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tovibeornottovibe · 1 month ago

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Don't Be Daft, You Practically Live Here - Part 1

Azriel x Fem!OC (Merrin)

Azriel and Merrin have been together almost one whole year now, all without his family knowing she existed. After he comes back from a mission and spends the day with her, he realises that it might not be so bad for them to meet after all. So, what better time to introduce her than Starfall? [7.9k words]

warnings: tooth-rooting fluff (domestic bliss, cats, confessions of love etc.), mentions of sex (no smut... yet?), swearing, az being a lil cutie pie

Part 2 | Part 3

Prefer to read on Ao3?

For three weeks, Azriel had been away. Rhys had sent him to the continent to probe into Vallahan’s affairs, to watch who thought what and why. It wouldn’t be enough to break them apart if they decided to be difficult, but his spies could sow the seeds of doubt. From what Azriel had learnt, he would say they’d all enjoy seeing them rip each other to pieces. That would be no less than what they’d deserve.

As soon as he returned to Velaris in the dead of night, he went to the River House. Rhys and Feyre were still awake, though his nephew was asleep, for once. He’d almost felt bad for interrupting them, but he had other priorities tonight. He debriefed them with everything he’d found out, as matter-of-factly as he could get just to make it quicker. They thought he was being odd, he could tell, Feyre had that concerned look she reserved only for him when she was worried about him, and Rhys… he hid it better, but he was just the same. Maybe they’d chalk it up to him being tired and leave him be. Or maybe he’d get Cassian kicking down his door in the morning so he could beat some conversation out of him.

Not that he’d be spending his night in his room in the House of Wind, of course.

It had been a horrible job. Over the years, he’d seen and done a great many terrible things, to the point where very little bothered him anymore. Vallahan was a different beast. The day they signed the treaty was the day he breathed easy, knowing he wouldn’t need to return there. Else, if they marched against his Court, he’d enjoy removing specific parts from specific people.

But for now, he wanted none of that, because it had been three weeks, and for that time he’d thought of almost nothing but Merrin. So, he didn't even bother to make it look like he was going to the House of Wind, nor the townhouse. No, he flew along the Sidra, making for a four-storey house just shy of the Palace of Bone and Salt, where the rooftop terrace was littered with plants, and the little, three-room, top-floor apartment was hers.

He landed almost silently on the terrace and went to the glass doors that he knew she’d open wide in the morning to let the sun in. Most of the time, she left them unlocked for him, but she’d known he was out of the city for a while. It hardly mattered; she’d given him a key not so long ago. He said no when she offered it to him at first because—well, it felt wrong that she should let him have unlimited access to something so private. He very much understood the irony. Then she’d pressed the key into his hand, rolled her eyes, and smiled. “Don’t be daft,” she’d said, “you practically live here.”

As usual, she was right.

This place was so undeniably Merrin’s. It had everything she needed and nothing more: the main room with a rack for shoes and hooks for coats by the door; a seating area with a comfy sofa and a warm rug where her cat had curled up into a ball of dark fluff; a yellow armchair by the window for her to tuck her legs under herself and read one of the many, many books which littered the walls in sage-green-painted bookshelves.

There was the kitchen in the same room, well-equipped with enough storage, a stone basin which she said reminded her of the cabin she stayed in on holidays in Summer and a dining table in front of the glass doors so she could bask in the sunset glow of the city and drink in the cool night breeze while she ate.

Then her bedroom, off in the corner of the apartment, with her absurdly huge bed for someone without wings and her masses of cushions and throws and the softest pillows he’d ever slept on in his life.

Somehow, even her bathroom was nice. She had an old bath that she’d cleaned and repaired, tasteful blue tiles, and niches in the walls covered in bathing products and plants she insisted liked the humidity.

And it was all hers.

Almost, he thought as he locked the terrace doors behind him and carefully placed his key on the end counter of her kitchen so as not to wake the cat with their jingling. Looking around, he saw the little pieces of him in there too.

The far end of the dining table that they never used was scattered with drafts that her clients needed her to edit but also, neatly stacked beside the mess she left behind while she worked, some reports he still needed to read. She kept his preferred blend of tea on the second to the top shelf in the cupboard above the sink. They’d moved her sofa slightly further away from the coffee table so he could sprawl out and stretch his wings while she got lost in a book in her armchair. He had a drawer in her dresser and a section of her wardrobe and she bought the soap he used and kept it with hers next to the bath.

Considering he barely kept anything of his own in his rooms in Rhys’ houses, to anyone who knew him, it would very much look like he did live here. He supposed that was true, in a way.

His shadows rushed through the darkened apartment to the bedroom, where Merrin was fast asleep. They knew better than to wake her by wrapping around her, though they desperately wanted to, so they dozed on the bed while he undressed and washed in the en suite. When he returned, he saw she’d pushed the covers off her slightly, and had shifted to face the window, where the moonlight was softly streaming through the curtains, away from his side of the bed.

His side of the bed. Since when had he decided he even had a side of her bed? But… he did. She slept on the right. He slept on the left. Had done since the first time.

It had been a stupid first meeting, hardly the stuff of romance stories or songs of great love affairs. He had been stupid. After everything with Elain and that Solstice and Rhys, he had been determined to spite his brother, to prove he could have anyone he wanted and that he had never needed to pay for it. So once or twice a week, every week, for months, he got as drunk as he could get, danced with a pretty female and whispered sweet nothings in her ear until she invited him to spend the night. He did everything she wanted him to and he was damn good at it. When she’d had her pleasure and he’d had his, he would leave without a word, go back to the House of Wind and wake up for training the morning after with a splitting headache.

He never slept with the same female twice and never stayed longer than he needed to. Never wanted to. It wouldn’t have been fair to her. He didn’t want her to expect something that he was never going to give. He just wanted sex. He wanted release, and he made that clear to whoever it was who wanted him.

Though that night, the night he met Merrin, he hadn’t been looking for someone to sleep with. He’d been itching for a fight. He’d wanted to hear the crunch of bones and for his knuckles to sting. There were easy ways to get that in Rita’s.

Drink. Watch. Dance with a female he knew had a partner at the bar. The female hadn’t minded, in fact, she’d been ready to pull him away somewhere more private. He had almost laughed at how predictable males were when he let her partner pull him off her and snarl in his face. Maybe it had been ill-advised to start a fight in Rita’s, but he had been past the point of caring. At least he’d felt something when he threw his fist at that male and cracked his jaw. The joke was on him, really. Who tries to start a fight with an Illyrian in a bar?

The worst of it was that he couldn’t even remember what that female had looked like, didn’t know the cadence of her voice or the colour of her hair. When he’d caught Merrin staring at him curiously from across the room, every thought had emptied from his head. Even as someone pulled him and the male apart, she was still watching while her friend chatted at her, and, for some reason, to this day he thought she’d been a fool for it, she wasn’t completely terrified. She should have been. He had been the very definition of someone you don’t approach in clubs that night.

Maybe she just had a thing for dangerous people. Or maybe she was drunk. Or both.

He decided, right there, as she kept looking at him while they threw the other male out for starting the fight (Azriel had the kind of privilege which made people think he was never in the wrong with this sort of thing), that she was going to be the one he was going home with that night.

And she was.

Sweet nothings and promises of what he’d do had done very little for her, or so she said. He had humoured her on that, since the both of them reeked of arousal anyway. Instead, she’d asked him questions. Innocuous ones to start. He’d escalated it just to see what she’d do. By the time she led him from Rita’s, they were just being obscene. Especially Merrin, especially when it came to his wings, which she didn’t get to touch for a while afterwards.

She had taken him to this very apartment, dragged him into bed, and for the first time in a long time, he went almost all night. Because she was the best he’d ever had and he wanted to know exactly how to make her whimper and gasp for him. That night, he’d broken one of his only two rules. He stayed wrapped up in her until the morning. She slept on the right. He slept, still aching and needy, on the left.

When they woke, she’d straddled him and had him again. He’d remember her smirk when he groaned her name for the rest of his life. He could have stayed there all day, raking his scarred hands which didn’t seem to bother her across her soft skin and pulling sounds from her throat that made him twitch. Frankly, he could have died very happily between her thighs and had no regrets.

But she’d kicked him out. Sometime in the late morning, she detangled herself from him, gathered the clothes that she’d torn off him and thrown to the floor, and chucked them at him while he was still coming down from his high. She cited meetings and work and I actually have a life which I need to do things for as her reasons, but he wouldn’t have argued with her if she hadn’t given him any reason at all. It was sort of sweet that she felt the need to say anything in the first place, and it was more than he’d ever given anyone.

He had definitely shown off when he left, taking the time to spread his wings to their full breadth before launching himself from the terrace, just so she could think about them some more. He got a kick out of the thought that they might distract her in her meetings later on. When he got back to the House of Wind, Cassian and Nesta had laughed at him and asked him if he’d had a good night with sly grins, but he’d given them a non-commital shrug because he was still thinking about her and he knew he was completely, royally fucked.

He was giddy like a green boy who just won his first fight, even his shadows were blissed out and calm, and he realised that for a good twelve hours he hadn’t thought about Elain. Not once.

He went to Rita’s again the week after and lied to himself about why. He told himself to find someone, anyone, and leave before he could consider whether Merrin was there too. But she was.

That night, he’d broken his second rule. He went home with her and stayed the night again. Cassian had called him a teenager the following day when they’d sparred and the marks she’d left on his back were on full display, even with his rapid Illyrian healing. He couldn’t find it in himself to feel embarrassed about it, and he wasn’t sure that was what his brother intended when he made the comment anyway.

The third time, she hadn’t given him chance to seek her out. Her friend, his shadows told him her name was Kessler, had already found company, so she’d dodged through the crowds to get to where he was leaning against the wall opposite the door and grabbed his hand before he even said hello.

“We’re getting dinner,” she’d told him with no room to deny her, though he never would have. So they ate in a little place where she knew the owner and they could get a private booth tucked away in the corner. He expected to feel exposed, but she’d read him so easily and taken him somewhere intimate and close. No one in there paid him or her any attention. Everyone else was off in their own little world and they left them to theirs.

The food was hearty and rich and the wine was good, made all the better by her twinkling eyes and soft laughter. He’d blushed when she’d interrupted herself and asked how he could be so gorgeous, then she called him cute for blushing and he blushed harder. By the end of the night, they had a deal to go somewhere of his choice the week after.

So, here he was, gently climbing into the bed next to her and shifting his weight so he didn’t jostle or wake her. He wrapped an arm around her waist and buried his head in her mousy brown hair, taking in the scent of fresh air and vanilla which surrounded her. But of course, she stirred, and his shadows took their opportunity to greet her, wrapping in her hair and wiggling under her black bedshirt, an old one of his that she’d stolen and claimed as hers. Her hand found his and she drew circles on his scarred skin with the pad of her thumb.

“Sorry,” he muttered, pressing his lips to the back of her neck, “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“‘s okay,” she said, her voice raspy and quiet. She shuffled back until she was flush against his bare torso. “Missed you.”

He tangled their legs together as he held her. “I missed you too.”

“Good day?” she asked, but she was drifting back off to sleep. He could tell by the way her head dropped back against her pillow.

In minutes of being with her, the tension he’d had in his shoulders had loosened, and his headache was easing. Settling against her, he replied, “Better now I’m here.”

She let out a contented hum. “Charmer,” she teased, threading her fingers through his and pulling his arm tight against her. A shadow curled at his ear to tell him to sleep.

He draped a wing over the two of them, the other he stretched out behind him for comfort, though the wingtip hung off the edge of the bed. Her breathing went steady before he could reply; the sound of it gave him something to ground himself so he could rest. He let his eyelids droop, and he was out not long after.

A kiss at his jaw woke him up. Merrin had turned herself around in the night to face him and her hand had crept around to his back, where she stroked the space between his wings. The feel of it made him shudder. Gently, she was saying his name.

Three weeks without her. Without this. He didn’t know how he hadn’t gone mad.

“Az,” she said, her other hand tracing the lines of his tattoos which whirled around his bicep. He tightened his grip on her as a response. “Az,” she repeated, more urgently this time, so he cracked an eye open to find her looking up at him. “I have to pee.”

He sighed and released her, begrudgingly lifting his wing to let her out of their little cocoon. “‘Morning to you too,” he murmured against the pillow he planted his head against in her absence. He rolled onto his front, taking up the space she’d occupied, and stretched his wings until he felt a satisfying pop in the joints at their base. The sun was barely filtering through the curtains. It had to be early.

“‘Mornin’,” she laughed. Azriel trailed her as she rounded the bed, shamelessly enjoying the view. “Stop staring at my ass, Az,” she called playfully, disappearing into the bathroom. That’s not fair, he thought, she stares at my ass all the time.

He must have fallen back asleep for a while, since when he woke again, Merrin was nowhere to be found and the sunlight was streaming onto his face. His shadows hid themselves from it by diving under the sheets. Or, most of them did. A few came rushing through the door to tell him that Merrin was out on the terrace watering her plants and to whine that her cat batted at them when they went past.

Once again, he caught the scent of her clinging to the bedsheets, and he could imagine her waltzing around her terrace, humming some jaunty tune from Winter to herself, her honeyed brown eyes catching the morning sun.

…Fuck it, he thought. He’d already missed training.

Rhys, he said, pulling on the thread his brother had left in his head in case he needed to contact him. It was mid-morning. He probably wasn’t waking him up. For a moment, there was nothing, so Azriel tugged harder on that thread, and it jolted.

That one hurt, Azriel, came his brother’s voice, deep but a little breathless. He wondered if Nyx was still asleep. What is it?

I’m taking the day off. Shock came trickling down the thread, but it was quickly replaced by worry.

You—the last time you took a ‘day off’, you came back half-dead, Rhys said.

That was true, but he hadn’t really taken a day off. He had needed to go to Illyria for information, and he’d needed to do that without interference, but Rhys rarely let him go there without his brother or him. To not rouse his suspicions, he said he would take a rest day, and Rhys hadn’t questioned it. Probably because Feyre convinced him not to. He had gotten what he needed, which assuaged the guilt he’d felt about tricking them.

I’m actually taking the day off, this time, Azriel assured him.

You said that last time.

He huffed. Why did this have to be so difficult?

I was lying last time.

And you’re not this time?

No, he said, his mind wandering back to Merrin. Not this time.

He almost heard Rhys sigh. And what will you be doing on this day off of yours? he asked, voice laden with doubt.

A good question. What would he be doing? He needed to get up and get dressed. He’d go to the terrace and Merrin would tease him for getting up so late, but she’d actually be pleased that he slept for so long. They’d go to that cafe across the street for breakfast because he knew how terrible she was at getting enough food in. She’d have cinnamon swirls and coffee. He was undecided. Then she’d take him to the Palace of Bone and Salt and they’d plan dinner. It would probably be mid-afternoon by the time they got back. They’d lounge around not doing much and enjoy each other’s company until one of them caved and climbed on top of the other or it was time to eat. All of that interspersed with him kissing Merrin an awful lot, to make up for the weeks they’d gone without each other.

I’ll be in the city, was what he settled on.

Doing what? Rhys persisted.

Anything I want, he said, that’s the point of a day off.

Azriel’s shadows began to swirl. Rhys didn’t believe him, that he knew, and he almost considered just blurting the truth that he was spending the whole day with Merrin. But Rhys had never met Merrin, he didn’t even know she existed. None of his family did. Not because he was embarrassed or ashamed or anything like that, he never could be when it came to her, but because he wasn’t ready. Well, he didn’t think he was ready to introduce that part of him to her. Yet.

She knew what he did, his job, and she knew some of the things he had done to get it, some of the things he wasn’t proud of and would rather forget. She knew those things because he wanted her to understand what she was getting into, being with him. He’d been so caught up in what he thought about himself, in the idea that he could never have someone like her because she deserved better than him. When he’d told her that, she had said that she wanted all of him. All the good bits. All the horrible bits. She told him that if he didn’t believe he was worthy of her, she’d believe enough for the both of them until he did.

So maybe it was foolish to keep his family from her. They’d love her, it was difficult not to, and she’d take it all in her stride. But his life wasn’t quiet like the one she led. And the moment anyone from another Court found out that she was with him and involved with the Inner Circle, she’d have a target on her back. Always. After all the shit she’d gone through to get to Velaris, to build this life for herself, the idea that it might be taken away from her because of him terrified him.

The thought that someone might take her away terrified him.

With hesitance coming at him in waves from his brother, Azriel said, I promise you. I really am just going to do nothing.

Would it make it easier for Rhys to trust him if he just said he was spending the day with a friend? Oh, the word tasted like ash in his mouth, sure, it was nowhere near strong enough to describe how he felt, but it would perhaps soothe his brother’s anxieties, and would invite far fewer questions than ‘I’m spending the day with my lover who I’ve been hiding from you all for a year and I’d like to be left alone with her for a while’ would.

Rhys’ response came half a second later. If we have to drag you to Madja’s at two in the morning again, I swear—

You won’t have to, he interrupted him. He hadn’t expected Rhys to be so against it, though, he supposed it was rather unusual for him. Then again, being with Merrin had made him do lots of strange things, like whatever had possessed him to let her put eyeliner on him that one time. He did have to admit, he looked damn good in eyeliner, just as she said he would…

Are you with someone right now, Az? Rhys’ voice, tinged with concern, dragged him from the memory of that very bizarre, very good night. You can just say if you have a hangover, you know.

Azriel scoffed out loud. I just got back, he said, You think I went on a bender last night, of all nights?

Something inside him wanted to be annoyed that Rhys would assume he’d immediately gone back to drinking as soon as he was back, but he couldn’t blame him. He was guilty of using his supposed sleeping around as cover when he was spending time with Merrin.

I wasn’t judging, Rhys said. We’ve picked worse nights to go on benders.

Well, I didn’t. I just want a break, Rhys. He left the fact that what he really wanted was for this conversation to be over and to go attach himself to Merrin for a few hours unsaid.

For a long few moments, they were silent, though the thread between them pulsed, both with his restlessness to get this over with and with Rhys’ gentle prodding, as though he could feel out if he was lying from the River House.

Okay, he finally said, I was just making sure…

I know you were, Az said. I’m fine. In their bed, he was more than fine, actually. Tell Feyre I say hello. And tell Cassian I’ll come find him tomorrow. He owes me ten gold marks over the Grand Duchy’s real hair colour.

Fondness tickled down the thread. I will. See you soon.

See you, he said, and the thread flickered until it went back to being dormant in the back of his mind.

A heavy, but relieved, sigh fell from his lips, and his shadows swiped across his skin as if to congratulate him on a successful negotiation. Then they hissed, hiding between his wings as gentle padding sounded through the room. Something jumped onto the bed, and a second later, a soft, furry head butted against his cheek with a purr. He freed his hand from the covers to fuss it, scratching under its chin, which had her cat pushing into his hand.

“Hello, Raskal,” he muttered quietly, all the while his shadows seethed at the attention he was diverting from them. “Did you miss me?”

As though he could understand, Raskal chirped contentedly at him and tried to curl up on Merrin’s pillow. Azriel caught him and pushed himself up, depositing the cat down by the side of the bed.

“You know you’re not allowed on the pillows,” he chastised, while the cat looked up at him as though he’d personally insulted him. “We don’t want to breathe in your hair while we sleep.”

Raskal stalked off hurriedly and Azriel had to restrain his shadows before they lashed out and attacked him while his guard was down. The relationship between his shadows and her cat had never been civil, but they seemed particularly antagonistic with each other today. Maybe they’d preferred the separation while he’d been away.

Leaving the warmth of the bed was difficult, and he might have sat with his legs swung over the edge, swaddled in the sheets to retain some of the heat before he braved the bathroom, for a little while, but he managed it. When he reemerged, there was melodic humming wafting in through the bedroom door. An old tune from the Winter Court about a snow fox which tricks a bear out of food. He knew the lyrics off-by-heart; it was one of the first songs she had taught him.

