#the people she hurts just don’t understand her vision! but she can help them :)

[jennycalendar]

willow enthusiasts who don’t get her thirst for power cannot truly be called willow enthusiasts. like that’s been the whole point since the beginning, guys.

[rebeliz7]

Ride

Pairing: Wanda Maximoff x Reader

Request: 28, 37 & 64 with Wan? R is in love with Wanda but Wanda is between R and Vision and every time R tries to talk to her about it Wanda just gives excuses and R feels like Wanda just like her for the sex but Wan realizes she's in love too.

Word Count: 2815

28. “I don’t want to hear your excuses anymore.”

37. “You’re n-not ,um, w-wearing anything under that, are you..?”

…

Vision is - a good guy. He’s the kind of guy that any woman could date and be certain that he’d never hurt them. He’s reliable and polite, and nice to talk to. He’s a good friend, and even a better partner to have in the field. 

He’s been in love with Wanda for the entirety of his existence. You don’t think he even knew what love was when he fell for her, and still. 

They make a good looking couple, and Wanda seems to fit in his arms. Especially when they’re dancing like they’re currently doing. 

There’s a part of you that wants to desperately go over there and ask him to remove his hands from Wanda’s waist, but she’s not your girlfriend and you’re not generally a jealous person. 

Still, jealousy beats underneath your skin and you don’t like it. You don’t like it at all. 

Before Wanda, and before you got tangled in this situation, you used to despise jealous people and the feeling as a whole. You didn’t quite understand it either, and you often thought that jealousy was just a response to insecurity. 

There is no room for insecurities with Wanda, you know exactly where you’re standing with her. You two are not in a relationship, and you hate to feel possessive of her but you also can’t help it. Just looking at Vision touching her, as innocent as he does now -as he always does-, is enough to drive you mad. 

You turn in your seat, trying to spare yourself from the visuals any longer.

Usually you’d be enjoying a night like tonight. You like to dress up, put on some make up, do you hair and pick a nice outfit to wear. You should be mingling, trying to befriend whatever new person Tony is trying to impress, because that’s what these little parties serve for after all. 

Tonight you sit by the bar by yourself, nursing a drink and although dressed to the nines, you don’t feel like talking to anyone. 

“Can I get some water?” You haven’t even noticed the music changing, even less so Wanda approaching the bar. 

She looks radiant, of course. Her cheeks are flushed the slightest bit, you guess from all that dancing, and she’s smiling widely when she meets your eyes and you’re pulled into her orb immediately. 

“Hi.” You smile and her smile twists into something else, something more meaningful and private. 

“Hi.” She husks out, her voice dropping lower as she walks closer to you and takes the glass of whiskey from your hands to take a drink, her eyes never leaving yours. 

“Thirsty?” You ask as she gently gives the glass back and takes a discrete step backwards. 

She very openly checks you out, her eyes traveling from your face and taking every inch of you where you sit before she meets your stare again. You don’t shy away from her, but you do have - other reactions. 

“Very.” She nods with a sly grin that does inexplicable things to you. 

You breathe in deeply, perhaps in a weak attempt to get a grip of yourself, and you take the opportunity to really look at her too. 

She’s wearing a casual loose black mini dress that looks ridiculously good on her, and that does nothing to conceal the curves you know are under it. Her high heels make her legs look longer than usual, and her hair is down in soft meticulous waves that mixed with that smile, give her an angelic yet sensual appearance altogether. 

“You look amazing.” You smile when you meet her eyes, and she raises an eyebrow in amusement. 

“I feel like you’re talking to my legs.” She says with humor, and you become incredibly desperate to kiss that smile off her lips. 

“Well, obviously.” You reach out as she laughs and you take her hand to pull her closer to you. She wraps one arm around your shoulders and even kisses your cheek, all normal things that can be taken as two friends interacting and nothing more. 

“You look really hot with this.” She whispers, close to your ear, and her hand running down the front of your blazer. 

You swallow with difficulty as she steps backwards again, this time to take the water the waiter has finally brought her. 

She drinks her water and you become entranced with the movement of her throat, and the way her lips stay wet after she puts the glass down. 

Your stomach begins to ache when you can’t control the desire you feel for her, and all that ache slowly travels southwards and you don’t think you can wait another minute to have her. 

“Come on.” You take her hand and you don’t wait to hear an answer, although she’s laughing as she practically jogs behind you to keep up as you pull her out of the suite and towards the elevators. 

The moment the doors of the elevator slide closed you’re kissing her. She’s about to tell you something when you do, and you catch her open mouth in a delicious and drowning kiss. 

She moans softly as she wraps her arms around your shoulders, and you push her against the metal wall. 

You kiss her fully, your hands on her waist as the taste of her cherry lip gloss invades your senses. Even more so when you let your hands travel further down her body and you don’t feel any other fabric under her dress. 

“You’re n-not ,um, w-wearing anything under this, are you..?” You ask against her lips, your throat now dry while you think about her walking and dancing all night long like this. 

“Why don’t you find out.” She husks, her lips gracing yours as she speaks and you feel your knees go weak. 

You swallow with difficulty as your brain short circuits. Your stomach is tied in knots and you’re pretty sure that you’ve never felt as turned on as you feel right now. 

“We need to get to my room.” You tell her with urgency, and she smiles provocatively. 

“You’re taking me to bed?” She asks with an innocent smile that doesn’t fool you at all. 

“Who said anything about a bed?” You retort as you run your hands down her legs, scratching her skin lightly as she combs your hair back with her fingers and you kiss her again. 

You kiss her until the doors slide open, and she’s pushing you lightly with a beautiful smile on her raw kissed lips.

…

You remove her dress as soon as your bedroom door falls shut behind you, and she laughs at your impatience. You, on the other hand, are not laughing at all because she hasn’t been wearing a thing beneath that dress and the realization makes your skin prickle. 

“You’re such a bad girl.” You tell her as you guide her towards your bed. 

“Only because I know you love it.” She teases you, licking your lips and your jaw before she steps backwards and lays on your bed willingly. “Well? Are you gonna make me beg?”

You stare at her and you can’t believe her audacity. A few minutes ago she was dancing with a man who she knows is in love with her, and now she’s here, wet and ready for you to do whatever you want with her. 

You don’t make her beg. You could never. No, you live to give her whatever she wants. You yearn to make her cum as many times as she can resist. 

Your face between her legs and your lips wrapped around her clit, you have the pleasure of making her cum and hearing her moan your name, over and over again. 

While she catches her breath you get rid of your clothes, and then you immediately lay on top of her, wanting to feel her body against yours and desperate for a little release yourself. 

“Baby.” She whispers against your ear as she wraps you in her arms, and accommodates your thigh between her legs while pushing hers against your wet heat. “You’re so wet. I love it.” 

Her easy laughter makes your chest flutter, and you kiss her cheek as you try to find a rhythm with your hips. 

“Of course you do.” You smile and she gasps when you push your hips particularly hard. 

“I want to taste you.” She rolls on top of you, and kisses you needly before she kisses down your body wantonly. 

She doesn’t make you beg either, and the visual of her between your thighs, eyes locked with yours as she eats you out without holding back in the slightest, is enough to push you towards the edge. 

You’re laughing when you come back to your senses, and she’s already peppering your face with sweet kisses and a wide grin on her lips. 

“Wanna put on the strap for me?” She asks mischievously, biting her bottom lip as she waits for an answer. 

“What are you thinking?” You ask as you roll the two of you in bed again. Your lips kissing her cheeks, her jaw, her lips.

“I’m thinking - ” she cups your face, a devilish smile on her lips. “You look really well under me and I really want to ride you.”

You swallow thickly, and the next second you’re promptly getting the strap. 

The process of getting it on catches you both in a fit of laughter, but is comfortable and familiar, and you’re caught thinking that you’ve never had this feeling of belonging with anyone before. 

“Lay down and do nothing.” She instructs you when you’re ready, and you swiftly follow her orders.

You watch her take the toy in her hands as she sits on her heels beside you, that smile never leaving her lips as she strokes the fake dick and sends shots of pleasure directly to your clit each time she moves. 

“You want me to suck you?” She asks and you laugh as she moves to sit on your thighs, her hands never stilling. 

“I kinda do.” You nod and she leans forward to plant a sweet kiss on your lips before she crawls down the bed. 

To say that watching her give you a blowjob is the most bizarre thing you’ve ever seen, would be a poor understatement. Not that you don’t use the strap often, you do, whenever you feel like it. But she’s never offered to suck you before, and you think you might have been missing out. 

There’s something about her and her lips as she bobs her head up and down, her eyes never leaving yours as she struggles to breathe and stubbornly wanting to take the whole thing in her mouth at once. 

But there’s a moment when she comes out for air and she looks at you, and you think you can’t wait another second before you’re inside of her, and she seems to have the same thought. 

Grabbing her hand you pull her up and kiss her messily, and almost desperately. She moves to straddle you and you both work on lining the toy with her entrance before she sinks down on it with a heavy sigh and trembling body. 

For a few seconds she just sits there, and you try to stay still. Her head is thrown back, her hands squeezing your thighs behind her as she swallows and breathes in and out. 

You watch her and you know you want her. You want her for good, for yourself and you need to tell her that. 

When she finally moves her hips and her eyes meet yours again, you know you love her and you think she might love you too. 

She wasn’t kidding when she said she wanted to ride you. She does that enthusiastically for a little while, and when you grab her and roll on top of her, she moans out your name in the most delightful way. 

Her nails are digging on your back as you thrust your hips and fuck her against your mattress as hard as you possible can. 

And when she cums, a tidal wave of pleasure showers you as well, and you cum along with her. 

“I want you.” You tell her as you look up, the toy still buried in her. 

“Again?” She asks breathlessly and amusedly.

“I want you, Wanda. I want to be with you, and I want to be the only person in your life.” You tell her and her smile drops. 

“Let’s not do this tonight, please.” She seems to beg, her hands on your face now, trying to placate you like she’s done many times before. 

“I love you, and I want more than this. I deserve more than this.”

She looks away, still trying to catch her breath and pushes you off of her to be able to get out of bed. 

For a moment all you can feel is rejection, but you take a deep breath as she hurries to grab her dress from the floor and you get up too. 

You throw the damn strap away and you pick up a long shirt and put it on, if only to maintain some sort of dignity in the upcoming exchange. 

“Don’t you dare to leave like this.” You tell her when you see her grabbing her heels and heading for the door.

“What do you want me to say?” She asks you and you walk closer to her. Her hair is a mess, her makeup is smudged and if she walks out right now you have no doubt that anyone who sees her will know what she was just doing. 

“Anything.” You shrug and you see tears gathering in her eyes. “But you can’t just walk away after I told you I love you for the very first time.”

“I really don’t want to ruin this.” She tells you, and her words confuse you.

“How would you ruin this?”

“I always ruin what I love.” She says and you take her hands, letting her heels fall on the ground. 

There it is. 

“That won’t happen with us.” You assure her gently. “You’re my favorite person, and I love you.”

She chuckles when you say that and you go back to feel light, in a way. 

“And I want to be with you. For real this time. Don’t get me wrong, I love the sex. We’re very good at having it, but I want more and something tells me that you do too.”

