#sorry there are so many tags for this game I'm trying my best

[haz311bl0gs]

"Instead of doing that, how 'bout you stop running away from reality!?"

[crowfanity]

Suddenly really want to replay Tales of Berseria again because I love the characters and (most of) the story but it's been years and I still can't think about it without getting pissed off at how badly the ending screwed Velvet over

[the-cooler-king]

Oh yeah..... midnight gospel be hitting.... sitting in my bed fuckin. Crying. Get a grip girl

[enwoso]

Ooh a bit of an angsty one!

Can we have something about when Alessia transferred from United to Arsenal and how grumpy reacted to the fans (not all fans but quite a lot of them) turning on Alessia?

Something about the transition period and how they adjusted to the new club please!

Love your writing so much!

FOR THE BETTER — alessia russo x child!reader

sorry to whoever requested this that it has taken me so long, i do apologise! this was supposed to be out last week but then i was ill and then life was busy so it’s been a bit delayed but hey better late than never eh?

ALSO thank you all for 400 followers i love and appreciate each and every one of you all<3🥹

grumpy universe masterlist

the past couple of weeks had been a whirlwind for alessia but even more so for you. you weren't used to change nor were you a big fan of change.

you'd had basically the same routine your entire life. same bedtime, same favourite teddy, same favourite colour, same amount of sweets you were allowed before bed.

it was all you had ever known and so was manchester.

so when you got home from being australia it was a little weird to you not be going back home with your auntie ella and the other united girls like you usually would after an england camp.

when leaving for the world cup you didn't realise that, that was going to be the last time you were going to be in that home in manchester, the last time you would wake up in that home.

instead, this time you were going back with lotte and the other girls who lived in london for some strange reason unknown to you.

"mummy! where auntie ella going?" you asked as sat on top of the trolley of suitcases as alessia had went to say goodbye to her best friend not knowing when she would next see her.

"back to manchester lovie" she smiled softly, her voice a little shaky. your eyebrows knitted together a litttle, "why we not go with her, we live dere too!" you pouted, your face struck with confusion.

"lovie, we had this talk before we went to australia" alessia had stopped in the airport, dismissing lotte who stood waiting for her. signalling that you'd catch them back up.

"talk?"

"about mummy,, moving to a new club" the blonde spoke calmly trying to re jog your little memory as your mouth opened to an 'o' shape. realisation hitting you that change was happening as the talk memory appeared back into your head.

"your here, i thought you were watching tv in my room" you jumped a little at the sound of your mummy's voice as she came into your room. you'd been playing a game with your dolls on your bedroom floor.

"you wan be this one?" you asked holding up a doll towards your mum as she smiled, nodding and joined you on your bedroom floor.

"before we play though, i actually need to talk to you" your mum sounded serious as a frown appeared on your face, mummy only ever wanted to 'talk' when you had done something you were not supposed to of.

"oh- your not in trouble lovie"

"so mummy has been asked to join a new football club, called arsenal" she explained to you as the doll in your hand dropped slightly. a slight silence filling the room.

"you still play here?" you asked as your mum shook her head, "no lovie it means we have to move down to london"

you paused for a minute, it processing in your head "oh, but who play tag with after training?" you sadly smiled, you would play tag with millie and ona after each training session.

"i'm sure many of the girls will love playing tag with you, beth and leah play there too" mummy said as you looked back up from the ground.

"from england?" you asked as mummy nodded. it took a little convincing from you but once alessia had assured you, after you were a bit hesitant you agreed and didn't feel as sad about leaving manchester.

since the day in the airport, you had settled into your new home in london. it had already been better than manchester as you already seeing your uncles and grandparents more in the past week than you had the entire time that you lived in manchester.

you had made friends at your new nursery, settling in quick — quicker than alessia expected. as well as decorating your room the colour you wanted as well as picking out a new bed, which mummy had described to you as being your first big girl bed.

alessia of course had already started training for preseason. however you hadn't had a chance to go to training with being at nursery so today would be the first time meeting your mummy's teammates.

you were scared.

you don't remember meeting the united girls, to you they had always been there. but mummy said that was because you were just a baby when you first met those girls.

walking hand in hand with your mummy, your other hand holding your elephant teddy, esme which you'd had since you were really little held close and tight to your chest.

your mummy leading you to where she would put her training bag away, along with your bag before leading you down the long corridors to where the team was having lunch.

the arsenal girls knew that you were coming today and had asked alessia what was the best way to introduce themselves to you, not wanting to make you feel overwhelmed by all the new faces.

alessia suggesting that it be one by one as you weren't the biggest fan of big crowds and being fussed over.

you tugged on your mums arm, asking to be picked up as she did placing you on her hip as she walked deeper into the room. there being a few faces which you recognised that being the three england girls but once you spotted some of the other girls you hid your face deep in your mum's neck.

"oh is that you tiny?" beth beamed as you kept your face hidden feeling the movement of alessia sitting down. her hand rubbing up and down your back to try and soothe you, hoping you would come out from your little shell you'd put yourself in.

"she's gone all shy" alessia shrugged as she tried to peel you from your hiding spot, only whines coming from you as you dug your face deeper into her chest.

"shy? if there's one thing tiny isn't and that's shy!" you heard leah say, as well as your mum hum as she nodded her head in agreement.

it was true when you had the chance you could easily talk for england and would most definitely come away with a gold medal in that type of competition. alessia had her brothers and ella to thank for your chattiness even though she loved to hear you ramble on about anything and everything.

“tiny! do you want to see these photos of myle?” beth tried this time, you had been obsessed with the little puppy that beth had just gotten. myle was so small and any time you were at beth’s you would sit and talk to myle — you considered myle to be one of your best friends since you’d moved to arsenal as she too was getting used to all the new faces just like you were.

this seemed to do the trick as you slowly peeled yourself from your mums chest, half your face turning to look at beth, as the other half was covered with your grey elephant teddy. beth who was on her phone more than likely looking for the photos.

you looked up to your mum still unsure as you could see out the corner of your eye the unknown faces of your mummy’s new teammates. your mummy smiling nodding her head enthusiastically as you slowly climbed down from her lap and over to beth who was sat in between leah and viv.

you fingers in your mouth, you other hand having esme the elephant in it as you walked nervously over to beth, standing next to her as she lifted you onto her lap.

her phone screen in front of you as she showed you an arrange of photos of myle, some with a little scarf wrapped around her collar, some of her just lying asleep around beth and viv’s apartment and the rest were myle with some of the girls who were sat in the room with you right now.

“who dat?” you pointed to one of the girls who was holding myle another one of the girls sat next to her as your face scrunched at the unknown people.

“that’s vic and steph, look their over there!” beth pointed the two girls out as they both noticed you looking at them sending you a small wave, as you returned it. alessia watching on as she talked with leah and viv a smile appearing on the blondes face as she watched you slowly come out of your shell.

beth carried on swiping through the photos as you had now learned who kyra, katie, caitlin and stina were sending them all a small shy wave as beth pointed them out in the canteen.

“who dis?” you pointed to the girl in the photo as beth has swiped to the next photo.

“and that’s lia” beth smiled as you looked at her confused, “no that not leah? le there” you frowned as you pointed to the blonde leah who was sat with your mum across the table from you.

beth chuckling lightly at your little misunderstanding, “no tiny, there’s another lia! look there” beth pointed to the other lia as you awh in realisation, sending the lia a little wave like you’d done with the other girls.

“there two leah’s?” you turn to look at beth, who nodded with a smile on her face.

beth carried on, pointing out each of the arsenal girls as you did your signature shy wave at them as beth felt a slight feeling of accomplishment that you’d began to come out your shell, yes you may have not actually met the girls properly but you’d been introduced to and anyway there was plenty of time for you to meet them, the arsenal girls would not only becoming your mummy’s new teammates but they in time would become part of your family.

alessia had now been at arsenal for a few months now and you both had fully settled in, your home in london had finally come together and your room was fully decorated and in your opinion a lot better than your room in manchester.

and now the league had started and you’d now become fully acquainted with all the girls and as your mum had expected once you’d come out your shell, you loved them all.

after beth sat you down and showed you all the girls, it took you a few days to learn all there faces but you had now learned all about them and they had learned all about you and your little habits too.

katie who you learned was irish and had an accent that you found funny as she would say some words funny like the word three always had you in stitches as it sounded like tree, she was cool too as she would let you get away with being a little naughty sometimes.

caitlin, steph and kyra were all australian, they all had a funny accent to you too but the three of them were all different. caitlin was quiet but she would always let you pass the ball to her and play tag with you once training was done.

steph would let you talk to her as she answered all your questions you had about australia especially after just spending the summer there. and kyra well she would help you cause trouble, she would always sit with you and colour as well as dance around the changing room with you when the music was on.

vic was someone who mummy would sometimes take to training, and who mummy would spent a lot of time with when at training. vic was dutch just like viv. and vic wasn’t a big fan of mummy’s driving and on a morning when you were going to training with the as you sat in the back vic would sometimes sit and complain about mummy’s driving as you would sit in the back in your car seat giggling.

and for lia it had taken you a few days to wrap your head around there being two leah’s as in your mind you had only met one leah and that was blonde leah. so you had decided to give them your own nicknames, leah one and lia two just so you didn’t get confused.

as for the rest of the girls they had all been very welcoming to you and your mummy, helping you both to fit in.

and now it was onto the second match of the season against manchester united, the first time alessia was going to be back since she left. to say she was a little nervous was an understatement but she was trying her best not to show it.

“you okay?” lotte asked knowing how much the blonde had been dreading this fixture to come, and it being so early on in the season was not helping. as she walked into the leigh sports village with alessia, you following suit next to her.

wearing your new arsenal shirt, russo printed on the back in big white capital letters over the top of your hoodie it being a cold october night down in manchester something alessia definitely wasn’t missing since moving back down south.

alessia didn’t say anything just nod as she looked over to her england teammate, her lip bottom lip between her teeth as her eyes making sure not to loose you as you three reached the changing room.

you sat on the bench quietly watching your ipad munching on a few snacks you’d been given as your mummy got changed and did her pre match routine.

“mummy?” you looked up from your ipad, your mum doing her hair as you watched her wrap her bobble around her bun. “yes lovie?” she smiled at you.

“we see auntie ella and mazza?” you asked, you knew that arsenal were playing manchester united as you had overheard mummy talking to auntie ella on the phone you then interrupting and talking to ella and how you were excited to see her after a few months not yet being totally used to not seeing her every single day of the week.

the excitement following through the entire week as it was all you had spoken about to anyone you’d seen, even the staff at your nurseries knew.

“after the game we can, i’m sure they are both just excited to see you” she smiled as you nodded excitedly, you little legs swinging from the bench as mummy kissed the top of your head before smoothing out her kit to change into, your attention going back to your ipad.

the match had now begun and was just nearing half time and you were sat with leah one who had come down on the bus with the team, but she still had a big ouchie on her knee meaning she couldn’t play.

you were wrapped in a blanket with your big thick puffer on which mummy had made sure to zip right up before she ran onto the pitch.

watching with a smile, but that smile quickly dropped as then you noticed.

the manchester united fans were booing your mummy. the same fans which would cheer and shout her name while asking her to sign and take photos with her just a few months ago. they were now booing.

the first time you thought maybe it was just a mistake, but then it happened again. every time your mummy touched the ball, they booed.

“why they booing?” you asked, as leah frowned not knowing how to exactly explain it to you but she could tell it was upsetting you.

“i’m not sure tiny” leah sighed as she pulled you onto her lap so you had a better view of the pitch. making sure your blanket was kept around you to keep you from the crisp cold air.

“me no like it” you huffed, a frown not replacing the smile that was on your face moments ago.

“it’s okay, look your mummy’s got the ball, she might score!” leah tried to turn your focus away from the sound of the booing but that’s all you could hear, it was ringing through your ears.

“stop! make it stop le!” you whined shoving your head into her chest as your fingers went into your ears. leah’s heart dropping as she watched you start to cry, deciding it was probably best to take you into back inside away from all the noise.

alessia watched each step that leah took, you in her arms. your face hidden, alessia knew straight away that the noise of the booing as well as the nasty chants were upsetting you. alessia had learned with time to block them out when she was playing but you were young and took things more sensitively.

leah had turned back to try and catch alessia’s eyes, quickly realising alessia was already watching leah. alessia mouthing a quick, ‘is she okay?’ knowing that was probably a silly thing to ask but she did always before running to get the ball from katie, still noticing the quick thumbs up that leah threw towards alessia.

the booing only spurred alessia on more, wanting to play that well that it would silence them. something the travelling arsenal fans had been good at, chanting louder than the many home fans.

leah took you back into the changing room just after half time has finished doing her best to calm you down and distract you — it taking a few laps around the inside of the stadium and a trip to the food van before the tears stopped.

back in the changing room, you sat down on the bench, your ipad propped up as you both began to watch a cartoon as you placed your blanket across your legs and leah knees being extra careful to not hurt her ouchie on her knee.

you both being very consumed by the bright light of the ipad screen you both didn’t even hear the sound of the changing room door go, the girls beginning to pile in at the end of the match.

“hey lovie” you mum cooed softly, placing a hand on your head slightly startling both you and leah. but you were quickly jumping into her arms as she twirled you around.

“you okay now?” she asked softly as you nodded, your arms wrapped around your mummy’s neck not wanting to let go. alessia rubbing her hand up and down your back as you placed a little kiss on your cheek, mouthing a thank you to leah who smiled nodding her head.

“good” alessia whispered, as you let go from hugging you mum as you sat on her hip. “why were they booing” you asked innocently, the same frown appearing from earlier, since you didn’t get a proper answer from leah, you might from mummy.

“there just upset i left that’s all lovie, there silly anyway and there nothing you-” your mummy began as your frown still stayed, “-need to worry about, okay” she finished booping your nose a small smile flashing on your lips.

“i know you love me and that’s all that matters” mummy told you with a smile as you nodded.

“now we need that smile to come back, cause i don’t think auntie ella and mazza will want to see you all grumpy!”

[brekkie-e]

Thinking a lot about how the devs basically said there is no conflict in the team or between historically opposed people in Thedas in this game because "the stakes are too high, everyone has to work together." When the stakes are very very similar to Inquisitions?? Albeit we as a player know it's "real" this time. The big one.

But correct me if I'm wrong here (I'm not) the previous antagonist was a blighted OP mage with a knock off Archdemon trying to tear down the veil and ascend to godhood? And we are currently trying to *checks notes* defeat a blighted OP mage with an Archdemon trying to fuck up the veil and ascend to godhood? Oh sorry. Two.

Yes, the Blight. But it's hardly as though there weren't Blight concerns in Inquisition. Adamant, anyone?

Anyways, my point being is that the characters of Inquisition have no reason to see the stakes of that story as any less dire than the characters of Veilgaurd. And bless their hearts, those kids have Issues™️. They're all in on petty conflict. That was part of the genius, that the stakes were so high these deeply different people had to find a way to work together despite butting heads.

And the rest of the world didn't suddenly forget it's drama as well? Halamshiral's underlying elven rebellion. Orlesian civil war. The Mages vs the Templars. Chantry infighting. Seeker infighting. Tranquility. They didn't all go, "wait! there's a hole in the sky! we should put aside hundreds of years of systemic issues in the name of togetherness." Excluding the Inquisition that is.

Okay, Blight. Let's talk about the Blight. The Fifth one. You have the most rag tag group thrown together to stop the spread. This is literally the game that founded the series. Its defining features were political conflict. The king was betrayed! In a battle against Darkspawn! During a Blight! What a time to not stand as a united front, Loghain. In your own party, you're trying desperately to prevent Morrigan from emotionally assasinating Alistair. Oh! More conflict. While we are here, let's murder her mom real quick because *checks notes* Blights are when we all come together to hold hands.

If you play as an elf, you're putting up with human nonsense. If you play as a mage, you put up with mage nonsense. If you play as a woman- oh boy. I would make the argument that the realness of that setting, the way it highlighted human nature's best and worst qualities- is why it sunk it's claws into so many fans hearts.

It just.... whatever they've got going in Veilgaurd on only works for a YA novel. Which Dragon Age has never tried to be before. And, frankly, is a weird thing for it to aim for.

[ziminy]

Nightshift pt.3

Having them as roommates was a problem

Tags: smut, mdni, ageless and blank blogs will be blocked, explicit language, f!reader, college au, Gojo and Geto as housemates , jealousy (again), filming, fingering, oral (f and m giving and receiving), public s[e]x (in the car) , panty stealing, crying, hand job, double penetration, squirting, threesome, hair pulling, edging, overall just me going feral again,

Author's note: I'll be honest with everybody in here, I'm embarrassed by what I'm writing. My creativity surprises me sometimes.

Author's note(again, sorry): I wanted to post it sooner but I'm busy with school and shit. My classes are in the morning and I'm this close on dropping everything for some sleep 🤏 (I wrote this a few months ago and all I can say is that life is so much better after dropping out.)

Pt1 Pt2 masterlist roommatesmasterlist

Life is strange. It's amusing the way it works. Fascinating, you could even say. Goofy, perhaps. But a thing was clearly, as long as you're housemates with Gojo and Geto you'll never live a peaceful day ever again.

Truly strange.

And you can't even figure it out when it all started, because now it's just normal. Your worries flew out the window a long time ago. Did you think that your relationship was weird? Yes. But it's not that unusual if you don't think about it.

You were anxious because they were anxious. Their weird energy got to you, that's why you ran away. Or maybe your thoughts got to them and now it was this game where everyone goes back and forth for nothing. Fighting over things that aren't even that deep to begin with. Conversation will always be the key. And if you know how to use it, then you'd have access to so many doors in life.

That's some philosophical talk, and we don't do stuff like that in this house. It was an idiot trying to show how dumb the other is, even if they share the same brain cells. Everyone were dumbasses in here. No one knew how to communicate or use the so called keys. Everyone were on their own trying to do what they know the best.

It's complicated. What is right and what is wrong? What made you so irresistible that made those hungry wolves to want to eat you alive? What made you so gorgeous that they couldn't take their eyes away? What made them want to compete with each other when they used to share women like air, changing the person next to them like socks. Here's a lady, and now another.

No one wanted to share anymore. All they wanted to do was to prove that one can have you more than the other. A competition with no start and finish line until you decide to make it stop. Which one you liked more? Which one made you stay up at night or make your pussy wet by just thinking of him?

Which one did popped up in your head first? Did you touched yourself think of someone? The thoughts could go on and on. It was truly amusing the way they didn't try to talk to you. Only make fantasies in their heads while observing you. So small, so cute. So ready to take that cock right now.

One had to do the first move on proving something that it doesn't need to be proved. Someone will cry, someone will laugh. One will end up victorious while the other will be sad. It can be both of them who's crying. It can be a whole another mf that gets you in the end.

Someone need to do something. Quick. Fast. Just hurry up.

And the one who did the first move was Gojo. Just the way he asked you to move in with him, he was also the one that made the decision on what's going to happen next.

It was simple. It wasn't even a move to get you. It was more to piss Geto off. It was to annoy his friend with the fact that he fucks you when he's out. It was to show him that you're having so much fun when he's not home. It was an audio of your sweet moans opened at the wrong time.

Geto didn't had the time to check his phone when he was out. Now that he got home, he walked in the kitchen, ready to eat something with you and his other housemate. He sat down on his chair, took a few bites and then press play on what his friend sent him. Moans. Everyone stopped and turned their heads on the dark haired man.

"Suguru, you dirty bastard." Satoru laughed. You looked in shook. You didn't even recognize the voice of who ever was that on his phone.

"Satoru, why would you send that?"

"Satoru???" you looked at the white haired man and all he did was to laugh.

It was just the start. Next time Geto received a video.

It started with Gojo placing his phone on the kitchen counter, facing you who was washing the dishes. He left his phone there and walked behind you, kissing you softly as his hands went down on you. You only sighed. You stopped whatever you were doing for him. His hands already in your pants, fingers rubbing your clit slowly. Your soft sounds, the way you let him do what he wanted to do. Suguru's eyes were fixed on the screen. He wanted to turn up the volume so bad, to hear you. He wanted to listen to your voice. And then the video stopped with Satoru fucking you with his fingers, his eyes moving on the camera, smirking.

Fucking hell.

How unfortunate for him to be away from home. Why does he have to be out here instead of being in that damn house.

So he waited. He waited until he got home. He waited a few days for his dear friend to go away, to just be out this house so he could get his hands on you.

Ohoho. And when he did.. He placed his phone on the couch, to face your lower half, getting in the picture your thighs and him who was in between your legs, eating you out.

He was doing it with so much passion only to make you loud. To make you clearly shake for the camera to capture it. To make your hands go in his hair so hesitantly, not knowing if you should pull at it or not, if you could even touch him. His arms were flexed, looking so big compared to your body. He was doing it intentionally, he even did a few pushed ups before he even pressed the record button.

He didn't wait for the sun to shine at the right angle for nothing. Everything was calculated, from the way the camera captures your body, to the best place in the house.

And it sure did backfired at Gojo, who was staring impatiently at the clock. When can he go home? When can he see you himself? That fucker. He thinks he can play his game? The game Satoru started? To think that he's the one jealous now.

And here was the plan for the other video the white haired man did. Or this is how it went.

Skin against skin. Usually he would have been scared of crushing you with his weight, but today? His body on top of yours, chest against chest. Your bare skin touching him with nothing in the way, your legs wrapped around his waist. Whenever you or him tried to get a little away, someone dragged the other back. Your nails into his back, holding into him like your life depended on it. Everything felt so intimate. The way you looked at him. Those big eyes that Geto calls ugly. That dumb little smile. You looked in love. In love? No. It can't be. Can you even love to begin with?

Is this what made you happy? Playing this gentleman of a man? Someone who will hold you tight in moments like this? I mean, who doesn't. But did you really liked it that much?So much that you'd look at that guy he calls his friend like you've been in love with him all your life? You're not even doing anything, just kissing, you're bodies being pressed against each other.

He had to try it himself.

Just like before. He waited for the right moment, then acted his plan up. Because if he'll get interrupted or wake up with an unwanted guest he'll go nuts.

He wasn't horny. He wasn't even in the mood to do something today, all he wanted to see was if you were like in that stupid video.

He sat at the edge in your bed, watching you getting your clothes off, never taking his eyes of you, always making you stay in front of him where he can see you better. His hands carefully placed on you, slowly dragging you into his arms.

He kissed your jaw, your neck, his hands all over your body. Just wanting to feel your skin, the warmth you gave him. How you looked so different compared to him. You were glowing, you were like a flower carefully placed in a field full of sunlight. And he was the moon who wanted to take all that happiness. The way you smiled under that damn sun, he wanted to take that away.

"Suguru.." you said his name so lovely. He was really going to bite you.

"Kiss me." he ordered. He wanted you to do a wrong move so he could punish you for looking so warmly. You let him in your arms so easily. It made him mad.

You cupped his face in your hands and kissed him. It was so quick that he bearly even noticed.

"You call that a kiss?" he wrapped his arms around you and let himself fall down in bed, dragging you along with him. You yelped. You closed your eyes by how suddenly that was.

Skin against skin, huh? To hold you so close that you basically become a part of him.

He just got an idea.

He wrapped his hands around you while you were on top of him, trying your best to not fall into him. All he did was to tease you. His mouth on your chest, kissing and biting your nipples. One of his hands on your ass while the other was rubbing your back. Making you move your hips without even think on him. What he needed was you all needy for him.

And when he finally got you all desperate, he opened his camera, acting all nonchalant. Acting like he does this on a daily basis, like he have you all over him like this.

"You want me that bad?" he was a good actor, or at least that's what he thought.

"Stop playing with me. I need it right now." his heart skipped a beat, and so did Satoru's when he saw the video. The way you looked down at Suguru. The way you moved his pants to let his cock free, almost jumping on it instantly. It was his laughter that made you stop for a moment. You were frustrated, and you made sure to let him know about your feeling by looking angrily at him. He played with you for so long, you can't even count the minutes he played with your pussy. Fingering you so good and then stopped right when you were so close. He did this so many times that you don't trust a single word he says anymore. "You think it's funny?" you finally got his dick inside you. And oh, you're not going to stop until you get to actually cum this time.

"If you wanted me that much you should have said it earlier." he moved his hips forward, to help you. And to help himself.

"Dickhead." you slapped his chest softly. You couldn't listen to his words even if you wanted to. All you did was to move your hips, you needed any kind of friction. Anything that would calm the aching between your legs. Anything that would finally make you cum.

Your hand went between your legs, rubbing your clit, and biting your lip, refusing to let any sounds out that might feed his ego.

"Y/N." he looked in your eyes. He moved your hand away and he started to rub your clit. All you did was to gasp. "Focus. Move your hips like you mean it." this fucker. All he got from you were some little curses you let under your breath and you moving your hips better.

That video ended with you almost cumming. So close that it got Gojo gasping when he saw how fast the video ended. He didn't got to see you cum? The disrespect. The audacity. The idea he just got.

For the first time since you live there, Gojo call you in his room and placed you on his bed. Until now it was your room or any other place around the house. Anywhere but his own bed.

You never thought you'll get to sit in his bed like this. To get to do the forbidden tango in his room.