He leant against the doorway, arms crossed, a small smile on his face, indulging himself in the sight of her flitting about the room, watering the indoor plants on the windowsills. Once, he’d asked her why she had such a fascination with greenery. She’d given him a soft, slightly sad, look and said, “You can’t grow much of a garden in Winter. I was always jealous of our neighbour’s greenhouse, and when I was little, I promised myself that when I got older I’d have one too one day.” Then she’d laughed, “This is as good as I can get in this city! ”

“Are you going to stand there all day, hun?”

Jolting from the memory, he blushed a little at being caught staring. She stood in the middle of her living room, a hand on her hip, and unabashedly took in how he looked in just his underwear as though she’d never seen him in anything less.

Merrin, on the other hand, was attempting to kill him with what she was wearing. A sundress, green, floral, cut at her mid-thigh with a square neck. Cinched in at the waist. Very slightly hugging her hips. Straps for sleeves which left the toned muscle of her arms on display…

“Are you going to ogle me the whole time?” he teased, pushing himself off the doorframe and making his way towards her.

It felt so natural; they slotted together perfectly, his hands snaked around her waist and her arms around his neck. This felt right. Leaning down just enough to give a chaste kiss to her lips while he drew his wings around her just so. A gentle tug of a smile appearing. Her fingers threading through the downy hair at the back of his neck, sending shivering pleasure straight down his spine, so good he was almost keening.

“Only because you want me to ogle you,” she said, rolling her eyes. “And because you’re allergic to clothes.”

He shrugged, pecking her on the lips again. Even with the slightest of touches, she melted into him. Gods, she was divine. Even his shadows knew it. They danced around the two of them, whispering excitedly at their reunion.

“Not allergic, I just prefer to be without unnecessary barriers.” With a sweep of his hand at her back, which her sundress had left bare (there was only a tie at the back which kept it up), he made his point.

She hummed a laugh.

“I have a day off,” he said.

Delighted surprise came across her face. “My favourite words: ‘day off.’ In that case… If you keep fiddling with that—” he had indeed begun to pull at the tie of the dress, “—my dress will fall off.”

“What a nightmare,” he deadpanned, his voice lower than he had intended it to be, with no complaints from Merrin, of course. “However will we cope?”

“Later,” she purred, pressing a kiss to the underside of his jaw, the exact wrong place to get him to back off. Which she knew. “We need to eat. I’m thinking pastries. Actually, I’ve been craving them since I’ve been wasting away while you’ve been lounging around all morning.”

Still playing with her dress, though not actively trying to undo it, he said, “You could have woken me up.”

“Never, you need your beauty sleep.”

“Oh?” he laughed. “Am I not pretty enough for you?”

“Shut up,” she said, flicking him in the back of the head, making him yelp slightly. “You know you’re pretty.”

He grinned. “I might need to be reminded.” Another flick. He sucked in a breath with bright eyes. “You’re so violent.”

“You drive me to crime, Az. What would your law-making brother say?"

“‘Hit him harder.’”

She tutted, taking her hands and planting them firmly on his chest. With another kiss, this one a little longer, a little more fiery, she pushed him off her, and laughed at his scandalised expression. “Go put some clothes on,” she said, “I’ll be here, just waiting, because you take forever, gods know what you do in there—”

“Okay, okay,” he said, throwing his hands up in surrender. “I’ll be quick.”

It was midday by the time they stepped out onto the street, already bathed in glorious Springtime sunshine, with their hands intertwined. Such a simple thing, to hold her hand, but he got high off the feeling every time. Never had she flinched away from his hands, or any of the other scars that littered his body. In fact, one evening, she’d traced them one by one, and he told her some of the ways he’d gained them. No matter how gruesome the tale, it was never pity she gave him. Just love. She had a few scars of her own. He offered her the same.

It had taken some getting used to, having someone so… unbothered. Merrin didn’t ignore his scars, or his shadows, or his, more occasional these days, moments of broodiness. She simply accepted them, without judgement, and without fear. That had been hard to swallow too. She didn’t think him a monster, even after some of what he had told her. He wasn’t sure he could feel the same way about himself, but with her encouragement, he was trying.

She squeezed his hand and brought him back from his thoughts as they made their way to that cafe. They gained curious, but friendly, looks from passersby. There was not a single one who didn’t recognise him. A few, locals mainly, looked at the both of them tenderly, but especially at Merrin. Sure, he had their gratitude, but the people of Velaris did not love him like they did Feyre or Rhys. He didn’t need them to, didn’t want them to.

Merrin, however, had garnered the warmth of her neighbours just by being herself. She read to their children at the library and offered to cook for older fae who found themselves lacking the energy and paid a coffee forward for someone without the means every time she ordered. And she didn’t do those things because she wanted to be recognised for them, it just never occurred to her not to. Yet another thing to add to the list of things he loved about her.

They sequestered themselves in their usual corner of the veranda of the cafe, perfect for people watching and for privacy, though no one ever bothered them. No one ever talked about them in any way other than ‘oh, aren’t they such a nice couple?' Azriel knew this, he had checked. For a while, he’d been paranoid about people seeing them together, about putting her in danger, but no one blabbed about them, and for that, he was grateful. He’d realised that the people who lived here, in this quiet part of the city, were quite fiercely protective of each other’s business. If they gossiped, it was only amongst themselves.

“Az,” she sing-songed, drawing out his name tunefully. He blinked. She frowned. “Are you alright? You seem a little… distracted.”

He leant back in his chair (the one that, once the owner had discovered that he was the mysterious stranger who was with ‘our Merrin’, had been swapped out for one which could accommodate his wings). How could he explain to her everything he was thinking? All his undecipherable emotions?

“Hey,” she said softly, reaching for his hand, which he happily let her grab. “It’s just me. Tell me what’s up.”

At that moment, just as he opened his mouth, their order arrived, delivered by a bubbly waiter who Merrin knew casually through a friend. They chatted, Merrin being too polite to give him short answers to make him go away, but he did, eventually, having left her cinnamon swirls and his chocolate-filled cornetti, a coffee with frothed milk and sugar for her, and a black, bitter coffee for him. With a worried look, she knocked his leg under the table, ignoring the food altogether.

“I just…” he trailed off. How to say it…

He blurted the only thing he could think of.

“I’m in love with you.”

She quirked her brow, an incredulous look on her face, then chuckled. “Well yes, I should hope so. I love you too, you know that.”

Of course he knew that. Everyday they were together, they told each other. Every little thing she did for him, with him, she did with love. He was past the point of doubting her. But that wasn’t really what he was getting at.

“I mean,” he said, struggling to think of a better way to put it, “I’m in love with you.”

A pause. “You’re going to have to elaborate, hun.”

Now, he was really wishing he’d taken Cassian’s advice and actually read some poetry. How in the world could he put it to make her understand?

“I don’t—it’s… difficult to explain.” He gave her a pleading look, as if to beg her not to make him keep talking.

But, as ever, she was unyieldingly stubborn. Taking a sip of her coffee, she said, “We aren’t in a rush.” Hastily, she added, “But you don’t have to say, of course, I’m just— intrigued. I never really thought there was a difference between loving someone and being in love with them.”

There was. Azriel just couldn’t articulate it to her. It was like choosing between standing by a fire for heat and wrapping yourself in a blanket with a mug of tea. Functionally the same, yet entirely different.

“But I suppose there is,” she continued, getting that contemplative look on her face, like when she read something she couldn’t quite wrap her head around. “Loving can be surface-level, like how you love a book, or the way the Sidra looks on Starfall. It’s love, but it’s not always deep, not always in here.” She tapped her chest right where her heart was. “But being in love, that’s like… you can feel it, in every part of you, head to your toes. Like it’s a part of you.”

He smiled gently. “You get it,” he said. Of course she did. It was Merrin.

“Then—I’m in love with you too, Az,” she said quietly, her eyes twinkling. “Now we better eat, the coffee’s going cold.”

So they did, their conversation lightening as they picked apart their pastries and drained their coffee cups. They wandered from person to person: she told him how Kessler was writing her tenth book in a fantasy series before the eighth had even been published; he spilled details on Amren and Varian (Amren, for whatever reason, fascinated her) and their escapade at the Autumn equinox—he was not above petty rumours, after all, they made up half his job. She ordered more coffee, which he teased her for (“You’ll be bouncing off the walls when we get home.” ), and he inappropriately used his shadows to eavesdrop on a couple who had caught her attention as they walked by. Ex-lovers rekindling their affair, both married, he divulged, while she emphatically gasped.

As he predicted, the Palace of Bone and Salt was their next stop. He was happy to indulge her dragging him around every stall, talking with every seller, some of whom offered them free samples as a show of thanks to him, which made him feel incredibly awkward. Merrin liked them, and told him to enjoy the benefits of being someone important.

“Lots of people are important,” he said. “They just don’t get people offering them their livelihoods.”

“A sliver of pecorino won’t pay their rent, Az. Take the damn cheese,” she said, then, a finger to her chin, “actually, I need cheese. We should go back.”

Bags loaded with goods (he sneakily bought oranges while Merrin wasn’t looking, because they were her favourite and she never got them in, "Too expensive," she said), they chatted idly on their way back to her apartment. Her sports team had beaten his in the third round of the championship just the week prior, so she gloated until he pulled his "but my team have won the most trophies overall so who’s losing in the grand scheme of things, Merrin? " card, which never failed to get her spitting, "The last time you won was sixty years ago, Az! Six-oh!" Another thing they had in common: an unrelenting competitive streak. She’d actually shoved him into the Sidra once because they were arguing about the best draughts opener. "Accidentally," she insisted. He shook water at her in revenge.

He was suddenly struck by the thought that Cassian and Rhys would laugh their asses off if they saw that happen. They’d probably buy her a drink or two… Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to introduce her to them.

Actually, he could spare himself the agony of having another person to taunt him. Combining their strength would be an awful idea, now that he thought of it.

Raskal sniffed curiously at the shopping bags before his shadows chased him from the kitchen table and out onto the terrace. He meowed indignantly when they attempted to shut the door on him, but Az pulled them back with such conviction they apologised to him. He told them they should be saying sorry to the cat instead.

Merrin swatted at him when he revealed the oranges from his pockets with a grin, and laughed when his shadows dropped three more in the fruit bowl. While he unpacked the rest of the food, she pared the skin off two of them and cut off the pith. They shared the slices at the table.

“Are you partying hard in the House of Wind for Starfall?”

“Of course. All the civil servants and regional advisors will be getting progressively more drunk and I will be sipping wine watching everyone else fall over themselves,” he said.

“How sophisticated,” she smirked. “I’ll be sure to send an anonymous gift. If I address it to you and sign it with kisses at the end, will your family freak?”

“Yes, please don’t give them more ammunition to tease me. They have five-hundred-years of it.” A smile grew on her lips. “Don’t you dare, Merrin,” he warned.

“You can’t stop me now,” she laughed.

Seeing there was only one orange slice left, he split it in half carefully, managing to keep the spray of juice contained, and handed a piece to her. “I can,” he said, still chewing, “I will invite you so they can bombard you with questions while I laugh at you.”

“‘Joke’s on you, hun, you’re just letting me network at that point.”

He snorted. “You network every other week.”

“I could always do with more useful people to know.”

An idea bloomed in his head. Ill-formed, possibly. But a good one? Hopefully. Today had made him realise, he could introduce her to everyone. It would be awkward, he would hate it more than she would, but… he’d been out in the open with her today, and it had felt so normal that he hadn’t even considered checking if any of the Inner Circle were in the city too. He found himself not caring if they had been.

The threat it posed still frightened him. He’d have to explain to her what it would mean for people to know they were together outside of Velaris (because it would get out, politicians talked, a lot). But he could protect her. It wasn’t arrogance to admit it. No one would be stupid enough to touch her.

Besides, she could take care of herself, and had been doing that for a very long time before they met.

“Then, come to the House of Wind for Starfall,” he said seriously. “Not for networking,” he added quickly, “for me.”

She stilled.

“Are you joking?”

“No.”

“...Can you just invite me?” She snapped her fingers. “Like that?”

A raised brow told her that yes, of course he could.

“Isn’t it supposed to be for, you know, important, political people who all do jobs with fancy titles and—?”

“Merrin,” he said, cutting her off before she could spiral. “You are important. To me, at the very least. And we do invite people we like too. Makes for a better afterparty.”

For a moment, she considered him.

“And how will you be introducing me?” she asked quietly.

“Partner, lover, girlfriend, love of my life, most gorgeous female alive… take your pick,” he said, the latter earning him an eye roll with a very small twitch of the lips, which he took as a victory.

“All of them?” A tentative question.

“Fine. All of them,” he said.

Her voice still small and raw with emotion, she said, a soft smile brightening her face, “Then I’m afraid we’re going dress shopping. I don’t own anything nearly nice enough.”

Lie. He could think of three dresses in her wardrobe that would work, including the green velvet one that had made him lose his mind one night before she went to a gathering for the publishing house. He’d almost, almost, convinced her to stay home and spend the night with him instead.

Better not wear it for Starfall, then, he thought. He wouldn’t make it through the night decently.

He hummed in agreement. “Don’t invite Kessler—”

Merrin scoffed. “Gods, no. I love her to bits but her fashion sense...” She gave a theatrical shudder.

Azriel couldn’t help but agree. He and Kessler had met by accident, once, (though, he kept tabs on her just in case. Just doing his job!) and he liked her very much, not just because she was a good friend to Merrin but because she was totally, unapologetically herself. If Kessler liked him back, Merrin had never told him, however, it was likely he would know if she didn’t. Kessler was like that. She and Nesta would either get on well or level a building when they clashed.

“She’s going home for Starfall anyway,” Merrin said. “Her brother insisted this year.”

“Any news from your brother?” he asked. Occasionally, he sent a shadow or two to the Summer Court to check on her brother, usually at her request when she hadn’t heard from him in a while. The male was always swamped with work. Unsurprising that he so rarely answered personal letters. Tarquin really did run him ragged.

Wrong thing to ask, it seemed. She grumbled, “He’s still uppity about the Solstice.” Right. Her brother went back home to the Winter Court for it. Merrin did not. “I haven’t been back for decades. I don’t know why it’s only just started bothering him. At least he’s making headway, he was all too eager to gloat about the new ‘Egality’ laws he helped draft. I mean, great. I’m glad. But, gods, is he smug about it. I can actually feel it coming off the page from him.”

She’d shown him some of her brother’s letters to her. The smugness was not new, but no less annoying to read. A part of him was glad they’d never met. After some of the stories she’d told him, he started to understand why Rhys felt so strongly about Nesta.

“Let’s not talk about him,” she said. “Gives me a headache even thinking about it. How are your brothers?”

“Well, I think. I saw Rhys last night. Nyx is keeping him and Feyre up all night, though. And Cassian—” he shrugged, “—when I left Nesta had told him to sleep in the townhouse. He must be back up in the House by now.”

Merrin gaped at him. “Did you not go see him when you got back?”

“No,” he said. “I came straight here.”

“Az!” she admonished him, shaking her head. “Priorities!”

“He can go another day without me. He’s a fully-grown male, most of the time.”

“Well, I’m telling him you called him a child when I meet him.”

The certainty she had said that with made him smile. Starfall with Merrin; the first one they would spend together, where she would tease him with Cassian and blush around Feyre and pepper Amren with questions and… maybe he was ready after all.

a/n: want a taglist for this one? let me know! also, this was the first fic i wrote for Merrin and Az, so it's technically their origin story (even if Club Rats comes before it chronologically. the shirt Merrin wears in this is the one she steals in that fic hehe)

#azriel #azriel x oc #azriel acotar #azriel fanfic #azriel fic #azriel shadowsinger #azriel x reader #azriel x you #azriel fluff #azriel in looooove

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darsynia · 10 months ago

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Forgiven (CEO Steve/f!Reader)

MCU MASTERLIST | STEVE MASTERLIST | Ro Roll | Part II

Summary: Since dropping out of school to care for your sister, your daydream has been that a rich, handsome man will save you from drowning in debt. Until then (read: never), you’ll work hard at your new receptionist job and try not to ogle the impossibly hot construction guy working in the foyer…

Words/Warnings: 2,855 | none

As 5/7 of my Ro Roll birthday fics for @ronearoundblindly, forGIVEn is a fluffy meet cute between CEO Steve and f!Freader. Gif is by @ashilesun.

Excerpt:

“Something wrong, miss?”

You look up to see Foreman Eye Candy standing beside the desk looking gently concerned. One sandy blonde curl is plastered to his forehead with sweat, and you can see that his eyes are a gorgeous shade of blue.

From behind you, a hand lands on your shoulder with just enough pressure to guide you to your seat.

“Nothing of note, Sir, I’m sure!” your coworker says hurriedly.

“All right,” the man says, setting his left hand down on the counter. There’s no ring on his finger. ‘Sir’ Eye Candy (you’re going to hell for all of this) offers a kindly, “Have a good afternoon,” and right at that moment, both of the reception phones ring. There’s no time to process the oddness of what’s just happened, not until you’re back at home and making dinner for your sister.

“How was your hump day?” Jennie asks from the living room.

You nearly splash boiling hot water all over yourself.

FORGIVEN

“Thank God for the internship last summer!” your sister says (again).

“I do, I do,” you promise, looking at yourself critically in the grubby bathroom mirror. She doesn’t have to know you pick a new deity to mentally ‘thank’ every time. Today it’s Thor, because you need to bring electricity to your first day on the job.

You’re hoping to look professional but approachable for this customer-facing position, and it looks like the months of clothes thrifting before your internship last year are really paying off. Do you wish you could work in your field of choice? Sure, but working in the same company as a receptionist means you have both in-field and company knowledge. Once Jennie is back on her feet, you hope to be back on yours, too.

You step into the kitchen to check that everything is set up for your sister. “Are you sure you don’t want me to come back at lunch?”

“No mother hen-ing, you promised! I’ll be fine, and you’ll need your own lunch!”

Your watch beeps that it’s time to start walking to work, so you slip into your sturdy dress shoes and give the room a final once-over. Jennie’s cooler of food is near the couch, she’s got all of the remotes, and her walker is within reach. You’ve even put a pair of crutches in the umbrella stand and lashed the damned thing to the couch so she can’t knock it over. Her charger is at hand, the blinds are down, and the end table has her morning coffee on a coaster.

“Get out or I’ll start throwing things at you and you’ll be late from having to clean them up!” your sister teases.

“I love when you nag,” you tell her, shutting the door before she can retort.

Star Industries is honestly your dream workplace, even after pausing your mechanical engineering degree to take care of Jennie. After Tony Stark and his company spun it off as a subsidiary, Star really came into its own. The company has an inspiring mission: to ensure safe, affordable prosthetics for the people who really need them. Many customers are war veterans, just like the two men in charge. The COO even has one himself.

You’d filled out your paperwork after hours, so when you walk into the building, it’s a nice surprise to see how the morning light floods the lobby. The atrium of the building is made up of a multi-storey open space lit by tall windows, with the company’s logo laid out in the tile floor right as you come in the doors. The A in the word ‘STAR’ is, of course, a star, but it’s the missing ‘K’ from its parent company that catches the eye. Instead of upright, the K is laid on its ‘back.’ One stick figure’s front leg and another stick figure’s back leg make up the angled lines from the K--and they’re both wearing prosthetics.

The name badge you’re given has a smaller version of the same logo, and you can’t help but hope this isn’t the only time you’ll be representing the company. You fix it to your lapel and sit nervously at the desk beside the woman who will train you. It’s an hour before you come up for air long enough to notice there’s some renovation work going on nearby.

Honestly, ‘notice’ is embarrassingly underselling it.

The windows in the lobby are clearly designed to encourage shafts of sunlight that flood a particular area with a cheerful glow. You’ve managed to look over right when one such beam illuminates a man wearing rough work clothes, his head tipped back to drink out of a water bottle. He’s handsome as hell, with a face like Adonis and powerful muscles straining his sweat-damp t-shirt. The sunlight turns him into a golden statue, and you sure as hell would visit museums more often if the art looked like that!

Your phone rings and you answer promptly, tearing your eyes away from the construction worker just as he smiles at someone. The stammered greeting you offer to the caller could be chalked up to it being your first day, but that isn’t the reason at all.