She doesn’t say anything for a beat, and that’s how you know you’ve hit a point. 

“We will fight.” She argues weakly, and you peck her lips. “We will yell.”

“And then we’ll have make up sex. That’s like, the best sex out there.” You counter, and she laughs. “You love me?” 

“I do.” She nods, her voice soft and honest. She kisses you this time and even presses herself closer to you, so much so that you can feel her heart beating against your own chest. 

“Then no more excuses. We can do this.” You smile and kiss her again. She smiles, her hands on your face as she nods. 

“I’ll have to talk to Vision.” She realizes and you kiss her again. 

“So that’s that?” You ask with a smile. “We’re together now?”

“We are.” She nods and you pick her up and twirl her twice. You’re both laughing when her feet touch the ground again, and things seem to fall back into place. You’re you again.  

“Let him down gently.” You suggest and she takes a deep breath before taking off her dress one more time, and heading straight to your closet and then your bed. 

She’s familiar with your room, she knows where everything is, and she’s stopped asking to borrow your clothes a while ago. You watch her put on some shorts before she looks at you again. 

“I will. He’s such a nice guy.” She says as she throws your comforter to the ground, and you take a clean one from the closet. 

“He really is.” You agree, as you both get under the new comforter. 

“Are we bad people?” 

“Maybe.”

You’ll think about that in the morning, right now you want nothing more than to cuddle your new girlfriend and have a good night’s sleep. 

… 

[cozage]

Zoro, Sanji, Luffy, Law, and Ace with fem S/O with healing water powers. The catch is that whenever she uses those powers, she feels pain from the wounds she’s healing. And this isn’t a Devil Fruit ability. It’s sorta like water bending from Avatar.

A/N: I really debated on how to lay this one out, but I chose to have them find out about her power. If anyone wants a head canon follow up on how they act now that they know, send me an ask :) I maybe made this a bit too long, but those soft moments with each of these boys are my WEAKNESS. (Law may seem a little OOC but I truly believe that man gets tunnel vision when he sees you in pain)

Characters: F! reader x Zoro, Luffy, Sanji, Law, Ace

Cw: blood, pain, injuries, angst, all those fun things. Sanji’s contains slight spoilers for WCI

Total word count: 6.3k

The Pain of Healing

Zoro

Word count: 1.2k

“It’s only five more minutes until my Haki returns.” Luffy says between pants, trying to catch his breath. 

“Then I have five minutes to help you. Sit down.” 

Luffy collapsed onto the ground at your command, and you examined his body as he slept. It didn’t look good. His body was riddled with scrapes, scratches, bruises, and he was bleeding out from his side. Several minor injuries could be more painful than large ones, but Luffy had a mix of both. The best thing to do would be to focus on the large ones first, and if you have energy left, fix the small stuff as well. 

You guided water out of your flask and started with the hole in his side. You were used to the pain that came with healing by now, but it still made you flinch every time you started. You had to grind your teeth together to keep from crying out, not wanting to wake Luffy. He needed rest, and you didn’t want him to see the repercussions of your decision to help heal him anyway. 

After five minutes, you’ve taken all of the major injuries away from his body, and you managed to take a few small ones away from him as well. You wipe the tears from your eyes before you shake him awake. 

“It’s time, Luffy. Wake up.” You put on the biggest fake smile you can muster before his eyes flick open. 

“Aw man, that was the best nap in my entire life! I feel amazing!” You stay seated as he stands up, your body too riddled with pain to move. 

“Go get them, Captain!” It hurts to even speak, but Luffy’s already up stretching, too hyped up to notice your exhaustion.

“Thanks for whatever you did to make me feel so great! Leave the rest to me!” Luffy calls back, bounding off to finish the fight. 

Once he’s out of sight, you fold your head into your hands and weep. The pain was immeasurable, and every time you helped Luffy recover, you don’t understand how he’s still alive. You sit there for a long time, crying until there are no tears left. And then you hear cheers from the village nearby, signifying Luffy has won and your work paid off. Knowing that you helped him win makes you feel a little better, and you need to see everyone again. 

You stand up, ready to go meet the rest of the crew, but your body seems to disagree with your movement. Your legs shake, and when you go to take a step, you can feel your body collapsing, falling to the ground. You brace for the impact of your worn body against the solid ground, too tired to do anything else.

It doesn’t come, though. Someone catches you as you stumble forward. Strong arms wrap around your back and your legs, scooping you up and pressing you into his bare chest. Zoro. 

“Easy.” His expression is stone as he stares at you, but you can see worry underneath. “You gonna tell me what the hell you just did to Luffy?” 

You avert your eyes from his gaze, running the tip of your finger along the scar on his chest. “I healed him.”

You can feel his body tense with your words. “That didn’t look like healing to me. And since when do you have a Devil fruit power anyway?”

You bite your lip nervously. Nobody had caught you healing someone before. It wasn’t something you flaunted, or even something you told people about. “It’s not a devil fruit power.”

“Woman, if you don’t tell me-” he breaks off mid sentence, and you look around for any sign of danger. But there’s nobody around besides the two of you. You risk a glance up at him, and you see his face is pained as he stares down at you with a form of understanding. “You took his pain from him, didn’t you?”

Your mouth falls open from shock. You’re not sure how Zoro was able to guess something so accurate after seeing your power one time. You nod, confirming his suspicions. “He’s got an incredibly high threshold for pain tolerance.” 

“How are you still alive?” Zoro shakes you a little when he asks the question, which causes you to groan in pain. “Sorry, sorry. I’ll be more gentle. Do you want to sit? Stand?”

The thought of being upright makes you dizzy. “Can you just keep holding me for now?”

He nods, and returns to questioning you about your mysterious power instead. “Doesn’t it hurt?”

“Yeah.” It hurt to talk honestly, but you didn’t want to tell Zoro that. 

“How often have you been doing this?”

“Only like three or four times for Luffy, I think.” You're certain it’s been more than that, but you can’t tell Zoro that right now. 

“Three or four times?? For Luffy?” You can feel him trying to figure out the meaning behind your cryptic words. 

“There’s been a few other people I’ve done it for too.”

“Have you done it for me?” He's scowling at you, like he already knows the answer you’re going to give and he's waiting to scold you for it. 

“Maybe once or twice,” you lie, and you feel your cheeks burning. He squints at you, and you know you’ve been caught in the lie. But he says nothing, he just readjusts you in his arms to hold you closer. 

He had been walking for a few minutes, and you had almost fallen asleep. He had managed to keep you mostly still while he walked through the destroyed city, and you were too tired to care if he was lost or not. “It’s a neat power,” he finally comments. “You gonna tell me more about it? Or do I need to keep asking questions?”

“Can I tell you later?” You mumble into his chest. Between the safety of Zoro’s arms, the warmth of the sun on your face, and the exhaustion that’s set in from all that pain, it's hard for you to stay conscious. 

Zoro doesn’t say anything for a few moments, and you struggle to stay awake while you wait for an answer. He was never one for mindless chit chat, but you could tell that something was on his mind, so you decide to indulge him.

“It’s not a devil fruit. I was born with it,” You start, and you feel a heavy weight lift off your shoulders with those few words.  You’re so relieved that you can finally tell someone about your secret now. “I was never supposed to let anyone see it being used. If the World Government knew…” You trail off, thinking of how the Navy would turn you into a weapon. You shutter at the thought, and continue on in your explanation. 

“The power isn’t perfect, though. I feel the pain of whoever or whatever I heal. It’s not permanent, but if it’s too much for my body to handle at the moment, I might die. I’m really not sure, I’ve never tried to heal a fatal wound before.”

Zoro is looking off into the distance with a faraway look in his eye. “Just like Kuma.”

“Who?”

“Back on Thriller Bark we met a Marine named Kuma,” Zoro begins to explain, and you focus all your energy into listening to him. “He took all of Luffy’s pain and told me if we wanted to save Luffy, I had to take his pain upon myself. It was just after his big battle with the warlord Moria, and the pain…” he trailed off, and you knew he was reliving the moment in his mind. 

“Does he know about your sacrifice?” 

Your question brings him back to reality, and he looks down at you. He chuckles at your question, and bends over to kiss your forehead. “Does he know about yours?”

Sanji

Some light spoilers for WCI arc

Word Count: 1.2k

You didn’t realize that your ability was keeping Sanji up at night. 

Anytime he had a cut, or a burn, or any other kind of injury, you waited for him to doze off before you pulled out some water and healed his hands. The injuries were never serious, and after a few times, you barely noticed the pain. 

You didn’t mind, and you knew how much your boyfriend valued his hands. It was your silent act of love to him, something you wanted to give him but could never tell him about. One morning after you healed a bad burn, you found him sitting up in bed, staring at his hands. 

“Is something wrong, Sanji dear?”

The cook was examining his hands thoroughly, flipping them over again and again. “I could’ve sworn I had a burn here yesterday.”

Your cheeks tinted at the thought of being found out. “Oh, well maybe you just have superhuman healing powers!” You laugh it off, trying your best to act natural. 

“Yeah, maybe…” You could tell something was bothering him, but he didn't say anything further. 

You caught him staring at his hands throughout the day, as if he was waiting for a bomb to explode. At dinner you noticed a particularly bad cut on the topside of his hand - a cut he must’ve gotten while chopping vegetables - and you made a note to heal it that night. 

He stayed awake later than usual that night, and he seemed more wound up with anxiety than normal. You peppered his face with a few kisses, trying to get him to relax some. 

“Sanji, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine.” He sighed, pulling you into his chest and laying down to finally get some sleep. “I’m sure it’s nothing.”

He fell asleep quickly with you pressed into him. His slow, even breaths signified he was finally unconscious, and you pulled out some water to cover his wound. It stung you a bit as his flesh stitched back together, and you let out a low hiss in pain, and you froze as Sanji stirred slightly in his sleep. This wound was deeper than his normal cuts and burns; he must’ve been really distracted when he hurt himself. He wasn’t usually so careless around knives, but you knew whatever was bothering him would be revealed when he was ready to talk to you about it.  

With his wound healed and Sanji’s breath returning to normal, you curled back into place against him, and fell deep into sleep.

You woke to a string of curses falling out of Sanji’s mouth, his body tight and tense against yours. 

“Hm? Sanji?” You rub the sleep from your eyes and open them to find him staring at his hands again. “Sanji, what’s wrong?”

“That’s impossible,” he mumbled, speaking mostly to himself. He looks panicked, staring down at the place where his cut was yesterday. “That’s not humanly possible.”

You feign innocence as you have in the past, but you can’t ignore the nervous look in his eyes. “What is it, Ji?”

“I had a cut here yesterday. It was deep.” His breathing quickened, and you could see that he was scared for some reason. “It couldn’t have healed overnight. It’s not…It can’t be…”

“I’m sure it’s just-”

“You don’t understand.” He cuts you off mid-sentence, something he’s never done before, and it takes you aback. He gets out of bed abruptly, his eyes never leaving his hand.

“Sanji?”

“I need to go. I need to get out of here.” He’s pacing the room now, his stress overflowing into the space between you. 

