all his clothes, preventing it from zipping up without something weighing it down – which is why his blazer sits on the bench, not in his bag, or yours. You told him that he could put it in one of your bags, but you both knew there was no room, what with all your different wedding outfits. He deadpanned at you, hearing that revelation – the multiple wardrobe changes –, throwing his facial cleanser at your loose makeup bag (the one you ended up shoving in his backpack too).

But not everyone can just wear one suit like him! You have the pre-wedding outfit, before you change into your attendance dress at city hall while you help Jaehyun set up; then, there’s the dinner dress, which you plan on also using at the rehearsal dinner, and a dress for the real reception, and of course you need a backup in case something happens to one of those, in addition to the matching shoes, because shoes (and accessories) elevate the appearance, as you reasoned, which made him visibly nervous for some reason, as if you would leave him looking like an outsider with your family, the same family he has known since middle school. You reassured him that he will always match with you, and if not, Busan has a thousand stores to buy a tie … which would have the potential to also not fit in his bag, like the blazer, but you two – he – can make it work! He makes everything work, like a superpower.

Jeno end up wearing the blazer over his hoodie, to the station, giving him a needed second layer against the dark 16-degree weather. He looked more put together with it on, than he probably actually felt, especially considering that he only had 10 minutes to get ready before Mark drove you to the KTX station. Although, the façade breaks now that it’s just the two of you in the booth – no strangers, no coverups, no friends, no expectations; so when he picks his head up and his hoodie falls, navy fluffy hair sticking out at random angles, you stop staring at your hands below his and catch his bangs, tucking them back gently into place. You want to move him into your lap (it might be more comfortable), but not yet; the conductor still has to punch your tickets, and you don’t want to repeat Chuseok 2020 when the conductor scolded you for laying across the bench. Plus, you never really get the chance to do this with him, be this close to him, not that you don’t want to, or that it’s too hard.

You just … never get the chance.

“How are you this awake,” he groans, raising his analog watch into squinted view, nearly crying laughter as his eyes close again, cheek pressing into your shoulder, “at 5:37 AM?”

You roll your head dramatically, provoking more grumbles out of him that make you giggle as he jostles. “Some of us actually go to sleep earlier when we know that we have a schedule at dawn.” You graze your recently manicured nails into his scalp, mumbling through a smile, “You knew we were going to leave for Jaehyun’s wedding a few days in advance; you were there when I booked our tickets; he invited us to lunch because of you.” Jeno makes an objecting noise. “Ah, maybe I should’ve invited Haechan instead.”

“Hey.” Jeno smacks your thigh, his long fingers curling behind your knee to pull you closer. You gulp, praying that he cannot hear the knot in your throat. Apparently, his displays of strength are inversely related to his energy levels; the less energy he has, the more he uses his strength with you. But thankfully, he remains oblivious, poking your stomach with his furthest hand. He slinks up your shoulder, massaging down your tension to get selfishly comfortable, warm breath exhaling into your neck. “You fell asleep maybe 20 minutes before I did,” he objects, arguing the root of the problem, as if knowing that he will always be your first choice, “and that was, like, four hours ago.”

“Ha,” you laugh sarcastically, masking the new sweat on your palms under your sweater paws. You rub your hands together for a second, bouncing the heels together, before pushing him up, with all your strength, holding him there long enough – despite a series of complaints – to take the tickets from under his ass. “I wasn’t the one who said,  ‘No,’ to coffee when Jaemin offered.”

“He went to sleep when I woke up!”

“Eh,” you wave off and lay him on your shoulder again, “Excuses.”

“You’re so mean to me,” he whines, pouting, cuddling you so tightly that your revolve falters, “I’m doing you a favor, and you’re being mean to me.”

You comb his hair again, soothing all the wrinkles in his forehead, not denying it. He is partially correct. You do take advantage of his kindness – merely because he offers it so nicely, on a silver platter; it is a reason why you lo… why you … why you return it so easily, albeit quietly, like now. He will attend your cousin’s wedding this weekend; he lets you overpack his luggage; he opens his apartment to you with wide arms. And in return, you paid for the KTX tickets and hotel; you reserved a slot at a shooting range in Jeonju where your layover stops; you let him fall asleep on your shoulder right now, even though you are tired as hell, too.

Besides, your cousin, Jaehyun, probably would have invited Jeno to the reception anyways. He invited everyone, on a limited occupancy, from Eunwoo to Jihyo. And Jeno , who once wished Jaehyun to be his older brother, is pretty close with your family. There is no way he would not end up in the family photos.

“Ugh.” Jeno sits up, rubbing his eyes single handedly with the arm detached from you. “Why did we agree to lunch? We could be sleeping right now.”

You laugh at him, tugging him back down easily, and ghost your fingers in his hair. “Mingyu has to finish up some work project before they can go on their honeymoon, so Jaehyun suggested lunch to give his fiancée some uninterrupted time.”

“Boo, they’re just going to fuck,” Jeno yawns, starting to fall asleep again. “You stay over at my apartment all the time, it’s like you practically moved into my room, and there’s no way you get any work done.”

“Ha … ha .. a .. yeah …” Totally not distracted by him, or how much freer he is in his bedroom, always wearing basketball shorts without underwear as it seems, always manspreading enough for you to see. It is definitely not the same thing. You lift your head to look over the seats. “Where is that conductor? We need to get moving.”

Jeno slides you back down. “But really, you got this?”

“Ye-yeah.”

“Alright.” He nuzzles into your neck, almost kissing your skin when he tilts his chin up. Your entire body freezes for a second, anticipating, hoping, that he kisses you, any part of you. But he doesn’t. And you press your lips together, eyes closing too, just briefly, as not to fall asleep. “I’m going to take a quick nap. Wake me when we get there?”

“Yeah, okay.”

As he settles into sleep, Jeno’s head slowly nods forward, and you cup outside his cheek, catching him before he falls, lingering your nails behind his jaw for a moment, for this moment, until you spot the conductor. Amazing timing. You sigh. Jeno’s fingers twitch closed, briefly, like a reassuring hug that you misinterpret – willingly misinterpret – as something more, like this is okay, it is okay to have feelings during arbitrary moments. You inch apart from Jeno again, shifting on your hip, into the aisle, and pick up the tickets again, holding them so tightly that little veins fold onto the papers.

The conductor comes by, moving ever so slowly, like he wants to help you preserve this moment, with your best friend unconscious on your shoulder, and as though he could read your heart, he says, “You’re a cute couple."

"Ha ... thanks," you smile politely, biting your lip, grounding yourself with a look a Jeno. He spasms in his sleep, hand squeezing your thigh again. “Oh, right.” You hand the tickets over, reality resuming. You try to cease your shaking hands between your thighs, shoulders raised as awkwardly as the smile on your face, but Jeno’s hand, his strong hand, splits your legs, so you give up.

“We still have some chocolates left from White Day,” the conductor informs softly. The entire world seems to calm down, or stay asleep, for Jeno’s sake, and you don’t blame them, lowering your own tension too. “I can bring some for you and your boyfriend if you like.”

You swallow thickly, licking the corner of your mouth, considering it selfishly because why would anyone reject free candy?, but you shake your head. “No, I’ll – I’ll, ah … wait for my b-boyfriend to wake up first. H-he really likes chocolate.” Oh, my God; be cool, you scold yourself, but the nerves make you feel bad, like you are too close to Jeno or you make him uncomfortable with other people’s assumptions.

“Alright,” the conductor nods, smiling at the two you, practically repeating cute couple, “Let me know. I’ll save some for you.”

After he punches your tickets and hands them back – an archaic practice, and vain, since you checked in electronically around 5 AM – you grab Jeno’s hand.

And, in his sleep, he weaves your fingers together.

Attention, passengers: we are approaching Jeonju Station in five minutes. Please collect your items; we will be stopping shortly.

Jeno yawns awake, lulling his neck tall along the line on the backrest, kneading the kink in his spinal cord that keeps forming after he sleeps on your shoulder (he should really move onto your chest). Speaking of you, Jeno reaches at his sides, left and right, fingers dancing into the empty seats, not even finding his blazer. He peaks an eye open, wincing as the full morning light assaults his vision, then he actively looks for you, and finds you easily, already standing, pulling down your bags from the overhead hanger. A wheel jams on the railing, making you lean on your toes, shakily, to get it down, but you look unstable, so he immediately gets up, the second he sees your ankles wobble, and steadies you by your lower back, using one strong hand to bring down the luggage by its handle, his palm lingering too long.

The timing hasn’t been that great lately, these last few days – months, if he’s being honest. Like, yeah, you practically spend every waking moment together, a side effect of knowing each other since middle school and now working together on a project for urban revitalization in the lower Seoul district, but there are little things that still separate you from him. Not enough to make him feel as if you are drifting apart as best friends, as childhood friends; only enough for him to notice that he relies on you to be his personal comfort, his home away from home. And maybe, he thinks, this trip can recenter your relationship.

So, he starts by closing the distance.

Except, as strong as he might be, Jeno knows he is unaware of how much he uses at any given moment, and you tense in front of his hand, instinctively jolting up and hitting him square under the chin with the back of your head.

“Ow!”

“Sorry!” you scream, equally cringing and grabbing your hair, before finishing lamely, not knowing how to help, “sorry. You scared me.” You step into his personal bubble, practically into his chest, and grab his chin before he can cover up the temporary pain, holding him almost as long as he touched your back, except he didn’t have a valid excuse to you that long. He holds his breath, as if a doctor started the inhale-exhale stethoscope check, but you stop talking.

“You could’ve woken me up,” he tells you, moving your hand with his jaw, staring at your lips, willing you to talk or break the beat. “I know the bags are heavy,” he says, which translates to I would’ve helped you.

“Yeah, but you looked so cu … so peaceful. I didn’t want to wake you until I absolutely had to.”

Jeno nods, fair; he’s done the same in the past when you were in college, especially after exam season, after you pull multiple all-nighters in a row but still make plans with your friends. Like, there was this one time, you stayed over at his apartment, a different one than he lives in now, one closer to Uni, for Haechan’s birthday party later, and you fell asleep on his bed while he played League with Jaemin and Jisung. He ended up waking you up about ten minutes after the party started, to give you a bit more than an hour of sleep. Needless to say, neither of you were the first to wish Haechan happy birthday, for which he only accepted monetary penance, but Jeno thought it was worth it, no amount of money enough, to see your smile refreshed and echoed in your posture.

“Hey, is that my blazer?”

You glance at the lapels, slightly raising your arm as well, as if you forgot that you were wearing it. “Yeah, sorry, I – I got cold.” You slowly take it off, shaking the sleeves off your shoulders. “Do you – Do you want– ?” Do you want it back?

“No,” Jeno interrupts, fixing his jacket by the lapels over your shoulders again. “It’s alright. Wouldn’t want you to get hypothermia”

Once it situates correctly on your body, Jeno trails his hand up your arm, rubbing your bicep, sensing that the cold probably got to you, given that the loud air conditioner in the back contradicts the clear sunny sky. Then, the train stops, violently, and you both reach your arms out to steady one another, ultimately falling against the chairs, his waist pressed tightly against yours. You inhale sharply, first, and he copies you, hands brace above and below each other’s elbows. Neither of you really stand this close to each other, having too much respect for your friendship. He can name less than a handful of moments: 7 Minutes in Heaven at the beginning of 9th grade; an awkward dance at your first high school dance in 10th grade; truth or dare during sophomore year of college; accidentally pressing against you in the copy room at work after the shelves in the supply closet broke and the handyman shoved a thousand boxes next to the printer. Jeno doesn’t know what is different now; this, too, is probably another rare occurrence. He has loved you forever, never making a move, but …

“Th-thanks,” you whisper, quickly pulling away your hands.

There it is.

“No, um, no problem.”

Wordlessly, you go through the unloading motions: you stacking his backpack on the roller luggage, him taking the duffel bag that you claimed was heavy. Jeno closes the distance again, putting his hand behind the small of your back, walking you preemptively down the aisle. You slump against his palm, resting your cheek occasionally on his bicep as more people file out in the front, and he lets you, slinging an arm around your shoulders, because the fatigue is probably hitting you now that you have to force your body to move.

Once you get to the front of the train, an exit almost like a plane since you sat in the middle of the cart (not the most coveted place, since you can’t recline or get out quickly, but the easiest to snake), the conductor greets him:

“Hey, you’re awake!”

Jeno points at himself, lines forming between his eyebrows.

“Yeah,” the conductor confirms, handing over a small bag of chocolate hearts. “I saved these for you.”

“Thanks?” He tilts his head to the side as he unwinds himself from you, accidentally bumping his elbow on your head, and accepts the candies with two hands – a clear bag of shiny pink and yellow Hershey’s mini-chocolate bars. “Why us– ?”

“Okay, thanks, have a good day!” you shout, pushing him into the station, barely stopping to bow before exiting the train.

Jeno manages to catch the conductor’s last words, something about good-bye and being cute. “Do you know what that’s about?”

“Nope,” you lie badly, and he gives you a skeptical look, which you ignore. “But fr-free chocolate.”

So he lets you ignore it, eating one. It tastes good, but he swears he hears you exhale in relief.

The layover in Jeonju lasts two hours, until a little after 10:30 AM, but it feels like two minutes.

You spent the entire time latched onto Jeno, supporting your caffeinated body through all the laughter and smiles – yours and his, as you surprised him with activity after activity, a thank you for coming, for willingly enduring gossipy aunties practically cross-examining him on the reception floor and drunk uncles at the karaoke machine who would otherwise be tone-deaf without the drinks in their hands. After the first activity – a short 30-minute session at a shooting range – Jeno picked you up with his knees, spinning you around outside the building, repeatedly crushing your torso between his beefy arms. And when he thought that was it, you Uber’ed to the Jeonjuchun River and rented a couple bikes next to one of the pretty pavilions (big mistake; you had to go back to the start and wait for him there because you couldn’t keep up without your ass catching on fire!). His dumb, wide smile made you want to keep going, plus you had a last planned surprise to grab coffee and pastries at the Mural Village, having called ahead two days prior to reserve a couple of their signature glazed donuts, his favorite.

So, it makes sense that when you get on the last train to Busan, exhaustion hits your entire body full force.

As Jeno packs the bags on the overhead hanger, you sit sideways on the chair, watching him, noting how his hoodie slightly rises, right under his belly button, confined neatly by the prominent outlines in his abs. To really sell whole ‘not-checking-out-your-best-friend’ bit, lean into the spine of the booth, lazily leaning your head against the leather cushion, half-closing your eyes, lazily leaning on your own shoulder, arms folded comfortably across your stomach. You don’t know where the lie and truth meet, but you still wear his blazer, and the earthy cologne keeps you awake, as a (poor) substitute for his proximity, until he kneels down next to you.

“Tired?”

You can hear the smile in his cheery voice.

“Mmhm.”

If he were Jaemin, you might’ve cancelled every surprise (or just not planned them) and accepted his offer to take a nap in the station while the next train arrives. If he were Renjun, you might’ve left later in the day, or the previous day, or maybe not even planned lunch with your cousin, since the two don’t really know each other that well. If he were Haechan, you might’ve gotten teased after the second you stared wobbling on your toes, needing his support to get you on the train, or he would have driven all the way to Busan in that newly painted car, taking turns at rest stops. But no, this is Lee Jeno, your best friend since middle school. You used to joke that you had a platonic crush on him, that you manifested being his best friend from the moment you saw him; you just didn’t know that it meant this.

“Short on words?” he jokes. Earlier, you were more talkative than him, a side effect of being as awake as he is now, before you ate a peanut butter jaffle, nearly falling asleep as you finished breakfast, like a child after Seollal dinner with the grandparents. “You had so much to say when you were willing to let me, your best friend, starve.”

You roll your eyes, leaving them closed when he takes his seat, offering his arm as a plushie for you to cuddle; you also shift your hips, invading his personal space to lean even deeper on him. “As if you would starve. How many donuts did you eat? Six? A dozen? How many sandwiches?”

“Are you calling me fat?”

You slide your arm across his abdomen, letting your hand dangle on the other side. “I’m saying you’re just giving me more surface area to hug.”

Jeno rolls his eyes, his entire head, mocking your actions from the first train ride, “Excuses.” You slap his chest, accidentally groping his pec (you were aiming for his arm), and leave your hand there, slowly dragging your wrist down his abs (again, not intentional – and hopefully he feels that way too) to hug his waist. He brushes your hair behind your head, equally running his thumbpad along the curve of your ear. “I got this one; take a nap.”

