#thank u for the prompt this was so fun to write !!!!

[shitouttabuck]

oh my god nina!!! 8 for the bedsharing prompts if it takes your fancy <33

thank you sweet peach this scratched an itch !!!

bed-sharing prompts: whispering “Oh, you are going to be very embarrassed when you wake up.”

Eddie’s not old—he’s not even 30, despite the near-constant jokes about his senior citizen-isms he seems incapable of shaking. And he wouldn’t even say he’s a man of creature comforts. He just likes familiarity, and routine, and his own goddamn bed.

Quarantine has brought a lot of change: being away from Chris, living in a single-occupancy apartment with three other people, and sharing a bed with all six-foot-two of Evan Buckley.

Currently, this means waking up at some wretched hour and squinting in the moonlight filtering in through half-open blinds, because the aforementioned best friend has stolen Eddie’s pillow from right under his head yet again.

Eddie groans quietly, easing his neck out of the crick it’s cramped in. He glares at the enormous lump snoring serenely beside him and pats the mattress blindly for his pillow. Eyes adjusting to the dark, he’s greeted by the same sight he’s woken to at ungodly hours thrice this month already: Buck with his gigantic thieving arms wrapped happily around Eddie’s goddamn pillow as he clutches it to his chest, dead to the world.

“Fuck’s sake,” Eddie mutters, reaching out and tugging the end of the pillowcase to no avail. Buck’s vice-grip doesn’t falter even in sleep. Eddie’s usually able to coax it out of his grasp without waking him, but it takes a minute, and their last shift had been a full-body workout from hell, and Eddie just wants to go the fuck back to sleep with a single measly pillow supporting his exhausted head. Surely that’s not too decadent a luxury to expect.

He tugs again, harder and meaner than he normally would. The pillow inches out of Buck’s hold, and Eddie grabs a firmer handful to yank it away, grunting triumphantly when it pops free.

“Hrmmph,” Buck grumbles, crease appearing between his eyebrows. Eddie stills, holding his breath as he gauges Buck’s proximity to consciousness. He thinks he’s in the clear, but then Buck murmurs unhappily and rolls ever-so-slightly towards Eddie.

“S’your turn to be th’ li’l spoon,” he slurs, and Eddie freezes even further. “’M th’ big spoon t’night.” He pats half-heartedly at the mattress between him and Eddie, jaw going slack again after a few seconds.

Eddie grins, just barely containing the snort that bubbles up at Buck’s sleep-talking. There’s enough distance from Ali and even Abby, post-train debacle, that means he can wring weeks’ worth of teasing out of this. Whichever one of them it is Buck’s dreaming of, Eddie thinks multiple nights of interrupted sleep allow him a little good-natured—if merciless—ribbing.

He shifts onto his back, shoving the pillow under his head and shutting his eyes with a sigh, but the movement has Buck mumbling again. His face is mashed into his own pillow, words barely intelligible when he says, “Y’re littler than me. C’mon, lemme be big spoon.”

The snort sneaks out of Eddie then, just a bit. He barely knew either woman, but he can’t quite picture them indulging Buck in this line of conversation. It’s—sweet, if deeply mortifying for Buck himself to know anyone else has heard it.

Buck snuffles discontentedly, forehead scrunching as he reaches out in search of the pillow, still asleep.

“Oh, you are going to be very embarrassed when you wake up,” Eddie whispers, wondering if there’s more entertainment about to be provided and if it’s worth getting up to unplug his phone and catch the tail end of this on video.

“Urgh,” asleep-Buck responds, patting the bed a little more insistently when he’s unsuccessful in his pillow-retrieval endeavours. “Wh’re—c’mere. Eddie. Y’re li’l spoon.”

This time when Eddie freezes, it’s such a sudden locking of every joint in his body that his neck cricks in the opposite direction. He barely feels it, singularly focused on Buck’s latest garbled complaint, because—is Buck awake? Is Buck dreaming about him?

He’s frozen so still he doesn’t realise Buck’s questing hand is now well in range of Eddie himself, and he jolts back into his body when Buck’s strong, calloused fingers wrap around his wrist.

“C’me back,” he whines, tugging at Eddie while shuffling closer at the same time. Eddie holds himself carefully still, hardly daring to breathe as Buck slowly but surely plasters his long, long body along Eddie’s side, hitching one leg over Eddie’s thigh before flinging an arm across his torso and dragging him nearer.

“Mm,” he hums, brow smoothing out. His cheek rests on Eddie’s shoulder, face smushed but seemingly satisfied. Eddie’s arm is trapped between his own side and Buck’s stomach, and he worms it under Buck’s body almost on autopilot, more to get comfortable than anything else. This leaves him basically cradling Buck to him, and Buck gives one final happy grunt before burrowing his face into Eddie’s neck and going limp, a dead weight over Eddie’s right side.

Eddie makes his fingers relax where they’re clutching the back of Buck’s t-shirt. This is—fine. Normal and fine. So Buck isn’t dreaming about cuddling an ex-girlfriend, he’s dreaming about holding Eddie. They’ve been living out of each other’s pockets more than usual recently, leaning on each other a little heavier through a global pandemic and missing Christopher. Eddie’s told himself it’s because of constant proximity, and maybe it is, but whatever the reason, if Buck’s subconscious is embracing that vulnerability in this way, that’s fine. He’s an affectionate guy, and while it’s relatively new for Eddie to be on the receiving end of that from another man, he’s not one to shy away because of someone else’s archaic ideas of masculinity.

And—hold on. Y’re littler than me? Was that what Buck said? Eddie huffs indignantly, and then huffs again for different reasons, feeling his cheeks heat. He doesn’t know why, but he pulls Buck a little closer.

It’s still normal and fine, he finds, turning his head to press his nose into Buck’s curls. That surprises him a little, that there’s no freak-out of any kind accompanying—whatever this is. Buck smells like vanilla, because he used Chim’s fancy shampoo that’s actually Maddie’s fancy shampoo because both of them are missing her something fierce, and he’s definitely drooling onto Eddie’s neck, and now that he’s not sleep-talking he’s back to snoring like a motorcycle, and Eddie’s slipping under before he can marvel any more at just how normal and fine it all is.

When the moonlight is swapped for sunlight, Eddie stirs to Chim singing along to radio in the kitchen downstairs. Buck blinks awake right alongside him, cheek imprinted with creases from Eddie’s collar and turning pink as he hastily peels himself away.

“Oh, um, sorry,” he says, voice rough with sleep. He contorts his body in surprise trying to roll off Eddie’s arm. “Did I—sorry, Eds.”

Eddie works his arm back under Buck, easy and deliberate. “S’fine,” he yawns. “It was my turn to be the little spoon.”

In his peripheral vision, Buck turns a brilliant red, and Eddie gives him a reassuring squeeze before taking great joy in telling him just how embarrassed he should be about the contents of his dreams.

(Buck’s mortification is blessedly short-lived, since the contents of Eddie’s dreams are equally embarrassing in the very exact same way, as it turns out.)

[mappingthesky]

planymphia wives honeymoon cutesy fluffy and overwhelmingly emotional drabble pleaseee

take my hand (take my whole life, too)

or: it’s their first week of being married - jane can’t stop referring to nymphia as ‘my wife’, nymphia can’t stop crying, and no one has ever been more in love in all of time.

Jane wakes up when Nymphia rolls over and flings a heavy arm across her torso in sleep.

Jane’s eyes flutter. Sunlight threatens to spill in from the other side of the heavy hotel room curtains all too soon. She’s only half conscious, and her eyes are still a little blurry with last night’s wine, and she’s content to drift back off to sleep, lulled by the gentle brush of Nymphia’s fingertips down her sternum, but then-

A little gasp, a sharp intake of breath. “Oh my god.”

“Mmwhat?” Nymphia mumbles, her eyes still closed as Jane grabs for her hand. Again, when her wrist is nearly pulled from the rest of her arm. “What?”

“Nymphia,” Jane whispers, but it’s thin, because she’s smiling. Nymphia can barely make it out through the dim light of the room and the sleep that clouds her vision, but she knows it just the same. She would recognize that smile by the sound of Jane’s words spoken through it, by the feeling of her soft gaze upon her. She would know it anywhere - even in the dark.

“We got married.”

Nymphia’s eyes blink open and look over at Jane. She’s on her back, holding Nymphia’s hand up to the light. She turns it over carefully, fingertips against her open palm, thumb tracing over the silver band on Nymphia’s ring finger. A diamond glitters in the dark.

“I know,” Nymphia grumbles, still half-asleep, still unwilling to be awoken for anything at all. “Spent eight months planning it, ’member?”

It was longer than that. It was the culmination of years of dreaming and months of planning, of Nymphia ironing out every last detail, Jane somehow even more stressed than she was, because she’d wanted it all to be perfect. For her.

(“You have a say, too,” Nymphia had reminded her on more than one occasion. “This day is about the both of us.”

“I know, baby,” Jane said, that spot between her brows that creases when she thinks too hard momentarily relaxing as she kisses Nymphia’s cheek. “But it’s really about you. Everything is about you.”)

Jane pulls Nymphia’s hand closer, studies it for a long while. Nymphia’s eyes are just closing again when Jane presses a kiss to her ring finger, then to her palm, more kisses up the inside of her wrist, the length of her arm, up her shoulder. Nymphia whines.

It comes back to her slowly as Jane coaxes her from her sleep, the only one she’d ever allow. Their night. It was everything they ever could have asked for, more than that. Their friends lining the aisle, swearing that they knew this day would come, arguing over who had really called it first. Jane, who had sworn she wouldn’t cry, who had warned Nymphia not to be worried if she didn’t, dissolving into tears the moment Nymphia emerged in all white. Nymphia, unsurprisingly to everyone, openly sobbing for half of the night, dabbing a tissue underneath her damp eyes at the dinner table. They’d had two glasses of champagne each, and nothing else.  They’d promised, because they wanted to remember this: the toasts, the dancing, each other, every moment.

Nymphia is beaming by the time Jane kisses her shoulder blade, eliciting a hum.

“Was it everything you wanted?” Jane murmurs, brushing a dark strand of hair back to kiss Nymphia’s ear.

A smile splits through Nymphia’s sleep, eyes still closed as she nuzzles deeper into the pillow, deeper into Jane. “It was perfect.”

Jane kisses Nymphia’s cheek. “What was your favorite part?”

“Mmm,” Nymphia hums, because how could she ever pick just one shining moment to stand out among the rest? How could she even begin to split the single most incandescent day of her life into segments? 

“The part where we went home,” Nymphia says, and Jane is pulling her closer. “The part where we went to bed and you let me sleep in.”

“Can’t let you sleep in,” Jane says, chin coming to rest on the crown of Nymphia’s head where it comes to press against her chest. “Too in love with you.”

They’re both quiet for a moment, basking in the warmth of last night as it rolls over to this morning.

“Wanna know my favorite part?” Jane asks, and Nymphia can feel the soft reverberation of her voice through her skin. “The part where we wake up and I get to say that you’re my wife.”

Nymphia can’t help but laugh at the sentiment. “This part?” she says, finally tilting her head up to look at Jane. She’s never gotten used to this - Jane looking at her every day like she’s still shiny and new. She doesn’t think she ever will. 

“Yeah. This part,” Jane beams, one hand coming to cradle Nymphia’s cheek as she smiles. “You’re my wife.”

“This part’s pretty good,” Nymphia stares into Jane, belly burning with butterflies, a love bigger and brighter than she ever thought was possible. “Say it again.”

Jane grins and brings her lips to Nymphia’s, kisses her with a lifetime of devotion. She pulls away, and there’s forever in her eyes. 

“You’re my wife,” Jane smiles. “And I’m yours.”

-

Jane doesn’t travel well.

She puts her packing off until the last possible minute and grumbles all the way to the airport. Nymphia can’t be upset though, because Jane ‘my wife’s’ Nymphia at every possible opportunity - she does it to the disgruntled employee who checks their bags, and the TSA agent who checks their passports, and the barista who makes their coffees while they’re killing time at their terminal. Nymphia rolls her eyes every time, but she’s smiling too, and can’t stop examining the sparkle on her left hand ring finger. 

Jane goes so anxious on the plane that Nymphia has to hold her hand through the takeoff. She doesn’t let go until thirty minutes into the flight, when Jane is finally distracted enough to drop her shoulders and stop thinking about the miniscule possibility that they go plummeting to the ground.