“Go where? Sanji, calm down. Talk to me-”

“I can’t be here! I can’t endanger you! Or anyone else, for that matter!” His face is contorted with such pain you’ve never seen before. You don’t know what’s going on with your boyfriend, but his reaction to such a small cut is starting to scare you.

You jump out of bed and stride over to him. When you reach him, you clasp his face between your hands, forcing his eyes away from his hands and up to your eyes. His eyes are wide with pure fear, and his breathing is rapid and shallow. You can feel his body shaking as you hold him. 

“Sanji.” You push down your own fear and speak to him in a soothing tone, trying to bring him back to you. “Talk to me.”

“I’m a monster, Y/N.” Tears fill his eyes, threatening to spill out as he speaks. “If my body is regenerating like this…I’m a threat to you all.”

“You’re not,” You whisper. “You’re not a monster, Sanji.” You stand on your tiptoes to try and kiss the space between his eyes, but he pulls away from you.

“You don’t know.” He backs away from you, fear returning to his eyes again. “I am a monster. And now that I’m-”

It’s your turn to cut him off now. “I healed you, Sanji.”

His brows furled in confusion, but his eyes looked less panicked now. “Wha..?”

“I have this power,” you explain. You walk back to the bedside table, gathering some water from a cup and suspending it in the air. “I can heal people with water. I’ve been healing your small injuries for a while now. I wanted to make your life easier, I swear. I’m sorry I kept it from you. I just…I wanted to help.”

You see him relax the more you explain your powers, which was not the reaction you were expecting. He watches you move the water through the air, and tears finally flow from his eyes. 

“Y/N-chan,” he sobs, running over to you, embracing you in a hug. He’s holding you tight, smothering you into his chest. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner? Why did you hide it?”

Your face burns against him, embarrassed that you had kept it from him for so long. “I’m not supposed to tell anyone, and I knew you wouldn’t want me hurting myself for you, but-”

“Hang on.” He pulls back from you, peering down at your face with a frown of concern. “You’re being hurt?”

“Just when I heal people,” you rush to explain, seeing his frown deepen. “I just feel the pain of the injuries I’m healing, it’s no big deal.”

“It is a big deal,” he corrects, staring at you disapprovingly. “Promise me you won’t do it anymore.”

“Sanji-”

“Promise, Y/N.”

“No! Let me do this for you!” You’re pouting now, but you know Sanji won’t cave on this matter. You know he can’t let you hurt yourself at his expense. 

“I appreciate that you want to help,” he says sternly. You can hear the love in his voice as he speaks, and you know you’ll have to agree to his request.  “But there are other ways for you to help me without hurting yourself. Please-”

“Fine. Promise.” You give him a fake pout, but when he pulls you back into his chest and holds you tightly, you melt into him. “Are you sure you’re okay, Ji? You seemed scared earlier.”

“I’m fine, really.” He rests his chin on the top of your head, drawing in a long breath before he says more. “I just thought my past was coming back to haunt me again, that’s all.”

You all stand there for a long while, just enjoying eachothers closeness. You only break apart when you hear Luffy screaming for breakfast, and you give him one last kiss on each of his hands before you let him go. 

Luffy

Word Count: 1.1k

“Stay still, idiot.” You held Luffy down, looking at his wound in his foot. 

“I can’t! It hurrrtttssss!” 

“That’s what you get for wearing sandals in the jungle!” You could tell from the way the stick speared through his foot, Luffy wouldn’t be able to walk easily, and you still had another half mile before you made it back to the ship. 

You knew you weren’t supposed to heal people while they were conscious, but this was Luffy. He was the love of your life, and the Strawhats were your only family. If you couldn’t trust them, you deserved to be locked up anyway. 

You sighed, pulling water out of your flask in soft, flowing movements. Luffy was still writhing in pain on the ground, overdramatic in his reaction to his current impalement. It was possible that you might be able to heal him without him even realizing it. 

You surrounded his foot with an orb of water, and imagined the wound being stitched together, just like your mother had taught you. You saw his rubbery skin begin to mend together, and braced yourself for what came next. 

Your grip on Luffy’s ankle tightened when the pain came. It was sharp and fast, and it took the breath out of your lungs. You squeezed your eyes shut, but kept your focus on the wound and the pain that came with it. 

“Wooooahhhh!” You could hear Luffy’s sigh of amazement, and you knew he had caught you healing his wound. “That’s so cool! The hole is just closing up!!”

You didn’t speak, afraid that your voice would betray you. The last thing you wanted Luffy to know was that you were in pain because of the healing process. You could hear him freaking out about how cool it was that his injury was healing before his own eyes, but you did your best to ignore him and focus on the healing process. You kept your eyes closed the entire time, using the level of pain to guide how much longer you had to fix his injury. Finally, the pain dulled, and then disappeared. You dropped his foot and opened your eyes again, trying to ignore the lingering effects that your body was dealing with. 

Luffy was examining his foot closely, looking at it from all angles to see if there was any damage. He stood up, putting all of his weight back on his foot, and jumped up and down a few times. 

“It’s like brand new!” He shouted with glee. He came over to you and wrapped you in a hug. “You’re the best, Y/N!”

--

Over the next few weeks, Luffy offered up your services to others throughout the ship. You knew that Luffy was incapable of keeping secrets, and you had never explicitly asked him to keep that information to himself. You never minded healing your family though, and the injuries were always minor. Luffy sent Ussop to you when he got a burn on his hand, and Franky when he got a bad cut on his face. Chopper sent Zoro when he had a sprained wrist. It wasn’t until Nami came to you with a nasty cut on her shoulder that the secret of your healing was revealed. 

You smiled when she asked, and pulled water out to start the healing process. You coated the wound in a bubble of water, and clenched your jaw to prepare for the worst. 

You were aware of Nami’s eyes watching you. Everyone else watched their own wound magically heal, but her eyes remained on your face, watching for any signs of discomfort on your end. You had a feeling that she was suspicious of your powers already. She had been the most interested member of the crew from the start, asking about the stipulations and origins of your power from the moment she had found out about it. 

You kept your eyes on the gash, trying your best to mentally steel yourself for the pain that would come. You knew it wouldn’t be easy to hide the pain, but you were determined to make it look natural. When the feeling of pain ripped through your shoulder to match her wound, you gritted your teeth and kept your smile, but you could feel your muscles involuntarily twitch. 

If Nami noticed, she said nothing. When you finished, you looked back up at her and let out a shaky breath, smiling. She eyed you suspiciously, but thanked you politely and left you alone. Once the door swung shut, you collapsed back onto the couch you were on, desperately needing a nap after that performance. 

--

Luffy was awoken by a smack on the head. 

“What?” He asked groggily. “Are we at the next island?”

“Are you some kind of sadist,” the tangerine-haired girl scolded, shaking her finger at him. “Or are you just a moron?”

“What are you talking about, Nami?”

Nami rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, staring daggers down at Luffy. “Y/N’s power.”

Luffy rubbed his head, wondering if you could fix headaches. “What about it?”

“She feels pain when she heals people, you idiot. She probably feels whatever pain she’s healing.”

Luffy’s brow furrowed in confusion. “What do you mean by that?”

“I mean that she just healed my shoulder. And she was in some serious pain while she was doing it. She hides it well, but I could tell she was hurting.”

Luffy bit his lip, trying to think back to when you had healed him in the forest. But he had been so amazed at watching his own wound heal, he hadn’t noticed your reaction while you were doing it. 

“She seemed kind of tired after mine, but that’s it. I felt great though, so I carried her back to the ship!”

“So you are just a moron!” Nami punched him again. “No more free healing! Stop taking advantage of her!”

--

You woke up from your nap to rubber arms wrapped around you and Luffy’s round eyes staring at you intensely.

“Good morning,” you groan, trying to pull away from him to stretch. 

He let you go enough to stretch out, but kept a tight grip on you. “Does it hurt?”

You freeze mid-stretch, silently cursing Nami for her hyper awareness. “It just makes me tired.”

“You’re lying.” He knows you so well. You move your fingers up to his hair, twirling his locks around your index finger.

“Yeah,” you sigh the word out. You’re painfully aware of his gaze, transfixed on your face.

 “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Because Luffy, it’s not that bad.” Your eyes move back to his finally, and you can see the hurt and confusion that is held within them. “And I like doing what I can to help my family.”

He nods, accepting that answer, and snuggles up into your chest, holding you tightly against him. You let him lay there for a while, twirling his soft strands of hair around in your fingers. There are few quiet moments between you and Luffy, and you cherish every moment you can get like this.

“Nami said no more free healings, by the way.”

You laugh and give his forehead a quick kiss. “Guess I’ll have to charge you double.”

Law

Word Count: 1.2k

“Fuck.”

Law’s breath was ragged as you pressed into his stomach wound. Blood coated your hands as you tried to stop the bleeding, but it didn’t seem to be working very well. 

“I just need to...” Law coughed, and you could see red staining his lips. A small blue orb began to form in his palm, but it flickered out quickly. He was too weak to use his devil fruit powers.

“Fuck.” You repeated. There was only one thing you could do now. It meant exposing your secret and showing your captain your biggest weakness, but you’d do anything to save him. 

You pulled away from his wound, and let your hands guide water from your flask, maneuvering it through the air. “Don’t freak out,” you say, and you cover the wound in water. You let it sit for a moment, and then begin imagining the wound healing. 

It started as a dull, throbbing pain in your stomach. You began to think you were getting used to the pain, but then it began to grow, turning sharp and stabbing. You flinched at the sudden change in pain, but held your focus. 

Law watched you work for a few moments with wide eyes, unsure what was happening or what he could do. You wanted to scream from the pain that was growing rapidly, but you held your tongue, hoping he didn’t notice your facial expressions contorting into pain. Tears filled your eyes, and you finally felt Law move into action, his hand gripping around your wrists. 

“Stop,” he demanded, trying to push your arms away from his wound. You ignore his demand, keeping your arms locked against him, continuing the healing process at your expense. 

“Stop! Y/N-ya, Stop it!” His voice rose in pitch, and you could tell he sensed your pain. His efforts to push you away are getting stronger, proof that his energy is returning to him. You feel relieved in the fact that he is healing, even if it is exhausting you in the process. 

He finally succeeds in pushing you off him, and you fall backwards to the ground and lay there, dazed and stunned from your work. He quickly straddles you and pins your arms to the ground to ensure you’ve fully stopped whatever you had started doing to him. 

“What the hell are you doing?!” Law stares down at you, angry and scared of what you’ve done. 

You know his rage is out of fear, and you give him a small smile, looking up at him through half-lidded eyes. “You okay now?”

He stares at you, baffled at your question. He has energy now, and his wound in his stomach is almost completely healed. He knows it’s due to you, but he doesn’t know how you’ve managed to heal him so quickly. Fear. Betrayal. Anger. So many emotions run through him all at once. He has so many questions that he doesn’t know where to start. 

He tightens his grip around your wrists, keeping you pinned down. “Explain.”

“It’s a power I was born with,” you say, closing your heavy eyes. “I can heal other people’s injuries through water.”

Law watches you carefully, certain that you’re hiding something. He squeezes your wrists tighter until you finally open your eyes again, looking anywhere but at him. 

You can’t make eye contact with him or you know you’ll tell him everything. You can’t afford for him to know your secret, it was bad enough that he knew this much. 