He got in bed next to you, placing you on his lap nice and cozy, your back pressed against his chest. "Hold this for me, ok?" he handed you his phone.

"What do you want me to do with it?" you asked unsure. You knew he was filming your little escapades for quite some time now, but to hand you the camera himself?

"Film it. Do whatever you want with it. Show me what you want me to see." you got a little unsure there.

"Alright.." you noticed that it was already recording before you thought of something. The camera was facing your face, capturing Gojo behind you. You moved it lower, now facing your chest, not even sure what he wanted to see.

His hands on your hips, slowly getting his dick inside your pussy. That warm thight pussy he loved so much. "Am I doing good?" his hand moved overs yours, moving the camera lower to film how it looked with his cock inside you.

"Make sure to capture everything." Suguru looked at his phone without any words. It didn't matter what Gojo might think of doing next, Geto haves to be the one with the better idea.

And another video was made.

Geto offered to buy the groceries. It was supposed to be Gojo's time this week, and how could he refuse someone else doing his chores for him? And so, Suguru dragged you with him.

The surprise look on Satoru's face to receive an video when you just left half an hour ago. You on top of Suguru in his car, because the dark haired man took Gojo's car for this quick trip. His excuse was that he mistook the keys with his.

He would had expected that video any time, but not today. Not like this. Not when he was took of guard. He couldn't help but look at the screen and turn the volume up.

You're half muffled moans and Geto praising the shit out of you. "Good girl, just like that." and you couldn't help but bounce on him faster. "Keep it slow now, we wouldn't want someone to notice us." oh, but he was actually dying inside for someone to see you two. Both of your roommates hoped for you to get caught.

"Suguru.." you moaned that name so sweetly. Honestly, Satoru was so jealous right now. If he knew sooner, he wouldn't had let someone else do his chores for him. He could have been in that car and fuck you.

He waited for you to come home. He sat right in front of the entrance, waiting for that fucker to appear. He needed to think of something even better. How about fucking you in Suguru's bed? Or making you wear his clothes to make his friend jealous? Even fuck you in them just to prove a point. Bath you in his perfume so you would smell like him. There was so many options.

And he got an even better idea.

He let you rest for that day. No, he let you rest for the rest of that week. Waiting for the perfect day, the perfect moment.

"It's my turn to do the laundry." Geto sighed. "You got anything else left in your rooms? Give it now." Gojo smiled and shook his head.

"I have nothing in my room." you said.

"Me neither."

"Alright then." he waited for Geto to get started with his work, then he dragged you in his room. He was so impatient that he didn't know what to do faster. He was taking your clothes off, his clothes, kissing you, rubbing that pretty pussy so you would get wet faster. He was so impatient that he didn't even prepared you first, the moment you layed on his bed he got in between your legs, forcing his cock inside your pussy. It hurts a little, but it also hurts his pride not being able to outdo his friend.

He's number one. He's the biggest person here.

He got his phone out as soon as he could move better, pressing the record button as fast as he could.

He was thrusting into you, not even once letting you breathe in peace. "You're pussy feels so good." that's all he could say. "Sucking me in like this." what he got in return was a photo of your underwear. A photo where Geto was holding some pairs of panties that he could recognize them in a instant, they were yours.

"I don't think Y/N would mind if I take some of these." Gojo stared at his phone screen. Tsk. He wasn't satisfied with the reaction he got.

"I'll keep the pair that I just took off her." Geto looked displeased at his phone screen. Would his friend be happy if he just barge in there and auto invite himself in? He didn't do that in the end, he already had other things to do. And if he just go there, Gojo would be the winner because that means he gave in.

"Alright, I don't what's going on between you two but I want you to stop." you went the next day in the kitchen, ready to put an end to this endless fighting of theirs. "I know you've been filming and sending the videos to one another, and I want this to end because this is going nowhere." you sighed. "If you want photos that much you should have asked me instead of fighting."

"You'll send me pictures of you if we stop fighting?" Gojo asked like he didn't heard what you just said. He ignored everything until you said that last sentence.

"That's not what I said."

"You said that you would." Geto totally listened to you, but again, he only understands what he wants.

"Did you even listen to me?"

"So, if we get along again and we stop filming you'll do it?" you could only sigh. These guys were so delusional that you couldn't even talk to them like normal people.

"Alright." you didn't even tried anymore, giving up was the best option.

"Is that an yes?"

"Yes."

"Well, that's good because we weren't fighting to begin with." Geto's words left you in disbelief. Huh?

"Ye, we just like to show what we're doing. Nothing much." Gojo said nonchalantly.

"Why didn't you said that earlier?"

"I was waiting for you to finish talking."

"Alright, so. For starter I want to get photos of your boobies. Some videos of you touching yourself here and there to make my day going when I'm tired. I want that pussy fully on display." Gojo already started a list.

"You could send me a picture right now." Geto's words didn't helped the situation.

"Show me what nudes you have in your phone." Satoru got next to you, trying to see your phone and what's in there.

It was your fault for thinking they're normal, because they're not, not at all.

Fortunately for you, your days became more peaceful. You kept your words to send them some pics now and then, and they stopped competing with each other. Oh, and don't think that you could send them the same picture, because they would get mad.

You hated there, but you gotta learn how to live with it, because you were also receiving stuff from them. A dick pic whenever they missed you, even some videos of them touching themselves moaning your name. It was just crazy. It never fails to make your jaw drop.

But your days came back to normal, no? Whatever normal even means anyway.

You woke up on another peaceful morning, because it was quiet and no one disturbed your sleep. You got up from your bed and went in the kitchen. Just wanting to feel their company there, maybe exchange some small talk and then fall asleep since you feel rather tired and lonely. Instead, you saw your house mates with another guy. A tall blonde guy who looked older than both of them.

You didn't know what to say, you just stood there trying to think of your next move. Go back to your room, it was none of your business, you shall not get involved.

"Oh? I didn't know you're up." the white haired man said before you could go back to bed.

"Good morning." Suguru greeted you, a cup of coffee in his hand.

"Good morning." you quietly said.

"Don't go just now. Come here." can you get a break? You did as he said, you went and sat down at the table at your usual spot. "Y/N, this is Nanami." Gojo said.

"Nice to meet you." you didn't know what to do.

"Nanami, this is our sweet Y/N." Satoru said it with this weird smile on his face. You had no idea what was going on in his head. Can he not embarrass you for once? You and Nanami sighed at the same time.

"I'm sorry for him. He usually behaves like this so I have no excuse." you said in Gojo's behalf.

"I don't expect much from him anyway." you studied the blonde a little. The expensive watch that was on his wrist, and the nice fancy shirt he had on. He had big shoulders, his muscles could be seen even through his clothes. His posture was flawless, everything about his screamed perfection. You didn't mean to stare, but he was definitely eye catching.

Your housemates were watching you. Who's fault was it for getting Kento here? They should have thought of how you'll react first.

They're jealous again.

They just managed to calm themselves and now it's starting again. This again, this again and again. Can they ever take a break?

Was this what you wanted? A guy like him? What's so perfect about Nanami, huh? Was it how he present himself? He looks tired, like he haven't slept in who knows how long. And yet, that didn't stopped him from dressing like usually or doing what he's supposed to do.

He looks like he was working a 9 to 5, and would treat you right. He looks like he would buy you flowers on a daily basis. He looks like he would remember all those small dates where it supposed to be an anniversary or someone's birthday. He looked like he was there to stay and put a ring on your finger. Was this what you wanted? A husband who would help you raise the kids properly?

Both Gojo and Geto gasped at the same time, they did a big mistake.

"Y/N, no." Satoru finally said something when he came back to reality. He haves to do something now so you won't end up married. Especially to Nanami, he looked like he would be perfect, that's what scares him the most.

"Y/N, go to sleep. It's too early for you." you looked confused at both of them. They told you stay there in the first place.

"Huh?" you looked at them in disbelief.

"Just go."

"Alright..?" you got up from your seat and went back to your room. What a bunch of weirdos.

That day, they promised to become just like the enemy, so that way you won't be impressed by some random fucker out there.

Their plan would fail so miserable, like always, but you can't do shit about it. It's not like you can figure their next move to stop them.

You walked out your room to get something to drink, only to be welcomed by them dressed like they were going to a job interview.

You looked at them, blinked a few times then looked behind you. No cameras or anything, or at least you can't see it. Was this some kind of prank? Was it some kind of special day today?

"You're speechless by how handsome I look, huh?" you blinked a few times. "No need to be shy, admire me as much as you need." Gojo striked a few poses.

"What's the occasion?" you asked getting closer to them.

"I always dress like this." the way Suguru lied with a straight face.

"You do? This is the first time I see you like this." you fixed Gojo's tie. "Do I need to wear a dress or something?"

You got dragged in your room and placed on the bed while they were looking in your closet. They put their hands on everything they saw, bras, panties and anything they could find. It didn't matter. If they see it, they'll get their hands on it.

"So what are we doing?" you asked.

"Playing dress up, isn't it obvious?" Gojo got something in his hands and got closer to your bed. "Hands up." he took your shirt off.

"I don't really see anything for you to try." Geto was still looking through your clothes.

"Let me get those down for you." Satoru took your pants off. His hands traveling back to your panties, wanting to take those off too.

"These stays on."

"Nuh uhh." he tried dragging your panties down, only for you to try to pull them up.

"Let me do it." you tried to protest.

"No." he slapped your hand. "We're playing dress up. Get those off and let me choose another pair for you." you gasped at his actions. Did he really just slapped your hand away?

"Satoru." Geto said something, making you to breathe reassured. "Move away. I'll do it." these fuckers. What could you expect.

"Alright, alright! I'll take them off myself." their eyes on you, you got their full attention. You raised your hips and with a simple move you took your panties off. Your actions will always work like magic on them. The way they're so captivated by such a simple movement.

"Put them back on." Satoru said, his eyes still on your skin. The scene from earlier replaying in his mind over and over again.

"You told me to take them off. Why would I have to put them back on?" you could only complain because of how childish this situation was.

Geto got on his knees in front of you, picking the small material that you just took off. "Get up." he commanded.

Can they stop playing with you for at least a moment? You did as he said tho, you got up and you couldn't do much since your way was blocked by the dark haired man. A kiss placed on your lower stomach before he put your underwear back on you. Your hands were on his shoulders, trying to hold yourself from falling.

"Not fair." Satoru dragged you back on your bed. Your back pressed against the blanket and Gojo in between your legs. He got your panties in between his teeth, slowly dragging them down and tossing it somewhere around the room.

"What got into you two again?" it was something sinister about how they look at you. Their eyes dark and filled with some kind of lust you didn't saw it before. It was normal for you to be horny, it was normal for them too, but now it was different. You had no idea if your insides would be rearranged or you'll have the sweetest time of your life. It scared you.

Gojo was breathing against your pussy, hot breath touching your skin over and over. It made you squirm a little. While Geto's hand went through your hair, moving it from your face. He sat down next to your head, his thumb slowly getting in your mouth, giving you something to occupy yourself with.

"Guys?" their silence was scaring you. All you hoped was that you could still walk tomorrow.

Satoru finally got his face in your pussy, he was practically making out with it. Never giving you a break from the start.

"Eyes up on me." Geto kept reminding you. You couldn't even close your eyes, because if you blinked too fast or too long, he also didn't like that.

You could feel Gojo's long fingers getting inside you. Moving them in and out of you for a moment, making you more wet than you already were. Then he started to curl them, instantly making your body shake.

One side was satisfied with your reactions, the other one not so much.

"Focusm" Suguru wanted you to only look at him. His hand now in your hair, keeping you in place so couldn't take your eyes off him.

"Y/N, look at me." Satoru said your name, placing a kiss on your clit before he started devouring it. Your back arches. Suguru gulped at your fucked up expression. It was cute, no, it was in so many ways that he can't describe it. You were breath taking, now and at any other time of the day, every position and anything you might do from any angle. He wanted to fuck you and see more. He was so close on pushing Gojo away and fuck you the way you deserve it.

Gojo didn't looked happy at the way his friend kept your attention all to himself. "Say my name." it was a beg, it was a request. It sounded like anything but demanding. He sounded needy. He needed to hear you praise him, tell him how good he makes you feel and move your hand in his hair.

"Look at me." Suguru kept demanding the same thing over and over again. It didn't matter who's name you said as long as you're only focused on him, right? That means he won.

However, you realized they're doing it again. That useless fighting. You don't want only one of them, you wanted both. A little bit of what they have to offer you. Whatever they wanted to show you, you'll accept it.

They acted like this ever since Nanami was there. They started acting like this out of jealousy.

You wanted to punish them somehow. It was for the useless things they're thinking about.

You opened your mouth, you wanted to say something, yet no word got out your mouth. What if you said another person name. Someone who's not in the room at the moment. Someone who's not usually here at all. Your eyes were sparkling thinking of ways of torturing them, Geto could see that. Those eyes that looked so lovingly now full of fireworks and that dumb smile you had on your face.

Think of him, look at him. Only see him. Say how much you wanted him. Him and him only. What made you full of life if it wasn't him?

You had to do it. You had to punish them for being selfish again. Yet you couldn't. No matter how much you would love to see their reactions, you knew you were digging your own grave. It's you in the end who will suffer for anything they might deserve.

What if you don't say anything at all? What if you keep your voice to yourself and not let them hear you at all. That's what the silent treatment is after all, no? And so you did, you bite your lower lip and put a hand over your mouth.

Geto could only laugh, thinking that you're afraid someone might hear you. No one besides them would hear a thing, he could reassure that. He moved your hand gently, hopping you'll understand him without a word needed. Yet you still refused to let out any kind of noise. "No one will hear you. So don't worry."

"I know." that's the only words you said. You knew and yet you still do it?

"Maybe it's because of you. Look the other way." Gojo said, his hands around your thighs dragging you closer to him.

"It's actually because of you." Geto said, getting more close to you. You didn't said anything. And this only gave them the wrong idea.

They were trying to imitate the enemy, so, maybe it was their clothes? Or maybe the blonde was still in your head and you were trying to think of him? It infuriats them. They only wants your attention, the way you looked at Nanami so curious, so full of questions. You don't look like that at them.

Gojo got up from between your legs and Geto dragged you up in his lap.

"Why you're being a bad girl? Hm?" Suguru's low voice purred into your ear, so close, it gave you chills.

"Are we not enough? What do you want more." you were sandwiched between them, your back pressed on Geto's chest while Gojo was in front of you, getting his body closer to you with each second passes. Your legs were wrapped around Satoru, mostly because he placed them like this, to make sure to have access to you as much as he could. While Suguru's arms were also wrapped around you, keeping you firmly against him, not letting you move an inch.

You still refused to say a thing even if you had no idea what they're talking about. You just got tired of their games, those stupid thoughts of theirs that made your head spin. You couldn't figure out what was going on with them, why were they like this. What made them like this.

"Say something." Satoru's voice had so many emotions in it. Rage, disappointment. Sadness? It was complicated, yet it made your pussy drip.

"Y/N, do you want to see me mad?" Suguru got one of your hands to his mouth, kissing the back of your hand. You were like a doll in their hands. Standing there without doing much. It was supposed to be your punishment for them, for fucking with your life like this when they could talk everything out. But now you want to back down. Mostly because you were feeling scared. Their eyes were scary, the roughness in their hands scared you. How they're squeezing places around your body so hard that it might leave a bruise, and how quiet they became.

Should you apologize? You had no idea. Was it too late to say something?

You opened your mouth, eyes on you for your next move. Yet you still didn't say a thing. You close your mouth and looked away. If they're getting on your nerves you'll definitely say someone else's name to piss them off.

Are you not allowed to get mad? Do you have no right to do so? They did it with their own hands. You can put them in place however you want, whenever you wanted. No, in fact, you'll give them some time to think about this, about how they act in general. Sure, you have no problem with them being themselves, you love it. But it was until some certain point where you would tolerate their behavior.

You put your palms on the bed trying to get up somehow. That action itself made them go feral in the worst way possible. Why are you doing this to them? Their hearts almost stopped working.

"Don't do this, come on." no matter how mad you might be, their pleas sounded like a sweet melody. It was the way they're melting in your arms. Satoru's voice sounded broken when he spoke. You're not even doing much, yet it affects them so much. Both of them were weak for you, you got them on their knees trying to get your attention. Of course they would get mad if another is trying to get in.

You didn't said anything, only looking at them, those big eyes again, it was like the first time you interacted with them. So curious about your surroundings. You looked up at Suguru, and then looked at Satoru, who were looking at you trying to figure out what in the world is going on in your head.

"Say something." Geto's voice was so soft, even if he was angry at you. His hand went lower on your body, caressing your soft skin, somehow hoping that you'll warm up. Maybe you wanted more of their attention? "It's your fault." Suguru looked at Gojo.

"Me? You were the one who was like, look at me. Maybe she got enough of your ass." Satoru tried to imitate Geto's voice.

"Me? It's you. You started this." you tried to not laugh. You can't give up yet, all you wanted was to hear them say that they're sorry, or anything that shows that they realized their mistake, nothing more. But they're refusing to believe it's their fault.

"Alright, stop." you sighed softly. "Think about what you both did." they're still thinking about how you might be seeing another, forgetting about them. Moving out of this place and leaving them to be as miserable as they used to be, all sad and not even happy to be back home, spend all their time outside just to forget about their loneliness.

How dare you play with their feelings? For once in their lifetime they're serious about something and you're just toying with them? Gojo got his hands on your hips, dragging your ass on him, positioning himself after he undid his belt. With a simple movement, his cock was out his pants. Now he was getting in front of your entrance, ready to get inside. Why did you looked surprise, huh. "Why don't you think about what you did?" he's trying to imitate your words, like you're the bad guy.

You gasped when he pushed himself inside you all the way in with a single move, if he could at least give you an warning. Geto got your face in his hand, making you look up at him. "Inside voice. Don't let a single word out." this was ridiculous. What were they even thinking?

You frown, you didn't know what to say or do. You had them in your palm, right? Why were they like this then? This wasn't your plan. All you wanted was for them to think about their actions.

You wanted both of them, you gave your time to both of them. It wasn't only one who received your attention, it was both. You didn't let a single one feel left out, and they still dare to think that you're selfish.

"Bad boys." you said out of breath, trying to degrade them somehow.

"Oh yeah?" Satoru could only laugh. "I can show you how bad I really am."

"Sweetie, you have no idea what you're talking about." Geto felt amused by your words. They were so considered of you until now, or they tried. Sure, it might have not work all the time since they forget halfway through that's not only about them. But they tried, no? It was improvement in a way or another.

Gojo's hands were gripping your hips, moving in and out. The friction was overwhelming. You wanted to change the position, it was uncomfortable. You don't know where to even look when they were squeezing you between them.

Your hands were shaking, you didn't know where to put them since both of them annoyed you. You wanted to keep them to yourself, yet you were dying to do something.

You closed your eyes, grabbing your own thighs and leaving red marks on them from your nails, being around them was so stressful.

You bite your lower lip, trying your best to stay put it place. A few tears went down your face, the way Gojo was fucking into you was just.. Just. You can't even say words. "Cry for me. Let me hear that voice." Satoru's face went to your shoulder, trying to rest against it.

"Keep that voice inside." Geto was trying to push Gojo away. Wanting to tournament you for a little longer.

"Don't listen to him." the white haired man was out of breath, voice so low that it gave you chills. "Open your eyes, look at me."

Suguru's hand went under your chin, raising it to make you look at him. "Look at me." his voice sounded so soft compared to his thoughts and actions. You kept your eyes closed, wanting only to focus on their voices, on how they breathe.

"Fuck." Gojo said out of breath. He bite into your shoulder, making you groan for a moment.

Then a sudden thought went through Geto's head. He could do something so funny right now, something that could help you feel better, or not. It all depends on your performance. So, his hand traveled to your pussy, rubbing your clit in small circles and making your walls squeeze Satoru's dick. Couldn't they just act like this and stop being fuckers?

Without even thinking, one of your hands went of Gojo's shoulder while the other grabbed Geto's arm. You were shaking, you were biting your lip and you were so close. Satoru could feel that, and Suguru realized what was going on by your actions, you look desperate only when your about to cum.

Now, this is where was the funny part, at least for Geto. He dragged his hand back, leaving you with less friction than before. But that only caught Gojo's attention who understood what was going on without a single word needed. So, now you were left all alone without any kind of pleasure or friction, since even the white haired guy got out of you, leaving you there panting heavily and trying to understand what was going on. This left a bad feeling in your stomach, it left you all confused and trying to regain your conscious, your brain couldn't work properly.

"Why do you look so disappointed?" they were mocking you, you could feel it by the tone of their voices.

"Were you close?" so painfully close. That would have been a good orgasm if they didn't stopped.

Suddenly, you woke up being turned around, ass in the air and face pressed against your blanket. "Up." Satoru moved in front of you, making you rest your body weight on your arms.

"Be a good girl and you might cum this time." Suguru was behind you, placing a slap on your ass before he pushed his cock inside you.

You could feel a hand behind your neck, dragging your face up to look at the white haired man. He leaned down, placing a kiss on your lips for a moment before he too pushed his dick inside your mouth. They loved stuffing you good, didn't they? The way you struggle to take them, and yet doing so good.

Maybe it was your fault too, for ending up like this. You knew you shouldn't have fucked around with them, but you always go back, asking for more and letting them do whatever they wanted with you. Plus, you feel so good, like, so so good. It was impossible to hold back around you.

That's why they keep pushing more of them inside of you, trying to make you take more. Because you, yourself are greedy for more. You always end up begging for more, so how could they not give you more?

"Relax." Suguru said as he kept feeling you clenching around him, making him groan as one of his hands was traveling around your body.

But how could you relax? You were so close, and knowing them, they might deny you again. You wanted to cum, you needed this orgasm and if they're edging you again you swear you will leave through that door and find somebody who will give you what you want. They seemed to enjoy this, so why couldn't you do as well?

Your hand went to the one behind you, dragging him closer and making sure he stays there. Just a little more, it was so close. You might as well start crying because of how it was feeling.

A thing that they loved more than edging you over your limits was seeing you cum. It was something about the way you look when you're all fucked up. So it wasn't surprising when they dropped everything they were doing and focused on you, because they too know this would be a big one.

You woke up with your face against the bed sheets, hands all over you once again and all kind of words being whispered in your ear, about how good you're doing. How you'll get a lot more after this, how they'll make you cum again and again, for as long as you want. Well, you both know that some of those were lies, because it was more about until when they want this to continue.

Your cries were satisfying, and they aren't even afraid to admit that. How you grip the sheets underneath you, or how you moved your hand on Satoru, holding into him as you came, leaving a big mess on the bed as your body juices came out.

They both looked at you, not believing what they just saw. "Did you just squirted?" the white haired man said, whistling at the view you're giving him.

"I'm sure she can do it again, can't she?" that was more than enough to know that it would be a long day. You doub you'll be able to get out of bed any time soon, and who knows, maybe it won't be as bad as you think.

[zorosnavigator]

Timebomb fics rec

A lot of timebomb fics are hiding through a lot of CaitVi/JayVik tagged works on ao3 (while many are also CV orJV centric) so i made this rec post for everyone who dont want to spent 1 hour scrolling or missing some of them bc you're filtering other ships!! (sorry for the short summaries/ i didnt write my thoughts as thoughtfully as i would have liked because.yk.time and all. update chapter count/add of new fics every week)

AU/crossovers fics

Je t'aime (Je t'attends) 3 chapter, WIP.

Hunger games x Timebomb/Arcane, the way the system of the games from the og novels are mixed in the Arcane universe is really masterful, the writer dont lose too much time explaining it but you understand the dynamics of the 2 cities and the characters perfectly anyway.

Where would you be now ? by enaven 5/6 chapters, WIP.

family/modern AU, timebomb feels, Ekko and Jinx are Isha's parents, CaitVi are just silly aunts and i'll never stop recommending this fic

you're the best thing to ever happen to me (but also the worst thing to ever happen to me) by grey_toiletpaper ( @greytoiletpaper ) 3/8 chapters, WIP. Rated T.

Timebomb inspired by 10 things i hate about you.

We Moved Into a Real House (a Wild Field Behind it) by smokesatellite 3/10 chapters. WIP. Rated T.

Modern AU, Timebomb roommates/friends to lovers, Isha is a foster kid...you know where this is going .. (Ekko as a nurse is not something i expected but its surprisingly good. Also the in law feud between Jinx and Cait is very funny)

s1 fics

Silco is less of an asshole

The Heart of Zaun by 1ts_Br1tney_B1tch 8/ chapters. WIP.

or: Silco try to rally the Firelights to his cause (in this case, Zaun - he's much more involved in doing better for his city than in the show) but of course they're bound to have some..tension between them, since they hate him - and Shimmer. (it has the good parent Silco tag so i'd say that all in all, this Silco is a little less...Silco than in Arcane, but manage to keep some of the bite he has in canon...) i only read 2 chapters, and what i can say is that it does a good job with the general cast, the interactions between Silco/Ekko-Firelights are believable, i think the one thing that could have weird me out is the way Silco is said to be 'proud' of the Firelights in the summary (for me 'pride' is something he'd reserve for Jinx yk?? anyway i stop the rambling) . The Timebomb relationship has more or less the same push and pull as in the show, with Ekko thinking about the girl Jinx used to be/ Ekko being a link to the past before Jinx and all that entail...so yeah, i'm loving it!