Eventually, they settle in. It’s a long flight, nearly twenty hours, and they shelled out on first class for the occasion. Nymphia’s got the window seat (partly because Jane knows she likes to look out the window, and partly because she can’t stomach seeing the ocean several thousand feet beneath them), and Jane wastes no time getting comfortable. 

(“It’s for my wife,” Jane tells the stewardess when she requests an extra blanket. “She runs cold.” 

Nymphia stares up from her book just long enough to swat Jane’s arm, muttering “that’s not even true.”

“I know,” Jane shrugs. “Just wanted to see what playing the wife card could get me.”

“Careful,” Nymphia warns. “You’re gonna wear it out.”

“What, calling you my wife?” Jane grins. “Baby, that’s never gonna get old.”)

They’re curled up together, alternating between books and movies and laughing at odd little happenings around them. Jane scoffs at shitty jokes on the screen, and Nymphia leans over to read her passages from her book, and Jane hums like she’s listening, but really she’s just admiring Nymphia in her comfy clothes, dark hair pulled back, glasses sliding down the bridge of her nose. She likes her the best like this.

At the end of her movie, Jane glances over at Nymphia. “Are you excited?”

She thinks she knows what the answer will be, but she’s asking anyway, because she wants it to be perfect - their honeymoon, their first trip together as a married couple, their first foray into the rest of their lives together. They’d debated on a destination for weeks on end. They’d considered a roadtrip across America (too pedestrian - they’ll save that one for another summer), or a week in Vegas where they’d get married again in some cheap chapel (too cliche - they’ll save it for their vow renewals). They’d debated on whether or not to book a room in the most luxurious resort they could find in Thailand, but had settled on a cozy beachside bungalow instead. Jane thought Nymphia would like that the best, knew she would too, because she’d be happy if Nymphia was.

It’s funny how someone can change you so completely and entirely, how they can bring out the best part of you that was waiting to be discovered. Before Nymphia, Jane had always put herself first, even at the expense of others. She was content like that, and then she met Nymphia, and the center of her universe shifted outside of herself. For the first time it wasn’t a chore to care for someone else, and Jane was better because of it. 

“For the honeymoon?” Nymphia asks, folding her book in her lap. She looks down at Jane all nestled in her blankets, hoodie pulled over her blonde hair, and can’t help but smile. 

Nymphia had always been a hopeless romantic, all too eager to hand her heart over to the wrong person. She was a tender thing then, bruising easily in careless hands, burning through her own wells of hope faster than she could replenish them, and after the almost-great-loves of her young adulthood, she felt like she’d been cored. Having her heart handed back to her so unrequitedly time after time, she’d thought she’d been selfish to want a love as big as her own, to expect anyone to be able to return what she gave to them. She’d stopped dreaming of it altogether, and then she’d met Jane. Jane, who reveres her like the Earth reveres the Sun, who worships the ground that she walks on, who straightened out every desire Nymphia had crumpled up inside of herself and gave her more than she could ever dare ask for. 

Now, Nymphia knows she can be selfish. She looks over at Jane and thinks that she wants this for all time - all of Jane, all to herself. 

“Yeah, baby. I’m so excited.” Nymphia reaches over to take Jane’s hand. “Jus’ wanna spend time with you.”

“Good,” Jane smiles, “me too.” She tilts her head up, puckers her lips in a silent request for a kiss, and Nymphia obliges.

-

The plane starts its descent several long hours after they’ve woken up, and Nymphia is grabbing Jane’s hand before she even has to ask, because she knows she hates this part the most. Jane sucks air through her teeth as the last bit of turbulence rocks the plane, and Nymphia rubs her thumb in soothing circles over the back of her hand. As soon as they hit the tarmac, Jane snaps back into place, blocking the whole aisle just to get Nymphia’s carry-on out of the overhead compartment.

“Sorry,” Jane says over her shoulder to a disgruntled passenger. “My wife. She’s pregnant.”

“Jane,” Nymphia hisses through her teeth. “You of all people should know I’m not pregnant.”

“Not yet,” Jane kisses her shoulder before they maneuver down the aisle. “But when I’m through with you…”

Nymphia scoffs, smiling into the air, because she knows it’s impossible, but if anyone’s love could defy the laws of science, it would be theirs.

-

Despite their sleep on the plane, Jane and Nymphia are so impossibly jetlagged, and the car ride to the bungalow is a delirious haze. Determined to push through the rest of the day, they tumble out of their room and onto the tree-lined streets, perusing the local offerings and getting dinner while they speak to each other in exhausted, two-word sentences that wouldn’t make sense to anyone else. It’s all they need.

And then they’re out under the sky, wandering in this beautiful place with blue-green water that laps in whispering waves over the sandy beach, and Nymphia has never looked so beautiful to Jane as she does under the moonlight. 

She’s running up the beach, shrieking as the water splashes at her feet, or when Jane chases her up the shore and catches her, spinning her around and pressing crazed kisses against her hairline. Nymphia is laughing, and then her cheeks are wet with tears, and Jane is wiping underneath her eyes.

“Hey,” Jane says, pushing Nymphia’s hair behind her ears, a careful concern crossing her face. “Why tears?”

“I’m just so happy,” Nymphia blubbers, smiling through the silver-wet stars in her eyes, because it’s all been such a beautiful blur, and it hasn’t hit her until right now that this is the rest of her life. “I can’t believe we get to do this forever.”

“God, you’re unbelievable, you know that?” Jane smiles. “Here I was thinking you stepped on a sea urchin. Or you got stung by a jellyfish. And I’d have to pee on your leg or something. Wouldn’t that be a great start to our honeymoon?”

“Shut up,” Nymphia sobs. “You’re ruining the moment!”

“M’sorry, my love,” Jane coos, wiping another tear from Nymphia’s face. “You’re the most sentimental girl alive, you know I can’t keep up with that.”

Nymphia just laughs, because yes, she’s endlessly sentimental, but, secretly, so is Jane. She still remembers the first time she’d opened a card from Jane and was met with pages filled almost entirely with ink, letters squished together to make room for as many as possible, words winding around whatever tacky quote was stamped in the middle. Jane had a way with words, despite whatever she’d tell you otherwise, and never ceased to amaze Nymphia with the sincerity she seemed to save just for her. 

(It crosses Nymphia’s mind then what her favorite part of the wedding really was - when Jane had recited her vows from memory in front of all their family and friends, had taken those impossibly beautiful things that were usually relinquished to their most intimate moments and had loved Nymphia enough to profess it in front of everyone. Not that they didn’t know already. You can’t hide a love as enormous as this one.)

“You keep up just fine,” Nymphia says softly, resting her cheek against Jane’s hand. She swears Jane’s eyes go misty just before she kisses her right there on the sand, beneath the stars, beneath the universe that brought them together.

-

Nymphia smiles when Jane crawls into bed. She’s in a gray crewneck that’s cut across her shoulders, and she’s propped up against fluffy pillows, and Jane is pushing the book out of her hands.

“Dinner was perfect,” Jane kisses her cheek before slipping into bed beside Nymphia. “But is it bad that I just wanted to get back to the room?”

“It’s terrible,” Nymphia turns over, slotting her back against Jane’s chest. “Is this the part where we get old and boring?”

“Yes,” Jane envelops Nymphia in her hold, fits against her in the way they’re going to for the rest of their lives, slides a hand down the length of her torso and up the inside of her thigh. 

“Not even gonna call you a whore or anything,” Jane kisses her ear. One hand cups Nymphia’s breast, the other dips between her legs. “Just gonna fuck you good and tell you how much I love you.”

“So boring,” Nymphia sighs, already melting away.

“So boring.”

(It’s not boring at all.)

-

Now that it’s hit Nymphia, she can’t stop crying every time the sheer enormity of it washes over her.

She’s always been emotional, but sometimes there’s a delay. Her life moves so fast, always swept up in the current of whatever dream she’s chasing, and sometimes it isn’t until she has a second to slow down that she realizes just how special every fleeting moment has been.

It’s been a whole week of being married, of wandering through villages and long hikes up mountain sides and afternoons spent sunning on the shore, of dawns and dinners and keeping a distance from the rest of the world as they know it. Now, Nymphia is sitting in a hammock at the edge of the beach, and she’s looking out over the water, and she’s basking in the overwhelming perfection of this moment. It’s something out of a dream, the sort of thing she’d long thought would be impossible for her to experience, and she can’t help but want to slow it all down, to draw out every precious moment long enough to memorize them, to make them last forever.

She’s sniffling just a bit when Jane finally finds her. She slides into place beside her, knees tucked into her chest, and stares quietly at the last of the sun as it sets over the ocean.

“Beautiful,” Jane murmurs, and it’s about the sunset, but it’s about Nymphia too. She presses a soft kiss to Nymphia’s shoulder.

“I don’t want it to end,” Nymphia sighs, unwilling to look away from the heaven that’s in front of her. They still have another day of this, one more perfect day at the edge of reality, and then they’ll be packing their things, leaving the quiet paradise of their bungalow and flying home. Back to work, back to their crazy, stupid friends, back to the never-ending rush and whirr of the city.

It’s not just that Nymphia doesn’t want the honeymoon to end. She doesn’t want this to end: her and Jane, so head-spinningly in love that nothing else matters, so finely attuned to one another, so freshly devoted to making it last. Nymphia wants so desperately to do it right, for their love to outlive that of either of their parents, for them to see all of their promises through for years to come. The possibility that they can’t pull it off is mind-numbingly terrifying, but the possibility that they can…

It’s an impossible promise to make to one another, and yet they’ve already done it. 

Nymphia sighs, mind swirling, and Jane somehow knows exactly what she means when she says, “what do we do now?”

Jane goes quiet for a moment, staring out over everything she’s ever wanted, and does her best to be brave for Nymphia.

“We sit out here until we’re too tired to keep our eyes open, and then I’ll take you to bed,” Jane says softly. “And then we have one more beautiful day, okay?”

“Okay,” Nymphia says, chewing on her cheek, still unable to look away from the landscape should it all disappear on her. “And then what?”

“And then we go home,” Jane looks over at Nymphia. “We go back to our house. And I’ll take you to work every morning, and then I’ll come home and be pissed about something, probably, and you’ll roll your eyes and tell me to shut up and I will, because I love you and, y’know, I generally think you’re right about everything. And we’ll have our stupid friends over and show them a billion pictures from our trip and kick them out so we can watch Project Runway and fuck. How does that sound?”

Nymphia giggles, and when she finally tears her gaze away from the beach, she realizes there’s another heaven right beside her, one that she gets to take home. And home, their home, the one with the fat cat and the mismatched furniture and their pictures all over the wall, that's another heaven too. Suddenly, the trip being over doesn’t seem like such a bad thing. Nymphia is almost looking forward to it.

“Are you scared?” Jane ventures softly, searching Nymphia’s face carefully. “It’s okay if you are.”

“Only a little,” Nymphia mumbles, voice wavering, eyes watering. 

“I’m a little scared too. We’ll take it one day at a time, okay?” Jane continues, looking a little smaller all of a sudden, pushing through every worry that threatens to override her strong front. “I know we’ll have bad days too, Nymph. I know I’m gonna fuck up and not listen enough and piss you off sometimes, but I love you to fucking pieces. I’m gonna give you the best I’ve got, I promise you.”

Nymphia takes Jane’s hand, and there are silent tears streaming down her face, because it’s only been a week and she already loves Jane more than she did on the day that she married her. It’s enough love to override everything that threatens to pierce through their perfect bubble, enough to fuel the years to come, enough to roll over into the next life and the one after that.

“And if you get sick of me,” Jane teases, squeezing Nymphia’s hand. “Y’know. Just say the word.”

“Shut up. I’ll never get sick of you,” Nymphia cries, throwing her arms around Jane’s shoulders. Jane laughs into her neck, pulls her closer into a bone-crushing embrace. This is the best part - Nymphia married her best friend. It’s enough just to hold her, just to be beside her. All those other parts, the sex and the sweet nothings and the swearing each other to forever, they’re just the luxuries of being in love with her. 

“You promise?” Jane says into Nymphia’s hair. She knows what the answer will be. She just wants to hear it anyway.

“I promise,” Nymphia whispers. “I love you.”

“I love you,” Jane says. “With all my heart.”