“You were in pain.” He says it as a statement, not a question.

You squirm from underneath him, trying to get free, but his grip doesn’t let up. He’s determined to get to the bottom of what you just did. He needs to protect you. He needs to keep you safe from all harm, even if that means protecting you from yourself. 

“Let go.” You say, still trying to get free. His grip is starting to become painful, and you try to pull your arms away from him again. “You’re hurting me, Law. Let go.”

His eyes stare down at you, unmoving from his current position. The more you squirm, the tighter his grip gets, and you know he won’t let go until he has an answer. “Y/n-ya, why were you in pain?”

“It’s a side effect!” You cry out in frustration, finally giving in. You suspect he knew the moment he saw it. “I feel the person’s pain as I heal them.”

In his shock, Law’s hands loosen their grip, and you finally pull free from him. You try to turn away from him, but he’s still sitting on your stomach, and you don’t have enough energy to push him off. You rub at your wrists, trying to get the sting from his grip out of your body.

Law is frozen, staring down at you with wide eyes. He grits his teeth, watching you massage your wrists. “I’m sorry,” he says, reaching for your hands again, more gentle this time. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me.”

You let him grab one of your hands, and he begins massaging your wrists gently, whispering apologies to you. You close your eyes and try to forget that you’ve broken your number one rule about your power: telling other people. You focus on his wrist massage for a while, his own way to apologize for his outburst.

“Y/n-ya?”

“Hm?”

“Why did you save me?”

You sigh, opening your eyes again. This time, you meet his gold eyes, radiant against the sunlight. “You never want anyone to save you, Captain.”

“It’s my job as a ca-”

“I saved you because I love you, you idiot.”

You can see Law’s eyes twitch in surprise; his hands freeze against your wrist. 

“You don’t get to decide what sacrifices I make for you,” you continue. “You don’t get to tell me what I can and can’t do to save you. That’s my decision. You’ve made many sacrifices for me, some extremely painful ones. Remember the incident at Low Sand Creek?”

Law doesn’t respond, but he slowly starts to massage your wrists again, which you take as a sign to keep talking. 

“I don’t get to criticize your decisions on sacrifice. And you don’t get to criticize mine either. I love you, and I know you love me. Do I want you to risk your life for me? No. But that’s just something I have to live with. And so do you. Okay?”

Your captain says nothing, and you can tell he’s sulking over your lecture. It wasn’t uncommon for you to have to do this with him. Law was one of the smartest people you knew, but relationships weren’t really his strong suit. It resulted in you having to do a lot of explaining and voicing your needs.

“Law, do you understand?” You insist, needing to stand your ground. He had a tendency of not responding when he didn’t agree with something.  

He huffs out an irritated breath. “Okay.”

You scrunch your face at him, shooting him a semi-fake glare. 

“I understand, okay?!”

You twisted your hand to intertwine with his, and grabbed his other hand with your free one so that both of his hands were now holding each of yours. You locked eyes with him, and you could see there was something else there, something that was bothering him. 

“What is it? What’s wrong?”

He was quiet for a moment, as if he were working up the courage to admit whatever he was feeling. His eyes moved away from your gaze and focused on one of his hands instead, still intertwined with yours. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” His voice comes out slightly choked, and you realize that you had forgotten to explain the most important part to him. 

Your cheeks redden, embarrassed at your oversight. His eyes snapped back to yours, and now it was your turn to avoid eye contact.  

“It’s… I was told to never tell anyone about it. Or let someone else see it.”

You can feel him staring at you, his eyes willing you to look at him, but you refuse. He waits patiently, and you know he’s asking you a silent question: Don’t you trust me?

“I trust you, I just…” Neither you or Law had really talked about your past much. You preferred to live for the now, for the future. The past was just too painful to think about. “People died protecting that secret. I didn’t want to add more names to that list.”

Law gave a dark chuckle at your response. “And after all that preaching about not deciding who gets to make sacrifices.”

Now it’s your turn to sulk. “That is not-“

He cuts you off, pulling you up to meet him, and his lips collide with yours. 

He pulls back briefly, basking in your beauty. “No more secrets. Promise?”

“Promise.” 

Ace

Word Count: 1.5k

Ace wasn’t used to being hit, and when someone made contact with him, it hurt. He grimaced as he limped from battle, blood dripping down his leg from the giant puncture wound in his thigh. You had your arm around him, helping him run, but his injury was slowing you both down, and the enemy was closing in quickly.

“Sit,” you commanded. “Let me help.”

“I just need to get back to Marco, he can help.” His breathing was labored, and you knew he was expending too much energy just speaking to you. 

“I can heal too.” You helped him sit down, and you could feel his eyes staring at you, trying to understand your cryptic words. You chose to ignore him for now, and examined the wound. It was deep, but manageable. You braced yourself, and summoned some water out of your flask, covered his wound, and focused on stitching it back together. 

Pain ripped through you, and you had to bite your lip to keep yourself focused. It wasn’t the worst pain you had felt, but the wound was deeper than you had initially thought, and you could feel your muscles tearing apart, just like Ace’s had when he was cut. You knew that it was just a phantom pain, no actual bodily harm was being done to you, but it was still pain nonetheless. 

You could feel tears pooling at the corner of your eyes, but you refused to stop until the job was done. You watched his muscle stitch back together, and when it was finally completely healed, you sat back and closed your eyes, exhausted and riddled with aches. 

When you opened your eyes again, you could see Ace in front of you, you could feel him shaking you violently. He was screaming something, but you couldn’t make out exactly what he was saying over the loud ringing in your ears. Slowly, your hearing returned, and you realized he was screaming your name. 

“Ace.” Your words were slow. You were still trying to come out of the fog of pain that always came with healing. “Stop shaking me.”

He finally stopped, but his hands were still tightly gripping your shoulders. He was staring at you in terror, fear spread across his face. 

“What were you doing?” His voice was loud and piercing, causing you to flinch. “How did you…What do…Where did…” He struggled to find the right words, and you stared at him with still-glazed eyes while he tried to form a sentence. You were struggling to refocus after the pain, and were thankful that Ace was tongue-tied for the moment. 

Ace took a breath, finally able to form a sentence. “I didn’t know you had a devil fruit power.”

“I don’t.” Normally you let people believe whatever they wanted in order to guard your secret, but this was Ace. If you couldn’t trust him, you couldn’t trust anyone. “It’s just an ability I was born with. I can heal people with water.”

Ace’s facial expressions had always been easy to read. Even in your dazed state, you watched as his concern turned to shock and then to confusion. You waited for the inevitable question to come, and it did. “If you’ve had this power, why haven’t you used it more often?” 

“I…” you hesitate. You didn’t want to tell him the weakness of your ability. Not because you didn’t trust him, but because you did. You knew that if Ace discovered the trade off of your powers, he would never want you to suffer for him or anyone else. 

You had told Marco about your power when you joined the crew, and the doctor had forbid you using your ability except in dire circumstances. Marco trusted you to make judgment calls on what you could handle, but you didn’t think Ace would feel the same way. 

You could hear the enemy's battle cries getting closer, and you take the opportunity to avoid the question. “Let’s go. We need to get back to the ship.”

Ace stands, and you follow to do the same. You take a bit longer to get to your feet, still light-headed from the trade off of healing Ace. His attention has shifted to the enemy pursuing you now, and thankfully he doesn’t seem to notice your sluggish movements. 

Ace’s fist becomes engulfed with flames, and he stands between the enemy and you. “Go back to the ship, I’ll hold them off.” 

“Idiot! That’s what got us here in the first place!” 

“Yeah,” He smirked back at you like the devilish fiend you knew he was. “But this time I won’t lose.”

You can feel your knees start to go weak, but you’re not sure if it’s from exhaustion or from the man in front of you. You hate to leave him, but you know you’ll only be a liability in this fight. With Ace’s energy replenished and the ability to fight in an open space, he’d finish off the enemy easily now. 

“You better not die.” Your words hang in the air, and you take off towards the Moby Dick. 

As soon as you got aboard the ship, you went straight to your room. You didn’t bother giving a report. Ace would do that when he returned. Sleep was what you needed now. 

—

You woke with arms wrapped around you tightly, and the warm body of Portgas D. Ace pressed against your back. You weren’t sure how long you had slept, but there was no longer any light coming in through the porthole in your room. You shifted, trying to get out of Ace’s grasp without waking up, but his strong arms tightened against you when you moved, keeping you close to him. 

For a long while you laid in the silence, unsure if Ace was asleep or awake. He wasn’t snoring like he normally did when he was asleep and he refused to let you move away from his grasp, but his breaths were even and he didn’t speak to you. You didn’t mind the quiet, your body was still exhausted from the fighting and the pain of healing today, and Ace’s warmth was almost therapeutic against your tired body.

“Your healing…” Ace's voice finally breaks the silence, making you tense from surprise. His voice was low and quiet in your ear. “It hurts you, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

You can hear the sadness in his voice, and you know that he’s figured it out. Whether he solved it on his own or if Marco told him, it didn’t matter now. You’ve always been a bad liar, and you could never bring yourself to lie to Ace anyway.

He squeezed you tighter, pulling you closer to him. There was another long pause, and you let him hold you while he processed everything. 

“How bad is it?” His voice is level, but you can hear it beginning to grow thick with tears. 

“It depends on what I heal. I just feel the pain of the injury.”

His forehead presses into the crook of your neck, and his breath becomes shallow and ragged. You can feel his emotions coursing through him, and all you want to do is comfort him. You squirm, trying to flip over so you see his face while you talk, but his iron tight grip refuses to let you move. 

“Ace,” you speak gently, your hands pulling at his arms, and his grip loosens just enough for you to turn over onto your other side. You’re laying face to face with him now, but his eyes are squeezed shut. His freckled cheeks are wet with tears, and your heart constricts seeing his sadness. 

You press your forehead against his, and use your free hand to brush some of his hair away from his face. You continue softly sweeping your fingers through his hair, soothing him as you speak. “It’s not so bad, Ace. But that's why I don’t use it very often.”

His eyes are still closed, but you feel his hands ball into fists against your back, gathering the fabric of your shirt in them.

“Why did you use it to save me then?” His voice comes out more of a demand than a question. It’s harsh, and you know he’s angry. Maybe at you, maybe at himself, probably both. His question makes you freeze, your fingers still entangled in his strands of hair. 

You feel a slight prick of irritation at his question. You pull your head back and tilt his face up to look you in the eyes, but they’re still tightly shut. “Look at me,” you demand, your tone matching his from a moment ago. You feel him stiffen slightly at the intensity of your words, but his dark eyes open to meet your own. 

Your hands find his cheeks, cupping his face, and you press your forehead back into his. Your eyes never leave his, and you can feel his grip against your back finally start to soften as he focuses on you instead of what you’ve done. 

“I did it.” You pause for a moment, still staring at him. God, he was so stupid. You swipe your thumb across his freckles, wiping the tears from his sad, sweet eyes. “Because you deserve to be saved.”

[uglypastels]

Logan idea- reader has very similar traumas I.e trained as a weapon, memories wiped, has bad nightmares, slower aging, modified healing.