Powder doesnt become Jinx

The Alpha Command by typewriter_in_galaxy 13 chapters. WIP. Rated E.

ABO/Reverse AU where Powder doesnt become Jinx and is raised by Viktor, Ekko is taken in by Silco. btw i dont read a lot of abo fic (im very nickpick) but this one does every characters justice, and actually dwelve in depth in the abo universe.. (everything by typewriter is good to be honest, but my favorite thing is how they write Powder, who even when she doesnt become Jinx, is still shaped by a very violent world/trauma and it shows through her mental health issues and very, very low self worth/need to prove herself. )

everything's better with a friend by typerwriter_in_galaxy 7chapters. Completed. Rated E.

Timebomb centric rewrite of Arcane, Jinx is Powder, she doesnt fall under Silco's hand (or in his arms precisely), Ekko is Ekko, and 1, i need to hug Powder, 2 she deserves the world and 3 the characterization of everyone, everyone is so brillantly written and the timebomb relationship (damn even the CaitVi one too) oh, the timebomb of it all... they feel so, so real and it hurts, Powder's insecurities, her mental illness, her guilt, her need to prove herself but in same time she doesnt feel herself worth of anything (or anyone) good... just.read it. read it, because i just did, after like 2 years of not doing that and. im like mad bc why didnt i??? but in same time so grateful to just discover it now, taking my sweet little time reading it; it rewinded my brain its amazing, (like this work in another fandom, the first time i read this rebelcaptain's fic A Love song by skitzofreak - did i just linked it for you to read even tho its a timebomb rec post??? yes. yes i did. thats how much i love, adore, worship this one guys - so everything's better made me think a lot of this TB fic, and also of RC (the abandonment issues, thinking that you have to leave first before everyone leave you, Jyn and Powder damn).

Shattered Web by Firewolf2132 1 chapter. WIP. Rated M.

you know how everyone make the comparaison between Ekko and Miles?? well, the author found a way for Ekko transform into a spiderman that feels right in the arcane verse (end of act1) and damn its so good. Ekko slowly morphing and gaining his powers while everyone still have some focus on them (mostly Powder), but it still manages to keep the suspense of the fate of other characters. fabulous. author note: [I have seen so many comparisons between Ekko and Miles and a lot of fanart. So it felt that I had to do this. I can't promise future chapters right now (busy), but I am eager to see if this inspires any stories with a similar premise.]

S2 fanfics

fics covering Timebomb moments between ep 8 Ekko saving her /they painted each other and ep9

Go Back For Her by A_Lily_In_The_Moonlight 3/3 chapters. Completed. Rated E.

Ekko's pov -i only read 1 chapter - we see his thought's process on his relationship with Powder AU/ Jinx, and how he came to the conclusion he must go back to her. the moment where he help Jinx with his Z-drive comes a little differently than in ep8 (well, the aftermath) aaand another fic where Jinx's grief over Isha's death shatters me, the pain and the self loathing/blaming from Jinx really devastating.

I dont believe in God, but i believe you're my savior by mquesterminds One shot. Rated T

[summary: every time Ekko has to rewind time to stop Jinx it cuts to a different moment from throughout their love story because I'm allergic to happiness the moments covering their shared past really make their present 10 times sadder.]

I'm sure we're taller in another dimension by hallwayheart One shot. Rated M. i have nothing to say because i'm still processing what i just read.ty.

Fires That Were Set by ilophilia ( @ilophilia on tumblr) 1 chapter. WIP.

the conversation after Ekko helped Jinx in episode 8. Loved the banter, the emotions (the grief is there and its important to feel it but damn i want to hug them so bad). They tell each other what happened when Ekko was gone, and you feel the distance/the closeness, near intimacy building again and its beautiful..

Hope is a winged beast by Grey_ Unicorn 4 chapters. WIP. Rated E.

prepare you tissues because i was myself not ready for chapter 3 and the emotional wreck of Jinx processing her grief. but here we are.

fics from AU Powder pov/exchange between Jinx and AU Powder

what we left behind by re_dragon_rising 3/3 chapters. Completed. Rated T.

Powder traverses to the og arcane universe 1 year after Ekko's visit. (the insight into her life after Ekko leaves is wholesome and also give the reader a glimpse of the Mylo/Claggor/Powder siblings dynamics + the impact of Vi's death on them. really great. a little sad too.)

The other Ekko by GrammarThyEnemy Oneshot. General audience.

Powder knows this Ekko is not her Ekko.

memento vivere by fuwaaa 1/2. WIP. General audience.

covering the AU episode, Powder knows something's up with Ekko.

See Ya On The Other Side by moth_dust 3/5 chapters, WIP. Rated T.

Powder also travel to the og universe.

these forgotten faces by whippindippin ( @whippindippin on tumblr too!) 6 chapters, WIP. Rated T.

Jinx and Powder body swap and its both the worst and best thing that could ever happen to either of them. great reading and their reaction on point.

Isha is alive

Astrantia by AelinCreativ ( @aelincreativ they're on tumblr too!) 5 chapters, WIP. Rated T.

canon divergence where Ekko saves Isha. a lot of angst. but also a lot of happiness. so we can cry while smiling along with them. great. ty author!!

Ankle-Biter by darkfire1220 8/9 chapters, WIP. Rated M.

Isha is Jinx's biological daughter, Silco is a not so bad (grand) father, and their mother/daughter bond is one a the greatest thing ever. (very slowburn timebomb). Also Vi. i love you Vi.

post s2

we made our peace with weariness (and let it be) by The_FlamingTiger 3/3 chapters. Completed. Rated M.

Ekko and Jinx reconnect in Bilgewater..(and Jinx goes to therapy. that too. its nice)

I don't believe in God (But I believe that you're my savior) by yeonatsu Oneshot, general audience.

Ekko is mourning.

this hunger for love won’t disappear by Amuria Oneshot, rated T.

Months after the battle for Piltover, Ekko begins to dream of Powder. He thinks it’s his grief playing tricks on him. She has different theory.

Francesca (Do You Think I'd Give Up?) by PoetProlific 2 chapters. WIP.

Ekko tries searching for Jinx...(with the help of Caitlyn, yep. and its well done, because I think Cait would help, for Vi. And i love how Ekko-Cait's dynamics might evolve because of this..)

So I met him there and told him I believe by ijustwanttoreadinpeace 3 chapters, WIP. Rated T.

Jinx begins a new life in Bilgewater but is forced to come back... (edit: be warned, this is now an orphan account so idk if there will be more chapters.)

all the 6 timebomb one shot by atabex (the other fics are not timebomb) they're all rated E and oh boy is it worth it. most of these oneshot are gut wrenching and do smut + characters so well... the most recent one is just Ekko and AU Powder ahem doing the boombayah on the rooftop, but yk, with bits of sad and tragedy here and there.

i'm a little ashamed i'm only adding it now but every TB os fics by @shroomystar is 🤌 nothing else to add because each one of them are good. so. (if you want the explicit one-shots it's here and if you prefer without, it's here )

[simp-ly-writes]

Gentle-Fellow's

─────── · · A Smosh Fanfic

Pairing: Spencer Agnew x gn!Reader

─ · · SUMMARY: You, Spencer and your fellow cast mates Angela and Shayne all star in yet another Don't Win Mario Party, Gentlemen addition!

─ · · TAGS: gender-neutral pronouns, part social media au, use of dated terms as comedy, swearing, smoking, fluff, attempt at humour, cute.

─ · · MASTERLIST | TAGLIST REQUEST | WORDCOUNT: 1,463

─ · · A/N: thank you so much for the ask, anon! sorry it took so long, had to brainstorm some jokes and scenarios but it was a load of fun! 😄

─────── · ·

"Oi! 'ello Chaps, I'm here with my fellow gentle-lads and t'day we'll be playing some good old fashion mario party, just how I like my liquor-" you began to intro to the camera before Spencer was slapping you gently on the shoulder, his body acting out more impact than you actually received but you still fell off the couch for comedic benefit as he put his shoes up on your supposed 'corpse' in good taste.

"Well enough with what that fellow was going on about, I must say we shall play. This game is better suited for a trio rather than a quartet- the same philosophy can also be said for working in the navy. Was much better to night-watch with a trio-"

"Ah yes, I do believe three-and-some is an adequate amount. I have yet to try four but it sounds you would not recommend?" Shayne leans forwards on the couch to fully face Spencer who adjusts his tophat while looking down at you, silently asking if you were okay while laying down off camera. You shot him a smile upwards, rolling over and returning back to the couch.

"Yes, I would not recommend such activities. Too many men with not enough places to go and scope out. Much better to have three, did you not serve to learn this?" Spencer asks with a tilt to his head, his top hat already falling off again as you hold back a chuckle to his playful glare in your direction.

"I in fact did serve! I was a leader, and I good one at that too. Took my whole group to one of the colonies, we had to strip ourselves of layers from how humid the climate was," Shayne clarified, pretending to light his cigar as Spencer lit his own, passing his lighter towards you.

"Thank you, gentleman," you responded, lighting your two cigarettes, wearing them like vampire fangs that had Angela near tears at the end of the couch. "I do remember being down to my undergarments at multiple points with my men, I'll have you know we were all in position within the ama-zone. Quite the discoveries we made there, so uncivilized."

"AYE!" Angela corrected, pointing a finger, her moustache slipping down her face, "I'll have you know my third mistress is from those parts, and she is the best. You mustn't make such hastily claims gentlemen, it is unbecoming of you!"

You nod your head, "yes, yes, very unbecoming. What are we? Boys like our sons? I can't remember the last time I had ashes in my lungs with that child's work," you continue as Angela agrees with a huff, the game seemingly long forgotten as you all carry through conversation, trying your darnedest not to break character.

"Ah yes, I think I have a son or two, I can't quite remember. I think to name them all William, a strong English name," Shanye comments once you all get... gently reminded to play the game you intro-ed over half an hour ago, you hoped that the editors would be able to find something distinguishable in these files.

─────── · ·

"I do believe it is your turn, gentleman," Spencer comments, casting you a wink. "My, I have seen to misplaced that powered-device. Does anyone see it?" Everyone starts to feel around the dips in the couch, Spencer was the first to stand, walking closer to the cameras from where you rolled to during the introduction bit and comes back with your controller, dipping it towards you with a bow.

"Thank you, my, you must be quite the bachelor, charming a fellow like me, oh my," you add with heated cheeks as Spencer returns to your side, his leg nocking against your own as you shout out in disbelief to obtaining a star you DID NOT want. "This is outrageous, I demand a re-play of my turn! I did not intend-"

"We must play by the rules," Shayne cuts you off, tilting his hat down as you stick out your tongue. Angela is focused on not winning the next mini game as you and Shayne continue your staring contest in the following two rounds before you claim victory. "Haha! I have trained with only the best, you can read a lot about another man through his eyes. Have you been hunting before? I love that wild look." Spencer jumps to respond.

"Yes, I must say, you really can tell a lot..." and in that moment you both look at one another. Shayne and Angela are both screaming over something on the screen but you both sound it out, lost in this little moment before realizing your both won... or well lost.

"It appear we have lost," Spencer says, emitting a sigh. "No, I would say we have won," you tease loving the way his cheeks heat up to his ears before you both return to the game more driven then ever to not win.

─────── · ·

Jokes have you all toppling the couch at some point from your rambunctious laughter, Angela is struggling to breathe through her sentence much similar to you over just how funny Spencer manages to be wearing sweatpants and a cheap half tux.

Spencer immediately went to protect your head with his arm as you all fell backwards with a large crash, the crew all gasped out in shock before your laughter only grew more boisterous. "I think I hear a little man again," Shayne comments, forcing himself upright to look over the couch as stars begun to be distributed.

Like snipers at position you all kneeled, your eyes only visible from the turned over couch. Top hats giving away your cover and you had placed second, falling back to the ground in fake shock and relief. Spencer teased mouth to mouth that had you pressing a hand to his mouth and narrowed your eyes at his large ones filled with glee and adoration.

─────── · ·

Angela had lost in the end in first place. you second place. Shayne in third and Spencer being the ultimate winner in fourth.

"FUCK!" and the video ended abruptly to quickly cute to her wearing a dog cone while trying to light a cigarette, only for them to keep collecting down by her neck.

"Thank you all for viewing our game time today, I have had the most splendid time today with you chaps, as I hope you all have ventured the same?" Shayne asks the now upright couch and cast.

"Yes, I was quite filled with delight," you replied, nodding your head and tipping your hat to everyone on the sofa.

"I do agree with my fellow gentleman, here" Spencer replies, clapping you on the wrist this time, very much close to holding your hand, your fingers interlacing while watching Angelas 'winning' speech.

"I hate you all-"

"Why that id not very gentlemanly of you, do you wish to handle these matters outside in more space for our thoughts?" Shayne rebuttles.

"Yes, I rather have a few thoughts to show you," Angela challenged, brow raised as she begins to roll up her sleeves, Shayne doing the same. Alex closes the video by panning upwards and the screen fades to black.

─────── · ·

🔔 Smosh Games just posted! watch now?

─────── · ·

Gentleman's Rules: Don't Win Mario Party (Again!)

Smosh Games ✓ [Subscribed] 👍 67k | 👎 7.78M subscribers 300k views 1 week ago only the politest of games... click to read more

1,110 Comments

username01 (name) and Spencer out here being the cutest even while cosplaying as colonizers, iconic behaviour you two!

username88 09:45 "Ah yes, I do believe three-and-some is an adequate amount" - Shayne Topp 2024

↳ username70 OMG why did I not catch this earlier LMAO 🤣 ↳ username91 or what about 20:01 " What are we? Boys like our sons? I can't remember the last time I had ashes in my lungs with that child's work..." - (name) was UNREAL for sayin' this XD ↳ username70 OMG YES! 🙌😂

username22 I don't know about you but I'm feeling like I'm ready for a whole series of just this cast and just this game. I have had this video and repeat since it's come out! Please. Make. More. 🙏

username14 Literally so in love with how gentle Spencer was being with (name), dropping the persona to held them find their controller and even making sure they didn't fall hard?? 😭

↳ username91 and did anyone notice those little winks? UGH 😩

username40 this is not good material to be eating to, almost choked from laughing so hard, would not recommend.

userame66 That little exchange about seeing into one another's eyes was so poetic, like that bit did not need to go that hard 💗

─────── · ·

─ · · SPENCER AGNEW TAGLIST: @lisiliely @missflufffanfics @little-stitious-studios @thejourneyneverendsx @sibsteria @lizzylynch1 @babble2 @delaneyburghardt @thevintagefangirl @uniquely-haunting @maricarorp

[lynnimini]

₊⊹ 𝘢𝘱𝘵 ₊⊹

description: fluff ⋆ comedy ⋆ a little suggestive

in which you become sungho’s neighbor from across the hallway and the spark between you two is just too strong to ignore

pairings: p. sungho x afab!reader

words: 3.2k

warnings: suggestive ⋆ mentions of alcohol ⋆ mentions of sungho & y/n making out

author’s note: chat lynn is back!! (˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶) im sososo sorry this oneshot took so long (｡•́︿•̀｡) if you couldn’t tell by the title, it’s partially inspired by “apt” by rosé and bruno mars so i strongly recommend that you listen to it while reading (ㅅ´ ˘ `) happy reading !!

tags: @onedoornet @blossomnet

game start !

"alright sweetheart, let us know if you need anything at all"

the older woman at the front desk smiled sweetly as she handed you the key to your new apartment.

"thank you so much"

you bid her goodbye as you boarded the elevator, praying that there would be a broom or something inside so you could clean while procrastinating on unpacking.

you arrived to your new apartment and saw tons of boxes stacked up in the hallway. you breathed in the scent of cardboard, paint, and air from the balcony. a little weird, but it was the smell of a new beginning.

"now how do we open the door"

you muttered as you fumbled with the key. you turned it over and over, hearing it click so many times but the doorknob just wouldn't turn.

"you okay?"

you jumped slightly as you heard the clicking of another door from behind you, turning to see quite possibly the prettiest boy you've ever seen.

"oh yeah, i'm just trying to open the door"

you laughed awkwardly as he locked his own door, bearing an amused smile as he watched you very unsuccessfully turn the knob.

"you sure you're okay? i'm the only one on the floor at this time and about to leave soooo if you're sure.."

he took baby steps towards the elevator before you whipped around, nearly dropping your keys in the process.

"i lied"

you said sheepishly as you watched him grin and do a mini jog towards you.

"i figured"

he teased as you blushed a shade of pink and laughed softly.

"no one's moved to this floor for a while so the room hasn't been opened that much. you just gotta.."

he cut himself off as he rammed lightly into the door with his shoulder, the door finally swinging open and revealing a dusty, creme colored room.

"just gotta give it a harder push"

he looked at you bearing an accomplished grin, making you laugh and set your backpack down on the floor of your apartment.

"i'm y/n. and you are?"

"park sungho. it was nice meeting you and i'm so sorry but i'm in a hurry to get to my class. looking forward to meeting you, miss new neighbor"

sungho smiled as he hurriedly jogged towards the elevator, waving to you as the doors closed.

apt, apt

you walked into your apartment for the first time ever, shutting the door and sliding down with your back against it as you squealed to yourself, calling your best friend.

"jules, the cutest guy i've ever seen lives across the hallway from me"

"oh my gosh girl no way?? pleaseeee talk to him and don't pussy out this time"

"i did a little bit and he helped me get into my apartment but he left to get to his class. i'll try as soon as i see him next girl, promise!"

"good luck babe. i gotta run to my stupid afternoon class too so i'll text you later. love you"

"love you julie <3"

your best friend and day one never failed to hype you up and match your energy. you got up and dusted yourself off, not even noticing the amount of dust on the door and floor before you slid down.

grabbing the broom in the corner of the room, you started sweeping as much dust as you could into a pile and opened the windows to air out the place. within half an hour, your apartment was almost completely dust free.

"now to bring all this stuff in"

you breathed out a heavy sigh, reluctant to bring 50 boxes inside, but also excited to settle into your new home.

"HOLY SHIT"

you screamed the second you opened the door and saw sungho's figure: arms crossed staring at the messy boxes in the hall.

"what are you doing here?"

you asked with a hint of amusement in your eyes. neither you or sungho could stop the slight smiles from spreading on your faces.

"got bored. wanted to help my new neighbor move dusty boxes instead of listening to lectures about stats"

he said nonchalantly as he lifted a box. you sarcastically rolled your eyes, shaking your head with a smile.

"you skipped just to see little old me? i'm honored"

sungho scoffed and looked on as you picked up a box.

"don't even, i used you as an excuse to leave stats"

he teased as you both exchanged glances and laughed as you set your boxes down, chatting about little things you two were curious about.

"so what brings you here of all places instead of like, the maldives or something?"

he finally asked as the last box was set in your apartment, sitting on it as you sat across him.

"well, i just got out of high school and i wanted a sense of freedom. so i came from busan to seoul for a change of pace. i wanted to see the city and be away for once"

you smiled to yourself before looked up at sungho, who was looking out the glass door leading to the balcony.

“i feel you. i’ve lived in the city all my life and couldn’t imagine being without it. i just moved provinces away from my parents to gain more freedom”

sungho grinned, turning to look at you who smiled in recognition.

"well it's getting late and no better time to go see seoul than now right?"

sungho stood up and went to go open the door, letting cool summer air into the room.

“so you’re saying i should go out now??”

you were amused, but didn’t fully catch onto what he was saying. sungho beckoned you over to the balcony and pointed outwards.

"look over there. see those lights? that’s the part of seoul where nightlife is most active"

he smiled at seeing the way you were so enchanted seeing all the colorful lights.

"i was gonna go out to the club with my friends tonight, did you wanna come with? they're all cool, promise"

he glanced at you as you two closed the balcony doors. you were hesitant in your answer. busan was definitely not the most loud, party city, but what did you even come to seoul for if not to get out of your comfort zone?

"yeah that sounds great"

you smiled and nodded and sungho patted your shoulder.

"i'm gonna go back to my place to get ready and hopefully you can dig up your stuff in a couple hours. i'll knock when it's time"

sungho nodded as he closed the door behind him, leaving you to scramble and find which boxes had all your clothes and makeup.

and lo and behold exactly two hours later, you were freshly showered and had glitter on your face and dress alike as sungho knocked.

red hearts, red hearts

"well this is a nice change from the girl covered in a dusty tank"

he teased as he shut the door behind you guys and got on the elevator.

"shut up, as if you weren't covered in dirt the entire time we talked and moved boxes"

you rolled your eyes as sungho opened his car door for you, letting you get into the passenger side.

"kidding. but you clean up nicely"

you could've swore his eyes glanced up and down your body as he slipped into the drivers seat, looking back at your face that clearly showed you were caught off guard.

you became hyperaware of how good sungho looked too, your eyes catching on how his tight shirt displayed his broad shoulders.

"thanks, you too.."

you said slowly, unconsciously eye fucking him before you snapped out of it, looking up to meet his eyes. the slight smirk on his face laid painfully clear until he realized that you knew he was eyeing you as well. the two of you looked away after a brief moment and cleared your throats.

im tryna kiss your lips for real

"anyways you're about to see the best club i've ever been to. best dj and bartender in the world”

he said, focusing on the road as you looked between him and the view of seoul’s busy streets.

the loud voices of the people walking by and the bright, colorful lights were a sharp contrast to what you were used to in your hometown, where it was all quiet with noises from the sea.

sungho took a quick peek at you while stopped at a red light and found it endearing the way you looked so enchanted by something he found so normal in his life.

he thought you looked so beautiful with your hair waving in the breeze of the open windows, light reflecting off the glitter on your face.

dont you want me like i want you, baby?

dont you need me like i need you now?

“we’re here”

you turned your attention back to sungho who just got done parking the car in front, walking to the passenger side to let you out.

“after you, miss”

he swept his hand outwards, teasingly directing you out of the car and onto the sidewalk as you rolled your eyes at him.

“what a gentleman”

you teased back as he laughed and offered you his arm to hold, playing the part as he walked you towards the club.

turn this apartment into a club

“hey sungho!”

sungho steered you towards his friends, who were shouting and waving to greet him over the loud music playing.

“hey guys”

he individually greeted 4 different people as you stood by and smiled as you enjoyed the unfamiliar, but lively atmosphere, straying a bit from the table as you looked around.

“who’s this pretty girl?”

one of the taller guys asked as sungho promptly stood next to you, placing his hand gently on your lower back to bring you back to the table.

“this pretty girl is my new neighbor, y/n. she just moved here so i invited her to come out”

he explained as you smiled and waved at all of them.

“i’m y/n, nice to meet you”

you said politely and the four of them immediately welcomed you to sit down with them.

“so how do you feel about soju shots y/n”

one of the guys, leehan, asked as he poured one up and offered it to you.

“my favorite”

you replied excitedly as you took it fast, chasing it with a nearby lime.

“i like her already”

jaehyun shot a pleased smile at both you and sungho, promptly following you as he took a shot.

“okayyy you might’ve found the one this time”

riwoo whispered to sungho as he watched you down shots like they were nothing, the others happily drinking with you.

“i hope so. she’s really nice and really matches my personality”

sungho whispered back before also taking a shot.

“come on, don’t think we didn’t see you taking your shots hella slow”

taesan teased sungho as he poured him more shots, sungho rolling his eyes as he took them all.

“you know better than anyone that i’m no lightweight”

sungho scoffed, shaking his head and smiling while taesan took one more shot.

“wanna go dance?”

taesan shouted to the table and everyone agreed, including yourself. it wasn’t until you were on the floor that you started hesitating.

“what’s wrong?”

sungho shouted to you over the music, seeing how hesitant you were to follow the others into the crowd.

“i kinda don’t know how to dance”

you shouted sheepishly and sungho took your hand, smiling reassuringly.

“i’ll teach you how. do you trust me?”

he asked, and you just laughed.

“big request when we just met today sungho. but yeah. i do trust you”

you smiled widely at sungho, who mirrored your smile and tugged you into the crowd with the others.

sleep tomorrow, but tonight, go crazy

“just follow the music. don’t even worry about what anyone else thinks. they don’t care”

sungho said right next to your ear as he pressed his body directly behind yours, fingertips lightly ghosting your hips as to not make you uncomfortable.

“you got it”

he praised, and you laughed as you both jumped along to the loud music blaring, not caring about a thing in the world.

“this is fun”

you turned to look up at sungho, whose smiling eyes made his entire being glow with happiness. it was contagious. you couldn’t help but smile in peace knowing it’s him leading you through it.

the two of you looked away quickly, but the moment was enough to make you really think about sungho.

maybe it was just the alcohol talking but even after you turned around and started jumping around again, sungho was all you could think about.

the closeness and intimacy of it all, how he matched your energy, how he was so respectful yet goofy in the way he touched you. it all showed the caring nature of park sungho, and maybe you could see yourself falling for your new neighbor.

are you ready?

“guys i think i’m gonna take y/n home. she’s drunk and starting to get a little…”

sungho didn’t even know how to describe you, and let your actions speak for themselves. you were giggling profusely at nothing and slightly stumbling if not for sungho holding you still.

“and you’re okay to drive? i can call you guys an uber”

jaehyun worried over you two as usual, but sungho shook his head.

