#such a pathetic vanity project

[zot3-flopped]

Louis blew the budget on the DMA'S and didn't have much left for the other two acts. The Illiterati are still running the account.

[waitimcomingtoo]

Uranus

Pairing: Peter Parker x Avengers!Reader

Synopsis: you fix Peters science project while he’s out on a date with another girl

Masterlist

You walked by Peter’s room and paused in the doorway. The empty bedroom reminded you of where he was tonight and it send a sick feeling down to your stomach. The scent of his cologne lingered in the air as you looked at all the discarded outfits he had left on his bed.

“I’m not cleaning his stupid room.” You decided and walked away. You were barely halfway down the hallway when you turned and sprinted back to his room to start to put things away. You knew it wasn’t your job to take care of him but you simply couldn’t stop yourself from tidying up. You assumed he’d be getting back late from where he was and probably wouldn’t want to clean up all his clothes just to get into his bed. As you folded a pair of his jeans, you looked up into his vanity mirror and sighed.

“You’re so pathetic.” You told yourself through a groan.

“Stop talking to yourself.” Your reflection replied and pointed at you with a scathing finger. You jumped and looked down to see your finger was pointed as well.

“Right.” You mumbled and left his room.

You then went into the living room and saw Peter’s science project sitting on the couch. He had been building a model of the solar system for weeks now for his astronomy class with a little help from you here and there. All you did was hold pieces together after he glued them but he still insisted that he could not have done it without you. You smiled at the memory of the two of you working on it together and picked it up.

“Why would he leave it where someone could sit on it?” You sighed and moved it to the bar counter in the kitchen. You left the living room to use the bathroom just as Thor was entering the room. He stepped onto a bar stool with ease and took a seat on the counter to eat the apple he had taken from a lunchbox labeled “Sam’s: do not touch”. He munched his apple for a moment before feeling something digging into his back. He sat up a little and pulled a small ball out from under him that was painted to look like Mercury.

“Hm. Thats strange. I don’t remember putting that up there.” Thor frowned as he rolled the planet between his fingers. You walked back into the living room and smiled at Thor until you saw what he was holding. Your heart stopped at the same time your feet did and you let out a dramatic gasp that sent you into a coughing fit.

“Thor!” You exclaimed. “You just destroyed Peter’s science project!”

“These tiny colorful balls were his science project? What was it on? Tiny colorful balls?” Thor asked as he stood up to look at the science project he had completed crushed.

“No. It was a model of the solar system. And you just crushed it. How did you not feel that when you sat down?” You whined as more parts of the project fell from Thors jeans and back into the counter.

“Lady Y/n, you must be mistaken. I’ve seen the solar system with my own eyes. And then I had my eye cut out. And then I had my eye replaced and saw the solar system again. Peters little balls looked nothing like it.” Thor told you, making you roll your eyes up to the ceiling and stamp your feet like a little kid.

“I don’t care about your optic history.” You groaned. “Peter’s been working on it for weeks and your giant butt just crushed it in seconds.”

“Thank you. I eat a lot of yams to get these yams.” Thor smiled at the presumed compliment and patted his thigh. You watched him for a moment before letting out a deep sigh.

“Okay.” You was all you could stay in your effort to remain calm.

“I don’t see what all the petulance is about. If he formed one solar system out of tiny colorful balls, surely he can do it again. All the pieces are right here.” Thor pointed out.

“Yes, but that doesn’t erase the fact that you ruined the project he spent weeks working on. He’s gonna be devastated when he sees this. And who taught you the word “petulance”? Have you been watching The Twilight Zone again? I don’t know why you do that. It always scares you.”

“Never you mind.” He wagged a finger. “I do feel bad for the boy. I’ll collect the tiny balls since it was my behind that crushed them and then Peter can glue them back together.”

“He can’t. It’s due tomorrow and right now he’s on…I don’t know. He’s just busy and he can’t fix it tonight.” You sighed and started to collect the scattered pieces of the project.

“Busy doing what? You’re here and his small balls were finished. What else could the boy be doing?” Thor wondered. You paused for a moment and felt that sick feeling in your stomach again.

“He’s on a date.” You said for the first time out loud since Peter told you his plans for the evening. You’d been quietly stewing all day over it and letting it settle in a massive dark cloud over your head.

“Well I’m sure the man he’s with will be understanding that he has to come home to fix his balls.” Thor told you.

“Stop saying balls!” You scolded. “And the date is with a girl, for your information. A very pretty girl from our business class who smells like a vanilla and my broken dreams.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Lady Y/n. I never knew why but I know that small boy means a lot to you.” Thor said sympathetically and put his hand on your shoulder. You gave him a sympathetic smile and patted his hand.

“Seems like a lot of things are broken tonight.” Thor continued. “Your dreams, Peters balls-“

“Say balls one more time.” You said through clenched teeth.

“Or what? You’ll stab me?” Thor challenged you.

“What? No. Jesus Christ. Who hurt you?” You mumbled and pushed his hand off your shoulder.

“My brother. And then he hurt me again. And then my sister hurt me. And then my brother once more before he died before my eyes. Enough about me, why are your dreams broken?”

“It’s complicated.” You sighed. “Can I tell you something personal?”.

“No.” Thor replied and left the room without another word. You shrugged in defeat and wondered why you even bothered.

“Well that was a fine howdy do.” You mumbled and finished collecting the pieces. You laid out all the broken bits of Peter’s project on the kitchen counter and folded your arms. It would be a lot of work for Peter and you had no idea what hour he’d be getting back. As much as you hated the idea of him being on a date, you more so hated the thought of him coming home happy and his smile falling when he saw what had become of all his hard work.

“I need to fix these balls.” You whispered to yourself. You grabbed Saturn and one it’s broken rings and started to see how you could glue them back together.

“No. I can’t do this.” You said out loud. “I can’t fix every little thing in Peter’s life just to make him happy. I’m not his girlfriend. I’m not the one he asked on a date. I’m just a friend.”

You put the pieces down and folded your arms to keep your hands off it. You knew you should walk away, but you couldn’t stop thinking about all the nights you walked past his room and saw him working on the project. He’d put so much effort into it and now it was in pieces on the counter.

“A girlfriend would spend the next few hours working on a project that has no impact on me just to save Peter the trouble. A good friend would feel bad that his work got destroyed and offer condolences when he got home. And I’m a good friend. Not a girlfriend. It’s not my problem. So I’m walking away.” You decided and left the room. You lasted all of three minutes before you ran back into the room with a tube of crazy glue.

“I gotta fix the balls.” You exclaimed and plopped yourself down at the table. Once you organized all the planets and parts of the solar system, you went to Peter’s room to get the sketched out drawing he had made of the project to use as a blueprint. You silently thanked Peter for being so meticulous and followed his sketch to rebuild his project.

Time went by slowly but your hands cramped up quickly as you worked on the model. It was around the time you glued on Saturns 30th moon, you understood why it took Peter so long to complete the project. All the moons and planets looked the same to you so you had to carefully study his drawings and rely on your memory of when you helped him with the project to guide you as you worked. You had to stop every so often to rub your eyes and roll out your wrists to keep them from getting stiff.

You drifted off into sleep at some point when staring at Jupiters moons became a little too mind numbingly boring. Peter got back from his date about midnight and strolled past you on his way to his room. He backtracked when he realized you were asleep at the table and frowned. His completed science project was beside you, save for one missing moon next to Jupiter. His eyebrows knit together in confusion over the sight so he gently shook you awake.

“Hey. You awake?” He asked in a soft tone as he shook your shoulders. You shot up immediately and nearly knocked your head into his.

“I’m not snoring.” You blurted as you pulled the hair that was stuck to your cheek away.

“I know.” He chuckled. “What are you doing here? Why is Ganymede stuck to your face?”

“Why is what?” You asked through a yawn. Peter smiled and pulled the missing moon off your cheek and held it out to show you.

“Ganymede. The largest moon in the solar system.” He told you and put it in its correct spot on the model.

“There is no way you saw a random gray ball stuck to my face and correctly identified it as Gammy meme.” You insisted.

“Ganymede.” He corrected. “And I only know because I labeled them. See?”

Peter pulled the moon back off to show you a tiny G written on the bottom with the word “Jupiter” in parentheses beside it.

“They’re labeled?” You nearly shouted. “Well that would’ve been helpful four hours ago.”

“Four hours? That’s how long you’ve been here? What happened?” Peter frowned and took a seat beside you. You gave him a sheepish smile and looked at the model.

“I’m sorry, Peter. Thor sat on your project by accident.” You admitted. “I’ve been putting it back together ever since. I think I got most of it the way you had it but I never found Pluto. I honestly think it went up his ass and he just didn’t realize.”

“You spent four hours fixing my project?” He asked with a surprised smile.

“Of course I did. I know how hard you worked on this. I didn’t want you to have to start all over.” You told him. He gave you a fond smile and placed his hand on top of yours. Your eyes flicked to your hands and you gulped but said nothing.

“I really appreciate this but you really didn’t have to do this. You should have called me. I could’ve come home and fixed it myself.”

“But I knew you were really excited about tonight. I didn’t want to interrupt your date.” You said without looking at him.

“Well that was very selfless of you. And I hate to tell you this after all the work you did, but the date was bad. I would’ve loved an excuse to leave.” He admitted, making you smile involuntarily.

“It was bad?” You asked and quickly cleared your throat to cover up your smile.

“Woah. Don’t sound too happy.” He snorted.

“What?” You asked in a high pitched voice. “I’m not. Why would that make me happy? But please elaborate anyway.”

“It was bad.” He grimaced. “Like, season 6 of Glee level bad.”

“That bad?” You gasped. “So many forgettable characters. So many odd couple choices.”

“They sang Let it Go. They worked Let it Go from Frozen into the plot and made them sing it.” Peter shook his head.

“That was not the worst for me. The worst was when Mr. Shue rapped Same Love. They let the straight adult rap a song about being gay when the entire cast of queer young people were right there. And wasn’t there a child in the club for some reason? And twins who were lowkey dating?”

“Yep. All of that. And yet, my date was still worse.” He shrugged. You looked down at your lap and smiled a little before quickly dropping it.

“It was that bad, huh?” You asked and tried not to sound too interested.

“So bad.” He sighed. “She was a great girl, don’t get me wrong. We just had no connection whatsoever. She didn’t laugh at any of my jokes and then there were a few times where I thought she was joking so I laughed but she didn’t and then we sat in awkward silence.”

“That’s the worst. I hate awkward silence. I once pretended to forgot the word for “seatbelt” just to keep a conversation going with an uber driver. I kept calling it a strap on.”

“Wait, is that not what a strap on is?” Peter played dumb. “Should we Google it to make sure?”

“Shut up.” You rolled your eyes. “Keep going. I want to hear more about this awful date with the girl you’ll never see again.”

“There was just no spark. We realized pretty quickly that we didn’t have anything in common. At one point, she asked me if Star Wars was the “movie with the things you can’t feed after midnight”. So I don’t foresee a second date.”

“Wow. She had to have a serious lack of knowledge about two major huge pop culture movies to ask that question.”

“I know. I told her yes and she believed me.” Peter replied, making you laugh. He laughed as well over how ridiculous the whole night had been before stopping to look at you. When your laughter died down and you realized he was staring at you, you smiled shyly and looked over at the project to avoid eye contact.

“Well, I’m sorry it didn’t go well.” You told him. “Maybe the next girl will understand you more.”

“Yeah. I hope so.” He said in a soft voice and never stopped looking at you.

“You’ll have better luck next time. To be honest, I thought the date was doomed as soon as you told me you were going for sushi. You hate raw fish.”

“Because I’m not a seagull.”

“Because you’re not a seagull, yeah.” You laughed. “I think of that every time I eat sushi. I’m no better than those damn seagulls.”

“Don’t say that. You’re way better. A seagull would not have done all this for me.” Peter insisted and gestured to the project. You looked over at the solar system you had given too many hours of your life too and smiled as you realized something.

“I had to fix it. I didn’t want you to be stressed.”

“But didn’t this stress you out? Designing this thing gave me gray hair and premature menopause.” Peter replied, making you laugh softly.

“A little.” You admitted. “But I felt better when I remembered why I was doing it.”

“Why were you doing it?”

“Because I’d do anything for you, Peter.” You said simply. You watched his ears turn pink and he turned his head so that you wouldn’t see his smile.

“I’d do anything for you too, you know.” He said in a quiet voice.

“Careful.” You warned him. “You already owe me big time for fixing this unnecessarily detailed solar system. If you tell me you’d do anything for me, you’re really at my mercy.”

“Uh oh. Sounds dangerous.” He laughed softly. You shared another moment of eye contact and smiled softly at each other.

“It’s late. We should probably get to bed.” You suggested.

“You’re right. Thank you again for this.” Peter said and picked up the project. You didn’t know if you were sleep deprived or delirious from working on the project all night but you felt compelled to share every secret you had with Peter.