They find healing with the X-men and get close with Logan because of their similarities the reader is more sunshine to Logan’s I don’t know if pessimism is the right word. They go on a mission, goes missing for a period, and when they show back up they’ve been brain washed and are fighting the X-men but Logan recognizes them instantly. And does the whole this isn’t you sweetheart while taking a beating cause they can both kick ass and that’s one of the things Logan loves about them. He gets the mask off of them cause he realizes that’s part of the issue for them not recognizing everyone and then it’s hurt/comfort them feeling horrible for getting caught and Logan feeling horrible for letting them get caught. And even though they hadn’t been together before just very close friends/testing the waters this brings them together cause they realize they want to be with each other after some healing and Logan be soft with the reader while they heal from the brainwashing fiasco.

I dunno I love the idea of Logan feeling horrible about not being able to rescue the reader and then recognizing them fighting his allies and helps bring them back from the void. I’m a sucker for two people relating to eachother having a friendship that a hard time brings out their true feelings with lots of fluff and healing cause Logan understands that.

this made me think of some of my favourite wolverine scenes from different media so it's all inspired by that i guess. hope you like it :3

warnings: angst. mind control. reader presumed dead. swearing. violence. hospital-setting. guilt.

Masterlist ~ X-Men Requests are Open

‘What the hell are you doing? We have to go back!’ Logan started yelling as soon as he realised you hadn’t made it back to the jet. 

‘It’s too late,’ Scott shouted back at him from the pilot seat. ‘We won’t make it.’ 

‘She won’t make it,’ Logan retorted, already lunging at the cockpit, claws itching to come out. And they would have if it wasn’t for the cold hand touching his skin. He looked up to meet Rogue’s eyes. They were filled with sadness–pity– as she held his hand. He tried to pull out of her hold, but the longer it went on, the more frail he felt. Everything around him began to spin, his vision blurred until it all turned black, and his head hit the steel flooring of the plane.

⮿

Rogue had held on for too long. That much she had realised as soon as Logan had passed out.

It took a whole day for him to come by, but not even her powerful narcosis had suppressed his rage. As soon as Logan had woken up and his senses had felt Scott’s presence, he was on his feet, grabbing the team leader by the collar of his shirt, pushing him against 

‘You proud of yourself, punk?’ he spat in Scott’s face. ‘Got your sorry ass out all safe and sound, huh?’

‘There was no other way. We would have all died if we had stayed, Logan,’ Storm clawed at his shoulders to pull him back, but none of her methods sufficed. ‘This was the only way.’

‘No the fuck, it wasn’t!’ He saw red with anger. ‘We could have saved her.’ He had pulled out of saying that one word at the last minute. I could have saved her. That was the only thing on his mind for weeks. How you still would have been there if it wasn’t for him. 

The plan had been simple; that much had been clear in your face as you suggested it the last time he saw you. But he never should have gone along with it. He never should have let you go on your own. If he had just stayed— ran after you— maybe…

A pitiful portion of him still kept up hope. That one day, the heavy doors to the mansion would open, and you would stand in the middle. Perhaps a bit bruised up and tired, but all there. And he would pull you into his arms like he had wanted to all those times before.

But you never did show up. Days turned into weeks turned into months, and there had been no news, no sightings. Even the Professor had stopped seeking Cerebro’s help as nothing turned up anyway, no matter how hard he looked.

⮿

His heart was in his chest as he raced through the dark corridors of the bunker complex. Logan looked around him for the way out with the least henchmen as chances of there being none were slim. He had already left a trail of bodies behind him and was ready for the next wave of men to beat into a pulp.

He turned the corner, but what he saw was the last thing he had expected.

For a second, he thought he was dreaming; perhaps it was a hallucination brought on by some chemicals they pumped into the air to get to him. It wasn’t possible. His mouth had already fallen open, ready to call out your name, but as you got into a stance of attack, eyes blank except for a fury deep inside them, Logan realised it wasn’t a dream at all. It was a bloody terror. 

It was the hardest fight he had ever been in, trying to block all of your attacks while pulling himself back. He couldn’t het himself to hurt you. All he found himself doing was calling your name, but it was useless. It was you, but it wasn’t. Nothing he said seemed to matter, seemed to take any effect on you. You lunged at him, punching and kicking. 

It was futile to try and argue with you, and so, against every muscle and nerve in his body screaming against it, Logan started to place his movements harder, fighting against you until you went limp in his arms. He cursed himself out as he looked down at your unconscious body, pushing some of your loose hair out of your face. But as he looked at you, he also saw that it really was you still in there. And so he didn’t waste a second thinking about it as he picked you up in his arms and ran as fast as his body could take him. Out of the tortuous underground maze and back to that godforsaken jet that had been the scene of the dreams that had plagued his mind for the past months.

⮿

Everyone had practically stopped in their tracks at the sight of you in Logan’s arms. He stumbled into the jet, nearly falling over, having had, as predicted, to deal with a number more nameless jackasses, but with you in his arms, it made beating them up a bit more challenging.

‘What—’ Storm’s eyes were nearly as pale of shock as they would have been of her powers. 

‘She’s been brainwashed,’ Logan explained before anything else, ‘or controlled. I don’t know, but he’s hostile. We need to keep her down.’ He laid you down on the ground, sitting right beside you, wiping the sweat off his forehead with a deep heave, and only then he noticed the looks of everyone around him. ‘What?’

No one said a thing, but he knew what they were all thinking. For he was thinking it, too. Was it safe to bring you back home? Could whatever they had done to you be reversed, or was he just putting everyone at the school in danger by taking you back? 

‘Is everyone back?’ He just said after no one had dared to say another word.

⮿

Logan didn’t know what had possessed him. Why he had suddenly grown so protective over you, but he could not stand the idea of you being alone in the hospital wing. It took nearly half a week just for Jean and the Professor to understand what had happened to you, and the treatment itself took far longer than Logan would have liked. 

He didn’t know why he came to visit you every night, far outside the regular visiting hours, past when anyone would be awake to see him sneak in and sit by your side, holding your hand, hoping you could feel and hear him as the apologies spilt out of him.

‘I’m so sorry, bub.’ He kissed your knuckles. ‘I should have gone back for you. I should have–’ He stilled as you stirred in your bed. 

‘Logan?’ You croaked out, throat dry and hoarse. In slight shock, Logan said nothing. You blinked and tried to find him in the darkness of the room. ‘Logan? Is that you?’

‘Yeah, it’s me.’ He chuckled softly to himself, squeezing your hand.

‘What happened?’ You tried to sit up, orientating yourself to where exactly it was that you were, but he quickly pushed at your shoulder to stay put. 

‘It’s a long story, kid.’ Never before was Logan happy to be sitting in the dark as the tears he had subdued for months finally fell down his cheeks in extreme relief. ‘You uh– you’d been gone for a while.’ 

‘I was?’ you tried to remember, ‘I can’t recall anything. It’s all—’

‘I know.’ He kept your hand in his, rubbing your skin with his thumb. Logan knew to call for someone as soon as he saw you stir awake, but he needed this moment alone with you. Make sure you are doing alright himself. Besides, the professor was probably already on his way. 

‘It’s okay. You’re alright now.’ He continued, happy you had finally come back home.

the end.

thank you for reading 💗

if you enjoyed the fic, please consider reblogging and leaving a comment. or send a message via my inbox. requests are also more than welcome. 💗

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: Emotions (Sadness)

Sadness can manifest differently in different people. Here are some notes on writing sad characters in your stories/poetry.

Sadness: Other Words to Use

HIGH grieved, crushed, gloomy, hopeless, heartbroken, devastated, despairing, distraught, heavy hearted, miserable MODERATE dejected, dismayed, hurt, hurting, disillusioned, downcast, forlorn, glum, cheerless, melancholy LOW down, disappointed, blue, discouraged, low, somber, sorry, unhappy

Sadness: Some Phrases to Use

A wave of sadness

Irremediable sorrow (impossible to cure/put right)

A sob rose in my throat

A pining melancholy

A plaintive cry (mournful)

A great pang gripped his heart

Her eyes were prickling with tears

Aching with sympathy

His eyes misted over

There were tracks of tears on her face

Her face contorted as though she was struggling not to cry

Sadness flitted across her face

Shaking with grief

His voice cracks, thick with grief

A lump formed in her throat

Sadness: Show, Don't Tell

Eyebrows may be lower and pulled closer together

The inner corners of the eyebrows may be angled up

The corners of the mouth may be drawn downwards

The lips may be either drawn in tightly or pouting outwards

Crying: A Sign of Sadness

Tears may first pool in the eyes before they streak down a person’s cheeks.

Tears distort vision, so if you’re writing in the first person, don’t forget that your character’s vision will be blurry.

Crying usually isn’t a pretty sight, so don’t be afraid to show that the character’s face is red or that their nose is running.

Sadness: Other Notes & Tips

There are many different ways that sadness can be felt and expressed depending on the intensity of the emotion, and there are many different things that can trigger a sad response in a character.

When a character is truly heartbroken, their expression may change to be more numb: their mouth may hang open loosely, their eyes may remain closed, and the rest of their body may become limp and heavy.

Complexity also means that sadness is often experienced in tandem with another emotion, such as anger, happiness, or disgust.

Show your reader the sad (a) behaviours, (b) facial expressions, (c) actions, (d) speech and (e) inner thoughts of your character.

The arts, humanities, give us the space and freedom and consolation to share our sadness.

Sadness can be one of the best things to happen to us, because it shows we still feel and want to strive for a better life.

We usually associate rain with sadness BUT Bad weather is better than good weather at sustaining people’s attention and maintaining productivity, according to a study by Jooa Julia Lee of Harvard University, Francesca Gino of Harvard Business School, and Bradley R. Staats of the University of North Carolina. In a study of Japanese bank workers whose windows gave them a view of the weather, a 1-inch increase in daily rainfall was related to a 1.3% decrease in worker completion time for data-entry tasks. When the weather is bad, workers are less distracted by thoughts of outdoor activities.

Tap into your own emotionality. It’s important to remember that emotion is inside of you—you just need to access it and put it on the page. In fiction writing, you might achieve this by doing some writing exercises or prompts that help you tap into your own emotions and then translating those feelings to your characters’ emotional states. Or, you might find yourself getting deep into your characters’ heads and using their backstories to connect to your characters’ emotions.

Know the difference between sentimentality and truth. To successfully write an essay or novel with weight or substance, you have to understand the difference between sentimentality and truth. Sentimentality is manipulative and unsurprising. It’s the easy words that have always been used to signify certain emotions without actually moving someone into feeling them. Oscar Wilde said, “A sentimentalist is simply one who desires to have the luxury of emotion without paying for it.” In a similar vein, James Joyce said, “Sentimentality is unearned emotion.” The sadness can’t be forced or formulaic, but it’s important to always look for a way to move people, to add meaning, with more than laughter. You provoke tears or deep emotion when you open a genuine window into who you are or who someone else is. Sadness has to be authentic, so you need to maintain that authenticity in your framing of the emotional moment. Resist the impulse to overplay it. It’s not a soap opera; if your subject is experiencing real pain, they’re doing all of the work for you.