“You got the tickets?”

“Eung.” He pulls them out of his front pocket. “Freshly printed from the KTX terminal –“ He grabs your fingers, gently rubbing them between his like helping you wash your hands. “- ink smudged under your nails.” You groan when he drops your hand.

“Bags put away?”

“Yeah, all four of ‘em.”

“Make sure the pastries–”

“Shhh.” Jeno curls his hand over your mouth. And you are tempted to lick his palm, except your mouth is too dry, so you resign to breathing through your nose above his long fingers. “Sleep; I got this.”

“You know, these seats recline …”

“Shh,” he repeats, laying you back down on his shoulder.

Unfortunately, you wake up the next hour after a train attendant bumps your booth with her snack cart. Ironic, since you had a weird dream involving Haechan as a Domino’s delivery boy (even though he hates American fast food!), dropping off a pizza with all the pepperoni replaced by Jeno’s eye smile, and you paid using a ₩100,000 bill with Renjun’s college CSA (Chinese Student Association) presidential portrait in the middle. Eh, you’ve had weirder. Like that dream – after Jeno started working out more … diligently, in college – where you basically pounced his bones at the end of multivariate calculus in the middle of the lecture hall. That, and the one with a young Bill Nye.

You inhale deeply and push your palms on either side of your legs, inadvertently groping Jeno’s thigh in the process, making him jolt too, when you get yourself upright, leaning a little more on him than the chair.

“Everything good?”

“Hmm?” you yawn, stretching your limbs under his arm, which somehow blanketed you during the ride. You spare it a glance before looking up at him again and answering his question, “No, yeah, all good, just –” Another yawn escapes you. “– tired’s’all.”

Jeno squeezes your torso into his chest. “You can go back to sleep. We have a little more than an hour until Busan.”

You nod into his hoodie, almost accepting it.

Then an egg sandwich with your name scribble on it appears in front of your nose. And you reluctantly wake up, shaking Jeno off your shoulders as the train attendant hands you a small paper food-box, the lunch that you reserved with an extra ₩10,000, in case the jaffle place was closed on Thursday mornings. With the professional photos and multilingual descriptions, you practically could not say no to the gilgeori toast.

Except, you can and you do. One bite into the brioche, after the attendant leaves, you barf the mashed pellet onto a napkin, quickly washing away the taste with some water.

“Don’t like it?” Jeno teases, giggling loudly. Then he takes a bite of his caprese katsu sando and immediately regurgitates it into an empty paper cup on the table. “Oh, ew.”

The two of you exchange raised eyebrows and nod at each other, verbally confirming, “Switch.”

As you finish your second sando, of three, occasionally nibbling Jeno’s food, just to make sure that you really don’t like it, the train unexpectedly shuffles forward, making a fast stop as if it almost missed the station – not the Busan Station, which you aren’t sure whether to be happy about. On one hand, it would mean that the conductor almost missed your stop in Busan (literally impossible, since it is a major station), if you were in Busan; on the other hand, reality, it just jerks the entire cart, your bags and everything loudly jangling above. You hear the rumpled plastic tote bag, full of pastries from a local shop near the Mural Village, squish between the luggage bags, and you immediately get up to save them.

Jeno’s hands stabilize you as equally quick, when you crossover his legs to enter the aisle. His strong fingers dip into your skin that exposes after you grab the pastries, your hoodie lifting right below your belly button. You exhale shakily and look down at him. He concentrates on reading the stats on the game he lost when you got up. You come back on your heels. Then the train jolts again, stopping for real. And Jeno grabs you harder, probably more surprised than you, given the way his wide eyes ask if you’re okay. You nod, then dig through his backpack, pulling out a Tupperware in addition to the pastry bag, and take your seat again – all while aided by Jeno’s massive hand.

He takes the bag from you, holding it in front of him on the table, as you open the Tupperware, to check if everything was all good – no broken cookies.

“Oh, thank Go– Hey!”

Jeno takes one of the cookies with bigger chocolate chips, although the edges are distorted, curved out of shape. “Yum, I love your mom’s recipe.”

You frown, whining, “I made those for Jaehyun and Minghyu.” You pinch his arm, closing the box and taking the bag before he eats everything there, too. “Plus, you ate an entire bakery in Jeonju. How are you so hungry?”

“Nothing compares to a mother’s recipe.” Jeno bites into the cookie again. You cross your arms under your chest, trying to emulate your best mom-caught-him-with-his-hand-in-a-cookie-jar state. He doesn’t crumble, but he coaxes the last bite into your mouth, smiling after you comply.

You roll your eyes, sighing, “God, these are good.”

Jeno rolls his eyes too, munching on his last sando again. “I love that you’re so humble about your baking skills,” he laughs

But all you catch are the I love you and his crinkly eye smile.

Attention, passengers: we have arrived at the Busan station. Please gather your belongings and departure the train at your nearest exit.

The actual stop is even worse, if that’s possible, than the other 500 it took to get here. And Jeno finds that he doesn’t like this train very much – the stop is too abrupt, and there was no warning like the previous ride. He might even file give a comment or two on the feedback card, assuming there is a box somewhere for it. Once, he gave a thumbs-down on a YouTube video for not effectively helping him tie his boxer hand wrappings. Or, maybe, the driver sucks.

He just hates that you wobble so much every time you stand up in the cart, even though the ride is over now. Not that he hates helping you. He doesn’t mind, almost enjoys it, if he were being honest – holding your waist between his long fingers, under the guise of steadying you or warming you up, given that he never really gets to be this close to you. And he takes advantage of the moment, of your exhaustion, inhaling the remnants of your shampoo as you nestle into his chest, face first.

You mumble something incoherent against his shirt, then groan when he laughs.

Jeno pushes you back up, for less than a second because you fight him, trapping his waist in your arms. He laughs a little bit louder, and his shoulders rise to his ears, allowing him to hug you around your neck, practically suffocating you between his beefy biceps. “I didn’t quite catch that.”

“I said –” You lift your chin, pouting at him through your eyelashes. “– the Uber will be here in five.”

“Oh, then should, um, should we …?” He gestures to the exit.

“Yeah,” you doze, shaking yourself off him, shoving your hands in his blazer pockets. Jeno frowns. He hopes you can get more sleep tonight, especially since the hotel is, like, 20 minutes away from the train station. “Let’s go wait over there.”

Jeno throws his arm over your shoulder, guiding the two of you through the automatic double doors, his hand hanging in the air above your chest. Outside, you slant onto him more, wrapping your arms around his waist again, turning your cheek on his pec, eyes half-closed too. He can smell his own cologne on your skin. But, scared that you might hear his heart skip a beat, Jeno rotates you into his neck, resting his face on your hair. He only gets half-a-second though, until your phone beep beeps, altering the Uber’s presence two meters away, which is even closer than he thought. Seems like everyone wants time with you, at his expense. But as the car pulls up, honking, confirming your ride, you yawn one more time and fix his hoodie, with your arms circling behind his head, before packing the luggage in the trunk. It takes Jeno another moment for his body to move. He waits until you have to pat the car seat to grab his attention – because no matter what, he’ll always leave an eye out for you, an ear open for you, an arm free for you. And he follows.

Everything goes fuzzy during the 15-minute drive (the driver took the freeway, rather than the streets), without an object to distract him. He basically ordered you to sleep, as if the car vibrations weren’t a strong enough lullaby, shushing you into the crook of his neck, like he leaves that place specifically for you.

“– cute couple.”

Jeno snaps his neck up. The driver’s – an older man – eyes reflect a smile through the rearview mirror, and he repeats it:

“You two,” he clarifies, “You look like a cute couple.”

The sentiment echoes later, again stealing the air from Jeno’s lungs, once you arrive to the hotel, accurately predicted by the app on your phone, not that he was counting down the meters until you arrived …

Jeno barely lets you thank the driver, shoving you through another automatic double doors set with renewed vigor. You give him a weird look that he cannot quite narrow down, so he ignores it, pointing to the front desk, unaware of how much time has passed, not wanting to block the entrance. You turn slower than him, and he thinks his cover has blown, that you will know that the Uber driver said something weird, something he has pondered since, basically, middle school. But instead of asking question, you answer the concierge’s questions: Name and ID? Credit card? Reservation for … two? Jeno taps his toes into the ceramic tile, tempted to pull out his phone, but he doesn’t, in case you need him.

Then, she makes the point that snaps his neck up again: “You two make a cute couple – oh,” she frowns, typing into the computer. “A room with two beds?”

“Yes,” you confirm, sounding like gritting through your teeth. Jeno cranes his neck forward to confirm, but as he does, the concierge grants you the room tickets and you move on, pulling him by the hand – interlaced fingers – toward the elevator, avoiding the topic.

Silently, again, Jeno follows you through Floor F to Room 23, only stopping when you roll his luggage in front of the TV and dresser. He copies you, unsure what to do or say without knowing exactly when Jaehyun, or Mingyu, will stop by for lunch; although he expects it to be soon. You put your hands on your waist, staring at the floor. He almost asks you what you’re thinking about, but you cross your arms under your chest, sheathing your hands under his blazer.

“S-sorry about that,” you whisper, so quietly that he has to step closer. “Be-because she thought that we, um, th-at we are –” You wince. Jeno reaches out, squeezing your shoulder, thumb rubbing harder to reassure you further. “– were a couple.”

“It’s o– ”

“The same thing happened with that train conductor.”

“What?”

Maybe he sounds too surprised, because you look mildly offended, mouth agape. And he pauses, for what feels like eternity, until you laugh. Then, he laughs. You sway forward a little bit, both hands landing on his chest. He catches you, steadies you, again, laughter fading into a smile.

“Sorry, about that,” Jeno apologizes honestly, by the tone of his voice: soft and comforting. He rubs the back of his neck, feeling like he owes you some sort of explanation. “I guess I was too close to you.”

But you disagree.

“No, it’s fine!” you reassure him right away, as if all his worries are ridiculous – which they might as well be, since you are his best friend (don’t tell Jaemin; although, Jaemin tends to be more affectionate than you in social settings, and they have been mistaken for a couple on quite a few occasions, even with you present). Then, you glance at your hands, darting between your fingers on his shoulders and his eyes. “I w-was probably too close to you to-too.”

And with that, you retract your hands.

But he catches them, puts them back.

“It’s okay,” Jeno promises, his palms stroking small circles into your waist. “The Uber driver also thought we were a couple.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

A beat passes.

And in that beat, Jeno realizes that neither of you are like this with your friends – you don’t hang off his arm; he doesn’t spend an entire night staring at you from the corner of his eye – and neither of you were like this as kids – you weren’t each other’s first kiss; never have you been called out for cuddling, justifying it as “we’ve been doing this since we were young!”. But this could be the residual pent-up energy from forcing his body not to immediately find you in every setting. Like, his judgement can lax while the real world pauses outside the Busan border. You know, he has let you borrow his clothes from middle school through college, to now; he has held your hand across the sidewalk, making sure that you stay on the side furthest from the cars on the street; he has hugged and kissed (your forehead) and cuddled you in the past. And each time, he shoved any inkling of feelings back down.

“I –” Jeno starts, but you are too close to his face and words fail him. He needlessly brushes hair away from your face, as if the action would bring him clarity. It doesn’t; it gives him more questions than answers, especially in the way that you slowly crawl toward his face, eyes trained on his lips. Jeno returns it, mouth parted on the last syllable he said, shoulders falling down, down, down. He slides your hips over his, stuttering his hand onto your cheek, letting you rest in his palm, your head turned, ready if he closes the distance.

You lean forward on your toes, standing tallest on his shoulders. He mimics you, getting smaller, as a way of asking for your consent, and this time, you copy him – copy what he usually does – flickering your gaze to him until enough time has passed. You get closer … closer … closer …

Ping!

“S-s-sorry,” you mumble, pulling out your phone from your back pocket but not pulling away from him. Jeno bites the inside of his mouth, unsure whether to move, since you don’t. One breath escapes his lips, mutually breaking the moment. “It’s – It’s Jaehyun – Oh,” you exclaim, as if realizing the proximity for the first time. You step back, escaping his grasp, pointing toward the bathroom at the front of the room. “I-I sh-should get ready. He – He – Jaehyun, my-my cousin, um,” you stutter, shaking your head at the ground, “I don-I don’t know why I’m telling you that; you know him.” You grab your duffel bag, but it pounds the floor. Jeno thinks you weren’t aware of how heavy it is, and he raises his eyebrows. “Anyways, -” You smile at him, hands pressing into your hips. “- he – Jaehyun – will be here in 30 minutes. I-I’m gonna go change an-and get ready in the bathroom. Yeah, uh, bye.”

You slam the door.

Another five minutes later, after he collapses on a bed, it hits him: Jeno almost kissed you.

Lunch goes off without a hitch. Mingyu picked an Italian place called La Bella Citta, which was originally meant to cater their wedding, until Jaehyun decided that he wanted traditional food at the reception. It is a pretty expensive place, hence why they paid (partially because you and Jeno are the siblings he never got). And the lunch followed a simple formula: Jeno makes a (bad) joke; Jaehyun brings up an unrelated anecdote, chuckling prematurely at just the thought; Mingyu laughs too hard, accidentally spilling champagne; and you get a bunch of memories, smiling fondly as Jaehyun cleans Mingyu’s shirt with a Tide pen.

Well, there was this one thing.

Your risotto didn’t taste very good – the rice was overcooked; butter had been added over oil; the dish lacked its creamy texture, more soupy in consistency. Thankfully, Jeno exchanged half his steak with you (not the tenderloin part, of course). No one would have noticed; had you not been so obviously gawking at him for the gesture, because it sparked Mingyu’s clumsy ass to comment something about doing the same for Jaehyun in the past. And then Jeno turned it into a competition for which of them has exchanged more meals with the Jung family (although you don’t share the same last name; you are part of the family by extension).

While they battled it out, with Jeno winning since he did take your egg sandwich on the train earlier, Jaehyun poked you in the arm. “So you brought him?”

You narrowed your eyes. “Is that a problem?”

“No, no,” he shook his head, “I just thought you might bring Jaemin or Renjun – I never see Renjun, and he buys really good gifts.”

You snorted. Yeah, right. Renjun bought a choco pie for Jaemin’s birthday, like, at midnight, from a convenience store; he bought Jeno PJs, even though Jeno doesn’t wear pyjamas (you can attest); and he bought you a thrifted candle holder which broke after you put an electric candle in it. If Jaehyun wanted a good wedding gift, he should have told you to bring Jaemin. Still, you would’ve brought Jeno; like, no matter what, you would have asked Jeno first, and he would always say yes. Even during that awkward orientation week in college when his physics professor caught him shotgunning two beers at the same time right before class (it happened twice); you begged him to go to office hours with you, needing constant reassurance that you did not, in fact, sound like an idiot.

“And I thought you liked Jeno,” you frowned.

“No, I do; probably not as much as you, but of course I do. If you didn’t tell me before the wedding invites went out, I would’ve sent one to him myself.”

After that, everything everywhere happened all at once; you didn’t have time to contradict him, or self-reflect – Mingyu spilled more champagne; Jeno leaned his arm behind your chair, using his other hand to pull you closer, to help you avoid touching the entering wedding party; Jaehyun tilted his big ass forehead at you knowingly. You were almost relieved to head back to the hotel, instantly collapsing on your bed without changing out of your Sunday finest clothes instead of responding to Jaehyun’s cryptic observation.

“I’m dead; I’m dead,” you complain, throwing your arm over your eyes to block out the golden hour seeping into your room. Dramatically, you fall backwards onto your bed, relaxing your entire body into the comforter. You peak under your arm to find Jeno when he doesn’t respond, and he smiles back at you, hanging up his blazer before taking a running start.

“Oof!” Jeno flops like a fish beside you, covering his eyes too. “All of us are dead,” he jokes, referencing the drama he started last week. You started it first, binging it a couple days after it aired, but when he told you about it, you didn’t have the heart to tell him that you’d already seen it and watched half the season with him. It became part of your daily lunch routine, not that you know how long it will last. Your urban revitalization project is temporary, a bit long term temporary, spanning until maybe October, but still temporary.

You shift onto your side, hands folded in prayer under your head as a pillow, scanning his peaceful face. “Hey,” you whisper tentatively. You wait another few seconds (maybe even a minute) before opening your mouth, hand reaching out to touch him. “Jen, I –”

“Yeah?” his voice rasps.