Your first week on the job is equal parts satisfying and stressful. Satisfying because it turns out you’re a natural at taking zero shit with maximum politeness. Your stress comes from the renovations.

The work isn’t loud, and it’s not like you’re worried about safety or anything. Technically, your job isn’t affected at all… well, not because of your assigned work, that is. No, you’re the one affected, and it’s thanks to the man who seems to be in charge.

After that first day, the tarp that separated their construction from the rest of the lobby had been removed, meaning you could just look over and see him at any point throughout your day.

You’ve been rationing those glimpses for your own sanity.

Despite this, there are still details you’ve noted. One, he’s definitely the foreman. Everyone defers to the guy, but his leadership style seems to rely on trust and respect. Two, he has the most genuine smile you’ve ever seen. Paired with his looks, it’s a disastrous combination, especially given Reason Number Three: he’s an utter beast. More than once you’ve seen him moving things with ease that would take multiple other men to lift.

Today is Monday and the men were all at work before you arrive. Their project is taking shape; it appears to be a café with low counters, maybe a wheelchair-friendly gathering space? It would be on brand for the company, and certainly explains why you’ve been brought on as a second receptionist. The usual population in the lobby will certainly go up once it’s completed.

Before you sit down, you take stock of the wide welcome desk. Would anyone notice if you nudged one of the large flower pots to the left to mostly block your view of the café area? You decide to risk it. Foreman Eye Candy is a Distraction with a capital D, and you already love this job.

The morning goes smoothly--but by lunch you’re fairly certain you’ve memorized the pattern on the side of that damned pot, for as often as you’ve looked over at it.

When you come back from your break, the pot is back where it was before.

Your hands shake a little bit as you log back into your computer. Did a cleaning crew come through and adjust it? You’re not brave enough to ask the senior receptionist for fear she’ll question why it was moved in the first place. It’s probably a fluke, you decide.

Without your makeshift barrier, you find yourself looking over at the Foreman way too many times before you’re done for the day, but he’s smiled at least twice in your direction, so that’s something.

On Tuesday morning, you choose discretion as the better part of valor and scoot the pot over to obscure your view again, even taking the time to nudge its closest neighbor a little, to even up the spacing.

After lunch on Tuesday, both pots are moved back, and Eye Candy is smiling. You doubt the two are related.

On Wednesday you bring in one of those Newton’s Cradle desk toys with permission from your coworker at the desk. It’s altruistic, distracting the children when their parents show up to ask questions. Because your area is recessed a bit, you risk setting the item on a little paper sorter to make it level with the visitors’ side. Completely incidentally, that placement blocks some of your view of the café under construction.

You come back from lunch to find the shelf moved to the other side of your computer monitor.

It’s so disconcerting that you stand there staring at it in shock for a long moment, long enough to attract attention.

“Something wrong, miss?”

From behind you, a hand lands on your shoulder with just enough pressure to guide you to your seat.

“Nothing of note, Sir, I’m sure!” your coworker says hurriedly.

“How was your hump day?” Jennie asks from the living room.

You nearly splash boiling hot water all over yourself.

Chanting ‘it’s Wednesday, that’s called ‘hump day,’ there’s nothing that implies you’ve been thinking impure thoughts, pull it together!’ in your head, you answer something non-committal and continue with dinner.

That night you have a dream that Sir Eye Candy walks over and smiles at you, illuminated by one of those rays of light straight from heaven.

On Thursday you arrive at work to find the pots have all been moved farther back along the decorative part of the receptionist’s desk, much too far to move any of them without notice.

As if he’d been waiting for you to see the change, you make brief eye contact with Sir Eye Candy. He does a little nod of acknowledgment before turning to move the large sign for the café. By himself.

“Am I awake?” you whisper to yourself, unable to look away from how effortlessly he moves under heavy strain.

“Keep staring at the boss like that and the rest of his crew will never let you hear the end of it!” your front desk coworker Marcia jokes.

Your cognitive function flatlines as you try to process the word ‘boss’ while at the same time watching the man in question wipe sweat off of his brow. “It’s obvious he’s the foreman,” you mumble, dropping your phone so you have to look away to pick it up. If the screen cracks, you deserve it.

“Oh, honey, this is his side gig. Pet project. Maybe even a vacation, knowing Rogers,” Marcia chuckles.

The name ‘Rogers’ finally gets through to you, in context to ‘the boss.’ Steve Rogers.

Sir Eye Candy is CEO Eye Candy.

“Wait…”

“There it is!” Your coworker gives you the kind of look only busybody aunts and elder coworkers can pull off. “Word is his gym is closed for a few weeks, so he pulled some strings to move this project up. Nice way to start a new job, yeah?”

You’ve been ogling the CEO. “Should I put in my two weeks’ notice?” you whisper. Dismay doesn’t even cover it. You’re practically mortifie--

“I’d advise your manager not to accept,” a nearby voice says. “If anything, I probably ought to call myself into an HR meeting. I’ve been quite distracted this past week.”

It’s CEO Eye Can-- Rogers. All you can do is mutely look up at him, watching the amused look on his face turn into a stern one.

“Have you been messing with my plant display?”

It’s not at all what you were expecting him to say, and you’re still befuddled by the idea he was distracted by you, so you stammer out an admission that yes, you did move his pots.

The phone rings, and after a subtle gesture from Rogers, Marcia takes the call.

“Sir,” you begin, noting the way his posture straightens on hearing the title. You lick your lips in nervousness, and god, his eyes go straight there. HR would be having kittens.

“Go on?” Rogers’ voice is resonant. Everything about this feels like a rom-com, and you are totally worried you’ll screw it up.

“Forgive me for staring?” you offer. You’d meant to say something less obvious, but it’s too late now.

“Yes, well. I’d like to go over your conduct at a lunch meeting, if, that is, you--” he breaks off, lifts his chin, and clears his throat. “In a half hour.”

“I-- Of course--” You’ve answered too late, he’s already walking away and calling out to the crew. Stunned, you look over at Marcia. She’s grinning, but doesn’t look up, and you decide to take your cues from her.

Fifteen minutes later, the work crew wraps up. You see them file out in your peripheral vision, but if Rogers is going to play the Principal’s Office card, you’re going to play at being an obedient student.

This sends your mind on a complete irresponsible rampage, and you’re still tamping down the mental images when a gentleman in a suit walks up to the front of the desk.

Your welcoming smile is already in place when you lift your head to greet him, but it widens into surprised happiness to see that it’s Rogers. At the very last minute you stop yourself from acting like he’s picking you up for a date, even though you very much hope that’s what this is, HR be damned. Every fairytale has a villain, after all, and villains are made to be thwarted.

“Can I help you, sir?”

The word choice is deliberate.

“You can. Marcia, do you usually cover for lunch?”

“I do.”

“Good. We’ll be prompt,” he says firmly, tapping the flat of his palm on the desk with finality. You take the cue, getting up and slinging your purse over your shoulder, but inwardly your stomach is a riot of sawdust.

Are you reading this wrong? All of your teenage aspirations to be swept off of your feet by a rich, handsome man feel like lead weights at the bottom of your shoes. Steve Rogers’ reputation is sterling, and despite your less-than-angelic daydreams, you don’t want to come across like a gold-digger. Even if you are strapped for cash.

Rogers opens the door for you. The front door. The front door of his business. It’s heady and confusing, even more confusing when a slick silver car pulls up and a valet hands him the keys.

“You look like you either need sunglasses or smelling salts,” he says gently.

“A neck brace,” you quip. “For the whiplash.”

His smile is sheepish as he opens the car door for you. “That’s fair.”

The car is cinematically nice inside, and you suppress the desperate desire to pinch yourself until you wake up as he gets in and adjusts the seat for his height. He doesn’t look over at you, which your adrenaline-drunk mind can’t decide is good or bad.

Then he does, and all you can do is smile back at him.

“A confession: I cribbed some of those lines.” Rogers eases the car out into traffic and lets out a long breath. “From Bu-- a friend of mine. Advice on how to be in charge and ask out a subordinate at the same time.” He stops at a red light and shoots a look over at you. “How’d I do?”

You kind of want that neck brace, but despite the trappings, you’re really enjoying who this man is turning out to be. “That depends. Do you want me to be turned upside down and sideways?”

That earns you a look akin to the one he sent you when you’d called him ‘sir.’ You shiver, and he notices. “I don’t think you want to know what his advice might be on the answer to that question! How about ‘maybe?’”

“Maybe is good,” you manage.

“Glad to hear it. What would you like? Italian? Deli?” Rogers looks over and catches his breath like he’d forgotten his wallet. “An invite to lunch without your employment on the line? I’m sorry about that. I got--” He looks back at the road, hands tight on the steering wheel. “--carried away.”

His candid mix of charm and command are sweeping you completely off your feet, tarnished halo and all. “I don’t think I have time to phone a friend for a better answer, but is ‘maybe’ still good?”

Your sister would walk her ass to the car to smack you if she knew you’d just told the CEO of your new company you’re a ‘maybe’ for a one-on-one ‘maybe’ date with him. You suspect his friend would be facepalming, too.

“Your job isn’t on the line, I promise. I’d never misuse power like that--” He breaks off from his serious tone, looks down at his suit and the fancy car you’re both sitting in, and chuckles. “All evidence to the contrary.”

The whole situation is absurd, unrealistic, completely romantic, and everything you’ve always wanted.

You’re going to wake up any minute now.

Rogers looks over and raises his eyebrows. You realize with embarrassment that he wants you to either tell him where he can stuff his lunch invitation, or where the two of you can go eat.

“I got carried away too,” you rush to say. “Yes to lunch. No maybes in sight.”

“You’re forgiven,” he smiles.

Part 2

#steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x f!reader #steve rogers fanfiction #steve rogers fic #fluff #CEO AU #meet cute #captain america x reader #captain america #steve rogers #mcu #mcu fanfiction #marvel #steve rogers imagine #steve rogers x you #captain america x you #captain america x f!reader #humor

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seat-safety-switch · 6 months ago

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For years, real estate predators have said they aren't making any new land. Today, I'm proud to tell you that this is, at long last, slightly incorrect. The seaborne microplastic crisis of abandoned fishing nets, old condoms, and 1996 Saturn SL1s has in recent months congealed into a single glorious island in the middle of the ocean, and we're doing condo pre-sales for it for just $350,000.

Now, I hear what you're asking on the message boards and at the town halls. Is this "land" consisting mostly of shopping bags and Garfield telephones actually sturdy enough to build several tonnes of condo building on top of? We simply don't know, but the important thing is that it doesn't keep you from speculating on the property. Buy one today, and then sell it in a month for twice what you paid, even before we broke ground on it. In fact, the price went up to $500k just while we were talking, so you better jump on it.

Don't worry, though. Just because we got the land for free, and are violating several hundred international regulations on human rights to build these buildings, doesn't mean that you're getting a bad deal. Sure, it's made of a flimsy reclaimed-timber frame made of old trees we found floating by, but if the walls ever catch on fire, the ocean is right there to put it out. Full of water. Couldn't be safer. Price is now $750k, to reflect the changing market dynamics of housing.

Investors, I mean homeowners, we regret to inform you that our esteemed construction partner, Scamco, has run away with the seed capital we paid them. We've got no way to get that money back, I'm totally gutted about it and we'll have to ask everyone for another $200,000 to resume construction.

After an audit conducted by our internal partners, it turns out that they had no expertise in this kind of construction in the first place, and couldn't build a 60-storey luxury condominium using my uncle's old bass fishing boat as a cargo barge. Why my uncle? Oh, my brother runs Scamco. Rest assured that we have no conflict of interest here, we don't let him sit in on board meetings that are held in the bedroom next to his. Come to think of it, in case any of you have family of your own that want to buy another of the condos in our building before we begin construction, it's only $1.5 million for the next week.

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luciacaminoz · 21 days ago

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NEW GAME+ (2.6k)

"Third law of Kindred kinematics," Julian calls, voice slicing through smog and car-horn-choir blare. He taps his temple. "Momentum's a bitch until you become the bitch."

March 2021

Sol crouches, calves coiled, eyes tracking the labyrinth of rooftops and laundry lines spiderwebbing across Colonia Independencia. The night market’s cacophony—braying norteño accordions, sizzling cabrito, vendors hawking bootleg PS5s, Cartier replicas, Trump piñatas—thrums five stories down.

A neon crucifix above the club, Carnicería Diablo, dominates in cherry-red over the green glow of OXXO and farmacia signs this side of the district. Monterrey’s greater skyline pulses in the distance—a sodium vapor haze of LED billboards plastered with Tecate, telecom scams, and a vaping Santa Muerte.

She takes off running, sneakers pelting sun-baked aluminium, the warehouse rooftop groaning under weight as she vaults an HVAC unit. Julian echoes ahead:

“Castillo!” His silhouette leans on a satellite dish two buildings over, backlit by the Fundidora smokestacks and a yellow sickle moon. “The whole point is that you’re supposed to keep up!”

She snarls, rousing the Blood—reigniting veins like struck matches. The leap sends her arcing over a yawning alley where dumpsters reek of lye and rotting carnitas, and for three glorious seconds, flight feels possible…

Then her knee buckles on impact.

“Fuck—!”

Sol slams into a small water tower, claws screeching against rusted metal. Julian’s laugh bounces off the Banco de México’s glass facade as he zips onto a fire escape, effortless.

“Oh man. Gotta stick the landing, chica.”

“Eat shit!” She flings a loose bolt at him. He ducks, still laughing, and jumps the railing straight into a sprint across the steel bar latched between tenements.

Sol grits her teeth and pushes off the tower, vitae drumming in her ears; dead nerves lighting up, stretched puppet-taut.

The city becomes a strobe—glimpses of a meth cook’s startled face in a garret window, feral cats scattering from overturned buckets, Julian’s black windbreaker flapping like a raven’s wings. He hurdles an electricity box with arrogant finesse before he’s a glitch, rocketing ahead.

“Left!” His voice comes from everywhere and nowhere.

She swerves hard, nearly clotheslining on a low-hanging cable. A Chihuahua yips from a rooftop garden, tiny teeth snapping where her ankle just was.

”Wrong left, Solona!”

She pivots back, claws gouging mortar as she flings herself onto a wrought-iron balcony. The metal shrieks. Her knee slams into a potted bougainvillea—petals explode like confetti.

Julian’s perched another storey up, hood pulled low over his eyes, grinning down.

Dick.

“You’re thinking too mortal. Flow with it.”

Flow with it.

Jesus, she wants so badly to fuck him off. Instead, she leaps for the drainage pipe.

Her foot slips.

Julian’s hand clamps her wrist mid-air—then a sickening full-body lurch as he yanks her up beside him.

“Relax,” he says. His thumb brushes her raw knuckles. “You’re forcing it. Let the Blood lead.”

She shoves him off.

“I am.”

“No. You’re button-mashing then panicking. This isn’t Protean, Sol—and you aren’t manipulating vitae with Sorcery. Celerity’s about rhythm. You’re all…” His palm slaps the low wall of concrete beside them in an unpleasant staccato. “When you should be…” His fingers dance smooth up her arm, light as a MIDI beat.

Suddenly she’s trying hard not to smile.

“Stop flirting with metaphors.”

“Who’s flirting?” Julian pulls her in by the elbow, pecks her nose. “Again.”

———

First foothold: crumbling concrete. Second: a railing crusted with pigeon shit. Her muscles scream, legs pistons with stripped screws—every part of her body suddenly fledgling-fresh, mortal-clumsy. The world blurs at the edges, colors smearing like wet ink, and—fuckfuckfuck—she’s overshooting—

—Until Julian’s arm hooks her waist.

“Solona. You’ve gotta feather the gas, not floor it.”

Sol jostles free.

“I know.”

“Do you, though?” He twirls what looks like a USB, taunting. “Because that was—”

She swipes for it. Julian fucking dissolves, reappearing six feet away atop an AC unit.

He tuts and pockets the drive, phone (matte black, graphene-thin, quantum circuitry prototype) already in his other hand. He points with it. “One more time. From the PEMEX sign.”

“Julian—”

His phone chirps a Mario power-up sound.

“Again. C’mon.”

———

Vitae’s still humming wrong—like chewing foil, like fucking in someone else’s skin—as she sprints along the gas station’s platform onto the farmacia. For a second’s stretch, she flies by spires gutted into strip dens and nightclubs, over cartel-owned taquerías, above abuelitas pushing strollers around the plaza of Iglesia de Nuestra Señora de la Soledad. Julian flickers between adobe and solar panels, occasionally pausing to mock-applaud.

Gravity remembers her once she’s airborne.

Sol hits the next roof’s edge too hard, too fast, ribs audibly cracking against parapet, claws scrabbling for purchase. Mortar dust fills her mouth as she dangles, legs kicking over a sixty-foot drop.

“Fuck!”

Julian’s there instantly, hauling her up by the scruff of her hoodie.

“Fucking Looney Tunes Discipline. I hate it,” she spits.

“Hate it faster.” He fires the thumb drive-sized device into the air—it sails across another gap, lands with a clink in a zinc chimney. “Next one’s got a timer. Tick-tock.”

———

She almost clears.

Almost.

Her shin splats against the ledge. Vitae sprays. She eats shit, claws shredding concrete until she grinds to a stop.

Julian’s waiting, picking at his nails with his karambit.

“Six seconds.” He checks an imaginary watch. “That grandma with a walker down there could’ve outrun you.”

Sol coughs gravel out of her throat, then rubs the rest from her palms.

“Fuck your metrics. And fuck that grandma.”

“Fuck your form.” He holsters the knife, looking at her, serious. “You’re burning through blood like a Toreador at Coachella. Short bursts—controlled, yes, but let vitae carry you. Observe—” He demonstrates, blurring strides with preternatural precision between each frame of movement, “—then reset. Like, y’know, checkpoints.”

———

So that’s what two miles round of AC units become—blink to the first, pause, blink to the next. Her vision swims in technicolor motion, kaleidoscopic afterimages—Mexican flags, flailing limbs, Julian’s smirk—astigmatisms of her own making.

Here, the EDM lounges of Zona Rosa war with Bad Bunny bleating from armoured Suburbans stuck bumper to bumper; here, diesel rain and fried masa cling to the humid Spring night.

“Better,” Julian says. “Now add a wall run.”

Add a wall run—wh—motherfu—

He launches himself at a neighboring building, sneakers hitting brick at a 70-degree angle, displacing air so seamlessly it’s pornographic.

And then he’s gone—no tell-tale, footsteps barely kissing rebar.

Sol—still jagged, coltish; arguably a little more fluid—follows only the idea of Julian Sim until the last of Monterrey’s colonial corpse gives way to the cranes of half-built luxury condos and mirror-chrome high rises.

Her young Sire’s a suggestion in techweave and neon-trim when he slows, rippling back into her line of sight to drape them both in the not-there. Light bends as they pass security cams, Julian staying within range to better flex Obfuscate. It probably would’ve been the easier choice of Discipline for her arsenal too, if—

“Keep the pace!”

Short bursts. Checkpoints.

They slalom through Calle Morelos’ circuit board esophagus of pristine tech start-ups, soldered with glass walkways, six lanes of headlights, screaming ads for Pacífico and VPNs. Julian dances ahead, but Sol’s not lagging far behind.

Her next leap sings smooth as a struck bell, braid arcing like a scorpion’s tail, rust flakes kicked up behind her on sheet metal. Julian's piercings flash when he glances back, grin softening at the edges.

She rolls, liquid shoulder-tuck; comes up running, bones intact—vitae burning through marrow like fucking nitrous, laughter unfurling wild in dead lungs.

Julian whistles.

"There she is."

They gain storey upon storey, the Haqimite electric, the Caitiff stick-shift, racing through the carcass of opulence—future penthouse suites now just I-beams and Ethernet cables.

Sol vaults on gazelle legs over a pallet of marble, soars through a cloud of fiberglass dust, and lands a neat meter from where Julian perches like e-boy Icarus, sneakers swinging above oblivion on the 18th floor.