Leave room to be surprised by specific detail. That is how you will create natural emotion, which will resonate with your readers, especially if you show and don’t tell. Often something small can trigger reader emotions better than big, dramatic events or descriptions, especially if they’re already familiar with your characters’ backstories.

Pair strong emotions with ordinary ones. When working with heightened emotion, think of ways to pair it with an ordinary, everyday moment. This can help emotional writing sound less melodramatic and make intense feelings stand out.

Use backstories to add weight. If you show your character’s history, that can help build up to an emotional reaction to minor-seeming actions, language, or even body language. Foreshadowing a sad event with a backstory can make the climax feel more intense.

Use sad moments to further character development. Remember as you’re writing that your characters are on a journey. You are rendering only a small slice of that journey on the page. Nonetheless, your characters will need to grow and change. Difficult emotional experiences can shape your characters, so make sure intense emotional scenes fit into the whole story in a way that feels authentic to your characters and plot.

Sources: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ⚜ More: Writing Notes & References

If these writing notes helped with your poem/story, please tag me. Or leave a link in the replies. I'd love to read them!

[magics-neptunes-things]

Concussion

Hi guys!

I don’t have much to say about this story, except that I hope you like it. I’m not so happy with what I’ve been writing lately to be honest, so if you have any ideas or suggestions, I’ll gladly listen.

Summary: You are injured during an international match, far too far from your girlfriend’s comforting arms.

TW: Wound, blood.

______________________________________________________________

Playing under the snow doesn’t appeal to many people, but you have always liked it. You like the idea that weather conditions make players think differently and nothing amuses you more than having to clear the ball from the snow before putting it back into play. You and your Swiss team were winning 1-0, a goal scored by Ana from the start of the match and you have managed to keep the advantage since. Especially helped by Lia’s talent in midfield. You flew with her from London, playing for Arsenal, just like her.

That’s where you met your girlfriend. Leah, despite the fact that she is still recovering from her injury, remained in England, still having to respect Sarina’s wishes. The trainer seems to want to keep her captain close to her, even injured.

After the middle of the second half, the snow falls even stronger than before. The ground is slippery for your shoes, but prevents the ball from rolling properly. This doesn't prevent Ramona from sending you a ball to allow you to run quickly near the goalkeeper of the other team. If you could score a second one, it would completely shelter you.

However, you are stopped rather abruptly in your race by another player, just when you passed the penalty zone. The tackle itself is far from mastered and throws you to the ground. Because of the snow, you find yourself sliding against the post of the opposing goal, making you inert. A silence falls on the football stadium and you don't feel when the opposing goalkeeper roll you on the back. When you regain consciousness, you see the faces of your national team healers leaning over you.

"She is awake" one of them launches in Swiss-German, provoking sighs and exclamations of relief around you.

For your part, you are confused. Your whole body hurts and you have trouble concentrating. The snow failing on your face is cold, but it help your headache.

"Leah" you whisper, before closing your eyes when they put a flashlight in front of them.

"She’s right there Love" a female voice answers before calling her.

When you see Lia appear in your field of vision, you understand the misunderstanding. What an idea to have chosen a girlfriend and a best friend with a similar name. Lia doesn’t need you to talk to her to understand, and you're glad. She send you a little smile. The pain in your head is appalling and keeps you from concentrating.

"It’s going to be okay" Lia gently kneels beside you to take your hand in hers.

In the ocean of pain in which you find yourself, this affectionate gesture is rather pleasant. You close your eyes and let it happen when you are put on the stretcher, launching you lulled by the movements that take you to the infirmary.

"Don't fall asleep" makes you one of the healer, but you can do nothing but release a moan for any answer.

Leah’s face floats in your mind as you darken again, seeking relief from the various pains you have. You regain consciousness in the ambulance but you quickly find yourself nauseous. It only takes a few minutes for what you ate during the day to end up in a basin next to your bed.

********

On Leah Williamson’s side, we went into panic mode. She followed your match thanks to her mobile phone and the different streaming offered on the Internet. She quickly knew it was bad when she saw you weren’t getting up. After thinking for a few moments, she left the stadium to jump on the first plane that could take her to you. Still in her coat with the Arsenal logo, she made as fast as possible to reach you, kept informed of your health by your family and Lia.

She came to pick her up at the airport with her car, trying her best to calm your girlfriend. It's in the early morning that Leah can finally be at your side, far too long to her taste. On your side you have to admit that you saw nothing, having been sleeping all along. Your concussion is bad and you’re just going to have to watch your teammates for the next game and probably miss the next Arenal's game. But it could have been much worse.

When the blonde walks into your room, you’re asleep. Her gaze slips on the different machines that are attached to you, frowning. She recognizes the one that measures your heart rate, the one that sends you regular doses of morphine. But her beautiful blue eyes end up running through your face and her heart tightens. In addition to your concussion, you have a impressive cuckold and we had to sew your eyebrow.

"How is she?" Leah asks to the nurse next to her.

"She was feeling nauseous when she arrives here, but it looks like everything is fine now. She’s a little confused as well. When she woke up earlier, she had trouble remembering what had happened. She was convinced she was in London to have appendix surgery."

"She had her appendix removed urgently two years ago" Leah mutters as she looks at you.

The nurse nods thoughtfully and informs Leah and Lia that you need to rest now, before slowly leaving the room. Noticing that her friend seems panicked again, Lia gently puts a hand on her shoulder.

"She went back two years, confusing hospitals. What if she doesn’t recognize me when she wakes up? Or that she forgets we’re together?"

Offering light pressure on Leah’s shoulder, Lia gently shakes her head with a small smile.

"She’s just a little confused. It will be ok, I’m sure."

Lia having been informed that only the family can stay overnight, she in turn leaves your room quietly. Sighing softly, Leah settles down next to you. Being both afraid to wake you or to hurt you, she decides instead to press her face on her two, placed on the edge of your mattress.

When you wake up a few hours later, you are relieved to see that someone has thought about turning off the light from the ceiling of the room. You quickly understand where you are but you have trouble knowing what time it is. Outside, it's not yet day but given the season it could still be 7 hours past. Feeling your head still numb, you prefer to close your eyes for a few more moments. It’s only when you move your hand slightly that you touch Leah’s arm.

Mechanically, you open your eyes and look in this direction, remaining surprised by discovering your girlfriend deeply asleep at your side. Contrary to her habit when she is asleep, Leah’s face is far from relaxed. Her famous frown is still present on her face. Gently raising your hand, you caress her face, applying yourself to erase it. You take the opportunity to put a lock of her hair behind her ear too, clearing her face. You didn’t want to wake her up, but she finally moved slowly and opened her eyes.

"Hi" you do say quietly as you watch her waking up. "How are you feeling?" Leah asked, standing up, wincing as she felt her neck hurt. "Confused. What are you doing here?" "What... what do you mean?" Before falling asleep, Leah let her mind wander perhaps a little too long. Despite Lia’s reinsurance attempts, she has long imagined the different scenarios you would face if you ever forgot what had happened between you over the past two years. As if it were possible. "Aren’t you supposed to be in London?" You ask before you add when you see her getting paler than before "I’m glad you’re here, but you were at Wembley last night? No?" Leah doesn’t answer, seemingly completely lost. Which has the effect of losing you even more. You let it go for a few seconds before you say timidly. "Leah?" "Do you remember me?" mumbles Leah without looking at you. "What the... I don’t understand anything" you moan, softly massaging your temple. "Why would you want me not to remember you?" "The nurse said you were mixing today with your hospitalization two years ago" Leah’s tone is still very low and you are finally starting to understand what can happen in her mind (a little twisted, let’s face it). She let you take her hand in yours, but didn't raise her eyes on you. "I know who you are. You are Leah Williamson, Captain of the England Team, European Champion and my little lovely Muffin" Leah hates that nickname, which you’re only allowed to use when you’re alone. But for once she seems happy to hear you use it, lifting up on you a look where hope and relief blend perfectly. "Can I have a kiss now?"

A big smile on her face, Leah leans over you to kiss you tenderly. If you had been with all your abilities, you would certainly have pulled her onto the bed to squeeze her against you. But that conversation alone seems to have exhausted you and you willingly sink into the cushions after that.

"Do you have pain somewhere?" asks Leah nicely

You shake your head negatively before bitterly regretting your gesture. The grimace of pain that appears on your face doesn't escape Leah who doesn't even ask your opinion before calling the nurses. Outside, the sky finally seems to clear and the clock in front of your bed informs you that it is indeed around eight in the morning.

After a full check-up, the nurse straightens the head of your mattress and informs you that she will bring you breakfast. You’re pouting, not really hungry. But she insisted that you should eat something and it didn’t fall on deaf ears. As soon as your tray arrived, Leah asks you what you want to eat.

"I’m not hungry" you mumble, frowning.

But Leah being known for her determination leaves you no choice. You end up opting for yogurt, leaving bread and jam aside. It's with Leah installed at the feet of your bed, feeding you with a spoon, that your parents find you when they come to visit you.

********

A week later, you were allowed to go home to London. Despite your headache that sometimes persists, you are much better and you no longer have dizziness or nausea. Leah stayed with you every second, making sure you weren’t hungry, hurt, or thirsty. The blonde may have been a little excessive, but since you were allowed extra hugs, you never complained.

Set up in your plane seats, which Leah chose in first class despite your protests, you let yourself go against her. You have two hours of flight left and since you have no screen for another two days, you intend to enjoy having Leah just for you a little more. You know that in London, you will find your daily routine back. You’re not allowed to resume training, but Leah still follows them, even at her own pace.

"I’m glad we can go home" Leah say thoughtfully while looking at the window.

"Switzerland isn’t good enough for you, Williamson?" you pretend to be offended.

Leah laughs softly and lays a kiss on your hair.

"No, I love it. What I meant by that is that I’m glad that this story is behind us. I was fucking scared."

You just hum, playing with her fingers. You finally learned that the blonde jumped on the first plane possible, renting a jet to make sure to come to you quickly. You already had scolded her about spending so much money for so little, but then you got scolded back, Leah claiming she would die of anguish if she stayed away from you under these circumstances. You didn’t object to that.

"I know I’m an ass sometimes, with my dirty temper and all, but I really love you"

You smile this time, raising your face in her direction. It’s been a little less than two years since you started dating but you were around each other for several months before that. You took your time, preferring to be sure before trying. And it worked pretty well for you.

"I know that your character is only a shell and that inside you are as tender as a marshmallow"

"Shh, somebody might hear you" Leah frown, putting a finger on your lips.

Her face quickly cracks with an amused smile when you pretend to bite her finger.

"Behave yourself" Leah maliciously mumble before putting a kiss on your lips.

She puts her arm around your shoulders to hug you again and you willingly let her take you in her arms. Her scratching in your hair has the hidden purpose of putting you to sleep, and no matter how long you struggle, you end up sleeping peacefully in her arms.

[steddieas-shegoes]

Request: Hop & Joyce don't really like or trust Steve & he knows it. He can tell by their behavior towards him. Post spring break from Hell, Steve tears into them both after they insinuate that it's his fault for the kids being hurt. Steve YELLING at them in front of the party bc he is injured more grievously than the kids & he once again protected them, to the detriment of himself.

Joyce & Hop are forced to acknowledge that their behavior was cruel. And they have to apologize but Steve doesn't accept their apology straight away.