“she had a couple more drinks in there but i sobered up. we’ll be okay”

sungho reassured everyone, bidding them goodbye as he basically carried you back out to the car.

“sungho..”

you mumbled out as he buckled you in, moving around to the other side to buckle himself in.

“yes?”

“was so fun”

sungho couldn’t look at you for fear of crashing his car, but let out a small laugh all the same.

“i’m glad. you seemed like you had a good time drinking with everyone”

“mhm”

it was a mostly silent car ride back. you dozed off as sungho was left alone with his thoughts. thoughts about you. he met you 12 hours ago and he could barely get you out of his mind.

he glanced over at your sleeping figure curled up in the passenger seat, tossing his jacket over you as a blanket. he hoped that you would sober up a little during the car ride so he could talk to you a little while longer.

sungho parked the car and tried to shake you awake from your nap without much luck, so he picked you up and carried you into the building.

“oh? i didn’t know you two met already”

the sweet old lady at the front desk teased when she saw you two together. sungho just laughed and pulled your dress down to cover your thighs since it shifted when he picked you up.

“i was just showing her around and she had a little too much fun”

he and the woman shared a laugh before she shooed him into the elevator, saying that you two should get some rest. not that you were awake for any of it anyways.

once he got in front of your door, he realized that he didn’t know where your keys were. your purse was in the car and he was not about to go down into the parking garage for it.

he unlocked his own door and laid you down onto the couch, walking back to lock the door behind you two.

“sungho?”

he whipped around to find you sitting up, clutching your head.

“you feeling okay?”

you gratefully accepted the bottle of water he passed you, nodding as you drank it.

“just a small headache, it’ll get worse in the morning”

you jokingly said as sungho let out a light laugh and sat beside you.

“i took you to mine because your purse is in my car and your keys are there, and i also remembered you have no bed yet. do you want to stay here or do you have anywhere else..?”

you shook your head.

“if it’s okay, could i stay here? and maybe borrow some clothes?”

you asked sheepishly and sungho nodded profusely.

“of course! i’ll be right back. you can help yourself to anything i have”

his voice faded away as he ran to his closet looking for clothes small enough to fit you. you sat up on the couch while you waited, looking at all the pictures sungho hung up until he came back with a loose tshirt and sweats.

you changed into them and thought about how kind sungho was: taking a girl he barely knew out because she was new, letting you stay in his house. you made a mental note to yourself to get sungho a gift or take him out for dinner later.

“thanks for taking me back to yours after you let me tag along with you tonight”

you settled next to sungho on the couch and gave him a sweet smile, to which he smiled back. you decided not to point out or tease him about the light pink blush on the back of his neck when you moved a little closer to him.

“it’s no problem. i had a lot of fun dancing with you tonight, and i know my friends like you a lot too”

he cleared his throat, clapping a hand to the back of his neck to hide the spreading blush that you so obviously noticed judging by the small smirk on your face. he avoided your gaze, staring at the TV for a movie to put on.

“i had a good time too. we should do it again sometime”

you looked up at sungho from beside him, smile faltering nervously at how close his face was to yours.

“yeah, for sure..”

his voice trailed off as he looked at your lips, the soft opening melody of a random movie playing in the background.

the building tension from earlier combined with the slight buzz of alcohol awoke immediate feelings for one another, not being able to think about anything but kissing the other’s lips.

the two of you kept looking at each other and hesitating before you tugged on the front of his shirt lightly, finally pulling him in for a kiss.

the kiss was slow and sweet. sungho was stiff at first, scared of making you uncomfortable until you started getting bold, letting your hands roam over him.

it took a while for you guys to pull away, not wanting to let go of the moment. you both only let go for air, smiling at each other as you caught your breath.

“you’re a damn good kisser”

you teased as you ran your hands over sungho’s chest and shoulders, him giving you a quick kiss as he laid you down onto the couch.

“yeah? i could do better than that”

he teased right back, making you laugh softly as he hovered over you.

“i think i liked you better when you were all shy”

your eyes started fluttering shut as sungho pressed another kiss to your lips, hands wandering under your shirt and rubbing circles on your waist.

“i mean i could just sit right next to you again”

sungho abruptly pulled off of you and sat you both up besides each other, making you laugh and struggle to pull him back down with you.

you were finally able to pull him back down into another long kiss, forgetting about the random movie playing in the background.

“not a chance pretty boy. gotta finish what you started.”

just meet me at the…

[forwntrx]

girls like girls (like boys do)

(reader x winter / reader x yunjin) smau series

you are the fifth member of aespa. one of the aces. loved by the public, the media, and even other idols. you were confident and assured in everything, except...your sexuality. you were so sure you were straight, just like a pin, until you met yunjin.

huh yunjin. a member of le sserafim. when she slips her number in your cookie at music bank, your whole life is thrown off balance. from that point on, she relentlessly tries to steal your heart, not knowing that winter was the one who set her eyes on it first. kim minjeong has loved you ever since she met you, but she was so sure that you could never see her that way. she lets go of her feelings and chooses to be your best friend instead. that is, until yunjin tries to make you hers. the three of you become locked in a triangle no one can escape. not without getting hurt that is.

- " i wanted her first. "

- " didn’t you ever hear second is the best, first is the worst? "

- " that’s not how that goes. "

STATUS - ongoing! not started yet but updates will come soon. my second smau so give me grace

TAGS - GAY GAY, 'unrequited' love (at first), fluff, pining, angsty a little bit i'm sorry, slow burn, slice of life, friends to enemies to friends to best friends to lovers (winter, most of this happens before but there will be flashbacks), strangers to lovers (yunjin), one bed trope hehe, fake dating, tipsy!yunjin, dorks in love, arguments, found family with aespa, !!! CHOOSE YOUR OWN ENDING !!!, think of it like a decision game where it branches out those two branches being either yunjin or winter

TAGS (PT2) - lesbian!winter, lesbian!yunjin, lesbian!reader, reader is clueless & indecisive, winter is bad with emotions and communication, she's trying her best, yunjin is the biggest flirt to ever exist, eventual winter and yunjin friendship (emphasis on the eventual), yunjin is annoying but in the best way possible, overthinker!yunjin, protective!winter, lots of fun guys

IDOLS FT. - yeonjun (txt), sunghoon (enha), jake (enha), aespa, le sserafim, yuqi (g-idle), tzuyu (twice) jihyo (twice), yeji (itzy), jeongin (skz), chaeryeong (itzy), other idol mentions most likely

CONTENT WARNING - sex jokes, alcohol, suggestive jokes, might have suggestive scenes nothing graphic and is sfw, too many pretty girls, swears, angst (sorry but only a little), very unserious sometimes, live a little, will update more later

TAGLIST - open! free! ready for whoever wants to be on it, just send me an ask

PROFILES ! — y/n's groupies | yunjin's haters | the idol club

I. FIRST ACT

music bank cookie

just me ()i-dle

canon event

room 312

exile

20 questions

oh okay

comfortable

so cute

on mine

is this your love affair?

i hate you

the jealous type

II. SECOND ACT

14. talk?

[mosneakers]

Reaper's Wardrobe Collection- Information Packet 📝

I didn't want to bloat the original post up with all of this(it's a lot) and it took way longer than I expected! Sorry I've been so strapped for time recently, balancing life (and ironically—death, unfortunately) but I've finally found some time to include some additional information about the newly released (December- Friday the 13th!!) Reaper's Wardrobe Collection, which by the way, you've all been SO sweet and kind and receptive to, thank you eternally 🥺💗 Below is some additional information if you're interested, just because one, I'm a certified yapper, but also I like to include that with my cc when I can <3 Please, if you use these items for your sims, TAG ME!! I would seriously be so happy to see how you use them 😍

Lamplight Dress (+Glowy Version) and Final Layer Accessory Lingerie

A sensual little number that will draw them in like a moth to the lamplight. This versatile dress comes in a variety of swatches, including even sheerer options for when you really want to turn up the warmth. You can pair it with the Final Layer Lingerie—a maxis match accessory lingerie set found in the glove category—or any other accessory underwear to layer and customize your look.

Lamplight Dress: 44 Swatches Final Layer Lingerie: 26 Swatches

And for those special sims who are the light of your life, or maybe just get lost often, try the bonus glowy version that actually glows up!

Both dresses are standalone, so neither rely on the other to work. You can freely have both in your game at the same time or just one, whichever you prefer.

Lamplight Dress-Glowy Version: 11 Swatches

Deathflower Pendant

Yes, it's the one and only deathflower, now wearable! Meshing this as a beginner almost sent me over to the other side, but I'm happy to say that with the help and support of my lovely husband, I got through it. Which I'm grateful for, because I needed this in my game. Available for ages kids and up, and comes in 9 swatches.

Death Grip Ear Cuff/Eternal Whispers Earrings

Embrace the whispers of the beyond with the Death Grip Ear Cuff and Eternal Whispers Earrings. This one can be a little finicky. So because of how the UV_1 maps work, there doesn't seem to be a reasonable way to make the ear cuff move along with the ear slider, at least that I'm aware of. So the best we can do is to remove the ear cuff entirely or shape your sims ear to work with the cuff. I know, not ideal, sorry :( It was created with ear preset 1 in mind, but you might be able to mold your own ears with some sliding around.

The set is designed to be worn either together, or separated. The cuff (a metal skeleton hand) can technically be worn with other earrings, but due to texture constraints, most textures conflict. Although not all results look bad so definitely feel free to play around and make some happy mistakes!

Whimsical Wings Knit Sweater

A little flutter of quaint, a little flutter of spooky— What started out as an attempt to convert the Life and Death one for toddlers into a kids version, but ended up basically recreating it. However, there are a few more cute swatches special for kids that fit the theme. 16 swatches in total.

First Grimpressions Zip Up Onesie

For the little reapers in training— This cozy zip up onesie is perfect for jammies, costumes, or playtime, and is available for both toddlers and children. Although children get a few extra bonus dingy social bunny swatches reminiscent of the social bunny from ts2. The rest are reaper and "freezer-boney" themed.

Grimborn Onesie

My pride and joy :’) this is one of the first ones I started working on, a little hooded onesie subtly shaped like death himself. Many of the swatches feature an embroidered crow with the daintiest little heart, but throughout the rest of the 8 swatches you'll also find little wings, a skull, and and a freezer-boney.

Reaper Sleepers

How could your days ever be grim when you have these adorable little reapers bouncing around with you each step you take? These were what started this whole project, honestly. I was making a few things for Norvis, and obviously he needed a pair of house slippers, being a middle-aged son of the Grim Reaper, obviously. That's when I decided it might be fun to not only share them, but make this into a whole collection— then it snowballed from there. They're not the most perfectly meshed items, but I think that gives them some character ^̮^

Robes Of Respite

Just the Life and Death Employee Reaper Robes, but with no hood, because sometimes we all need a breather. I did tighten the rope around the waist a bit so your sims can show off that figure when they're reaping someone's soul and dragging them away to the unknown. I also enhanced the textures a bit and added a bonus dark swatch. One for Male frames and one Female.

Prep Me Pumps

Just a cute pair of soft goth pumps to make a statement, complete with the most darling little bow placed right under your achilles heel so you can prepped for anything, anytime. 13 swatches in total.

Spirit Sprinter Athleisure Set

Even though all 4 of these cozy swatches are adorned with a zip up ribbon corset, there's no need to sacrifice your comfort to look snatched. Whether you're bumming out at home handing candy out to trick-or treaters, or training hard to be the best reaper the company has ever seen, this outfit has you covered.

Reaper Scythe Accessory

This is just the regular Reaper's Scythe from the game, made into an accessory by leo_morg on MTS. Link here They don't seem to be active anymore or have a TOU. It is just an EA item from the game but I wanted to properly cover my bases when it comes to crediting, since they were the ones who did most of the work. I just made some edits to the mesh and textures. At first I was just using it for screenshots and previews but since its a fine piece of cc I figured someone might find it useful so why let it go to waste?

Eclipse Cloak-Illuminated, Eclipse Cloak-Veiled, and Halfway Hair

For the adventurous souls daring enough to tread that liminal bridge between the afterlife and the mortal world, shroud yourself in mystery with these deluxe reapers cloaks- This is the first hair I've ever created with the sole purpose of making it specifically for a hat, although I'm happy with how it looks with no hood too! As for the cloaks, I just wanted some separated dramatic cloaks/hoods for storytelling, both a version that is up, and down. Goes in the hat category. They're a lot of material in a small space so the textures aren't the the most beautiful up close—but at the very least they're not going to conflict with pretty much any clothing (unless that clothing item doesn't obey the allotted space, of course) The veiled version is kinda neat because it functions/chops as a hat, so it works with a select handful of hairs. The hair has your standard 24 EA swatches, and the cloaks have 8 matching swatches.

Morgue Moth Vintage Romper

If you're one of my readers, you may have noticed that I occasionally like to use moth motifs from time to time. They go hand in hand with the death theme and they're also just really pretty ♥‿♥ You'll see them a lot throughout this project, and this item is no exception. I especially love this romper because it's super versatile— all 11 moth adorned swatches make for an easy go-to outfit for those hot days, but also work as adorable pajamas or vintage swimwear, and have that whimsical-macabre twist that is so mothsneakers ✨

Plaid To The Bone Shirt

11 swatches featuring a grungy patchwork of button down flannels stitched together, layered with a haphazardly placed tee with grim but colorful graphics for that effortlessly unkempt look. Wanted to make sure we got something for the men too, but of course our girls can throw it on as well, if they want!

Cadaver-demia Coat Set

Fight the biting chill of the morgue freezers, or stay warm on your haunting moonlit walks in the cemetery, and look hot doing it! Lately this has been my irl go to look when I want to look put-together but don't want to think too much about what to wear. simply mini-skirt+shirt+coat, pair it with your favorite tights and boots and you're good to go 😊 Keeping that same kind of idea with this piece, I really love full-body outfits so I don't have to think too much about putting an outfit together, I always feel like the cc-world needs more full-body outfits (that aren't just dresses, but complete looks you feel me?) I digress, this set has 8 swatches.

Thanatolo-dress Outfit

Give off Thanatologist's day off vibes in this studious casual full-body set. 18 swatches; featuring a fitted turtleneck sweater, (some with grim graphics, some plain) layered under a cropped plaid button down top, and paired with a high-waisted corduroy mini skirt.

Once again, huge thank you to every single one of you who have reblogged and shared, or had such kind things to say about this collection. It's been so much fun to make, and I'm so glad y'all encourage my outlet and more importantly, that you're encouraging ALWAYS FREE CC 🥰 because there is no space for greed in this community let's just have fun ok? Please enjoy, please tag me if you use it (because I'm dying to what you do with it) and you can find the collection here 🖤

[salemssimblr]

My Top 24 Screenshots Renders of 2024!

I was tagged by the so many lovely mutuals and creators! Thank you @elderwisp, @savagemagician3, @sikoi, @blvckentropy, @mosneakers, & @azeterna! I love yall so much!

I'm so sorry, despite my very best efforts I couldn't choose just 24, so have 30 instead 😅

Looking at all these together, I'm worried I may have plateau'd just a bit 😅 No but in reality, it's really cool to see that I've refined my style and methods over the year, starting in January and continuing it all through 2024. Seeing progress and improvement is one of my favorite things about this process, so doing these recaps is always enjoyable.

January:

Looking back, I'm still so proud of the first dancing set of renders for Ariss & Vasily, and who could forget the first Alice sighting?? I can't, look at her.

February:

February was a bit of a slow month for me but I still love how this A+tM album cover came out!

March:

March was a bit slower, but I love this set of Ariss (:

April:

April was a goood month, I'm still so in love with all three of these.

May:

MerMay was lacking for me a bit this year, but I really love how my contribution turned out (: & this spicy render of Ariss & Vasily is one of my favorites, if for no other reason than his little fang peek.

June:

June was all about Alice + the Madness! & like LEGIT? I still can't believe I made this Rolling Stone cover? I have a secret, I've tried to make another one for Alice, but nothing has or probably will ever look as good as this one so I've given up lmfaoooo

& this render of Erisande was such a labor of love. I sat down and said it'd be really quick and then spent hours editing meshes and adjusting the lighting... but then, that always happens with me and "quick" renders 😅

July:

Bit of a slow month, but I'm still so floored (& happy!) about the love Millie has gotten! This isn't even a completed render and it's one of my most well-received posts to date haha, but I can't blame anyone, look how cute she is.

August:

Ramping up into spooky season we have two of my favorite renders of all time, my "bog demon" and mothwoman! As obsessed as I am with Ariss and Vasily, it's really nice to do creative one-off renders and these were both SO FUN to do. I hope to do more in the new year too (:

September:

This iconic portrait of Ariss will always be one of my favorites (& is actually my computer's wallpaper rn, but a version updated with her 'new' tattoos), & this render of Kai could definitely be improved on (maybe in the new year...) but it was a really fun challenge! I do see flaws in it now but that's growing and learning!

October:

October was (not surprisingly) a very busy month for me! The idea for the render of Theo & Millie had been rolling around in my head since I first created them, & while the end result wasn't exactly what I was envisioning, I still really love how it turned out.

& though this set of renders for Ariss & Vasily took me FOR-FUCKING-EVER, and I see a lot of flaws even now (after trying my damnedest to have NONE), I still really love it. The end result/edit/colorway was NOT what I planned but I really fell in love with it.

November:

November, the month of ambitious scene-building, pose-making, and upping my skin shader game in a BIG way. I spent literal hours perfecting Ariss' new tattoo, and literal days building the scene for that gorgeous render of Kai.

& I'm so glad yall love that pose set! It was definitely a learning experience and a labor of love.

December:

Looking at this overview, December has been dark and spicy lmfao but I actually love it. Once again, all of these took wayyyy longer than I thought they would when I sat down to start them, but I'm genuinely in love with all three!

& that's a wrap (so far) on 2024! I'm having surgery tomorrow so not sure I'll be able to create/post anything else this year, but I have big plans for 2025! So stay tuned (:

I'm tagginggggggg @kuroashims, @a-m-pyra. @acidheaddd, @gothoffspring, @pralinesims, @thebramblewood, @moonfromearth, @nepotisim, & YOU, I want to see all your creations!

(There were a LOT more creators I wanted to tag but I saw yall have already done this!)

[dyktvideogamesfx]

Rules and the like!

Song poll blog inspired by things like @doyoulikethis-videogame-song, @doyoulikethissong-poll and Guess the Game.

The general gist is similar to most if not all of these blogs in which a small clip of SFX from a video game will be isolated and posted here, with polls for people to vote on how well known it is.

This page'll most likely be updated the more this kinda stuff goes on.

Should go without saying but transphobes, aphobes and exclusionists are not welcome here.

Submissions are: CLOSED

General FAQ:

Do you take submissions: Yes! Though only when submissions are open. This will be through a google form that will open and close periodically, whenever I have the time!

Will there be scheduled posts at specific times?: Right now I'm scheduling around 3 posts at 4pm GMT every day, though this may change with my own schedule/if submissions are running low.

I'll do my best to keep it going! :D

What is your name/pronouns: You can call me Smudge. He/They. Nice to meet you :3

Can we say the answer in the tags?: I would prefer if people didn't as this goes against the spirit of the game- However, very vague hints are fine by me! Be warey of spoilers in the notes if you want to play along!

My submission wasn't posted?: I will post every submission I get to the best of my ability but if I cannot locate or find the isolated audio I will have skip as game noise can warp or disturb the sound itself. I will do my best to find it isolated beforehand, but if I cannot then it must be skipped, apologies!

A good resource for finding game SFX is The Sound Resource but unfortunatly not every game has a clean rip for its sounds!

Can we submit voicelines?: This is tricky, mostly yes.

I would say things like Hornet's "SHAW" from Hollow Knight count for this blog and I would accept them vs something like a clip from Cave Johnson's Lemon Rant I would not accept! Use your best judgement when submitting, but voicelines and clips are not specifically off of the table.

This SFX was used somewhere else!: This blog will run both on submissions and generally what the sound is more associated with rather than its original source! Not every SFX is original and some are used from specific sound libraries. The Roblox OOF, for example, comes from a game named Messiah - however, since it is more well known for its inclusion in Roblox, thats what this blog will use as its source if thats how its submitted.

I will also be going off of what people say is the Context/Source for a game so sorry if that is ever wrong! If it is entirely, 100% incorrect in terms of where its from you can send me a message and I'll change it!

Can you tag scary/sounds from horror games?: The point of the game is listening to unexpected sounds, and "scary" is an extremely subjective description. I will do my best to avoid posting loud jumpscare sounds or other sounds that I think are unpalatable to a general audience, but beyond that I don't intend on tagging specific types of sounds at this time.

How many SFX can we submit in the form?: I would prefer 4 per person, at maximum, if you submit multiple from the same series I will most likely space them out across a few days/weeks.

You didn't answer my ask/did you recieve my ask?: I tend to be doing other things while this blog runs on a queue, I try my best to answer and give the best responses I can for this blog to make it more accessible/comfortable and for everyone to contribute to this fun little game!

However- if you've noticed I haven't answered your ask, it's not personal. It may be due to it already being answered here, too spoilery concerning specific polls, inappropriate subjects for this blog or I may just keep asks in my inbox if they're especially nice/kind to look back on!

Can we add XYZ to the voting options?: I am quite happy with the three options as they are! I prefer not to muddy polls with very specific options, making votes a little more strict. Generally all 3 cover everything they should.

This sound is too loud/quiet!:

In all seriousness, if a sound is genuinely too loud, shoot me an ask. I'll see if its appropriate to add a warning!

Active Tags:

#open vote : Polls that are open

#closed vote : Polls that have been closed and the SFX source revealed

#asks : Asks for the blog.

#off-topic : For anything off topic - may be related to the blog or an update/announcement!

[lovebugism]

forgive me for what is likely a basic ass request but... steve has a crush on eddie's best friend? smut optional but encouraged :) (love, j.d. aka mypoisonedvine)

✶ ┄ LOVE YOU, ON PURPOSE (i)

part one | part two

summary: steve harrington took extra care to avoid the local freaks of hawkins. having shared custody of a fourteen-year-old forced him into a bitter friendship with one, he's steadfast in his refusal to befriend the other. that is, until you start working at the groove beside family video. steve claims he only fell for you because you tripped him. (17k)

pairing: steve harrington / eddie's bff!reader

tags: strangers to friends to lovers, mutual pining, protective eddie, canon divergence TW swearing, bullying, some smooching, talks of insecurities, reader is doubtful of steve's intentions because steve used to be a dick &lt;3

a/n: this request has been sitting in my inbox for ages. ages, i tell you! i wrote the outline the day it was sent in and ended up turning the blurb request into a full on 30k+ word fic. i'm sorry for the wait j.d. (and to everyone else who's been waiting patiently for me to put this out). i quite literally put my heart, soul, pussy, and so, so many hours into this. please enjoy! feedback is always appreciated! xoxo

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

Something happens and I'm head over heels.

It would be a total disservice to call you Eddie’s best friend.

It wouldn’t even feel right to call you his platonic soulmate or his sister from another dimension. Not when the two of you are essentially an extension of the same human being. It’s a twin flame on steroids — your mirrored souls make the rest of Hawkins believe in some sort of higher power. There’s no way it wasn’t destiny that placed the two of you together at exactly the right place, at exactly the right time.

Your entwined spirits could’ve been a beautiful thing.

It’s too bad you’re both total fucking freaks.

Unfortunately, being a couple of metalheads who spend their free time creating fantastical worlds in silly little board games hasn’t become cool yet — for some sad, strange reason. It leaves you and Eddie as the town’s token social pariahs. The kind of misfits you only spot when you care enough to look — laughing too loudly at the lunch table or sharing a cigarette in the alleyway between school buildings.

The kind of weirdos who get your attention without trying. The kind that people only look at when they need something to make fun of.

With that being said, everything Steve knew about you came from the people that hated you.

Tommy Hagan said that you and Eddie had been fucking since the seventh grade, that the two of you had gotten close between blowjobs and fingerbangs in the old chemistry classroom. No one’s quite sure where it came from, but they believed him without thinking twice. You and Eddie tried to squash the rumor for years before leaning into it full throttle.

“And these are the freaks,” Tommy announced when he approached your lunch table. He was giving Billy Hargrove a grand tour of the high school, or rather the shithole, and detoured like you and Eddie were some kind of sideshow attraction. Him and his goons ogled at you like zoo animals.

Steve idled some feet away, not as interested in the bit as the rest of them. He was even less interested in entertaining the new kid on the block thateveryone else seemed to be obsessed with.

“Hey, Tommy...” Eddie sing-songed through a mouthful of PB&J. You’d given him the other half of your sandwich, because you always give him the other half of your sandwich. “Hope you’re not comin’ back to ask for a handy again. I already turned you down, remember?”

A dumb grin took over the boy’s freckled face. He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned over to the California boy. “I wouldn’t get too close to them. Don’t know where their hands have been, you know? If I had to guess, I think Punchy got Munson’s rocks off in the janitor’s closet before lunch period.”

Neither of you were particularly fazed by the laughter that erupted all at once and threatened to swallow you whole. Instead, you smiled with bits of grape jelly smeared on your chin. “I bet you think about it a lot, don’t you, Tommy?”