A crane hook scrapes idly against naked concrete, plastic sheeting snapping in desert winds. Distant gunfire, three blocks east, percussive as a bassline. Suburbia sprawls for miles to the south, narco-mansions manicured and glittering all through the foothills of Sierra Madre in the north.

“Admit it,” he says, leaning back on his hand. “You missed this.”

“Missed your bullshit? Like a fucking migraine.”

He laughs. The wind whips her hoodie tight when she turns. His gaze lingers. She pretends not to notice.

Sol makes a point of surveying their midnight spread of Nuevo León once more as Julian chatters—about the city, the safehouse, their ghouls. Not the op. When she does flop beside him, feet also dangling, she stares ahead.

“You did good,” he says.

Their hands brush, then Julian’s pinky hooks hers. The motion itself is a relic.

Sol stiffens but stays. She glances at him.

He’s already looking.

A car backfires.

“Last stretch.” Julian nods toward the next buildings cutting smog. Smaller, plainer apartment complexes that will no doubt extort based on location alone once complete. “Race you?”

———

Sol’s surge is crystalline.

Julian’s right—Celerity isn’t Protean’s feral lunge, or Blood Sorcery’s calculated simmer. It’s rhythm.

She sees him ahead mid-vault, one arm outstretched behind, hair fanning like ink spilled in zero-G. Sees her own hand reaching—

Their fingers brush.

Julian's smile unfolds frame by frame: the curl of his bottom lip, the tapered apple of his cheeks, diamond-cut incisors—mesmerisingly symmetrical.

Sol's chest hits his back—

—and they’re a double helix spinning weightless—

—the city dilating below—

—a Bosch triptych halogen-spotted—

—gravity reasserts.

They crash through a skylight into an unfinished loft—glass explodes, shards spattering like prismatic shivs in the rich gleam of Monterrey’s nightlife.

Julian’s laughing.

He manages to land in a crouch for that microsecond before Sol hits half-sprawled on top of him, talons buried in the meat of his thigh.

"Fuck!"

"Sorry!"

He grabs her wrist, yanking her claws free.

"Put those things away. They’re banned.”

And then Sol’s laughing, righting herself to straddle him.

Shared Blood syncopates; rushes to pool where cold skin meets cold skin—an old tug of vitae, ten years frayed, easier to ignore now… uneasy in its familiarity. Julian's hands rest at her hips; one thumb digging into the hummingbirds there, the other circling. Her Beast purrs under his attention.

Below, in the neighboring apartments, a señora screams about flying demons.

"You really gotta work on your dismount,” he murmurs.

Sol’s eyes are flame-flecked staring down at him, pupils still slit with Protean bleeding through. Julian’s are black holes, event horizons.

The world narrows to:

The tick of her nail against his earring as claws retract.

The rogue strand of black hair stuck to his temple.

The tremble in her lower lip.

The way his Blood suddenly thrums beneath her palm, sparking warmth, simulating life—for her.

Julian’s hand rises—a languid arc, giving Sol every chance to pull back—and cradles her jaw.

“Solona…” has never sounded so much like surrender.

Time collapses honey-thick.

Slow as gangrene, sweet as sepsis.

The kiss unfolds in negative space—

Her mouth finds his.

His lips part.

She bites down just enough to taste the salt-iron synaptic burst, wintergreen gum of him, and Julian groans, low and wrecked, flicking into her fangs. His tongue drags deep along hers, insistent, sucking gently.

Dust motes spiral around them, suspended in strips of moonlight like Denver’s snow. She fists his jacket and grinds down where they’re pressed together—he makes that noise, that fucking noise, the one that starts in his diaphragm and splits into a whimper. His hands slip under her hoodie, skating up her waist, ribs, spine; Sol breaks the kiss to wrench the thing off—

A laser dot blooms red on Julian’s temple.

Celerity—him? her?—tears them sideways before the shot cracks reality back to real-time.

The Beast rattles caged and violent through bodies in a startled feedback loop. Sol’s shoulder dislocates with a nauseating pop as they go rolling across subflooring. The round pulverizes the pillar Julian’s head had just been in front of.

“MOVE—”

She’s already on her feet, dragging him by the arm into a sprint. Three more shots web the walls as they drop through holes between floors.

They hit the first intact emergency staircase by the 8th landing, Julian hacking the whole fucking grid with one hand while Sol half-hauls, half-guides him with the other. A door blows inward from another round—she feels the heat blister her cheek and panics, hissing and spilling back into a service corridor.

Fuck—neither of them have Kevlar tonight.

“Incendiary! What the fuck do we—”

“Left! Left left LEFT—”

Julian’s free hand vise-locks around her wrist as he pivots. Sneakers skid in tandem through standing water and discarded safety netting.

The corridor dead-end’s with an empty elevator shaft, car stranded above between floors. Bullets stitch the air behind them.

“JUMP!”

Maybe her equilibrium short-circuits.

Maybe Julian pushes her.

The ground tilts.

A drunk’s vomit hangs mid-air, chunky and iridescent, far across the lot.

The first delicate clinks of Modelo as a toast is caught in bird’s eye tableau.

An organillero’s note warps infinite, final fermata, outside fine dining.

Windshear.

Fear and velocity braid with the Blood.

Two Kindred ricochet off galvanized support beams like fucking pinballs.

The trumpet blows.

Laughter; someone drops their beer—more laughter.

Vomit splatters cobblestone.

Sol’s knees give way at the bottom. Julian catches her elbow, pulls her up running. They hit a clean sprint through the ground level, emerge out onto the construction site.

“See? Rhythm!”

“Fucking move your ass!”

Police sirens wail across downtown’s throb of traffic and tourists; more gunfire—not sniper rounds; seemingly unrelated—popcorns in a favela alley.

Somewhere, the norteño band butchers Depeche Mode for a bachelor party.

Somewhere, a shovelhead gets their throat torn out.

A quarter-second burst risks them through a gap in tail lights.

Neon smears at the marquee—7-Eleven green, taco stand orange, strip club pinks and violets.

Kine-slow, predators blend with prey: a crowd of football fans stumbling from a cantina; Julian’s hand still grasping Sol’s wrist.

They slip under a gothic arch into community gardens. It’s a chessboard of terracotta and steel to the rooftops. They drop down on the other side—an empty backstreet lined with dumpsters—and Julian flicks the not-USB from his pocket.

Hunger gnaws at Sol’s broken ribs.

Both vampires are a mess—plaster and scratches all over their hands and faces; her leggings and hoodie torn where she snagged on rebar and fell through glass, the outer thigh of his joggers partly shredded from her nails.

“Fuck, we were sloppy.”

“DAAE?” Sol scans the balconies above.

“Not that simple,” Julian snaps, eyes glued to his phone. Blood trickles from his nose.

“Then who? Sabbat? The fucking cartel?”

“Safehouse first.” His fingers fly over the custom rig. Sol keeps watch, claws out and twitching. “There’s an entrance into the sewer system beneath the grate here; two tunnels come up the other side of the Santa Catarina, but—”

“So come on—”

“Almost…” Julian mutters.

“Julian.”

“Got it.” He stabs a final key.

Ozone.

The district plunges into darkness.

Screams, gasps, shouting, car alarms, backup generators, trumpets, four wasted white guys still singing Personal Jesus at the top of their lungs—noise dulls to a submarine hum.

Julian’s mouth is fever-hot on her, Blush boiling beneath his skin.

Light calluses skim her cheeks; the faint ridge of scar, catch in her baby hairs. His fingers thread into where waves have frayed loose from braid, tugging her head back to deepen the kiss. Her moan vibrates through her molars and he echoes it; she feels it when he stops thinking, stops scheming, stops being Julian Sim, fucking Messiah of the Masquerade’s Collapse—and for a moment, it’s the turn of the millennium and they’re fledglings again: Sol too-eager, too-hungry, too-curious, pressed against the Geo’s hood under a Sonoran night sky, Julian’s nervous little laugh in her ear—“I mean, we’re technically dead but I guess—”

He pulls back now, forehead to hers.

“Safehouse—”

She drags him in for one more kiss.

When they separate, Julian’s grinning, all fangs and fuckery.

“To be continued?”

“Get in the sewer.”

"Told you there'd be a jacuzzi."

¡BIENVENIDOS A MONTERREY!

[previous prompt]

[all prompts]

each time i tried to paste all this into the ask my app exploded but thank you so much T_T i continued on from cicatrix for you but ended up cutting the real hot tub part bc it was getting far too long (explaining the layout of the safehouse & having nadia/elena interactions & building on some of the story here). had to split it—there is a smutty part ii coming for this one (yes i need plot with my porn…)

(btw ive two more prompts in my inbox rn but if anyone wants to send more feel free i love these. doesnt have to be a kiss prompt either it can be whatever ^^ hypothetical sudo the chihuahua custody battle etc)

#jez writing #vtm #vampire the masquerade #vtm night road #julian sim #oc: soledad #x: exit wounds #art tag #st: new game+#my babies..

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abbysimsfun · 2 months ago

Text

Sims In Bloom: Generation 2 Pt. 160 (Blast From the Past)

Felix pulled back anxiously as the blonde woman read his rights, a righteous anger creasing her dark brows. "Last I saw you, you floated up to me on my wedding day and begged me to run from my husband to join you as a ghost!"

"You what?" Lilith looked between them with a nervous smile.

"I..." Felix stammered. "I was still processing everything, Lil. I've had more than enough time to let go; it's been a century and a half."

"At least we hope so," she lamented, remembering they were here without Emit. She turned to the angry woman she suspected was her great-great-grandmother, Maude Alcorn Ruggbyrne. "Ma'am, do you know what day it is?"

The blonde cocked her head sideways. "July 13, 1920, of course! How don't you know that? Are you both dead?"

Felix reeled. "July 13th? You're certain?"

Maude pointed to a newspaper strewn across a nearby bench. "That's the paper I write for. Today's edition."

"We're a day early," he said to Lilith.

She frowned. "I must've set the wrong date on the device after we jumped from January 13th, 2020."

"What in blazes are you two talking about?" cried the blonde. "Felix, are you dead or not? And who in Watcher's name is she with all those nails in her face?!"

Felix and Lilith glanced helplessly between themselves. They weren't supposed to do anything that might change history, and they weren't supposed to tell anyone who they were, either. But Felix couldn't exactly lie to someone who knew beyond a doubt who he was. "They're piercings. Maude, and her name is Lilith Pleasant. She's my girlfriend."

"Your girlfriend!" she cried. "You...you were dead!"

"I was! For almost a century and a half," he said, leading the three of them to a nearby bench. "But a few years ago...In the future, I...I was still a ghost, and I made some friends who cooked up some ambrosia for me. You know how much I wished I could live again. Where I came from, Britechester looks pretty much the same as now, but it's been a long, long time."

"That old wives' tale about fish cakes is real?" He nodded, and Maude's face softened. "Why are you back here?"

"Lilith and I are helping a friend catch a time thief, but we overshot our landing by about 24 hours."

Maude looked at them as though they had two heads. "Felix, are you telling me tall tales? You sound like they just rolled you out of the asylum!"

"I promise it's not like that," he vowed. "But everything we tell you, we need to you to promise never to tell another soul."

"I'm a reporter, Felix! Telling the world the truth is my job."

"The world isn't ready for this. I'm not sure you're ready for this..."

"Spill it," she demanded. "Convince me your painted jumpsuits weren't issued by a psychiatric ward!"

"Could we go somewhere more private to talk? Maybe find a change of clothes so we don't stick out too much?"

Maude thought for a moment, studying Lilith with a discerning glare. "You're sure we can trust her? She looks spiky."

Felix laughed. "She's a lot like you."

Backhanded compliment or not, Maude appreciated the thought, studying Lilith with keen interest. "Berend's in Komorebi trying to become the first sim to scale the mountain, and Bruno's with his governess. I think she could fit into some of my roomier skirts."

Lilith laughed, unfazed. "She's not like me. She's more like Angela!"

"And who's Angela? Another girlfriend?"

Felix shook his head. "No, she's your great-great-granddaughter. And so's Lilith."

Maude's stunned expression remained until they'd made it to her two-storey home in Britechester. She lived here with her husband and three-year-old-son, but the elegant rooms were empty of voices when they entered.

Maude quickly found some clothes for Lilith to change into. "That hat hides the metal on your face quite nicely," she enthused.

Lilith forced a smile. None of the clothes she was wearing were her style, and she hated tucking her bright red hair under a hat. But she and Felix were stuck here waiting for Emit and the time thief to arrive the next day. She had to make the best of this.

Despite the rules they were supposed to follow, Felix and Lilith told Maude almost everything - about the ambrosia, about falling in love and Maude's connection to Lil's family tree. They showed her the time travelling device, and explained their mission to prevent a time thief from changing too much about the future.

But they didn't mention the young Landgraab behind the device - even in 1920, the name was too well known, and they'd promised Heather and Conrad they'd help protect him.

Maude listened intently, sitting before a portrait with her husband and young son - Lilith's ancestor, Bruno Ruggbyrne. "I never met my great-grandfather," said Lilith, but my grandmother Coral used to tell us he was the biggest charmer you'd ever meet."

"That sounds like Bruno." Maude smiled intently as she glanced at the portrait. "But Felix has been around a long time. It's a bit strange he's never found another soulmate except my own kin."

Lilith shook her head. "I think it makes sense. If he married you, my sister and I would have never been born. Bruno would have never been born."

Maude's face fell. "So this was meant to be? I was always supposed to be with Berend and you were supposed to live happily ever after with a girl with piercings in her face?"

"Lil's beautiful, Maude. She's your kin, after all."

"I think...you really love her," Maude said, rapidly processing this new information.

"I do. As much as you love Berend. Maybe more."

Maude smiled proudly. "My boss wanted me to quit the Times when Bruno came along, but Berend marched right downtown to insist I keep reporting to show our son what a hard worker looks like. When the boss promised to let me keep my job, Berend told him I'd take his job one day, too."

Felix was well aware of the future and he knew this was true, but he refrained from mentioning it. As long as things stayed the same, he didn't need to tell Maude what she would accomplish in her life. "I know I wasn't happy for you before, but a lot can change in a hundred-fifty years. I think you and Berend truly were meant to be."

"And I think Felix was always meant for me," said Lilith. "Before I met him I was stuck in a cycle dating an endless stream of losers and dreamers who didn't really care about me, but Felix showed me what it was to be really loved."

The corners of Maude's mouth turned upward. "Felix was always a good man. He let me pursue my career and didn't rush us into marriage, and I appreciated him for it every day...until the day he died on me. It's hard to overstate how important it is for a woman to be seen on the arm of a man to survive in this world, and after Felix' death, Berend offered opportunity. And I do love him, Felix. I know you said I never could as much I as I loved you."

"Maude, I was wrong. I'm sorry I tried to put you on the spot that day," said Felix. "You deserved better and you deserve this life. This beautiful house and your beautiful family suits you better than even I could have done."

She laughed. "You think you can date my great-great-granddaughter with that attitude? I know you, Felix. You were the best man I knew. I can see you haven't changed much, but I don't know you anymore. I don't know anything about this world you say you came from, with time travelers and computers and websites and eyeball phones, or whatever you called it. I don't know what a podcast is and my editor never puts my stories on the front page. Just his own tripe with spelling mistakes. A story like this could make my career overnight."

"If you tell anyone, you'll change the future in ways no one could possibly know," Lilith pressed. "Simanity doesn't figure out time travel until Emit appears in 2060. Even then, no one's saying much about it because it's so dangerous."

"That's why it's been so important to put the component together to catch the time thief," added Felix. "But if we get discovered here by anyone else, or you tell anyone about this, everything we've been though could be for nothing. Will you help us wait out our friend's arrival tomorrow?"

"I can't let you stay here tonight. My son and his governess will be home soon, and I don't know how to explain you to either of them, but I can help you find a room that'll let to unmarried men and women. I do need to work tonight at the Foxbury Jazz Club - why don't you come with me?"

Felix perked up at the mention of the club. "Foxbury Jazz Club was the place to see and be seen in the Roaring Twenties! I went once or twice, but never let anyone see me as a ghost."

"If you stick with Lilith tonight you shouldn't be recognized. Tonight's event's mostly out-of-towners who've come together for the Simlandia Builders' Club gala, and everyone's so well-known, they won't be looking at either of you. My editor wants me to take photos and sniff out content for the gossip page. You two could help me find a story to make up for the one I'm not allowed to tell."

Lilith, a loner at heart, didn't love the idea, but it would probably be a more interesting experience than sleeping on a park bench waiting for Emit to arrive the next morning. "I don't know any of the dances," she said sheepishly, but outgoing Felix grinned.

"I can lead."

"Berries!" said Maude with a grin. "I love the new jazz, and the Foxbury Club is heavenly!"

As they chatted, the front door opened and Maude stood, with a beaming greeting for Bruno and his governess.

"Mama!" Bruno raced into his mother's arms as the governess slipped quietly upstairs. "Mama we went park!"

"Did you have a nice time?"

"We threw rocks at pond!" Bruno laughed while he recounted his morning, looking up with curiosity when he spotted Lilith and Felix. "Who they, Mama?"

"These are friends of mine," said Maude, careful not to name either one. "They're going to work with Mama tonight to help me get a headline!"

"Mama Headline!" he celebrated, half understanding what it meant, but happy enough to join his mother in laughter.

Felix smiled at Maude with her son. He'd wanted children and a family of his own for so long, but he couldn't begrudge Maude for achieving her happy ever after. Not the way he once did.

"Motherhood suits you, Maude. Just as well as your career."

He felt Lilith's hand wrap around his own as they looked back to the portrait, and he wouldn't take for granted how their lives - or second lives - had thrived in recent years. In different timelines.

Felix knew his own happy ever after was just a proposal away. ->

<- Previous Chapter | Gen 2 Start | Gen 2.1 Summary

Gen 1 Start | Gen 1 Summary

FUN FACT: When I was putting together the newspaper, I looked up real history on July 13, 1920 and picked the weirdest piece of real news I could find. On this day in history, the US Postal Service had to ban people sending children through the mail because enough people were actually doing it.

WCIF: Thank you @deardiaryts4 and @matchalovertrait for letting your sims stand as models for the top right photo on the newspaper! I was so, so excited to play with them, you have no idea! And they look so good in some amazing period cc pieces, like Antoinette's La Maison Blanche coat by @javitrulovesims, Flapper Fabulous by Kiara Zurk (Antoinette's headband and Lilith's '20s hairstyle), Chorus Curls by Retro Pixels (Antoinette's hairstyle), Dmitri fashion set by @happylifesims (Antonio's hat), and happylifesims' Blessan jacket with @pleyita's matte trousers (Antonio's suit and Berend's portrait outfit in different swatches).

Lilith is in happylifesims' 1920s Cloche hat and Lady Mary's Day Dress, while Maude wears the 1920s Guest Dress in the family portrait on the wall. In the scene, she's wearing another happylifesims' Cloche hat and Day Dress 03. If you get the urge to set some scenes in the past or throw a costume party, happylifesims has incredible cc from many eras that I can't recommend enough. I couldn't have done any of this without their work.

I used @beto-ae0's Imperial Dynasty posepack for the portrait of Maude, Berend, and Bruno, and Maude and Bruno are posed in the living room with Guess How Much I Love You (Part 1) by @simmerberlin. The Ruggbyrnes' house can be found on the Sims 4 Gallery by JoaoDiBarro, and the Governess was aged up to elder and can be found on the Gallery by NMinnow.

And finally, I did not create Maude. A whole plate of cookies for after Iftari goes @purplesimmer455, who knew it was Maude when she showed up last episode! She guessed that this might be Mimsy, if not Maude - and fun fact - I used a Gallery-submitted version of Mimsy called 'Mimsy Von Haunt Teen Fix' and aged her up. I thought it looked nothing like OG Mimsy, while also resembling her just enough to be a sister (and the sim is beautiful), so Gallery-user mariuopole put up a good one!

I could not have put this installment together without the combined forces of everyone mentioned in one of my longest WCIF postscripts ever. Thank you so much, everyone!