“Honestly, Peter, I was happy to do this stupid science project because it kept me from thinking about you on your date.” You told him as you got up and rubbed your tired eyes.

“Really? Why didn’t you want to think about that?”

“Because whenever I did think about you on your date, I wanted to throw up.” You admitted. “And then rip out my hair. And then eat my hair and throw it back up. And then kill my self or something.”

“Well,” Peter said slowly, “I see your urge to rip your hair out and raise you the fact that I only said yes to this date because she wears the same perfume as you. And I needed a night off from staring at the ceiling and thinking about what would happen if I just told you how I felt.”

You stopped mid yawn and gave him a confused look. His eyes were darting everywhere except for your eyes and you could see the rosy glow on his cheeks even in the dim light of the kitchen.

“Oh? And how do you feel?” You wondered and crossed your arms. Peter gulped before sitting up straight in his chair.

“I don’t know. Why did me being on a date make you so upset?” He challenged you. You narrowed your eyes at him and he looked nervous but didn’t back down.

“I asked you first.” You shrugged.

“Well I asked you second.” He replied. “And as Aristotle or whoever once said, first is the worst. Second is the best. Third is the one with the hairy chest.”

“Ew, what?” You grimaced. “It’s treasure chest. Third is the one with the treasure chest.”

“That makes no sense. Why would a person in third place, the very last place, be rewarded with a treasure chest? They’re the loser so they get a hairy chest. Now that’s sensical.”

“No it’s not.” You scoffed. “It makes even less sense. If I come in third place, does that mean my chest will grow hair? Or does it mean I will be given a torso with a hairy chest? Or, hear me out, does it imply that my chest is already hairy. And that’s why I came in third.”

“You did what in third?” Peter mumbled.

“Shut up. Can we get back to what we were talking about?”

“You’re right. We should go to sleep.” Peter said and tried to walk past you. You placed a hand on his shoulder to keep him in place and he gulped.

“Hold up.” You told him. “I’m cashing in that favor you owe me right now. We gotta talk. Sit back down.”

“I’m sat.” Peter said quietly and sat back down in his seat. You pulled your chair up to be across from him and sat down as well.

“I’m going to ask you again and I don’t want to hear another single reference to chests or placement.” You prefaced. “How do you feel?”

Peter scratched the back of his head to spare some time because he knew he was caught. He suddenly got a shy smile on his face suddenly and looked over at his project.

“Can I show you something?” He asked you as he pulled the sun off the center of the project.

“Dude.” You sighed. “I just glued that.”

“I know. And I’ll fix it. But look.” He said and turned the sun over. You looked at him in confusion and leaned forward to see what he was talking about. On the bottom of the sun in Peter’s hand writing were your first and last initials.

“My initials? Why? You smiled in surprise and looked up at him.

“Because the solar system revolves around the sun.” He explained. “But my solar system revolves around you.”

You stayed quiet as he put the sun back on the model and took your hand. A look of skepticism stayed on your face as he looked into your eyes.

“I know I do a good job of hiding it. But there is a piece of you in everything I do.” He said. “There always has been. This was just one of my more obvious ones.”

“Wow.” You said after a beat. “I really should’ve looked at the bottom of these.”

“Yeah. You should’ve.” He laughed and leaned in a little.

“Yeah. I should’ve.” You cracked a smile and leaned in as well. You stared into big brown eyes for a second and decided this was the last night you and Peter were just friends.

“Can I ask you one more thing?”

“Is it about the solar system?”

“No.” You rolled your eyes. “Did you kiss her tonight?”

“I don’t know. Ask me that question again one minute from now.” Peter said as he closed the gap between you and kissed you. You wrapped your arms around his neck to pull him closer since you’d been waiting for this for a while. And it was everything you imagined it would be. When the kiss started to heat up, Peter slipped an arm around you and picked you up with ease. He hastily placed you down on the counter and you jumped apart when you heard a crunching sound.

You pulled out of the kiss and looked down to see that Peter had placed you directly on top of the science project that you had just spent hours fixing. You both stared at the scattered pieces in stunned silence for a moment before he gave you a sheepish smile. You didn’t smile back and instead stared daggers at him while trying to explode his head using your mind.

“I can fix it?” He said through a nervous laugh. You held your hands up in defeat and hopped off the counter without a word.

“What? That’s how this night ends? Come on.” Peter whined and followed you as you left the room and continued your silent treatment towards him.

“You’re seriously going to walk away after that? We had something going there. Don’t go now.” He whined some more and trotted after you like a puppy.

“Go get something going with the planets I spent the last four hours glueing back together.” You grumbled and held up your middle finger for him to see as he trailed after you.

“Come on.” He half laughed, half groaned. “You can’t send me to bed after a kiss like that. We need to at least talk about it. Let’s go back and…” Peter trailed off when you passed his bedroom and he caught a glimpse of his clean floor.

“Wait, did you clean my room too?” He asked, knowing he had left it a mess before he left for the date. You froze in your tracks for a moment but decided to keep the upper hand instead of admitting to Peter that you were so down bad that you had in fact cleaned his room.

“I don’t know. I don’t have all the answers, Peter. Goodnight.” You said and slammed your door in his face. He barely had time to react before you opened your door back up and grabbed a fistful of his shirt.

“Get your ass in here, loser.”

“Don’t you mean get your anus in here? Because it sounds like Uranus?” He said with a proud smile. You stared him dead in the eyes and didn’t crack even a hint of smile.

“Do you want to come in here or not?”

“I already unzipped my pants, yeah.” He admitted as he dashed through your bedroom door.

Tag List 🏷️

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[jamespotterismydaddy]

Academic Rivals

michael gavey x reader

summary: a partner project in the library leads to heightened emotions

A/N: a request from my dearest belie boo! hope you enjoy @valeskafics !!

TW: smut!, semi-public sex, degradation, hate-fucking, misogyny, michael is a little perv actually

word count: 1,788 words

You despise Michael Gavey. The smug bastard sits right next to you in history and the two of you constantly compete for top of the class. You’ll be the first one to admit that he’d have you beat in any math class but history is yours. The worst part of it is that your professor encourages the rivalry, insisting that it’s ‘healthy competition’. Which is why you’re currently (very apprehensively) making your way to the library to work on your partnered essay with Michael.

You don’t want to make it easy on him though so you strut in, ten minutes late with an iced coffee in your hand. You’re dressed in a sweater and a very short plaid skirt with black thigh highs that just reach under the hem of it. His eyes glance over you almost too quickly, like he’s trying to avoid your gaze.

“You’re late.” He says while looking at his notes.

“This part of the library wasn’t easy to find.” You look around and there isn’t a single person in your line of sight. “Maybe that’s why it’s so dead in here.”

He scoffs. “Or perhaps you’re late because you stopped to get overpriced coffee on the way. Whatever you’re drinking is more sugar than coffee anyhow.”

“So hateful today.” I tease.

“If you spent more time focusing on punctuality then I wouldn’t need to be.” He says pompously. “Get out your notes. I need your contributions for the analysis of economics during the 18th century.”

“In a moment.” You say as you pull out your compact mirror instead of your notes so you can check your hair. You don’t particularly care how it looks at the moment but you know your primping will piss him off.

“Did you even do your research or were you too focused with your own vanity to get the work done?” He asks in a snarky tone and your eyes dart up to meet his.

“Just because I enjoy putting an effort into looking good doesn’t mean i’m an airhead. Of course I did my research.” You say with a roll of your pretty eyes. Michael thinks you look particularly pretty when you’re angry.

“How should I have known any different? You spend more time worrying about getting attention than your studies. It’s pathetic really. You have so much potential, yet you let your feminine interests dominate you.” He says with a mock look of pity.

“Oh you poor thing. If my ���feminine interests’ seem to dominate my life then why do I have the highest mark in our class? Shouldn’t you have the highest mark if you dedicate all your time to your studies?” You give him a sweet little smile and he is mortified at the way it makes his cock harden.

“History is hardly my top priority when i’m in much more academically challenging classes and I was top of the class last week so it won’t be long before I overtake you again anyhow.” He tries to act nonchalant but you can tell your words got to him.

“It’s probably difficult for you to do as well as you could when you spend most of the class staring at me.” You say and feel a sense of accomplishment when his cheeks turn crimson red.

“I only look at you because you spend all class talking and giving your half-brained takes on the French Revolution.” He retorts but his words are a little clumsy.

“Then why are you blushing?” 

“It’s hot in here.” He says firmly.

“It is a little hot in here.” Your tone is casual but he can sense the mischief in your voice. His eyes widen as you shrug off your sweater to reveal a tight, white camisole underneath and because it isn’t really that warm in the library, your nipples harden under the garment and they poke through the fabric. “Something wrong, Michael?” You ask sweetly, noticing how his eyes are glued to your perky tits.

“No, of course not.” He answers too quickly and you smirk at him.

You stand up and walk over to his side of the table and sit on it right next to him, so your thigh could almost brush his arm. He can now clearly see the lacy hem off your stockings. “You’re so flustered. It’s pathetic.” You say a little cruelly and he stands abruptly, his chair almost tipping back.

“You’re a bitch.” He spits back at you.

“That’s no way to speak to a woman, Gavey. What would your mother think?”

He just glares at you for a moment and you can’t tell if it’s hate or lust burning in his eyes. You realize quickly that it’s the latter when he grips the back of your hair and forces your mouth to his. Michael presses himself against you and you can feel how painfully hard he is in his trousers as he kisses you roughly. You hate to say that you kiss back, enjoying how sloppy and inexperienced he is, although full of emotion.

He parts his mouth from yours but stays slotted between your thighs. He looks almost nervous, like he half expects you to slap him and leave. He’s fucking delighted when you roll your hips gently against his instead. The math nerd has never touched a woman before but he’s more than ready to grasp the opportunity. He slips both his hands right up your top and groans when he feels your soft tits. He massages them and you whine, lifting your shirt for him so he can see exactly what he’s doing.

“Oh, God.” He murmurs as he rolls your nipples between his fingers.

“Have you ever been within two feet of a woman?” You ask him with a cruel little smirk but then you squeak as he pinches your nipple hard. “Ow! Fuck, Michael.” You whine.

“You fucking slut.” He murmurs and you can’t tell if it’s a term of endearment or just plain old misogyny. “Always have some bratty little remark to say.”

Your eyes glaze over a little and you pout at the way he looks at you. You would never think that a virgin could act so dominant.

He looks like he’s fighting some conflict in his mind before he speaks. “Now, you’re going to take your underwear off and bend over the table… then i’m going to fuck you.” He says it like it’s a command but it’s almost as if he’s trying to breathe a dream into reality. When you obey him, his eyes widen and he begins to make quick work on the removal of his belt. He can hardly believe that a woman as hot as you just listened to him, that a woman who seems to despise him with every inch of her being has just bent over a table, waiting to be fucked by him.

He lifts up your skirt, feeling more bricked than he’s ever been as he rubs his hand over your ass. He gives a firm slap to your right cheek just to see how you’d react and he’s pleased when you whimper. Michael runs his fingers through your folds as he finally releases his cock from his pants. He pumps himself as he rubs you, enjoying how wet you are, knowing it means you like it.

“Jesus, Michael, are you gonna stand there all day or are you going to fuck me?” You barely manage to get the question out when he decides to slam himself, balls deep, inside of you. You whine out as you try to get used to how big he is. You really didn’t expect him to be so hung.

All he can do is think to himself, don’t cum, don’t cum, don’t cum. As he tries to block out the sound of your voice so he doesn’t spill himself inside you prematurely.

“Michael…” You whimper out, not even knowing why you’re saying his name.

“Shut the fuck up.” He murmurs before beginning to move himself in and out of you. “Little fucking brat, thinking you’re smarter than me.” He starts to thrust harder. “I’m the smartest person in this entire fucking school.”

His cock is slamming in and out of you at this point and all you can do is let out little moans from how roughly he’s treating you.

“Say it. Say i’m the smartest person in the school.”

“Fuck you, asshole.” You manage to groan out from under him.

He grins. “That’s my job.” Michael may have never had sex before this but he sure as hell knows how the woman’s body works. So, his fingers snake around your front so he can roll your clit between his fingers. You let out a strangled gasp. “Say it. Now.”

“You’re the… smartest… person… in the school.” He punctuates your words with his thrusts as his hips slam against yours, making you stutter at every other word.

“Good girl.” He says smugly.

You give him no warning when you cum and the way your pussy squeezes and convulses around his cock almost makes him fall to his knees and pray to God in thanks. He cums instantly after you, not having the self control to hold it back anymore and not having the will to pull out as he spills deep inside of you.

He now fully contextualizes the fact that, no matter if it’s a deserted section, the two of you are still in the library. He pulls himself out quickly and you whine at the abruptness of it all as he swiftly begins to clothe himself.