(They go home two mornings later, back to the city and their couch and their cat, and they aren’t scared anymore, because the warm glow of one another lasts much longer than fleeting sunsets over foreign shores. They wake up together, kiss goodbye on the way to work, hang their wedding photos on the wall and muse over the best day of their lives for years to come. They have lots of good days, and a few bad ones, too. They fight, and then they talk, and they never go to bed angry, just put each other back together in the way that only they can. And then they wake up and love each other more in spite of it.

The honeymoon was great, but here’s the best part: they make it last.)

[nicoise]

a kiss to prove you dont have feelings for them !!!!!!!

In an unexpected turn of events, Blaine was manning the kissing booth. 

It was possible he’d lost a bet. But he sat behind the counter looking completely at ease among the chapstick tubes and the breathmints and the stupid little privacy curtain. A tacky pink sign decorated with glitter hearts read, PUCKER UP TO SUPPORT MUSIC NITE. It was a dollar for a cheek kiss, five for a “friendly peck,” and ten for “ten seconds in heaven.”

Blaine was an equal opportunity kisser and the booth was quickly becoming a main attraction of the club fair. Kurt found it inexplicably embarrassing, like finding out an indie artist you kept to yourself had gone mainstream. 

“It’s really weird that you’re not lining up with the rest of them,” said Santana. “I thought you’d be salivating at the chance to plant one on his doe-eyed oblivious face.”

Kurt bristled. “You make me sound like such a pervert.”

“Well, aren’t you? I bet you couldn’t follow the rules if you were paid to.” At Kurt’s pointed look she said, “What, you think admin would let this happen unchecked? There’s no touching, no tongue, and no going past ten seconds. They have a timer and everything. Literal buzzkill.”

“That’s not what I meant. I can be normal about kissing Blaine,” Kurt said, offended. “I am so normal about kissing Blaine. I just - don’t want to.”

Santana looked unconvinced. “Because you’re incapable of being normal about it.”

“No. Because - because…” Kurt had the feeling that everything he said was playing into Santana’s hands. Santana was about to say something smug but he cut her off. “Shut it. Give me ten dollars and if you’re right I’ll pay you back twenty.”

“Thirty.”

“Twenty five.”

Santana pouted. “Fine.” She fished out a ten dollar bill from an implausible pocket in her skintight dress and did the annoying thing where she held it out to Kurt but hung onto it until Kurt snatched it from her. “Stay safe,” she yelled obnoxiously after him.

So Kurt found himself lining up behind a guy from his music theory class and a group of girls he recognized from Blaine’s social circle. He told himself he could always step out of line and make off with the money but he knew he wouldn’t.

Actually, Kurt let himself be so easily convinced because he felt that one kiss, surrounded by people he knew in passing and constricted by the bureaucracy of a fundraiser, would cure him of romantic delusions. Kurt had too much experience with unrequited love to make the same mistake again, and for all Blaine smiled at him and opened doors for him he was like that with everyone. So it wasn’t a crush. Just an illusion Kurt meant to break.

Kurt was almost at the front of the line when Blaine saw him and gave him a quick blinding smile. Then Blaine turned to take the ten dollar bill from the music theory guy. Was it the same smile he’d given Kurt? There was no time to wonder. Kurt watched as Blaine said something that made the guy give a flustered little nod and then Blaine kissed him. It looked slightly awkward, over the counter, otherwise not touching. Then it was over. Nod, smile, parting wave, not even a trace of a blush on Blaine’s face.

Kurt had signed up to be given the same charity kiss, the same nod, smile, wave. He stepped up to the counter.

“Kurt, hey! Are you here to support the music festival or did you come to see me?” Blaine grinned shamelessly.

It was a joke. He was joking. Kurt retorted, “Are you here to support the music festival or did you lose a bet?”

“Well, Sam was originally supposed to do it, but he has mono, so…” Blaine shrugged, slipping back on script. He gestured at the pink sign. “You have the choice of - “

Kurt slid the ten dollar bill across the counter. There was nothing he felt he could say.

Blaine glanced at it, then at him. There was something oddly heavy in his gaze before it smoothed into what Kurt could only call customer service. He went over the rules while Kurt thought of Sam, and Finn, and the music theory guy, and how there were no stakes in this, no destination.

“Do you want a breathmint?”

Kurt shook his head.

“Okay. Are you ready?”

Kurt was lost for words. What was this, a flu shot? 

Blaine caught Kurt’s look of disdain and genuine humor slipped through the protocol. There he was, amused, beautiful. He leaned in, inches away from Kurt’s face. “I’m going to kiss you now,” he whispered.

Kurt stood paralyzed, trying desperately not to let on that his heart was in his throat, waiting, unwilling to want. Then they were kissing. 

It was the most anxiety Kurt had ever felt kissing someone. Usually it was easy. It was something to do well, to make good. This wasn’t like that at all.

Blaine’s lips were soft from chapstick. He kissed closemouthed, but so tenderly it felt inappropriate, and he trembled in a way that couldn’t be construed as casual. Kurt couldn’t help himself and broke the hands-off rule to put his hands on Blaine’s shoulders, and Blaine relaxed into the kiss so sweetly with just that one touch it made Kurt’s head spin.

There was no way it was like this for anyone else. The crush, or whatever, that Kurt didn’t want to feel, or only felt occasionally, became undeniable like this, breath caught painfully between them, a sweetness so sharp it stung. 

The timer went off. Ten seconds. Kurt let go of Blaine and stepped back, feeling like all the blood in his hands had rushed to his face. He was aware of every point of contact on his skin, the way his clothes rested on him, and wanted so badly to touch Blaine on the other side of the counter that it felt like he’d develop telekinesis willing it to happen.

Through the white noise of the catcalls, Kurt managed to say, “That wasn’t a charity kiss.”

“No,” Blaine admitted. “It wasn’t.” He was dazed and flushed down his neck. Probably everyone was staring. “You should take your money back. I don’t want it.”

“It’s Santana’s money.” Kurt knew he was being awful but clung to it as a way out. “She convinced me - ” He couldn’t say it.

“Don’t try to tell me that meant nothing,” Blaine said, but he said it uncertainly, like he was asking. 

It was terrifying, what that did to Kurt. He opened his mouth to say those exact words, “it meant nothing,” but his gaze caught on how Blaine was running his tongue over his lips like he wanted another taste. A gut-punch of longing stole his breath. Kurt leaned in, heart pounding, feeling half crazed, and said in Blaine’s ear, “If I told you to abandon your post right now, would you do it?”

Blaine was nodding before Kurt was even done talking. He flipped the sign to CLOSED, pulled Kurt around to his side of the counter, and slid the privacy curtain shut in front. 

Kurt saw what he meant to do. “You’re crazy,” he said, laughing, helpless, but let Blaine take him by the hand as they made a run for it through the back of the booth.

Then they were outside. It was a blazing sun-soaked afternoon and Blaine let Kurt push him against the wall in the middle of the hall and kiss him and kiss him until they ran out of breath, and if there was a destination Kurt felt with stunning certainty they had arrived.

-

still taking prompts if anyone wants to send me any !!

[red-flagging]

💛 seb/lewis :-)

(kiss fic prompts!)

a little epilogue to rabbits are chasing :)

Lewis's flight lands at 8:02PM, which means that by 7:31PM, Seb is parked outside the airport arrivals door, drumming his fingers against the steering wheel and scanning the sky for approaching planes.

It's quite silly, getting here so early, but it's not as if there's much left to do at home. There's roast vegetables waiting in the oven, the cauliflower steaks that he started marinating earlier this morning chilling in the fridge. Mina and Ellie are safely ensconced in their duck coop with the heater turned on for the night. The sheets on the guest bed are freshly washed.

The car parked behind him starts up. Its headlights illuminate Seb's cabin. For a moment, he catches a glimpse of himself, harried and too-bright, in the rearview mirror. He scrubs his hands down his face. Christ. Get it together, Sebastian. He is a full 39 years old. Far too old to be getting the same jitters that he did the first time he invited a girl over at age 17, agonizing about what album to have playing when they came back to his room. Lewis is far too old for Seb to be doing all this. Lewis might not even be gay.

His phone buzzes. Seb nearly jumps out of his seat.

Lewis

just landed

getting my luggage now

hows it so freaking cold here

The inside of the car is already fogging up. When he'd asked Lewis to send dates he could come visit and Lewis had said just so you know the next few months are kind of crazy for me, Seb had expected late fall, maybe the holidays. Not the middle of slush season, when all the roads up the mountain have a 50/50 chance of being so muddy that they're undriveable.

Sebastian

I'm outside, in the blue Infiniti :)

He glances back up at himself in the mirror. The scab from where a wood chip caught the corner of his eyebrow while he was sanding the new planter box is almost healed over. His hair looks as good as it's ever going to. If Lewis asks whether he's been using conditioner, he's fucked.

It shouldn't feel like this. Seb beat Lewis to Senna's record, and Lewis still laughed at all his jokes the next season. Lewis watched Seb DNF twice in five races and still said in the media pen that he was waiting for the day Seb would be back up on the podium with him. When they inevitably auction off Lewis's Le Mans racesuit, it'll have to be with Seb's snot all over the front of it, because Lewis let Seb sob all over him and then laughed as he wiped sweat off of Seb's cheek with the sleeve. After all that – the fact that he's about to be in Seb's house for the next week shouldn't make Seb feel like he's standing in front of Lewis naked, without even the promise of a fast car or a good competition to distract Lewis from looking right at him.

His phone buzzes again.

Lewis

outside i think

Seb peers through the windscreen. Lewis – or rather, the blurry figure lugging a giant suitcase behind him that he assumes is Lewis – waves at him from the sidewalk. Seb flashes his lights at him twice.

The back door opens and Lewis's head, along with a burst of cold night air, pops in. "Hey," he says, a little breathlessly. "I don't think this is going to fit in the back."

It does, eventually, but not without a fight that involves Seb having to climb into the trunk alongside Lewis's suitcase and physically wrestle it into place while Lewis shoves from behind. They're both out of breath by the time they finally climb back in the front and slam the doors shut.

"You know, there are beds at the farm," Seb points out. "You didn't have to pack your own."

Lewis shakes his head, tugging off his gloves. His coat collar is turned up around his neck. He's wearing an an ear warmer headband, held in place by two butterfly pins. Every other bit of uncovered skin is pink, even with the heat in the car up at full blast. Lewis shoves his fingers in front of the vents and sighs with relief, closing his eyes. "Ugh, thank God," he says. He sounds exhausted. "Listen, you're lucky I fit everything into one." It sounds far less like a joke than Seb would hope. The fact that the fondness in Seb's chest still manages to outweigh the exasperation is probably a sign that Seb's beyond salvation.

"Next time I'll bring a trailer so you can fit your bathtub and toilet, too," he says, reaching for the keys. The engine purrs to life as he flicks the lights back on, then leans forward to scrub the worst of the fog off the windscreen. The thermometer on the dash says it's still 3 degrees outside. They might still be able to make it back before the slush freezes over. "Okay," he says, sitting back down and twisting around to reach for his seatbelt. "Ready to go?"

Lewis doesn't say anything. When Seb looks over, he's staring out the front window, playing with one of his rings.

"Lewis?" Seb asks.

Lewis's head jerks around. "Hm?" he says. "Oh. Yeah." He doesn't move to put on his seatbelt.

Seb frowns. Kills the engine so he can properly turn in his seat. "Lewis," he says. "Is everything –"

Lewis leans across the console and kisses him.

It's barely half a second. Seb still hasn't moved by the time Lewis sits back down on his side of the car.

"Uh," Lewis says, after a second. He clears his throat. "Sorry. I just – Shit. Sorry. The whole way over, all I could think about was – I had to get it over with before I chickened out."

He's fiddling with his rings again, but his eyes stay fixed on Seb's. His jaw is set. He still looks half-ready to bolt through the door behind him, out into the night.

"Well, you don't have to make it sound like taking your medicine, Christ," Seb says hoarsely, and drags Lewis back across the console to kiss him properly.

Lewis's lips are still cold. When Seb opens his mouth, Lewis sighs, pressing in closer with a soft sound that makes Seb want to go twenty years back in time and kick himself for not figuring out how to make Lewis make that noise sooner. His hands settle on Seb's wrists, holding him in place. Seb slides his own hands up, cradling the back of Lewis's head, to return the favor.

When he finally pulls away just far enough to catch his breath, Lewis follows him, close enough that their noses bump. His eyes are wide. This close up, Seb can see the dark circles under them more clearly.

He closes his eyes. Lewis is still there when he opens them.