You really lived up to the nickname. Punchy. You weren’t entirely sure where it came from — your fierce temper, perhaps, or maybe your intense personality. Either way, it suited you.

Vicki Carmichael once said that you bit a guy on a date one time. Barry Jenkins, a tennis douchebag who thought the world revolved around him because his dad owned a string of local laundromats. He took you on a date in his mom’s Impala and assumed making out in the backseat gave him free rein to stick his hand up your skirt.

The asshole sported a red mark on his neck the next day.

When people asked you about it, you smiled with all your teeth in place of any real answer.

Carol Perkins loved to comment on the state of your wardrobe, telling anyone who would listen about the time she caught you rifling through the $1 bargain bins outside the thrift store. She liked to joke that you were stealing from them. “Because she can’t even afford a couple measly dollars. It’s kinda sad, honestly. I feel a little bad for her,” you overheard her saying once.

You were smoking a cigarette in the stall and watching through the crack of it while her and her friends touched up their lip gloss. 

“Wait, really?” Tina wondered, stopping mid-swipe of mascara through her long lashes to gape at the girl beside her. Because, god forbid, they don’t have someone to make fun of.

Carol snapped bright pink bubblegum between her teeth. She looked offended, almost — manicured brows furrowed and shiny lips snarled — like the idea of her taking pity on you was insulting. “No,” she snapped in response.

You’re pretty sure it’s the only rumor about you that’s got any bit of truth to it. Or any rumor of hers, really. The thrift store was great and all, but you firmly believe that your best pieces come remanufactured straight from Eddie Munson’s closet.

So it isn’t any wonder why the two of you seem to dress so similarly — all leather jackets and distressed jeans and hand-me-down t-shirts that are either too big or too small. The both of you take little care in your appearance, wearing only what you feel good in. And sometimes that means wild hair and baggy clothes that swallow you whole.

To make it worse, you and Eddie even talk the same. You’re both loud and brash and have very little awareness of personal space. You aren’t scared to make a scene or use your voice when you think it’s being stifled. And when you love someone, they know it, because you won’t leave them the hell alone.

These are all the things that Steve hated about Eddie. So he hasn’t quite figured out why he’s so damn in love with you. 

But he is. 

Quite dreadfully so. 

Head over heels and stumbling since the day he met you for a second time.

It was the spring of 1986 and The Groove had just opened up. Steve had heard murmurings of a record shop taking over the empty outlet adjacent to Family Video but had no idea it would nearly run them out of business. The shiny, new music store attracted all of their usual customers. People were more excited to buy new cassettes than rent movies they’d seen a thousand times already.

Steve didn’t mind, though. He liked it best when the store was empty. But all of his friends — a closeted lesbian, a basket case, and a couple of fourteen-year-olds — seemed to have the same affliction that was plaguing the rest of the town. 

He tried not to be offended when Robin said she was going to spend her break next door and not with him in the closet-sized break room. 

He failed.

Robin spent her half-hour and then some meeting you. She returned forty-five minutes later with a blushing face and a bleeding heart. Suddenly, there were two people in Steve’s life that couldn’t seem to shut up about you. As much as it annoyed him, he let her gush about you anyway, because that’s what best friends do, after all.

But Steve knew you once upon a time. Or he thought he did.

You were a loudmouthed metalhead who wore all black to blend in to Eddie’s shadow. You created fictional characters because it was easier than making friends with real people. You were strange and awkward and mean and gauche — the total opposite of this heavenly, mystical creature Robin was making you out to be.

But then it became this whole… thing.

With Robin and Eddie constantly talking over him about you, the rest of the kids were as confused as Steve was. And as they so often tend to do, the group decided to take matters into their own hands and make the short trek to meet you formally. Steve figured that their answer would be final. When those teenagers hate you, you know it. He learned that the hard way

They’re gone for a little over an hour and come back with a thousand stories and various tapes they say you gave to them for free.

Lucas has got a new Beastie Boys cassette and a proud smile on his face as he recounts the promise you’d made him about catching his next basketball game. “And she said she really liked my ranger,” he brags less than humbly, telling the older teens about how you’d heard stories about his track record in Hellfire campaigns. There’s a sudden suaveness to his voice as he bounces his brows up and down at them.

Max scrunches her face in disgust. She clutches a Kate Bush tape close to her chest, like it’s a prized possession she never wants to let go of. She rolls her eyes at her boyfriend (or maybe ex-boyfriend, but Steve can never keep up these days) and makes her own conversation with Robin. The two girls are the only ones with more than half a brain cell between them, or so they claim.

The redhead tells her that she plans on bringing her broken skateboard over to your store soon. She says the thing’s been wobbly for days, and Robin nods along like she knows all about it. “Well, apparently, she has some tools and knows how to fix it. Said the trucks just needed to be reinforced or some shit, I don’t know, I’m just glad it’s getting fixed.”

“Wait, why didn’t you tell me?” Steve asks her, confusion contorting his words along with his features. He crosses his arms and leans against the counter. “I could’ve fixed it.”

“You don’t know anything about skateboards,” Max monotones.

“Okay, but you don’t even know this girl! She’s a total stranger, Max. That’s dangerous.”

She rolls her eyes. “She’s nice, Steve. Way nicer than you—”

That makes him scoff.

“—And you’d know that if you got to know her.”

It’s Dustin’s turn to gush about you next. His opinion, for a reason Steve has never been able to place, arguably means the most to him. And the kid is just absolutely fucking beaming about you. He holds a Star Wars orchestral vinyl in his hand —  the brand new one he’s been talking about for weeks but couldn’t afford. 

He talks of the collection of DnD figurines you were painting behind the counter and the promise you made to make one for his bard come the next campaign. 

Dustin gazes at Steve, wide-eyed and nodding like he’s as amazed by the revelation as Steve is.  “She’s cool, Steve. Like… really cool.” 

The boy thought that Robin just had a crush, that Eddie was just being Eddie and overdramatizing all of his stories about you. But you’re everything they said you’d be and then some. The kind of stranger you meet that takes your breath away, that makes you sad in the understanding that you’ll never see them again. Dustin is grateful you don’t have to be a stranger anymore.

You sounded… nice. More than nice. They painted you out to be a fucking angel, the way you took care of a bunch of kids you barely knew for the better part of an hour. You weren’t the freak everyone made you out to be all that time ago.

They talk a great deal about your looks, too. Dustin, mostly. Lucas had received a glare and a half-hearted punch on the arm from Max when he said how pretty you were — even though she ultimately agreed with him. The curly-headed boy uses too big words to describe the renaissance painting you are, all heavenly morose and beautifully strange.

“Hey,” Eddie scolds from the sidelines, mostly playful. “That’s my sister you’re talking about. Bring it down a few notches, ‘kay?”

Steve is silent for the rest of the day after that. He’s not pouting about it like Robin keeps saying he is, just reserved in his reminiscence. 

He can’t tell if he’s intrigued or annoyed. They talk about you the way people used to talk about King Steve — with a borderline obsession for someone they don’t really know. And deep down, he knows he’s just jealous. Jealous that no one talks about him that way anymore. Jealous that none of the kids have ever talked about him that way.

It leaves him skeptical and wanting to see the real thing for himself.

Steve opts to meet you on his lunch break the next day with a tight chest and sweaty palms, like a part of him knew it was going to change the trajectory of his life for the foreseeable future.

The door dings with his arrival. The record store smells like earth and nostalgia, a bit like flipping through the pages of an old book. Vinyls sit in rows and in towers that rise to the ceilings. Colorful cassettes, of which there are thousands, have nooks and crannies of their own. Posters decorate the walls along with various patterned records — there’s hardly a blank spot in the entire store.

And when Steve sees you for the first time, he only sees the back of you.

You’re in all black, just like he imagined you’d be. A sliver of skin at your midriff is showing from where your too small shirt has ridden up your torso. And your hair is as wild as ever, though a little longer than he remembers. You’ve haphazardly pinned back the ornery strings with a sparkly pin, but it doesn’t do much to tame them.

A breeze of warm wistfulness washes over him at the sight of you. A reminder of a life that used to be his, that you were a part of only passively.

It’s your smile that does him in. Maybe because you’ve never looked at him with it. As far as Steve’s concerned, no one’s ever smiled at him the way you do, and you barely even know him. You hadn’t seen him in over a year and if you shared any words in the past, it wasn’t anything more than snarky one-liners. But here you are, looking at him with sunshine anyway.

“Hi,” you beam with the warmest grin he’s ever seen, swiveling in your chair to face him. “Welcome in.”

He’s too stunned by the sight of you to respond. He just stands in the doorway, all wide-eyed and gaping, like he’s the first to see an angel on earth. And it’s strange because you’re far from perfect. 

You’re blousy and a little disheveled, like you’d been running late that morning. The lack of makeup allows your imperfections to shine through in a way that makes you somehow more alluring. And you’ve got paint splattered like freckles on your cheeks, the culprit being the figurines you’re painting behind the counter. If you know you’re dotted with shades of red, blue, and green, you don’t show it.

“Can I help you find anything?” you ask him, still kind even though he’s acting like a fucking weirdo. That’s supposed to be your thing, not his.

Steve grasps for something to say but comes up short. His lips part and then close again in an embarrassing pattern that resembles a fish out of water. It makes sense, though; it’s a bit how you’ve made him feel just now.

When he realizes he can’t make out anything intelligible, he shakes his head. “Uh… nope.”

He’s leaving before he even realizes he’s leaving. The door dings again and he’s on the other side of it, long legs carrying him the short distance to Family Video at record speed. 

He swings and slams the egress shut in quick succession, as though the ghost of you had been chasing him. He leans against the glass pane and exhales a heaving sigh, eyes squeezing shut as he recoils at what he’d just done.

He always knew that King Steve had died some time ago, but this was a new low.

Robin watches from the front counter with wide eyes. “…Did you forget something?”

Steve sighs a big, hopeless sigh, then peeks his eyes open. “My dignity.”

“She’s cute, right?” she asks, already knowing the answer. Her brows bounce in time with the smirk on her painted lips.

“Yeah, she’s cute,” he answers, all mad because it’s obvious. “She’s fucking— she’s beautiful.”

“Aw. Look at you,” she sing-songs and tilts her head to her shoulder. “I think your heart grew three sizes today, Stevie.”

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

I never find out 'til I'm head over heels.

Steve, all caught up in his boyish misery, has no idea that he’s enraptured you in a similar way.

You hadn’t cared very much for the guy in high school. You didn’t really know him then, and you didn’t particularly want to. King Steve was rich. King Steve was pretty — too pretty. King Steve got attention from pretty cheerleaders and overaggressive douchebags alike.

King Steve didn’t need any affection from the local freakshow.

But, by some strange turn of events, he’d managed to make nice with your best friend. 

The way Eddie talks about Steve, his words always dripping with a distant venom, it sounds like they still hate each other. Maybe they do. Or maybe he just doesn’t want to admit that they hang out far too often not to be friends.

If you were still in school, you probably would’ve judged him for it. Being friends with the boy whose buddies made your life hell certainly warranted some degree of ridicule. But now, having graduated and trying to move on from it all, you can’t find it in yourself to. 

High school might as well have been a lifetime now. There’s no use in holding onto old ghosts.

If Eddie could let that shit go, so could you.

He drops by after school to keep you company like he always does when he doesn’t have a campaign to prep for. It’s his favorite pastime, perhaps a close second to Dungeons and Dragons. He gets to hang out with his best friend and swim in an ocean of music while he does it. As far as freaks go, Eddie Munson considers himself the luckiest.

He likes to hear you talk about everything new you’ve gotten in while he rifles through the old stuff that isn’t selling as well. You happily let him take what he wants for free. And what he doesn’t take, he doesn’t pay for either, because you cheat the system with your employee discount and then wipe the record from inventory. Just to be safe.

“I love having a criminal for a best friend,” he jokes every time, without fail.

Eddie stays by your side until the sun sets. He parts only to flip the sign at the door to closingfor you, then plops himself back on the counter again. His legs hang off the side of it, sneakers occasionally thudding against the wood when he kicks them back and forth too hard. He scans the back of an old Lynyrd Skynyrd vinyl and bobs his head to the rhythmic bass as the song fills the empty store. He’ll take this one home, he decides.

You keep on painting like you have been all day, breaking only to assist customers or stretch your aching spine. The forest dragon had been far more work than you expected — made of pretty purple leaves instead of scales and blowing blush-colored flowers instead of fire. The little piece of clay has resulted in a day of back-breaking work. 

You’ll be damned if Eddie’s next campaign isn’t the most stellar looking one yet.

Focusing on that makes it easier not to bring up Steve. 

You want to. You just don’t know how. 

Eddie’s friends were Eddie’s, and you don’t get involved where it doesn’t concern you. Besides, you did sort of give him shit for hanging out with The Hair way back when. The last thing you want is him taking the piss out of you about it.  

You don’t want to sound like you care too much. Even more, you don’t want it to be obvious that you’ve been thinking about the boy all day — making yourself sick as you stew in what could’ve run him out like he did.

“Saw your friend today,” you remark, feigning a sort of absentmindedness, as you swipe your brush along the petals of your dragon. “King Steve.”

“Oh, you met him?” Eddie wonders, more intrigued by your words than you expected he’d be. He says it like you didn’t already know the guy — like this new Steve was a totally different person you needed to be reacquainted with to really know.

“I wouldn’t say met him exactly. He just, like, popped in for half a second and ran out.”

With your back facing him, you don’t see the shit-eating grin that pulls at the corners of his mouth. 

Eddie was waiting for Steve to crack and finally see you. He knew he’d bite after the way the kids had talked about you — Dustin, especially. Because even though he claims he doesn’t have favorites, he’s got a very obvious soft spot for the boy. And he knew Steve would like you because everyone likes you. When they’re not clouded by judgment and high school hierarchies, at least. 

He’s still got no idea how a guy that trips all over himself at the sight of a pretty girl could’ve ruled Hawkins once upon a time.

“Fucking idiot,” Eddie laughs to himself, already gearing up for the shit he was going to give Steve the next time he saw him. 

But you see the boy before Eddie does. Steve comes back the next day, an hour or more after opening, less frazzled than the day before. The nearly twenty-four hours he had to prepare himself for the angel he was going to see allowed him not to make a total fool of himself when he stepped into the store again.

And you wouldn’t say it out loud — hell, it’s not even something you want to admit to yourself — but you’d been hoping he’d stop by again. 

You thought Robin would come by and drag him with her, or that Dustin and his friends would come around before Steve dropped them all home. Frankly, you didn’t really care what brought him back. You just wanted to see him again.

Steve’s different than the boy he used to be. Enough that it was obvious from a measly thirty-second interaction. He used to be a charmer who could talk his way out of anything. Not to you, of course, he wouldn’t have been caught dead talking to you. But then he stops by out of nowhere, in rare form, stumbling all over himself and looking like he didn’t recognize you at all.

You’re still trying to figure out if that was a good thing or not.

He’s mystified you in a way he probably isn’t used to. Most girls like the hair and the arms — the super buff, super strong arms that fit so nicely in his uniform — or the fact that he’s got money and a reputation that precedes him. But you’ve never given a shit about any of that. 

You’re more enchanted by the way nothing could even begin to conceal the soft, shy boy that King Steve had apparently turned into.

The door chimes above his head when he enters. The scent of earthy nostalgia is already familiar to him — lavender, sage, and something deeper. Steve considers it progress when he plants himself a few feet away from the door this time. If he runs out again, he’ll have to make an embarrassingly longer escape.

You turn away from your nearly finished figurine to greet the new customer. The practiced smile unconsciously widens at the sight of him. “Hi!”

“Hey,” he smiles with a curt nod. He regrets the half-wave he gives you the second his hand shoots up.

“You gonna run off on me again?” you tease and swivel in your chair to face him completely.

You’re wearing a Hellfire shirt that’s just slightly too big for you. It probably belonged to Eddie before it belonged to you. And you wear a corset-looking thing over top of it, a sheer number with a lace embroidery and a ribbon that’s tied in a bow at your belly. It doesn’t cinch you in the slightest, though, more for decoration than practicality.

“No that was… I just—” Steve huffs out a laugh as he tries and fails to come up with an excuse. He figures anything is better than the truth — that he saw how pretty you were and his brain forgot how to work because he’s the lamest person on the planet. 

So he chucks a thumb over his shoulder and fibs. “I left something back at Family Video. Had to run back.”

“It’s okay. I was just teasing,” you assure. “Uh— Are you looking for anything specific?”

“No. Not really. Just… new records to add to my collection, you know?”

“Oh, you collect vinyls?”

He doesn’t realize that’s what he’s just said until you repeat the words back to him. 

He’s kind of just talking out of his ass and hoping something sticks. That line does, apparently, because you’re beaming at him instantly. He’s scared to say no because then you’ll stop smiling. And he can’t have that.

“Yep,” he answers with a nod. The stack of records collecting dust in his den has to count for something, right?

He can’t find it in himself to regret his little white lie when it has you lighting up like a christmas tree. 

You toss your paintbrush down when you rush from behind the counter to meet him. You seem to have forgotten that you’d just dipped the thing in purple paint. The thing splatters shades of lilac all over the limestone bench. And, in your haste, you nearly smack yourself with the leaden slab as you raise it to pass by.

Steve’s eyes widen when you narrowly dodge the weighty thing — then jumps, startled by the dense thwap that echoes through the small store when it slams back down again. He’s almost worried that it might’ve busted the hinge. 

You cower at the loud sound but move on with a commendable finesse, too focused on him to care about anything else.

“That’s so cool! I’ve always wanted to collect, but records are so expensive, it’s crazy,” you ramble as you walk up to him, totally unthinking in the way you grab his forearm and usher him to the back of the store. 

Your sheer black skirt swishes at your ankles as you walk. The dainty fabric is patterned with sparkly stars and crescent moons. He notices you wear a pair of dark shorts underneath for modesty. Steve tries his best not to stare at your ass. He almost succeeds.

“We actually just got in a couple of Dio records — The Holy Diver, you know, the one that just came out. I’m pretty sure there’s only, like, a couple thousand of these things in the whole world — which is totally fucking bonkers if you think about it,” you explain in one breath, laughing, before stopping abruptly in your tracks. Steve nearly runs into you when you turn around to face him. 

You laugh again, a sadder one, this time at yourself, as you bring your palm to your forehead. “Sorry. I don’t— I don’t even know if you like Dio. I mean, of course, you don’t, right? I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have… rambled like that.”

You’d just been so excited and Steve had just been so different that you forgot who you were talking to. Hawkins High Royalty, Prom King, Biggest Flirt and Life of the Party in the yearbook. 

As far as you’re concerned, Eddie Munson is your only friend. He’s the only person in the whole world you can be yourself around and never get self-conscious about any of it. 

But sometimes you have moments like this one with a total stranger. Moments where you lose yourself in the conversation and your own jumbled thoughts. Moments where you talk and talk and talk until something thumps you on the head and you realize how annoying you’re being. This time, it’s the musky smell of his cologne that knocks you back to Ms. Click’s history class. The crisp breeze of bitter nostalgia makes you shiver.

Steve can see the way you get so suddenly aware of yourself and how the cognizance of the moment makes you writhe. He tries to bat away the lingering insecurities with a smile. 

“Love ‘em,” he responds with a nod. He raises his brows and scoffs, grins and crosses his arms over his chest. “I mean, Dio? God, they’re like… top ten bands of all time, at least. Maybe even five.”

That isn’t totally true. He doesn’t know much about the band to have an opinion, but he’s pretty sure he might’ve said he hated them once. That was only because Eddie wouldn’t stop talking about them, though. Steve could learn to like them, if it means so much to you.

That’s exactly how he justifies spending $60 on four records. 

He tells himself that he’ll listen to them and think of you, that it’ll be a solid conversation starter the next time he sees you. 

You had a whole damn rack dedicated to all your favorite bands — “I put it together myself,” you’d bragged with a proud smile. S it’s a wonder Steve didn’t walk out with the entire damn store. Because you just kept on smiling and talking, so happy to have someone to care about what you had to say, and he ate up every second of it.

He’ll have to work overtime to keep his pockets from hurting, but it’ll be worth it. Because he’ll get to keep talking to you and indulging in all the things you seem to love more than life itself.

You’re still rambling as you ring him up. Steve notices you haven’t stopped yourself like you did before. His lack of dismissal has made you more comfortable, it seems. He likes that.

“I think we’re also gonna get a couple cases of Def Leppard cassettes tomorrow, which is super sick. I think I might have to start collecting, honestly. Tapes are whole lot cheaper than records, you know,” you tell him as you scan and bag all his vinyls. “And it’s also, like, a fucking stellar album. I don’t think I’ve stopped listening to Photograph since it came out.”

“Photograph. Right. Love that one,” Steve nods with a kind smile as he props his elbows on the counter. He doesn’t particularly care that he’s not entirely sure what you’re talking about, or that he’s never actually heard the song. He’s starting to realize you could talk for hours and he wouldn’t get bored.

“Oh, is that your favorite too? Eddie’s more of a Foolin’ kinda guy.”

Despite the fact that he’s never heard the song or this album in his life, he nods anyway. 

He sort of spent the first eighteen years of his life faking just about everything — it kind of came with being the King of Hawkins High. It’s a talent that hasn’t yet left him, it seems, lying through his teeth to impress people. It’s almost become a second nature to him.

“Foolin’s good, yeah, but I think Photograph is obviously better.”

“Obviously, right!” you exclaim with a sunshine-coated laugh. “That’s exactly what I told him! But he’s way too hard-headed to be wrong about anything, so…”

“Well, I’d like to put it on the record that I firmly agree with you,” Steve replies so smoothly that his tongue must be dripping with honey. It’s so easy for him to fall into King Steve mode — when he isn’t forgetting how to speak and running off, that is.

You’ve learned a lot Steve in the past half hour. He likes metal, but leans more toward rock. Particularly all the metal and rock that you like. He hasn’t once had a differing opinion than you, besides telling you he heard Eddie playing a Metallica song once that he didn’t particularly care for. The second you tell him it’s one of your favorites, he backtracks instantly, blaming the Munson boy for being too sloshed to play it properly.

And you don’t miss the way he’s looking at you just now either, with his chin toward his chest as he peers up at you with warm amber eyes. He’s the charmer that he always was. It makes you remember, again, just who you’re talking to.

“We have a lot in common, King Steve,” you lilt with a playful grin.

He deflates at the use of the old nickname. You see the light in his eyes flicker for a just moment before he’s ducking his gaze away from you completely. He tries to brush it off with a laugh. “Yeah, I’m not— I’m not really King Steve anymore…”

“No?”

“Nope. Just… Just Steve these days.”

When he looks back at you, he finds you nodding at him, almost in approval. 

Most people are upset to find that he’s changed so much. They hate that he’s no longer the recklessly stupid dumbass they used to get drunk with. 

Not you, though.

“Cool,” you mumble, smiling softly, as you hand him his bag and receipt.

“Uh, I’d love to, you know, come take a look at those tapes when you get ‘em in,” he says as he walks backward towards the door, finally making the brash offer he’s been thinking about this whole time. “Maybe I can bring lunch and we can—”

“Well, Hellfire’s been doing campaigns during lunch recently. And Gareth’s out sick, so I’ve been subbing for him, you know, so…” you interject awkwardly, shifting your weight on your feet. You hate to turn him down, but Eddie might just kill you if he has to get a substitute for the substitute.

“Oh…” he nods, softly puckering his plump pink lips that you can’t seem to stop staring at.

“But I don’t think they’re coming in until late, anyway,” you add quickly. “So, you can stop by at closing, if you want?”

“No, yeah, that’s cool. So cool,” he replies, a little more flustered than he’d been just moments before. He’s just happy that your rejection wasn’t a total refusal.

You try to bite back the wide grin threatening to take over your mouth. “Okay… I’ll catch you later, then, Just Steve.”

“See you,” he waves right before startling himself when he backs into the basket of clearance tapes sitting just beside the door. He barely catches the thing before it tips over completely. He flashes you a shaking smile afterward and finds you covering your mouth with your hand while you try not to laugh too loudly. 

He wishes you’d just went ahead and laughed at him. He wouldn’t have even cared that you were laughing at him, if it meant he got to see you smile.

And even though he’d just gotten done making the biggest fool of himself, he walks back to work feeling like the coolest man alive. There’s a foreign strut in his step that hadn’t been there before he saw you. It doesn’t leave him when he realizes he’s gone slightly over his break and that Keith is manning the counter in his absence.

The man mumbles a monotoned goodbye to the customer he’d just checked out.

She turns around and Steve realizes he recognizes this girl — Mindy or Mandy or maybe Monica — from Mr. Kaminsky’s class way back when. She did all of his homework for him before and after letting him fuck her on her twin-sized bed in her all pink room.  That’s when Steve was conquering girls like they were Mount Everest, way before Nancy, when King was a title he wore with pride. 

But he’s still so stuck in his head with thoughts of you that he doesn’t even see Mindy-Mandy-Monica or the flirtatious wave she throws his way.

“You’re ten minutes late,” Keith scolds, with his dead tone and his deader eyes.

Steve only shrugs, uncaring if it came out of his paycheck because — “I just got a date with the hottest woman on the planet,” he boasts with a puffed out chest and too smug smile.