“Get dressed!” He urges but you can hardly do more than lie there after being fucked so hard.

You move slowly as you pull up your panties and fix your skirt and top, your thigh-highs looking rumpled.

“We’re going to be expelled!” He panics as he kneels down to straighten up your thigh-highs for you.

“Nobody saw and there’s no cameras in here.” You say as you manage to pull yourself together enough to roll your eyes.

“T-This is your fault!” He exclaims.

Post-nut spiralling i guess.

“My fault?” You raise an eyebrow.

“Yes, it's your fault! You seduced me!” He gets his things together, his face one shade off of a tomato.

“Then it won’t happen again.” You say simply. His face drops.

“Whatever.” He seems to have calmed down a bit, slightly irritated by your words.

You sigh and decide that it’s best to leave while you’re ahead.

“Goodbye, Michael.” You say in a sing-songy tone as you strut away, now leaving him as the dazed one.

“B-But we didn’t start the essay!” Is all he can get out before you turn around the corner and out of his sight.

taglist (comment to be added): General: @valeskafics @urmomsgirlfriend1 @girlwith-thepearlearring @darylandbethfanforever9 @lovellies @juhdoche @papichulo120627 7 @watercolorskyy @ophelialaufey

sorry if y'all only wanted to be on my hotd taglist i forget

[caitchercatlady]

Sleeping Over at Ramshackle w/Rook

Having Rook to use you as his inspiration for a class project seems to be the most dubious thing you've ever heard of. Now that you think of it, anything Rook asks of you seems dubious enough. As weird as the request and excuse are, it is the most in character for Rook, and you can’t think of any reason to say, “No.” It’s only for one evening after all.

That doesn’t mean you have to like it. You expect Rook to be walking around with a small notepad, taking notes of your evening routine. Instead, Rook is attached to you like a puppy brought into his forever home. Your suspicions have shown themselves in the brightest light.

He’s watched you have the dinner that you manage to split between the two of you. He’s watched you clean the dishes by hand (complimenting your hands in the process). It’s when you go upstairs to prep for your shower when you point out the habit within his assignment progress.

“ ‘Tis a photographic memory thing, dear Trickster. I shall put it all together once we depart for bed.”

“If you say so,” you reply. “Just one question. You have no intentions of watching me shower and dress myself, do you?”

“Mes Sept, non! I already have those as the entracte of the assignment.”

“I’ll take your word for it, Rook, but don’t abuse it.”

“You have my word, Trickster.”

Much to Rook’s credit, he keeps it. What you don’t expect is for him to prepare his own guest room instead of you. You feel bad having him do the work. Although his pajamas give you the first smile of the night.

“Non, non, non. My homework is to see your usual routine. Unless you have these overnight rendezvous with friends everyday…”

Rook’s got a point there. You thank him anyway.

The assignment continues as you do your hair brushing and face washing next. Then, you spend a good half hour finishing your homework for class on Monday. All of this is normal enough for Rook not to ask questions.

He starts talking more than the usual when you set your bedroom for sleep. Rook doesn’t ask about your bed, your uniform, your school supplies, nor how you set up your vanity, but rather…

“This light fixture you possess has wondrous design.”

“Thanks. Found it in the attic.”

“It appears it’s used for night purposes?”

“Yeah, so?”

My curiosity is wondering why.”

“Is that gonna be important for your paper?”

“It will add an intéressant detail to the assignment, most certainly.”

“Then, it’s none of your business.”

Rook is taken aback by your harsh statement. He fails to understand what the issue is.

You try to turn on your night light, but it fails to flicker. “Light bulb is busted,” you frustratedly mutter. “I gotta search the broom closet,” you tell Rook as you pardon yourself.

On your way down the stairs, you turn on every light in the path to the downstairs closet. You fetch a new bulb from the closet’s middle shelf. On your way back up, you make sure to shut off each light behind you as you return to your room. Once  you replace the bulb, the problem is solved.

“You’re scared of the dark.” Rook’s statement is not a question.

“I beg your pardon?” you ask.

“You are afraid of the darkness.”

“I’m not six.”

“I didn’t say that. I felt your trembling vibrations when you left. Everyone has a tremble for something. Darkness is yours.”

You throw your hands. “Fine, you got me, but I don’t want you publishing that.”

“I wouldn’t dare to dream of putting you in such a predicament. You have my word.”

Full of shame, you go to bed and hide under the covers.

“Trickster, if you will allow me to ask, is there anything you want me to do?”

You peek out, eyes glistening. “What I want is to be less pathetic.”

Rook cups his mouth. “Mes Sept, you are none of the sort. You are human, as most of us are. Fear is not something to be ashamed of. It can be assisted, of course.”

“Hence this light.” You put at the small lamp. “I hate looking at it sometimes, but if I don’t use it, I can’t sleep.”

“I have une idée to fix that.”

You wonder how. Rook has you turn off the night light first. It’s only dark for a split second when a tiny spark of light magic emulates from Rook’s finger. He explains to you that he will have the light hanging int he room as the two of you fall asleep. Then, when you are in deep sleep, the light will dissipate by morning. You suppose you could give it a try. What exactly do you have to lose?

As said before, Rook leaves the small ball of light in the air. You watch it flat there, a soft delight embracing you. Rook takes to your side as you slowly but sure drift off to dreamland.

How beautiful indeed.

[mythicamagic]

Sukuna's Roommate (Sukuna x Reader) Chapter Eight

Summary: The rent is cheap, that's the only reason you're moving into apartment 167 on such short notice. The rent is cheap, you remind yourself again, staring up at the four-armed monster you would be living with. (Female reader x Sukuna)

Warnings: some dubcon moments and general Sukuna stuff i.e: murder. Warning for this chapter: Smut elements

Previous Chapters: One, Two, Three and others can be found on Ao3

--------

What could you say- what could anyone say when gazing at a physical form so unique it failed to compare to anything you’d ever seen? Oh I’d witnessed Sukuna stroll around barely clothed before in the apartment, whistling absentmindedly and reading through a book- but never had I gazed with such unrestricted access to his body. I stood and stared, taking it all in.

On some level, I understood that he was letting me. 

Water droplets rolled down from his hair, travelling with such soft, slow descent down his throat and built chest- one could be envious of their prolonged, intimate contact. The bold tattoos only accentuated his image despite rolling steam lapping at his torso. I had to wonder again if the marks were something he’d gained for ritualistic purposes or a pure vanity project because the latter served him well. My eyes travelled downwards. Those gracing his abdomen and the black tattooed rings circulating his toned thighs were especially nice. Perfect for sitting on, really. 

However, the…creative decision to have those same double rings tattooed on the shaft of his cocks was a…choice. 

It's almost like a gauge stick or something, my mind helpfully whispered. You are thiiiis full of him-

I choked on my own saliva, causing Sukuna to arch a brow.

Shaking my head and blinking rapidly as my eyes began to burn, I could only conclude- in my very sensible and not distracted brain- that Sukuna was, most definitely, one kinky motherfucker. 

He flashed me a lazy grin as if to confirm the thought. His lower hands came to perch on meaty hips, freehands spreading wide. “Well? Have you had your fill of gawking? I think it's about time you stripped too. Give me something to look at while we’re at it.”

“A-at what?” I tried thinly, returning from my vacation to Hornyland to focus on the here and now. “I- no, first of all, where are we? Why did you drop me here- and would you please sit down already or cover up?!” my hand shot out to cover the image of the two dicks. It didn’t work. I could still see them. I’d likely always see them, forever. 

“It's a bit late to be acting shy when you just devoured me with your eyes, woman,” Sukuna’s voice held a note of exasperation. “You said you wanted a spar. This is as good as.”

“A hot spring carved out of- is that a giant spine above us?! Oh god, are we inside one of your dead enemies or something? That explains the water colour,” I gawked at the structure of bones looming far above, looking reminiscent of a ribcage. “Anyway- none of this is what I’d call a spar!”

Sloshing water caught my attention. Like some kind of leftover prey instinct, I shifted backwards on impulse, plastering myself against the side of the pool as a large shadow swallowed me whole. Sukuna was even worse up close.

His usual malevolent energy and deceptively easy-going smile felt amplified, to the point he was fixated and intent. Intent on what, I didn’t want to entertain the idea of. He was so…big. Overbearing in both size and presence.

My stomach jumped at the first twitch of his fingers, as if wanting to reach for me- and I twisted, grabbing hold of the pool’s rim to haul myself up desperately from the water and collapse onto the side above. Before I could make more than a single pathetic flail away in escape, a weight settled on my back. 

Sukuna’s large palm pressed down between my shoulder blades, and as I wheezed like an accordion, I realized that was what he wanted. An amused noise rang out from above in response as my lungs compressed. 

His fingers dragged against the shirt plastering to my flushed skin- before flipping me over, causing my head to thunk on the black-stone floor. That weight returned, this time pressing heavy on my sternum and pinning me in place. 

Harsh, quickened panting filled the air. My breaths were coming fast and heavy. I didn’t understand why. He hadn't even done anything yet. Hadn’t spoken about any plans to kill or fuck. 

But it was there, in his eyes. A nonchalant curiosity. A caprice that he could commit either.

“Lift up your skirt,” he commanded in a calm, reverberating tone. 

My mouth went dry. Despite myself, heat shot down to my core, inspiring my thighs to lock tight together. If I wasn’t dripping earlier at the mere sight of him, there could be little doubt now. 

“S-sukuna,” I shuddered, gripping his hand on my chest. I could feel my lungs- uncomfortably struggling. His weight sank lower, heavier- and I wheezed breathlessly again. An unspoken reminder. 

He could do anything he wanted. 

I could be a crushed pile of meat and bones in two seconds flat. No better than the other skulls I’d glimpsed littered around the area. The concept of being so helpless shouldn't have made arousal spike in my abdomen. My legs shifted, inner thighs feeling suspiciously heated and wet. 

Sukuna’s pupils remained fixated, the red of his eyes glowing fiercely as my shaking fingers abandoned the hold on his hand to travel downwards. I held his gaze the entire time. There was no other word for it but spellbound. A brief battle between shame and intrigue took place inside me. My fingers curled in the soaked fabric of my skirts as intrigue won out- and slowly, I began dragging the material upwards to bunch at my waist-

“BWA- HA- HA- HA!”

I started badly. Obnoxious laughter echoed through the dark space, ringing straight into my bones. It eventually shifted, dying down into merry chuckles as Sukuna shook his head, mirth shining in all four of his eyes. “Ahhh you take everything so seriously. A truly earnest pet.”

I gaped, and could only lay there frozen. The look he shot me was nothing short of sadistic. “What? Did you think it would be that easy?”

“Excuse me?!”

He chuckled with mock dismay, lifting himself off me. “I know you’ve pleasured yourself to the thought of me, woman. I know how frustrated you’ve been- and how that encounter with your ex-owner probably wound you so tight you’re bursting at the seams for some relief. I know, so you don’t need to say it. But…passively lying there…” he tilted his head with a kind of mercurial smile- as if his mood could change suddenly and his words weren't said with feeling. It dawned on me (with a twinge of humiliation) that it was all passive amusement. “Seeing you like this isn't enough to whet my appetite,” he lifted a shoulder, confirming my suspicions. Something in my expression must’ve exposed me, because Sukuna gave a patronizing smile, leaning in close. “If you want me-” his lips were suddenly pressed against my ear, crooning in a low yet harsh whisper: “If you want me to fuck you like I mean it, try a little harder. Don't tell me you're giving up already~ you'll break my little heart.”

Of all the arrogant bastards. Fire rocketed through my veins, fueled by my shame and anger.

"I hate you," I managed to grit out, wanting to hide under a rock. Only he would frighten, arouse and then reject a girl all in the spade of a few minutes. 

It probably stung all the more that for all my big talk and avoidance, I'd been prepared to give in so easily a moment ago.

Sukuna just straightened and rolled his shoulders, both arms stretching themselves like he was preparing for a workout. 

“Anyway, I did promise you a spar. C’mon.”

“W-what the hell are you-?!”

He grabbed me without another word. I was suddenly acquainted with his back, hovering quite close to his sculpted ass as Sukuna strode into a smaller pool with my limp body thrown over one shoulder. He had a very cute butt. Knowledge I did not need to know.

"Again, I ask, and stress- what the hell?" I droned.

A hand pet my thigh. “Bath time. Don’t you know your onsen etiquette? You’re supposed to wash off before entering the hot springs.”

The world spun as Sukuna swung me up again like a ragdoll, and I found myself plunged into cool water. It took a moment to register the firm press of thighs cushioning my legs- a warm slab of body heat leaning against my back. 

I was sitting directly on his naked lap. Sukuna didn’t miss a beat, pouring a jugful of water over my head to rinse off the day’s events, massaging his fingers into my scalp.

“Good. Good pet," he crooned in my ear.