"How long have you been awake?" he asks.

Lewis blinks. "What," he says. "Are you talking about."

"Sleep deprivation," Seb says. His heart is pounding hard enough that he feels it in his throat. "People start to get delirious when they're tired enough –"

"I was awake for 24 hours and I didn't kiss you at the end," Lewis interrupts, his eyes sharp and bright. "I'm not making the same mistake twice."

Seb opens his mouth and nothing comes out. He tries again. Still nothing.

"Fuck," he says, closing his eyes. "Okay. Okay." He drags himself back upright and reaches for the keys. "We can – tomorrow. But we should – you need to shower. And sleep." Lewis's hand settles on his leg. Seb rests his own on top of it; after a second, he squeezes Lewis's fingers gently. Lewis flips his hand over and laces their fingers together.

"Yeah," Lewis says. His thumb traces over Seb's knuckles. "That – tomorrow sounds good."

The slush crackles under the tires when Seb starts to move. Ahead of them, the headlights carve a path through the darkness. Lewis's hand is a solid, steady weight against his leg. "Okay," Seb says, to himself, to both of them, to no one. Lewis hums softly from his side of the car. He squeezes Seb's knee gently.

Seb closes his eyes for a second. "Okay," he says quietly. "Yeah. Let's go home."

[wexhappyxfew]

Kennedy and John with “feeling their pulse” from the prompt list? I love them already

HI ANON!!!! can i just say when i got this prompt request, i was so so excited because o m g i am so glad!!! despite the fact i don't have writing with them out yet (and their only interaction so far was a snippet from a while ago) i am BEYOND EXCITED to put this out!!! :D definitely a fun duo to write and something i'd be happy to go deeper with writing on as well! there is a LOT to unpack haha! please enjoy and thank you so much!

run along lover boy

(a/n): safe to say i could've kept writing these two in every possible way, but i held myself because alas, i have every opportunity to write more for them. so please enjoy my chaotic duo - kennedy farley and bucky egan in stalag talking about the one thing no one seems to want to talk about. enjoy!!! :D

"She's still out there." Lieutenant Bradshaw said quietly from where she stood on the opposite side of the table, her arms crossed over her chest, face both sternly held and downcast, the look in her eyes dismissive and cold, "I saw her when we dropped. She couldn't have been far from me."

Kennedy watched as Annie glanced towards Brady who stood next to her - it was unmistakable not to notice the level of protectiveness Brady had seemingly taken on when Annie showed up to the Stalag, limping and bloodied. And now, it was nearly every time they weren't forced to be apart, they were beside one another. And the look in Brady's eyes said enough these days it seemed.

"How far you thinking, Bradshaw?" Bucky said from behind Kennedy, "You jump outta those things and you're playing with fate."

"A bit more to my right. Bes was to my left, Kennedy closest. Margie was somewhere behind the three of us," Annie said softly, her voice trying to hold. Kennedy watched as Annie glanced around the group, "I tried looking for her, I really did." Kennedy watched as Annie met Kennedy's gaze before looking down again and letting her shoulders fall.

"You did what you could, Annie," Kennedy heard Brady whisper quietly, before squeezing a hand on Annie's shoulder, "that's what matters." Kennedy caught the look Annie and Brady shared, those few extra seconds they held one another's gazes.

"It's Margie Harlowe," Buck said from the other end of the table, "she's still out there. We know that."

"No body ain't a dead body," Hambone said from his own spot opposite Buck, "how far from here you think you dropped?" Annie looked to him and pulled a thinking face across her lips and then sighed.

"Had to be somewhere upwards of 50 miles. We weren't deep into Germany on the mission. Outskirts." Annie offered.

"Yeah, suicide run, if anything," Kennedy offered and sat back in her chair, "gotta hand it to Lieutenant Bradshaw though, she probably was the calmest outta all of us." The group looked to Annie who wearily smiled at the group and nodded.

"Guilty is charged." Annie said and the group seemed to share smiles amongst one another.

"Probably closer to 60," Bessie said from where she laid on one of the higher bunks, flipping through a book, "whatever it was, those Krauts are damn sins. One nearly took out my eye."

"Did he miss the goddamn Lieutenant bar on your neck?" Bucky asked her. Kennedy glanced back and sent Bucky a look who shook it off.

"Buck-" Buck started, but Bucky cut in and stepped forward.

"Any of those sick fuckos try anything with any one of you ladies, you tell anyone of us, alright?" Bucky said, meeting each of their eyes, ending on Kennedy, "You don't know how fucking brain-washed they might be. They even lay a finger on ya, I'll-"

"Hear ya loud and clear, sir," Bessie said, pulling her legs over and hanging off the bunk edge, "Kennedy popped a guy in the balls. Pretty sure we can all do what we can. In a pinch."

"Really." Buck said glancing at her.

"I'm impressed," Bucky said looking down at her from where he leaned back against the bunk, "how hard ya hit him?"

"Did he bleed?" murmured Benny from his own bunk - he wasn't tending well to the Margie news, but he was coping it seemed.

"Oh he bled," Kennedy said, leaning against the table and sending a look to Bucky, "he was on the ground. Beggin' for Ma at some point. Last time one of those Nazi-fucks tries to touch the hair on my head. You do whatever you damn please, but you don't touch the hair."

"I knew I always liked you, Farley." Bucky said with a smirk, Kennedy catching a glance of that grin in her peripheral. He held her gaze a second longer, which she quite enjoyed; the way his eyes lingered a little on her eyes and then the scar on her cheek that was finally healing.

"She's right on that, "Annie said, as Kennedy pulled her gaze from Bucky's face, "they think they can keep doing whatever they want. Don't think it's gotten through their minds yet that we don't put up with that sorta shit."

"Guess that they haven't met a member of Silver Bullets yet and they're finally learning they can't just do whatever they want," Hambone said with a chuckle as he flipped through a mangled deck of cards, "c'mon, Bradshaw, tell me what the one said again?" Annie chuckled.

"The guy said that he was overjoyed to learn that America had things like baseball and cold beer," Annie said, "what a lunatic."

"Hey, don't be knocking it now. They're the gifts that keep on giving." Bucky said, looking at Annie with a smirk, "Ain't that right, Farley." Kennedy rolled her eyes and glanced back at Bucky with a raised brow.

"For some people," Kennedy said, with a knowing look, "if you're team is actually winning, that is." Bucky smirked before looking at the group.

"That's because she's a Red Sox fan." Bucky said, lowering his voice with a chuckle, "Traded Babe Ruth and it was game over for 20 years. Still kinda is." Kennedy leaned back and took a shove at his arm with a roll of her eyes, a few of the guys chuckling around them.

"She'll show up, she has to," Annie said with a firm nod, "I'm gonna go take a walk along the perimeter. Find the Colonel," Annie shrugged her shoulders and sniffled, that damn cold doing its number, "get an eye on some of the higher ups."

"I'm coming with you." Brady said quickly from beside her and Kennedy briefly heard Bucky let out a chuckle.

"Try and figure out who the one guy was who wouldn't stop staring, alright? He got that crazy look in his eye," Kennedy told Annie and Brady watching as they pulled their scarves around their necks and their beanie's on, Annie looking much smaller than Kennedy remembered in her coat now, "taller, teetering son-of-a-bitch."

"Will do," Brady said as he followed Annie out of the room, a few of the others taking that as their note to disperse, settle onto cots or start up games of cards or chess. Kennedy let out a sigh and then turned towards Bucky behind her and raised a brow.

"Really?" she said, her voice unamused, and slightly monotone.

"What?" admonished Bucky, shoving his hands in his pockets, a big, winning grin showing on his face, "Brady's walking around like a love-sick fool, I gotta have a little fun." Kennedy raised her brow further.

"C'mon, tell me you don't hear it at night, 'It's just you and I….here….now.', and all this other lovey-dovey shit, too, Farley," he said, nodding at her, "swear if you heard it yourself, you'd lose your mind to."

"He's been crazy about her since she got here, let them live a bit." Kennedy said, standing to her feet and coming to his side before lowering her voice, "Especially here."

She looked back up at Bucky and noticed how soft his face had grown so close-up. His eyes gently resting on her own, lingering gaze, his presence something back at Thorpe Abbotts she would've scorn about, but something here she was latching onto more often these days.

Even with Bucky's roughhousing and good-natured fun, Kennedy found herself gravitating towards him more often than not these days - she remembered when she'd first come in, barely alive, hoping to get her eyes on even just one of the guys from the 100th who was familiar to her. And Bucky had been the first, pulling her from the arms of the Germans who had been dragging her, forcing her to walk as she was fighting a fever, who immediately had taken her to where the others guys had been, and gotten her soup, water, and watched over her as she rested.

Back at Thorpe Abbotts, he'd been someone she could throw a bit of flirty words and teasing nature around, just for fun.

Now, he was the one who had pulled her from those few days of being lost, sick and far from home and in the hands of the Germans.

"You have to remember the first time you were in love, John," Kennedy said as she leaned on the bunk beside Bucky and surveyed the small bunk room, "all those butterflies, that lusting feeling, c'mon, with a face like that, you oughta know." She looked to him with a grin, but instead was met with a sour-looking frown. Her smile fell.

"Seems I forgot to do that." Bucky said, reaching up to rub a finger along his upper lip and then sighed, sending her a glance, "And the butterflies, or whatever the fuck you're supposed to feel." Kennedy stared at him and waited until he met her gaze fully.

"Let me guess, you got a cushy guy back home, your Ma set up for you from the country club, and just broke a guys heart before you came out here," Bucky said, his tone falling into a somewhat jealous and distant mantra, "you don't even gotta tell me. Look at you, any guy woulda been lucky to know you." Kennedy stared at him, her heart beginning to race the longer she stared at him and his stupid pretty face.

"No actually." Kennedy said, about just as firmly and slightly cold right back, "Guys at the country club were stuck-up twits anyway. Only heartbreaking that was going on was mine." Bucky looked her way and opened his mouth, before closing it again.

"Yep," Kennedy said with a nod, "strung me on like fish to a hook with bait. Showered me in love or whatever the fuck he called it. He stole a whole lot from me that I'll never get back. Youth, whatever else." Bucky was rather intently staring at her and refusing to look away.

"What the hell was his name?" Bucky said, his jaw clenched a bit tighter, his shoulders broader as he had turned to look at her now, watching her with a look that was enough to make her insides twist.

"Stephen." Kennedy said and then shrugged, "It's stupid anyway. First love is a load of bullshit half the time." Bucky was still staring at her and she was sure anymore of looking into his eyes and she wouldn't hold back. Whatever she was feeling.

"Anyway," Kennedy said looking away and grabbing some of the canteens from the table, seemingly catching Bucky off guard with her sudden dismissal of the conversation, "I'll go refill some of the water. I'll be back." With that she turned, heart pounding.

"Wait, Farley-" Bucky said, reaching out to grab her free hand, his large fingers clasping around her wrist, his hand hot, sending goosebumps all over her form. She turned to him and watched as his wheels turned, trying to figure out whatever he was thinking of saying.

"I shouldn't have said that about you - the country club bullshit, and he sounds like a complete asshole. Steve - whatever the fuck his name was." Bucky said and then righted himself, his grip loosening, but not free, "I'll come with you. To get the water." She stared at him, mildly surprised, but almost not. He'd been giving her that quiet look for days now. Whatever it meant. Enough it made her pulse race. And she knew he could feel it. Kennedy smirked at him and then reached forward, pulling her hand from his loose grasp and grabbed a few more canteens and placed it into his arms.

"How chivalrous." she said, before giving him a smile and heading out the door. Bucky stood there silent for a moment, and was left with a snort from Bessie on the top bunk.

"What?" grumbled Bucky, glancing over towards the woman - whom he hadn't realized was still here nor paying attention. Bessie chuckled and flipped a page in her book and smiled.

"Nothing." she said with a chuckle, before glancing over at him, "Run along, lover boy."

[astrobei]

hi suni astrobi my beloved dear suni ❤️🫂

sending you a valentine's day prompt because i can annnnnd.

i challenge you to write miwi bc i need more miwi in my life. you can do whatever you want with this, but i want to see little baby will making a valentine's day card for his best friend, mike. bonus points if it has like paladin mike and dragons and all that other good ole fashioned dnd goodness.

hi andi andiwriteordie my beloved dear andi <3 happy valentine's day !! as a special present for you, here is my first ever attempt at writing miwi :^)

On Sunday night, Will’s mom brings home a bag of candy.