#sims 4 #sims 4 gameplay #sims 4 screenshots #sims 4 legacy #sims in bloom #ts4 #ts4 gameplay #ts4 legacy #ts4 screenshots #sims 4 story #ts4 story #legacy challenge #sims legacy #ts4 legacy challenge #gen 2 #felix psyded #britechester #lilith pleasant #blast from the past event

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youryurigoddess · 3 months ago

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After a brief but necessary interlude, we’re back to clowning about the ongoing Good Omens production, this time in a slightly more analytic fashion. Appropriate level of discretion is even more advisable — due to the obvious sensitivity of this material, please tag it accordingly and share only with the fans consenting to know potential spoilers.

The Teal Bookshop (and yes, I’m trying to be clever here — the walls of Till’s Bookshop in Edinburgh are painted in a dangerously similar shade to Teal We Meet Again) is not a modernised or parallel-dimension iteration of the A. Z. Fell and Co. Building, but an entirely separate establishment located in a short distance from it.

How do we know it? The sheer fact that the crew decided to film it on location instead of redressing the Soho set is certainly a clue, but it’s not all. The street signs used for the filming on Monday were labelled as Nannette Street and Oldburgh Street, belonging to the City of Westminster Borough (W1) in London. Of course, neither actually exists on the map, but just like Whickber Street is an in-universe equivalent of real-life Berwick Street, these two must also have their respective identities.

Option one: Nannette Street is an in-universe equivalent of Winnett Street.

In this scenario, the Teal Bookshop’s suggested location in real-life London could become 77 Wardour Street (remember how God likes Her sevens!), which happens to be the address of the Duke of Wellington, a similarly painted, spacious, two-storey Soho gay bar.

Photos courtesy of @rhosmeinir (left) and Nadia M via Google Maps (right).

This would make some sense orientation-wise: across the street from the bookshop set we could spot an entrance to the local park and a small park booth marked as “Soho Coffee”, whereas a London passersby would face St Anne's Churchyard, also known as St Anne's Gardens, a public park on Wardour Street.

Everyone focused on Aziraphale and his hair, but the coffee stand behind him clearly shows where we are in this scene! Courtesy of alphaleym on Twitter.

The whole original church was left burned out on the night of 24 September 1940 during the Blitz, apart from the tower, which was left derelict. The remains of the eastern wall, the only significant parts left standing, were demolished thirteen years later, the site deconsecrated and prepared for sale, and the parish amalgamated with its neighbours. The religious complex standing in the same place nowadays was opened only in 1991.

Option two: Nannette Street is an in-universe equivalent of Manette Street in Soho, named after a character from Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. You know, the book that Aziraphale was actively selling in the 1859 scene cut from S1 and known nowadays as the “street urchin scene”.

Manette Street is a small thoroughfare that connects Charing Cross Road to Greek Street. Established in the 1690s, a bit after Aziraphale bought land in the area, it was originally called Rose Street before being renamed after Dr Manette, a character from Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities who is described in the novel as living on a quiet street corner “not far from Soho Square” and spent eighteen years in secret as a prisoner in the Bastille prior to the French Revolution.

The Hercules Pillars, bar mentioned by Dickens in his 1859 novel, and a façade of the temporarily closed Simmons bar at 7 Greek Street with a visible entrance to Manette Street as the covered walkway on the left. (Photos via MyLondon and Campaign for Real Ale.)

Now, this street has some historical significance concerning anarchist movements in the 19th century. The Rose Street Club, which once occupied premises here, was renowned as a gathering place for radicals from various nations. And these crumbs of context seemingly strengthening my old theories about Aziraphale eventually considering revolution instead of reform in Heaven are not even the most interesting here.

Remember that time when I hyperfixated on Aziraphale’s desk contents enough to decipher a random historical document and proceed to research it further on location in London? And then found an unexpected connection between said document and another one in the bookshop, discovering a possible Aziraphale’s secret investigation?

A historic plate on Greek Street marking the buildings owned by Josiah Wedgwood and his company.

Manette Street branches off Greek Street, Soho, exactly between houses numbered respectively 6 and 7, right next to the epicentre of these theories — Wedgwood’s showrooms located at 12-13 Greek Street with the adjacent area formerly known as Wedgwood Mews, currently James Court. Conveniently, there’s also a public park in the area, Soho Square.

The wind of change for this neighbourhood came with the arrival of Foyles bookstore in 1904. Its owners, brothers William and Gilbert Foyle, rebuilt the southside of Manette Street to expand the bookstore in 1916 and again in 1929. In the result, it was listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's largest bookshop in terms of shelf length, at 30 miles (48 km), and of the number of titles on display.

Foyles Bookshop, corner of Manette Street and Charing Cross Road as seen from the latter, London, 5 November 1955.

Foyles moved out the shop to its new home further down the road in June 2014, and the family company itself was soon sold to Waterstones. As part of a large redevelopment, the whole site was cleared, and a new and quite distinctive office block was created — and in doing so, also the new courtyard and alleyway, which design are somewhat reminiscent of the yet undiscovered parts of the S2 Soho set behind the Dirty Donkey.

Assuming that we know where we are at this point, let’s move on to the next question: what can Aziraphale and Crowley be doing here? Looking for a specific book, perhaps? Like the one Crowley appears to be transporting in some of the BTS shots? Let me know what you think, just remember to hide your spoilers!

#good omens #good omens finale #good omens 3 #good omens s3 #go3 speculation #go3 spoilers #good omens spoilers #good omens speculation #good omens meta #seriously don’t read it if you want to avoid spoilers #i’m dead serious about this #yuri is doing her thing #channeling detective aziraphale #that nice mister a. ziraphale who ran the bookshop two doors along #josiah wedgwood and john gibson and the line that connects them #teal we meet again #edinburgh #soho

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goblinontour · 5 months ago

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Mr. And Mrs.

the christmas special

part 12 | series masterlist

warnings: prof!al, age gap (not specified), fluff, sweet angst, sweet fucking, slight breeding kink, he’s so sweet

word count: 15.3k

It’s midday. The kind of winter afternoon that carries a reluctant warmth — softened edges to the cold, the sort that brushes your face, that lingers in liminality — not as bitter as yesterday, but not quite merciful either. The cold doesn’t slice into the small slivers of exposed skin as sharply as it could, as it has before. It’s the kind of cold that reminds you you’re alive. Even so, the air has its bite. You pull your coat tighter, tugging at the scarf knotted loosely at your throat.

The city feels unfamiliar in this corner, like you’ve stumbled into a forgotten painting, smudged and yellowed, a place you’ve walked past in another life but never truly stepped into. It’s quieter here, less bustling, less preened. The buildings around you, though worn, seem watchful. Hunched together, as if conspiring against the passage of time.

You glance to your left, attention snagged by a squat, unassuming structure. Its exterior tells a tale — peeling paint, frost-speckled windows. It’s tucked between other larger, newer ones, looking almost out of place but not quite enough to feel wrong. You pause, narrowing your eyes.

The building is modest. Only the ground floor and one upper storey stacked on top, as though the architect had no more to give. The shop window is smudged, a foggy pane of glass that resists reflection. Beside it, the door is plain, framed in chipped wood. Above it, some faded lettering struggles against the years. The words aren’t meant to be read from this distance. Their strokes are weary, edges blunted by time. But still, you tilt your head, trying to piece them together, wondering what kind of place it might be.

A hat interrupts the view — a man’s, brim low, crown rounded. Standing in the doorway, it shades the lettering just so, as though deliberately concealing what little clarity it might offer. But you imagine the letters are tired, the kind of font that’s seen decades without a care for reinvention.

If you keep walking, you’ll move past it, slipping into the more polished familiarity of the café next door, its entrance angled slightly outward as if inviting you in. Your gaze drifts upward. Beyond that, two wiry trees dusted with frost extend crooked fingers toward a cloudless sky. The light is harsh now, unforgiving in its sharpness. You know it won’t last — it never does. Soon enough, this blue will yield to black, swallowing the city in its winter embrace before you’ve had a chance to notice it fading.

“Oh, that woman gets on my nerves.” The harsh voice of hat-man cracks the brittle quiet. He says it loudly, enough as though the whole street should hear him. And his voice is sharp, cutting across the stillness of the afternoon. His words linger, landing uncomfortably in the air. There’s a woman following him, hurrying to catch up — a quick glance tells you she’s his wife, though the tension between them pulls tight in the space they share. The coat she wears is wrapped tight around her frame, but her expression reveals nothing. Is he talking about her? You can’t tell. A brief pang of sympathy rises, unbidden.

Through the glass, you glimpse someone else — another woman, left behind at the till. She rubs her temples, her shoulders curling inward as though she’s bracing against something. The motion is unmistakable, the gesture of someone wound too tightly. Even through the dusty glass, even with the distance between you, the tension in her body is palpable. You wonder what the man had said to her before stepping outside.

The thought pulls you out of yourself, and you murmur without thinking, “I wanna go in there.”

Your voice breaks the silence between you and him. It catches Alex off guard.

He’s been beside you all this time, his hand searching for yours, his fingers awkward over the thick wool. He tries for a better grip, one that feels intimate even through the layers. He’s been preoccupied, you realise — focused on the way the cold dulls touch, the way the gloves feel like a barrier he can’t quite breach.

He glances toward the building you’ve indicated. “There?” he asks, his voice a soft echo of your own, head tilting ever so slightly as he looks back at you.

You nod, though your own reasoning feels instinctive rather than deliberate. You’re not even sure why, not entirely.

He hesitates, the faintest frown touching his brow. “I’m tired of stores, honey.” he says, his voice a gentle protest but firm enough to suggest he’d rather not. But you know him well enough to catch it. Still, a small opening where you might nudge him.

You don’t hesitate. “We could get something for Penny.” you say, almost casually, though you’ve chosen the words carefully, the name landing like a quiet persuasion. “Maybe your Dad too.”

You don’t look at him as you say it, keeping your eyes on the shop. You don’t need to look to know it’s enough. It’s not just logic. It’s strategy. He wouldn’t say no to his mother. He wouldn’t say no to family. Anything else might risk too much — his own goodness, his tenderness, his pride. He wouldn’t risk looking indifferent, even here, even now.

He exhales, the kind of breath that lingers in the cold. A small puff of surrender. “‘Kay.” he says at last, his voice softened, his resolve melting like the frost on the trees, his glove shifting again against yours as he lets himself be pulled toward the little shop.

The warmth is immediate and clinging. If you had glasses it would have fogged them up. It prickles your cheeks as you adjust. The smell is faint but unmistakable — dust mingled with something floral, faintly artificial, like potpourri that hasn’t been replaced in years. It makes the place feel older, almost stuck in time, though its shelves are crowded with objects trying their best to stay relevant.

Alex removes his hat almost absentmindedly. It’s somewhere between a beanie and one of those with a big pom-pom perched on top, except his has a small, modest poof, like a shy exclamation point. He’s never liked it. Too silly, he’s said, too boyish, not the kind of thing he’d choose on his own. But it keeps him warm, and more importantly, you like it, so he wears it without much protest. Things could be that simple sometimes.

Now hatless, his hair is in disarray, flattened and sticking up in unplanned directions. The strands curl at the ends, not quite long enough to be tamed by his usual attempts to smooth them down. You take in the rest of him — his coat half unbuttoned, revealing a shirt creased from wear, its collar slightly askew. There’s a quiet weariness about him, like someone pulled half out of sleep and still tethered to a dream. He yawns, a wide, unguarded motion that he doesn’t bother to suppress.

The woman at the till greets you with a polite smile, but Alex doesn’t respond. He’s too busy battling with his gloves again, tugging at the fingers like they’re conspiring against him. You glance at him with mock exasperation, leaning close enough to mutter, “Wake up, Alex.”

You weave your way between the shelves, which are tall and narrow, nearly brushing the ceiling. The aisles are tight enough to make the place feel more cramped than cozy, but there’s a comfort in it — something about being surrounded by so many little objects, all waiting to be chosen. You pause in one of the aisles, stopping at a shelf lined with small, decorative pieces. Alex, still yawning, shuffles to a stop beside you.

“These are cute, aren’t they?” you say, lifting one of the ceramic napkin holders into your hand.

He blinks at it, bleary-eyed. “What are-” he pauses for another yawn, turning his head slightly before finishing, “-those?”

“Napkin holders.” you say, inspecting the little ceramic shape. It’s painted with delicate flowers, the kind of design that’s charming at first glance but verges on tacky the longer you look at it. Alex barely glances at it. “Put your hand over your mouth.” you chide when he yawns again, and his lips twitch into a faint smile.

“Yes, yes.” he says, covering his mouth too late. “Shouldn’t be allowed. It’s dangerous.” His voice is teasing, but there’s a drowsy edge to it that takes the sharpness away. He smiles at you, the kind of smile he knows softens you even when you don’t want it to.

It almost works. Almost.

“I hadn’t realized…they are cute.” he says after a beat, his tone half-distracted. He yawns again, quickly covering his mouth this time. “Sorry, baby.”

“You’re dreaming.” you tell him, shifting the napkin holder in your hand.

He shakes his head lightly, a touch defiant. “But I’m wide awake.” He reaches for the ceramic piece, finally managing to grip something with his now-gloveless hands. His fingers brush against yours as he takes it, warm and sure.

You glance at him, eyebrow raised. “You know, awake or asleep, it’s the same thing with you.”

“Oh really?” He tilts his head, feigning thoughtfulness, and then smirks. “I was going to say I only think of you naked when I’m awake, but that’s not-”

“Alex!” you hiss, slapping his shoulder lightly.

The layers of your coats and sweaters make the gesture more symbolic than anything else, the force dulled to almost nothing. He grins, unrepentant, the mischief in his eyes breaking through his weariness for a moment.

“That’s not the point.” you say, trying to sound stern, though the corner of your mouth twitches dangerously close to a smile.

“But you just said…” He trails off, his grin widening. “I’m really tired. ‘S your fault I can’t think.” He wiggles his eyebrows in a way that’s so absurdly him it breaks your resolve.

Okay, maybe it is your fault, but you were up all night too and you’re fine, aren’t you?

“You didn’t understand, Mr. Turner.” you say, trying to recover the thread of your thought. “There’s no difference between dreaming awake and dreaming asleep.”

He steps closer, wrapping an arm around your waist and pulling you gently back against him. His other hand, still holding the napkin holder, hangs loosely at his side. The ceramic piece suddenly feels laughably insignificant.

“I do dream.” he says softly, his voice brushing your ear. “Life’s a dream.” He pauses, just long enough to make you roll your eyes at his dramatics.

Then, quieter, closer: “Mrs. Turner.”

Your chest tightens, a warmth spreading from where his hands rest on your front. You smile despite yourself, though you try to hide it. You melt against him, though you tell yourself you shouldn’t.

Yes, you should. Yes, you do.

“If you think you’re being witty, you’re very much mistaken.” you tell him, voice clipped but with an edge that betrays you’re not entirely serious.

He doesn’t respond, just smirks in that half-sleepy, half-mischievous way that always seems to unnerve and amuse you all at once. You decide not to let him win this one, so you spin out of his grip in what you imagine might look like a graceful move. For a moment, it almost is — your coat flaring softly behind you, your movement fluid. Almost.

Then your shoulder catches the opposite shelf, halting your momentum with an awkward thud. Nothing falls, but the wobble of a few precariously placed trinkets makes you freeze. He raises a single brow, biting back what you’re sure would be a smug comment.

You ignore him, your gaze dropping to the cluttered shelf in front of you. A piece of decor — a ceramic plate painted with tiny, intricate flowers — catches your attention. You reach for it without thinking. His mother would like this, wouldn’t she? Something delicate and quiet, the kind of thing she’d know exactly where to place in her home.

Behind you, Alex whispers, his voice low and teasing. “You’re just being a bore…with-” He pauses, clearly searching for the word, “-with your stupid paradoxes.”

You glance over your shoulder, unimpressed. “We need to get them a gift.” you say, holding up the plate for him to see before putting it back down. “You’re incapable of talking seriously.”

Your look is pointed enough to make him stop in his tracks. For a brief moment, you imagine that if he had a tail, it would be tucked stiffly between his legs, shameful but still stubborn.

“Today, yes.” he concedes, though his voice is quiet, almost petulant. “Only today. Because of…because…” His words falter. You can practically see the gears in his head turning, trying to come up with something clever — or at least something that won’t offend you.

“Because what?” you challenge, tilting your head, already knowing he doesn’t have an answer.

His mouth opens slightly, then closes again. Finally, he gives up with a shrug, his hands rising in mock surrender.

“Today’s the same as any day.” you say, filling the silence as you reach for another object. This time, it’s a pair of little statues — matching figures that look vaguely like gnomes, though their features are less defined. You’re not entirely sure what they’re meant to represent. They’re oddly charming.

Alex leans in over your shoulder to inspect them, his breath warm against your cheek. He scoffs softly. You don’t need to look at him to know he’s raising that brow again.

You sigh and place the statues back on the shelf.

“Not quite as much.” he says, his tone faintly smug.

“Your witticisms are not very inspired.” you reply, your voice dry as you finally turn to face him.

“Neither are the gnomes.” he says, pointing at the shelf.

“They’re not gnomes.” you argue, folding your arms.

“They’re gnome-adjacent.” he counters, stepping closer with a slight smirk.

“Alex.”

“Alright, alright.” he says, holding his hands up as though to defend himself from the rising tension. Then he yawns again, and you narrow your eyes at him.

“I can’t believe you’re this tired.” you say. “It’s not even three o’clock.”

“I’m not tired.” he insists, though the yawn he tries to stifle completely betrays him. He rubs the back of his neck, feigning thoughtfulness. “I’m just…thinking at a slower pace.”

You roll your eyes, pulling another small object from the shelf — a delicate, hand-painted ornament shaped like a bird. It feels light in your palm, fragile. You hold it up for him to see.

“Thoughts?” you ask.

He studies it for a second, then shrugs. “It’s alright.”

“‘Alright’ doesn’t cut it. This is for your mother.”

He smirks, leaning against the shelf behind him. “It’s nice. Lovely, even. You’re the expert.”

“You’re insufferable.” you mutter, turning the ornament over in your hands.

“And yet here we are.” he replies, stepping closer again. “I’ll stop being insufferable if you agree to get coffee after this.”

“Who said I’d get coffee with you?”

He feigns a look of deep hurt, clutching his chest dramatically. “You wound me, Mrs. Turner.”

“I can’t believe you think that still works.” you say, shaking your head.

“It does work.” he says, leaning in close enough that you can feel the warmth of him despite the layers between you. “Because you still get that little smile when I say it. Like you’re trying not to, but you can’t help it.”

“Alex-”

“Mrs. Turner.” he interrupts, whispering it softly, the words brushing the air between you.

You turn away quickly, trying to focus on the shelf, but he’s already grinning. He’s watching you, half-lidded eyes following the way your hand moves.

“I don’t like you making fun of me.”

Your voice cuts through the still air of the shop, sharper than you intended. Alex straightens slightly, his hat dangling loosely from one hand as he shifts his weight. He blinks at you, his brows knitting together in brief confusion. He wasn’t making fun of you — not really. At least, not intentionally. Not in the way you’re accusing him of. But your words land heavy anyway, like you’re testing some unseen boundary neither of you had anticipated crossing.

You don’t know where the attitude is coming from. Maybe it’s the weight of the day, the pressure of finding the right gifts, or even something as intangible as the light in this place — the way it presses in, dim and dusty, making everything feel a little off-kilter. Maybe some restless ghost buried in the walls of the shop has taken hold of you, whispering mischief into your ear. That’s less likely than the truth: you’re annoyed. His slight disinterest has pricked at you, and lashing out feels easier than confronting it.

Still, there’s a part of you that winces internally at your own sharpness. You know he doesn’t deserve it. But isn’t it better to be a little bit of a bitch, to feel like you’ve regained some ground, than to sit in the uneasy space of his half-suppressed yawns and detached commentary?

He feels a pang of guilt at the sharpness in your tone, even if he’s not entirely sure where it’s coming from.