I stared uncomprehendingly ahead of myself. I could probably live a thousand years and never understand Sukuna’s whims. 

I sucked in a hard breath as his fingers cruelly worked their magic. Despite myself, I felt some tension abate. “All of this is so surreal,” I murmured. A damn understatement. 

“For a brat like you, sure.”

“You talk like that a lot,” I mused, swatting his hands away when they attempted to peel my blouse off. “Like you're ancient or something. Everything going on is so far from what I know about the world. Your buddies were like that too.”

“I thought I told you those cretins weren't my friends.”

I twisted on his lap to glimpse his narrow eyes. The sting of rejection had abated slightly now that I’d surfaced from that need he’d briefly instilled only to cruelly douse. I bit my lip, considering how to best phrase what I wanted to know.

Sukuna bounced his leg like a bucking horse, making me almost topple off his thigh. “Spit it out if you’ve got something on your mind. I’m in a chatty mood, lucky for you.”

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes, steadying myself on his bicep. “Well I just…wanted some context.”

“Oh?”

“I don’t know anything about you or the world you live in. If we’re going to keep being roommates, I think I’m owed some answers. You mess around with me so much I feel like I'll go crazy soon if I'm not given something to work with.”

“Heh, for a woman you sure do own a set of balls sometimes," Sukuna dumped another helping of cool water over my head. I sputtered as my hair swamped my face as a result. "You bounced back from my teasing pretty quickly too. Guess that means I'm becoming predictable."

I felt more than saw Sukuna pick me up again under my thighs, one hand cradling my ass and giving liberal squeezes to it. He stepped down the rocks back into the hot spring, settling into the water with me. The shock of warmth made me softly gasp.

"Let's see…the short answer is that I was around a long time ago. I made quite a name for myself, some might say," he smirked, but as I listened I could tell he was skipping large amounts of information. "Let's hazard a guess and estimate that it was the Heian Era of Japan when I was finally brought down by Jujutsu Sorcerers. My spirit was too strong to be banished even in death, tied to this mortal coil by my remains. 20 of my fingers," he mused, one of his free hands picking up a saké bottle out of the rocks lining the side of the pool. "They were all sealed away. Until that is- a few years ago one brat brought me hurtling back. I incarnated into his body the moment he swallowed one of my fingers." 

I stared. "I have so many questions. Mostly about context."

"I'm not about to give it," Sukuna shrugged, pouring himself a drink and taking a languid sip. "Anyway, I eventually got free of the brat." 

"Oh…you separated from his body?"

"Heh, I killed him,” Sukuna drawled, smiling with nostalgia over the rim of his cup. "Ripped my second pair of arms right out of his back and kept going until his old flesh was replaced by my new one. All that remained of the boy was the discarded ribbons of skin and muscle at my feet. Snakeskin, I guess you could call it, nothing more than a shedding process."

He seemed to pick up on the elongated silence. My lips were thin, eyes narrow. 

"You're disgusted,” Sukuna astutely observed. 

"Believe me, it's a common emotion around you."

He chuckled richly, lifting his cup in a mock toast. "Flattery will get you nowhere."

"You said you were a big deal but- what exactly did you do to piss off the- uh, Jujutsu Sorcerers, was it?" I had no clue what those even were, but for some reason, the hand sign Sukuna had made earlier came to mind. Sorcerers. So did they use magic?

Sukuna leaned his head back on the heated rocks, groping my ass absentmindedly with little squeezes reminiscent of a cat making biscuits. "I drank, fought, fucked and ate to excess. I raised villages to the ground and made love to war, and took delight in fighting only the strongest of opponents. It was truly a great era of fun and calamity."

"But…y-you're not levelling cities anymore th-" I cut myself off, remembering something. How Shibuya was nothing more than rubble now. Sukuna seemed to read the direction of my horrified thoughts. He tilted his chin down to catch my eyes with all four of his. His lips twitched, expression showing a complete lack of remorse. "That was just a little something I did to torment the brat. If your cities are still standing today, it's only due to my own disinterest in breaking them yet."

"Where are the Sorcerers now? Surely they- they know you're around, right?"

"I killed several of their strongest members when I shed my former vessel," Sukuna shrugged, gaze sliding away. "Unfortunately, in one last pissy act, one of them sealed the majority of my power. I won't reclaim everything I once was for another hundred years or so. Pity you won't be alive to see it, pet." 

So that was it. He was biding his time. Waiting until he could enjoy himself to the fullest degree. I wagered, based on his personality and supposed love of fighting- that he was waiting for the Sorcerers to rebuild and challenge him again. That was why he hadn't completely eradicated their forces.

He toyed with everyone as he pleased. He set things into motion on purpose just to watch people struggle and fall. It was the height of enjoyment and entertainment in his eyes.

I'd spent time with rude, selfish men before. Cruel, men. None of them measured up to Sukuna.

Truly, this man was a monster. 

"You're…I…" I tried to say something. Anything. A rude, disparaging comment. A curse. I found that I couldn't- as if a veil had been lifted and I was suddenly hyper-aware of the oppressive force of energy he held at bay. A deep, dark lake of malevolence. 

Sukuna’s lips curved into a smile that slowly widened, his eyes crinkling as sharp teeth exposed. His shoulders shook like he was stifling a laugh. 

"You're a- a brute…" I croaked.

He set down his alcohol with an air of finality. "Is that all you could come up with? Poor pet. Did I turn your brains to soup? That's no good. I still haven't extracted enough entertainment out of you yet."

He gave a weary sigh, shifting as though he intended to get up. "Tch, it was a short bath but if you're going to demand bedtime stories and then bitch about the endings then I'll seek satisfaction elsewhere. Lousy little-"

My heart stuttered. "Wait."

I leaned back on his hips, a kind of surreal clarity settling over my shoulders. Purpose, I realised. I had a purpose now. Something I could do. It wasn't noble or good or something like that but if it meant curbing Sukunas appetite and attention to me, and sparing someone else, there was value in that. 

If I could pull it off.

My fingers shook a little as I pulled my damp blouse off. This seemed to catch his vague interest. I quickly continued to undress until I'd kicked off my skirt and was left in bra and panties. I made sure to hold his gaze then- and reached behind myself to unhook the clasp, grinding my lower half slowly against his cock and inching higher- pressing my clothed sex to his stomach mouth. The hard line beneath me twitched and curved into a smile.

Sukuna watched patiently, observing my newly freed breasts with a kind of lazy acknowledgement. A purring tiger. He caught my eye as his hand on my ass dragged- claws skimming- cutting in, and I felt exposed and cold for a moment- like a piece of meat on display. I pushed past the feeling, sober to the sensation of my blood rising in small welts on my ass. I leaned up, and cupped his cheek, feeling a jolt of heat where our skin made contact. Our chests pressed flush together. I'd never been so willingly close to his face before.

It was handsome but marked with cruelty. Not an inch of softness to be found.

"Don't go. Please…" I spoke lowly, and- hopefully enticingly. "I'll entertain you."

Red eyes narrowed. He lurched in my hold- barking a sudden laugh and startling me. "Ha! Ahahaha- I was wondering what you'd do…but I didn't expect this. You think you can save lives by distracting the hungry dragon for a little while, huh? Didn't think you were so noble, pet."

Neither did I. What the hell was I doing?

His own, larger hand cupped my cheek, but a hot wet sensation flicked out. I jolted as it licked down to my chin in a crude mockery of my gentle touch. His tattooed tongue retreated back into his palm, grinning at me like his stomach. "If you really believe you can keep me here and sated then go ahead and try. Heh, this could be fun."

I narrowed my eyes in turn. He could talk big, but as I figured: he was a guy. Albeit a more sadistic, murderous one- but a guy nonetheless. Nowhere in his story had he stated he’d been born an otherworldly being, so he’d once been as human as anyone. All it would take was finding a few of his tells and preferences.

I boldly grasped his thick wrist in a hard grip, pulling it closer. He wasn’t a normal guy though- and that meant getting creative if I wanted to keep his attention.

I engaged a part of my mind I’d shut away- the party girl who would dance on tables and have sex in dirty bathrooms with strangers. Shame bloomed, painting my cheeks red before my tongue slipped out and I took two of his fingers into the hot cavern of my mouth. This was the easy part, of course. A fairly standard move as I licked and sucked at the digits, before pursuing what I was really after and abandoning them to chase the tattooed tongue lulling out of Sukuna’s palm, twining mine with it and sucking. 

Sukuna’s thighs tensed beneath my free hand, and I began grinding again, working on getting him hard with the first caress of his shaft. There were two cocks to choose from, but I picked at random, stroking it with firm strokes and teases of my fingers. He felt hot and heavy against my hand, a nice vein running along the side of one to his twitching head.

The mouth inside his palm engaged me eagerly, pushing past my lips and perhaps intending to make me gag with the full force of intrusion. I eased away a little and licked and kissed at his teeth within, allowing myself to draw back only once I was panting. I then guided his saliva-dripping palm down my chest, arching into his palm and mewling as its tongue and teeth closed down, sucking. Pleasure shot blisteringly hot and fast down my spine. A hard breath sucked between my teeth.

It took real effort to keep eye contact with Sukuna, who watched my efforts with that same serene smile. 

"I see you've learned a few moves,” he acknowledged evenly. “Did the boys you fucked before cum at the slightest touch?"

The image of my reflection in a groggy mirror came to mind, hugging my naked torso as I sat used and discarded on a bed. "Something like that."

"And I bet they left you oh so dry and aching in return…" he purred with a chuckle, wrapping a freehand around the back of my neck. “Never did understand why villages would offer me virgin sacrifices to spare their lives. They broke so easily. Whores were always much more preferable.”

Hot breath suddenly huffed out from between my legs. I felt the foundation beneath me shift as Sukuna’s stomach mouth finally opened. His large tongue snaked out to probe, wrapping teasingly around my thighs in slow languid strokes, as if tasting me. 

My cunt clenched hard in response, and I didn’t have to act this next part. Sukuna adjusted his grip on my neck to keep eye contact with me- the teeth at my breast scraping in a harsh nip that made my blood sing. “You’ve been starving for this in particular, haven't you? Go ahead and eat then.”

His offer was as benevolent as a God to his devoted follower. I lost strength in my thighs and pushed down, nudging my clothed sex needily against his wet, muscular organ that rose up just as eagerly to meet me. 

Thank fuck-

His stomach mouth enclosed the entirety of my lower half inside, my thighs straining as I sought to keep straddling him- but a broken noise escaped my mouth. That noise rose high into a yowling, pleasured keen. 

“A-Aaa-aah!”

The tongue had pried straight against my clit- nudging teasingly- until the entirety of his mouth pressed in harder with one deep suck.  I didn't even have time to worry about his teeth crowning my sex. He could quite literally bite me in half. I was submerged in the wet cavern of that death trap and happy to be there as Sukuna's stomach sucked again and again, the pressure more intense than any oral I'd ever experienced before.

My hips moved entirely on their own. They ground and bucked desperately, seeking friction while my core ached to be filled. Fuck. 

The mouth at my breast wasn’t to be ignored- and it clamped down with a harsh bite just as his stomach mouth undulated with the force of another suck, large teeth soon scraping at my panties and catching in the material, pulling until a sizable seam ripped through. The shock of it ripped an orgasm straight through me. 

"A-ah!- gn- hah!"

It was when his stomach tongue pried at my entrance that I realised my folly. My hand had grown slack and lazy against his tattooed cock. How could I ever hope to concentrate and outmatch Sukuna when he had more tools at his disposal than I could ever hope to wield?

For his part, Sukuna watched me with the air of a majestic king from on high. He smiled mercifully, as if generously forgiving me for forgetting him and seeking my own pleasure. It was what he’d encouraged me to do, after all. 

He brought yet another meaty hand to my ass- giving it a sharp smack. I yelped, gasping on a pant as the tongue occupied between my thighs pushed a little more insistently, seeking to slip inside as it lapped at my entrance again and again. “You get it now?” Sukuna cooed. “Give up any noble ambitions about distracting me and chase what feels good.”

I grit my teeth, eyes squeezing shut as his stomach tongue finally pushed in- the slick tip worming its way into my entrance. At the last moment, I lurched. Sukuna’s eyes widened as I broke free from his grip, freefalling for all of two seconds to wrap my arms around his neck. Before he could utter one word- I shoved my mouth over his own. His true, cruel lips felt surprisingly soft compared with the ones on his palm and stomach. It made me feel a little cruel myself to bite down on his bottom lip but it was necessary. 

My eyes slide open to look directly into his. 

You will pay attention to me, damn you.

Sukuna’s mouth shifted against my own, paralysed with surprise. He recovered soon enough. My cheeks were then claimed in his grip. His tongue and teeth sought me with a vengeance. My lashes fluttered shut as all my concentration was poured into those hard, punishing kisses. His teeth bit at my lips so hard and insistent I was sure to bruise. Blunt nails bit harsh crescent moons into his nape in return- and I felt him shudder in delight. The kisses shifted a little, easing up from the pain into surprisingly skillful brushes of his tongue against mine, stroking the roof of my mouth and exploring.