This, obviously, grabs his attention before anything else– brightly packaged somethings that crinkle loudly when his mom puts the bag down on the kitchen table. He can see them peeking out through the thin white plastic of the Melvald’s bag, and immediately perks up.

“What are those?” he asks, because it’s not rare for his mom to bring stuff back from work– especially on late nights like this, when she knows that Jonathan is busy with homework and no one’s had a chance to cook dinner, not when she’s been out all day and his dad is– well. His dad sure isn’t about to cook dinner, and Will has learned how to heat stuff up in the microwave but they’re currently out of everything that he can stick in a microwave. Will expects her to whip out a couple of TV dinners, and he kind of hopes she will, because it’s late and he’s hungry.

He peers over the long end of the table, trying to catch a glimpse, because the TV dinners don’t usually look like this– all pink and red and crinkly. His mom laughs, then holds the bag open by the handles so he can look inside. “Candy,” she says, “for your class Valentine’s Day party tomorrow.”

Will stopped listening after the word candy. He doesn’t know what Valentine’s Day is, and he doesn’t really care, because the bag is full of the brightly wrapped candies and chocolates that he saw in the store the other day when his mom took him inside. “Whoa,” he breathes out, and reaches out to stick a hand into the bag, even if just to make sure that what he’s seeing is real. A whole bag, full of candy. The wrappers crinkle some more, loud under his palm, and he pulls out a heart-shaped lollipop, flat and an almost aggressive shade of red. “Is this for us?”

“Oh, no way,” his mom laughs some more. “This much candy? All your teeth are going to fall out.”

Will grins. “My teeth are already falling out,” he says, pointing to where he’d lost his first one just a couple of weeks ago. He’s still not used to it, the strange space in his mouth where there didn’t use to be one before. He sticks the tip of his tongue into the gap there, and his mom rolls her eyes good-naturedly.

“Maybe that’s because of all the candy you ate at Halloween,” she says, and leans over to ruffle his hair. “It’s not good for you!”

“Danny in my class already lost three teeth,” Will mopes, “and he got three dollars from the tooth fairy, so maybe if mine fall out too–”

“The tooth fairy will refuse to give you money because you let your teeth rot on purpose,” Joyce says, and Will slumps into the chair next to her, pouting. “It goes against the tooth fairy laws.”

Will might only be six, but he knows that there’s no such thing as tooth fairy laws. There can’t be rules just for one person. That’s ridiculous. He tucks the lollipop from earlier into his pocket before his mom can see, though. Just in case. “What’s the candy for?”

“It’s Valentine’s Day tomorrow,” his mom says, walking over to the kitchen and opening the fridge door. “Your class is having a party, and these are for your friends.”

Will frowns. “What’s– Valentine’s Day?”

“It’s a holiday about celebrating the people you love.” Joyce emerges with a loaf of bread and a few slices of cheese. “Grilled cheese okay for dinner?”

They’ve had grilled cheese for about four days in a row now, but Will doesn’t mind. His mom makes them perfect. He nods. “Yeah!” 

“You have to eat the crusts this time,” she says. “Don’t think I didn’t see you throw them away last time.”

Shoot. So close.

“Fine,” Will agrees, then leans over to pluck another candy out of the bag. It’s pink this time. He thinks it might be strawberry-flavored. Will isn’t the biggest fan of strawberry, but candy is candy after all.

“I heard that,” his mom chides, back still turned to him, as the candy wrapper crinkles loudly under his fingers. “Put the candy back, Will.”

No! So close again. Will scowls at the traitorous sweet in his hand and tosses it back in the bag. “How did you even hear that?”

“I have superpowers, remember?” Joyce points to her ears and shoots him a wink. She’s probably right, Will thinks glumly. His mom has ears on the back of her head– or whatever it is they say.

“Why do my kids in my class get candy and I don’t?” 

“They’ll give you candy too,” Joyce assured him, flipping a sandwich over in the pan. “That’s the whole point! You trade candy and Valentine’s Day cards.”

Cards? “What kind of cards?”

“You can look in the bag. I picked some of those up on the way back from work.”

Will sticks his arm bag in the bag and shuffles it around, until soft cellophane gives way to the sharp edge of cardstock. He pulls one out– “Be mine,” he reads aloud, then wrinkles up his nose in confusion. “Huh?”

“Cheesy, huh?” Joyce slides a plate in front of him, and smiles. “Speaking of cheesy–”

Dinner! Will’s stomach rumbles, and in the face of a perfectly made grilled cheese sandwich, thoughts of Valentine’s Day slip instantly out of his mind. 

—

They don’t stay out for long, though.

“Jonathan?”

Jonathan’s room door is open, and he has his back to the door, but he turns around as Will peers through the doorway. “Oh. Hey, Will.”

Will shuffles his feet, hesitating. Is this a stupid question to ask? Surely Jonathan won’t think he’s stupid. Jonathan never thinks Will is stupid, even when Will asks dumb questions or says dumb things or acts super annoying. “What’s Valentine’s Day?” he blurts out.

Jonathan raises his eyebrows. “Huh?”

Maybe Jonathan doesn’t know. That’s a weird thought, though, because Jonathan knows everything. He’s in third grade now, which seems big and grown up and far away. It’s old enough for your grade to have an actual number. Not like kindergarten, which Jonathan says is, like, zero grade. “Valentine’s Day,” Will says again. Mom had been so vague about it, and he’s still not sure what’s up with the lovey-dovey stuff. Maybe Jonathan can help. “What is it?”

“Um,” Jonathan says. “It’s– the holiday of love, I guess?”

Oh. That’s lame. “Ew,” Will says, making a face. “That’s gross.”

“Tell me about it,” Jonathan sighs. “Why are you asking?”

“I have to celebrate with my class tomorrow,” Will sighs. “And mom got candy but I’m not allowed to eat any.”

Jonathan makes a sympathetic noise. “Lame.”

“I know!” Will exclaims. “And I don’t even– love anybody. Gross.”

“Well,” Jonathan says thoughtfully, “it doesn’t have to be love love. It can be, um. Any kind of special somebody.”

“Special somebody?” That’s a weird thing to call someone. “Huh?”

“You know. Is there someone special to you? Someone you really like?”

Will likes a lot of people. His teacher is really nice. He likes mom’s boss at the store, because sometimes he lets Will pick out a piece of candy from the display. He likes Jonathan, and he likes his mom, of course. But people who are special–

“Mike,” Will decides immediately. It’s an obvious choice, because Will hadn’t ever had best friends before Mike came into his life earlier this year. They do everything together– playing at recess, eating lunch, sleeping over at each other’s house. The other kids in the class even talk about them like they’re one person– MikeandWill– which makes Will smile. It’s nice to feel like he’s a part of something. Mike is special. Mike makes him feel special.

Something funny happens to Jonathan’s face, super fast, and then it goes back to normal. “There you go,” he says, then nods. “You can make something for Mike.”

“Like what?”

“Um, I don’t know. Draw him a card?”

“Mom already bought cards,” Will sighs.

“Make him a special one,” Jonathan shrugs. “Because he’s– um. Your special somebody.”

Will grins, wide enough that he knows his missing tooth gap is showing. Sue him. He thinks it’s cool, even if Jonathan has, like, five of them and doesn’t care. “Thanks, Jonathan!”

“Uh, yeah!” Jonathan sounds a little confused as he calls after him, but Will is already on his way to his own room. “You’re welcome!”

When Will gets back to his room, he pulls out his crayons and his paper, sits down at his desk, and–

He stops.

Oh no.

What is he supposed to put on a card? For Mike, especially, who’s one of the coolest people Will knows. What if he thinks it’s lame? What if he doesn’t want a card? What if whatever Will makes is so boring and awful that Mike laughs?

Will shakes his head. No, he thinks. Mike won’t laugh at him. Mike would never laugh at him, and that’s why he’s so special– everyone else laughs at Will, sometimes, about his clothes or his hair or the way he talks. But Mike doesn’t. Mike thinks he’s cool, and Mike thinks he’s fun, and Mike likes all the same stuff as he does– the kind of stuff that everyone else in their class thinks is lame but Mike doesn’t.

Will stares down at the blank sheet of colored paper. Blue, because Mike likes blue. And Will’s got a twenty-four pack of crayons and he doesn’t know what color to draw in, but everything else, the candies and the cards in mom’s bag, had been red or pink, so maybe Will should draw in red or pink too. And– everything else had, like, hearts on it, so maybe he can start there.

“For Mike,” Will says aloud, slowly and carefully, as he writes the words at the top of the paper. He’s pretty sure he spelled it right. He knows he’s got Mike’s name correct, at least. F-O-R. For. 

Yeah. That looks okay.

The heart is next. Will tries to make it big enough to take up most of the page, where the paper has been folded in half down the middle. It’s a little lumpy, but– yeah. You can totally tell it’s a heart.

Probably.

He opens the card to the inside, and pauses again. Great, he thinks, because what is he supposed to write on the inside? He’d already drawn a heart on the front, and it would probably be a little lame to draw another one on the inside.

“Think,” he groans out loud, putting the red crayon down and peering into the box. Half of them are broken, and some others are worn down to nubs, so it’s not even like he has a lot of options here.

What sort of stuff does Mike even like? Mostly the same stuff Will does, but then maybe that would be like Will is making a card for himself, and not for Mike. He looks at the paper some more, like maybe something will appear on it, fully-formed, if he stares long enough.

Nope. Nothing. 

Will sighs, and thinks harder.

Mike had liked that book they read in class last week– something about a knight rescuing a princess from a tower. Will hadn’t really been paying attention, because it was kind of boring and, like, sappy and about love, but Mike had been totally into it. Will had looked over during group reading time and his eyes had been huge and his jaw had been, like, on the floor. Will didn’t really get the appeal, because, again, it had been totally cheesy and sappy and gross. But Mike had found a stick at recess an hour later and brandished it like a sword, and Will had been too busy laughing to properly express how lame he thought the whole thing was.

It wasn’t lame when Mike did it, though. That’s why Mike is special– nothing’s lame when he does it.

Will picks up a crayon. He has an idea.

—

Don’t think it’s lame, Will prays, fighting every instinct in his body that’s telling him to squeeze his eyes shut and hold his breath. Please don’t think it’s lame.

Mike hasn’t said anything yet. Maybe he really does think it’s lame.

Will is starting to wish that maybe the asphalt of the playground could just open up and swallow him whole. Mike totally thinks it’s lame. Maybe Mike didn’t even want a card. Maybe Mike is weirded out. Maybe Mike–

“Did you really make this?”

Will blinks. Mike doesn’t sound weirded out. He sounds– impressed? Maybe?

“Um. Yes,” he says anyway. Mike’s eyes are wide where he’s staring at the card in front of him, and Will holds his breath after all– just a little– for one second, then two, then–

“Will!” Mike says, face breaking out into the biggest smile Will has literally ever seen him smile. “This is awesome!”

Oh, thank god. “Really?” Will can’t keep the relief out of his voice when he asks.

“Yeah!” Mike nods rapidly, never once taking his eyes off the paper. “This is awesome!”

“You already said that,” Will points out, but he’s smiling now too. “You really don’t think it’s lame?”

“No way!” Mike points at the crayon outline of a figure against the blue paper. “Is that me?”

“Duh,” Will says, pointing to where he had drawn an arrow and written Mike. Just in case there was any confusion. “It’s you as the knight. From the story.”

“I love the knight from the story,” Mike announces, and Will immediately feels like a million pounds of weight has been lifted off his shoulders. Thank god. 

“I know,” Will giggles. “You almost killed me with the stick you were waving around.”

Mike gasps. “Excuse you. It was a sword.”

“Sure,” Will says. “Okay. It was a sword.”

Mike looks like he’s going to say something else, and then he stops. He shakes his head. His voice is quieter now when he says, “You really made this for me?”

Will doesn’t know why they keep coming back to this. Obviously he made this for Mike. That’s why he’d labeled the drawing with his name. Mike. He’d meant for that to help, in case there was any confusion, but maybe he hadn’t labeled it well enough. Maybe two arrows next time. Or maybe he should add Mike’s last name, just in case Mike thought he made it for the other Mike in their class. “Duh,” he says again, because he isn’t sure what about this Mike isn’t understanding. “It’s for– Valentine’s Day.”