It doesn’t lessen Keith’s anger, just diverts it. Because he knows exactly who he’s talking about. And so does Robin, as she pops her head out from behind the man from where she sits at the computer. “No way,” they chorus in disbelief at his words.

Steve nods. “Yes way.”

“Eddie’s gonna kill you,” Robin remarks with the shake of her head. 

He knows she’s right. He just doesn’t care. 

Eddie’s always been protective of you. Everyone knows that. But the two of them were friends now — or somewhat good-natured acquaintances, at the very least. He would’ve been mad about a year or more ago, if King Steve had decided to suddenly woo his best friend. 

But it’s different now. He’s different now. Eddie knows how much everything’s changed, it’s just a question of if he’s willing to rehash old wounds.

It’s a good thing Steve knows how to take a punch.

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

Don't take my heart, don't break my heart.

Steve finds you again the next day less happy than he’s gotten used to.

The record store is dim and the red sign at the entrance has been flipped to closed, but the door is left unlocked — for him. The warm scent is a distinct contrast to the frigid spring night, a cozy high hemp and lavender, but your absence is noticeable and terribly heavy. 

Steve lingers in the doorway, his shadow looming like a giant before him from the moonlight streaming in from outside. 

He calls for you in the emptiness.

“Uh… Punchy?”

He’s relieved when you answer. The “back here!” you shout to him is muffled and far away. He follows the sound of your voice, filled suddenly with a childlike consolation. 

The yellow fairy lights dangling over his head guide him through the aisles of cassettes and closer to you. Through a cluttered backroom, Steve finds you standing just outside an opened door — left ajar, for him.

The smile you flash when you see him is as dim as the closed-down store. It lacks all the sunshine you usually look at him with, shades of stormy gray rather than the usual yellows. 

A look of concern flashes across his features — furrowed brows and inquisitive twinkling eyes — as you take a drag from the lit cigarette caught between your pointer and middle finger. You muster your best grin, but it flickers like a shoddy radio signal. 

“Punchy, huh?” you tease.

Steve’s brows pinch together as confusion floods his features. It takes him a moment to realize what he’d said and the nickname he’d used — and he doesn’t want to be dramatic or anything, but he kinda wants to die. It’s embarrassing, he thinks, to hold on to an old high school monicker. And, fuck, if you hate it half as bad as he hates being called king, he deserves a slap to the face right about now.

You laugh instead of ball your first. He’s able to smile meekly in relief. “Oh. Shit. Sorry, I… I don’t think I even realized it came out.”

“No, it’s okay,” you assure when you see him getting all apologetic. “Eddie still calls me that all the time, so… Old habits die hard, I guess.”

Steve tries to move on, but it’s hard to when you’re so obviously gloomy. He hates how reserved you’ve gone in your quiet, not talking up a storm like you had been the last time he saw you. Now you’re just… a storm. It’s a little like sitting next to a rumbling rain cloud.

The rumbling rain cloud beside him takes a drag of her cigarette.

“You okay?” he asks and sounds like he really cares.

You didn’t think King Steve was capable of caring about anything other than his hair, but he looks down at you like he can feel every blue bolt of your doom and gloom. He makes you feel seen in the void of your sadness despite all the years you spent being invisible to him.

“Uh, yeah. It’s just the tapes. They didn’t come in,” you answer with a shrug. Smokes leaves your mouth and lingers in white clouds in the air. “So I’m a little bummed.”

“Oh…” is all Steve says and his pink mouth forms a too pretty ‘o’ shape that you can’t draw your gaze from.

The following silence makes you momentarily cautious. Insecurity runs cold over you because no sane person gets this about upset over a broken promise of a couple cassettes. It’s stupid, you know it is, but you were really looking forward to them. It’s like promising a kid the most metal present ever and then snatching it out of their bare hands.

Now, over the course of a couple hours, you’ve managed to convince yourself you won’t remember happiness until you get those stupid tapes.

“Sorry,” you apologize to him for a reason he can’t place. You shift your weight on your feet and peer at him from beneath your lashes. “I know you were looking forward to them, too.”

You extend your hand and offer him the cigarette between your fingers like it’s an olive branch. He takes it from you with a distant smile, then opts to laze against the brick wall like you are. He stays a respectful distance on the other side of the entryway. 

“It’s okay. They’ll come. If I’m being honest, you know, I was kinda more excited to see you.”

His admission is brazen and a tad bit brash, even for a certified ex-douchebag. It lacks all of the usual honey-coated flirtation that usually tints his tone when he’s talking to a pretty girl. Because he wasn’t trying to make you swoon — though he certainly wouldn’t have minded if you had. This wasn’t some romantic advance, just a proclamation of his own personal truth.

A flash of shock contorts your features. “Really?”

“Of course,” he answers, breathing out a laugh that exits along with the smoke in his lungs. “I love talking to you. You’re… You’re cool, you know? S— Super cool.”

His face screws up at his stuttering, and he shakes his head at how the words sound leaving his mouth. His cheeks glow cherry red beneath an orange street lamp. 

“Super cool, huh?” you repeat with a giggle that’s bright enough to illuminate the velvet night. “I don’t think anyone’s ever called me that before.”

Steve scoffs when he passes the cigarette back to you. Because, lately, that’s all he’s been hearing about you. From Eddie, from Robin, from Dustin — every good thing a person could say about someone else, they all say about you. 

He’s starting to understand why.

Because you’re sweet. Like, pure sugar poured on the tip of his tongue kind of sweet. You’re bright like sunshine and soft like summer rain. You’re a shot of pure espresso for a boy who thought his life was at a dead end. He’s not entirely sure how he ever could’ve thought you were some deep, dark, devil-worshipping freak.

“I don’t believe that,” he dismisses with the shake of his head.

You breathe out a sharp exhale and a puff of nicotine-coated smoke. “I’ve been the town pariah since I was eleven, Steve. Everyone thinks I’m some kinda delinquent who’s in a cult because I play a dumb board game. So, no. No one’s ever thought I was cool before.”

“Still?” Steve wonders with a twisted face. “You graduated, like, a year ago. Are... Are people really still on your ass about that?”

“A little,” you answer with a shrug, trying your best not to look as affected by it all as you feel.

Steve feels his chest swell with the fiery urge to protect you. The same one he gets when Dustin tells him about the assholes at school that are bothering him. He wants to defend you from the same sort of assholes that he used to be. The impulse is borderline primal, rooted somewhere deep and far within himself, because god knows he’s got a terrible track record when it comes to winning fights.

“Shit, Punchy… I’m— I’m sorry.”

You sputter out a laugh at the apology, louder when you realize he’s using the nickname again.

He can’t relate to any of this. The trials and tribulations of being persona non grata everywhere you went were certainly lost on him. Steve might’ve lost his touch somewhere down the road, but he’ll always be crown royalty — the kind of guy you think fondly of when your wonderyears are long gone. But you? You’re lucky if people don’t cross to the other side of the street when they spot you coming.

Perhaps that’s why his words warm you so much. Because, despite all that, he’s trying to make you feel better anyway.

You give him a tender smile and a dwindling cigarette. 

“It’s okay. I mean, it’s whatever, you know? I think it’s because I still hang out with Eddie all the time. Like, people see us and remember what fucking freaks we used to be,” you say with a laugh, then start to ramble without thinking. “We saw Tommy Hagan at Melvald’s the other day, and he looked at us like we caused him severe PTSD or something, like, he looked terrified. I honestly felt a little bad.”

Steve smiles, wide-eyed, equal parts intrigued and unsettled by the reminiscent glimmer in your eye and the daunting giggle that spills from your lips.

“But I wouldn’t leave Eddie, you know?” you blurt, suddenly serious, like you’ve taken offense at the very thought. “Not even if it meant people stopped being so mean. ‘Cause I love him and everything… Even though he’s a pain in the ass.”

“Oh, he’s a total pain in the ass,” Steve agrees and flicks the butt of the cig between his fingers. “He loves you too, though. I can tell. The asshole never shuts up about you.”

“He talks about me?” you ask, voice fragile and pitched higher than normal.

Steve doesn’t like the way you say it. He hates how you look at him even more, with a scrunched up face and eyes that flicker with embers of shock. Like you don’t believe it, like you think yourself unworthy of it.

“You’re all he talks about,” the boy assures, feeling so suddenly brave and wanting to make you feel brave too. He hands the cigarette back to you. “I don’t blame him. If I were him, I’d never shut up about you either.”

The contorted look of confusion on your face untwists itself, and your features fall flat with disbelief. A smile pulls slow at your mouth. Your eyes glitter an orange gold beneath the streetlight. They flit over to the boy beside you just long enough to take the stick from him.

“Steve Harrington…” you lilt, almost scoldingly so.

It makes him smile. “What?”

“Stop flirting with me.”

“Well, that’s very presumptuous of you,” he retorts playfully. “Who’s to say I was flirting?”

“So you weren’t then?”

“Maybe a little,” he shrugs with a knowing, practiced smirk. “Can you blame me?”

You don’t seem impressed by his not-so-subtle attempt at flirting, and he isn’t at all used to that. The bravado and the puppy dog eyes are his one-two punch — any other time, he’d have a phone number tucked safely in his pocket by now. But you’re not biting.

“I’m so not your type,” you dismiss with the shake of your head.

“Yeah?” he challenges, shoving himself off the brick wall with his shoulder and making the short trek over to you. He plants himself next to you, leans with one sneaker crossed over the other, and smiles with a playful twinkle in his eye. “And what’s my type?”

“Nancy Wheeler,” you answer without missing a beat. “Pretty girls.”

“Well, I think you’re very pretty—”

“Not like her,” you interject with a foreign firmness that Steve hasn’t seen from you until now. You’re still smiling at him, though, still kind but looking like you don’t believe him. Like you think this must be some kind of sick joke that he’s taking too far.

You can entertain Steve. You like Steve. Mostly because he’s totally different from the douchebag you remember him being — the douchebag you were expecting him to be. 

You find that he’s terribly clumsy and not overtly good with words. He says dumb jokes that don’t come out right and smiles in relief when they make you laugh anyway. He’s soft like peach fuzz or a fluffy cloud, mushy like warm chocolatey gooey goodness, and not at all like you remember him.

But then he does this. He morphs into something else, changes shape right in front of you. He smiles at you with little of his dumbassery behind it — all smirks and faux longing gazes with the intent of making you swoon at his feet. He grins down at you and all you see is the teenage boy who would’ve never looked at you that way four years ago. Hell, not even one. 

It reminds you of who he is, who he used to be, and who you are now. 

You haven’t changed so much since high school. You’ve matured a little, sure, but there was never an asshole exterior that you felt the need to outgrow. You’re still loud at times, unaware and ignorant of the world around you. You still play lightsabers outside Eddie’s trailer in between lengthy Dungeons and Dragons campaigns. You still pretend like the lingering glares from all the people you used to know don’t bother you. 

They do, though. They always have.

You look at Steve and you see this butterfly — someone made of rainbow colors and mostly mature. He’s growing, and you’re stuck in the same cocoon you’ve been wrapped in since freshman year, still fumbling around and trying to figure out where you fit.

He’ll always be the pretty butterfly he always was, with his pretty little iridescent wings that catch the light and all the attention. He’ll feed off the applause he gets while you’re sitting on the sidelines. The girl who’s destined to stay bundled in her cocoon forever only hears all of his praise — never watches, never receives.

“You and I are completely different people, Steve Harrington,” you declare with a grin that tells him you’ve already made up your mind.

The boy doesn’t get it, though, why you seem so upset by the idea. Him and Robin were completely different people. Him and Dustin were, too. The two people he adored — tolerated — most in the entire world weren’t a single thing like him, and it was better that way.

You don’t seem to share a similar philosophy, though. You take a drag from your mostly gone cigarette and mourn what could have been; if only he had been the town freak or you had been born the pretty girl next door.

“That doesn’t have to be such a bad thing—”

He’s abruptly cut off by the sound of muffled rock music and the bright yellow headlights of Eddie Munson’s van. The two of you shield your eyes when he whips into the desolate parking lot and parks in front of you. The sudden intrusion feels like being blinding like the sun after you’ve found such comfort within each other in the dead of night.

The stifled Def Leppard song — or maybe Poison, Steve can never quite tell the difference — is brought to a sharp halt when the engine shuts off. The headlights dim. The metallic slam of the driver’s side door sounds so much louder in the darkness.

Eddie rounds the front of his van and eyes the two of you rather suspiciously. The boy inhales deeply, puffing out his chest and splaying his hands on his hips. “…What’s going on here?” he squints at you.

You give him a terribly manufactured sunshine smile and bat your lashes his way, like you’re pretending to be un-innocent. “Nothing…” you sing-song.

Eddie rolls his eyes at you, then turns his attention to Steve. They’re not really strangers anymore, but he still feels the need to treat him like an outsider anyway.

“Harrington,” he says in the place of any real greeting. “Don’t you have other shit to do? Like, I don’t know, a shift as the mannequin at the GAP or something?”

Steve can’t find it in himself to get self-conscious about his fitted-sweatshirt, khaki-slack combo when the insult comes from a guy in a decade-old leather jacket, unwashed t-shirt, and ripped jeans.

“Very funny,” the brunette monotones. 

“I’ll see you around, yeah?” you ask when you turn and walk backwards towards Eddie, like there’s a gravitational pull dragging you to him.

You say it to be polite mostly, but you’re hoping for an affirmative — a promise that you’ll have another night like this one, where he sees you just to be seeing you. Hell, you’ll even take a nod if that’s all he’ll give you. And when he does, he gives you a tiny smile that almost makes you trip over yourself.

Fuck, you think to yourself, like your brain is talking to your heart. We just agreed not to do that.

Before you get in the van, you walk by Eddie and bring your cigarette up to his mouth. You coax the stick between his lips with your pointer and middle finger, opting to let him take the last couple of hits because he never turns down a free smoke.

The passenger door shuts once you’re tucked into the seat of it. The sound it makes punctuates your absence. Steve feels all of its emptiness.

He eyes Eddie from the distance, immediately noticing the darkened skepticism dancing in his dark eyes. 

The boy’s always felt the need to protect you. When the entire town got spooked about stories of some satanic panic and started treating you like monsters, he wanted to shield you from the boogeyman everyone turned into. 

Steve wasn’t one of them, the bad men. But Eddie loves you and it’s made him doubtful.

“It’s not what it looks like,” Steve feels the need to say, as though he’d been caught with his pants down and not just sharing an innocent cigarette with a friend.

Eddie takes the final few puffs of it and exhales rather dramatically, lips pursing to blow it in his direction though it’s too far away to hit him. The boy throws the filter to the concrete and extinguishes the ashes with the toe of his dirty sneakers. 

He waits until the white smoke has fully dissipated to speak.

“Damn right, it isn’t.”

That’s all he says. He doesn’t even look at Steve when he says it, or when he rounds the van and hops into the driver’s seat next to you. Steve squints when the too bright headlights come alive again in time with the roaring engine and dated rock music. His tires screech when he speeds out of the back parking lot. 

The tin can he drives nearly tips over when he turns too sharply onto Main Street.

Steve doesn’t get a chance to get a good look at you before you’re gone completely. It makes him all boyishly upset, knowing the hours without you will be most agonizing, but the empty feeling is eclipsed by the warm relief of not getting clock cleaned by Eddie Munson.

Damn right, it isn’t. Four words. That’s all he gets. But they’re daunting and coated with a lingering foreboding that feels almost like a threat.

So, by all accounts, Steve probably should’ve known there was no way Munson was ever going to back down that easily.

Eddie comes back the next day, a thundering storm cloud of the boy he usually is, head wild with curly hair and a million thoughts. 

The door dings far too gently for such an aggressive arrival. Metal bangs against metal as the handle collides with the window pane. He stomps to the counter in several quick strides, dark eyes darting around the half-empty store — obviously searching for something.

Robin, manning the front counter, is entirely unable to be threatened by him. The all black, chunky metal rings, and crazy hair stopped being so intimidating when she found out you called him Eddie Spaghetti. Now, it’s all she can think about when she sees him. 

Even as he stands ahead of her, obviously upset, all she sees is a very cartoonishly angry Eddie Spaghetti, and it takes everything in her not to laugh.

“Where’s Steve?” the boy finally wonders when he realizes the boy’s not in the front.

“Uh, he’s in the back, I think. Why?”

Eddie doesn’t humor her with an answer. He just storms past the counter and makes a b-line for the break room.

Robin watches him over her shoulder. “You’re not supposed to go back there!” she half-heartedly shouts, but makes no further effort to stop him from doing so.

He finds Steve working beneath the dim yellow light of the back room. There’s a warmed-up container of leftovers on the small round table on one side of the room and a stack of unorganized tapes on the counter on the other. Steve multitasks between both and hums something summery under his breath — The Beach Boys, maybe.

He’s too distracted to notice Eddie’s abrupt appearance. It’s the subtle click of the shut door that gets his attention.

Steve’s confused at first. His head snaps over his shoulder like a ghost must’ve closed the door on him. He realizes that it’s just Eddie, and he’s so innocently relieved that it’s almost humorous, then confused all over again. His brows pinch together and through the chicken tender jutting out his check, he mumbles: “You’re not supposed to be back here—”

“Yeah, I got that part,” Eddie interrupts in a monotone.

He swallows. It’s as thick as the tension that settles between the two of them, made heavier by the lengthy silence. He crosses his arms over his chest, stands up a little straighter, and bares his neck when he lifts his chin. “I want you to leave her alone.”

Steve scoffs and chews through his mouthful. “Leave who alone?”

“You know exactly who I’m talking about,” Eddie squints with an unusual sort of seriousness. “I don’t want you messing around with her anymore, man. I’m, fucking— I’m so fucking serious right now.”

The clarification makes Steve laugh. He shakes his head and goes back to piling the myriad of tapes into organized stacks on the counter. “We were just talking, Eddie. I don’t need the lecture, okay?”

“We both know it’s never just talking with you.”

“What? Are you in love with her or something?” he retorts, trying to make a joke of it.

Eddie, for the first time in his life, isn’t amused. “Oh, god, get over yourself, dude. I know what kinda guy you are, alright? I’m not gonna let you hurt her.”

His words hit Steve like a pot of boiling water. It prickles his skin, leaving blisters and burning red blotches in its wake. He’s all but on fire with his anger, less offended by the accusation than by the person it comes from.

Steve and Eddie aren’t friends by any means. They’re just two guys with shared custody of a bunch of teenagers, bonded in their want to keep them all safe. But through their lighthearted animosity, is a sort of understanding: neither of them are the assholes the entire town claims them to be. Eddie isn’t apart of some satanic cult. Steve isn’t a douchebag that uses women as accessories. And that’s just a silent agreement they’ve both come to on their own terms. 

But now here they are, talking like it’s 1984 all over again and they’re strangers who hate each other’s guts.

“No. I’m not gonna hurt her. Because we’re just friends, Eddie.”

The boy just shakes his head. He scrunches his nose like he’s wincing, then laughs — a big, dramatic laugh that fills the tiny break room. He begins to pace, waving an accusatory ringed finger Steve’s way. “No, see… That’s the thing. I don’t think King Steve is capable of being ‘just friends’ with a pretty girl.”

Steve rolls his eyes with a heavy huff. He comes to the conclusion that Eddie’s just projecting and that there’s no use in arguing his case. He shoves a black VHS tape into its designated sleeve and slots it in with the rest of them, muttering under his breath, “I’m not King Steve anymore…”

“What?”

“I said, I’m not King Steve anymore!” he yells, a bit louder than he intended to.

He drives a tape onto the pile with an unexpected aggression. It hits the wall with a resounding thud. His arms flail wildly at his sides when he turns to face Eddie again. “God, you guys act like people can’t change! I’m not the asshole I used to be, alright? Jeez…”

Eddie exhales sharply through his nose in the place of any real reply. Deep down, he knows all that. He knows it’s all true because he would’ve never befriended him otherwise. Steve Harrington — the king, the rich kid, the douchebag — turned out to be a pretty damn good guy. 

And maybe if Eddie didn’t love you so much, he’d be able to wrap his head around all that.

But does. So he can’t.

He saw you two together the night before, sharing a cigarette behind The Groove — albeit a little too close for his liking — and suddenly, it was junior year all over again.

You’re stressed out about the ACT and college acceptance rates, none of your clothes quite fit you, and you’re trying out bold things with your makeup that don’t quite fit you either. You grin wildly up at Eddie through the vibrant lipstick smeared on your lips, laughing at his half-hearted attempt to cheer you up. 

And Steve is a senior, standing on the other side of the hallway — with his pretty clothes and prettier hair — and he lets all of his friends laugh at you. They make fun of your un-styled hair and the way your shirt makes your boobs look, and Steve doesn’t find any of it particularly funny but he lets them mock you anyway.

Eddie sees you together and forgets about the man Steve is now. All he sees is a boy who never stuck up for you, for either of you, who let his best friends make your lives hell because his reputation mattered more.

And it wasn’t like it was his job to defend you, because it wasn’t. Not really. It’s just that you would’ve done it for him, if the roles were reversed. Eddie, too. Neither of you would’ve let a lamb be led to the slaughter quite like that. It was the Hellfire motto, after all — to protect the little sheep from the creeping wolves.

That’s where the difference lies. It’s where the mistrust settles deep and where the root of all of Eddie’s worries lingers.

But Steve has done more to prove himself than Eddie likes to give him credit for. 

He takes care of a bunch of kids like it’s his job. He runs Robin to and from school most days out of the week, on time each morning — which, for a guy who showed up late every day for four years, was definitely saying something. He even comes to Eddie’s shows when he’s not too busy working the graveyard shift, never minding that he sticks out in his collared shirt and slacks — a pretty boy amidst a crowd of freaks.

Fuck. Steve Harrington was a pretty alright dude.

But you’re better than alright. You’re better than good. Better than perfect. 

If you got your heart broken, Eddie thinks he’d feel all of it times a thousand.

Steve’s been through his own kind of heartbreak, though. He’s slapped a bandaid over his own bleeding heart, and it’s made him soft. The good kind of soft — the kind where he sees a bug on its back and has to flip it over because it hurts too much to let it suffer. Eddie knows he’ll be that kind to you. Kinder, even.

“Yeah, you better hope so, Harrington,” the boy concludes with a slow nod of his wild head. He steals a chicken tender from the styrofoam box it sits in, like it’s some kind of power move, and waves it at him like a condemnatory point. “I hear you do anything — anything — to her… And your ass is grass.”

Eddie takes a hearty bite from the strip, then tosses it back into the container again. He spins on the ragged heel of his sneaker and stalks out of the break room, punctuating his absence with the slam of the door. The ancient thing gets lodged and doesn’t quite shut all the way, so he has to double back and shut it fully.

Steve is left dumbfounded, in more ways than one.

“…He just ate my chicken,” he mumbles to himself with a frown settled deep between his brows. But there’s a lingering tension in Eddie’s storming out — a tangible fog within his words that settles something heavy in the Family Video breakroom that doubles as storage. 

It feels almost like a blessing.

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

Won't escape my attention...

The more time you spend with Steve, the more confident you get. 

You visit him at work more often, caring less and less about bothering anybody when you realize they all wanted you there. You let yourself ramble in front of him, too, not stopping yourself nearly as often as you used to. Steve guesses you started to believe him somewhere around the millionth time he promised he liked hearing you talk.

You turn to glitter in his presence, becoming more unapologetically yourself and glowing with it — with all the things that used to make you insecure, things that King Steve would’ve made fun of you for some time ago. Everything you were scared made you too different, is why he liked you in the first place.

And Steve gets to watch it all play out right before his eyes. You inch slowly out of the protective shell you’ve built around yourself and bloom like springtime flowers. He’s grateful he gets to witness it, even more that you feel comfortable enough to do it all in front of him.

You’re hardly as timid as you usually are when you saunter into Family Video. Rather than tiptoeing in and apologizing for intruding, you burst through the front door with a beam and a high-pitched squeal. You’re as bright as every star in the galaxy combined; even dressed head-to-toe in black, you’re more blinding than the sun. 

Eddie’s leather jacket, either stolen or unenthusiastically lent from the boy himself, swallows your upper half. You wear a piece of Metallica merchandise beneath it. The thing is cut up to your ribcage. The jagged edges in the fabric, likely from a dull pair of kitchen scissors, tells him the chop was intentional.

A leather skirt clings effortlessly onto you, revealing the pudge of your stomach and the curves of your hips. The thing is donned with two spiked belts and several chains hanging loosely at your waist.

Steve is dozing at the counter with his chin propped on his first when you walk in. He’s half-asleep until he sees you. The shot of espresso that walks in makes him instantly forget how tired he is.

“Guess what?” you ask with wide, sparkling eyes as you skip to the counter with your hands behind your back.

Steve always hated that question. Usually, it came from Dustin or Robin — or, god forbid, both of them — followed by a “No, seriously. Guess.” It left him with no choice but to humor them until they ultimately caved and told him something he couldn’t have guessed in a million years.

He isn’t so annoyed now, though. In fact, he smiles. “What?” he replies.

You pull your bottom lip between your teeth, as though in a futile attempt to conceal the wide grin on your face, and take your hands from behind your back. You flash him the cassette tape you hold in the palm of them, a blue and yellow thing with the angled Def Leppard logo printed on the cover.