“I j-just wanted to thank you for coming with me today,” you change your mind, recoiling before he opens his eyes, which he does, peering at you with the same wide curiosity as the day you met him, “And switching meals with me all day. I – I –” You inhale. “– I really appreciate it, really … appreciate you.” You whisper the last bit, hoping that he doesn’t catch it.

But he does.

“Of course,” he tells you, like he could never say no. And suddenly, you cannot recall an instance when he has ever denied you the thing – he shares his food with you; he helped you spontaneously paint your apartment at 3 AM; he gives you his clothes at the crack of dawn. “You’re my best friend.” Now you can remember the moments – he wouldn’t do the laser tag tournament with you (and Jaemin); he turned down your invite to The Griffin Bar; and worst of all, he outright refused to go to Renjun’s Single’s Appreciate Day party with you. “I’d do anything you ask.”

You roll onto your back, facing the ceiling, and close your eyes.

“Jen-Jen-Jen-Jen-Jeno, Oh!” your rapid legato whimpers wake Jeno up.

First, his body reacts, an involuntary twitch from his feet to head. Next, everything above his torso moves, his arm covering his eyes. He turns into his elbow, away from the window that isn’t as bright as he thought it would be. He, then, remembers that he, somehow, fell asleep on your bed, or you two fell asleep on the same bed; neither of you really got the chance to figure out the sleeping arrangements, since yesterday had so many activities. Not that it mattered, or was a bad thing; you did spend the previous night in his apartment, in his bed. Granted, you slept feet to head, him on top of the duvet with another blanket.

Jeno drops his arm down his cheek, cautiously opening an eye to the other half of the bed.

His hand and jaw fall.

You moan his name again, mouth gaping at the ceiling, eyes twisted shut while your back arches off the mattress. At some point in the night, you must’ve changed, or you wore that lingerie set under your dress the entire time at lunch. Jeno cannot help it; his eyes find your tits spilling out of your teeny-tiny mesh cups that don’t look like they would cover up very much skin anyways. He tries to move to your face, but his willpower fails, and he looks for the source of your moans: your hand between your legs. Unfortunately, you still wear the matching, lacy panties, and your palm hides just how wet you are, the other fisted into the sheets by his thigh.

Jeno bites his lip. Why would you wake him up like this? Do that next to him? … Unless …?

Experimentally, Jeno leans onto you, pressing his still-clothed chest over you bare arm, the one attached to the blanket, clawing it roughly. He kisses your shoulder, ghosting his index finger down your naked stomach. Your moans get louder, more encouraging, so he doesn’t stop. God, Jeno wonders how you have this pornographic glow at golden hour, before the day even starts, that he cannot get enough of. You arch further off the bed, into his touch, making his fingers pad deeper into your skin, increasing their pressure until he gets to your pussy. He cups around your hand, guiding the way you grind into your own hand. But desperate for more movement, maybe more of him, you scissor yourself. And he can feel it, feel your knuckles flex, forcing your thighs separate for the deepest stroke.

“Fuck, you’re so wet.”

“To-touch me, please, Jeno, touch me.”

Jeno inserts his fingers with yours, simultaneously rutting his fully erect penis on your leg, which makes him realize that he is too clothed, but he doesn’t want to pull away from you. Instead, he straddles one of your legs, grabbing the opposite side of your neck. Blindly, using his tongue to find your most prominent vein, he sucks at your throat. He kisses you, kisses your neck, sloppily, repeatedly, until you whine even louder. Jeno has to break away, moaning into the air, his chest sweating through the white whore shirt. The two of you might get a noise complaint; is it bad that the potential turns him on? He barely gets to return to your neck, barely gets to make that wet mark even more tender, when you reverse the positions.

You push him back down, temporarily, just long enough to flip your hair over your shoulder and climb his waist. And apparently, he makes a strangled sound, because you release his shirt, smoothening out the wrinkles, mumbling something about buying him a new one later, but the entire action makes more of your hair fall down, so Jeno sits up quickly. You slide down his lap, only stopped by his long, thick cock standing under his pants. His dick outlines your ass curve, pushing your cheeks further apart. With the new position – the better position – he shoves your hair back, fisting it into a ponytail the same way you fisted the sheets, exposing your neck again. He starts a new hickey, too impatient to find the last one (it is on the other side), sucking his way down. Your bra straps fall down your biceps at this point. The plastic little adjuster springing free with your tits as Jeno bounces you in front of his cock, too much acceleration rolling your body on top of his chest that he has to force his body to slow down before he cums prematurely. He wants to cum inside you.

The decision to end the foreplay, the juvenile grinding, occurs when you rip his shirt open, mumbling something about buying him another later. Your nipples rub on his pecs, almost purposefully missing his, circling around the areola. He grunts throatily, catching your ass and pulling your cheeks apart, slapping them twice, fast, as a punishment for your sopping pussy teasing him, ghosting his cock.

“I want you,” he breathes, “I want you so bad.”

“Then, fuck me.”

Jeno hooks a finger around your panties, moving his knuckle slowly over your clit until your legs shake as much as his do. He gives you a quick look, a quick kiss, before lifting you on your knees, positioning his cock between your legs. You brace your hands on his shoulders, lowering yourself with his hand on your hip. He gets halfway in your pussy, the both of you throwing your heads back, moaning to the ceiling. After a brief recovery, he trusts in all the way.

Jeno stutters his hips down, preparing the next thrust, his eyes shut tighter than your pussy walls around his dick.

Then, he wakes up. For real.

He jumps, in a cold sweat, the birds chirping outside. And maybe, Jeno should be concerned now. Initially, he just looked for you, as the first thought crossing his mind while he opened his eyes – eg, when you slept over at his apartment, feet to head, him too scared to sleep next to you in case he accidentally confesses murder, or close to, during his sleep; when he slept on your shoulder in the train; this current moment.

Yeah, technically, he is in your bed – hotel bed, but still. Jeno fumbles around the mattress, untangling himself from the blanket that you probably put on him last night. When he stands up, in the small aisle between the beds, unbuttoned pants slipping off his waist, the hem covering half his feet, he recognizes that these are yesterday’s clothes, from the lunch with Jaehyun and Mingyu. He stumbles toward the night, every part of his body warm, his cock burned by the teasing memory of almost pounding you in the very bed he just woke up in. Of course it was a dream; it was too good to be real. Jeno grumbles, palming the small table for his glasses. As he puts them on, he finds the hotel stationery branded with your messy handwriting:

Left for coffee xx be back in 30 ♡

Jeno nods his head. Half an hour. The other half of the bed was vaguely warm, he remembers. He looks to the other bed – still made, pressed enough to bounce a ₩500 coin off. Evidently, you fell asleep next to him, too, and even though he cannot recall who fell first, he can recall who woke up first and how he woke up. His cock writhes, twitches under the waistband of his Calvin Kleins, no longer swinging between his legs; it wants to know how deep your vaginal canal is, and Jeno steadies it, groaning because he spent half the day steadying your pretty waist. The thought makes him involuntarily squeeze tighter, makes him realize that his underwear constricts the blood flow that rushes to his cock head, stopping at the base like a spiteful cock ring. So, he frees his entire length, shimmying his bottoms below his ass, and hops onto the empty bed, with what he assumes is enough time to finish what his dream started.

Focusing on the upper half, Jeno dry rubs his tip, roughly massaging his finger around the head, expediting his orgasm like a college freshman testing out the sock-on-the-door myth with a solo session. His fingers curl tightly around the circumference, slowing down his thrusting. Pre-cum quickly dribbles above his navel, leaking into little pools in the crevices of his defined abs. He slathers it along his entire cock, twisting his palm up and down, moans loudly bouncing off the walls. The wetness creates the foundation for his fantasy, conjuring the image of an equally moist mouth choking down his fully length, your mouth choking down his full length. Jeno knocks his head on the wall, whole body panting into the air. His hips float, too, and he chases his hand, a poor replacement for pussy or a sex toy; ass coming off the blanket as sweat builds up on his body. He unbuttons half his shirt, sliding his fingers to his nipple. That familiar tension in his stomach creeps into his chest, and his moans get more desperate, louder.

Then, as if his dream were a premonition, you come out of the bathroom, wearing a low-cut sports bra and matching tight, black leggings.

“Ah!!” you both scream.

A beat passes, maybe an hour, Jeno cannot discern between his exhibition rising and your gaping mouth.

You react first, running into the bathroom.

“I thought you were out getting coffee?!” he shouts, covering his dick with the blankets. It twitches underneath.

“Why would you think that?!” you scream back, before calming down and cracking the door open a little bit, “I got back five minutes ago. I was putting stuff in the bathroom for my shower.” God, his dick really twitches. He might even cum untouched. You sound like the beginning of a bad porno, and maybe his fantasy was an actual bad porno, but the thought of you, with so much exposed skin, willing to expose more skin under hot water. “Why are you –”

“I thought I had time!” he interrupts. He stands up and pulls his pants on, silently screaming at his boner to go away. It doesn’t. And he resigns, praying that you won’t see it. “I thought I would hear you bring me a coffee too and have time t-to-to cover it up.” You usually buy him a coffee too; you did it all four years through college – barged through his heavy apartment door, or announced it, pressing the iced coffee on any bare skin available.

“It’s in the fridge! I didn’t want to wake you after yesterday.” You slowly come out of the bathroom, and he turns around, wincing when his still-hard penis bounces against his hip. “It’s an iced coffee,” you tell him, biting your lip and avoiding eye contact. You cross the room toward the mini fridge. Jeno sucks in a breath. The coffee is inside. Of course it is.

When Jeno coughs, you immediately turn around then look away as equally fast, having accidentally made eye contact with his penis (and him with your tits, again, just like in his dream). “Do you, um, do you still want to take a shower first, o-or can I, um, get in there?” He scrunches his nose at the poor choice of words.

“N-n-y-you can go first,” you stutter through a mirrored cough.

His shower lasts the half hour he thought he had.

Overcoming awkwardness has, surprisingly, never come up in your relationship with Jeno, not even through the ungainly middle school phase, during when you confidently kept your fleeting crush on him a secret. Well, you hoped it was a fleeting crush. Those feelings bubbled up on and off for years, and currently, they were on. Last time they turned off (aka when you suppressed them), Jeno had a girlfriend, a long-term girlfriend, for two years. You thought you were in the clear, thought you were over it, permanently, especially after they got stupidly expensive promise rings, but habits are hard to break. And you crawled right back to him.

You step out of the bathroom, towel shaking out the water droplets from your hair, casually dressed like you arrived from Hongdae. The oversized shirt doesn’t stick to your skin as much as your sports bra earlier after your quick run in the streets, or the blouse that you nearly sweated through at lunch yesterday as the afternoon temperature increased to accommodate for spring. You jump on your bed. Well, you guess this is your bed, the one closest to the entrance and bathroom, because Jeno … occupied the other one. You glance at it, instinctively hiding your hands under your tousled covers, then shake your head. As you look away, you see your handwriting on the hotel stationery crossed out in perfectly straight lines (a symptom from majoring in architecture, you know) above Jeno’s cursive:

Went down to the lobby for breakfast. It ends at 11.

You flicker at the digital clock beneath a disconnected lamp: 10:05 AM. Still early. You got up some time around 5:30 or 6, your body absorbing too much sleep, having passed out almost right after getting back to the hotel from lunch. Unfortunately, Gwangbok-Dong doesn’t open until mid-morning, about 10:30, so you couldn’t buy a wedding gift yet (you have an envelope of cash for the reception, but Jaehyun added a registry link qr code on the invites). You also hoped to give Jeno more time to sleep, knowing that he must’ve gotten five interrupted hours total in the span of 36 hours. Shopping without him would have knocked out a chore, the only chore really, and then you two could buy him a tie or just wander around the area, which, come to think of it, costs a lot of money. It costs money to breathe, Jeno once joked during an ECON 305 lecture sophomore year, so now, you might as well take advantage of the complimentary bibmbap.

By the time you get downstairs, the chefs have disappeared, and only three plain bibimbap dishes remain amongst the sparse assortment of other breakfast snacks. At least this moment has somewhat perfect timing; you didn’t have very good timing earlier when you caught Jeno with his dick in hand (or did he not have good timing? You have no idea). You snake around the buffet-style tables, picking up a small mango juice and a few side dishes in addition to the main. Once you have a decent portion, you walk toward the half-empty seating area, scanning the chairs for a place to sit. You kinda look like a new high school transfer student searching for a clique – do you sit with the band geeks and their giant brass instruments? Do you sit with the chem nerds and finish the homework that’s due tomorrow? Or do you latch onto the one person you vaguely know so that people don’t stare at you for standing too long?

Yeah, you immediately find Jeno playing some cart rider game on his phone under the table. Nice to know that the sentiment is returned, ha.

“He-hey,” you mumble, clanging your tray on the metal table. “Do you mind if I sit here?”

Jeno looks up at you and puts his phone in his pocket. He gestures to the seat already pulled out, as if it were waiting for you. “Yeah, of course.”

You eat a few bites, hoping that the tension will go down the longer you are in his presence, but he fidgets by your side, rubbing his feet together loudly over the wood flooring. He gives you an apologetic stare, waiting for you to break first. Slowly, you finish chewing part of the egg and wash it down with juice, equally marveling at him, unsure how exactly to say alright, we both know that I caught you masturbating and you probably finished off in that not-so-short shower without (1) scarring the other guests and (2) completely altering your relationship. Like, you didn’t even have sex!

“About this morning,” you start, “I should’ve knocked.”

“No, no.” Jeno shakes his head. “I should’ve … not … done … that. We’re sharing a room for the weekend, an-and it’s your space as much as mine. I’m sor-”

“I mean,” you interrupt, pushing your spoon around the bowl of rice, “it happens. You – Guys get … those,” – morning wood, hard-ons, boners – “an-and it’s not like you were thinking about me. I get it.”

Jeno makes a strangled noise, so you whip your head at him. Suddenly, you notice his proximity, and you push all the way back into your chair, accidentally skidding it across the floor. Your eyes go wide, eyebrows more talkative than your sputtering mouth. You aren’t stupid; he knows that, but Jeno is too honest for his own good, even at the expense of his own thoughts. He bites his lip, evidently saying more than intended, and that is how you have known him for the last decade – overly blunt, blurting out his thoughts easily, every answer written on his face, stuck on the tip of his tongue.

And you cannot help yourself when the memory of his massive cock resurfaces, his pre-cum pooled at the neglected slit as his fingers massage right under the head. Your fight-or-flight response activated before you could make a conscious move to take the leap, to get even closer on him than the train allowed. You wonder, breath hitched, whether you idealize his cock – whether he idealized sex with you. On your end, it has been a while since you last got laid, a couple months, bit of a dry spell hitting you at the start of this new urban revitalization project to fix up the arts district around the SeMA. The initial funding took some convincing, both the government and museum not seeing the necessity, but once your team got the ball rolling and you were able to pull in Jeno, the lead architect, and Renjun, a graphic designer, you figured that time would be more in your favor.

That was not the case.

Your team leader divided the project based on skill-level, meaning that you had to cooperate on the ground level with Jeno and Renjun, planning every move from point A to point B. So, while half your coworkers enjoy hoesik, probably out there hitting on clubgoers and getting laid, you stay at the office past witching hour, hunched over blueprints and maps and expense reports. The only saving grace, really, is working with your best friend. … Your best friend who just inadvertently admitted that he jerked off to the thought of you. … Your best friend whose dick you currently think about, trying to revisualize whether you remember it correctly. Maybe you need a refresher.

“We don’t,” Jeno clears his throat, still avoiding eye contact, hands rubbing on his jeans, “um, we don’t need to talk about it.”

You bite your tongue.

Because you do want to talk about.

Geotechnical engineering, in college, was easy. Jeno received A-level marks all three terms, nearly a 100% in the second term. Designing a new plaza around the SeMA, for your project, was easy. Jeno got his first design approved by the MOLIT and the Cultural Heritage Administration, based on a 4AM napkin sketch. Fuck, even finding your G-spot in his dream was easy (although, credit is due to the movie magic directed by his subconscious). But all of those have something in common: a template. You know, like, engineering follows a basic algorithm, as do project designs. And he’s had years of experience giving people orgasms, even made a few squirt, so he can just manipulate a technique to best suit your pussy.