Mike goes a little pink. Will’s not sure why, because they’ve been sitting in one spot for all of recess so far, and Mike hasn’t been running around at all. “Really?”

“Jonathan said I should make a card for someone special.” Will tugs nervously at the zipper on his jacket. Why is he nervous? It’s only Mike. “And I think you’re special.”

Mike’s mouth drops open. He closes it, then opens it again, in an excellent imitation of their class goldfish Bubbles. “Really?”

Maybe Mike’s words just aren’t working today. Will feels like that a lot. He gets it. “Duh,” he says, for the third and hopefully final time. “You’re my best friend.”

“Wow,” Mike breathes out. “You’re an awesome artist, Will.”

“Really?”

Okay, maybe it’s Will’s turn for his brain to stop working. He’s not sure what’s so awesome about his drawing. You can barely even tell it’s Mike.

“Um, yeah,” Mike stares, like this is obvious or something. “You can totally tell it’s me! No one else in our class can draw this good. You should do it more. I think you could get, like, famous or something.”

Will doesn’t know about all that, but something warm and fuzzy is swelling up inside him anyway. Surprised and pleased at the praise. “Oh. Thanks, Mike.”

“I wish I made you something,” Mike says sadly, still staring down at the card, like he’s trying to absorb it with his eyes. “My mom just made me get the ones from the store for everyone.”

“It’s okay!” Will smiles. Really, he doesn’t need a card from Mike. He’s just happy Mike liked it.

“You can have my Reese’s,” Mike offers. He doesn’t fold the card up and put it in his pocket like Will thought he might, but holds it carefully in both hands and looks over at him, eyes wide. “Someone gave me one for our candy exchange, but I think you like them more than me.”

Will grins. “Okay!”

Mike hesitates, then suddenly, moves forward and throws his arms around Will’s shoulders. It’s sudden enough for Will to stumble backwards, a little caught off-guard by the puffy weight of Mike’s jacket and body against his. “Happy Valentine’s Day, Will,” Mike says. “You’re my best friend too.”

[sentientsky]

a tiny little ficlet based on this lovely comment from @queer4cryptids on this post! (i accidentally made it angsty, i’m so sorry!! but there’s comfort and gay yearning in there, i swear!) when the night falls low and settles against the side of the Earth; when the the dark begins to carry a certain weight, he shifts his stance. he lets himself breathe air he doesn't really need into lungs that exist simply by virtue of his inclination to breath. it's the same pattern Crowley's watched unfold a hundred million times times over—the stretching of a thread until it frays, three women, a set of blades; a wicked inevitability carried in the lines of time-weathered hands.

and still it never changes, never lessens the welling of grief that builds and breaks in his chest, that stagnates and stratifies like layers of sand upon gravel upon so many eons since he first fell from the sky and lost the right to mourn a woman hungry only for bread and a little kindness.

he leans back against a headstone, swallowing down a familiar hollowness. the sparrows have all taken root in the knots of tree trunks. the moon blinks back at him, clouds swaying like an eyelid closing to sleep.

he turns his face away from the light, sucks in breath for which he still has no need. the rough-hewn granite is going to scuff his coat; he knows this with the certainty of having lived in a world full of serrated edges for so many years. and yet he doesn't care. Crowley can't find it in him to give a damn because finally, finally he's there. he's there and he's real and tangible and it's been eleven months, two weeks, and four days since he's last felt the warmth of angelic skin so close to his own. not that he's been keeping count, of course. and Aziraphale's got that faraway look again. the one pressed into the lines of his face in the aftermath of a flood that tilted against the sky; the same one Crowley saw in the stark daylight of a death warrant unfurled and stamped with the name of the holy Mother herself. it's the same, hollow, teeth-gritted look Crowley himself wore as he stood on a hillside reeking of freshly-cut wood, bearing witness to yet another child of the Almighty thrown to the wolves. Aziraphale turns, then, and blue eyes meet black lenses meet amber-gold. "Crowley—" Aziraphale manages, choking it out in a half-whisper, like it hurts—like it scrapes his throat with bits of barbed wire. and, just like that, something in him is breaking and the oak trees are all whispering dangerous things and still, still he can't find a version of this story in which he doesn't lean closer, doesn't press himself forward into air that smells of earl grey tea and old books and something celestial and hallowed and holy underneath it all. and as though he's drowning—as though the moon doesn't watch them with a flickering gaze and the trees can't hear the brush of skin meeting skin—Aziraphale presses his fingertips to the side of Crowley's wrist. he moves no further. the air holds still, time seeming to freeze around them. it's intentional, he realizes; it's fire and it's heat and it's utterly fucking terrifying. even now, so far above ground, Crowley can nearly feel the weight of hellish eyes on his back. a shudder runs the length of his body. and yet. in the atomic space of that hungry, desperate, throat-baring yet, he turns his hand, trembling, to the side. he finds the angel's touch like a bird bearing North—like a compass forever calibrated to a single, fixed point.

"I know—" he rasps. “Angel, I know.” he twines his fingers with Aziraphale's, and it's positively electric. every cell in his tragically, wonderfully human body has turned pure gold, conducted and galvanized and sparking. a sharp, stilted inhale; a quiet anticipation carved out in the space between their pressed hands (and palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss...). the graveyard is still. the grief is there, still. the grief might always be there. but the sharp edges dull, the welling in his chest grows steady and slow and gentle. and the world becomes a little less difficult to bear with the two of them holding it up.

[tickle-bugs]

I have a Glinda and Elphaba prompt idea! Feel free to change things or take anything out. My prompt is semi based on the scene in the show where Glinda tells Elphaba that they should share secrets with eachother. Glinda’s secret is that she is really ticklish so of course Elphaba has to take advantage of that. Elphaba then shares her secret which is that she has never been tickled so Glinda (with Elphaba’s permission) helps Elphaba learn what being tickled feels like.

Secrets, Secrets

“Your very first party? Your very first party ever?! How do you feel?” Glinda bounces around in front of Elphaba’s bed. 

“Different.” Elphaba crosses her legs beneath her. She tracks Glinda back and forth, back and forth. 

“Of course you do! Elphie—“ Glinda comes to a screeching halt, blinking her big, sparkly eyes— “Can I call you Elphie?” 

“It’s a bit…perky.” Elphaba grimaces as supportively as she can. 

“To christen our new friendship, we should…tell each other something we’ve never told anyone.” Glinda flops onto Elphaba’s bed and they both bounce. She grabs for Elphaba’s hands, loud and insistent. 

“I’ll go first. Fiyero and I are going to be married!” Glinda squeals. 

“He’s asked you already?” Elphaba frowns. 

“No, he doesn’t know yet.” 

“Then that’s not much of a secret, is it?” Elphaba raises her eyebrow. Glinda pouts. She hums to herself in thought as her eyes scan the room. 

“Fine…I keep a reserve of extra glitter for formal events.” She gestures to a small tub on her shelf that’s genuinely emitting a low level of light. 

“No.” 

“I’m a natural blonde?” Glinda tries. 

“Definitely not.”

“I am—“

“It’s not a secret, Galinda.” Elphaba pulls on one of her ringlets. She pouts, then gasps with an idea. 

“My entrance essay was called ‘Wands: Need They Have a Point?’” She gestures as if the title would appear in the air.

“I was there when you announced that.” Elphaba snickers. 

“You are so—“ Glinda cuts herself off with a little growly noise that makes Elphaba snicker harder— “I have nothing else to share. My life is a beautifully open book.”

“Dig deep, Galinda. Surely you’ve got something.” Elphaba pokes her stomach and Glinda jumps. She does it again, then again, and keeps going until a stream of squeaky snickers fills the air. 

“E-Elphie, that tickles! Let me think!” Glinda swats her hands away. 

“Now there’s a secret.” Elphaba grins. 

“You wouldn’t dare.” Glinda narrows her eyes.

“Wouldn’t I?” Elphaba mimics the pitch of her voice. Glinda splutters in offense, and then she’s spluttering with laughter as the poking resumes. 

“I’ll turn you into a frog!” Glinda shrieks. Elphaba snorts and keeps poking at her waist. It starts to get less and less effective, especially as Elphaba’s touch gets harder. She frowns, but persists. 

“Y’know, I—eep! I expected you to be better at this.” Glinda still jumps at every poke, even as her laughter grows quiet. Elphaba recoils as if she’s been burned. 

“Oh. You don’t know how, do you?” Glinda murmurs. Elphaba turns sharply away. It’s a silly thing to cry over, but her nose stings with the promise of tears. She can’t help it. 

“Well, because I am so noble and full of dignification…I will assist.” Glinda bows. She takes Elphaba’s hands and places them gently at her waist. Elphaba considers tearing her hands away, but Glinda’s gaze is warm. 

“Now wiggle your fingers. Gently.” Glinda holds Elphaba’s wrists and nods in encouragement. Elphaba presses her lips together.

“Like this?”

Glinda collapses with a bubbly yelp. Elphaba immediately lets go. 

“Did I hurt you?” Elphaba leans over her. 

“No, no—you’re just a quick learner.” Glinda looks up with a dazzling smile, her curls fanned around her on the bed. 

“Oh.” Elphaba flushes a dark green. Glinda could be so much, sometimes. 

“Okay! Your turn!” Glinda boops Elphaba’s nose. 

“My turn?” Elphaba swats her hand away but doesn’t break focus. 

“For a secret, silly!”

“Oh, I don’t really…have one. I think.” Elphaba fiddles with her fingers. 

“Well, I’ll make this easy for you. I expect a rain check on a real secret later.” Glinda scoots so she can sit against the headboard. Her glossy smile tilts into something devious. 

“Are you ticklish, Elphie?” Glinda’s voice catches teasingly on her name. It steals the breath from her lungs. 

“Isn’t everyone?” 

“Dodging the question. Interesting.” Glinda smirks, leaning close. Her eyes rove over Elphaba’s already-warm face. 

“I don’t know. I’ve never been…people usually don’t want to be that close to me. Let alone touch me.” Elphaba sniffs bitterly, dropping her gaze. 

“That’s a shame.” Glinda says firmly. She stays close. Something in Elphaba flutters. 

“May I?” Glinda hovers her fingers over Elphaba’s stomach. Elphaba nods and exhales shakily. 

Glinda must not like that shakiness though, because she frowns deeply and takes Elphaba’s hands instead. She clutches one and spiders her fingers across the palm of the other, tracing up and down from elbow to fingertip.

“How’s that feel?” Glinda hums. 

“It’s…I…” Elphaba’s nose scrunches. Her smile breaks little by little, like the first sunbeams over the horizon. She tries to keep it together, but her lungs keep doing this indomitable shivery thing she can’t kick. Her whole body trembles with the force of restraining herself. 

“I’m barely trying to tickle you. I’m trying to take it easy on you,” Glinda snickers, her glittery nails dancing across Elphaba’s hand. 

“I-It can’t possibly get worse than this.” Elphaba peeks at her through one eye. 

“Don’t speak so soon!” Glinda says cheerfully, squeezing Elphaba’s side with a viciousness that contradicts everything ‘good’ about her. Elphaba crumples into a fit of ringing laughter. 

She wants to crawl out of her skin hearing her own laugh, the shrieky, cackly thing that it is, but every ounce of her self control has fled her. She falls backwards on the bed and Glinda crawls on top of her, tickling with reckless abandon. Elphaba tries to curl up, but she folds right into Glinda’s waiting hands. 

Elphaba throws her head back and snorts twice in a row. Glinda gasps.

“You are adorable.” She whispers gleefully. Elphaba hides behind her hands. Glinda tries to pull them away to no avail. 

“Kill me,” Elphaba groans, muffled. She resists Glinda until pointed nails poke just right into her ribs and she screeches, immediately flailing to defend herself. Glinda catches her wrists easily and pins them down to the bed.

Elphaba lets out a stream of nervous giggles, hearty and tumbling. Glinda flops on top of her with a dramatic wail. Elphaba’s hand finds her back instinctively. 

“What’s happening?” Elphaba hums, confused but not surprised. 

“You’re so cute, you don’t understand.” Glinda pops up in a distressed bounce of curls and ruffles. “I just want to tickle you for the rest of eternity.” 

And tickle she does. Elphaba squirms and giggles, tossing her head back and forth. Glinda coos at her, terrifying in her accuracy. Feeling another snort coming on, Elphaba grabs Glinda’s hands and pulls them away. 