“No way!” Steve finds himself exclaiming like he’s the number one fan of the rock and roll band. He isn’t; never has been, really. But he is a fan of you. All of his excitement, all of his bright and shining smiles — they’re all for you.

“They came in last night— when I was off, of course— and I opened this morning and there was a whole damn tower of these tapes! I’m the one who does the tape towers, okay? Plus, I’ve been doggin’ my manager for weeks about the things, so I can’t believe they came in and no one told me, you know?”

Steve gets lost in your rambling right along with you, nodding because he never wants you to stop talking. His twinkling gaze follows you back and forth as you pace in front of the counter. You gesticulate wildly with your hands, nearly elbowing a customer when they get too close to the line of fire.

“And she was all like ‘I can’t control when they come in,’ And I was like ‘well, you can’t control when I come in either, I’ll be taking a long lunch now, thank you’—” you recount, albeit at a slightly louder volume that shocks anyone who doesn’t know you. People shoot you lingering side eyes from over the aisles.

Steve doesn’t care. He’s even happier that you don’t seem to either. You feel comfortable enough with him now to stop caring about the rest. When you stop yourself, you do it because you’ve said everything you need to say, not because you feel like you’ve annoyed him in some way. 

“Anyway,” you conclude with a sigh. “I wanted to run it to you personally because, besides Eddie, you’re the only person I know who cares as much as I do.”

You smile sweetly at him, peering at him through your lashes, so suddenly timid — no longer the boisterous girl lighting up the whole room. Steve notices that you do that a lot, go from loud and sunny to shy and glimmering. Eddie does it too, sometimes, but it’s not nearly as cute.

“My wallet’s in my locker,” he tells you when you hand him the tape. He cocks his thumb over his shoulder with his free hand. “Let me go grab it. I’ll be, like, two seconds—”

You reach over the counter and take him by the arm, wrapping chipped maroon nails around the crook of his elbow to keep him from straying too far. Shock coats his features at the suddenness of your touch and the way it makes him buzz.

You scoff. “Are you serious? I’m not gonna make you pay, you weirdo.”

“No?”

“Of course not! It’s a gift.”

“Well, gee, Punchy. Considered me flattered,” he concedes with a faltering smile.

You laugh at his half-hearted attempt to be charming.

He rests his crossed arms on the counter and leans over the top of it in an effort to be the slightest bit closer to you. He gazes up at you with honey eyes and raised brows and a big, dumb smile. “And, you know, flattery... it goes a long way with me.”

You arch an un-manicured brow at him. “Does it, now?”

“Yep. So much so, I’m willing to break a few rules and let you pick out a couple of movies. On the house.”

It’s dumb and it’s sweet and so terribly innocent. He wants to give you so much than that but he’s got about eighteen dollars to his name, so all he can do is offer you a few measly VHS tapes. It has you beaming like he just offered you the world.

“Steve Harrington,” you scold playfully. “I didn’t know you were so naughty.”

He falters. His resolve slips and, for no more than half a second, his brain forgets how to work. 

He’s not quite sure how you manage to do that to him all the damn time. You make his brain shortcircuit and his belly quiver and his vision swim. He’s known you for a while now, long enough that the lovesickness should’ve well worn off.

Steve’s worried that there’s no cure for you, that he’s in it for the long haul now — upset stomachs, heart palpitations, and all.

“Well, I’m full of surprises,” he shrugs and sways on his feet. “What’s your poison, Punchy? Molly Ringwald? Robert Downey Jr.? The John Hughes type?”

You can tell he’s joking. You squint over at him and rest your elbows on the counter top your face-to-face. 

The wintergreen mint on his breath makes your head swim. 

Your rouge-tined lips are so close he can taste them — he wants to, desperately so. 

You don’t miss the way his gaze flits to your mouth, lingering there for no longer than a blink.

“Try Night of the Living Dead,” you challenge. 

“That is so dreadfully on brand for you,” he manages to reply without much stuttering. He’s surprised he’s able to get any words out at all, with the way his heart feels like it’s about to beat out of his chest.

“I’m nothing if not predictable.”

Steve doesn’t respond as he leaves the counter to get what you asked for. Silence is easier than saying that you’re the most surprising thing he’s ever met in his life.

When he returns, he brings the entire film franchise with him. All three movies are stacked in his arms and he scans the backs of them, hoping Keith won’t notice that they’re being rented free of charge.

“Have you ever seen them?” you wonder.

He shakes his head. “No. I saw one of them at a drive-in a long time ago, but I wasn’t exactly paying attention, if you know what I mean—” he answers with a soft laugh, quick to cut himself off. It was supposed to be a dumb joke, but both of you know what he was insinuating and it makes everything awkward. 

Robin would’ve slapped him on the back of the head if she were around to hear it. 

He would’ve deserved it.

“Well, you missed out,” you scold, not quite meeting his gaze. “They’re actually pretty good.”

“I’ll try and watch ‘em sometime then.”

“Tonight?” you offer suddenly.

Steve furrows his brows. “…Huh?”

“I mean, like— I don’t know… I thought maybe we could watch them tonight,” you stammer with your eyes turned down toward the counter, where you draw invisible patterns onto the granite with the tip of your finger. “Like, together… if you want.”

Steve is momentarily speechless. He’s spent weeks plotting how he was going to ask you out. It would come to him in waves. He’d feel like he’d concocted the most perfect, foolproof plan right before realizing there was no way in hell he could ever go through with it — all in the same fleeting thought. 

But here you are, biting the bullet for the both of you. 

He’s grateful. He thinks he’s dreaming.

“That sounds…” Steve trails off with the mindless nod of his head. “Yeah. No. Totally. That sounds… really cool.”

A wide smile pulls at the edges of your lips. You purse your mouth to the side in attempts to conceal it. “Cool,” you murmur all cool-ly, like his affirmation isn’t heaven to your ears.

“Uh, not to sound like a total douchebag or whatever, but my dad— he’s got this theater room and everything, and my parents are almost never home,” Steve rambles as he puts all three movies into a paper bag. Then his eyes go wide and his face glows cherry red. “Not like that! I didn’t mean it like— That sounded really weird… I’m sorry—”

You giggle at him, at the way he can pretend to be so suave, and then reveal all the marshmallow fluff he tries to keep hidden a moment later. “It’s okay, Steve. I got what you meant.”

He writes his address on a yellow sticky note with the Family Video logo printed in green at the very top. His handwriting is boyish and sloppy, the sign of a boy who never did care much about school. Some letters are connected, others far apart; some written too big, while others are too small. You find it endearing, but Steve knows it’s just because his hand was shaking something fierce.

He leaves his number written at the very bottom. Just for good measure.

“No funny business, alright, Harrington?” you joke, waving a ringed finger at him as you walk backward out of the store, heading back to your own job.

Steve bites back a smile. Once upon a time, he was all funny business. No girl was ever going to invite King Steve over and not expect some heavy petting. And he wants so badly to kiss you — fuck, he wants to kiss you all the time — but the want to spend innocent time with you eclipses all of those boyish feelings.

He yearns to be close to you. Like magnets. Or a moon and the ocean’s tide.

“No funny business,” he promises.

˗ˋˏ ♡ ˎˊ˗

You keep your distance with a system of touch.

It isn’t until you arrive at the front gates of the Harrington home you realize you’ve never been in the suburbs of Hawkins before.

You grew up on the very outskirts of town, where there were more trees than people or houses. The block was half rundown already and horribly secluded. The only interesting thing about it was the winding trail through the woods that led to the anterior of Forest Hills trailer park.

That’s where you spent the bulk of your time, practically living with Eddie and Wayne in their one-bedroom trailer, until you felt guilty enough to go back home for a day or two. Your parents would inevitably remind you why you ran off in the first place, and then the cycle would start all over again.

It was all just far enough away from Hawkins that you could pretend like the town’s bullshit didn’t exist. The freak from the wrong side of the tracks didn’t belong on Maple Street or Fairview Road or Laurel Avenue. That was for people who could afford new shoes every school year, who could go clothes shopping and not feel guilty about cutting into their food money, who were set up with trust funds before they were even born.

But here you are now, on Fairview Road, seven o’clock sharp, and standing in front of the biggest house you’d ever seen. 

You ring the doorbell and flinch when it’s louder than expected. The chime is light and jaunty. You wonder if it’s been programmed for the change in season.

Steve answers no more than a couple seconds later. He swings both French doors open, arms spreading wide like the smile on his face.

He’s traded in his slacks for comfier jeans and his vest for a form-fitting sweatshirt he’s bunched at the elbows. You realize, then, that you’ve never seen him without the forest green Family Video jacket. It makes him look naked, almost, like a totally different person — no longer the dork who works a measly nine-to-five with his best friend and visits the freak next door on the off chance his manager won’t dock his pay for it.

The vest had humbled him to a certain extent. Now he just looks cool. Like the boy people would either praise or avoid like the plague, for fear of getting in King Steve’s path — just a little bit more mature looking now, with his chiseled jaw and scruffy chin.

It makes you feel a little stupid from where you stand on the porch ahead of him, wearing the same thing he’d seen you in earlier that day. He’s got no idea you spent the past couple of hours agonizing over what to wear. For the sake of not seeming crazy overzealous, you opted not to dress up. Now you’re scared he thinks you just didn’t care enough to.

But you do care. So goddamn much that’s it scary. 

You never had to worry about what you wore or what you looked like before you left the house, about what you had too much of and what you lacked. Now, it’s all you can think about.

If Steve notices anything at all, he doesn’t show it. He just keeps on smiling at you, too happy to see you to care about what you’re wearing. He’s just glad that you showed up.

Truth be told, he had a six-pack and Robin’s number on speed dial on the off chance you canceled on him. He was preparing himself to wallow in self-pity and spend the rest of the night ranting to his best friend about the bleeding heart he had for you. Because, as far as he was concerned, you were far too good to be true. 

You were beautiful and funny and kind and perfect. You treat him like you’ve known him for years, like he didn’t spend so many of them avoiding you in attempts to keep some measly title that didn’t mean shit. You were too perfect. Sometimes, Steve gets scared that he just made you up.

But whether you’re a dream come true or the real thing, you’re standing on his front porch anyway, with a smile and a bottle of grocery store wine. 

He saves the beer in his fridge and the wallowing for another day. 

Steve escorts you through his lavish living room and to the downstairs area that’s got a movie screen hanging on the walls and a couple of leather couches sitting in front of it. The coffee table in front of them holds a myriad of glass bowls — popcorn, various candies, and more popcorn.

“You planning on throwin’ a party down here, Harrington?” you tease with a soft chuckle, trying to conceal how your heart’s about to burst at the mere sight of it all.

“Well, I just— I didn’t know what you liked, and I didn’t— I wanted to make sure you had something to eat, you know,” the boy stammers out. He brings the palm of his hand to rub at the back of his neck. “So I just… I got… everything.”

“It’s a good thing a like everything then, huh?” you smile at him as you pluck a Red Vine from its dedicated bowl. You rip off an inch or two with your teeth and then talk as you chew: “I hope you’re prepared for all of this shit get eaten, Harrington. I can get quite ravenous.”

Steve nods to himself and tries not to smile too big. “Sounds entertaining… Maybe I’ll just watch you instead of the movie.”

It was supposed to be a joke. 

But then you settled down next to him on the couch, keeping a respectful distance but sharing the same fuzzy blanket, and he has to physically force himself to drag his gaze away from you. 

He was right about what he said before, you were far more entertaining than the black and white film projected ahead of him — grabbing handfuls of popcorn at a time and quoting the movie through the mouthful. 

It’s a tad bit barbaric, the faintest bit off-putting, and otherworldly levels of endearing. It leaves him virtually unable to take his eyes off of you. 

He didn’t think you could get more beautiful, but you keep on proving him wrong. 

He’s starting to realize he doesn’t know shit.

You’re slowly coming to the same understanding.

You’ve heard stories about Steve. Usually from gossiping cheerleaders standing in circles at their lockers or whispering in the back of a classroom. Doomed as the freak and all but banished from the inner society of Hawkins High, you became an observer. You were so invisible that people sometimes didn’t realize they were talking right over you, sharing secrets they wouldn’t want someone else to get a hold of. 

But apparently you were the exception. Because you weren’t a someone to them.

They talked about how kind he was, how well endowed, how they were meant to go on some stupid date but missed their reservation because Steve got a little too handsy beforehand, and how they spent the rest of the night with their hands shoved down each other’s pants at Lover’s Lake. 

You were seeing, firsthand, how much he’d changed. How he made his promise of no funny business and how he was sticking to it — no teasing you about the whole thing with a knowing smirk and flirtatious honey eyes, no urging to close this distance between you, no tiny touches on your arm or thigh in the hopes of heavier petting.

He spends the entirety of the first movie perfectly respectful. Just like you’d asked him to be. 

And it was nice, knowing that you weren’t wasting your evening with some asshole who was only spending time with you in the hopes of you putting out later. But it leaves you the faintest bit empty. Hungry. You long for his touch like a missed meal. Starving and feeling it all.

It’s not even heavy petting you want, you just want to feel him next to you — to press yourself into his side and to warm yourself with him like a blanket. 

But you weren’t a pretty cheerleader or a girl dripping in expensive clothes and daddy’s money. You were the weirdo, the freak, the loudmouth nerd, Punchy — all names you wore proudly, like lit-up signs or steel armor. 

Until now. 

Now you think if you weren’t Punchy, if were you someone different, then maybe he’d want to touch you more.

The first hour and thirty-seven minutes of your favorite movie are strangely agonizing. 

Your hands itch with the desire to touch the boy next to you, and they busy themselves with the bowls of candy and savory junk food splayed out on the table in front of you. It’s mindless more than it is anything. You’re absentminded binging does nothing more than half-distract you from the thoughts raging rivers in your skull.

You don’t even realize you’re doing it until your hand falls into an empty bowl of popcorn and finds nothing but kernels at the bottom of it. 

It makes Steve laugh, thinking you were just too into the movie to notice — having no idea it was him taking up all your brain power. 

He leaves to fix more snacks for you while you slip the second VHS into the movie player. He returns with a bowl of freshly popped popcorn and two beers after the wine bottle has been sufficiently emptied. When he plops down next to you again, it’s in the same spot he’d been sitting in all night — a couple of excruciating inches away.

Under the guise of sharing the popcorn in his lap, you make the too bold decision to slither in at his side. It’s innocent at first — your thighs just barely graze and your elbows bump when you dip your hands into the bowl. And it’s still innocent some thirty minutes later, when you find yourself resting your head on his shoulder with your legs curled up behind you.

Steve tenses when he feels your temple pressed against him, but only for a moment before he relaxes again. It makes him all suddenly warm and self-aware of every movement he makes. He tries not to breathe too heavy or shift too often, for fear it might jostle you too much. He doesn’t want to stop feeling you against him like this, even if it’s got his skin prickling with a searing form of anxiety.

“Don’t tell me you’re falling asleep,” he jokes.

“Of course not. It’s way too riveting,” you scoff, even though he can feel you cuddling further into him. Your cheek rubs against the soft cotton of his sweatshirt when you look up at him. He turns his head to peer down at you and his nose nearly grazes your forehead. 

He finds you with a certain glint in your eye. It’s borderline playful, like it so often is, but coated with a sweetness that drips over him like honey. “You like it so far?” you wonder.

“Yeah,” the boy nods quickly. He couldn’t tell you what had happened the past two-and-a-half films, but he could tell you how your jaw tenses when you chew and how your smile curls just before you laugh out loud and how your eyes widen every time you quote the movie. “It’s really good. I like it.”

You beam at him before turning back to the projector again. You shift to get more comfortable against him. “Good.” 

By the third movie, you’re somehow even closer.

Truth be told, Day of the Dead wasn’t your favorite in the trilogy, so it left your mind wandering to far off places — namely, the pretty boy sitting beside you. He goes to put the tape into the projector, feeling immediately cold without pressing into his side, and when he returns he tries his best not to beg you to cuddle against him again.

“My shoulder’s gettin’ real cold over here,” he tries to joke. 

You see right through his beckoning, though. It makes you happy to know he wants it just as much as you do. 

“Just say you wanna be next to me, Harrington,” you tease like you aren’t happily obliging him. You snuggle into his shoulder and rest your head against him while your arms curl around his bicep.

“I wanna be next to you,” he repeats, a playful smile on his lips though his gaze softens with sincerity. “Is that so bad?”

You shake your head against him in reply. Suddenly as mushy as the boy beside you, you turn to look up at him. “Not unless it’s bad that I wanna be next to you, too…”

“Nah. It’s not bad,” he assures in something short of a whisper. “Guess I’m just glad I’m not the only one that’s so far gone.”

He doesn’t elaborate on what he means by that. He doesn’t have to.

Perhaps it’s the admission that this boy is so far gone for you that gives you a sudden burst of confidence. Maybe it’s the comforting feeling of being seen, of knowing you’re no longer alone in your similar far gone-ness. Each feels like rays of sunshine to your skin and has you pressing your lips to his wanting ones without much thought. 

The plump pink of his mouth are magnets for yours. They meet and lock together with little effort, almost destined to do it. It’s a soft, meager, and lingering little peck that sucks you both in a little too easily. It’s hard to pull away from him, but when you do, your lips click in protest.

Then there’s a look, then a deafening silence that says more words than either of you were capable of forming in that moment. His amber eyes dart between both of yours, asking a question without saying a goddamn thing. One that you answer with your own softening gaze. 

And it’s almost better than the kiss itself, the swirling feeling in the pits of your stomach, the knowing of what’s about to happen.

A silent plea and a blink later and his lips are on yours again. 

It’s an awkward mess of yearning mouths and tangled limbs as the both of you fight to find purchase on one another. Your fingers knot in the collar of his sweatshirt, pulling him impossibly closer, while his grip the bare skin of your waist from where your shirt had ridden up. His touch makes you buzz, like a static shock or a bolt of lightning.

Steve makes several observations when he feels you melt into him like honey on toast. He notices how you press yourself into him, like you won’t be satisfied until you’ve swallowed him whole, and how it has you kissing him like you’re scared he’ll pull away — like you’ll open your eyes and he won’t be real. 

You’re as domineering against his mouth as you are in real life, still as all-consuming and overpowering as the girl he’s gotten so familiar with.

He doesn’t realize how you’ve settled so intently on top of him until his back meets the pillowy cushion of the leather couch. You don’t either, until he exhales a sharp gasp against your cupid’s bow. Then you part from him, for the first time in several minutes, breathing in the oxygen your lungs had just begun to scream for. 

Steve finds you with kiss-bitten lips and glassy eyes that look upon him with a softness that he didn’t know existed until now. He smirks with his own swollen and pinker mouth like he isn’t glowing red beneath you. 

“I thought you said no funny business,” he manages to tease through bated breaths.

You don’t bother to make up excuses for yourself. You’re already on top of him, all over him — you’ve already kissed him like you would’ve died if you hadn’t. Now, you’re straddling him, caging him between your legs and under your torso. You’ve settled on top of him with a comforting weightiness, like you’re building a home in the familiarity you’ve sought in him.

“I lied,” you mutter with a lazy shrug. A sly smile pulls slowly at your lips until you’re all but beaming sunbeams down at him. He revels in your warmth. “’S not my fault you’re so damn cute.”

It’s easier to blame it on him for all the reasons you’re attached to him like a magnet to his metal, your moth to his flame. You part his lips with your mouth, rut your tongue against his own, reveling in the foreign familiarity of it all, and then blame him for the way you can’t seem to stop any of it.

Steve doesn’t seem to mind, though. The way his hands find purchase on your hips, petting the warmed skin there and sometimes squeezing to pull you further down onto him, tells you that he has a similar yearning to melt with you. He lets you kiss him all slow, allows you to taste all of him, and doesn’t rush you in your process. It’s comforting, tender. Free.

He’s not used to being on his back like this. Usually, he’s the one taking control. It’s his mouth that does all the work. So, it’s strange to be under you and to have you above him. But it’s more pleasant in an even stranger way not to be rushed — not to have to do all the work. His mouth opens so obediently for you and finds an effortless rhythm with your lips and your tongue. 

It’s the easiest thing he’s ever done in his life, kissing you. 

He delights in every ounce of the warmth and unfamiliarity you press to his mouth, and tries to shove down feelings of unworthiness that simmer in his chest while you do so.

You don’t part until your mouths are numb and tingling with it. 

Your lips are more vibrant in their color, aflame and swollen from being so ardently kissed and sucked and bitten. Neither of you mind making out like a couple of teenagers. It’s comforting to know that things won’t go further than a couple soft touches on burning skin. It was never supposed to be anything more than that, anyway. It was just about being close to each other.

You’ve almost succeeded in your effort to melt into the boy beneath you, when you hear the distant sound of a door opening and closing again. Muffled voices follow — unknown to you but obviously familiar to him. 

You part from him without thinking, like you’re a couple of kids again who’ll get in trouble if your parents ever found out what you were doing down here. Steve groans at the loss of you and in annoyance at the sound of his parents. His heavy eyes fall shut and his head leans back to the couch cushions as he fights to swallow down all of his anger.

His parents never really come around these days. They’ve got a bigger home in the city, closer to his dad’s work, and they choose to stay there most days of the week — month. 

They used to make excuses for why they left their only son behind. It’s five minutes from your dad’s firm. There’s more opportunity for your mom’s real estate business. Oh, don’t be so selfish, Steven, you’ll finally have the place to yourself. It’s a win-win for all of us.

Steve didn’t want their excuses. It was actually easier with them gone. 

But they come around every now and again, whenever it’s most convenient for them, and treat their arrival like something that needs to be celebrated. Like they aren’t supposed to be with their child in the fucking first place. And they somehow manage to pick the most inconvenient times for him, like they know he’s in a bind and want to see him struggle to get out of it.

Usually, it’s when he’s in between paychecks — when they want to take him out to some fancy dinner he could barely afford anyway, but especially when he’s hardly making it until payday. Now, it’s when he’s got the prettiest girl he’s ever seen on top of him, and he’s all hot and half-hard. Steve doesn’t want to let them ruin the moment, as good as they are at it.

“It’s okay. They won’t come in here,” he assures when he feels you tense at the unexpected company. “My mom will go to the bedroom and my dad will go to his office. We’re good, I promise.”

You figure he’s right. The voices grow more and more distant. Heeled shoes click up and up the stairs while heavy stomps head the opposite way. But you’ve already been so woefully knocked out of your stupor that you’re scared it’s too late.

Your lips are numb and the credits are rolling and you’re on top of this beautiful boy and you have no idea how you got there.

It’s almost frightening, the way Steve had consumed you mind, body, and soul by just existing next to you. You become dreadfully hyperaware of the whole thing — of who you are, who he is, and what you’re doing. You lose all your softness and turn to ice, hardening and shrinking back into yourself.

“I should—” you start before clearing your throat when the words come out heavier than expected. “I should head out anyway.”

“Oh,” is all Steve can say. “Right.”

You stare down at him, chest still pressed against his, nose nearly touching the tip of his own. “I just— I have to open tomorrow and everything, so—”

“No. Yeah. Yeah, I— I get it.”

You make tricky work of untangling yourselves.

His legs twist with yours when you both try to rise from the couch at the same time. Then your ring gets stuck in the fabric of his shirt, but not before his belt buckle gets somehow caught in yours. It’s like fate is protesting the imminent parting, but neither of you are paying attention to the signs.

He walks you to your car and chuckles under his breath as you scurry to the front door. 

You’re not-so-distantly terrified of running into his parents. They probably wouldn’t mind that he’s sneaking around with a girl, surely that they’re used to, but you’re almost certain they’re not used to girls like you. Girls with wild hair and leather skirts and chunky boots and too bold makeup. 

You’re not the girl next door. You’re the girl parents warn their sons about. “Leave that girl alone,” they say. “She’s nothing but trouble.”

You tell him all of this on the short trek to your half-broken-down car when you catch him laughing at you about the whole thing. You say it in jest, lighthearted and trying to make a joke of it. But there’s an underlying melancholia to your tone that reveals every truth you’re trying to evade.

“They don’t care enough about me to give a shit about a girl I’m with, I promise,” he confesses with a laugh that sounds more like a sad scoff than anything else. His chocolate eyes turn gold beneath the yellow street light. He smirks at you. “Besides, I don’t know if I told you this or not, but my middle name is actually trouble, so… I think we might be a match made in heaven.”

You roll your eyes at his attempts to flirt with you, though his lack of finesse makes you smile. “You’re an idiot, Steve Actually Trouble Harrington.”

“You really know how to say goodbye, don’t ya?” he grins when you reach the curb where your tin can car sits. 

“Yeah, I’m pro,” you shrug with a teasing glint in your eye, then you beam. “I’ll see you around, ‘kay?”

“Totally,” he nods, suddenly forlorn at having to leave you like he hadn’t just spent the past four hours with you.

Themetallic click of your car door opening sounds much louder in the emptiness of the suburbs. You glance at the boy right before you sink into the driver’s seat, feeling your heart swell with something short of yearning — anticipation. 

You weren’t actually a professional at saying goodbye, you find, because you’re realizing how hard it is to leave him.

“Steve!” he hears you shout from across the lawn when he’s halfway up the drive. 