“Making fun of you?” he echoes, his voice soft but edged with confusion. His hat — still clutched in one hand — drops briefly to his side before he presses it over his heart like some overblown poet, as though swearing allegiance. “But my dear,” he says, adopting a tone of mock sincerity, “I would never allow myself to-”

“You are allowing yourself,” you interrupt, cutting through his theatrics.

You spin around to face him, blinking. The light catches on the edge of your profile, illuminating the faintest frown pulling at your lips. He tilts his head slightly, studying you. His lips quirk slightly, not quite into a smile but close. He takes a step closer, moving out of the narrow aisle and into the small open space where the shelves converge. You follow without thinking. The objects around you seem to blur into a backdrop of muted colors and textures. All of it feels insignificant.

“Are we fighting?” he asks after a moment, his tone laced with quiet amusement rather than concern. He’s still looking at you with that half-drowsy expression that’s been driving you mad since you walked in here.

Something about the question — about the way he doesn’t take it seriously — makes your annoyance flare. It’s not that you want to fight him — God, no — but what if you did? What if you wanted to dig into the frustration and let it bloom into something loud and messy? Would he let you, or would he keep being this unbearably kind, unshakably soft version of himself? The idea that he’d brush you off so easily feels…infuriating.

“Ugh.” you mutter, turning sharply back to the shelf. The trinkets clink faintly as your movements disturb them.

“We are.” he concludes.

“Yes.” you say, exasperated.

He watches the tension in your shoulders for a beat, trying to determine how serious you are. Then he nods, his lips pressing together in mock solemnity. Finally.

“You’ll win.” he says, with a soft sigh.

Your head whips around, your eyes narrowing. “Why?”

“Because I’ll let you.” he replies simply, his voice so earnest it disarms you, so matter-of-fact it almost feels like an insult.

“Alex!”

“What?” he asks, his confusion genuine now. He blinks down at you like he truly doesn’t understand what he’s done wrong. His free hand brushes against your arm lightly, a hesitant touch meant to gauge whether he’s misstepped or if you’ll let him back in.

“You can’t just let me win.” you say, your voice tight but not as sharp as before.

“Why not?” His tone is calm, but there’s a faint edge of stubbornness creeping into it now. He’s tired — of this argument, of this shop, of the layers of cold and warmth and expectation piled onto the day. He rubs the back of his neck with the hand still clutching his hat, his hair ruffling slightly in the process.

“Because…” you start, but the words stall in your throat. Because what? You’re not even sure anymore. It’s something about how effortless he makes everything seem, about the way he sidesteps conflict with that easy charm of his, leaving you spinning your wheels. “Because!” you insist.

He sighs, his breath warming the air between you. He looks at you for a long moment, his eyes scanning your face with a tenderness that catches you off guard. When he speaks again, his voice is quieter, steadier.

“But I love you.” he says, the words simple and unadorned, like a fact of nature. He leans in and presses a warm, fleeting kiss to your cheek.

The action jolts you out of your frustration. You refuse to let him see it. Still, his words linger, as warm as his touch.

He knows he’s broken through.

You want to stay annoyed. You want to hold onto the spark that made you lash out in the first place. But he makes it impossible. The fight — the one you weren’t even sure you wanted — deflates before it can properly take shape, leaving you standing there, your cheek still tingling from the press of his lips.

“You’re mad.” he says after a beat, his voice quiet. “Aren’t you?”

You glance at him. “Not mad.” you murmur.

“Annoyed?”

You nod, barely.

“Because of me?”

You turn your head, fixing him with a look that answers the question for him.

“Right.” he says, a faint, sheepish smile tugging at his lips.

You huff and step away, placing some bird ornament you didn’t even know when you picked up back on the shelf. With more care than you’d like to admit. Your fingers drift to another object. Alex watches the way you move, your hands, noting the deliberate precision in the way you touch. He steps closer, close enough that his chest almost brushes your back.

“I wasn’t making fun of you.” he says softly. “Not in the way you think.”

You don’t respond right away, but your shoulders relax ever so slightly.

“I mean it.” he continues, his hand brushing against yours as he reaches for the snow globe. His fingers close around it, and for a moment, the two of you are holding it together. “You know that, don’t you?”

“I don’t know.”

Alex lets the snow globe go, his hand moving to cover yours instead.

“Well,” he says, “let me prove it to you.”

You roll your eyes, but there’s no real heat in the gesture. All you can focus on now is the way his lips feel against yours when he turns you around and kisses you, steady and sure, and the smile that bleeds into it.

“Don’t think this means I’m not still mad at you.”

“Of course.” he replies, straightening slightly but keeping his hand at your waist. “I wouldn’t dream of assuming otherwise.”

“You’re annoying.”

“Mhm…” he hums, “you’ll keep me around.”

“You’re lucky I will.” you say finally.

“Every day, my love.” he replies softly. This time there’s no teasing. Only truth.

It wasn’t surprising to you when Alex confessed that he missed the old car. He could be nostalgic like that, his attachment to certain things running deep in ways that both charmed and baffled you. What was surprising was seeing him pull up one day with it, looking entirely too pleased with himself as if he’d just pulled off the heist of the century.

“Hadn’t you sold it?” you’d asked, staring at the weathered thing parked in front of your home, its once-shiny paint still dulled with age.

He hadn’t, of course. It turned out he’d loaned it to a friend who’d been keeping it in a garage somewhere outside of the city. So now you are stuck with it — this clunky, rust-speckled piece of nostalgia — for the long drive up north.

It’s three minutes past nine when you climb into the passenger seat, arms full: handbag, gift bag, another gift bag, your notebook, pencils, and a pencil sharpener balanced precariously on top. The car smells faintly of leather, aged and worn, mingling with the sharper scent of something metallic and slightly sweet — old oil, maybe.

Alex loads the rest of the bags into the back. When he settles into the driver’s seat, his hat already pushed back on his head, he looks determined. Like he’s ready to tackle the road ahead, even if the odds aren’t in his favor.

A couple of minutes later, he starts driving. If you’re lucky — and that’s a big if — you’ll reach your destination a little after noon. That’s assuming you were in a car that could go at a decent mileage per hour and that traffic wasn’t so bad.

Traffic, of course, is terrible.

Even on a Monday morning, the main road is backed up in both directions. Brake lights stretch endlessly ahead of you, a sea of red blinking intermittently in the pale winter sunlight. Alex sighs, a heavy sound that you feel more than hear.

You settle in with your notebook open across your lap, pencil poised in your hand. The low scratch of lead against paper fills the car, soft and rhythmic, but Alex’s attention keeps drifting toward you.

After the third exaggerated sigh, you glance at him. He’s gripping the wheel loosely, one hand resting at the top, the other on his thigh, but his knee is bouncing restlessly. The movement makes your nerves jittery, though you try not to show it.

“Alex.”

He doesn’t answer, his gaze fixed on the endless line of cars ahead, his jaw tight.

Okay, Mr. Wants Attention. He won’t say it outright, won’t just ask for what he wants. Instead, he’ll make you pull it out of him. Another sigh, this one louder than the last, escapes his lips. It’s dramatic enough that you could swear you hear a hint of theatrics in it, like he’s in a play where his only role is the long-suffering driver.

His knee bounces faster, the leather of the seat squeaking faintly under the motion. His hand shifts on the wheel, gripping and releasing, a quiet little fidget that says more than he would if he actually spoke. You can practically feel him daring you to ask what’s wrong, though you know the answer already.

You sigh yourself now, closing the notebook with a quiet thud. You try to shove it into the dash compartment, but it doesn’t fit. The latch won’t click shut, and after a few futile attempts, you resign yourself to leaving it on your knees. You reach for the radio, fiddling with the dial, flicking through station after station until static fills the car. It’s a distraction, something to do with your hands while the car inches forward. But Alex sighs again, louder this time, and his knee keeps bouncing.

“Leave it.” he mutters.

You stop, your hand hovering over the dial. The silence feels heavier now, filled only by the occasional hum of an engine revving somewhere behind you and the faint creak of the car as it shifts with each stop-and-go motion.

“Fine.” you mutter under your breath. “Would you like me to entertain you, darling?” you ask, your tone just dry enough to make your point.

His eyes flicker to you for the briefest second before returning to the road, but the corner of his mouth twitches. He’s holding back a smile as far as you can tell. “Didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.” you mutter, rolling your eyes but leaning just a little closer to him anyway. “Honestly, Alex, if you wanted me to pay attention to you, all you had to do was ask.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

You let out a laugh, low and quiet. “Sure, Mr. Subtle.”

Alex leans forward slightly, craning his neck to try and see around the cars in front of him. His fingers drum against the steering wheel, impatience palpable. He mutters something under his breath — something sharp, likely not meant for your ears.

“It’s Monday.” he says finally, his voice tinged with exasperation. “Where are all these people coming from? Jesus.”

You glance at him out of the corner of your eye. His knee is still bouncing, and his fingers are tapping out an erratic rhythm now, too. The smell inside the car shifts. The faintly nostalgic scent of old leather is overtaken by the sharper, more acrid smell of exhaust wafting in from outside. You crack your window slightly, but the cold air doesn’t help much.

Alex keeps glancing toward the side of the road, as if expecting to see some miraculous shortcut that everyone else has somehow missed. His mind is likely running through every backroad, every alternate route, every possible way to shave even five minutes off this crawl of a journey. But nothing presents itself, and he lets out another quiet sigh.

“You’re quiet.” he says suddenly, his voice cutting through the silence.

You shrug, shifting in your seat. “Not much to say.”

He hums in response.

“You’re quiet, too.” you add after a moment.

He glances at you then, a flicker of amusement softening the hard line of his mouth. “Am I?”

“Yes. It’s unnerving.”

He smiles faintly, his fingers stopping their drumming as he leans back into his seat. “I’m just thinking.”

“About?”

“About how I probably should’ve left this car where it was.” he admits.

You laugh softly, and for a moment, the tension in the car eases.

“I didn’t want to say it.” you tease, leaning your head back against the seat.

“You didn’t have to.” he replies, his voice warm now. “You’re good at saying things without saying them.”

The traffic inches forward again, and the moment is interrupted by the blaring of a horn somewhere behind you. Alex sighs heavily, his knee bouncing once more.

You reach over, your hand brushing lightly over his thigh. “Relax.” you say softly.

He glances at you, his expression softening as he exhales slowly. “I’m trying.”

“Try harder.” you reply, a small smile tugging at your lips.

He laughs, and the sound feels like a small victory — something to hold onto as the road stretches endlessly ahead.

Alex shifts in his seat, one hand gripping the wheel, the other resting loosely on the gear shift. He glances at you again, his lips quirking into a half-smile. The weight of your hand on his thigh — too high to be innocent — lingers in his mind, and you can tell he’s doing his best to maintain composure.

“Help me out ‘ere.”

Your eyebrows arch as if to say what exactly do you mean by that?

His eyes flick to yours briefly before returning to the road. He knows you too well. “Don’t even.” he mutters, though the faint flush creeping up his neck gives him away.

“Don’t even what?” you ask, voice dripping with sweetness.

Neither of you speaks for a beat, both locked in a silent test of wills. You’re daring him to elaborate, he’s daring you to act.

“We’re not that predictable.” he finally says.

“We’re not.” you agree, your hand still on his thigh, fingers curling ever so slightly.

“We’re not.” he repeats, but his voice is strained now, the words lacking conviction.

Your hand gives a deliberate squeeze, and his jaw tightens. His free hand comes up to rub over his face, exasperation both real and performative, all the same. “Oh, fuck…” he mutters under his breath as the car jerks to another stop in the seemingly endless traffic.

“Hmm?” you prompt, your tone as sweet as syrup.

“I forgot to shave.” he says, shaking his head slightly, as if that were the biggest concern right now.

“I like you rugged looking.” Your fingers press into the soft fat of his inner thigh just enough to make his breath hitch.

“My mother doesn’t.” he mutters, attempting to steer the conversation back to neutral ground. The car lurches forward a few feet. “Since…”

“Since?” you ask, leaning into him slightly, your eyes glittering with curiosity.

“Well…” He pauses, scratching his jawline. “Since I had my phase.”

You laugh. “Oh, right, the phase.” He chuckles along, but his smile falters when you add, “You still look good, though.”

The compliment softens him. His gaze flickers to yours for a moment, his smile returning, small and genuine. “Thank you, darling.” he says.

The traffic crawls on, and the silence between you becomes less charged, more companionable. He nods toward your notebook, still perched on your knees.

“How’s the book coming along?”

You groan, leaning your head back against the seat. “Alex, it’s not- it’s just a bunch of made-up nonsense…a lot of it, actually.”

“That’s usually what you call fiction.” he replies.

“It’s not the same.” you argue.

He laughs softly. “It’s in the paper, in black and white, you can’t deny that.” With the air of someone deeply offended, you huff out a dismissive pfff! “It’s all there.” he says again, stretching his arm to tap his fingers on the notebook’s hardcover.

You snap it shut as if it wasn’t already and tuck it under your arm, already anticipating his next question.

“Are you gonna let me read it?” he asks, his voice curious but not pushy. Yet.

Your hand leaves his thigh, and instead, you dig through your bag, pulling out a compact. You flip the car’s sun visor down and open the mirror, focusing intently on your reflection.

“Babe.” he says, trying again.

You ignore him, pretending to adjust your hair.

“You read my stuff all the time.” he points out, his tone edging toward plaintive.

You snap the compact shut with a decisive click, the sound sharp in the confined space. “I do not.” you say.

“Yes, you do.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Is it about me?” he interrupts, and you immediately slam the visor back up with more force than necessary. The sharp sound makes him wince slightly, and he raises a hand in mock surrender.

“Babe, c’mon.” he says, his voice gentler now, but you’ve already decided the conversation is over.

“Do you think Sock will miss us?” you ask abruptly, your tone casual but clearly a diversion.

He chuckles, shaking his head at your transparent attempt to change the subject. “Yeah, but he’s fine with Jules.”

Julia — or Jules, as Alex affectionately calls her — is the sweet elderly neighbor you’ve reluctantly grown to trust with your beloved cat. You’re still not entirely used to this whole “neighbor” thing, despite how long it’s been since you moved in with Alex.

“I hope so.” you murmur, glancing out the window at the sluggish traffic.

“He’s our little boy.” Alex teases, a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“He is.” you agree, your voice softening as you think of those big, curious eyes and the way he always seems to know when you need comfort.

Alex reaches over, resting his hand lightly on your knee. “He’ll be fine, love. Jules spoils him rotten.”

“I know.” you say, placing your hand over his. “I just miss him already.”

Alex squeezes your knee gently. “I miss him, too.”

The car inches forward again, and Alex’s knee stops bouncing. “Maybe we’ll make it there before dark.” he laughs.

“Maybe.” you reply, your fingers brushing against his as the traffic finally begins to ease.

Just enough to lull you into a false sense of progress for a little while, the slow hum of the engine blending with the strains of a half-decent song on the radio. But the reprieve wasn’t enough to distract you.

Boredom set in like a slow burn, your fingers tapping, your eyes darting to Alex as his hands gripped the steering wheel. He hadn’t noticed your shift in mood yet.

But then, of course, you had to push it. You always did.

It didn’t take much. A touch on his arm that lingered too long. The slow slide of your hand to his thigh. His reaction was immediate: a quick intake of breath, the slightest flex of his fingers on the wheel.

“Don’t.” he warned, though his voice lacked conviction.

“You’re telling me no?” you asked, incredulous.

“I didn’t say that.” he muttered, already losing the battle.

He wouldn’t say no. Who would?

What followed was short and sweet, the kind of indulgence you’d both blame on the traffic and the old car with its expansive, accommodating seats that left you just enough space for your business.

You really were that predictable.

Now, you are wiping your mouth with the back of your hand, leaning against the passenger door as Alex sits up straighter, wrestling with his jeans. His zipper, much like the rest of the car, was stubborn and unreliable, catching on the fabric and refusing to cooperate.

“Jesus Christ.” he muttered under his breath, fumbling with the metal teeth. A well known personal vendetta of impatience

“Need help?” you tease, your voice light but still tinged with satisfaction.

He shoots you a look — equal parts exasperated and amused. “I think you’ve done enough, don’t you?”

You shrug, a grin tugging at your lips as you watch him finally win the battle against his zipper. His shirt is untucked now, rumpled in a way that would betray you both if anyone looked too closely. Not that anyone would.

Alex leans back against the seat, running a hand through his hair, which now had the telltale signs of your handiwork. He lets out a long sigh, shaking his head as if to scold himself.

“You’re trouble.” he says, keeping his eyes on the road and his grip tight. On both the steering wheel and himself.

“I’m your trouble.”

He turns his head to look at you, his lips curving into a small, lopsided smile. “That you are. Do I look okay?”

“You look fine.” you say, smirking. “Rugged. Like I said.”

He laughs softly, shaking his head again. “Rugged isn’t exactly what I was going for.”

“Well, you should have thought about that before letting me-”

“Letting you?” he interrupted. “Letting you? As if I had a choice?”

“You always have a choice.” you said, reaching over to smooth down the collar of his shirt. Your fingers lingered on his neck.

“Not with you.” Alex sighs. “You know, we’re never going to make it if you keep distracting me.”

“Who says I’m the distraction?” you counter, leaning back in your seat, satisfied.

He gives you another sidelong glance, his eyes warm despite the faint accusation. “I love you.” he says. Simple and unadorned.

Predictable or not, there is no place you’d rather be.

The dining room smelled like rosemary and roasted potatoes, a soft warmth radiating from the old brick fireplace that had been lit for the evening. The walls were lined with framed photos, decades of family history encased in polished wood, their stories lingering like ghosts in the air. Dinner had been as pleasant as you’d hoped: his mother doting on Alex with casual reminders about portion sizes, his father making quiet but pointed observations about the state of the world. It was comfortable, even cozy, in the way only a family home could be.

And then, of course, the gnome ornament had stolen the show.

“I just love it.” his mother had gushed, cradling the little ceramic figure in her hands like it was something truly precious. She had no idea that, yes, Alex had doubled back to buy it behind your back, no clue that it had been a small rebellion against your mutual skepticism about it. But as she beamed at the tiny, vaguely odd-looking figure, you caught Alex’s eye. His smirk was almost imperceptible, but it was there. And yes, it made you love him that much more.

Dinner continued in easy conversation — stories of neighbors, updates on distant cousins, the kind of talk that didn’t require much effort. But the peace was short-lived.

“Well,” his mother begins, “when are you gonna give us a grandbaby, Alex?”

The room seems to shift. It’s not a heavy silence, but it is enough to make you set your fork down a little too carefully, the scrape of metal against porcelain louder than it should have been. Alex pauses mid-chew, his eyes darting to you, then back to his mother.

Your heart thuds in your chest. You haven’t exactly avoided this topic with Alex, but you haven’t fully dived into it either. It was one of those nebulous, someday things, a distant idea floating somewhere on the horizon. And now, it is here, smack in the middle of roast lamb and green beans.

It’s not that he doesn’t want kids — does he? He’s told you he does. Maybe. Always in those quiet moments where the future feels far away and safe to talk about. But Alex, for all his charm and wit, is a man who lives in the present. Planning for something so big, so permanent, feels like asking him to stand on the edge of a cliff and look down. He’d rather keep his feet firmly on the ground.

And you? You’re not sure. You’re not even sure what your hesitation is. Maybe it’s the fear of being seen as just a role — mother, wife, a fixture in someone else’s life. Maybe it’s the quiet terror that you’d somehow fail at it, that you’d be the one who didn’t measure up.

“Uh,” he starts, his voice stalling as he swallows too quickly. He coughs lightly, reaches for his water, and takes a long sip. “That’s…a big question, Mum.”

His father chuckles softly, leaning back in his chair. “It’s not a big question. It’s a fair one.”

“Fair?” Alex raises an eyebrow, a small, nervous laugh escaping him. He’s still stalling, still trying to buy time.

“Well, it’s been what? Two years now?” his mother presses, her gaze shifting between the two of you. Her smile is warm but expectant, like she’d already imagined herself knitting tiny hats and booties.