“W-Well, if you keep doing that, you’ll kill me, and you need me for your sorcery tutorial.” Elphaba points at her, eyes wide with a giddy sort of desperation she’s never felt before. Glinda pretends to think hard, but really, she’s smiling. 

“You drive a hard bargain, Miss Thropp. I’ll think about it.” Glinda brushes Elphaba’s hair out of her face. Elphaba deflates in relief. 

Then: a suspicious tickle at her kneecap makes her release that snort she’d been desperate to suffocate. Glinda cackles evilly. 

“W-Wait, Galinda—“

“Oh, you didn’t think I was going to think about it now, did you?” 

[padfootastic]

james potter and Severus snape , word: potioneer

Please and ty ❤👀

hohohooo sadie coming in strong 👀 i’m so sorry i couldn’t help dunking on snape, he’s just so,,,,,easy to pick on 💀

Little known fact about James: just because he didn’t like potions, doesn’t mean he wasn’t damned good at it. He’d learnt at the knee of Fleamont Potter, the greatest potioneer of the last century, after all.

Snape realises this only a few minutes into their combined brew. He’d ranted and raged but Slughorn refused to part them.

“You better not mess this up for me, Potter,” he snarled, instead. The unbothered smirk he gets in return only infuriates him further.

“You’re slicing the root too thick, Snape,” Potter replied coolly before quirking his eyebrow in judgement. “And those beetle eyes, little squished, don’t you think?”

In the end, Snape had fumed his way through the prep, the easy competence pf Potter’s brewing—and his valid criticism—only increasing his ire.

“Excellent,” Slughorn announced with a simpering smile. “Of course, no surprise there, eh, Mr. Potter.”

“You flatter me, Professor,” Potter demurred but the glint in his eye as he winked at Snape was pure arrogance. Bastard.

Send me a drabble prompt!!

[actual-bill-potts]

i just read your finrod-re-embodiment prompt fill and I'm having all the emotions </3 (loved it a lot, I will re-read this so often, I already know that!)

For another Finrod-related prompt: anything about his friendship with Turgon, maybe?

(I'm very partial to any "Finrod survives and is brought to Gondolin for some reason"-aus, if you need more incentive, but I'd be happy about anything! From fluffy early childhood in Valinor days, to "where did my best friend vanish to I miss him"-angst.)

-finnritter

Turgon had once loved the Eagles of Beleriand: the hope they represented, the promise that the Noldor were not completely abandoned by the Valar. He still trusted them, and honored them for their help. But ever since they had come bearing his father's body, he could no longer feel joy at their coming. His father's chest had been crushed in; blood had encrusted his mouth and run down his neck; the bones of his legs had been shattered beyond repair. His death must have been agony.

Nothing would ever erase the sight from his mind, and no matter how he tried he could not stop wondering: if you could bear my father away from that battle, why did you wait until he was dead? Perhaps it was a disloyal thought, to the Eagles who had indeed risked much to retrieve his father's body, and to his father who would have been furious to have been ripped from the battle he had chosen; but he did not care.

So when he saw an Eagle circling, and was able to discern a limp body clutched in its claws, his only thought was: not again. And then as the Eagle descended, he caught a white-gold flash of hair and began running for the hill-top on which they customarily landed, heedless of his startled guards or the flashes on concerned recognition on the faces of his people. His mind was wiped clean of all but a burning urgency. He was aware of a cresting wave of grief, growing in strength in a corner of his mind - but he would not mourn until he was sure. He would not. He would not.

He reached the top of the hill just seconds after the Eagle landed, his hair blowing back by the wind from its wings. He bowed hastily and then hastened closer.

The Eagle had deposited its burden on the ground, a bloody heap of rags and limbs in disarray. The one ear visible through a tangled mass of dirtied golden hair was cruelly torn.

This was not Finrod. Surely it could not be Finrod. Finrod was motion and laughter, beauty and song, always arrayed in gauze and gems; this Elf had had misery carved into the jagged lines of his bones.

The Eagle bowed its head to him. The Lord of Wolves has suffered a great defeat, it said in rasping Eagle-speech, and left this one behind. We recognized him.

With that it departed, and Turgon with shaking hands reached out and rolled the body onto its back.

The delicate lines of Finrod's face stared back at him, thin and bloodied and so very, very still.

But there is not room for another monument next to Atar's, Turgon thought, miserably and inconsequentially. There was a great scream building in his throat, but he could not let it out. I shall have to find another spot. Perhaps I will have it encrusted with pearls. He would like that. His head was pounding. He could not move. He could not speak.

Footsteps behind him; his retinue had arrived. "My King!" Culúrien in the lead said; then, sounding astonished, "What has happened? Who is that? We must summon the healers! Cyruion, Eruion, go the healers' wing and tell them to come at once to the Eagles' Hill! Go, now!"

The sound of the chosen messengers retreated quickly, but Turgon took no notice. "There is no need, Culúrien," he forced out, "he is dead, do you not see?"

"But he is not dead!" Culúrien exclaimed. "My King, he breathes!"

It could not be. He had prayed for this, when he saw Elenwë's still body, and Aredhel's, and his father's. His prayers had never been answered.

But now he was looking for it, he could see it: the faintest rising and falling of Finrod's chest. His head spun.

But there is so much blood, he thought, how can he be alive?

Finrod's chest continued to rise and fall. Suddenly his hand twitched - Turgon saw with a flash of nausea that it was mangled, the white of bone shining oddly through his palm - and he let out a quiet cry.

Turgon was not entirely aware of having moved, but he was suddenly kneeling at Finrod's side, one hand in his friend's filthy hair.

"It will be all right," he said, like a prayer. "It will be all right. My dear friend, you will be all right."

Finrod's lips moved, soundlessly. Then his eyes opened.

"Turgon...?" he breathed. "There was...an Eagle..."

"Yes," Turgon said, "The Eagle brought you here, to my city. To Gondolin. Here you will be safe. Just - hold on. Don't try to move," he added hastily, seeing Finrod gathering himself as if to sit up.

Finrod stilled, breathing harshly. "Wouldn't...dream of it..." he said.

Behind him, Turgon heard the approaching footsteps. "The healers are here, Finrod," he said gently, and moved to get up.

But Finrod reached out with his undamaged hand, hissing through his teeth as he did so. "Please," he said, voice growing fainter with every word, "Please - don't leave. My friend - I have missed you."

"I won't leave," Turgon said, and meant it. He grasped Finrod's undamaged hand, and held it as the healers lifted Finrod onto a litter and bore him back to the city; as they bandaged his wounds and set his broken bones, and stitched together the deep marks of teeth and claws all over his shoulders and chest; and he was holding Finrod's hand when his friend woke next.

Finrod's smile, now lopsided by a scar that split his upper lip, was still as brilliant as he remembered; and the pressure of his fingers, though thinner and more bare of rings than Turgon had ever seen, was a warm and familiar weight.

"I am relieved," Turgon said, "that I no longer need to order an absurd amount of pearls for your burial mound."

Finrod frowned slightly. "What?"

"Oh, nothing," Turgon returned, and laughed. Something within him that had been frozen since his father's death seemed to be cracking open, flooding his chest with light.

He laughed again, because he could. It felt like a miracle.

[sga-owns-my-soul]

kiss numbers: 36, mcshep

yessssss i always love an excuse to write a good mcshep fic

36- To Give Up Control

"I didn't fucking ask for this, you know."

Rodney looked at the Major, hurt and confusion radiating on his face.

"Uhh, you kind of did? I mean, you actually very explicitly asked me to come out and have a beer with you, so I'm not sure what exactly you mean by that," Rodney responded, and John let out a frustrated huff.

"No, I mean this," his arm waved around, encompassing the general space around them, "coming to Atlantis, being in command of an entire goddamn base of people, including civilians." John slammed back the rest of his beer- his second beer, Rodney noticed, and he was reaching for a third- and ran a hand through his hair.

"Oh," Rodney said, because he wasn't sure what else to say.

"I just... My career was practically over, I was banished to Antarctica, and then all because I sat in the wrong chair, I'm suddenly in charge of keeping people alive in a war I accidentally started in another galaxy? What the fuck, man?" John wasn't normally so honest or vocal about, well, anything, but the beer must have been enough to make the words start flowing, because now it seemed he couldn't stop.

"Every choice I make has such huge consequences now. It feels like I've been forced into playing God, like I'm... Like I'm somehow worthy of deciding who lives and who dies. No one should have that much power, that much control. Every choice I make feels wrong, but doing nothing is somehow always worse. I just wish, for 5 fucking seconds, I didn't have to make the life changing decisions. I wish I didn't have to be in control."

Rodney still isn't sure what made him act. He isn't sure he'll ever know, between the beer and the odd moment of calm peacefulness that seemed so rare in the Pegasus galaxy and the intensity John was speaking with- but something told him it was the right thing to do.

He took John's beer out of his hand right before he raised it to his lips, setting it aside as John gave him a confused look.

"Rodney, what are you-" John's words were cut off by Rodney's lips on his, his hands pushing John's shoulders back to lay against the ground of the pier. The tiniest sigh came from John as he went limp on the ground, completely at Rodney's will.

Rodney kissed him harder, moving to straddle John's hips to get a better angle. John's hips bucked up in response. Rodney's hand ran through John's hair, pulling slightly at the base as he started kissing down his jaw. John moaned.

"I'll take control. You don't have to make any decisions, any choices with me. I'll decide for you, all you'll have to do is relax. Just relax, John," Rodney whispered in his ear, and John melted against him.

[thelawsofdaylight]

Relationship: Enjolras & Grantaire Wordcount:  3,912 Chapters: 2/2

They’ll later learn it was an act of sabotage. Since their maiden voyage, the Musain and her crew have managed to establish themselves as one of the most prolific rebel groups in the galaxy. Such a feat does not come without making enemies.

That’s later, though.

In the present, Enjolras tries to keep his calm as he watches Grantaire float further and further away from the hull of the shuttle, knowing that the longer he waits to act, the less chance Grantaire has of making it back alive.

___

Or, a Les Amis in space AU wherein a scheduled maintenance check goes horribly wrong and Enjolras becomes Grantaire's only hope of a rescue. Written for @racetrackthehiggins as part of the Discorinthe Anniversary Exchange!

[and-its-with-one-l-bitch]

i NEED to see a titoshaundi proposal for the prompt thingy pretty pleasee 🫶🏻

Prompt 31 - Proposal - 1.6k words, post-SR2.

The linen curtains sway in the breeze behind them, the soft glow of twilight illuminating the rooftop balcony of the fancy hotel they're staying in. The Saints make big money, and now they spend big money, and Shaundi? Hell, she's a celebrity now, nothing but the best for her. She's dressed like you wouldn't believe, the curls of her hair tied back into a loose ponytail and her dress tailored to perfection. It's purple and shimmers in the low light as she leans back in her dining chair, a faint smile on her face as she watches Tito across the table they share. He's dressed nicer than usual, shoved into classy clothes that don't quite seem to fit his frame, too tight in the shoulders and too baggy around his waist, but he's clean and tidy and fidgeting with the box under the table. Shaundi loves to watch him. "You know, when you showed up here, it was a surprise," she begins, straightening in her chair and leaning towards him, "a good one. After all we've been through, dinner dates were not what I expected. You've changed." She remarks with something lingering between admiration and confusion. "What happened?"

Tito swallows, hard, and quickly runs the back of his sleeve over his forehead as a feeling of dread and anticipation settles in his chest. He's got to be cool. Taking a deep breath, he shakes his head and forces a smile onto his face, digging down into the same reserves that got him through all the shit with Maero to steel himself for what comes next. "Shaundi," he begins, reaching out for her hands and taking a hold of them harder than he means to, "you and me, we've been around this city too many times to count. Y- uh, you mean so much... to me." He stumbles over his words, laughs with a little frustration, and powers on. "I can't imagine facing the future with no- with anybody else." With sweaty hands, he picks the ring box up out of his lap and places it on the table, something still too tense about his posture. "I want to spend the rest of my life, no matter how long, with you." Tito says with a smile, and across the candle-lit table, she brings a hand to her lips, a single tear glistening in the corner of her eye. Pressing on, he opens the ring box to reveal an enormous, diamond-studded band, pushing the box across the table. "You've been with me through thick and thin, Shaundi. I can't imagine my life without you. Will you—"

"CUT!" Comes the bellowing voice of the director, booming through the megaphone he absolutely does not need and only adding to the migraine currently making Tito's head spin. The illusion of intimacy, however fragile, is shattered immediately. He grits his teeth and prepares to listen to the little man squeal. "What the fuck was that?!" The director snaps, hopping off of his squeaky chair as he comes waddling to the table. Glancing at Shaundi, Tito spots her rolling her eyes before dropping her chin onto her steepled hands. "It's meant to be emotional! Passionate! You sound like you're gonna puke!" Cries the director, his hands in the air like he's begging for God's intervention. Tito's jaw tightens in time with his fists, his face growing hot. He never wanted to get involved with this show - shit, he could have never heard about it again and been at peace, but oh no, he had to be a pest, had to keep showing up on set and picking on the producers, had to keep dropping in to make sure Shaundi was fine. She always told him she was when he called her on the phone. Funny how he never believed her. Guess his face became too familiar on set, gave the producers too many ideas, and with enough convincing from the star herself ("It'll do wonders for the ratings, Boss!") he relented and agreed to the stupid script. Turns out reality TV isn't all that real.