With this, with you, with the real you, Jeno doesn’t know what to do, or where to start, when you are so close to him, concentrating on straightening out the main knot in the tie you wrap around his neck. I’ll buy you a new one echoes in his mind, the assurance you whispered in his dream, now that you are actually out shopping. He can smell your own body wash this time, compared to the cologne on his blazer in the train station. And you probably don’t even know how hard it was for him, then, to not kiss your neck. Maybe that’s why his subconscious creates a pattern out of it: bring you close (like at on the KTX), taunt him in his dream (give him the kiss he wanted and set up something more), bring you close again.

It took a moment, both times, to actually build up tension. The first time, he scarcely kept his eyes open, couldn’t really appreciate your body, half-tired, half-scared; probably why his subconscious went easy on him last night, as if having mercy for all the dick veins in his heart. And when he caved, you caught him. Jeno spent the better part of this shopping excursion keeping his distance – e.g., even though you browsed home appliance stores together, he walked a few meters behind you, only stopping to make commentary:

“What if we get them an air fryer?” he suggested, to get out of there as soon as possible and relieve the awkwardness.

You refuted, “They already have an air fryer. Mingyu bought one, since Jaehyun can’t cook.” Right. “Makes him feel like Baek Jongwon.”

So, you settled on a nonstick, ceramic, pink Always Pan set (in addition to the cash envelope) that Mingyu might get more use out of and help lessen the dish load. But you let Jeno pick the color.

“There,” you finish, eyebrows unfurrowing. You turn him toward the adjacent mirror, arms crossed over his chest. He doesn’t immediately scrutinize your work (not that it was necessary; you have been tying his ties for formal events since MUN championships in high school). Your hands linger, warm, on his shoulders, falling slightly on his pecs. Then, you let go, palms up as if an AED machine alerted you about the next incoming shock. “I’ll either do this same knot –” A cape knot. “– or an Eldridge knot, depending on which dress I choose, but both look good for a solid color tie, like this one.”

“What about a trinity knot?”

Jeno cannot believe that he is making small talk with his best friend about the various types of knots; the same best friend who vomited into a cup 0.2 seconds after entering a bar, resulting in your entire group getting kicked out, and then fell asleep on the sidewalk outside, resulting in a cop arresting all seven of you for the night because you made it seem like you were all blackout drunk. Your relationships survived that whole mess, despite everyone losing the ₩25,000 entrance fee (although, Haechan and Renjun refused to go out with you for, like, a month). Most importantly, your relationship with him survived that; actually your relationship with him didn’t even take a hit. He nursed you back to health the next day, which might have, or not, been a symptom of his excessive drinking – tucking you into bed with a thousand blankets, bringing you 35 water bottles, taking your temperature every 4 minutes.

“Mmm,” you consider, fixing your gaze back at his neck. “Probably not. It’s not really formal enough for a wedding, and I’m already on the fence about an Eldridge knot, in case Jaehyun or Mingyu want to wear one – it’s like if I wore a white dress to their wedding. People would think that we were getting married.” Jeno raises an eyebrow and is met with silence. You drop into your hands, twiddling your thumbs, a forced laugh bubbling through your esophagus. “Sorry.”

“No, it’s, um, it’s fine,” he reassures you. He should be sorry, for making you deal with his emotions. “You could, um, tie it change it at the wedding hall, or, um, at the reception. I don’t think I’ll end up wearing it all night.”

“Or you could learn how to tie something better than a half-Windsor,” you tease, slowly lifting your head.

An identical smile breaks onto his face. “It’s a classic for a reason!”

“Call it what it is: basic.”

“I haven’t had to learn how to do other knots!” Jeno pushes your shoulder, laughing when you do. “Besides, it’s never about my clothes. I’m just the accessory, your arm candy.”

Your giggles fade, then almost as if remembering the distant morning, you separate from him. And he has to close the distance again. He tentatively reaches for your hand, boldly threading your fingers together. You don’t react, instead choosing to focus on the glass display case under the mirror. Your hair moves just a little, the strands loose from your ponytail blowing, slightly, in the wind. His hand could replace it – the hair tie – if you wanted (it’s what his subconscious wants), but you focus on the glass display case under his reflection. You fiddle with the blade of a tie that you both rejected earlier (ha, you seem to be rejecting a lot of things today). The color didn’t suit his skin tone or the garden wedding theme; Jaehyun made sure to include a sample of his bouquet in every invitation. How is he going to be a good wedding date, to you, if you can barely look at each other?

“Did I sa–?”

“Let’s buy this one,” you decide, interrupting him simultaneously. You pull the purple off him, as if un-marking him. Another stark contrast to his dream, which has him wondering whether his fantasies are boring. “Then, we can get dinner at that bistro down the road. I know you’ve been craving steak, and Jaehyun is doing a chicken-or-fish style reception.”

Jeno shakes his analog watch into view: 3:27 PM. You finished breakfast before noon. Should you leave now, you might be able to finish dinner just as quickly (or long), based on your pace eating bibimbap, and grab coffee before the café by the hotel closes.

“Yeah, okay. Sounds good.”

Jeno pays for the tie and an extra two white dress shirts (just in case), as well as a chocolate bar from the tiny stand at the register, stacked near the gift cards. You thank him, but it is the least he can do – (1) he feels really bad for this morning, and (2) you essentially paid for every other part of this trip except the food. He reassures you that you need not apologize; you are his best friend, but then you throw that back in his face when he brings up money. Both of you keep parroting “don’t worry, it’s fine” at each other, only to retreat into awkward silence.

You hold the shop entrance open for him, gesturing him out the door, then walk a pace behind him. The medium-sized, paper shopping bag swings between the two of you; well, it would, if he stood next to you.

Jeno stops.

“What are we doing?”

You pause too, body freezing mid-motion for a second, then you look over your shoulder, eyes looking him up and down. When his head tilts to the side and his eyebrows furrow, you turn around.

“We’re going to the bistro,” you answer, as though it were obvious.

But Jeno already knows that. He made the plans with you half an hour ago. “No, I mean this. Why are we –” He shakes his head again; he knows why, too. His reflection in a department store catches his eye, so he pulls you from the middle of the sidewalk around the corner, somewhat hidden behind another building. “What are we doing?”

“Jeno … are you okay?”

“I’m serious! We practically spend every day together, it feels desolate when you’re gone, and … and –” He steps into your personal bubble. “You’re not here with me right now.”

“Jen,” you drag out his name, looking away from him, “I don’t think you know what you’re saying.”

You are not hearing him.

Jeno cautiously withdraws his hands from his bomber jacket. His nails accidentally scratch the pocket inner lining, giving him a chance to back out, to reconsider his declaration. But he doesn’t need a second chance; he just needs the first chance. So, instead, Jeno grabs your palm, inching his fingers up your elbow, and scans your eyes. Without resistance, you draw him closer at his waist. The shopping bag falls down low on your wrist, drumming against his thigh and yours. He feels your leave his waist and slide up his cheek; he has to close his eyes, not entirely believing the way his body betrays him, leaning into your face.

“I … I …” he pants, head spinning.

“Hey, it’s okay,” you assuage. He can feel your breath on his lip, so he sucks in air, lips parted slightly, scared he might ask for too much. And maybe that is where you get a signal – get the signal – because he feels you rise to the tips of your toes and kiss him. “Let’s just order room service.”

Why did you say that? Let’s just order room service. The suggestion prolonged the time before you could kiss him again, because once you got back to the hotel, heels practically floating off the ground, you had to wait.

Luckily, the hotel was just around the corner. If you ran, you would have been upstairs in 10 minutes, but the two of you took your time, practically strolling through Gwangbok Road. He walked beside you this time, his pinky occasionally grazing behind your hand.

And in the elevator, Jeno became bolder. His entire body, previously trembling, gravitated toward you, latching onto every part that you would allow, and you gave him permission, made it known that you wanted him to touch you. You almost pressed him into the reflective wall, trapping him on the cold metal railing, but you restrained yourself; you already made that initial move: kissing him (well, it was the next move, since you caught him masturbating, earlier, to the thought of you. Then, he was the first person out the elevator, practically dragging you into the bedroom, nearly detaching your arm. Outside your hotel room, Jeno kissed you. Your hips knocked beside the key swipe, making it easy to fumble the key card out of your pocket and through the lock. You didn’t open the door immediately, choosing, instead, to stand on your toes, and wrap your arms behind his neck, essentially climbing him, like a tree, in the empty hallway, the shopping bag floundering on his back. Jeno paused the kiss, trailing his lips away, ghosting his breath on your tongue. His gaze flickered from your parted mouth to your eyes, and you saw his dilated pupils grow bigger. He pointed his eyebrows to the green light, right before it turned red. You scanned his face for another rejection, and seeing none, you opened the door.

But once you got inside, Jeno sat you on the bed, perching you where you fell asleep next to him last night. You dropped the shopping bag and your jacket to the floor, staring up at him the entire time, hopefully inviting. While he towered over you for this second, you admired your work – bruised lips, static hair, flushed skin, even his breath bated. Subconsciously, you touched your bottom lip, dragging it down to see if it were equally swollen (it was). Jeno took a step forward, but changed his mind, ordering room service from the restaurant downstairs through the phone on the nightstand.

Now, you flicker your gaze over his body, checking him out like a man who convinced his foreigner girlfriend not to dress modestly at the clubs. Your eyes flicker slower, up his tiny waist (that makes his flat ass appear a little plump) to his strong biceps, sleeves pushed up to reveal more skin, back to his lips, which mumble a swift thank you before returning to the edge of the bed. You slide to the very tip, spreading your legs wide open enough for him to stand between. Jeno curls his thumb under your jaw, lifting your chin, maybe admiring your features too. You hope that you look equally disheveled.

Jeno gently pins you on the bed, slithering up your torso, brushing his pecs on your tits. He grabs your waist, fingers dipping toward your butt, dragging you to meet his pelvis.

“You have to tell me,” he says, eyes closed, millimeters from kissing you again, “right now, that you want this, want me, before we do anything more.” His thumb comes under your shirt, drumming an indiscernible beat directly on your stomach, just around your belly button, almost unsure which direction to go – toward your pants, toward your bra, outside your shirt. Your breath hitches, and you feel your body sink lower into the mattress. “I need to know that we’re on the same page.”

“Can’t you feel it?” You guide one of his hands down your pants, his long middle phalanges driving cautiously into the seam. He cups your pussy, falling level on your chest. His lungs pant heavily into the back of your neck, tickling the hairs into standing up. “I want you.”

Jeno chases your lips, barely managing, “Not what I meant.” With your consent, he kisses you again, and you, consumed by his undivided heat, ignoring everything that isn’t his touch, like the white sheets rusting under your long hair as his shirt grinds into your abdomen, riding your clothes up. He hooks a hand under your thigh, switching the positions for you to straddle him. His legs stretch forward, feet planting into the ground, which gives him the leeway to sit up and brush your hair back into a makeshift side ponytail. Jeno scans your eyes, darting side-to-side, all the tension melting away after you smooth his shoulders. “I … I …”

You caress his cheek, having mercy on his dick (currently hard under your ass), and lift his chin higher. “I know what you meant.” You press your lips into his, chastely. He responds, puckering his lips each time you peck him, but he also frowns – frowns deeply enough for you to really pull away; his frown looks more intense than you felt. “I …” you whisper, sliding your arms on his shoulder, fiddling with his hair. You teeter on your knees, shifting your weight across his lap. He stops you. “I like you so much. More th-than friends.” Then you kiss him again, to wipe your confession away, because you can live with it. You can live with the repercussions of his mistake; you can be his mistake. This doesn’t have to be a whole thing. You don’t need to finish your confession with his rejection.

Jeno whimpers your name, tugging you away by your hair. “I –”

“It’s okay,” you whisper, “You don’t need to say it. Just me –”

“No, I need to –” He sucks in a breath. “Can I kiss you?”

You shake your head, an actual mistake because he freezes; you only meant it in disbelief. So, you lower down again, sliding your hands under his jaw. You turn your head to the side and mumble, “Don’t stop,” before reconnecting.

Jeno pats his palm on your pussy. His opposite hand, the one above your hip, fingers your waistband, scratching continuous circles, waiting for an affirmation. “I meant kiss you here.” He pouts at you through his eyelashes. “Can I kiss you lower?”

You shimmy off his lap, pushing him into the bed. “Everywhere,” you answer hastily. He helps you glide off your pants, and his veiny hands are all you can concentrate on, everything else blurring until he fondles your clit, above your black panties.

“Do you like this?”

“God, yes,” you pour moans into his mouth, holding his throat straight, like a tall glass for iced tea. When he inserts a single, long digit between your wet pussy lips, he winces, as if being penetrated himself, as if you found his prostate on the first try without any lube other than your spit. He adds a second finger, his longest finger, the middle finger, the ‘fuck you’ finger (literal in this case), prompting you to hump his hand. Your hips roll forward, increasing intensity. You gasp when he scissors his fingers wider and crosses them over one another, like a promise, then you bounce higher, your ass cheeks squeezing together. “Fuck, I didn’t know you could do that.”

Jeno slips in another digit, curling all three forward, his ring finger (the free one) twitching unrestricted. “I guess there’s still a bit you don’t know about me,” he blows into your gaping mouth, your moans following his rhythmically to the beat of some song you cannot think of while riding him.

You sink all the way down his hand, grinding your clit on his palm, and take off your shirt. Before your tits can spring free, Jeno pulls you close, trying to suck marks above your bra. You grate broken ah, ah, ahs, growing louder whenever his fingers sheath completely inside you. As if goading you, he slaps your jiggly ass, twice for every once you shake down. You yank Jeno away by his hair, darting through his swollen lips, his flushed cheeks, his narrowed eyes. Under you, his dick twitches.

“Should I –“ you pant, slowly stopping on his hand. But he seems not to like that response and drives his fingers back up. “Can I,” you correct, “ah, ah – Can I help you with-with that?”

“I want you to cum.” Jeno squeezes your ass cheek, and you fall into his lips again. Your tongue falls out, stiff, virtually asking for something to occupy your mouth. He takes his free hand, shoving it between your lips, pushing your tongue down, saliva pooling under his fingerprint. “Are you close, pretty girl?” His hand moves faster, rougher. Your thighs twitch. “Feels like it.” Your panties threaten to slip back into place, so he rips it. “Sorry,” he mumbles carelessly. You don’t blame him, too focused on your legs tensing up but his thumb on your tongue pushing you back down.

“Don-don’t worry,” you whimper, “I, ah-uh, have a – ah – nother pair. They’re also black, fuck, but lace. Hides better under my-my dress.” You skid lower down his waist, and his cock stands up on your ass.

“Fuck, you’re going to ruin me.”

“Untouched?”

“Maybe.”

However, you don’t like the thought, considering it unfair – unfair to him that he has to settle for a cheap orgasm; unfair to you that you cannot milk him dry between your thighs. So, you descend his legs, prying him open at the knee. You spare it a glance, covered by his jeans, wondering what it would be like to bend over it, ass in the air, spanked harder.

“Hey,” Jeno calls, snapping you back to attention. You relieve your thighs, unclenching, to stare at him. “Is this –” he inhales sharply, possibly trying to come off nonchalant, like it would be okay if you decided to stop, decided that you didn’t want this anymore; you swoon. “Is this still okay?”

“Of course.” You meet his eye. “Always.” You loop the tops of your fingers under his waistband, above his Calvin Kleins, the name brand embroidered as thick as his veins leading under it. “Can I help you with this?”

“God, yes, please,” he finally answers, throwing his head back on the pillows.

You unzip his pants, the sound bouncing off all four walls without any moans to cushion it; you could practically hear a pin drop. Jeno props himself on his elbows, and his abs crunch forward, tightening his impeccably defined six pack. Like, you already knew – since college – that he sculpted his body at the gym like Pygmalion did Galatea, but it adds pressure, not because your hand wraps around his cock (you have yet to touch him), rather because his gaze burns holes through your hands.

“You don’t,” he mumbles, “You don’t have to take it all. If you can’t. You don’t.” Jeno shakes his head, his hair shyly hiding his eyes. “I just want you, so it’s o – Fuck.”

You lick the premature bead of cum, digging your tongue in his slit to clean all of it out. Your thumb and index fingers wrap, tightly, below the glans. You bob your head a little lower, tasting just the tip, flittering your eyes to gauge his reaction. While your inexperienced days are behind you (pun intended), Jeno has this magical first-love quality about him, that makes sucking his dick seem like your first, like when two rom-com leads finally have sex, except it’s in a car on a cliffside for added drama. He appears to agree – how? You don’t know exactly for sure, but people outside your relationships have mentioned that you make a good first girlfriend.