A spotlight you hadn’t asked for but couldn’t avoid. Two years. The number hangs in the air like it means something, like there’s a timeline for this sort of thing, a deadline you’ve been blissfully ignoring. You glance at Alex. He looks calm on the surface, but you know better. The laugh was a tell. The way his fingers tightened slightly on yours under the table was another.

You knew this touch well — his silent I’m recharging, as you two called it. It was a phrase born out of a joke, something lighthearted he’d said once, but over time it had grown into something more. You were his personal power bank, he liked to say. It sounded cute, and sometimes it was. But other times, it felt like he was pulling something from you without meaning to, like he was draining a piece of you to refill himself.

You did the same to him, though. You didn’t have a name for it, but you knew he could tell when you were especially wound up. He’d pointed it out once, gently, that you tended to cling more, hang onto him like a lifeline when the world felt too much. You hadn’t even realised you did it until he said it.

“I know when you’re extra stressed, my love.” he’d said. “You hang on me more.”

“And you don’t mind?” you’d asked, hesitant, a little guilty.

“‘Course not.” he’d replied, wrapping his arms around you in a way that made you feel like you could finally exhale. And you did. That sigh — your signal of release — was always his cue to let go.

Now, under the table, as his thumb traces lazy circles over your knuckles, you feel the familiar tug of him recharging. You give him a small squeeze in return, your way of saying, It’s okay. I’m here.

He wants to say the right thing, but the right thing isn’t clear.

“We’ve, uh…we’ve talked about it.” he says finally, his voice careful. “Haven’t we, love?”

You blink, caught off guard by the sudden toss of the conversational ball into your court. “Uh, yeah.” forcing a smile. “We’ve talked about it.”

His mother’s smile widens, her hands clasping together, kind eyes filled with a hope that borders on entitlement. “And?” She’s lovely, truly. But this? This isn’t about her, or the tiny hats she’s already knitting in her mind.

“And…” Alex says, dragging the word out as he rubs the back of his neck. “It’s not exactly…it’s not in the cards right now.”

“Not in the cards?” his father repeats, his tone carrying just the slightest edge of disapproval.

“Mum, Dad, come on.” Alex says, his voice softening into that almost-whining tone he uses when he wants to placate someone — you would know. “It’s not like we’re saying never. Just not…now.”

“Why not now?” his mother asks, her brows furrowing. “You’ve got a lovely home, you’re both doing well. What’s stopping you?”

The question reeks in the air heavier than the smell of roasted garlic. Alex shifts in his chair, the scrape of wood against the floor breaking the silence. “It’s not exactly that simple.” carefully measured.

Not that simple. You almost laugh. You can see her knitting needles faltering in her imaginary hands, her perfectly stitched plans unraveling at the edges. Alex isn’t trying to disappoint her, but he doesn’t know how to explain it. That this thing, this life you’ve built together, is enough for now. That it doesn’t need to be expanded or multiplied to be complete.

“We just…have other things we want to do first.” you finally join, steady, stern, but not unkind by any means. “It’s not that we don’t want to, but we’re happy where we are right now.”

You lean back slightly, studying him for a moment. He looks good tonight, sharp but soft around the edges, like he belongs here and nowhere else. It’s always strange seeing him in this context, under the warm, homey lights of his childhood dining room. Here, where he’s both Alex, the man you love, and their Alex, the boy they raised.

His mother doesn’t know the half of it. She doesn’t know how much of himself he pours into you, how he loves with a quiet ferocity that sometimes leaves you breathless. She doesn’t know how many nights you’ve stayed awake, piecing him back together while holding yourself together, steady and unshaking, because if you didn’t, who else would? Who else would be there to fix him, to gather up the fragments he doesn’t even realise he’s lost? She doesn’t know how it feels to bear the weight of him, his fears, his insecurities, his dreams, all of it laid bare in the space between midnight and dawn, whispered in a voice so soft it’s almost not there.

She doesn’t know how he clings to you in those moments, like you’re the only thing tethering him to the ground, the only thing keeping him from coming undone. She doesn’t know about the times he’s buried his face in your lap, too exhausted to speak, and how you’ve run your fingers through his hair, murmuring assurances you weren’t entirely sure you believed yourself. She doesn’t know how you’ve felt yourself bending under the strain, a fine line between breaking and holding, praying silently that you’d stay strong just long enough to make it better for him.

She doesn’t know the words he whispers to you in the dark — words so raw, so vulnerable, that they slice through you in ways you can’t describe. Words that make you wonder if you’re strong enough to hold all of him, if there’s a part of him too wild, too broken, too much for you to bear. But you do bear it, because it’s him. Because when he leans into you, pressing his forehead to yours with a sigh that seems to come from somewhere deep inside, it’s like he’s giving you a piece of his soul, trusting you with it in a way he’s never trusted anyone else.

And she doesn’t know that even with all of that — his weight, his words, his breaking and rebuilding — you’d still choose him. Every time. Even when it’s hard. Especially when it’s hard. Because no one else could hold him like you do. And no one else could ever be enough for you.

But you do. And maybe that’s enough. For now.

Alex shoots you a grateful look, his shoulders relaxing just a fraction. His thumb strokes over the back of your hand, and your world narrows to just that small, steady motion of silent reassurance, a thank you, a reminder.

His mother sighs, the sound cutting softly through the fragile quiet. Her disappointment is carefully masked, an undercurrent of longing she can’t quite hide. “Well,” she says, “I suppose I can wait a little longer.”

“Thank you, Mum.” Alex lets out a short laugh, a gentle nudge to let the topic drop. “Plenty of time.”

His father grunts something under his breath along the lines of “As long as you’re not waiting forever.”

The conversation shifts after all of that, moving on to safer topics like the weather and plans for the holidays. But there's a faint echo of it that refuses to fully fade.

Later, as you and Alex stand in the kitchen doing the dishes, the quiet hum of the house settles over you both. He nudges your shoulder with his, subtle but obviously intentional.

“You alright?” His voice was low, careful, like the words are something fragile he’s handing to you.

“Yeah.” you murmur, rinsing a plate. “You?”

A pause. You can feel his eyes on you, even if you didn’t meet them. He’s drying a glass, moving the towel over it with slow precision, as if it’s the only thing left to make sense. “I didn’t mean to throw you under the bus back there.”

“I know.”

You place the plate on the rack, and his hand comes to rest on your lower back. His touch always felt like a question, unspoken but clear. This one is softer, quieter, but it asks for the same thing it always does — trust.

You don’t lean into him immediately. The silence between you isn’t empty — it’s full of him, full of the things he wouldn’t say. Things he didn’t need to. His hand stays on your back, patient, steady. He’s not trying to pull anything from you this time, not the way he sometimes did without realising. This isn’t that. This is him letting the moment be.

When you finally lean into him, it isn’t for his sake but yours. You feel his exhale, a soft shift of air against your temple as he turns his head slightly.

“I don’t mind it.” you whisper. “When they ask. I don’t. Not really.”

His hand moves, tracing the smallest arc along your spine. He doesn’t speak. You feel the words there anyway, between the press of his fingers and the warmth of his palm. He never needed to explain himself to you — not about the questions, not about the answers he wasn’t ready to give.

You turn your head just enough to glance up at him. There’s something there that feels like the edge of a deep breath he won’t let out. It isn’t a promise he gave you. It was something smaller. A kind of understanding only he could offer.

The silence stretches for a moment too long, heavy but not unbearable. Then Alex breaks it.

“You know, if they ask again, I could just tell them we’re waiting for Sock to start talking so he can weigh in on whether he wants siblings.”

You shake your head, the smallest smile breaking through. “God, don’t give your mum any ideas. She’d probably knit him a little sweater that says big brother.”

Alex chuckles. The tension finally cracked, just a little. “Alright, noted. No sibling talk in front of Mum.”

“No sibling talk at all.” you corrected, nudging him with your elbow.

“Fine, fine.” He grins, leaning closer until his voice is just a murmur. “But if Sock starts talking, all bets are off.”

It was absurd, but it worked.

The afternoon is suspended in that semi-darkness, the kind that feels like it could stretch on forever. The curtains are drawn, filtering the pale winter light into muted shadows that fall over Alex’s room. His figure is a quiet mound beneath the blanket, shifting slightly as he adjusts to your presence. His back is to you, hunched. His Christmas pajamas — red with cartoonish reindeer — peek out from beneath the covers, ending awkwardly at his calves where the fabric is just too short. They’re old, rediscovered while rummaging through boxes of things he never throws away. They’re somehow endearing. You can’t believe he’s still wearing them.

You knock your knuckles against his exposed ankle, a quiet gesture that’s more habit than intention.

You knock again, the sharp point of bone a contrast to the soft fabric covering the rest of him.

He coughs, then groans. “What is it?” he asks, voice hoarse and half-muffled by the pillow.

“Whatcha doing?” you ask.

“Napping…” He yawns, stretching the word into something almost melodramatic. “…obviously.”

“Well, wake up.” you prod.

“Oh, dear, dear…” he grumbles, turning over like a petulant child dragged from bed too early with the kind of exaggerated effort that’s as much a performance as it is genuine irritation. The blanket clings to him like it’s part of his skin, and in his struggle to free himself, he ends up more tangled than before. He sighs in surrender, his face poking out from the fabric, hair a mess of dark waves.

His eyes are heavy-lidded, his cheeks a little flushed from the heat of the blanket. He looks particularly cute like this, even with the hiccup that follows — a small, tiny squeak that catches you off guard, so out of place it even startles him for a moment. Cute, until it morphs into that familiar expression: brows furrowing, lips tightening, the kind of face that looks like he’s seconds away from either a burp or a gag. No, he’s still cute.

“What’s the matter?” he asks finally, blinking up at you with half-hearted concern, his voice still hoarse from sleep.

“I don’t know.” you say honestly, your hands finding his ankles again, sliding up over the faint ridges of his tibia. The friction of his leg hairs against your palms makes him twitch, and you grin as he squirms, trying to jerk away.

“Stop it.” he mutters, but there’s no bite to it, just a quiet plea.

You relent, letting him settle again, before climbing onto the bed beside him. He shifts to make room, though the blanket clings stubbornly to his legs. The bed creaks. His body feels warm even through the layers, radiating heat like a sleepy furnace. Alex blinks at you, his face caught somewhere between sleepy irritation and that soft, half-lidded fondness he doesn’t bother to hide.

“I just miss you.” you say, softly this time, your hand brushing over his arm.

His eyes catch a glint of the dim light sneaking through the curtains. For a moment, he just looks at you, the sleepiness fading

“You miss me?” he echoes, voice hoarse, like it’s the most ridiculous thing he’s ever heard. He rubs at his eyes, a slow, lazy motion that makes your chest tighten. “I’ve been right here the whole time.”

“I know,” you murmur, pulling your knees up to your chest as you sit beside him. “But you’ve been…napping.”

“And?” he asks, mock affronted, though the way his lips twitch betrays his amusement.

“And…I don’t know.” you say again. “It just feels like forever.” His hair sticks up at the crown, and you resist the urge to smooth it down — barely.

Alex lets out a sigh, dragging his hand down his face before looking at you properly. “You’re being dramatic.”

“Probably.”

He sits up, propping himself on one elbow, and the blanket slides down to his lap. “What am I supposed to do with that?”

You shrug, fingers playing idly with the edge of the blanket. “Let me stay?”

He grins. It’s not long before he gives in, though, because it’s you, and he’s never really been good at saying no to you.

“Stay, then.”

You don’t wait for further permission, stretching out beside him and resting your head on his shoulder.

“Hey-” he grumbles, wincing as you jab at a sensitive spot. “Do you want something, or are you just here to bully me awake?”

“A little of both.” you admit, your fingers already sneaking their way beneath the edge of the blanket, brushing along his ribs. His skin is warm, almost feverish, though you know it’s just the heat he keeps trapped under all those layers. The jittery feeling that had been gnawing at you begins to subside.

“God, you’re freezing!” He jerks away, his own hand coming up to trap yours, holding it in place against his chest like he could warm it through sheer proximity.

“Don’t exaggerate.”

“Not exaggerating.” he says, dragging out the words. He still hasn’t let go of your hand, though.

“I’m right here.” he says, his voice low and a little scratchy, as if the words had to crawl their way out.

“Yeah.” you reply, but you can’t help curling even closer, resting your head against his shoulder. His arm moves instinctively, wrapping around you and pulling you into his warmth. He presses his chin to the top of your head, the slight scratch of his unshaven jaw making you smile.

“What’s this really about?” he asks after a moment, his voice quieter now, almost cautious.

“Nothing.” you say, your words muffled against the soft cotton of his shirt. “I just wanted to be close to you.”

Alex hums, his fingers tracing slow, absent patterns along your arm. “You’re always close to me.”

“Not like this.” you reply, and though the words come out simply, there’s an edge of vulnerability to them that you hope he doesn’t notice.

Alex notices everything.

He shifts slightly, turning so he can see your face. “Hey,” he murmurs, his free hand tilting your chin up. His eyes search yours, their depth almost unnerving in this semi-darkness. “I’m not going anywhere, you know?”

“I know.” The corners of your mouth twitch, waiting for him to react. He doesn’t disappoint.

“Good, baby.” He leans in and kisses your forehead, a soft, lingering touch that feels like both a promise and a reassurance. You go closer, pressing your cheek into his pillow, your breaths mingling in the narrow space between you. His lashes flutter as he opens his eyes again, meeting your gaze. “You really miss me?” he asks, quieter this time.

You nod, your nose brushing his. “I do.”

“Even when I’m right here?”

“Especially then.”

The hint of a smile twitches at his lips, soft and fond in a way that makes your chest ache. “S’pose that’s alright, then.” he murmurs, letting out a long sigh. He shifts, untangling himself from the blanket with lazy, deliberate movements until his arms are free and reaching for you.

When he wraps himself around you, the room feels even warmer, even darker, like the world outside doesn’t exist. His hands find their way to your back, smoothing over the fabric of your shirt in lazy circles, and his voice comes low and rough against your ear.

“Miss you too, y’know.”

You don’t answer, not with words. You bury yourself into him instead, tucking yourself so close it feels like you might sink into him entirely. His breathing evens out after a while, but his fingers never stop their slow movement. Neither of you says anything more. You don’t need to.

Until he hiccups again. It’s sharp and quick, breaking the stillness of the room, and you can’t help but giggle. But then something else slips through, something heavier, and before you can stop it, a tear edges out and clings to your lashes. You press your face to his shoulder, hiding, but not well enough.

Because the thought comes unbidden — too sharp to ignore, too deep to escape. You can’t help but imagine a smaller version of him, soft-cheeked and wide-eyed, hiccuping just the same. And the image twists something inside of you, almost hurts, because how could your heart survive it? How could you hold so much love and still exist? You barely survive him every day.

“Alex?” you say, your voice small, almost hesitant.

“Yeah?”

“Do you want to have a baby?”

He’s silent — not in a way that shuts you out, but in the way that means he’s turning it over in his mind, letting it settle. His lips move against your skin, brushing kisses wherever he can reach: your collarbone, the slope of your shoulder, the spot just below your ear. His hand has stopped its gentle motion on your back, now just resting there.

It takes a long moment for him to speak.

“I think…” he starts, pausing like the words are too heavy to admit. “I think I’m too old to have a baby. To be a father.”

There’s something in his voice — something faint and distant, like disappointment hidden under layers of careful resignation. He says it like a fact, one he’s come to terms with.

You don’t look at him. Can’t. Instead, you focus on the sound of his breathing, warm and steady against your skin. But the air shifts, and suddenly, it’s not about a baby anymore. It’s about him.

It hits you all at once: Alex is going to get old one day. His hair will go grey, his laugh will quiet, and there will be a day when you won’t wake up next to him. When his warmth won’t fill this space, when you’ll reach for him and find nothing but air.

“Hey…” he whispers, his lips pausing in their path along your skin. His hands come up to cup your face, and when he tilts your chin up, you can’t hide from him anymore. He can see his own reflection in the tears clinging to your lashes. “Did I- did I say something? Are you okay, darling?”

“You’re not too old.” you say quickly, your voice trembling.

He smiles softly at you, a faint curve of his lips that aims to bring you back out. He knows this isn’t about the words he said. Knows you’re not upset, not exactly. He just holds you tighter, like he can squeeze the ache out of your chest.

“I just don’t want our kid to have a dad that’s sixty before they’re ten.” he says, and his stupid little math makes you laugh despite yourself.

“Alex,” you chuckle, a tear slipping down your cheek, “you’ve got your math all wrong. Severely.”

“Yeah.” he admits, laughing softly. “Probably.”

He shifts, sliding his arms around you, pulling you close until you’re almost beneath him, tangled up in his weight and warmth. He’s everywhere — solid and heavy, pressing you into the mattress. His breath is against your ear, his chest rising and falling in a steady rhythm, and the thought that had unraveled you before feels so far away now.

“I’m sorry for…” You trail off, trying to find the words for crying over nothing and everything at once.

Alex hums, brushing his lips against the curve of your neck. “You don’t have to be.” His voice is a soft murmur, filled with a kind of understanding that makes you ache even more.

“I just didn’t know it would be like this,” you whisper, not meant for him to hear.

“Like what?”

“That I would become so closely tied to you.”

There’s weight in the words, the kind that would feel crushing if you weren’t so completely wrapped up in each other. But neither of you has the energy to linger on it, to pull it apart and examine it.

So instead, you just hold on. Feel the warmth of him, the life of him, the love that’s so much a part of him you can barely tell where it ends and where you begin.

Lips melt together, air exchanged between mouths like you’re both trying to live off each other’s breath. He’s pressed so close, and yet somehow, you still miss him. It’s like no matter how much of him you take in — his touch, his warmth, his quiet murmurs — you’re always left wanting more. There’s a hunger to it now, a longing that no amount of kisses seem to satisfy.

It’s been too long since you kissed him like this — messy and unrestrained, all need and no patience. The kind of kiss where you lose track of where your body ends and his begins. His lips are chapped, and yours are starting to sting, but it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter that the walls are thin or that the door isn’t locked or that you’re both supposed to be adults, because right now, it feels like you could drown in him and still come up gasping for more. The air was too thick with propriety for you to touch him the way you wanted in front of his parents, for what felt like forever. It feels dangerous. Like every kiss, every touch, could spiral into something impossible to stop.

But you can’t stop. Neither can he.

His hips roll against you, deliberate and slow, lazy grind and the sensation sends heat pooling low in your belly. His hands move with purpose now, gripping your waist like he’s afraid you might slip through his fingers.

“I like you a lot.” he murmurs, his voice rough and low, the words muffled against your lips.

It’s so simple, so earnest, that it makes you laugh — a soft, breathless sound that he swallows with another kiss. You could get drunk off this.

“Al.” you murmur, pulling back just enough to look at him.

“Hm?” His lips chase yours even as he hums, his eyes dark and heavy-lidded, focused entirely on you.

“I want-”

“You want me to fuck a baby into you?”

His voice is so serious, so matter-of-fact, that it takes you a second to process what he’s said. Then, you laugh, the sound startled and bubbling out of you uncontrollably. “Alex!”

“What?” He grins, unrepentant, leaning down to nip at your jaw.

“You know you can’t.” you say, though the heat blooming in your chest betrays the way his words made you feel.

“Well…” He shifts, pressing closer, his lips brushing against the shell of your ear. “I can try.”

His hands slide lower, slipping beneath your shirt, his palms warm and rough against your skin. He smiles against your neck, his breath hot as he adds, “I can fill you up with my babies…do my part of the deal.”

“Al!” You swat at him, but your protest is half-hearted at best, your body already arching into his touch.

He kisses you again, and this time it’s all need. There’s nothing gentle about it now, nothing careful. His teeth catch your bottom lip, his hands gripping you tighter, pulling you closer, until there’s no space left between you.

You feel like you could crawl inside his skin, live there, wrap yourself up in the way he smells, the way he feels, the way he breathes against your neck. God, you could spend the rest of your life like this, and it still wouldn’t be enough.