I am usually such a sucker for Hopper adopting Steve and treating him as his own that this was really difficult. Like, maybe top 5 most difficult things I have ever written. It's kind of short, but I wanted more of the focus to be on people standing up for Steve and Steve standing up for himself than the actual angsty part. My darling, I hope it lives up to expectations! -Mickala ❤️

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

“I guess I just don’t understand how Max ended up like this if Steve was supposed to be protecting them all.”

Joyce’s words echoed in Steve’s head.

She was whispering to Hopper in the waiting room, but it was surprisingly quiet, and easy to hear just about anything.

The kids were asleep on the couches, waiting for any news on Max or Eddie, but the nurses told them it could be hours. Hours were a long time to wait when someone was bleeding out and the other someone had multiple broken bones and was unconscious.

Steve felt untethered, his connection to the earth cut the moment he saw what happened to Eddie, pushed into a dangerous orbit when he saw what happened to Max.

“He’s never really let me down like this. Did you hear Dustin say he thinks he was distracted by Eddie?” Hopper asked quietly.

“What did he mean by that?” Joyce paused. “Oh. Do you think so?” Steve couldn’t see their faces, couldn’t see the way they were having a silent conversation within a conversation. “It wouldn’t be the first time Steve let his romantic feelings get in the way of their safety.”

And that really wasn’t fair.

It wasn’t fair because he always put these kids who weren’t even his first whenever he could. It wasn’t fair because it wasn’t his job to be perfect. It wasn’t fair because they were the adults who should have been here to help and they weren’t.

He could feel tears building up, his vision getting just blurry enough that he knew he needed to walk away or he would start actually crying, and he couldn’t let anyone see that.

Especially not Joyce and Hopper.

Apparently, they already thought so little of him, he couldn’t possibly show them that he was struggling now.

“I think we’ll have to have a talk with the kids about trusted adults. They seem to rely on him for a lot and maybe if we just explain to them that Steve can’t handle it-”

“Excuse me, Mr. Hopper?” A nurse, thankfully, interrupted them.

Steve turned to see a young nurse, probably barely older than him, standing in the entranceway to the waiting room.

Hopper walked over to her, actually whispering this time, as if what was being said right now was a secret, but not the way he felt about Steve.

He glanced over at Steve, then nodded to the nurse. He called Joyce over to them, whispered something, then they both looked at Steve.

He hated what was happening. He was used to being a disappointment to adults, but in a silent way. His parents weren’t really ever around long enough to show their disappointment for long. Seeing it now, on the faces of people he respected and wanted to impress, hurt.

Hopper started walking over to him, his face serious.

“They have Max stable. She may not wake up from the coma, but they’re hoping she makes a turn for the better soon. Eddie woke up a few minutes ago while they were trying to stitch him up and he kept yelling for you. He isn’t quite stable yet. He passed back out as they were trying to put him on oxygen.”

“But they’re both alive?”

“For now.”

“Can I see Max?”

“I don’t think that’s a great idea right now. They’re trying to reach her mom, but the phone lines keep going down. I’m standing in as the adult responsible until she can be contacted.”

“So now you want to be the adult responsible? Not any other time when we needed you?” Erica said from behind them.

She’d been asleep with Lucas and El only a minute ago.

“Erica, it’s fine. I’ll just wait with you guys.”

“No, Steve, it’s not fine.” Erica put her hands on her hips, scowled up at Hopper and Joyce, who had just joined them. “Steve looks out for us every day. Even when the world isn’t trying to end. He drives us to school or from school or to the arcade, he pays for our food at the diner all the time, probably spends all his paychecks on us. And where are the parents? They don’t even know where we are most of the time.”

“But-” Joyce started to interrupt until Erica held up her hand.

“You left your kids to fly to Russia when you knew something weird was going on. You could have died, and then what? You know who would have stepped in? Steve. Because that’s what he does for us. Do you know one of his worst concussions was because he was protecting Lucas and Max from Billy? You know he drove Max everywhere she needed to go all year because she didn’t wanna be around anyone else? How about the fact that without him, we wouldn’t have even been able to get Eddie back here? But sure, blame him for this. It totally makes sense to point the finger at the one person who has protected us over and over again.”

Steve was crying.

The other kids were starting to wake up from her voice getting louder as she spoke, and it didn’t take long for them to realize what was happening.

El and Dustin surrounded Steve, cuddling into his sides to comfort him. He needed it, and he was always willing to accept love from the kids. They so rarely gave it, not because they didn’t love him, but because they were at that age where they didn’t want to.

These kids were his in almost every way that mattered, and he was just grateful that they weren’t hesitating when he needed them most.

“You kids could have died. Steve should have never allowed most of this to happen. He’s the adult, and he let you all go into this without even considering you could die.”

“You think we were just gonna sit around and wait for the adults to handle it? When have we ever done that?” Dustin asked incredulously.

“It’s what you should have done. Steve knows that.”

“Mr. Harrington?” A different nurse was standing in the doorway now, older, definitely less nervous.

“Yes?” Steve responded, wiping his tears away quickly.

“Mr. Munson is in a recovery room. He’s woken up a few times for a minute and each time he’s asked for you. Are you family?”

He was pretty certain hospital policy meant only family could go back, especially during natural disasters, so he lied.

“Yes, he’s my cousin. I can’t reach anyone else yet.”

The nurse smiled, though she probably didn’t quite believe him.

“Right this way, then.”

Dustin tugged on his arm.

“Can I come with you?”

“Sorry,” Steve shook his head. “Not yet. Let me check on him, and I’ll come right back out for you.”

“See? This is what I meant about letting his feelings get in the way! What if we weren’t here? Would you just leave the kids to sit out here alone?”

This time, El spoke up.

“Steve is always putting us first. He can put himself first sometimes. That is allowed.”

Steve wanted to hug her again, but the nurse looked like she was going to walk away, and if he didn’t follow her, he wouldn’t see Eddie.

“Go see him, we’ll be here,” Lucas said from next to Erica.

He nodded at them all, giving them a smile before he followed the nurse without looking back at Hopper or Joyce.

Eddie was asleep when they entered the room, so the nurse whispered to him at the door.

“He’s on a lot of morphine, and he’s still receiving a blood transfusion. He may wake up off and on, but he probably won’t make much sense until they lower the dose. Just be here for him,” she smiled before leaving the room.

Steve turned to Eddie and couldn’t hold back more tears.

He’d let him down. He’d let all of them down.

He was supposed to be the hero, despite the jokes about it all, they all knew he was.

But not this time.

Eddie almost died. Max almost died.

He could feel the bat bite on his stomach burning and itching, like it was already getting infected, but he ignored it.

He could wait.

He sat down on the side of the bed, slowly so he wouldn’t wake Eddie up.

But Eddie’s eyes fluttered open once, then twice, then a third time before they managed to stay open enough to see Steve.

“Stevie?” His voice rasped out, a small smile hidden under his oxygen mask. “You’re here.”

“I’m here, Eds.”

He had to be strong, but his brain was so focused on everything he’d done wrong and if he’d just been faster or got out of the vines quicker, Eddie probably wouldn’t be here and Max would be awake and-

“Stop.”

“Hm? Stop what?”

“Bein’ mean.”

Steve’s brows furrowed. He hadn’t even said anything else, had he? Was he so exhausted that he was actually talking without realizing it now?

“I’m not even saying anything.”

Maybe it was Eddie hearing things. He knew morphine was pretty intense.

“To yourself.”

“What?”

“Bein’ mean to yourself. In your head.”

“I-”

“‘S okay. Me too sometimes. Just gotta stop.”

Steve couldn’t help but smile at the way Eddie’s eyes kept drooping closed as he spoke. He would probably fall back asleep any second.

“I’ll be nice. You get some sleep.”

“You rest?”

“Not yet. Maybe later.”

Steve couldn’t really rest until he knew everyone was home, safe, and sleeping off some of the worst of their injuries.

“Yes yet.”

Steve snorted. Eddie was so high. He knew it was better than whatever pain he would feel when they eased him off of everything, but hopefully he wouldn’t remember all this.

“Sleep,” Eddie said, his hand managing to find Steve’s and tugging weakly on it.

“I can’t sleep here, Eds. This is your bed.”

“Our bed.”

Steve’s cheeks were hot, he knew if he touched them, they’d feel like fire. Eddie just had that way of completely rendering Steve speechless. He’d done it so many times over the last couple of days, Steve lost count.

“I’ll stay right here until your uncle gets here, okay?”

“And after?”

It probably wasn’t smart. It would look weird for him to stay in general, but he also had to get the kids home, try to patch himself up at home, maybe shower before he did some rounds and made sure everyone was taken care of.

“I have to take care of the kids.”

“But they have parents.”

“Yeah, well.”

They were interrupted by a knock on the door.

Hopper walked in, face as serious as Steve had ever seen it.

“I was able to contact your uncle, Eddie. You can go now, Steve.”

But Eddie gripped his hand harder, frowning at Hopper. He seemed more awake all of a sudden, but with the way his eyes kept trying to close, Steve could see it was a challenge.

“I want him here.”

“Eds, it’s fine. He’s not too happy with me right now, so-”

“What? Why? You helped save the world.”

Eddie was looking between Steve and Hopper like an answer would suddenly make itself known, but Hopper was just staring at Eddie, and Steve was just staring at his feet.

He didn’t want to get Eddie involved in this. He just wanted to pretend it never happened, maybe try to look Hopper in the eye again someday, and apologize to Joyce for not keeping the kids as safe as he could have.

But Eddie apparently took the “no running” thing very seriously now.

“Steve? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Just. I kinda let them down, didn’t keep everyone safe.”

Steve shrugged it off, but he knew he wasn’t very convincing, or really even shrugging it off. He still felt the ache of disappointing people in his chest.

“Hold the fuck up. You’re serious?”

Eddie sounded as outraged as someone high on morphine could. His voice was barely distorted by the oxygen mask on his face, and his eyes were nearly at their normal size.

Steve couldn’t look at either of them.

“Steve is trusted by all these parents to keep their kids out of danger, and he brought them headfirst into it. It just made Joyce and I wonder how often they were doing stupid things,” Hopper explained, though he didn’t even sound convinced he believed his own words.

Joyce was walking in just as Eddie was about to speak.

“Steve, I think you should bring Dustin home. Claudia is going to get worried.”

He didn’t need to look up to know that Eddie was glaring at Joyce and Hopper.

“Let me get this straight. Steve provides free rides, and babysitting services, and meals, and fun for your kids damn near every day. He protects them during this shit every time it happens, literally puts his body on the line to keep them alive. Tried to somehow keep them as safe as possible when it seemed like the world was ending this time, did keep them alive, and you’re still finding reasons to blame him?”

They both had the decency to at least look like they regretted it.

But they still didn’t say anything.

“Fuck this. I’m not gonna pretend to know everything about your little Upside Down Club, but I’m in it now. None of us wanna be here, but we are. Steve’s been doing his best for years, since he was a kid, and all you can do is complain that your sweet angels aren’t completely unscathed? This is a team effort, you know that. They volunteered. Steve would have had to lock them in a prison cell for them not to help.”