Jeno involuntarily stutters his hips higher, pushing half his cock past your lips, making you gag. Evidently, there are many things about him you still don’t know – namely, how big his dick is. You always suspected him to be above average, especially after his sporadic growth spurts in high school, but you never imagined that this would be your way to measure him! He can barely fit half his shaft through the rim of your lips. And it gets worse (better?) when you hollow your cheeks, scraping your tongue above your teeth, because your mouth squeezes him out. Jeno mumbles a string of curse words, nearly screaming them as you suck harder, his fists twisted in the blankets. You pull off his cock, replacing your mouth with your hands, albeit tighter, and spiral your saliva down to the base, leaning tall on your knees to spit more on his tip, in the slit from where precum bubbles out.

“I told you: I want you.”

“Fuck.” Jeno throws his head back. “Okay, sit on my face.”

You stop moving your hand, subconsciously throbbing your palm to the beat of his (dick) pulse. “What?”

Jeno’s fingers tap on the blanket, his voice increasingly whiny, “Sit. On. My. Face.”

You comply, kneeling around his cheeks, knees brushing his shoulders – which still wear his shirt, nothing but his abs and penis exposed. All the cloth touching your skin makes you feel more vulnerable, most likely more vulnerable than Jeno, and he might regret this in the morning. So, as he anchors his extra-large hands under your thighs, digging into your muscles, you pinch his shoulder, like a safe word, a safety action. And he stops.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, curving his neck to see you better. Maybe you frown too deeply or maybe you are on the verge of tears, because he sits up again, immediately spinning in front of you. “Hey, -” He gingerly reaches for your cheeks, holding your chin above his fingers. “- We don’t have to do this, if you don’t want. It’s okay. I want you to want this.”

“I,” you swallow, cautiously looking into his eyes. You cover your chest, hide your boobs by your bra – the only clothing on your body - and naked arms. “I just,” you mumble before finishing lamely, face warming with his hand, “feel really naked.”

“Oh,” Jeno says simply. He scans your face indiscernibly, so you, not wanting any of this to end, raise your eyebrows suggestively and glance at his shirt. “Oh!” Jeno takes it off, elbows crossing on either side of his ears, showing off his Dorito torso. And you must have been leaning forward, because you fall into his chest, a hand bracing widely on his obliques. You sheepishly raise your face, slightly ducking under his perky nipple; you lower eye-level with it and hesitantly lick it. “Fuck. Is this why you wanted me to strip?”

You flatten your tongue under his areola, then flick upward, tentatively building more pressure until you have his waist in both your hands, holding him steady while you massage his nipples. Your opposite thumb pushes small circles where your mouth neglects, almost kneading him like that time he taught you, in Chem 224, how to use a mortar and pestle properly, holding the ceramic bowl firm against the thick pestle breaking apart various solids into fine powders. Deeming his left pec marked enough (by your nails and lips), you move to the right, leaving a moist path between his boobs, but, rather than fondling the other side, as you did when it was dry, you fist his dick, dragging him forward. You assume Jeno gets the hint, given that he traps you on the sheets, under his flexed biceps. He kicks off the rest of his pants and slithers up your body, pressing his completely naked body into yours, only your bra left as a barrier. Jeno straddles across your hips, his cock spasming, as if asking you to do the last honors while he gropes your entire lower half, massaging your ass with the heels of his palms.

“Do – do you-you still want me to sit on your face?”

“No,” he heaves instantly before doing a partial push up (push down?) to kiss you, aggressive and instant. You can feel his broad deltoids pinch together while you ground yourself on his muscles, using the moment as an excuse to grope him. He swirls his tongue in your mouth, simultaneously smacking his wet lips to you, making you constantly chase him, come up only to be pushed down again. “Fuck, mayb-maybe later.” Later. You’re going to do this again. Jeno holds his torso still, slowly moving his cock between your pussy lips, lubricating himself prepared. “I want, uh, I want to be inside you,” he moans, voice breaking, “Can I fuck you? Please?”

You guide his tip into your cunt. “Please.” And when he stretches your hole, urging his girth past the involuntary tightening, you arch your hips up. “Full, full, fuck.” He shallowly thrusts, pulling out a little bit, only to push in more. Your thighs shake, and you point your feet down, curling your toes, to keep your legs separated enough for him to go faster. But you notice that, while he pistons in and out of your cunt, you cannot feel his balls slapping your ass; you cannot hear the distinct skin-on-skin noises – that’s when you realize: he’s not completely in you, despite the full feeling practically in your cervix. “Jeno,” you whine, “Fuck me.”

“I am,” he answers, breath quivering through gritted teeth.

“Harder,” you beg, fidgeting to give him additional access, little grabby hands wriggling along the outline carved around his muscles. “More.” You claw into his well-defined six pack. “F-fill me up all the way.”

Jeno mattes your hair down with his thumbs, coaxing your eyes open again. You peak through just one, then slowly open the other; you can feel the lines in your forehead melt away. Just for a second though. Because he uses your temporary relief to bottom out. You barely process any of his movements, until he kisses you again, his thrusts stuttering too gently. His breath trembles, controlled, masking the way his hands fight some urge to bruise your hips, so you hook your shin around his strong leg and topple him. When you sink down on his dick, taking every inch, pussy working overtime to accommodate him, the both of you groan. You honk his pecs, matching each squeeze with your breath. The bedsheets rustle, having come undone with all your tossing and turning, and Jeno kicks the blankets off the bed, sitting up. He mouths your perky tits, tilting his head to the side, jaw dropping with his tongue to suck as much skin as possible. You grab the headboard, accidentally slamming it into the wall, once, twice, three, four, five times, when he circles his hips, dick flopping around inside your cervix, ridiculously deep. Jeno grabs your ass, strikes your skin hard to start bouncing you on his lap. He helps you keep his cock inside your pussy, guiding you less than halfway up and banging his skin against yours. The position pushes you forward, allowing his shaft to graze your sopping clit, vulva pinning opened.

“Ahh,” you scream, “Je-Jeno, I’m-I’m –“ You throat tightens, words choking, “Oh, shit, I’m gonna cum.”

Jeno brings his lips to yours, half a millimeter away. He grunts, abs tightening too. “Cum, baby, you can do it. You can do it. Come on, baby.” He grabs you by the throat, holding you in place as he licks into your mouth, eating up every moan, every breath, and fucks you faster. Your pussy gets wetter, more malleable, and you finally cum, toes curling, unwinding in his chokehold, tongue flopping out. He kisses your pink, plump tongue, lips smacking heavily, moaning out his nose and mouth, “Uh, uh, uh, fuck. Can-can I –“

“Cum inside me,” you finish for him, answer for him.

Jeno propels his cock a couple more times, the last one driving both of you into the air. Thick spurts of cum shoot into your pussy, almost adding another inch, the tip of his cock hitting, jerking, on your G-spot. You sit there for a little bit, your bodies slumping down the headrest, possibly addicted to the way your walls continuously milk even more cum out of him.

When he finally finishes, cum forcing its way down your thighs, he kisses you. “So … about sitting on my face?”

Your face lights up, the thought of him eating his own cum out your cunt way too exciting, and you push him on the bed, immediately popping his cock out and straddling his mouth.

An obnoxious ringing interrupts Jeno’s dream, way too early (well, anything that wakes him up is too early), and he whines at it, preferring to sink into his heated mattress pad. But the default iPhone ringtone seems especially heartless, right now, for whatever reason – even though he probably wake up earlier than this during the work week. He buries his head in his pillow, trying to force the alarm into snoozing. His nose brushes into the soft pillowcase, inhaling the aromatherapy. Then, it moves … you move. And Jeno remembers the night before. It wasn’t a dream this time.

You slam your hand on the nightstand, briefly sliding out of his arms. The alarm – your phone – persists though, falling to the floor. You mumble a small fuck under your breath, softer than last night; the memory makes his dick twitch. He feels you crawl over the edge, rustling the bedsheets, your ass brushing his dick away. You dip heavier into the side with a Herculean effort, reaching for your phone, then slide it onto the mattress under your pillow. He tries not to react, tightens his already closed eyes, but his dick twitches. Thankfully, you seem blissfully unaware, nuzzling back into the pillows, a hand crossed over your chest, breathing deeply.

Jeno exhales through his nose, relieved. You must’ve fallen back to sleep – good, honestly, with work and then the whole train ride mess a couple days ago. Maybe he can use the time to finish what he started yesterday morning. Unfortunately, when he grabs his cock, points it up, his pelvis scrunching his abs, your thighs part, just briefly, then close again. The tip catches between your ass cheeks, trailing toward your pussy, sliding with back and forth, aided easily by how wet you are. Jeno internally groans at the thought of you having a sexy dream, hopefully about him. You start swaying, and your arm starts shaking, and your breath labors – you are touching yourself: your neck, your arms, your stomach, your clit. All the shifting spurs Jeno into action. He slowly and shallowly rocks his hips forward, spreading your natural lubricant across the top half of his cock. You lean into him, hands changing to claw his burly naked shoulder, and guide his fingers to your cunt. At the new position, the closer position, he sloppily mouths the part between your neck and shoulder, his breath as hot and heavy as his tongue.

You freeze for a second, stiffening your posture, and he thinks that maybe he misunderstood or that you changed your mind, so he slowly pulls back. His cock springs free from the tight crevice, wet and warm and hard, twitching on your round ass.

“I’m sor – Did you not – I thought – I’m sorr –“

You turn around and kiss him quiet, throwing a leg over his hip. Your heel digs into his lower back, above his flat ass, lodging the tip in your pussy again. Slowly, you lower yourself on his cock, kissing him harder the further you sink down. Once he is completely inside, you pull your face back and wrap your arms around his neck, practically fusing your bodies together. Everything moves too fast for him. Jeno is unable to appreciate your touches. He makes it known with a mewl, chest beating quicker than yours. And as if you sense it – best friend intuition, you might say in any other situation where his dick isn’t in you, like wordlessly handing over a bag of ramyeon that you ‘borrowed’ from Renjun’s room – you brush a few strands of hair away from his eyes, and he opens them this time. You’ve always been good at comforting him: when he had a panic attack over losing his wallet, when he got reprimanded at work for shredding the wrong abstract, etc. He has always known it. Well, not always; he doesn’t know where it began, but he knows the feeling will last forever, like a vow. Jeno hugs you around your waist, tighter, asking you to move for more or to stop for less, because, much like last night, should you give him an inch, he’ll take a meter.

“Don’t be sorry,” you beg, humping his cock again. “I want you.”

Jeno loses balance and falls on his flat ass, his thighs sandwiched densely between yours. He fumbles around the bed, pushing away the thin sheet to see his cock disappear in your pussy. It should be impossible; you should be tight, having nothing to prep you beforehand, but maybe his stroke game last night was enough, you came twice on his cock alone, the stretch evidently lasting through now. The mattress creaks and the headboard hits the wall as you bounce firmly, knees jabbing into the bed. Your breath shakes, abs visibly flexing, and you fall forward, hair splaying over his shoulder. He licks his middle finger, then drags it under your thigh, trapping his cock in a V, using his lubricated finger for added pressure on your clit, his dick abusing its underside. His free arm belts behind your back, index finger teasing outside the rim of your asshole.

“Oh, oh,” you scream, biting your lip, pawing the comforter for some stability while he rams your little cunt. “F-f-ffuck.” He spanks your ass, dragging the meaty flesh up with a glowing hand mark. “Cu-cu-cumming. Mmm, oh my god, I’m so c-close.”

“Already? Shit.”

You tuck your hips forward, and he takes advantage, moving his hands under your torso, massaging your clit with all his fingers and sucking your tits. The repetitive sounds synchronize – your whimpering, his whimpering, your skin slapping into his, the bed springs screeching, your cunt squelching. All of it overwhelms his senses, and had you not been so close to his ear, Jeno would’ve missed your mantra:

“Jeno, Jeno, Jeno,” you squeal, moans getting increasingly louder, “I’m cumming, I’m cumming, cumming.” Your pussy drools cum down his legs, and he gradually decelerates, riding out your orgasm.

A beat passes, full of tense heavy breathing, before he pants in your face, nearly screaming (as if you hadn’t done so a moment ago, in his ear, with his face buried in your neck). “Breakfast,” he says simply, loudly, trying to hear himself through the ringing in his ears that preserves the way your moans sound, as if this could end on Monday morning when you get back to your real lives – which it could. You never said what this is. “Should we, um, should we get breakfast?” He remembers your alarm, trying to suppress the hardness in his cock, as if this were all just a formality, a complimentary wake up call not provided by the hotel, and he looks away, but he doesn’t go far, only dropping to your lips, not wanting to part, even in his view. “You know, that first meal of the day, typically eaten during moan-morning, often in, um, including rice, eggs, milk –”

Jeno flickers his eyes away from your lips, catching you gazing at him. Somehow you make it less creepy than when he does it. There was this one time at the end of high school when he checked on you, in the next cubicle over, in the library, only to find you asleep on your textbook, relying on osmosis rather than flash cards to study for the CSAT; 15 minutes passed and he felt like he regressed into that middle school nerd who just stood there, wheezing. Or that other time in international student building during college when Renjun slapped him on the arm because he was staring at you too long; he lied, saying that he was just making sure you got the right coffee from the vending machine, but Renjun knew. Jeno is convinced that his entire friend group knows how he feels about you – Haechan tried setting him up with you back in high school; Jaemin practically read his diary; Mark … Mark might actually be the only one who doesn’t know, for sure, but he definitely suspects something!

You grab his chin, snapping him out of his thoughts, and search his face before kiss him, your eyes fluttering closed as you grind him through the overstimulation. “Cum in me,” you order, “I’ll milk your cock dry.”

“Fuck,” Jeno breathes, never detaching his lips. He hugs low on your waist again, slapping your ass with both his hands. And when he can’t take it anymore – take the grinding, the clenching, the bouncing – he mumbles your name in your mouth, “Baby, I ne, uh, I need to cum. Let me cum inside you,” he takes you up on your offer, like the more-than-decade-long pining stops at a dam, at your answer.

Wordlessly, you shove you tongue in his mouth, cradling his cheek as he leans deeper between the pillows. You grab whatever length of his cock that is not in your pussy, and he whimpers when you throb your hand around him, teasing the other half inside your cunt. Jeno scoots forward, using the momentum to slap himself all the way in you, making your hips stutter. Fuck, you’re tight. And he knows that it’s a dumb myth for the vagina to be this compact, narrow canal, but your wall muscles barely conform to his girth, and the thought boosts his ego, so he holds you steady against his chest, repeatedly ramming your pussy with long thrusts. Your tits jiggle off your chest, scraping his pecs, almost slapping him in the jaw as he tilts his head up to suck more bruises under your chin, to soothe you from all the choking last night.

“Je-Jen,” you stammer, “I don’t –“ You swallow, shaking your head. “My legs are-are going to giv-give out.”

“It’s okay, baby, just breathe,” he tells you. He punctures your hips at a faster pace, like giving your pussy CPR, ordering your clit to administer a shock, blowing the kiss of life for the both of you. “In, out, in, out, in, out,” he guides, “You can do it.”

Jeno flips you on your back, an oof resounding the room, yelps and giggles following. He gives you a second to gather your composure, regulate your breathing, then pistons his cock repeatedly in your pussy. His tip catches on a particularly hard clench, and your walls refuse to let him go, trapping him in a spot that abuses your G-spot. He pushes the entire length inside you, practically fucking your cervix again, driving your back arched. You writher along the mattress, hair splaying among the sheets. His fists outline your obliques, thumbs erroneously pointed outward, trying to support your back. He accidentally slips on a particularly hard thrust, but before he can save himself, he protects your skull from hitting the headrest or your arm from getting crushed by his chest. Phew. Maybe if he were weaker, he would hold you on the bed, thrusting in a way that lets the both of you fall into the pillows, or maybe if he were stronger – mentally and physically – he would be able to stay up, not tempted or dizzy at the sight of your slightly parted mouth. Jeno readjusts his hands – one pushing your waist into the comforter, for his own support, and the other creeping toward your neck. You lift your chin up, giving him consent, and it takes him a second to move forward; he didn’t think he would get this far, that you would completely let him manhandle you. But, he guesses, he doesn’t know everything about you, and he is so excited to discover more. He pads his fingers on either side of your esophagus, squeezing just enough to make breathing a little harder for you, make it harder for you to follow the breathing pattern he ingrained in your cunt.