“Do you even think before you say shit like that?” you manage to gasp, though your voice is more amused than annoyed.

“Not really.” he admits, his grin widening as he pulls back just enough to look at you. His hair is tousled, his cheeks flushed, and he looks so thoroughly pleased with himself that you can’t help but laugh again.

“Can’t believe I married you fool.” you say, shaking your head, but your hands are tangling in his hair and pulling him back down. So soft against your palms, and his skin is warm under your fingertips, and you think, This is home. He’s home.

He pulls back just enough to press his forehead against yours, his breathing uneven. “You really miss me that much?”

“Even when you’re right here.” you say, and you mean it.

“Especially then.” he murmurs, his lips brushing yours as he speaks.

You could live off this. Off him. Easily.

When he kisses you again, it’s softer, slower, like he’s trying to memorise you. Like he’s trying to leave pieces of himself with you, pressed into your skin, embedded in your bones. And you let him, because if anyone gets to claim parts of you, it’s him.

His pants are pushed down, your shirt is tugged up but not off — it’s too cold for that. Your skin pebbles with goosebumps, nipples perking up as the air brushes over them, and Alex’s gaze snaps to them like they’re the only thing in the room worth looking at, like he’s just unwrapped the best gift under the tree. His eyes light up, soft and wide, and he’s got this stupid, almost boyish grin spreading across his face, like he’s just stumbled into the best Christmas morning of his life, even though he’s seen you like this before — dozens of times. Maybe hundreds.

“God,” he starts, his voice low, “you’re so-”

“You too.” you interrupt, and it’s so fast it almost makes him laugh. But he doesn’t, because your hand slides down between you, brushing over his stomach and lower, and he forgets how to do anything but exhale sharply.

Your fingers curl around him, and he lets out a sharp, breathy sound that goes straight to your chest. He’s hard, but you can feel the slight chill on his skin as your hand moves over him. He groans, low and unsteady, his head tipping forward to rest against your shoulder as you stroke him. “Fuck, you’re eager.” he says, his tone teasing but breaking halfway through when your grip tightens just slightly.

It’s cold, he thinks, and he’s absurdly glad the blanket’s there to cover you both. Not just to trap the heat but to hide the way his balls have drawn up tight from the temperature. You wouldn’t care anyway, he tells himself, but it doesn’t stop the small pang of self-consciousness.

You don’t seem to notice. Or maybe you just don’t care, because your hand moves with purpose, stroking him with a rhythm that builds faster than he expects. Your lips are everywhere — on his neck, his jaw, the corner of his mouth — and between kisses, you murmur things that make his head spin. “Not enough?” you murmur, your hand moving slowly, your thumb brushing over the tip just to watch him shudder.

“Shit-” he hisses and you bite your lip to hide your grin. His hands find your waist, gripping you, but it’s no use. You’ve got him exactly where you want him, and you know it.

“Fuck, you’re so good, Al.” you say, your voice a soft, breathy hum against his ear.

“Oh-” his hips go jerking up into your hand, unable to stop himself. “Fuck, you’re gonna- god, you’re gonna-” he groans, his voice low and wrecked, the slick slide of your palm dragging him closer to the edge.

“Good way to go.” you tease, leaning down to press your lips to his neck, and he lets out a noise that’s somewhere between a laugh and a groan.

“You’re impossible.” he says, but his hips are already moving again, thrusting up like he can’t help himself. He can’t.

“Impossible?” you echo, your tone mock-offended. “You’re the one who’s already- oh, god, Alex, you’re practically whining right now.”

“I’m not whining.” he shoots back, but his voice cracks on the last word, and you snort.

“You’re so whining.” you say, laughing softly against his skin.

“Jeez.” he mutters, but he’s grinning now, his hands sliding down to your hips as he presses you closer. “You’re gonna regret teasing me.”

“Am I?” you ask, your hand stroking him with just enough pressure to make him shudder again.

“Yeah.” he says, his voice low and dangerous, but there’s a spark of mischief in his eyes that makes your stomach flip. Before you can respond, he’s shifting, his hands tugging at the waistband of your underwear. “Off.” he says, and you laugh, shifting to help him.

“Demanding.”

“Desperate.” he corrects. You can’t even argue, because his hands are already on you again, sliding up your thighs to pull you into his lap. “Fuck, I need to be inside you, girl.”

You smile against his lips, “Then what are you waiting for?”

He doesn’t need to be told twice. He barely manages to kick his pants down farther before he’s reaching for you again.

“C’mere.” he murmurs, his voice low and rough, his hands warm against your chilled skin. You settle over him, the weight of you grounding him, and for a moment, he just holds you there, his forehead resting against yours as he catches his breath. “You okay?” he asks, his voice soft, his thumbs brushing lazy circles into your skin.

“Always.” you say, your fingers sliding into his hair, and the way you look at him — like he’s the only thing that matters — it makes his chest ache.

“Mhm.” His hands tighten on your hips as he guides you down and the groan that tears from his throat when he sinks into you is almost enough to undo you completely.

You laugh softly, your fingers threading through his hair. “Missed me, huh?”

“Shut up,” he says, but there’s no heat in it.

“Thought you weren’t whining?” you tease, rocking your hips just slightly, and his hands clamp down on you, holding you still.

“Christ, you’re gonna drive me insane.” he mutters, his head tipping back against the pillow.

“Already have.” you say, leaning down to kiss him, and he groans against your mouth, and his hips are moving again.

“Impossible.” he mutters, his hands sliding up your back, pulling you closer.

“You said that already.” you remind him, grinning against his lips.

“Still true.” he says, and then he’s kissing you again, and it’s messy and desperate and perfect.

He moves then, his hips rocking up into you, and the heat of him makes you forget about the cold entirely. The blanket slips off your shoulders, pooling around your back, but you don't care. He doesn't care. All he cares about is you and your warmth and your weight and the soft sounds you make as you move with him.

“Fuck.” he breathes, his voice shaky as he buries his face in your neck. “You feel so good.”

“So do you.” you murmur, your hands gripping his shoulders until they feel like they’ve been set on fire, until it feels like the whole world’s on fire.

The pace builds, faster, rougher, but there’s still something tender about the way he holds you, the way his hands move over your skin like he’s afraid you might disappear. You feel like you might burst. You kiss him again, swallowing his groans as he thrusts up into you, and you think, I could live in this moment forever.

Alex doesn’t just lose himself in you — he unravels completely. His grip on your hips tightens as his breath comes heavy and ragged, his forehead pressed to yours for a brief moment before he pulls back. “You…” he mutters, his voice low and hoarse, as though that single word is the only one he can manage.

Before you can respond, he flips you over. The mattress dips and you barely have time to gasp before he’s on you, his body pressing yours into the bed, pinning you down. His hands find your wrists, pulling them above your head as he settles between your legs. He’s everywhere, all at once, overwhelming and intoxicating, and you can’t help the small, broken sound that escapes your throat.

“Shhh…” he murmurs, a crooked smile flickering across his lips, his eyes bright with amusement. “They’re still awake.” You know he’s talking about the thin walls, the parents in the other room, but it doesn’t matter, because his smile fades almost immediately when you clench around him, your hips lifting to meet his. “Fuck-” he hisses, his voice breaking, and he has to stop for a second, burying his face in your neck like he’s trying to compose himself. “Love, you’re gripping me so tight-”

“I’m so close.” you whimper, high and breathless, and his head snaps up.

“Yeah?” he murmurs, soft but teasing, and one of his hands leaves your wrist to smooth over your hair, petting you gently like you’ve just done something worthy of praise. “That’s my girl.”

The words undo you. Your body tenses, arching against him as you come, your cries muffled by his hand when he moves it quickly to cover your mouth.

“Shhh.” he murmurs again, more soothing. His hand slides from your mouth to your jaw, his thumb brushing over your cheek as he watches you fall apart beneath him as he starts moving again, rougher this time, and the sound of him sliding in and out of you, wet and obscene, fills the room.

You can barely think, barely breathe, and when you dare to moan, loud and broken, he shuts you up with his lips. Messy and desperate, his tongue sliding against yours as he thrusts into you harder, faster. You can feel him everywhere, his hands gripping your thighs, his weight pressing you into the mattress, his cock stretching you so perfectly it almost hurts.

“You’re so- fuck-” he mutters against your lips, his voice shaking. “You’re so good. So fucking good.”

You’re too cockdrunk to answer, your head falling back against the pillow as your body shakes beneath him. He groans, his hands gripping your hips tighter as he chases his own release, his movements becoming erratic.

“I’m gonna come inside you now.” he says, low and wrecked. He’s already halfway there and you nod, your fingers digging into his shoulders. “Wasn’t asking.” he mutters.

“Please.” you whisper, and it’s that — your soft, trembling plea — that seems to undo him entirely.

“Fuck.” he breathes, his hands gripping your hips so tightly it feels like he’s grounding himself on you, holding you in place as if he might get lost otherwise. His face twists, caught between pleasure and something close to pain, and you watch him fall apart, his usual control slipping away.

It’s always like this when he comes inside you. Like he’s completely overcome, lost in the heat and wetness of you, in the way you take him so completely. There’s something elemental about it, like you’re the only thing keeping him on earth, and he clings to you like you’re the answer to every question he’s ever had. The sounds he makes are devastating: deep, broken moans mixed with your name, half-spoken, half-gasped.

He presses his forehead harder against yours, his breaths coming in short, ragged bursts, and you can feel his body trembling, overwhelmed by the intensity of it all. “God, you feel so-” He cuts himself off with a sharp gasp, his hips stuttering and he presses deeper, hot and endless, and he can’t stop, and he doesn’t ever want to stop. “Fuck, fuck…” he mutters, the words tumbling out of him. He’s not even aware he’s speaking. His hand slides from your hip to your stomach, splaying wide over the place where his cum is now buried deep inside you, as if he’s trying to feel it through your skin.

It drives him crazy, every single time. To be so bare with you, so vulnerable, to feel you around him like this, no barriers, nothing between you. It’s too much and somehow never enough.

He stays like that, hips pressed flush against yours, his cock still twitching inside you. His eyes are shut tight, his jaw clenched, like he’s trying to hold onto the feeling, trying to commit it to memory.

When he finally opens his them, they’re dark and glassy, still hazy with pleasure. He looks at you like you’re something unreal, something he can’t believe he gets to have. “You’re so fucking beautiful.” he murmurs, his voice hoarse, and it’s not just a compliment but a declaration, raw and unfiltered. His thumbs brush gently over your cheeks as he kisses you, slow and deep. It’s softer now, reverent, like he’s thanking you, like he’s worshiping you.

You can feel him still, still warm and pulsing, and you know he’s not ready to pull away yet. Neither are you.

“Fuck.” he mutters, his voice muffled against your neck.

You laugh, your fingers sliding into his hair as you hold him. “Yeah.” you whisper, your voice shaky but warm. “Fuck.”

He stays inside you far longer than makes any sense, long enough that the warmth between you turns to a sticky, shared heat that you can feel seeping out, dampening the sheets beneath you. Neither of you moves, and he’s quiet everywhere — his body heavy against yours, his breaths slow and even, the weight of him pinning you to the mattress in a way that feels unshakable. It’s not the kind of silence that asks for anything. It’s just Alex. The way he lingers in moments like this, unhurried and unwilling to let go, like pulling away would break the spell. You know he should move, that you should clean up, but the thought of him leaving you empty right now feels unbearable. You don’t want to move.

You tilt your head just slightly to press your lips to his temple, the salt of his sweat faint on your tongue. His eyes are closed, but you know he’s not asleep. He’s just…here, with you. Fully.

“I love being with you,” you murmur, “even when you stay silent so long.”

His eyes open slowly, and they’re impossibly soft, the kind of look that makes your chest feel tight and full all at once. He shifts just enough to press his lips to yours. “I don’t mean to stay quiet. Sometimes I just…don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything. I like it. The quiet with you.”

He hums, his hand drifting lazily up and down your side, his fingers tracing the curve of your hip, the dip of your waist, memorising you all over again. “It’s different with you.” he admits, his voice barely above a whisper. “The silence. It’s not empty. It’s…” He trails off, his brow furrowing. He’s searching for the right word.

“Full.” you offer, and his lips twitch into the faintest smile.

“Yeah.” he says softly. “Full.”

Softening but somehow still so present. It’s ridiculous, how much you love him in moments like this — when he’s not doing anything extraordinary, just existing with you, just letting himself be here.

“I should move.” he says eventually, though he doesn’t sound like he means it. His hand slips to your stomach, his thumb brushing absentmindedly over your skin. “I’m probably making a mess.”

You laugh, the sound light and quiet in the stillness of the room. “You are.” you say, and he groans softly, hiding his face in your neck.

“Sorry.” he mumbles, though he doesn’t make any effort to pull away.

You press a kiss to his hair, your fingers tracing lazy patterns along the nape of his neck. “Don’t be.”

It’s not reasonable, staying like this. The sheets are ruined, and the air between you is heavy with the aftermath of everything you’ve just shared, but none of it matters. All that matters is him, here, with you, so close it feels like you might dissolve into him if you’re not careful.

“You know,” he says after a long stretch of silence, his voice muffled against your skin, “I don’t think I’ve ever felt this way before.”

“What way?” you ask, your hand sliding to his shoulder, holding him a little closer.

“Like I could stay like this forever. With you.”

Your chest tightens, and you kiss him again, because you don’t know how else to respond to something so devastatingly simple, so honest.

Forever. You think you could stay like this forever, too.

The weight of Christmas morning presses heavier than it should, tension tightening the air like an over-wrapped gift. In the living room, the Turners exchange looks — small, darting ones that say everything without anyone daring to open their mouths. You can’t decide if the silence is better or worse than outright commentary, but either way, the room feels suffocating. It’s impossible to look at anyone directly. You can’t help but think, We really should’ve stayed at his place.

The first chance you get, you slip away upstairs to Alex’s room. Even as you ascend the stairs, snippets of hushed teasing float up from below, followed by poorly disguised chuckles. Your cheeks burn with fresh embarrassment.

You collapse onto the bed, burying your face into the pillow to smother a groan of frustration. You don’t have to wait long before Alex joins you. The door creaks open, and his steps are slow and heavy, weighted with a mix of exhaustion and mortification. He practically slumps inside, closing the door behind him with a soft click. He’s silent, but you can see his shoulders shaking. For a second, you think he might actually be upset — until he lets out a muffled laugh, half-horrified, half-disbelieving.

“Oh my god.” he groans into his palms.

You prop yourself up on one elbow, watching him with a mix of guilt and amusement. “That bad, huh?”

The room feels smaller with him in it, or maybe it’s just warmer. Alex lies sprawled beside you on the bed, his arm still flung over his face like he’s shielding himself from the weight of the world — or at least his family’s knowing looks. His cheeks are still pink, and even though you can’t see it, you know the tips of his ears are red too. They always are when he’s embarrassed.

“They’re relentless.” he mutters, voice muffled by the crook of his arm.

“Do I-” you start.

“Wanna know?” he finishes for you, dropping his arm to glance sideways at you.

“Yeah.” you admit cautiously.

“No, you don’t.” His lips twitch, and you can tell he’s fighting a smile.

“Okay.” you say, drawing the word out as you roll onto your side to face him. “Were we…that loud?”

He exhales sharply and presses the heels of his hands against his burning cheeks. “Loud enough.” he admits, his voice low and strained with amusement. “Apparently.”

You can’t help it — you laugh. It bubbles up and spills out before you can stop it, and soon, Alex is laughing too, the sound soft and self-conscious but also a little freeing.

He lifts his head just enough to peek at you. “Loud enough that everyone had something to say. Even grandma.”

You cringe. “Oh no. What did she say?”

Alex groans again, dropping his head back dramatically against the mattress. “Something about how ‘young love is passionate’ and how she’s glad we’re ‘keeping the spark alive.’” He lets out another strangled laugh, covering his face again. “I’m never leaving this room again.”

You try to suppress a laugh of your own, but it bubbles up anyway. “Well, at least she was supportive?”

“She also gave me a knowing look, like she’s proud of me or something. That’s even worse.” He groans, rolling onto his side to face you. “How are you so calm about this? I feel like I’m gonna die.”

“Because,” you say, trying to keep a straight face, “it’s kind of funny.”

“It’s not funny.”

“It’s a little funny.”

He glares. “You’re not the one who had to face my entire family while they all knew.”

“True.” you admit, grinning now. “But you’re the one who said, ‘I’m gonna come inside you now.’ Pretty sure that set the tone for the rest of the night.”

His jaw drops, and he throws a pillow at you. “You’re the one who begged me to!”

“Shh!” you hiss, laughing as you dodge the pillow. “Do you want them to hear us again?”

Alex groans, pulling the blanket over his head like a shield. “This is officially the worst Christmas ever.”

“Worst?” you tease, crawling closer and tugging at the blanket. “You didn’t seem to think so last night.”

He peeks out. “I’m serious. Next year, we’re staying home. Just you, me, and a soundproof door.”

“Deal.” you say, leaning in to kiss his nose. “They’re not going to let this go, are they?” you ask.

“Not in this lifetime.” he replies. “Ugh…Dad kept looking at me like I betrayed the family name.”

“And your mom?”

“Oh, she didn’t say anything.” He grimaces. “But that’s worse. I could feel her thinking things, and it was bad.”

“Define bad.”

He shifts onto his side to face you, his hand reaching out to lightly trace the edge of your jaw, his embarrassment softening. “Bad enough that I never want to find out for sure.”

You snort, nudging his shoulder playfully. “We’re not sneaky, huh?”

“Not even a little bit.” he says, leaning in to press a quick, warm kiss to your forehead. “But at least it’s over now.”

“Over? Alex, it’s Christmas morning. We’re still here.”

“Right.” he groans, flopping onto his back again. “Kill me now.”

He’s a grown man now, but some things never change. Even at this age, Alex can’t quite handle being caught in the act. Not that you blame him. The Turners have a way of making their judgment feel monumental, like you’ve broken some sacred Christmas tradition by being, well, married. And doing married stuff.

He’s flushed and disheveled, his hair sticking up at odd angles from the way he’s been running his hands through it all morning. His shirt is wrinkled from where he flopped onto the bed, and the collar’s just slightly askew. He’s always been handsome in that unintentional, almost careless way, but right now, he looks adorable.

“You’re cute when you’re embarrassed, you know that?” you say, unable to resist teasing him just a little.

“Don’t make it worse.”

“I’m not!” you protest, biting back a laugh. “I’m just saying. Some things never change.”

He raises an eyebrow, curious but wary. “Like what?”

“Like how you turn into a human tomato whenever you’re even slightly flustered,” you say, grinning. “Or how you can’t make eye contact when you’re embarrassed. Or how you always-”

“Alright, alright, I get it.” he interrupts, laughing as he rolls onto his side to face you. “I’m a walking cliché. Thanks for the reminder.”

“Not a cliché.” you correct. “Just…you. It’s kind of endearing, you know.”

He doesn’t respond, just looks at you with that quiet, searching expression of his. It’s that same look that made you fall for him in the first place.

“I really do love you.” he murmurs after a while, his voice low and warm.

“I know.” you whisper back, resting your head against his chest. “For what it’s worth,” you say, glancing up at him, “I don’t regret it.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” you say with a small smile. “Worth the teasing. Probably.”

His laugh is warm and low, and he squeezes your hand lightly. “Well, remind me to return the favor next time we stay at your place.”

You roll your eyes but can’t help smiling as you nudge him again. “Merry Christmas, Alex.”

“Merry Christmas, trouble.”

a/n: Merry Christmas (Eve) for those who celebrate, I guess! (I’m just in it for the gifts icl) I hope you liked it, might be a bit all over the place, haven’t got a chance to properly check it for any mistakes but yeah, I’ve missed him a lot. Is it still prof!al if he’s not her professor anymore? I’m counting it.

#alex turner #alex turner x reader #alex turner x fem!reader #alex turner x you #alex turner x y/n #alex turner fluff #alex turner smut #alex turner fic #alex turner fanfic #smut #mr turner #goblinontour

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