I found myself oddly leaning after his lips as he stopped.

“That was- hah- interesting," Sukuna panted, pulling away slightly with a new type of grin. Awakened, lively. The red in his eyes shined brighter than ever, like bloodied rubies.

His clawed hand shifted to grab my chin, and he studied my face with more enthusiasm than before.

“Heheh, okay- I feel warmed up now!" He said with gusto, bouncing me on his stomach. As a result- his frozen stomach tongue thrust deeper, burying itself inside my cunt to the brim. It wrung out a desperate yelp as it began exploring with a vengeance. His image blurred as tears welled up in my eyes, overstimulated to the max as I felt my insides turn to mush, that tongue rubbing against every inner wall so deliciously it should've been illegal. I'd never felt so stuffed full yet stimulated at the same time.

Sukuna's hand almost felt gentle as it petted my hair. "Keep going," he encouraged. "More...give me more of your best, woman. I won't settle for anything less.”

[hcfiles]

The PR that went very wrong because of promiscuity, vanity, hypocrisy and lack of discernment.

PRs: They are planned to influence and direct people's interests, and to sell a product. What was the product they tried to sell, this time, rather than his manhood? How does a promiscuous help his career? Putting a promiscuous and a conservative Brit together could be good to what other business? Let's not forget she works (or at least worked) for Legendary.

They tried to sell an unknown h**ker and insignificant promiscuous as a V.I.P. of a production company. That's Hollywood, it usually transforms nobodies in celebs at a glance. First, as VP and/or Exec Producer of Legendary (for whom she might still work) and later, an Exec Producer of Vertigo, ALLEGEDLY involved in a project he SUPPOSEDLY would produce.

But, the FAKE NEWS she was working for Vertigo, could have two reasons:

a) Legendary wanted to protect its name and to stay away from such an unscrupulous circus. So, the fake news was to deviate attention from Legendary to Vertigo, who accepted being part of this shitty plot to promote the company. It wouldn't surprise me, taking in consideration who the owner of the company is.

b) Or, they needed to try to save her rep to avoid staining his, by linking her name to a project he was SUPPOSEDLY related to. But, is he really going to produce WH? Or, the news was also fake, first, to sell him as a mature celeb (a joke) and also, to try to make her name relevant in the industry and save her ass?

All she gained with this shitty and unscrupulous circus was to be promoted as the most popular redneck, tacky old and tired sl*t (she's at least 43 years old) of Hollywood, exposed to public execration, while gaining a blue check mark on her IG. What for? Who is her sponsor and what did they intend to have her promoting? APPARENTLY, she started posting some Netflix movies and series as a desperate attempt to call attention and be relevant somehow.

But, she wasn't successful as an influencer. So, I doubt she was supposed to promote Netflix's broadcast programming. She also tried promoting other streaming broadcast programming. So, apparently, she was only lost, trying to become relevant in the industry, screaming for attention. If all this crap was really to promote her as a producer or an actress we would have seen her giving interviews in talk shows and in some REAL project production.

APPARENTLY, this PR was only to boost his manhood followed by an idiotic, childish, unprofessional, immoral and unscrupulous prank as a result of wounded pride, stubbornness, stupidity, lack of emotional intelligence and discernment from Henry Cavill for the severe criticism he suffered.

Her IG still has the blue check mark. So, if not to boost her fake man, what the f**k is this woman's professional activity, rather than being on her knees? Whatever! After almost four years of pure shame and public execration, I'm sure the old sl*t must be tired of this shit, for she sees she screwed her chance up. At least, with the latest celeb she chose to escort her.

But, based on how unprofessional and pathetic this circus was, it wouldn't surprise me if it all had been planned by both, without a professional team behind it, to introduce his wife to his fandom. Yes, it's possible the dude got married to his harlot a long time ago and that they planned this shit show so he would introduce her to the fandom. Despite all the signs it's a PR.

People are saying they don't show the baby to protect IT. After exposing an apparent pregnant woman to public execration until the last birth minute? I doubt it. It's most likely the REAL baby is not seen, for there is no baby. If there is, he's not the father, just a dude playing the part of a clown.

[wrathfulrook]

WIP Wednesday

Tagged by @socially-awkward-skeleton and @direwombat. Ty!!!

Tagging @trench-rot @adelaidedrubman @strangefable @vampireninjabunnies-blog @strafethesesinners @deputyash @josephseedismyfather @v0idbuggy @voidika @schoute @shallow-gravy @afarcryfrommymain @inafieldofdaisies @direwombat @jacobsneed @stacispratt @purplehairsecretlair @derelictheretic and anyone else with something to share! I love seeing everybody’s wips!

A bit of Wrathling I wrote yesterday:

Patience stared, mouth slightly parted in surprise as John moved fluidly and comfortably through his large walk-in closet, pointing out what was hers.

He’d procured for her a full new wardrobe. An assortment of jeans and shorts in her size. A number of tank tops, t-shirts, button-ups, and jackets. A few dresses in various colors and styles. Shoes, socks, even underwear. She blushed in embarrassment at the thought of him buying bras and panties for her.

“I based the sizes off of the clothes you had on you before your confession. If anything isn’t right, let me know and I can get you something else. And let me know if there’s anything specific you want.” His voice turned suddenly serious, and he leveled his gaze to meet hers before adding, “These things are yours, Patience. They belong to you, and no one will take them or get rid of them without your say-so, okay?”

She nodded and clenched her jaw in an effort to control her expression. She didn’t trust herself to speak. She wouldn’t tear up over a gift from John fucking Seed. Especially when she knew it was a blatant manipulation based on the mini-breakdown she’d suffered downstairs. She had to give credit where it was due: he clearly had these things waiting for her, but masterfully twisted their reveal to prey on the vulnerability she’d been unable to hide just minutes ago.

She swallowed heavily and finally managed a “thank you.”

His face lit up and he gave her a beaming grin. “You’re welcome. Come,” he said, taking her hand and leading her out of the closet and into the en-suite bathroom.

Her eyes nearly bugged out of her head at the size of the room. A huge standing shower with a rainfall shower head and room enough for three or more people to stand comfortably stood beside the door. Against the far wall was a jet tub bigger than any she’d seen in a person’s home before. The vanity had double sinks and dark marble countertops.

None of that was what he wanted to show her, though, as he let her go and walked to the vanity, pulling out drawers and opening cabinets under the far sink. He pulled out the items within to show her each: a wood-handled boar-bristle hairbrush, a large rectangular plastic hairbrush, a new package each of hair ties and blonde-toned bobby pins, pads, tampons, face wash, face cream, scented body lotion, and on, and on.

“I don’t know what you use,” he told her, placing the items back in their respective spots. “Let me know if there’s any specific brands or products you need and I can get them for you. If there’s anything here you don’t want or need we can gift it to someone else in the Project. The same goes here as with the closet. This is yours and you can rearrange or dispose of whatever you want. No one else will mess with it.” The stupid smile stuck on his dumb, bearded face.

Patience nodded, face flushing red in a mixture of emotional overwhelm and pure anger. She was grateful to finally have things that belonged to her, things that she needed, and that pissed her off beyond measure. How pathetic had she become that she was grateful to the man holding her against her will for anything?

She knew John was the face of the cult. She knew he was their main recruiter. She knew she had shared some of her most intimate secrets with him under duress, and she couldn’t even remember everything she’d said. He was trying to manipulate her into handing over her trust and control and he was good at it.

A single tear fell down her face, and Patience couldn’t even be sure if it was an angry tear or not. She hastily wiped it away and thanked him again anyway. The smile on his face, the sparkle in his eyes, didn’t fade for an instant.

John excused himself and left her to shower after showing her where the towels were and teaching her how to work the controls. The shower was as luxurious as it looked and so she let silent, angry sobs wrack her body as the warm water flowed over her. She went through the motions on autopilot. Washing. Drying. Moisturizing, brushing, braiding, dressing…

And when Patience looked in the mirror, she actually recognized herself for the first time in too long. Hair braided down her back, black studs in her ears, choker around her neck. Grey tank top under an open olive button down. Dark skinny jeans tucked into black boots. Grey eyes, pale skin, tan freckles.

She looked like herself. But more than that, she felt like herself. For the first time in months, she felt like more than The Deputy. She felt like Patience Joy Ekner.

At home in her own skin, in John Seed’s bathroom.

She picked up the large glass bottle of fancy French lotion she’d just rubbed into her skin and whipped it, hard, against the wall above the tub. She didn’t even watch it collide with the stone tile. She heard the shatter and met her own gaze in sprawling mirror. She opened her mouth and screamed. Loud and long, until her face was red and her breath was gone.

~ ~ ~

John did not even look up from his book when he heard the sound of breaking glass followed by a piercing, wrathful scream. He simply smiled.

[titleknown]

KAIJUNE NEO: MR BRIGHTSIDE

First of all, I want to tell you, this was not at all my fault. If they'd have listened, if they'd have gone along with the fucking plan, none of this would have happened.

The stupid thing wasn't even alive when they brought it to me. But, even I will humbly admit, it was ingredients of high quality. Primeval flesh frozen by time and strange vapors, the tools of the United States government, the very eitir of the earth...

...Yes, I refuse to call it liquid God. Beyond the apellation of false notions of divinity, it isn't just one thing, there are nuances I would be willing to explain if I believed you had the capacity to understand it. But I digress.

Now, there were initial setbacks. There were the few interlopers, who suggested that I was ethically unfit for this project, that the resource expendatures could be better-used to prevent the beasts out there culling the expendable hordes, that the whole idea of the creation of one of these creatures was deranged vanity project. 

Luckily, the people providing the resources were of like minds, even if their sights was far too low. Leave it to the US military to avoid pretensions of compassion when they see a work to be compleated.

It was going well, at first. Why, I hadn't had this much of a fruitful field since my time with the Blue Rose! They let me be, they didn't say no, and I hadn't had this much access to subjects since... well. The Blue Rose.

I will tell you, it's far easier to test the processes of life and power when they know enough to let you use a few expendables, unlike some idiots.

And then one of these puritanical SHITHEADS had to break in for one of my subjects. I don't even know what the fuss was about, I'd already used up the one he was looking for. And the idiots didn't even shoot him! Just now you get cold feet?! Just now?!

And now it is awake. And ungrateful. What's wrong you giant oaf, I thought you were a god-being, lashing out like a child over a little pain is pathetic!

At least the combative capabilities were functional, as evidenced by the plasma "fires" they still failed to put out. A small blessing, amongst the carnival of incompetence as my handlers failed to handle it.

They use the pretense to call me a creature of hubris, a terminal miles glorosius. They underestimate my skill. 

They even had the gall to call me a Faustian figure, how fucking dare! I would never make a deal with anything I couldn't cut the throat of and sip the juices from their neck.

And I will regain control over this creature, and I will enact my special plan for this world. For who is greater, God or the chymist who built God in a bottle...

-The notes of professor Thomas F. Johnson

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

...So, when starting this I knew I was going to have to have some variety of dinosaur here. Lucjkily I found this cheapo toy at the Swap Meet and, as you can see, heavily modified it. This one out of all of them was one of my favorite models in terms of how it came out, I will say.

I basically picked the name of the poor tormented thing because I just thought Mr Brightside by The Killers sounded like a neat name for a kaiju, also the neon-on-black color scheme was probably a part of it.

If you're wondering why the profoundly evil professor (Who was heavily influenced by Dr Pretorius from Bride of Frankenstein and Jeffrey Combs' Herbert West, for the record) has my name, they're actually a pre-existing character from my Creepypasta Creatures of the Woods, who I made the choice to give my own name despite him being hilariously far from me. 

Again, like Devlin, this is this universe's version of the guy, not the exact same guy... maybe. It's always hard to tell with that jerk...

Ability Notes: One word: Plasma. Of all kinds and horrors, usually sort of a weird electrical fire-y green, though the fact that he's in constant pain makes it hard for him to focus on channeling it beyond wanton destruction. It's theorized where he mentally coherent, he could potentially output pulsar levels of power.

Bonus Trivia: If you want to know Professor Johnson's backstory, just watch the Behind the Bastards episodes about Scott Adams and note what they say about the man's early pre-Dilbert life. Now imagine he'd gone into mad science and things had... escalated.

And, in that grand (exceedingly late) Kaijune tradition, this character and all related narrative elements are under a CC-BY 4.0 license, as long as I, Thomas F Johnson, am credited as their creator. 

[clandestinemeeting]

I hate Kane so much its unreal

"Oh, I'm lawful good. I serve the people"

No, you're an asshole who's only concern is helping your king friend and his wife's pathetic vanity project, you imperialist dog.

"I neglected my own needs and desires to achieve a state of near transcendence"

Skill Issue!