“Fuck, baby, breathe just like that.” Jeno peeks an eye wider, glancing at the blanket tosses away. Cautiously, he drifts his gaze to your stomach, and his cock twitches. You moan loader, almost confirming him thoughts – is he really that deep? Your pussy clenches. “Fuck, I’m gonna cum.” Jeno kisses you. “Cum with me,” he moans your name.

You used to make fun of him for being such a romantic, always cooing when he’d swoon over Knox and Chris, until he decided that he didn’t like their romance anymore. It’s too possessive. Although, he understands the sentiment, because the way you look at him, now, face contorting over your second building orgasm, incomprehensible whines spilling into the air. He should have done this sooner, should have kissed you sooner, and he would have, if he had known it would lead to this, because he can do it; he can bury the depth of his feelings while you sort yours out. If he can have you this close, like this, he would do anything.

Jeno draws his hips back, your name snagging on his moan. He feels your fingers dig in harsher as your legs tense up, tension building in your stomach. His knees chafe against the sheets, rocking an imprint into the mattress that keeps your legs open. Jeno slows his thrusts, instead hammering his entire cock harder. He tries not to cum prematurely, wanting to see your second orgasm of the morning overstimulate, but as he abrades your clit, holding your thighs wide, he feels himself shoot a thick rope of cum deep in your pussy, and it’s not long until he spills everything else, fucking you through his own orgasm, fucking his cum into you, your hole greedily drinking it all. You follow a few hits later, shaking your ass to help yourself along, then Jeno collapses, sweaty hot body enveloping your matching one. He presses sloppy, wide, open-mouthed kisses on your clavicle, steadily trailing up your neck, your cheek, and pecking you on the lips.

“Better than your dream?” you giggle, returning a kiss.

“Way better.”

Getting out of bed takes forever. The first time you tried to leave, you sat on the edge, stretching your arms upward. You bent over, standing on the ground, reaching for your toes, shaking off the jelly sensation, but Jeno, equally awake, rejuvenated from the twenty-minute rest since his cock was in you, leaned over the edge as well and made out with your pussy, licking all the way to your rim and back. Rather than shoving his head away, you pushed your hips back, for more, and eventually returned to bed, kicking up your legs and giggling your way into another blow job. The second time you tied to leve, you had to cross over Jeno’s body to get to the aisle between your beds, since your bed was pushed against the wall). You slithered a leg over his waist, balancing your palms on his shoulders, his cock twitching on your ass. He grabbed you by the waist, holding you there. You raised your eyebrows, pretending to be innocent (even though you really did want to get out of bed) as his cock hardened.

And now, the third time, your legs shake on your way off the mattress, having experienced way too many orgasms in less than thirty-minutes.

“Come back to bed,” Jeno whines, patting the empty warm spot you previously occupied.

“No,” you laugh, holding your arms out for balance before you fall again. You slap his grabby little hand away from your ass, much to his dismay, and pick up one of the new shirts you bought him yesterday that slipped out of the bag after Jeno kicked over a blanket. “I’m hungry,” you pout, facing him and buttoning up the top few buttons. “I need something to eat.”

“You have something I want to eat.”

“Real food, dork.” You walk over to your luggage, hunching over, ass on display but too far away from him. He groans, and you can hear him flop back onto the bed. You slip on a pair of panties, and his groan gets louder, making a smile instinctively spread on your face. “Come onnnn,” you complain, crawling onto the bed with a blouse and bra in hand, inching into his face, “Let’s grab something at that bistro. We won’t have a lot of time tomorrow at the wedding, and it’s already 5.”

Jeno sits straight, back against the headrest, his arms behind his head, showing off his thick muscles and tiny waist. He looks you up and down, a frown settling into his lip as he releases his arms with another groan. “Are we doing this backwards?”

“Doing what?” you ask, focused on exchanging his top for yours, another long-sleeve but black this time. You creep onto his lap, legs folded over the edge. He instantly goes to stabilize your waist, and you replace your arms around his neck, giving him a chaste (albeit sensual) kiss on the cheek, the corner of his mouth. “I just want to get dinner.” You put a hand on his arm, doing your best to give him a set of puppy dog eyes that you hope he cannot refuse. “Please?”

Jeno throws his head back. “Okay, let me put on some pants.”

The wait time at the bistro exceeded the amount of time it took to get ready and Uber over there, so you decided to look for something else. It seemed as though the universe wanted to punish your feet, everything else either closed by noon or surpassing an hour wait. You know that Jeno hates waiting more than 45-minutes. If he even knows that the restaurant is trendy or high-end, he won’t leave the apartment.

“I’m sorry,” you mumble and stop in the middle of the sidewalk, an empty sidewalk around the corner from yet another restaurant. Jeno slows down ahead of you, a hand coming out of his blazer to rub the frown lines in his jaw. “I didn’t think everything would take this long.”

“Hey,” Jeno calls, stepping into your personal bubble, preventing you from looking away by cradling your cheeks, “Hey. It’s okay. We’ll find something.”

“No, it’s not okay,” you shake your head, tearily looking into his eyes. The night sky almost obscures them, but Jeno led you close to a building with motion sensor, external lights. “It’s ridiculous, honestly, and you keep comforting me, but I’m starting to feel like a bur –”

You are cut off by your own gasp when Jeno kisses you, effectively shutting you up, and you melt into his arms. He simply puckers his lips, kissing you as long as he inhales before breathing out, just enough to regulate your heartbeat. The whole world slows down around you, every sound muted except the gentle smacking of his lips. One of your feet pops, kicks up, and you lean into his touch, fully assuaged.

Jeno pulls away first, leading you over to an open hotteok stand without a line. He orders two for each of you and a large soda to share, paying quickly. The vendor compliments the two of you as a couple, but when you go to correct him, Jeno interrupts you again, a hand on your lower back, thanking the guy, and walks you down the street. Once you get to a bridge, streetlamps connected by strung lantern lights, he relaxes against the railing, using the warm pancake to heat up his hands. You look him over again, then glance at your attires; it seems weird – you both wearing nice date clothes but eating ₩10,000 snacks, sharing a soda instead of wine.

“What?”

“I just …” You turn the wrapper around in your hands, gaze falling to the chewy dough. “How are you so nonchalant about everything?”

“What do you mean?”

“Are w-we going to pretend that the stuff in the hotel room didn’t happen? Like I didn’t confess that I like you, more than platonically?”

Jeno sighs, casting his gaze to the floor. But, like, why? You are the one vulnerable right now. In the last 24-hours, you confessed, to liking him more than friends. You only ever came close three other times; three times in 12 years: at the beginning of high school, motivated by your friends to take control; at the end of high school, before graduation, when you thought that he would go to KAIST instead of Yonsei with you; in the middle of college, during volunteer work at a soup kitchen. And each time, you chickened out. You thought that maybe, after you entered the workforce, like a real adult, you would face the music, face these constantly lingering feelings, and maybe, this is it; this is the music, but something about him, about this, regresses you back to that teenage girl feeling: shy and insecure.

“I –” Jeno inhales, crumpling the hotteok wrapper into his pocket, then waddling over to you. “I don’t think you know what you’re saying.”

You frown. He is not listening to you. Why else would you repeat the friendship-shattering phrase? You thought that this was it, that you could live with being his weekend mistake, but that involved getting a solid response from him, something tangible to let you know how he feels.

“I just … You don’t …” You lick your lips, gradually dropping your gaze to the floor, unable to face him with all this uncertainty. “I,” you emphasize, pointing your middle phalanges above your heart, “don’t know what you’re saying. Jen, I want some cl –”

For the second time tonight, he cuts you off with a simple kiss, long and chaste, holding you by the neck, as if the action exempts him from explaining himself. And maybe you are easy to sway, because you let him kiss you in the middle of a bridge overlooking the Busan city streets, convincing yourself that having him physically close is the same as having him emotionally close.

Jeno hopes that he won’t be like Jaehyun on his wedding day – absolutely insane. Well, he hopes that he won’t be like this on his wedding day, with you, oscillating between awkward silence and carrying out his childhood, assuming that he marries you. Granted, the wedding cake did melt, and another groomsman, the best man, Yuta, is running late (delayed flight from Japan), and Jaehyun did rip his tie, hence why Jeno, now, runs around the Park Hyatt Hotel, searching for any front desk attendant to point him toward a sewing kit at the very least. He should have brought his back up tie, a skinny black tie that he definitely does not know how to turn into a cravat, and he cannot ask you, not after last night when he evaded your question by sleeping with you.

Left. Right. Left again. Jeno looks around the empty, second-floor hallway, above the equally empty front desk, adjacent to the imperial staircase. Promptly, he shuts the door, inhaling and exhaling under the weird single lightbulb at the center of the ceiling, eyes shut, trying to imagine his happy place.

“Jeno?”

He sighs, shoulders dropping, face finally relaxing without the groom-zilla pacing and spiraling without “his soul mate” to calm him down, but Jeno cannot refute very much. Even in his dreams, you exist. And maybe he talks too little, or you talk too much; maybe he doesn’t say enough, or maybe you don’t say the proper words, but he could live in the in-between, in the that moment after you say something and right before he doesn’t. So, he sinks into your enveloping voice, engrossed by just the sound of his voice, no pressure behind it – pressure to answer your ‘I like you’ confession with his thousand-word ‘I love you’ confession; pressure to have the ‘what are we’ conversation; pressure to face your inevitable rejection that, although you feel something more than friendship for him, you don’t feel the same way. Except, Jeno doesn’t just feel the warmth from your words.

Your fingers slowly touch his tall shoulder, pads of your fingers dipping in harder to grab his attention. And he screams.

And you copy him.

It takes a moment for him to turn around, a hand over his heart, patting down his lapels. But when he does, when he finally looks at you, as if he were the groom this wedding, waiting for you, the bride, to surprise him at the end of the aisle, Jeno’s breath stops. He cannot discern whether it’s due to the shock value of being in close proximity to you again, in an intimate setting almost rivaling 7 minutes in heaven (though he can say that he’s had more than 7 minutes in heaven with you, outside a closet); or it’s because you look absolutely stunning, somehow making the lime green garden wedding theme work for you – Jaehyun practically shoved a floor-length dress in your arms the moment you both arrived, absolutely exhausted, half-filled coffees pressed against your foreheads, above your sunglasses blocking the sunlight, as if you two were hungover (you weren’t; neither of you have drank more than water this weekend so far), before he directed you to Mingyu’s “side of the hotel”, even though you are his cousin, and took Jeno to his side. And, when you initially asked him to be your wedding date, Jeno didn’t expect to stand with the wedding party, thought he would just have to sit in the audience, watching you stand at the altar in front of the wrong man (granted, your cousin and his groom), but Jaehyun gave him a matching green tie and the second groomsman spot.

“Ha-ha-hi. What, um, what are you doing in here?”

You, staring at the floor, feet squirming clickty clack in your heels, hold up a tiny sewing kit. “Stealing some supplies for Mingyu. He brough an extra cravat and wants me to sew in tie, as a precaution, in case something happens to the current one.”

Jeno lets out a small laugh, and you slowly look up at him.

“What?” you frown.

“Nothing,” he smiles at you. “Just … they’re really meant for each other. Jaehyun ripped his tie, and he sent me looking for a sewing kit to fix it.”

You furrow your eyebrows and tilt your head to the side. And Jeno coughs weakly into his hand, trying not to think about the way you kissed him, last night, head tilted again, eyes half-lidded, lips parted slightly. “What about Yuta?”

“Delayed.” Jeno jingles his watch into frame. “He should be arriving at Incheon in the next few minutes, but he won’t be here until, like, 20 minutes be-before the wedding,” Jeno trails off slowly at the end. The ceremony, the intimate short portion of the early afternoon, starts in two hours. Except, right now, the closet seems more intimate – perhaps 50 people will be accommodated later, the ballroom, and if he translates that into this space, about a tenth would be in attendance. And they probably would not like to witness him undress you with his eyes.

“Mmhmm,” you hum, stumbling your fingers onto his lapels. You feel the material once, under your thumb, then smooth out imaginary wrinkles. He has to wonder what you see that he doesn’t, but he says nothing about it, not wanting you to leave him. “Luckily, Jaehyun has you then, huh?” You press your palm into his jacket, just the one time, above his rapidly beating heart, then start dropping your hand.

But he catches you.

“I’m lucky,” he says, the words falling from the tip of his tongue, like breaking the dam, letting all the pent-up and unresolved feelings flood, “to have you.” Jeno subconsciously tugs you forward, by your hand, until you stand just a hair away, your dress breathing like a Lee Byung-Ho sculpture for SeMA’s Aging World installation a few years ago (he took you and spent the whole time scribbling your name next to the notes that he had to decipher later for his extra credit essay). He flickers his eyes across your face, waiting before he gets an approval. You stay still for the longest second in history, and he mirrors it, mirrors you. When you appear to move away, he also copies that. “Sorry. Sorry. I know we’re in a kind of uncomfortable spot, and I probably shouldn’t’ve –“

“Jeno?”

“… Yeah?”

“Can I kiss you?”

“Please.”

You fist his jacket, ruining the lapels more obvious for him to see, making him stagger forward. He braces a hand on the bookcase storage behind you, pulling your lower back toward his pelvis to help you evade ramming your spine into the shelves, but he still falls, face first into yours, one strong arm keeping you close, the other hovering above your cheek, too scared that he might crush you with the impossible weight of his crush, his feelings. You try to comfort him – as you always do, like a rock – fluffing his hair. Then, your foot slips, stiletto heel snagging on a loose roll of toilet paper. And he catches you, of course, always, holding your waist so tightly that you might crack. You echo him, this time, grabbing, groping, gripping every surface that you possibly can. To stop himself from toppling you, he bunches your silk dress at your hip and shoves his strong leg between your thighs. He drags you up his knee once, twice, thrice, and you moan.

“Jeno,” you barely manage to breathe, after one kiss, lips tight. You go lax in his arms, fawning over his arm like a damsel in distress – head thrown back, hair starting to tangle at the roots, leg hooking onto his waist. He moves down to your neck, your collarbone, your chest; he slides down the spaghetti strap for easier access, peppering wet kisses onto your skin. “Oh, my God,” you moan, arms tightening around his neck, drawing him impossibly close and thrusting your half-exposed tits in his face. “Don’t stop, don’t stop.”

Jeno kisses you harder, his tongue barely poking out, bottom lip dragging up. His inhales feel – and sound – heavy, trying to inhale everything about this moment.

“I want you,” he mumbles, nose brushing your cheek. He stops kissing you, open mouth panting into your ear. “But not like this. Not right here.”

“Jen,” you whine, sliding your hand under his jacket, clutching the back of his dress-shirt slightly untucked. “Please. I want you.”

“I – “ he gasps. “I –“

Then your phone rings.

I want you so bad, but not like this. I want to make love with you.

“He-hello?” you answer. You press your forehead to Jeno’s, and he takes the opportunity to analyze your face, the face he has memorized in his daydreams. Jeno twirls a loose, long strand of your hair, tucking it behind your ear. “Yeah, I f-ff-found it.” He presses a singular kiss under your jaw, tongue hunting for a prominent vein. And when he finds it, he pushes, harder, sucking just light enough not to create an ostentatious mark. “Mmm,” you nearly moan wantonly, legs giving out, “I-I’ll br-bring it by right now. O-okay, yeah, bye.” You quickly hang up the phone, dropping it to the floor, and wrap your arms around Jeno’s neck, returning one kiss, the final kiss, long and chaste, everything spilling out. “I have to go,” you whisper, sliding down his thigh.

“Yeah,” he mumbles back, “Me too.”

During the wedding, you did this a lot.

Thankfully no one noticed, or you hoped that no one noticed – you and Jeno staring at each other, across the altar; you behind Jeonghan, Mingyu’s best man; him behind Yuta, Jaehyun’s best man. You wanted to pay attention to the grooms, and their lovely ceremony, but seeing Jeno, just a few people away, had you quixotically imagining him at the forefront of the room, surrounded by your own friends and family. Who would be his best man: Renjun, Jaemin, Haechan? Would you get married in his hometown, or maybe abroad? What would you wear – Leehwa, Vera Wang, custom Prada?