He turns around, expecting to hear you tease him some more or tell him you were having car troubles. Neither would’ve shocked him. You’ve got a smart mouth and a shittier car. But you keep on surprising him, all but launching yourself into him before kissing him harder than he’s ever been kissed before.

Steve tenses against you at first, then relaxes again in record time. He sighs in the comfort of having your body pressed so intently into his and your arms wrapped around his neck to pull him somehow closer. 

You feel the breath of his exhale fan against your cupid’s bow. It makes you smile, and he feels the expression contort against his lips. His hands rise to the widest part of your hips without thinking. It’s all muscle memory now.

And even though he’s spent the better part of an hour kissing you, this one is so obviously different. This wasn’t just to pass the time. This was more than just to feel him — it was to tell him something. He hears every word you don’t say, but rather press like a stamp to his mouth.

He’s breathless when you pull away. You meet his flushed face with a mischievous grin.

“What was that for?” he wonders breathlessly, but doesn’t waver with his hold on you. He quickly notices that yours doesn’t either.

You shrug in response. “‘Cause you’re pretty.”

“Yeah, well…” he tries to play off like he’s not blushing like crazy. “You’re pretty too.”

Your beam ebbs into a teasing, tightlipped smirk. “Stop flirting with me, Steve Harrington.”

You shove him away with a rougher hand than you realize before you walk away from him. Steve rubs at the ache in his chest with the palm of his hand.

Your playful teasing and your lingering kiss is the only thing Steve has to remember you by when you turn on your chunky heeled boot and head off down the driveway again. He’s frozen, mesmerized by the sight of you and reeling at how you manage to drive him crazy without trying.

Your eyes find him again just before you duck into your car, and you see him still looking at you — mouth agape and eyes wide like you’re some kind of rare find. You figure you must be, in some way. Girls like you aren’t supposed to like guys like him. Vice Versa. Tale as old as time.

The boy stays locked in his stupor until the sprinkles whir on. The spurts of freezing cold water spray all over him and his pretty hair and expensive sweatshirt and his vintage jeans. “Shit!” you hear him swear as he rushes for cover on his front porch. 

He’s quickly soaked and freezing cold, but he smiles anyway when he hears the sound of your giggling behind him. It’s as animated as your personality and spills from your mouth like so many rays of sunshine, just a little too loud for the quiet midnight suburbs. 

It’s perfect, he realizes. You’re perfect. 

[pedroshotwifey]

Trouble in Paradise (Part One)

Pairing: DBF!Joel Miller x f!reader

Word Count: 3.4k

Summary: Of all the things you thought you might be doing on your summer break, falling in love with your father's best friend in Hawaii wasn't one of them.

Tags/Warnings: Nothing crazy yet! Some kind of maybe tension, pet names, talk of Joel knowing reader since she was small, reader has a dad, mom is not mentioned, yadayada

A/N: Hello my friends! I'm terribly sorry I've been away for so long. There have been a lot of...unsavory happenings lately. Want to say sorry in advance because I know this isn't my best writing, but i'm trying to get back into the groove of things. I'm hoping I'll be back to my scheduled programming (TTF, FB, answering requests) by the time this short series is done. Expecting it to be around 3-5 parts. Thank you so much for sticking with me <3

*******

You’ve been laying in your bed blasting your “chill” playlist through your earbuds since you got home from school around five. The last exhausting day of your freshman college year. Lana Del Rey, Cigarettes After Sex, Hozier, and the like have been floating lazily through your head as you watched the sun go down. 

After a long day, you’d hung your head off the foot of your bed, intent to bask in the golden glow of the evening in a baggy T and your underwear until your eyes shut for the night. You were almost asleep when you were interrupted by a sound that didn’t quite go with “Wicked Game”. 

You yank your earbuds out, sitting up on your bed. You don’t remember it getting so dark. Your cracked window allows the late summer breeze in to gently rustle the curtains framing it. Crickets and cicadas chirp loudly outside, creating a symphony to compliment the stars shining through the inky sky. 

“Sweetheart?” 

Your head swivels to look accusingly at your closed door. The name was shouted from the stairway. Definitely your dad.

You roll your eyes but get out of bed. The clock on your nightstand tells you it’s 8:02pm, so he’s probably calling you for dinner. You’ve told him before that it’s easier just to call your cell, but when has he ever listened? You pad to your door, crack it, and shout back. 

“Be down in a minute!”

Getting no response, you can only assume he heard you. You close your door back and pick up the polka-dotted pajama pants crumpled into a pile beside your bed. You tug them on through a yawn, almost tripping a few times before they’re on all the way. 

You check your mirror before heading down. You look sleepy, not like it really matters. Your door creeks as you push it open again and make your way down the stairs. The soft carpet laid in the middle of the hardwood keeping your steps quiet. It’s about halfway to the kitchen that you hear a second voice to your father’s. It sounds vaguely familiar, and your heart skips a beat. Surely it’s not—

You climb down a few more steps and stop in your tracks at the sight of Joel Miller sitting at your dinner table. You haven’t seen him since at least your high school graduation. You’d harbored a small crush on him then, but that had to have been nothing compared to whatever the hell you’re feeling now. Your entire body seems to glow with some mix of embarrassment and surprise. 

You really thought you’d gotten over this silly little crush. Then again, it’s hard to get over something like Joel Miller. High school boyfriends? Sure, no problem. But the classic DILF next door of a best friend your dad has isn’t so easy. He’s been a constant in your childhood, always kind and there for you even when your dad wasn’t. So, in other words, highly inappropriate for you to be so attached to. 

It’s easy to say the years have been kind to him. He’s a few years older than your father, so probably about mid-forties now. He’s started to gray, a fine amount of silver peppered into his mousy brown hair. That beard of his has taken the brunt of it, though. That beard you’ve imagined between your thighs so many times. 

His dark eyes seem to have become kinder thanks to the crow’s feet carefully etched into the corners. He’s wearing his signature T-shirt and worn jeans, his brown leather jacket and work boots likely disposed of near the front door. 

He smirks as his brown eyes fall on your disheveled form, halted on the bottom step. You, in contrast to the god-like figure he’s sporting, must look like an absolute mess. Despite that fact, he looks at you almost in a different way than he used to. More intensely. It makes you resist the urge to squirm. 

“Joel,” you finally manage to choke out. “Hi.” 

Smooth, you think. 

“Hey, trouble,” he returns, light amusement lacing his tone. It makes you nervous, like he’s clocked your little secret. 

He gets up from his seat, and you can tell he’s going for a hug. You shock yourself into action and take the few steps to reach him. He envelops you in his strong arms just like he used to, and you take the opportunity to breathe in his scent. Smokey pine, whiskey, and a hint of mint—just like you remember. 

You’re smiling like an idiot despite yourself as you pull away. Luckily, your dad makes an appearance before you say something embarrassing. 

“Hey, sleeping beauty,” he teases. “You remember my buddy Joel, dontch’a?” 

Joel scoffs before you can answer. “‘Course she remembers me, Scott, known her since she was damn near in diapers.” 

Your dad rolls his eyes. “Well, just to ask,” he argues. 

You shake your head. Same banter between those two for as long as you can remember. They’ve been friends since your dad’s freshman highschool year, and Joel’s senior. Everyone who knows Joel and Scott considers them to be brothers as much as Joel and Tommy.

Cheeks heated, you make your way to the bathroom to freshen up while they’re distracted. You shut the door and comb through your hair with your fingers, straighten your tank top, and wipe away the smudged mascara you didn’t care to wash off earlier. 

When you look half-decent, you wash your hands and walk back to the dining room, choosing to ignore the fact that you just tidied yourself for your dad’s best friend. Totally normal thing to do, right?

Joel is sitting back in the same spot as you found him the first time, your dad in the seat opposite of him. There are three bowls of spaghetti served, one in front of each man, and one beside Joel. You’re not going to complain about that. 

You slide into the seat next to him, flashing him a quick smile when he turns his head to acknowledge you. You swear his gaze lingers for a second, but it’s probably just wishful thinking. 

You look away and dig into your food, zoning out as Joel and your dad talk about work. Joel’s presence beside you fuels your daydreaming, his deep, drawling voice keeping it running. You wish so badly to lean into him, feel the comfort of his embrace. Maybe more. You wish, not for the first time, that he would look at you the way you looked at him. You wish he would—

You jolt when you hear your name in conversation, your spaghetti-filled fork halfway to your mouth. 

“No, I don’t think she’d mind at all, would’ya, honey?” 

Your dad looks expectantly at you. Your eyes dart between him and Joel. 

“Uh, sorry, what?” You ask, your cheeks heating for the second time tonight. 

“Helping Joel out. I know it’s been some years, but it’s just basic stuff. Plus, it’ll be in—” 

“Really, Scott, you don’t have to volunteer her if she don’t want to—” 

“No, no,” you interrupt. “I don’t mind at all.” 

In all honesty, you didn’t think your answer through. You have no idea what you just signed up for. Though, if it’s with Joel, it can’t be too bad. 

“No, really, sweetheart,” Joel interjects. “I wouldn’t wanna have a pretty ‘lil’ thing workin’ away on her summer vacation.”

You turn to look at him, flashing him your sweetest eyes. He called you pretty—you feel like you might explode. “I really don’t mind.” 

He waits for a moment before he clears his throat and turns back to your dad. “Alright then,” he says before taking a sip of his drink. “We leave for Hawaii next Tuesday.” 

You just about choke on your dinner. Your dad laughs. 

“Told you, Joel, she doesn’t listen to a damn thing we say.” 

*****

Hawaii? For two weeks? With Joel? What do you even pack?

You stare at your suitcase, waiting for your closet to help you out and throw something in there. Should you bring sundresses or work clothes? Both, right? Probably both. Maybe more work clothes. You said you’d be helping, after all. But with what? 

God, you should have just paid attention to that damn conversation. 

It’s late Monday night, and you haven’t been able to pick up on enough over-the-phone conversation to get the gist of it. You need to stop being such a wuss and just ask. But that would mean calling Joel. Do you really want to call Joel? 

Well, yes, of course you do. But do you really want to sound awkward around Joel? No, no you don’t. And you know that’s exactly what would be happening over the phone with a man you’ve never talked over the phone with. 

You groan, flopping yourself onto your bed to stare at your ceiling and overthink. You don’t want to overpack, because you don’t want Joel to see that you overpacked. But you also don’t want to underpack, because you don’t want Joel to see that you underpacked, either. This really shouldn’t be that hard. You’re about to get back up, say screw it, and throw a mixture in there, when you hear a knock on your door. 

“Come in,” you call, unmoving.

“Hey, honey,” your dad says as he creeps in. “Just got off the phone with Joel.” 

You sit up at this. “Yeah?” 

“Yeah, he figured you might want some advice on what to pack.” 

Oh thank God. 

“Said he’s gonna be puttin’ you to work, but to bring some pretty clothes if you want. There’s a pool at the place you’ll be workin’ at, and a beach nearby.” 

You nod along, thanking all that is holy that Joel had the idea to give you some input. 

Your dad eyes your empty suitcase and raises a brow in your direction. 

“He’ll be here around 4:00am, so be ready by then.” He looks back at you. “I love you, sweetheart, I’ll see you when you get back.” 

He gives you a hug and closes your door. 

You take Joel’s advice and pack mostly for work—with a few pretty things just in case. 

*****

As expected, Joel’s truck is in your driveway at 4:00am on the dot. You’re in the passenger seat and headed for the airport by 4:03. 

The ride is less tense than you thought it would be, mostly because the two of you are so tired. You’re practically in a coma against the window, the dull classic country music playing quietly from the old truck’s speakers lulling you to sleep. Joel is in about the same mindset, the lazy drumming of his fingers against the wheel the only thing convincing you he’s still awake. 

Buildings pass in a dark blur, everything mushed together into one big half-dream. Joel’s scent fills the cab, sealing the state you’re in. You glance at the clock: 4:48. You blink, and it’s 5:20, the truck is stopped at the airport, and Joel is gently nudging you awake. You squint at him, the cab light rudely intruding, and you can just barely make out the faint smile on his lips. You have a strong urge to lean forward and kiss him, but thankfully you’re conscious enough to not make a complete fool of yourself right now. 

“C’mon, darlin’, we got a plane to catch.” 

You nod, trying to get your bearings. Joel slides out of his side of the truck, and you follow out of yours, getting a good stretch in before leaning back into the cab and retrieving your suitcase from the narrow backseat. When you make your way around the truck to Joel, he gently grabs it from your hand. 

You look at him, mouth open and ready to argue, but he gives you a look that makes you shut it just as quick. Your stomach flutters at the gesture, and you kind of want to slap him for it. Or maybe yourself. Either way, you keep close to him until you’re entering through the sliding doors out front. 

It only takes about an hour to get through TSA and in line to board the plane, but you’re wide awake by then. And hungry. 

“Hey Joel,” you whisper. He hums at you but doesn’t look down. 

“I’m hungry.” 

Now he looks at you. “I don’t think we got time to grab anything now, darlin’, but we should have a layover at LAX in about three hours. Think you can hold tight ‘till then?” 

You nod, trying not to overthink the conversation. It was literally a few words exchanged between the two of you, but it might be the first time you’ve conversed alone outside of your dad’s house. It felt domestic to you in a way that makes you feel like an idiot. It was one conversation. 

Of course, you have to ruin the moment by humming “Party in the USA”. I mean, it’s Joel’s fault. He was the one to mention LAX. 

He laughs and nudges you. “Quit that,” he commands, though you can tell he thinks it’s funny. You giggle but indulge him. 

“Fine,” you draw out. “Somebody hates fun.” 

He scoffs another laugh, but says nothing. 

Finally, the two of you are next to board. You stop around the middle of the plane, and Joel hoists your bags into the compartment above your seats. Then, he moves aside to let you in first. 

“By the window, darlin’,” he says.

You smile with excitement and settle in, Joel sitting next to you a second later. 

“Your dad said somethin’ about it bein’ your first time flyin’, so I figured you might want a window seat,” he explains. 

Your heart warms at this. Why does he have to be so thoughtful? 

“Thank you, Joel,” you say genuinely, flashing him a smile. It may be the lighting, but you swear you see his cheeks pink up just a little before he nods and faces forward. 

The flight goes by relatively quickly. Joel does some sort of paperwork on the little desk in front of him, and you pop your earbuds in and listen to a downloaded playlist while you read. The light romance you chose was cute, but it failed to distract you completely from the hunk of man beside you. 

You’re not sure how many times you caught yourself staring at the flex of his wrist as he wrote whatever down. It was maybe once or twice that your eyes found their way up to his bicep, possibly a few times that they landed on his lower lip, his teeth bitten into it in concentration. You definitely got heated more times than you would’ve liked. And as your book started heating as well, you had to put it down. You really hope it’s not just you that feels this new tension.

For the last twenty minutes or so, you’ve been looking out the window, content to listen to your music and watch the land go by. For the last five, you’ve felt Joel’s eyes on you. You refuse to look back at him, though, just in case it’s your imagination. 

But you swear you can feel the weight of his stare. You fidget, trying to ignore the feeling as you stare out the window and at the clouds. Then you hear a sharp sound from the speakers 

through your earbuds. 

You take them off and look back at Joel as the pilot informs you that you should be landing in about ten minutes. 

He was staring at you, and he didn’t look away. You don’t look away now, either. You don’t say anything.

“Thank you for comin’ with me, darlin’.” 

You’re taken aback. Of course you would go with him. 

“It’s no problem, Joel,” you say. He gives you a short smile. “I mean, really,” you joke. “You’re the one taking me on a free vacation.” 

He smiles fully this time and rolls his eyes. He tends to do that a lot with you. It makes you smile too. 

The speaker dings again:

“Should be some light turbulence, but we’ll be on the ground soon, folks.” 

Joel looks away after the announcement, gathering his work to put back into his bag. You shake yourself off and choose not to acknowledge whatever the hell that was. 

******

You knew LAX would be busy, but. Holy shit. This place is insane. 

You keep close to Joel as he navigates the two of you through the crowds and to your next gate. He keeps slightly in front of you, and you keep getting the urge to grab his hand to keep up, but you don’t. You don’t think you’ve ever seen this many people in one place—and you thought the Austin airport had been overwhelming. 

There are a million shops and restaurants and gates as you make your way down the massive hallways, up and down the escalators, and through trains. It takes an hour and fifteen before you can even see the sign for your gate. Your legs hurt from walking, and your head hurts from all the noise. 

You keep an eye on some of the closer restaurants you pass so that you can backtrack to them and grab a bagel or something before you have to get on your plane. You catch a glimpse of a Burger King when you’re suddenly slammed into. 

You gasp as you’re sent flying onto your ass by a man who couldn’t be bothered to glance your way to see if you’re alright. Joel whips around and sets the bags down, quickly helping you up. 

“Shit, are you alright, darlin’?” he asks, a deep concern in his eyes. Your cheeks are burning with embarrassment even though it wasn’t your fault. 

“Yeah, I’m okay.” 

Joel looks you up and down to make sure as you stand on your own two feet. He turns around, trying to scope out the man who bumped into you, and turns back when he finds that he’s long gone. 

“I’m sorry, honey,” he finally says. “People don’t give a rat’s ass here.” 

You nod, smiling at his choice of words. “I’m alright, Joel.” 

He sighs and picks his bag back up, slinging the large weight over his shoulder, and then picks your suitcase up in one hand. WIth the other, he grabs onto yours. His hand is rough but warm and comforting. 

“Just stay close ‘till we get to the gate.”

Practically glowing, you hold onto him and let him lead the way. It only takes a few more minutes before he’s telling you to sit down at the waiting area. 

“I’m gonna grab you somethin’ to eat, ‘nd I’ll be right back.” 

You decide to read while he’s on his errand, picking your book back up to a particularly smutty part. You’re not going to pretend like you aren’t picturing the characters as you and Joel as he eats her out on a countertop. You bite your lip, consuming each word with fervor.

You’re just finishing the chapter when Joel strolls up with two breakfast sandwiches, a coffee, and an orange juice. He hands you a sandwich and the latter drink, and takes the seat next to you with a groan. 

“Probably have at least thirty minutes,” he grumbles. 

You nod as you thank him and unwrap your sandwich. It’s silent for a few minutes, before you can’t bear it and break the peace. 

“What all are we going to be doing?” 

Joel looks at you, almost flustered. He must have misheard you. “Huh?” 

“Like when we get there, what are we going to be working on?” 

“Oh, uh,” he clears his throat and takes a sip of his coffee. “Mostly flooring ‘nd some drywall, but there should be somethin’ to do in the kitchen if I’m hearin’ right.” 

You nod and take a bite of your sandwich. Joel continues. 

“Should have a few days to relax, though, if we get everythin’ done in time.” 

Your stomach flips at the thought. A few days to relax with Joel. 

“Sounds easy enough,” you say. 

Joel nods again. “Atta girl.”

“Flight 332 is ready to begin boarding.” 

You and Joel take the last bites of your sandwich in silence and stand up to get in line once again. This flight is going to be longer, about six hours. 

Joel throws your trash away and comes back to grab your bags. Same as last time, you have a seat by the window. Not like it matters much in the long run, because just after Joel takes his seat and the plane takes off, your head falls onto his shoulder, and you promptly fall asleep. 

******

Thank you for reading!! Part two should be coming soon.

Itty bitty mini taglist: @callachloe @kewwrites @casa-boiardi @pastawench (love you guys)

Pls let me know if you would like to be tagged in pt. 2!

[ppumeonae-bigvibe]

between the lines

↖ navigation: seventeen masterlist || main masterlist

pairing: dormmate! woozi x gn! reader

↬ tags: bringing the 96 liners into this because i can, pining + longing, love is blind yada yada <3, quite wholesome towards the end

summary: through unspoken thoughts and harmless meddling, both you and jihoon get caught in the midst of your friends playful matchmaking

word count: 1.1k words

a/n: i posted it a whole day later ,, i thought today was the 1st of august… ㅠㅠ

jihoon wanted to get close to you. but the only thing stopping him was just that he was bad at initiating anything, especially when it came to things concerning you. unlike his friends who seemed to so easily befriended you. he sadly thinks that his love language might just be existing.

soonyoung displayed his affections with physical banter, oftentimes grabbing you and roughing you up playfully. you didn't mind it one bit, but jihoon did when his chest tightened at the sight of you leaning against soonyoung almost willingly as the male scrolls through his phone and shows it to you. or when you linked arms with soonyoung as the two of you strolled, leaving jihoon trailing behind.

the ever so brotherly junhwi was like a big sibling figure: upon your request, jun always never hesitated to do anything for you within reason. acts of service was something jun excelled at; on the other hand jihoon's dejection simmered beneath his skin when you walked past him towards jun, asking for his help even though jihoon could have done it too.

you sought wonwoo to spend time together. every time he thought of asking you to do passive things together, you had claimed to be spending time with wonwoo instead. wonwoo and you clicked because of the games you two played, but outside of gaming you two also do school work together in comfortable silence.

in conclusion, he's bad at expressing his feelings that he wanted to be with you. he found it confusing himself too, not being able to put a feeling as to why he always desired to spend time with you, to hold your hand, to do things for you.

funny thing was that, his friends knew about his way-too-obvious crush, and have been devising so many ways for you two to be alone together. call it brothers for brothers, or something.

jihoon zones back into the present: it was a movie night after finals and you had suggested to host a sleepover with the rest of them. wonwoo lightly bumps shoulders with jihoon; a curt nod, and a small grin.

junhwi unpacks all the food and exclaims in displeasure (jihoon thinks it was a bit too much), "we didn't get the drinks!" sooyoung makes a show of sighing (a little too loudly), "dang i was just getting thirsty for some cola..."

"i can go get them!" you offered unknowingly and jihoon perked up. his three friends looked at each other, as if their brains were firing off signals simultaneously and jihoon immediately claims, "i'll go down too, you guys can set up the area."

"yeah that would be good. we aren't too familiar with the neighborhood here." wonwoo adds on, sealing the deal. (jihoon never thought he'd see the stoic wonwoo trying his best to fight off a playful smirk)

with a recycle bag slung on jihoon's shoulder, the two of you headed out as the evening sun started to dip. "i'm glad finals are over." you light-heartedly started the conversation, beaming a little when jihoon reciprocates with his shy smile, "me too. it's been a while since we last saw them too."

silence blanketed you two again, and jihoon started getting fidgety as the convenience store emerged as both of you turned left. you glanced at the male, "jihoon, do you have something to say to me?" his shocked expression betrayed him with a mere statement from you.

you soften your eyes, "is this about the laundry? if it is, then i'm sorry, i knew it was my responsibility and i've been just so cooped up with all the tests and everything, and i know that you're a stickler for hygiene and i--" jihoon notices a whizzing cyclists pedaling downslope and immediately drags you towards him, "watch it!"

you let out a gentle "oof" at the sudden impact and jihoon hopes his heart wasn't beating too loudly. you moved away from him almost as quickly as he pulled you in.

"you okay?" his hands were still lightly grasping yours and your face flushed under his scrutiny, "yeah. you can let go of me now." jihoon's reluctance seemed to catch your eye too, "did you mean to talk about something else?"

dang it, you and your perception.

jihoon glanced down at his hand intertwined with yours, "why can't i link arms with you like you do with soonyoung?" you were mildly taken aback by the sudden question, but jihoon pressed on, "or when you got jun to do things for you when i could do them too? i'm your roommate, not him. certainly you don't need him to move your shelf when i was around."

you stared back at him with an unreadable expression and jihoon abashedly looks at the ground, "and when you spend time with wonwoo instead of me, i feel like i've been...left out. i don't know, tell me if i'm reading too much into this or maybe..."

he hears your sudden laughter amidst his worries and he thinks you might have lost it. you wiped away a tear from the sheer amount of force it took you when you started chuckling, "i didn't think this day would come. i like you, lee jihoon. like, a lot."

jihoon sputters, "this entire time?" you averted your gaze, "i just wanna ask if...maybe you do have feelings for me?"

"i do, for as long as i've met you and i..." you pecked him on the cheek and rocked back on your heels, "then that's all i wanted to hear."

if jihoon could combust right now, he would. he noticed how your blushing face mirrored his and he pulled you in for a hug: this time it was far from anything like that of two friends embracing.

"the things you mentioned: about soonyoung, he's just naturally clingy like that, but i thought maybe if i got closer to him it would make you jealous. same with jun, or more like he offered and i decided to test you a little to see if i was right. and for wonwoo, he was totally on board trying to rile you up."

you stopped your rambling and raised your hands as if to surrender, "i said my piece. the boys had a hand in all of these sneaky actions."

your words caused jihoon's mind to run at miles per hour, "but they told me they'd be 'wingmen' for me, and would try to create more opportunities for us to be alone together...?"

realization hit you. they've been instigating everything, orchestrating every action. "do you think they..."

"i think so." you confirmed his suspicions. hurriedly, you two entered the provision shop and bought the drinks, feet quickly carrying both of you back to the dorms to confront the three trouble makers.

the door bursts open at the impact, effectively shocking the three masterminds.

jun swallows his food comedically, "uh-oh." "seems like our plan worked out, huh?" wonwoo smirked as he leaned over to high-five an equally joyous soonyoung, "welcome back lovebirds!"

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