[zot3-flopped]

Louis is shepherding the next generation of indie artist into our musical world

- demented Sea

He's not shepherding anyone. The indie music scene pretends he doesn't exist. His music is never on indie radio or indie charts or in indie media like the NME.

Absolutely. Every year his pathetic vanity project of a festival gets smaller and smaller. He pays a few bands to play but nobody in the industry takes it seriously.

[the-brainrot-central]

I hate myself so fucking much. Fuck. And don’t fucking give me that “no you’re perfect” “no you’re special” “you’re great because x” bullshit just shut the fuck up for once. I’m so fucking sick of people pretending they know me and making misinformed assumptions about who the fuck I am. Stop telling me to love myself. Stop telling me that I’m fucking good and loveable and deserve to be happy, because I don’t. You don’t fucking get it, and you never will. Despite your misguided conjectures and false declarations of virtue, you don’t know fucking shit about who I am. You think you know me but you don’t, you really fucking don’t.

You say you love me the way I am, say you love me, no you fucking don’t. What you love is the false projection of myself I display to the world. You love the image of perfection, of normalcy and humanity I have crafted to hide the fact that I’m a fucking monster, that I’m fucking filthy and dirty and wrong in every possible way.

You don’t fucking know me. You can’t say you love “me” when you don’t even really know who “me” is in the first place. Your love is fake. What you have fallen in love with is a mere facade, an image, an illusion. You have fallen for the concept of me, the vision, the projected ideal I perform for my friends and colleagues. Every good thing about me is merely notional, conventional, a meaningless, weightless piece of the facade. I mean nothing. I’m disgusting. I’ll never feel real love. I’ll never be real. I’ll never know what it means to be human, but I wish I could. I wish I could be different. I want to be someone else. I disgust myself, my vanity, my ego, my narcissism, my obsession. I hate it. I’m so pathetic like this. I just wish I could change. But I can’t seem to change

[scytalesucksatwriting]

"Think of it like a, ah, transponder," Myiir said. Even in a conversation between two people in a secure, remote location, the lanky creature kept his eyes and hands moving like a nervous tweaker. Kiire was soundly unimpressed by her brother's sudden appearance, much less the pushiness he brought with him. She supposed it was his norm, albeit a sickly and pathetic one.

"Myiir, every single fucking time you ask me to 'take' something of yours, it ends up being a goddamn catastrophe that I have to tidy up afterward. How much is it going to cost me to get you out of my life forever?"

He clicked his tongue in a self-satisfied, mocking way. "Depends, my darling sweet sister. We don't do normal lifetimes, remember? We're so much more than that, so I'll tell you: you can get a mortal's lifetime away from me if you just take this box and put it somewhere no shifty, clever little fiend will find it."

Kiire considered her options, and foolishly she tried her luck with a challenge of her own; "And if I refuse?"

She expected his immediate, instantaneous response: "Oh, I'll just kill you."

"You're not even wearing your own body, dipshit. What are you going to kill me with? I'll erase this entire block before you put your disgusting hands on me."

He could just about see the light in her eyes flare when he proceeded to wag his finger in her face. "Kiire, Kiire, Kiire! What good would that do? I mean, sure, yeah, you'll destroy this little suit I'm wearing. But I'll always find you, because you're family and I love you. And the next time I find you, I might not come in a fancy suit. I might bring something uglier, something you will very much dislike."

Frustration licked at her internally, a dying flame, but Kiire instead cocked her head back in a show of defiance. While usually eager to engage in petty verbal jousts with hated adversaries, Kiire did not have an immediate counter ready for her brother's threat, owed mostly to the fact that she knew he absolutely could--and would--make good on it.

Myiir rapidly tapped his fingers together, over and over again for no other reason than to fill the space between them with sound. His sister had so finely tuned her body that she was almost entirely silent, even in motion. Her vanity, to him, was a pitiful learned behavior, yet it was hardly the point of their exchange. He knew he could leverage it. "I can turn you into a grotesque wolf-man, too."

She made a sound of utter revulsion and swiped a hand through the air as though he were an illusion she could dispel. "You are unbearably disgusting and so are your idiotic pet projects. What are you going to give me in exchange for keeping your stupid box?"

"Um, well," Myiir smiled so broadly his lips seemed pulled just thin enough to crack apart, prompting another sound of disgust from his sibling. "I'll kill Neyon for you."

"Really."

"Mhm."

"You're going to waltz on into Drenquell's territory, and kill him? You realize you're already a hot topic over there, Myiir."

"Well," he laughed lightheartedly. "You make it seem so simple. I mean I'm going to abduct him first, obviously. I feel like a point-blank execution won't give me the closure I so, so deserve. Don't you think, Kiire? That I deserve closure?"

She took a step back without consciously realizing it. It was in the way that he had asked; how his voice went from a playful dismissal of the impossible to a strained, simmering desperation--it tripped an alarm in the back of her mind. Before she could think to play negotiator, Myiir elected to elaborate.

"Oh, you know me, Kiire. I really need that closure. I have so very much I need answered--like why you were the favorite child, and why he obsessively stalks you while spurning me. He's always done that, you know, to me. Specifically. It's like I don't exist to our father, but Kiire, this plan of mine is going to force him to finally acknowledge me. I will be seen. I will be heard. He will acknowledge me."

"Okay," Kiire exhaled, not even realizing she was a second away from choking on her own words. "Right, sure. But I'm not getting involved in this. I am not about to pick a fight with the most powerful territory in the system."

"About the response I'd expect from a small-time dictator, but sure, whatever. I just need you to take the fucking box. Put it somewhere no one's going to find it, and keep it hidden forever. Do you understand?"

His crimson eyes bored straight into her soul. A small, well-buried part of Kiire felt a shameful--yet indisputable--sense of dread. She resented the urgency forcing her compliance. She resented her own unpreparedness. She resented Myiir. And the worst part of the entire situation, she knew, was that whatever designs he had on their father would not simply end with their father. Kiire knew he would pursue her next.

"I got it. Drop your shit off and get out, Myiir."

Content, then, with their exchange, Myiir closed the distance Kiire had created between them and brushed her cheek with his thumb before she had the mind to smack his arm away. "Such a sourpuss. Don't worry though, I'm sure we'll be seeing a lot more of each other very soon."

Impulsively, she lunged forward with every intention of throttling him. Before she could even attempt to register it, the man before her had dematerialized and vanished without a trace.

[kevin-keller-artistic-director]

My point was in the context of jug perspective as the author is the show I didn't explicitly say that but I probably should have. His depiction of her in relation to him is what I was talking about specifically.

Him knowing Cheryl better than Toni is true but it doesn't mean much and in regards to him not getting in the way of her schemes I mean if he's tryna figure shit out stopping Cheryl would prevent him from learning more

Cheryl is self absorbed she's extremely unhinged etc but I don't agree that Cheryl ever saw Toni as a vanity project she's just a white girl with PTSD I actually think he can't perceive intense emotion towards a woman as a attempt of goodwill so he immediately attaches it to a project when in reality his little teen book is a legit vanity project

He in tandem with his mommy issues is mixing up unintended results from behavior with intention which to me is a technical root of him as a character he can't see woman as people until the world's at stake

I don't think other people don't see Cheryl as conviving Betty can tell,Ronnie sees how messy she is and Archie wants to see the good in people. Toni loves a complicated woman so that's it's own thing

For most of the show Jughead cannot maintain emotional intimacy with a woman if she is not perfect he's been scarred by his mom who is sharp and kinda a dick it's not that he's the only one that sees it's that he believes himself to be above the woman most like him V and Cheryl because that makes him feel safe in his denial bubble

The final woman he dates isn't even a woman she's a godamn angel like Tabitha because unlike a normal woman who would pass by his pathetic ass and live her life she's stays because it's the angels will or whatever

So yes beef is the wrong word but things that make jug like righteous are the things that he has in common with someone else he's like Alice (I believe she's his ant but that another thing)

The whole point is jughead is not brilliant thinker or person he's just a WHITE guy who was forced to save the world he is just judgmental guy who perspective by extension is warped and that includes his perception of Cheryl

Cheryl's beef with jughead cracks me up because it reads more as what jug presumes Cheryl thinks about him like she says so little to him and it's always about him being homeless or gay like don't get me wrong she's classist but she's got way more depth than that

Also like she's chill with Kevin Arch and Reggie so she's able to be around dudes

[clemsfilmdiary]

Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (2015, Andy Fickman)

6/27/18

[vivaamor]

“I was made for loving you.” with tony stark please? I love a good fluff with him ❤️

yes yes yes I love my boy tony I’ve been waiting to write for him! here you go! <3

word count: 1.6k

I Was Made For Loving You, Honey

This was borderline exhausting.

You didn’t know how Tony did it. Granted, all he really did was pull on a suit, spray some cologne and fix his hair before going to one of these stupid parties. To be fair, you shouldn’t call it stupid. It was a charity event, but it surely felt stupid, considering you’d been standing for two hours in front of the vanity in Stark Towers that Tony had so kindly put together for you.

You’d done your makeup, a light smokey eye and paired it with a dark lipstick. That alone had taken you about forty-five minutes. It would have taken you not as long, but you very rarely did your makeup, let alone eyeshadow and eyeliner, and eyeliner was a whole task in itself. You worked from yours and Tony’s place, so you didn’t often need to look to impress.

Then it was time to do your hair. You usually settled for a messy braid or a half-assed bun, but instead, you decided to curl your long locks. The worst part about getting ready for tonight was figuring out what to wear. Tony had bought you dozens upon dozens of dresses over the past two years you’d been together, and they were all so beautiful. After maybe thirty minutes of contemplation, you went with the emerald green, floor length gown. It really was pretty, and you hadn’t had the chance to wear it yet.

“Almost there.” Happy announced from the car he had driven you inside of, nodding to the spectacular building on the right. You almost felt underdressed just by how elegant it appeared. You shot happy a thumbs up and unbuckled your seatbelt as the vehicle pulled to a stop. He met you outside of the car, helping you out, since Tony claimed he’d meet you at the charity event. He’d had something he had been working on with Bruce, which meant a couple long workdays, and you had yet to see him today. “Excited?” Happy asked, closing the car door and handing the car keys to the valet.

“To mingle with a hundred people that I’ve never even heard of, but will kiss my ass in hopes of getting some donation from Tony?” You raised an eyebrow at Happy, who returned your look with an amused smile. “Elated.” Your answered sarcastically, though your words were no match for Tony’s sense of sarcasm. You were more nervous than anything. You and Tony had been in a relationship for two years now, and tonight would be the first time you’d be attending an event with him. You both had busy schedules and you usually weren’t in town for the events he would attend. Now that work had slowed down (much to Tony’s joy, he hated that you had a job, but you insisted you wouldn’t just live off his money alone), you were around far more often than usual.

Happy nodded to the gentlemen who opened the front doors to the building for the two of you. “You sound just like-”

“Me.” You lifted your head, and your eyes met the dark one’s of your boyfriend. He immediately grinned at you and took the few steps separating you to interlace your fingers together. “You look…”

“Like I’m pissing my pants?” You finished the sentence, waving to Happy, who had walked away to go greet Natasha.

Tony chuckled, “One, pissing your dress.” You rolled your eyes playfully while he raised your locked hands and pressed a kiss to the back of your hand. “And I was going to say enchanting.”

“Ever the gentleman.” You teased, walking further into the building, where music was playing, and drinks were being poured. “I missed you.” You told him, not caring how pathetic it sounded. You had just seen him last night, but you hated waking up to find he had already left to go meet Bruce for their project.

Tony pointed between you and him to the bartender, announcing that he would like a scotch and requesting a vodka martini for you. “Oh, did you now?” He turned back to you and let go of your hand to grab the glass of scotch for the bar, the bartender continuing to make you a dirty martini. “Good. I missed you, too. You’re much more fun than Bruce, did you know that?” You rolled your eyes again as you took the martini from the bartender. “It appears we have an audience.” He noted, eyes flickering over to Agent Phil Colson, who stood at the other end of the bar patiently, obviously waiting to speak to Tony.

“It appears we do.” You replied, swallowing down a sip from the martini. “Go on.” You waved him off and smiled at Phil. “Hi, Phil.” He returned the gestured with a mutual smile. You planted a kiss on Tony’s cheek before he eventually wandered off to go speak to the agent.

“Ms. Stark,” You turned your head and were met with Steve Rogers, one of Tony’s fellow Avengers. Tony had referred you as Ms. Stark so many times, that the rest of them had started saying it as well. It was an inside joke at this point.

“Steve.” You smiled softly and set your glass down on the bar top. “I didn’t think I’d see you here. Didn’t know that charity events were your thing.”