Everything faded in front of you, when he met your gaze, staring you down over Yuta’s shoulder, closest to the officiant. You thought that the venue’s organization had it out for you, putting you on a pedestal below Jaehyun, but as Jeno returned your acknowledgement, you realized that the venue was, really, protecting your feelings, because the moment you locked eyes, the entire weekend flashed through your memory – almost kisses, actual kisses, accidental touches. You had to suppress all those feelings, make sure none of it was written on your face, like they meant nothing, like you don’t know what his current suit looks like crumpled and on the floor of your hotel room, like he belongs closer to you. The cheers following Jaehyun and Mingyu’s ‘I do’s were the only thing to bring you out of your own head, to draw the details of reality again, as if you willed time itself to move into the reception so that you could have Jeno to yourself again, restoring the intimacy of this affair to the grooms.

Unfortunately, it took a bit longer to even breathe in Jeno’s direction.

Both the Jung and Kim families shuffled everyone down to the reception ballroom, where even more friends and family and colleagues waited. You had to go back upstairs, without Jeno, to change into your party dress – the silk purple one, a shorter material that matches the tie you bought him. And then, the tables separated you as well, sending Jeno to mingle with other singles and you with your distant cousins, through the first course as both grooms, together, made their rounds, greeting every guest and expressing their gratitude in low bows for coming to celebrate their union. You finally found an escape during the main dish, which forced everyone to pull food from a buffet table rather than be served the same appetizer.

“Hey,” you bump elbows in line with Jeno, stealing his attention from the galbi-jjim, a small smile fighting your cheeks. “I – I can’t believe we got separated there. Do you think I can sneak you back to my table?”

Jeno chuckles and places a rib on your plate, using the obnoxiously large tongs to fix a batonnet carrot atop the meat. “I hope so,” he answers honestly, nose crinkling as a sign of it. “You’d think that they would put us together, since I’m supposed to be your plus one.”

“But I guess not,” you finish for him. You look over your shoulder at your table – nearly empty, like the preceding pew taking communion, then whisper, like making a tryst between spies, “Meet me at my table when you’re done. You can take my aunt’s chair; she’s dreadfully boring.”

You finish plating the traditional food that Jaehyun picked out for the occasion (according to Mingyu) and return to your table (Table No. 3) ahead of Jeno, who stopped to wait for a restock of japchae right before the dessert platters. He is easy to please – and they do say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach – because after he plates his noodles, he looks over his shoulders and sneaks a bite, eyes prettily fluttering closed, lips puckered around the tips of his manicured nails, licking his fingers clean. You try not to laugh, biting it behind an inevitable smile. Jeno finds you, easily, as he always does, tilting his head in confusion, but you wave him off, gesturing for him to finally join you, make you feel at little less alone among the extended family branches.

“Here, take some of the japchae,” he says, already unveiling a nearby fork from the dark green napkin cloth and piling it next to your rice. “It tastes –” He kisses his fingers. “- chef’s kiss, amazing.”

“You two make a lovely couple,” your aunt interrupts – not the dreadfully boring one; a different aunt, a younger aunt, who, just two years ago, claimed that she wouldn’t be like the rest of the peanut gallery, gossiping and leaping to conclusions about everyone younger’s love lives. You and Jeno sink into your respective chairs, deliberately avoiding touching each other. She leans in, over your arm, almost daring Jeno with her excited Princess doe eyes. “Can we expect another wedding soon?” He coughs. And you drop your metal chopsticks. And your aunt leans back, shrugging as if she hadn’t dropped a bomb. “It shouldn’t be a surprise. I’m probably not the only one who is expecting it. You graduated college – what – 10? 13? months ago. Right now would be perfect for you to get married, while you’re still young.” She briefly points a spoon at Jaehyun and Mingyu, before chopping up her almon bowl. “They got married young, and now they’re going to honeymoon across Europe. I’m just saying –“ She shoves a bite of food in her mouth. “It’s better to get married young – you grow together; finances are easier to manage; your health is in good shape, etc. etc.”

Your other aunt, her wife, finally joins, too, and smacks her arm. “Are you bothering another couple about getting married?” She turns to you with sympathetic eyes. “Sorry, after we got married, four years ago,” she emphasizes more to her wife than you or Jeno, eyes slightly narrowed (although playfully) on the last syllable, “she has been obsessed with weddings.”

“Happens when you marry a wedding planner.” They kiss.

You turn away, shyly looking at Jeno, mouthing an apology.

Surprisingly, he leans into your ear, whispering. His initial breath, before he even says anything, sends shivers down your spine, and he grabs your arm, rubbing your naked forearm for warmth. Oh. He mistook it. “Just play along,” he instructs. You can feel a hair move from its place. “It’s easier to say that you don’t know when we’ll get married than to explain why we’re, um, you are not dating.”

“W-we don’t actually know when we’ll get married,” you answer, gradually building your voice to conversation decibel.

“See! I told you they were a couple! There is no way that they wouldn’t be. Look at them!”

You cautiously glance at Jeno, stopping at his matching purple tie (he must’ve changed when you changed; and lucky him, a simple tie is easier than an entire dress), because you do not want to be so obvious about your lie. The train conductor, the Uber driver, the hotelier … they all thought the same, but since then, the start of your trip, you discovered that he does want you to touch him, in all the ways that carry meaning (and then some). You just do not know to what extent. He never said anything, never explained anything, not that you are entitled to his feelings. And you tried to reason it all – maybe you say too much, not really letting him, or maybe he says too little, constantly shocked to silence by all the secrets you spill.

You open your mouth at the round table, but another aunt of yours comes by and pinches Jeno’s cheek, saying something about how handsome he is, the statement echoing far off in your ears. And thank God, honestly; you did not quite know what to respond, merely hoping that, if you simply opened your mouth, your Broca’s area would follow. It didn’t.

“Yes, yes, but as you mentioned, my lovely date does not have a drink, so we best fix that,” you hear Jeno express. You peek to your side, then up, seeing him having stood at some point in his conversation. He throws you a look, eyebrows raised, eyes wide, smile nearly rectangular, and nods toward the open bar. Oh! You stand up, too, albeit clumsily, knocking your thigh into the mahogany, the silverware and ceramics jostling; you give your aunts a hasty bow and apology before taking Jeno’s arm. “See,” he says to your other aunt, “We must be going. There is a long Island iced tea out there with my name on it.” They laugh together, then you let Jeno drag you away to the open bar, away from prying aunties.

“Long Island iced tea?” You quirk a single eyebrow. He refused to drink those ever since the 2020 trip to Germany when you, Jaemin, and Renjun got so fucked up on Long Island iced teas, consuming more and more, claiming that it just wasn’t hitting, until it did, that the four of you missed your nonrefundable trip back to Incheon.

Jeno rubs the back of his neck. “Yeah, I, uh, couldn’t think of a different drink.”

You flutter your eyes to the drinks menu, reading through the specialties until you find the Long Island iced tea … right above the Sweet Pink Punch, a fruity pink margarita that is definitely right up his alley, had he had a few drinks in his system already. You raise your eyebrow even further up.

“Okay! I wanted the pink drink,” he pouts. “Is that what you want me to say?” The bartender immediately pops one up on the counter for him, pointedly fluffing the pink little petals over the equally pink salted rim. Jeno groans. “So not what I wanted.”

“Here,” you laugh, flagging down the same bartender. “I’ll take a six blueberry kamikaze shots and a whiskey smash.” It is Jeno’s turn raise an eyebrow at you, and you laugh harder, lightly smacking him on the stomach. “Don’t look at me like that. We’re just gonna take a couple shots to take the edge off this whole party, –” A bit of liquid luck, if you were being completely transparent. “– then, we’ll make a few rounds and leave early. The key is – thank you –“ You pass him half the shots and put your drinks close together, making it ambiguous which belongs to whom. “– The key is to make a strong impression, and since we were at the altar today, I think we’ve got a free pass, but, just to be safe, –” You down a shot. “– we’ll take a few more photos, schmooze Mingyu’s cousins, note a talking point for later, then –“ You click your tongue. “– we’ll bounce.” You down another shot. Just one little glass remains, filled on your side of the bar, while your date has yet to even touch the table, so you look up at him. Jeno has an arm folded under his chest, opposite fingers dragging his bottom lip down, intermittently padding inside his mouth. And you swallow, throat suddenly dry with only liquid courage to drink. “Is … Is that okay?”

“Huh?” He drops his hand, and your eye follows, mouth drawing a continuous blank. “Oh, yeah,” he answers. “But, um, we don’t have to leave right away. It’s your cousin’s wedding; it might be fun to hang around with everyone for a bit.”

Jeno doesn’t know why he said that – We don’t have to leave right away, and it might be fun to hang around for a bit. Those few rounds you talked about (not the shots ☹) turned into hours, even more after you offered to stay while everyone else left, to help clean the reception hall. Jeno stood up, also, to start piling dishes into bus tubs, but you, and the others helping, only gave him easy-to-complete tasks or shooing him away. He eventually just sat down, sporadically drinking a bottle of soju, watching you laugh with your aunt and Mingyu, now your cousin-in-law, over something he couldn’t hear from so far away.

And when Jaehyun approaches, Jeno misses him, too caught up in the way your eyes almost physically light up at Mingyu’s umpteenth gawky faux pas of the night.

“How long?”

Jeno jumps, straightens his back. He relaxes after seeing Jaehyun, who looks far calmer than a couple hours ago. Maybe marriage suits him, brings out the vulnerability that no one really sees unless they get a few drinks in him. Jeno wonders if marriage would change him. Would he be more conscientious? Introverted (if that were even possible)? Would he have the same level of self-control? Or would his sex life get worse? And what if he didn’t marry you? He wants everything that marriage entails, even the compromises he might not be able to think about right now, but he isn’t sure that he would want it if it wasn’t with you.

“I …”

“How long have you been in love?” Jaehyun repeats, a knowing look quirked into his smile.

Jeno inhales, once, twice. He opens his mouth. Then, he puts down his bottle. “Forever,” he answers quietly, “maybe.” He winces. That sounds wrong, so he corrects himself, “Probably. Your cousin …” he starts, not saying your name, because if he does, he might accidentally confess something that he wants only you to hear.

Jaehyun chuckles, possibly more intoxicated than Jeno. It feels like that time in high school (Jeno cringes at how often he’s thought about his teenage years, like someone stuck in the past, but he cannot help that he has spent half his life with you) – that time in high school, near the end, when you invited him to his first college party, Jaehyun’s college party. So many things happened, so many firsts happened: his first beer, his first time losing his wallet (it was in the garage refrigerator), his first hickey; he emerged from a random bedroom, tugging up the collar of his shirt, and accidentally bumped into Jaehyun who was coming out of the bathroom from a different – but similar – experience.

“Dramatic,” Jaehyun comments. And Jeno whips his head to look at the groom, but he finds him looking at Mingyu. Jeno turns, too, but his eyes find you instead, instantly forgetting about the wedding party, until Jaehyun starts talking again. “Though, understandable.” Jaehyun spins his chair to Jeno, crouching a little closer, like he is about to reveal a secret. “You know, I almost asked you to give a wedding speech too.”

“Me?” Jeno points to himself. Jaehyun nods, re-affirming. “Why?”

Jaehyun shrugs, leaning back. He takes Jeno’s soju. “Because you give good speeches.” He tilts his bottle to Mingyu and you dancing and singing (Mingyu off-beat; you off-key). “My husband –” He smiles (that annoying and sickening lovey-dovey smile … that Jeno can’t help but want too). “– thought it might make you confess.”

“What?!”

Jaehyun shrugs again. Then, a beat passes, and Jeno opens his mouth, but Jaehyun gets up to join you and Mingyu; you pulling him up by an imaginary lasso. He hands back the soju, shimmying toward his husband. Another jealous pang bubbles in Jeno’s chest, and, yeah, he may not be the best person to let give a speech, or he might be the best. Sure, he wants that – to be called someone’s (your) husband and dance the night away with them (you); and yeah, he thinks about what it means to be in love, or what love itself means, and he comes to the same conclusion, every time. He comes to the same conclusion as you gesture for him to join the mini-after party, starting up an old SHINEE song on your iPhone that everyone knows.

More muzak fills the silence, albeit awkwardly now, through the first floor of the hotel. Jeno holds the sensor open, allowing you to enter first and push the Floor F button. He takes a place next to you, leaning on the cold wall, flushed face finally starting to mellow. You stare at the red numbers increasing on the monitor above the door, adjusting the hem of your purple cocktail dress lower than his tuxedo jacket hanging off your shoulders, rubbing your thighs together at your knees. The reception lasted longer than you anticipated; weddings, especially those so deep in Busan, tend not to exceed two hours, but you stayed passed 7 PM, since 11 AM, helping around where you could. And maybe it started out as a way to avoid Jeno, after the previous night, then all the discomfort and embarrassment faded, once you got a kiss and liquid courage. It seems to have faded by now though.

“Beautiful, um, beautiful ceremony,” Jeno mumbles, scratching the back of his neck and biting back a smile.

"Yeah,” you agree, breaking into a nervous smile. You fumble with the silver cufflinks, the memory of the last time you were confined to a small space with him – the closet at the Park Hyatt Hotel – at the forefront of your brain, and you wonder if his breath would be warm, or warmer, on your neck now. A glimpse of Jeno crawls into the corner of your eye, so you look him up and down. He doesn’t appear tired, rather lost in thought, like you, lips sucked in as if preventing another secret from falling out (or maybe he has to throw up). It becomes harder to ignore the weekend tension, the unsaid confessions, the sex. “Jeno, I lo –”

“So –”

Silence pulses, and the elevator goes up a floor.

You both close your mouths again. Perhaps you should have taken the stairs; the huffing and puffing would help you break the quietude. Beautiful ceremony was the first thing he said to you since getting into the Uber from the reception hall. And before that, he only made small talk, interrupting you if he even sensed a deeper conversation. It was frustrating, but you also understood. You kept bringing it up at inopportune times. Either the next task (eg, the wedding, the not-your wedding) or the atmosphere (eg, too many people) prevented you from really talking it out.

“Oh, you go first.”

“No, you were talking first. You go.”

You inhale. “Jeno, I lo –”

Ding. You have arrived at Floor F.

There it is again.

Jeno shrugs his shoulders sheepishly, gesturing for you to leave ahead of him. “We can talk about this in our room.”

Our room. Funny enough, since you two moved into the new gender-neutral dorms, at the beginning of college, people assumed that you were roommates (oh, my God, they were roommates) and were quite shocked upon finding out that Jeno chose to stay with Jaemin and you with an upperclassman, Yoohyeon, who had the same major as you but was in her last year. And similarly, to this hotel, your room – our room – is in the middle of the Fth Floor. Yay, more awkward silence to tread through. :|

You fall into routine with Jeno, as you step foot in your hotel: he takes your his jacket from your shoulders, hanging it in the closet by the door, and you saunter towards the closest bed, eyes trained on the ground as if an officer asked you to for a walk and turn test. You kick your shoes off by the heels, nearly moaning when the straps release your feet, and rub the bottom before a blister appears. Jeno, equally shoeless, joins you, sits beside you, his thighs parted widely on the space you give him.

“Jeno, I lo –” you start. But he leans over, caressing your cheek, and kisses you, slow yet passionate. His thumb rubs long, comforting lines above your jaw, helping you to relax further and you accept, holding onto his arm for stability. You add another hand, behind your back, supporting yourself as he guides you down on the neatly pleated duvet. He almost tries to say something through the embrace, his tongue clicking a syllable or two above your teeth. “Are – are we doing this again?”

Jeno pecks your lips and rests his warm, exposed forehead against yours. “As much as you want to.” He kisses you again, falling alongside you on the open bed, turning you from the edge. “I,” he pants, eyes closed, chest rising. You brush away his hair, pushing back all the strands you can bunch, stealing the moment to selfishly admire him without the weight of ruining an already intimate affair with your affair. “I – I can’t do a onetime thing with you.”

“Me neither.”

Jeno opens his eyes, instantly analyzing your face. “What does that mean?”

“It –” You peck his lips again, rolling him under your body, straddling his waist. “– means that this feels good.” You grab him by the collar, a button falling undone. He immediately finds your waist, just like the train ride, hands belting through your short dress, dragging the silky material up your thighs. You can feel his shirt scratch into your skin as you both find the most ideal spot. He winds up further on the bed, arms mingling with the sheets, and you slide down his hips, slipping to his dick, teetering on your knees, preemptively riding him. “Do-do you like it?”