"I just... don't think it makes sense." Tito says through clenched teeth, every instinct telling him to lash out at the angry director in his face, but something about Shaundi's expression holds him back. She looks almost... sad. "Look, Stilwater knows me as a shit-head, right? You think a suit and some emotional music is gonna make them forget Shivington?"

The director waves the script under Tito's nose. "Showbiz, kid. You know that prick with the shiny hair, Josh Birk, hottest thing on TV right now? Guess what he did before TV? Not fuckin' charity work, I'll tell you that. You've got to sell the lines."

"I am sellin' the lines!" Tito protests, rising from his seat to stand over the director as he feels his temper flare. Thing is, he really is doing the best he can. Never was much of an actor, but these words? He'd mean them, in another context, maybe in another life, but here? Surrounded by cameras and vultures? He feels boxed in, prodded. Searching for an anchor before he starts to lose his cool in a more permanent way, he looks to Shaundi for help and finds her giving him a sympathetic look that begs for him to just give it another shot. Ever since she showed him that she's the brains between them - at least a dozen times by now - he's been loath to refuse any of her ideas, and the pleading in her green eyes does him no favors. Snapping his mouth shut with an audible clack, he straightens out his shirt and slowly sits back down. The director scurries back to his chair.

"Take it from the top, people!" Orders the spiteful little man Tito has quickly grown to hate, waiting for the crew to settle back into their places; Tito takes a little bit longer to settle down and pretend like he doesn't feel sick to his stomach, but then the cameras are rolling again and he doesn't have much choice. From the top. One more time. Play the charade just once more.

"Shaundi," Tito says through the same tight smile he had on before, "you mean... God, what am I fucking saying?" He mumbles, planting his palms on the table. "You don't even know how many times you've saved my ass. The world wants you wrapped up in a bow and put on screen but I fuckin' miss you. Have I told you that? I don't wanna lose you. I know I'm shitty at this stuff," he scoffs a little, "but you always let me get away with it. You do mean the world to me. I'm sorry I don't show that enough."

Shaundi's eyes are narrowed, but there's a tiny smile twitching at the corner of her glittered lips. Wildly off-script but finally feeling like he's making sense, Tito takes another breath to finish the scene, the scenario, whatever, when, "CUT! Jesus, is this amateur hour?" The director's in his face again, and this time Tito's really pissed off, whatever confidence he'd clawed back snuffed out by the reddened face of the shouting man and his megaphone. Shaundi looks defeated; she'd been invested too, maybe hoping for an end to the never-ending work day. The director raises the megaphone to his lips but doesn't get the chance to start yelling again, not before Tito has snatched the damn thing out of his hands and tossed it over the penthouse railing. It's a miracle the table and the director don't follow, with Tito grinding his teeth to keep from committing a serious crime on camera. He stands up and shoves the director out of his space, but stops short of storming off. He looks to Shaundi, still sitting pretty as a picture in her glistening dress but looking exhausted.

"I'm sorry." Tito says quietly, feeling the fight go out of him as his shoulders sag. She offers a wry smile as she stands up, brushing out any wrinkles in her perfect dress as she rounds the table. "I hate the cameras." Tito whispers as she gets closer, and she hooks his arm without a word. "Can we go?"

Shaundi gives the director an icy, arched-brow stare that quells any argument, but her disappointment and fatigue are evident in every movement. She pats Tito's arm and steers him past the cameras into the back of the set, finally letting out a heavy sigh once she's sure they're alone. "God, I need a smoke." She groans, letting go of Tito as she comes to lean against a wall, hands on her knees. She looks up at him through fake lashes and begins to cringe. "I'm sorry I put you through all that. I know the show pisses you off."

"No, it's just," he sighs, feeling awkward now that it's just them, "I'm not made for the celebrity shit. You're good, you know? You're a real... star?" He says uncertainly, the words uncomfortable in his mouth as he says them, but Shaundi just laughs. She looks a little brighter as she stands up straight.

"You wanna get outta here?" She asks coyly.

"Where you thinking?"

"You still got that shitty apartment in the Red Light district?"

"Sure. It's still got that mold problem, though." He says, and even if he doesn't realise it, she's got his defenses down again. He feels relaxed. Shaundi grins, grabs his hand and tugs until he's following obediently. Glancing up at him, she's smiling again.

"Perfect. I stashed some weed in your dresser a few months back. I don't wanna hear any hang-ups; you are going to smoke that shit with me, we are gonna watch a shitty movie on that busted television, and we're gonna forget about all this. You with me?"

Leaving the set and trailing behind her, fingers hooked loosely together, he feels in this moment that he'd do anything he was told. "Yes, Boss." He says with a dopey, lopsided smile. "Wait, my dresser?"

[whumpshaped]

im gonna ice both cyoa stories of mine until after my exams are over. in the meantime im just gonna do short drabbles and hopefully focus on silence !

[hendolish]

hello hendolish/southkane anon back and wowwwwww can i just say how good those ficlets are? you made my little prompts into something amazing and i'm so happy just smiling like crazy to read them! thank youuuuuuu so much for making them a reality, its helped me feel better this week too. hope you're having an amazing weekend x

(also if still taking prompts and don't mind writing more hendolish can i maybe ask for another one? ur so good at writing them ahhhh. what would be nice to read is some throwback younger hendolish. so like flashbacks from the present to them when they're first meeting at SGP or even before. idk how or why they would have met pre England though, maybe at an industry event or training camp, or coaches introducing them, or via teammates on a night out? or little Ireland Jack sneaking to Wembley to watch England seniors play lol)

jack grealish/jordan henderson | first meetings ♡

“D’you remember when we first met?”

Jack asks absentmindedly one day after training at SGP, mumbling against Jordan’s chest where they’re tangled together on his bed, lazing around in their free time. He cranes his neck upwards to meet Jordan’s gaze when the hand combing through his hair stills.

“Course I do,” Jordan tells him with a chuckle and fond, crinkled eyes, “It’s pretty hard to forget.”

-

It’d been a few months before Jack’s first England call up to the senior team. He’d been knocking around with the U21s before then for a while, so SGP was no maze to him, but he’d managed to get himself lost some way or another and was just accepting that his fate had been sealed when he’d walked head-first into somebody’s firm chest blocking a doorway.

“Woah, y’alright?”

A low and very undeniably Mackem voice had asked him, gripping a hold of Jack’s shoulders when his balance had threatened to tip him over. Jack could feel the heat of his fingertips through his thin training kit.

Glancing upwards finally, Jack had been met with a handsome face that he definitely recognised off of the telly. His jaw was stubble-lined and bright blue eyes wide with concern at the time.

“What?” Jack had asked dumbly, still stuck staring until a dull pain had ached through his jaw as he cradled it, “I mean— yeah. M’alright.”

“Well good,” Jordan had said, still blocking the doorway Jack had been trying to go through to get back to the cafeteria (at least that’s where he thought it led to), “Could’ve been an nasty knock.”

Jack just nodded at him because he didn’t really know what else there is to say. Thankfully, Jordan was quick to speak instead, “Wait… aren’t you Grealish? Villa and all that?”

Allowing the corners of his mouth to hook upwards, Jack nodded at him again. Should probably actually say something soon. Jack remembers thinking.

“Huh,” Jordan’s gaze roamed over him then, like he was sizing him up, “Saw you get punched that one time.”

Jack wasn’t expecting that and a laugh snuck out of him; thankfully it just seemed to widen the tentative grin on Jordan’s stubbled cheeks.

“Yeah. Thankfully it was just the one time.”

He can’t pretend he wasn’t delighted when his comment had made Jordan laugh further, and soon the older was asking him where he was heading and holding back a smirk and amused grin when Jack told him he was going to lunch because it turns out he was heading in the complete opposite direction.

-

“Yeah,” Jack agrees with a laugh, reaching up a hand to rub over where he’d face planted into Jordan’s chest, “I did smack into ya pretty hard.”

But Jordan’s confused brow soon has him mirroring the expression on his own face, “Hmm?”

“That wasn’t the first time we met.”

Jack’s staring at him now, “Uh… it’s— it’s not?”

Feeling himself tilt his head at Jordan in confusion, Jack tries not to think about how it reminds him of when Skye was a puppy.

“No,” Jordan tells him, looking amused at the fact that Jack can’t appear to remember as he grins down at him, “It was at that club.”

-

Jordan had been just about to call it a night, reaching out for his friend’s shoulder to shout into his ear that he’s ‘gonna head home’, when some drunk lad had stumbled so close to him that Jordan had reflexively reached out to catch him and save him from the fate of the sticky wooden floor.

After helping the lad stand on his own two feet, Jordan had been about to resume his course of action when the lad, with longish hair that’d been slicked back against his head, had stared up at him and said, “Woah.”

Great. Jordan had thought, mildly annoyed to have been spotted by a fan on what was supposed to be a night off. But then the lad went on to add, “You’re fit.”

Amused, and slightly taken aback, Jordan had chuckled in response before remembering to let go of the lad’s arms now that he seems to be perfectly fine standing on his own.

“You want a drink?”

The dark-haired lad had shouted to him over the music after staring for a moment too long. And Jordan had let himself glance over him then; a horrifically loud designer t-shirt paired with tight black jeans, a clean-shaven face with all sharp angles pleasing to the eye.

Jordan had grinned kindly at him, “I think you’ve had enough already.”

The lad looked almost visibly disappointed then, but Jordan had been quick to pat a hand to his lower back, distracting him, “Where’re your mates?”

“Gone ‘ome.”

He told Jordan, the words coming out mellowly as if he couldn’t imagine why anyone would ever want to. Jordan had grinned to himself then, intrigued and almost fascinated by this lad’s endless enthusiasm.

“Alright,” He’d said to him then, making a decision that he’d text his friends later, “Let’s get you in a taxi then.”

-

The lad was, of course, Jack, who seems to be having trouble closing his mouth once Jordan has relayed the story to him, brown eyes flickering wide, amazed and partly horrified.

“You’re not havin’ me on?”

“I swear.”

Jordan tells him as he watches Jack continue to absorb this revelation, although he’d really thought that the younger remembered. Jordan had only known his name when they met at SGP because he’d been amazed to have seen the very same lad on telly playing for Villa just a week after he’d encountered him in the club.

“And I just told you I fancy ya, right to your face?”

Grinning, Jordan resumes soothing his hand through Jack’s hair again, which seems to calm him somewhat, “Pretty much.”

Jack visibly cringes at himself before emitting a deep sigh.

“You let me suffer in silence for,” Jack counts it out on his fingers, “Five months, before making a move on me?”

The younger’s exasperation is clear. Jordan slips arms around him and brings him closer in order to press a kiss to the creases in his forehead.

“Didn’t know if you meant it, did I.”

Jack scoffs, “Course I did. I mean everything I say. Got no filter.”

Jordan smiles fondly at him before kissing his lips, causing a grin to spread onto the younger’s cheeks in return.

“I know you don’t.”

♡

[hirokiyuu]

ace/riddle/floyd - nonary game

"We shouldn't trust him," says Ace, whose voice is a little rueful and whose watch reads 6; "Like, c'mon, when did he do a single thing that made any sense while we were in that room with him?"

Never, if Riddle's being honest--which is exactly why he can't shake the trepidation lingering in the hollows of his chest. Floyd is erratic, the type to get bored and wander off in the middle of a death game, and that means at this very moment on a whim he might be pressing Ally with just a single point left on his bracelet--or he might very well be pressing Betray.