Steve huffed a laugh and offered you his hand to come with him while you waited for Tony’s little meeting with Phil to be over. “I don’t have much of social calendar these days.” You followed him to where everyone was dancing and conversing, eventually meeting up with Natasha and Bruce, too. Steve had always been a nice guy since you were introduced to him after the Battle of New York. You’d thanked him for babysitting Tony, to which Tony profusely denied that he needed a babysitter. You and him both knew that Tony needed to be kept in line sometimes, but you loved him for it, anyway.

It wasn’t long until Tony had returned from speaking with Phil and found you and Steve dancing. “Ahem,” He obnoxiously cleared his throat and stood beside the two of you. “I think she might be a little young for you, Cap,” He offered a sarcastic smile and held his hand out for you to take. You waved goodbye to Steve and eagerly took Tony’s hand. “I leave you for ten minutes and you’re over here with grandpa.”

“He’s a nice friend!” You retorted with a giggle, Tony’s other hand finding your waist and yours on his shoulder. “You know I hate these things. I don’t like your parties.”

He scoffed in mock-offense. “My parties? Honey, my parties are way better than this snooze fest.” You shrugged your shoulders innocently, which only caused him to scoff again. “Say it, please say my parties are better.” Again, you shrugged. “We’ll stay for an hour then leave.” He spoke matter-of-factly.

“Tony, no. We said we’d be here. We can’t just come for the open bar and then-”

“Hour and a half?”

You pretend to consider his offer. “Deal.”

“Alright. Come on, lightweight.” You giggled, pulling Tony into the living area and out of the elevator by his tie. Tony after a few glasses of scotch always amused you. He was less backtalk and sarcasm, mostly because he couldn’t think of anything sarcastic to reply. You both stumble around the sofa and fall on to it. Tony was the main one who was stumbling, you were more doing it because the damn heels were making your feet utterly miserable.

Tony sat with his back against the couch and your legs bent to the side. He reached forward and grasped your ankle, pulling it onto his lap. “One hour was long enough.” He mumbled, focusing on the strap of your shoe, and somehow unbuckling it before he dropped the high heel to the floor. “Other one.” He waited until you stretched your other leg on to his lap. “There we go.” He yawned once he got the other one off, his hand rubbing up and down your ankle.

“I got all ready for an hour at some event.” You huffed, crossing your arms over your chest as you leaned back into the comfortable sofa.

“Why? Should we go back and stay until the end? Okay, put your heels back on!” You shook your head eagerly, and he laughed. “What do you say that tomorrow, we just stay here?”

You furrowed your eyebrows in confusion. “What do you mean? No work?”

“No work. Just you and me. And maybe a bottle of champagne.” He leaned forward and kissed your forehead, then your cheek, and then planted one last kiss on your jaw. You look at him and don’t say anything. Not because you don’t agree, you’d give anything for a lazy day with your boyfriend, but your feelings are overwhelming you. It had always been this way with Tony. Although he wasn’t one to be super sentimental with his words, he showed you how he felt with his actions. You both had said I love you before, but those three words weren’t enough for how deeply you felt for this man. “What?”

You moved closer to him, your thighs moving onto his lap. You cup his cheek in your hand and press a sweet kiss to his lips. He still looks confused by your lack of response when you pull away. “I love you.” You tell him, his hand traveling to your back and using it to hold you to him. He leans down and pressed his lips against yours softly, his lips slowly moving in time with yours. You push your hand to his chest. “Hey. You didn’t say it back.”

He grins, even more wide than usual with the alcohol in his system. “I was made for loving you, honey.” His sweet grin turns mischievous. He full-on tackles you into the couch with him hovering above you and kissing firmly all around your neck, his fingers tickling your sides.

“Tony! That tickles!”

[onecanonlife]

Wilbur wakes up one morning to find white in his hair. This is—irritating, for several reasons, but that's all it is. An annoyance. A distraction.

There's nothing deeper at work here. There's nothing wrong at all.

(Or, the stresses of the presidency give Wilbur a white streak of hair earlier in canon, and somehow, this serves as the cry for help he can never bring himself to make.)

(word count: 5,039)

(second part) (third part) (fourth part)

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Part One

He first notices it because he chances a glance in the mirror. Not something he does often, these days, because he dislikes looking at his appearance for longer than necessary. The mirror only tends to show him his flaws and imperfections: the bags under his eyes that he can never quite hide, the way his cheekbones jut out in too-telling prominence, the way his uniform never seems to fit right lately, and not just because he almost never finds the time or energy to give it a proper wash.

So, he doesn’t look in the mirror beyond a cursory glance in the mornings as he’s dragging himself out of bed, just long enough to be sure that his veneer of professionalism is holding, because frankly, he has nothing if he doesn’t have that. No one’s called him on his slowly slipping standards just yet, and he intends to keep it that way. He is president, after all; he must lead by example, and if the nation is to be a success then he must be as well. Or at least, his citizens must believe that he is.

But this morning, his gaze lingers just ever-so-slightly longer than he normally allows. And then, his vision catches on—something. He thinks he must be mistaken, and he hasn’t the time to figure it out, really, but he can’t help but lean in closer, searching his own reflection. What he sees makes dread beat out a two-timed rhythm in his chest.

There is white in his hair.

Not much. Just a few strands. But it’s strange enough to catch his attention. There has never been white in his hair before. He can’t imagine what caused it. He’s not that old. But nevertheless, the white is present, and it’s not so obvious that someone would catch it on a first glance, probably, but it stands out enough against the dark brown of the rest of his hair that it’s not inconceivable that someone might spot it. Spot it, and then ask questions. Questions that he would not want to answer, if only because it would be ridiculous for someone to be grilling him about his hair of all things.

He doesn’t want to deal with it. That’s the only reason why he’s bothered, surely.

He’s going to be late to a meeting if he dallies for too much longer. So his gaze flicks about his room—which is fairly bare, fairly utilitarian; decorating’s been the last thing on his mind in recent weeks, and it would be a waste of time that he could be devoting to bettering his nation—and lands on a sword leaning against the wall. One that he’s barely touched recently, and that he hardly knows how to use, and certainly not well at that, but if he’s looking for a quick solution, it will serve. So he crosses the room, snatches it up, and returns to the mirror.

With one hand, he picks out the white strands. With the other, he uses the sword to slice them off. Crude, and he’s certain he gets a few brown strands as well, but it’s effective, and that’s what’s important.

It only takes a few minutes more after that to prepare himself. He emerges from his room confident, his head held high, a president ready to take on the challenges of the day. Never mind that he barely slept last night. Never mind that he’s stopped eating regularly, grabbing a bite only when his schedule allows him. Never mind that he’s been feeling jumpy of late, more anxious, that he’s taken to tracking the whereabouts of everyone around him at all times, if only to know that they’re safe. Never mind any of that. He is the president, and sacrifices must be made.

He is, after all, only as good as the country he builds.

---

The incident slips his mind in the following weeks. It’s simply not important when there are so many other things to accomplish; infrastructure and food and an economy and all the other intricacies that go into running a nation, that lead to endless stacks of paperwork for him and hopefully, prosperity for his people. All the other intricacies that, as it turns out, he has no idea how to handle, but he’s trying.

Because it’s all worth it, if it’s for them.

But one night, he’s tugging off his hat, shucking off his coat, tears already pricking at his eyes for no other reason than the feeling of being terribly, desperately overwhelmed, and he happens to glance at that hated mirror. Rather than alighting on any of the other aspects of his physicality that annoy him—most recently, it’s the fact that he always feels that he’s not standing straight enough, and that other people are judging him for his lack of professionalism—he focuses on his hair.

There’s white in it. Again.

And more of it, this time. Not too much, still, but definitely more. Enough that someone else might actually notice. He’s not sure how he didn’t, up to this point. He strides over to the glass, already tugging at his hair hard enough to hurt, and sure enough, there they are. Strands of snow white hair. Like he’s bleached them, except—he takes one and rubs it between his fingers—without the brittle quality that often-bleached hair tends to take on.

He doesn’t understand why this is happening. He can’t feel anything about it other than annoyance, because this is just one more thing to deal with, one more thing to add to the pile. And it’s made worse because it’s practically a vanity project; sure, he doesn’t want people bothering him about it, but logically, he knows that hair shouldn’t be such a big deal to him. It’s only that professionalism is important, and he already feels like he’s not doing enough in that area. Not enough to garner the respect that a good president should command, at any rate. So he needs to keep this under control.

Somehow, the thought of doing anything about it tonight is too much. Exhaustion pulls at him like anchors tied to his legs, even though he knows his sleep will be broken and fitful, as it usually is of late. He breathes in and out, slowly and deliberately, hoping to attain some measure of calm, but it doesn’t work, only makes him more aware of the tears readying themselves to fall.

It’s a disgusting display of weakness, truly. He only allows himself this because there is no one else here to see it, no one else to realize just how weak a man their president truly is. He can break down in private, as long as it doesn’t interfere with the rest of his duties. There was even a time when crying into his pillow made him feel better, if only a little, made him feel as if he was getting rid of all the emotions and incessant whispers of failure that always build up in him over the course of a day. But those times are long gone. And yet, the tears still flow.

Here, alone, in the privacy of his chambers, he can never manage to stop them. He lacks willpower.

Weakness. It’s pathetic. He knows it is.

But if he has to be weak here in order to successfully pretend at strength for everyone else, then he will put up with the self-loathing that he can’t seem to shake, and he’ll let himself cry. It’s not as if anyone will ever know about it. No one will be able to judge—except for himself, that is, but dealing with his own judgments is nothing new. In a way, it’s what keeps him going, his self-criticisms. They keep him sharp, doing what needs doing; he can always trust himself to tell himself the truth, after all, even if he can trust no one else.

He casts one more glance at his hair, disgust flooding him. He’ll trim it out in the morning, same as before. For the moment, he crosses his bare floor to his bed, slumping into it. Almost immediately, his eyes begin stinging with more intensity, and the first of the tears roll down his cheeks. He turns his face, burying it in his pillow as emotions well up in him, too many at once, washing over him and drowning him, because it’s all so much and this is the only way he can deal with them, because he has to be strong. Has to have himself together.

It truly is pathetic, how much trouble he’s having with handling this. He should be able to do better, and yet, here he is. He can’t help but wonder what they would all think if they knew. Surely, they would consider him unfit to lead them, and the trouble is, they might even be right. But that would destroy him, he thinks, if they were to believe him unworthy of their trust, of their love.

And sometimes, he wonders what Phil would say if he could see him now. But he always shies away from that. And besides, Phil doesn’t need to know. He’ll keep sending letters that emphasize the good, and Phil will be happy, and Phil will be proud of him, and—he needs to stop thinking about this.

Morning comes too soon, but he forces himself out of bed, as per usual. Cuts the white hairs until there’s no sign they were there at all, and hopes that will be the end of it.

---

The problem is, that’s not the end of it. The white hairs keep appearing, and at an increasing frequency as time goes on. It starts to be that he can’t go more than a day or two without checking for them, lest they become noticeable to literally everyone else around him.

The most troublesome thing about it, though, is that he simply doesn’t have the time to deal with it. He doesn’t have time to painstakingly comb through his hair every morning, not when there’s so many more important things he could be doing, so many tasks to accomplish, ideas to form and sign off on, an entire goddamn nation to keep afloat. He doesn’t have the time, and it’s wearing on him already, so he needs a different solution.

He considers hair dye. He could get his hands on some fairly easily, and likely surreptitiously. No one would have to know. But the trouble with hair dye would lie in finding the right color; if no one has noticed the white hairs cropping up until now, they certainly would notice if he came into the office with his hair an entirely different shade of brown. And that would make it obvious that he’s hiding something; no one dyes their hair a different shade of its original color unless they’re trying to cover something up.

Possibly, through trial and error, he could make a dye that matches his hair color exactly, or at least, close enough that the difference is imperceptible. But there’s the time issue again. He can’t waste his efforts on experimenting with hair dye when he’s meant to be trying to better the lives of his citizens, to build up a prosperous, glorious country. What kind of president would that make him? He’s already well aware that he’s not a very good one; he doesn’t need to make matters worse.

So, hair dye is impractical. He’ll revisit the idea if he truly gets desperate. But the situation as it is is untenable. He’s been having difficulty getting out of bed at all in the morning, recently, a combination of exhaustion and a strange, pervasive apathy serving to keep him under his covers long past when he should have been preparing for the day ahead, even though staying in bed longer doesn’t seem to help him catch up on sleep at all. Why he finds himself wanting to lie there, doing absolutely nothing other than staring at the ceiling for hours on end, he has no idea. He doesn’t let himself, of course, or at least, not for more than an hour or two just after dawn, but the fact remains that the temptation is there, and growing stronger every day. He can’t be spending ages on his hair every morning. It’s not feasible.