His body freezes, and you fear that you did something wrong, touched something wrong, said something wrong, but then, Jeno shimmies his hips, sliding down his trousers. You feel his cotton Calvin Kleins touch your own cotton panties; your pussy practically activated by the twitch of his cock. He taps high under your thigh, drumming hard enough to jiggle your ass, almost contemplatively.

“I … like it,” he decides to say, but his easy-to-read face frowns and he opens his mouth again, “I … I love it.” He bites his lip. “I love … I love you. So much.”

“You do?”

“Yeah.” Jeno gazes into your eyes, and you try your best to reciprocate, because you do reciprocate everything: the looks, the feelings, the love. Slowly, he sits up, rolling his spine toward you. When he gets in your face, millimeters away, he tucks your hair behind your ear again. You trap his hand there, clamping it between your cheek and shoulder, leaning into him. “It’s okay if you don’t feel the same,” he whispers, but you both know that your relationship would not survive the depth of either one of your feelings, not after all these years.

“I love you, too, Lee Jeno,” you answer, kissing him before he can say anything else.

He slithers his fingers under the sides of your underwear, twisting them up, his face pliantly moving in your hands. You grind through your panties, and after a moment, you find his dick, grazing just the tip through your ass, all the way to your clit.

“Shit,” he moans. His hands readjust on your waist, gripping tighter, making you moan. “Are we doing this again?” You nod your head, holding him still and diving a bit lower. Your thighs adapt to the new curve in your back as you sloppily kiss his neck, tongue exploring his clavicle. “Then, sit on my face.”

Jeno helps your legs around his face, licking the wetness up your knees. His constant eye contact tells you to watch him, and you have to fight the urge to completely melt on his washboard abs. Jeno pulls the crotch of your panties to the side, a finger hooked around the black lacy material you once mentioned, that you looked forward to wearing after he ripped the other pair. You nearly lodge a complaint at the silence and the emptiness, but then, he moves. He flips you over, simultaneously tearing away your underwear, clawing your ass to ride his face; his chin lifting, abrading just under your clit. Your forehead falls to his groin, nails scratching into his bare legs – smooth and muscular. He starts peppering tiny kisses all over your vulva, tongue probing the further you soak his face. As a distraction, you unbutton his shirt, from the bottom up, fisting the hem, dragging up his torso. You walk backward, on your knees, punching holes into the mattress, exposing his abdomen. Experimentally, you lick a stripe through his well-defined abs. His knee kicks up. You do it again.

“Princess,” he whines, forehead resting on your inner thigh. “I won’t be able to control myself if you touch me like that.”

“I’m barely doing anything,” you mumble, crawling to his leaky cock again. Jeno, vindictively, adds a finger, and another, and another. He licks your pussy, swirling his tongue near your rim, then jumping back to your cunt, joining his three fingers. You fall forward, groaning, and take his cock, clothed, in your hand, drawing his tip along the lines of your lips, suckling the head.

“Fuck.” His head hits the mattress. It makes you feel attractive, sexy, to turn him on like this, and you love it.

“God, I love you,” you whisper.

“I love you,” Jeno returns. He almost nips your skin, lips barely covering his teeth in time. “So much,” he breathes, almost awed.

“Jeno, I’m gonna cum.”

“Wait!” He pulls his face off. “I want to see you.”

Romantic. And you guess it’s the season, that heightens, if not adds, to the sentiment. So, you contribute, trying to give him everything and more – that is what you have been doing all weekend with the train ride and the food and the hotel and the clothes, giving him your whole self.

You scramble off his chest, turning around, to face him. He flickers from your eyes to your hair and combs the staticky baby hairs back down. And you like to think that you’ve gotten to know him more, the last couple of days, think that you’ve gotten more accustomed to the little gestures, the tender indicators which show you something lasting. You lean down again, slowly, pressing a gentle kiss to his lips. He rolls you under him, trapped by his strong biceps, humping his dick between your legs, not allowing you a single moment of refractor. With his lips sewn into yours, he extracts his cock, lubricating it with your vaginal spit, teasing your hole. You swivel your hips, trying to push him inside. And just you think he might taunt you further, your orgasm hanging by a thread, he presses forward, centimeter by centimeter.

“Fuck,” you both groan, heads thrown back. A beat pulses, letting you, and him adjust to the size, the tightness (even though you spent 24-hours practically attached to his pelvis, skin sticking in this same way).

“Okay,” you exhale, “Okay. Move, please.” But Jeno keeps his head glued on your shoulder, breath shaky, chopped by tiny whimpers. You groan his name, elongating it when your voice chokes on a sob, feeling his thick cock throb inside you, raw and bare. “Jeno, please, I wan – I need to cum.”

Without looking at you, Jeno pulls back his hips, thrusting shallowly, his tip flopping around your cervix, searching for your sweet spot. And he knows when he finds – you know that he knows he found it – because your face contorts, eyes twisting shut, body relying on his touch to see. At some point, he meets you in the middle, greedily rolling his torso on top of you, roughly dragging you through the bed sheets. Jeno kisses you again, the same tender passion rising but more fervent, like he needs to chase the moment, like he missed out on chasing you all these years. So, you slow down, gasping into his mouth, showing him that you are here, with him, for him, forever, if he wants. And you let out a strangled cry, repeating his name like a mantra, hooking your arms under his shoulders:

“Jeno, Jeno, Jeno, Jeno, Jeno.”

He starts fucking you faster, increasing his pace as his name disappears into a series of blurry sobs on your tongue; he smashes his lips on yours, slamming his hips hard – hard even for him, judging by his own low-pitched whines. Your dress chokes your waist, the straps having slid down your arms, off your wrists, and your boobs spring free, somewhat free, since he holds you so close. You pull him in, nails clawing his back, flexing your legs away to give him the freest access to your cunt. He finds some stability in your clit, pushing the pulsing nub into his thrusting cock.

“Tell me you’re going to cum.”

“I’m so close. Please, please, please.”

Jeno pinches your clit. Your back drives off the mattress, trailing his abs, grinding every inch of skin that you possibly can, both of your outfits doing little to obstruct the tension, only adding strenuous friction. His hand punches the mattress, to avoid losing balance, and gives him more leverage to move faster, if that were even possible. In, out, in, out, yank, pull, prod, in, out. You babble more nonsense, brain barely processing quick I love yous and his name, before an earthquake shatters your sympathetic nervous system, breaking down the walls that blocked your orgasm. Your body trembles, rolling upward, accidentally meeting his thrusts, and your pussy spasms, coaxing out weepy hiccups from Jeno. You push two fingers between your bodies, around the base of his cock, helping his orgasm. And you feel the first ribbon of cum shoot deep in your cervix, his shoulders shuddering, but he keeps going, jamming his cum far up your cunt.

You lay there, curling around his arm, taking his cum while he planks above you, watching your spasms lessen. Jeno moves first, removing your clothes and situating the two of you by the pillows. He pulls you into his chest, shimmying your dress off your legs and his shirt off his shoulders. You let yourself close your eyes, melting into his arms, into the weekend, into finally getting the love of your life. And maybe minutes, or an hour, passes, not that you’re counting, because you’ll have him as long as he will have you. And you think he feels the same, know he feels the same when he whispers a phrase that only people who want to be together for a long time say:

“So, when are we getting married?”

[val-of-the-north]

@drenched-in-sunlight while I am not going to deny that you probably have some issue with this fandom at large, this post of yours is still pretty relevant to mine. You start it off by talking about it, said "most of it was wrong" (despite admitting you just skimmed through it in the comments),

that blender's reblog "refuted everything in it" (false, also you wouldn't know that) and even that you would have reblogged just their addition while leaving out the entire thing I wrote if you could have. If that doesn't spell out the low opinion you had of my original post, I don't know what does...

And I'd say the fact it's not a vagueblog as you said but that "everyone knows which post you are talking about" is exactly why I should be allowed to respond to this without issue. If I reblogged someone's addition to a take of yours that attempted to debunk it and then belittled your original post in a separate instance on my blog, you would have all the rights to tell me I did something you disliked/that upset you.

I am sorry to hear some shallow people have attacked your art, trying to educate you in the comments or reblogs or whatever else, or that they have disregarded your clear appreciation of Marika's character to make their own dumb claims. It is not something I ever condoned, and in fact, I have had issues with people doing this kind of thing in the past, specifically with a post from another user about Midra and Nanaya and how every other commenter was trying to "correct" the artist with their (completely subjective) take on the situation.

With that out of the way, how is that any different from what Blender did in their reblog of my original post? It is quite literally coming onto my post, and reblogging it in a manner that does not partake to the original point I was trying to make in the slightest, using their own conjectures and story ideas as proof and evidence. I may not be a great artist the way you are, but these posts take time to formulate too, so forgive me if I find it annoying when my post is not only disregarded, but also derailed from the original point I was trying to make in favor of something they clearly cared more about (Marika "slander" over literally any other point about the Hornsent and genocide) and belittled on top of that! Is it only allowed to be frustrating when it happens to you, but something worth celebrating when it happens to someone you don't agree with? Is that so?

But yes, that is what annoyed me, really. My post only touched upon Marika and Messmer tangentially, and yet the other user reblogged it, focused on that aspect specifically, and even completely spat on my point about genocide by trying to cast moral ambiguity on both the extermination of Fire Giants and even the Hornsent themselves just to give Marika some levity from some of her 100% confirmed crimes! I was baffled at how utterly my point was disregarded/missed/straight-up ignored, and your approval of that only made it worse (especially considering you didn't even read my post fully, and I honestly start to doubt Blender did either). I don't get acting just like the people you say you dislike, except with words that actually do have weight because you are an account far bigger than any of your haters I would think. I didn't wish the point to get muddied by Marika discourse, and some of the points brought up by that original reblog did just that, and I am sorry, my post was NOT meant to be the place for it.

I do not wish to make an enemy of you, especially not about some fictional stuff. I don't care if you don't feel the same way I do about some things, and that you interpret them differently. What I don't want to see is the blatant disregard for anyone's points and opinions because of it. Maybe you have seen more people absolutely shitting on Marika, but I have seen the opposite much more frequently, which is the reason my post was made. It's ultimately a matter of what you choose to prioritize. You would have been fully justified to feel the same annoyance I felt if a Marika post you made was twisted in the reblogs to be about the corruption of the Golden Order or whatever.

I contemplated a lot whether to reblog that post because i think most of it was wrong, but the addition is so great and refute pretty much everything while raising some amazing points so if i could reblog only the addition without the original posts i would.

It’s just funny to me how every time i see ppl “here are Marika’s crimes” they list like 50% is what she actually did, and the other 50% are things that either was during Radagon time (when Marika couldn’t even have a proper statue that depict her as being the one in control), done by some other guys, or after she got strung up inside the Erdtree. Y’know, literally impaled and knocked out cold ?

The ritual sword and shield talisman (which depict sword and shield of Crucible Knights too btw) pointed at Radagon’s face to say by his time, all ritual combats in honour of the Erdtree had died out, but in LoS it was maintained and Messmer even had a talisman of Godfrey in his castle. A talisman depicting Godfrey accepting the duty to be his Mother’s Lord. Without wavering.

The ritual combat is just another thing that will remind people of the first Elden Lord’s devotion to his Goddess, which would do Radagon no good. so that, along with the Crucible Knights, gotta go.

All this just show how by Radagon’s time, the Golden Order’s ideal no longer reflects the Erdtree’s - another testament at how far from each other his and Marika’s will have diverged.

Also, i really like the fact that the Zamor and Ice Dragons allied with Marika to fight the Fire Giants who had chased them from their home, because to me that means at the start of her age, Marika was extending her help to people who needed it (with ulterior motives, yes).

Her age wasn’t built in a vacuum. She was a healer Godling with no offensive spells, Messmer’s health just got a bit better, Godfrey with all the implications in SoTe, was probably just a simple bear hunter? What on earth those 3 could even do in a land where the Hornsent royalty reigned supreme?

Go somewhere else, recruit as many people and make as many alliances as they could. I have no doubt the world under the Hornsent was a violent one (hell, it still is now, every time i went into a Gaol i want to go back and smack the Hornsent inquisitors a few more times). And for a new God to appear, and instead of stuffing people into jars, delivering Death, entrapping their followers into watching over some flame for eternity, running away and leaving their Lord to get backstabbed by a tyrant, this new God… healed people? Big shock!

So of course people would flock to Godfrey’s banner, believing in a Goddess that could barely fight, but soothed away all of their pain and sorrow. Sounds fucking familiar isn’t it.

Btw, why do people like to invent a bunch of authority and power for Marika then at the same breath will say whatever her kids do is to… spite her and show kindness to the oppressed?

So she is an all-powerful tyrant that could kill whoever she dislikes, and by some ppl’s standards she dislikes literally everyone in Lands Between (💀), but Godwyn could just befriend a dragon and spread a cult about them within the Capital, Messmer could have an albinauric as his Commander (to command an army that she paid wads of cash to and bless them with her hammer’s power???), Miquella and Malenia could go their merry way and build a whole ass tree castle (where is the fund. Where is the fund) and she couldn’t do anything to stop them? Even though those actions directly affect the strength of her army? What?

I swear i can’t even see other people’s Marika as Marika. Because their Marika sounds dumb as hell and a doormat too. Like what is this???? 💀 do you think i sacrificed my back and wrist to draw Elden Ring characters as beautiful as possible, so they could go be devote to someone like the Marika some of y’all envision? The bar was on the floor for you but not for me.

[slasherlouvre]

:¨·.·¨:

`·. About me

- you can call me Nymphie!

- (she/her/afab | early 20's | INFP | switch/vers)

- Sinclair boys biased ꒰⌗´͈ ᵕ ॣ`͈⌗꒱৩

- this blog is 18+, minors will be blocked

Requesting rules, info, & Masterlists 💌 ↓

Writing Masterlist!

Ask games & Writing Prompt Masterlist

Tag Directory:

(Because my tags are probably unnecessarily confusing at this point)

Who you can request:

- Thomas Hewitt 🌻

- Bo Sinclair 🧢

- Vincent Sinclair 🕯

- Lester Sinclair 🦝

*I'll sometimes write for other slashers, but that's really only whenever I feel like it (I have major Sinclair brainrot rn). If you're requesting headcanons/reactions though, I'll include them^ all by default!*

What I write:

- x readers (full fics/oneshots/shorts), reactions, headcanons, drabbles ✅️

- platonic, romantic ✅️

- sfw, nsfw ✅️

- fem dom reader pegging ✅️

- hinge poly relationship (no slasher x slasher, just slashers x reader) ✅️

- cnc, dubcon ✅️

- standard gore, violence, etc. ✅️

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- just want to send in slasher thoughts/random asks/etc.? please do! ✅️

Don't be afraid to get specific when requesting/suggesting! Otherwise I'll leave it up to my imagination or preference :)

What I won't write:

- incest ❌️

- pedophilia ❌️

- violent noncon, r*pe ❌️

- most BDSM ❌️ (sorry Bo..) (overstimulation, edging, orgasm denial, light bondage, gentle (fem)dom reader etc. are all okay)

- bathroom related kinks.. ❌️

- parenting/kids?? ❌️ (themes involving breeding kink/pregnancy are welcome, just nothing beyond that)

- m|m and f|f pairings ❌️ (just because I don’t have enough experience to properly write for them, but I try to keep all of my writing as gender neutral as possible; otherwise they'll be x fem reader/afab by default)

- going into detail about reader's gender/sexual/cultural/religious identity etc. ❌️ (I really don't want to accidentally misrepresent you in my writing, sorry!)

- anything else relating to these categories/that I may not be comfortable with

Additional Info:

- if you're still not sure if I'll write for your request based on the rules, you can send it in anyway & I'll review it!

- please remember this blog is a side hobby I enjoy and I am not *required* to write your request/suggestion

It may take me a while to put out works or reply to messages due to mental health/uni/work/adhd etc., but I love writing for our slasher boys, and I look forward to seeing you in the inbox! 💓

- also!! if I haven't replied to your inbox ask it's probably because I'm busy, or (slowly) working on your piece in my drafts :) I'm not ignoring you, I promise!

Thank you for all of the likes, reblogs, and kind words ! ! !

I may not always reply, but I appreciate every single sweet/funny/motivational tag, comment, message, etc. They never fail to make my day! :') 💗

Also, if we're moots, we're automatically friends and you could never annoy me when interacting, ily 🫂

Ok, that's it, thank you for stopping by!!

(( I'll keep this post updated in case of changes or additions! ))

Special thanks to @osirisisv for letting me use their lovely art for dividers!! 💕