But that leaves only one real solution. And that’s to leave the white hairs as they are, and simply try to hide them. The more he considers it, the more he believes it’s the only real avenue worth pursuing. He could probably manage; his hat is a part of his uniform anyway. He rarely takes it off outside of his bedroom. So, all it will take is an extra moment of styling to make sure that all of the white has been pushed up under it. And perhaps checking a few times during the day to be sure that nothing has come loose, but that should take seconds at most. He can spare a few seconds, probably.

At the very least, it will take less time than what he’s been doing. That’s the goal here, really.

He hates that this is something that he’s having to put any amount of thought into at all. But he’s reached a decision, and the next morning, he gives it a shot. Arranges his hair so that more of it lies hidden under his hat than usual, and sets out for the day.

No one comments on it. Not this day, nor the next day, nor the next. He supposes he could consider that a success.

It does mean, of course, that the amount of white in his hair only increases as time goes by, until his hair is streaked with it. But if he’s careful, if he continues to be cautious with it, no one will know about it but him, and he can dislike it in the privacy of his own quarters. Just as he dislikes everything else.

---

On the rare occasions that he has any time to himself before retiring for the night, an instance that becomes more and more seldom as the days and weeks pass on, he often finds his feet carrying him to Niki’s. There is a safety here that is difficult to find anywhere else, even in his own quarters. Perhaps especially in his own quarters, because there is nothing warm, nothing personal about his room. Here, though, there is the scent of baking bread and cookies, a heat that gets trapped under his skin and chases the chill away, and there is, of course, Niki herself.

He finds it hard to lend too much trust to anyone these days, but Niki is an exception to that.

So, here he comes, and here he stays, when he has an hour or two to spare. He comes here, and they talk, about little things, unimportant things, about how her days have been or the latest prank that Fundy has performed—and it’s nice to hear about Fundy. He barely sees his boy, busy as he is, and it’s good to hear that he’s doing well, that he’s still the upbeat, rambunctious lad he knows and loves.

They talk about these things, and they talk about other things, and sometimes, they talk about nothing at all. Sometimes, talking is asking too much, and Niki always seems to see it, and she kneads dough and lets him sit in front of her and watch. He likes watching. The motions are repetitive, soothing. If he had the time, he might ask if he could join in; he thinks he might enjoy it, even if he’s never had a deft hand in the kitchen. But he never has the time, of course, so he just watches, for whatever time he can spare.

Today is one of those days. It’s nearing nightfall, but for once, he’s cleared his desk of a majority of his paperwork, so here he is, slumped against Niki’s counter, letting his cheek rest on the cold stone as she pats down the space in front of her with flour, rolls out her dough with a rolling pin. Cookies, then, rather than bread. He likes watching this, too, likes watching as she spreads out the dough again and again, cutting out more shapes until all the dough is gone, used up, in the oven and baking.

He likes being here in general. He could be doing other things—he told Fundy he’d take him fishing soon, for instance, but soon keeps on being put off, and he feels terrible about it, but the job has to come first. His country has to come first. Or, there’s a new redstone gimmick that Tubbo worked out that he wanted to show him, but that can probably wait for a bit. Or, Tommy wanted to watch a movie with him, he thinks, but he never has time during the day, and by the time night comes, he’s far too exhausted, so he comes here, instead. Comes to see Niki, where, somehow, the weight of all the expectations placed on him seems to lighten, if only for a little while.

He always ends up being horribly unprofessional here, in this bakery. Always ends up messing up his uniform, taking off his coat, getting a smudge of something on his face, not sitting straight enough, not keeping his shoulders set, slumping in general, a whole list of faults. But it’s harder to care when it’s Niki in front of him. Because she’s always glad to see him, and she’s one of the few people from whom he can believe that the sentiment is the truth.

But that is always, and this is now: Niki’s making cookies, the last batch of the day, and he’s watching, head resting against the table. He almost feels like he could fall asleep like this, which would be a miracle in of itself. He wouldn’t let himself, of course; a bit of unprofessionalism is one thing, but falling asleep where anyone could see him, where anyone could get to him, that is quite another.

He wonders if he should tell her any of the things he’s been thinking about. About his own ineffectiveness, about how all his work seems to amount to very little actually being done. About how he’s sure everyone is losing faith in him, and he can’t even blame them, because he’s losing faith in himself. About how in the end, he has no idea what he’s doing, and he was a fool to think that he did. About power and its nature, and who has it and who doesn’t, and about how his words might not amount to very much at all, actually.

Probably not. He’s not sure she would understand. And he shouldn’t burden her with his troubled mind.

So he just watches, and lets himself drift a little.

“Rough day today?” Niki asks, working her rolling pin, smoothing out all the clumps.

“No worse than usual,” he says. “It’s just tiring.”

Niki hums. He likes when she does that. From someone else, it might sound dismissive, but when she does it, it means the opposite, means she’s considering all of your words, giving them due thought.

“I’ve noticed you’ve been tired a lot, lately,” she says. She sets the rolling pin to the side, picking up a cookie cutter. It’s leaf-shaped. For autumn, he assumes. Outside, the trees are beginning to change colors, though the shift to reds and oranges and yellows won’t really get going for a few more weeks. It’s that hazy, indistinct time of year when it’s not still summer and not yet fall, too hot for one and too cool for the other.

Not that he’s been paying that much attention. It’s been a while since he was outside for any significant length of time. Or rather, for a reason other than approving construction or checking on borders or something of the like. For a reason not presidentially important.

“It’s a tiring job,” he says. “Who would’ve thought? I’m alright, though. It’s well within the bounds of what I can handle.”

“Have you been getting enough sleep?” she asks. She presses the cutter into the dough. Lifts it. Pushes the shape out of the cutter and onto her baking sheet. Repeats.

He laughs, quietly. “I don’t need you to mother hen me, Niki,” he says, and without looking up, she reaches across the counter and swats him on the arm.

“I am not mother henning,” she says. “I’m being your friend. Your eyebags could hold second, smaller eyebags in them.”

“What, you don’t think I’m gorgeous?” he asks wryly, and she snorts.

“I’m sure someone out there would,” she says. “Tiredness has to be considered hot somewhere.”

“Mm. I think I’m hot. Very sexy.”

“You would think so.” She’s got enough cookies on the sheet for a batch, now. The next step is to put the sheet on a pan and put the pan in the oven, and that’s exactly what she does. It pleases him that he has the steps memorized. “I’m serious, though, if you have too much work to do, give some to your cabinet. I’m sure Tommy or Tubbo would love to help out more. Or Fundy.”

“Fundy’s too young.” It’s a bit of a longstanding argument between them. He tries not to let it get to him.

“And the other two aren’t?” She returns from the oven, an eyebrow raised, and then goes for another baking sheet. She’s still got dough left to roll out. One more batch will do it, he thinks. “You—oh, wait a moment.”

He watches bemusedly as she leaves the counter again and crosses to her sink, washing off her hands and then dampening a dishtowel. He’s not sure what she’s doing; it doesn’t make sense to wash up when she still has another batch to make. Her hands will just get dirty again. But now she’s walking back over, towel extended toward him and—now she’s rubbing it on his head. He blinks as a corner of the towel flops over his eye.

“Sorry, I got a lot of flour in your hair,” she says. “I’ll get it, hang on.”

And then, her motions slow, and then stop.

“It’s not coming out,” she says slowly. “Wilbur, did you dye your hair?”

The question doesn’t make any sense at all, at first. Because no, of course he hasn’t dyed his hair. Part of the whole problem is that he doesn’t have time to dye his hair. Not properly. Not in a way that no one would notice.

And then his brain realizes that that’s not what she’s asking about at all. Realizes that he’s been lying with his cheek resting against the counter for the past half hour, face parallel with the surface it’s resting on. Realizes that his hat has long passed the point of being merely askew and is now barely touching his head at all. Realizes that his hair is splayed out for anyone to look at.

He shoots upright, grabbing his hat and slamming it down on his head. Too late, of course; the damage has been done. Niki jerks back at the suddenness of his motion. Her damp towel drips a bit.

“No,” he says instinctively, and then curses himself, because—because hair dye would work as an excuse, wouldn’t it? A reason for why it’s like that? It might get her to not push further, and he’s not even sure why it’s so important to him that she doesn’t, because it’s Niki of all people, and Niki won’t use this against him later. Probably. Hopefully. Most likely. Maybe it’s just that he doesn’t want her to worry, because he knows that she will, even though it’s not a big deal at all and her efforts would be better expended on other problems, other people.

Fuck, wait, it’s been too long since he said something. Can he still change his answer without arousing suspicion?

“Yes,” he says, and internally cringes. It was definitely too late for that, because Niki’s just staring at him now, eyes wide. “Um, yeah, I thought it’d be fun. And then it went a bit wonky, so I’ve been covering it up. It doesn’t look very nice, does it?”

Is this what he’s been reduced to? Lying to one of his closest friends?

Gods, he’s pathetic.

“It looks fine,” Niki says, in that soft tone of voice she uses when she either doesn’t know what’s going on or doesn’t know how to proceed without scaring someone off. Like she’s talking to a frightened animal. “Wil, are you—are you really alright?”

“Of course,” he says. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Her mouth works for a second.

“Wilbur,” she says, just that, and something in his chest turns hot, wrenches all around, squeezes, and for a brief, panicked second, he thinks he’s having a heart attack. But no, he can feel his heart pounding. A bit faster than it should be, if anything, but strong. His vision blurs, too, but he blinks hard, and everything comes back into focus. Which might be a mistake, because if anything, Niki looks even more distressed.

“Wil, please, you can talk to me if something’s wrong,” she says, and he laughs, shaking his head and standing. His stool scrapes against the floor, loud and grating to his ears.

“There’s nothing wrong, Niki,” he says. “You don’t need to worry so much. Though I have realized, I do have a bit more work to do tonight, so I should probably get back to it.” He smiles at her, though she doesn’t smile back. “But it was very good to talk to you. I’ll see you soon, okay?”

“Wilbur—”

He’s already leaving. His chest feels tight again. Tight and hot. For absolutely no reason at all, because even if Niki did ask him more questions, it’s just hair, for crying out loud. It’s hardly the end of the world.

But he needed out of there. He doesn’t quite understand why.

His parting words were not a lie. He does have a bit more work to do. There is always a bit more work to do. The work never ends. He can’t actually remember the last time he didn’t have work to do. Before getting independence, surely. Back when he still felt entirely sure that he could do this, that he could build a country, that peace through words was a sustainable option, that he could look at the mess of things that need to be done to form an effective nation and actually accomplish them.

He tries not to think about that.

But instead of to his office, his feet carry him back to his room. To his blank walls and floor, his few pieces of furniture, his few sets of the same uniform. He really does need to get around to washing them. His gaze falls on his sword, next, still leaning against the wall, and then his guitar, propped up in the corner. There’s a layer of dust collecting on it. He should clean it off. That’s not good for the wood or the strings, and he’s sure it’s terribly out of tune. How long has it been since the last time he played?

There’s no time for music, nowadays. Not when other things need to take priority. He’s got a country to run; he can’t be wasting his time. He can’t afford to.

But rather than do anything productive, he winds up in front of the mirror. He takes off his hat, though it’s almost unnecessary; his hair sticks out from under it every which way, after how he shoved it on so carelessly. He hopes no one was watching him as he returned here.

There is a broad white streak in his hair. Right in the front, right where people tend to look. He tugs at it, and his scalp stings. He’s not sure what else he was expecting.

He definitely can’t cut it out now. It’s far past that point; people will definitely notice if he goes about with a whole chunk of hair missing. And they’ll also still notice if he dyes it, so that problem remains.

He just needs to be more careful, that’s all. The thing with Niki was a foible. An error on his part, a lapse in judgment. He’ll take more care from now on to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

He lets out a shaky breath, and then, he blinks and finds himself kneeling on the floor, still in front of the mirror. He looks at himself, and then immediately looks away, because he can’t stand what he sees. It’s not just the white streak, though that’s awful enough on his own; it’s all the inadequacies stacked together, all the imperfections that he can’t help but pick out, all the screaming signs that seem to point directly toward his own incompetency.

It’s a wonder no one else has seen it yet.

Tears burn his eyes, and he can’t seem to blink them away. They go rolling down his cheeks, and he watches their progress in his reflection as best he can. His breathing hitches, and a small gasp escapes him, and he can’t have that, can’t make too much noise, so he stuffs a fist in his mouth.

He’s fine. The fit will pass, and he’ll be fine. He’ll spend the next three or four hours in bed staring at the ceiling, wishing he could fall asleep, and then, at last, he will, and he’ll wake up in the morning feeling more tired than ever, and he’ll drag himself out of bed because he has to, because he’s got responsibilities that he can’t shirk, even if he can’t fulfill any of them well enough. And he’ll be fine, because he can’t afford to not be, because he’s got a country on his shoulders and that means he needs to keep standing.

He’ll be fine. He is fine.

He is.

He is.

He still can’t bring himself to look in the mirror. The next morning, he covers it with a sheet, and tells himself that it’s not a defeat.