Steve looked up at Eddie, watched as he started to lose the fire that had overtaken him temporarily, his eyes dulling as the morphine dripped into his veins and flushed through his system.

“Best damn babysitter…” Eddie mumbled as his eyes fell closed.

Steve watched him for a moment, waiting to see if he suddenly woke up again. When he didn’t, he stood up slowly, didn’t want to risk him feeling the bed move, and made his way to the door.

But something hurt in his chest, something he knew wouldn’t go away unless he said something.

He turned to see Hopper and Joyce staring at each other, having a silent conversation.

“I’m used to disappointing people. I’ve been disappointing my parents my whole life. Disappointed friends, Nancy, bosses. But I have never let those kids down. I do my best with them. I try to be there for them the way I wish someone had been there for me. I make sure they’re kids because life handed them a shitty card or whatever and they deserve to still be kids. You can be mad at me if you want, but I know I did my best. They know I did my best.”

He didn’t wait for a response, didn’t want to hear them say anything else about how wrong his decisions were.

But Joyce stopped him from leaving the room, hand on his arm.

“Steve, wait. Honey, I’m sorry. I think…I think we got caught up in the moment and just needed someone to blame.”

“You do the best you can. We know you do a lot for them.”

It was nice to hear, but he couldn’t get over the uncomfortable itch in the back of his head that he deserved more than that.

“Thanks, but I don’t think I can accept the apology right now.” And then the anger really set in. It came over him so fast, he could feel his hands shaking. “A lot of things are out of our control. We all wanna blame someone for this stuff, but it just boils down to the same people over and over. Max is in a coma because of Henry Creel, not me. Eddie is in the hospital because of demon bats, not me. Eleven and Will are connected to the Upside Down because of the government, not me. I’m just trying to be whatever they need, and that’s better than I can say for either of you at this point.” Steve left this time, Joyce dropping her hand from his arm halfway through his loud speech.

Okay, he was yelling.

But Eddie slept through it, and it felt good to get all of that out.

He made his way to the waiting room, hoping everyone would still be there so he could check in.

Everything felt too fresh, too much like Vecna could show back up and take any of them at any moment.

But the waiting room was empty, not even Dustin remained.

Steve did his best not to panic. Their parents had all been contacted, so they most likely had just been picked up and brought home.

“They’ve all been picked up, sugar,” an older nurse said from the front desk.

“Oh. Thanks.”

“They left you a note, though.”

He recognized her as the woman who had been here the whole night, handling phone calls and people walking in like she’d been doing this for decades. Maybe she had been.

He walked over and grabbed it from her, giving her a small smile in thanks.

He walked outside before he opened it, not sure why he was suddenly nervous.

But as he read, he felt tears in his eyes for what felt like the hundredth time that night.

Steve- Go home and sleep. We’ll be okay for a day while you rest. You don’t ever do that. We don’t agree with Joyce and Hopper, and we hope you know you’re the best damn babysitter ever. Love, Dustin, Lucas, Erica, El, Will, Mike, and Max (if she could)

He folded up the note, put it in his pocket, and walked to his car.

He ignored the blood in the backseat, rolled his windows down to ignore the stench of iron.

Knew he would be spending most of his day tomorrow trying to clean the stains out, but figured it would be a good mindless task.

He thought about Eddie, about how quick he was to defend him. About how he’d gripped his hand like it was a lifeline.

It felt that way to Steve.

He hadn’t let Eddie down. He’d saved Eddie.

If he didn’t do anything else right, he’d done that, and nothing Joyce or Hopper said could take that away.

[messedupfan]

Chapter 18

Summary: Wanda has been seeing someone. Daisy reconnects with Reader. Jean and Anna have special plans.

A/n: Heeeyy, please don't hate me. Enjoy!

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Wanda checks her watch nervously. She had arrived at the office thirty minutes early to mentally prepare for the appointment. She wasn't sure what she was going to discover in that room. All she knew was that the idea made her feel ill. Her mind jumps to all of the people she slept with and she begins to feel like an idiot. Her leg bounces nervously as she thinks about how she will be judged by the doctor. It won't happen in front of her but she's almost certain it will happen. 

“Wanda Maximoff?” Her head snaps up at her name being called. “I'm ready to see you now.” Wanda nods and rises as she collects her things. She was going to be fine. Agatha swears by therapy. She was going to be fine. This was the next step to getting better and getting on with her life. 

You are standing in the backyard of your former home. “You wanted to show me my own craft space?” You ask with arms crossed over your chest. 

“No, we wanted to show you our future craft space,” Jean says and Anna waves her arms around as she presents a stack of boxes where your tools and materials used to be laid out. 

“What's this? You know that I need the space when I get an order. I know it’s been a while but it’s not just for me. I’ve been able to help you guys with the money I make from this side job. It’s not some frivolous hobby,” you walk around the room. 

“Yes, well, it’s actually been a year – close to a year and I’m pretty sure we were your last customers,” Jean says. “Besides, since we’re going to have all of this time we thought would be occupied by a baby… We want to make it into a craft space.” 

You clamp your mouth shut as you look at the boxes. It wasn’t fair for them to throw that in your face but this scenario was eerily similar to the one you’d witnessed with Wanda’s basement and Vision. You couldn’t stoop as low as that man so you sighed and nodded. “Okay, can you give me time to find somewhere to store it all? I don’t have the space right now.” 

“Sure,” Jean says, “just please don’t take too long. I have a lot of idea’s and I’m excited. Well. We’re excited.” She pulls her wife close to her and the two share a kiss. You find their behavior to be odd but you don’t think about it too much. 

“Okay,” you drag out. “I should get going. I need to do some grocery shopping and make some phone calls to see who will be willing to store my things until I can find a better place.” You walk through the gate to get to your car as they allow you to go. You scroll through your contacts to see who you can trust with your tools and supplies. You pause for a moment when you see Daisy’s contact. You know that you didn’t love her the way she deserved but it still hurt to see her name. You decide to leave that task for when you’re home because you needed to focus. 

You walk around the store with this nagging feeling that you should contact Daisy for some reason. You didn’t understand it. In the time since she ended things with you, you haven’t wanted to contact her once. Maybe it was because things with Wanda have crashed and burned alive. You don’t know, but you had to fight it because it wouldn’t be fair for you to try and insert yourself in her life again. As you shop you recignize her friend and you can’t stop yourself from saying hi. Because you mistakenly feel as though that would be rude. “Hey, Jemma!” You greet with as smile. 

Her eyes go wide and she almost runs but instead turns around smiles back. “Y/n, it’s been a while. How have you been?” 

You take a deep breath as you mentally run through the chaotic months you’d been having. “I’ve been better,” you nod. “Yeah, um, how have you been?”

She makes a face and narrows her eyes at you, “Let’s not waste our time here. I’m not the person you want to know about. Am I?”

You’re surprised by the implication and you shake your head. “No, I’m genuinely curious about you. I wouldn’t ever put you in a position to update me about Daisy. She made it very clear that she wanted me out of her life.” 

Jemma’s eyes scan you and she nods. “I’ve been well. Daisy, however, not so much. I’m telling you this because she is going to reach out to you soon. As much as I don’t like you, you do deserve the warning.” 

Your eyebrows twitch and you frown slightly, that was not what you expected to hear. “Oh, I hope I can help her with whatever it is. I just… She’s not going to try and get back together right?”

Jemma bursts out laughing and you smile and nod as she makes a big show of her amusement. “I’ve forgotten how funny you are!” She points at you with a grin. “No! She doesn’t want you back!” 

“I’m sorry,” you say as you try not to roll your eyes at her reaction. It was unnecessary. “Just, let her know that she can contact me whenever she wants. I’ll see you around, Jemma. Or maybe I won’t.” You walk away and continue to shop for the week. You go home and put your groceries away and don’t think about Daisy the rest of the day.

Wanda sits in her office and goes over her budget proposal for the project she was assigned. The company has been trying to score her former in-law’s as a client for years. She knew Stark Industries was a big corporation when she married into the family. It’s what paid for this house. It’s what allowed her to not work for six months. It’s what has paid for her new land. But for some reason she still feels weird about using her relationship to the Starks to help this company land them as a client. It made her realize why they probably hired her in the first place even with the unexplained unemployment gap after being fired from her previous firm. She runs through the proposal a couple more times and hopes that this doesn’t create a rift with the people she was getting to build a healthier relationship with. 

When she feels confident about the proposal she sets it aside and starts to work on the digital blueprint of her dream home. It has gone from sketches to utilizing the program on her computer to draft together a more visual representation of what she wants her house to look like. She has lots of windows and an open floor plan. She knows where she wants a dining room and how she wants the kitchen to look like. The second floor has a den space and an office space and multiple bedrooms. Then she considers adding a third floor but thinks it might be too much. 

She starts to shuffle the rooms around and considers moving the office to the ground floor. Then she adds a basement. Then she takes it away. She plays around with the design until her stomach grumbles and she is reminded that she has to eat. She shut down her work and walks downstairs to make herself something to eat. As she sets out ingredients, she fantasizes about you standing in the kitchen helping her. She wonders if you'd wrap your arms around her and kiss her cheek as she chopped vegetables. She thinks about how easily she could melt against your body. She allows herself to think about moments she could have with you without making herself feel guilty about it. She's tired of feeling guilty for wanting a better life for herself. 

As she lays on the couch and watches a show that she has been binging lately she mindlessly traces the letters M, I, N, E, on her upper thigh. In her mind, it's a memory of you, but really it's only another fantasy. She doesn't know why she can't just give in. She doesn't know why she pushes you away. She knows she shouldn't have but she also knows that she probably would have hurt you. She takes a deep breath and sighs. 

She walks up to her bed as her mind prepares her for waking up early the next morning. The mental checklist of what she has to take care of tomorrow. What she should wear for her meeting with Tony. What she should make herself for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Should she go out? Should she anticipate Tony offering to take her to lunch? 

She thinks about the therapy sessions she has scheduled for the next several weeks. She thinks about wanting to hang out with her friends. Then as she closes her eyes, she thinks about you and a small smile lifts up her lips. 

You are getting ready to take your lunch break when your phone goes off in your pocket. Your heart leaps into your throat when Daisy’s image covers your screen. You answer and start walking away from the job site. “Hello?” You say into the phone. There is a loud drilling sound and someone starts banging a hammer on a wall. “Hold on, I can’t hear you. One second please.” You cross the street and keep walking until you find a quiet area. You sit down on a park bench. “Okay, I can hear you now. Um, hey,” you say as you remove your hardhat. “This is a surprise. How are you?”

“Is it a surprise? Jemma told me that she warned you I might contact you,” Daisy says. 

“Uh, she did say that but I wasn’t sure when to expect your call. So it is still a surprise,” you reply as you run your fingers through your hair. “She also warned me that you’re not doing too well. Is there something I can do for you?” Daisy goes quiet and you think that the call has dropped, you move the phone from your face to check but the sunlight makes it difficult to tell. “Hello?” 

“I’m here,” she sighs and you can tell that she is trying to hide that she is crying. You take a deep breath as you brace yourself for what she might tell you. Maybe Phil is terminally ill. Maybe her mom passed. Maybe this, maybe that. 

“I’m here for you,” you tell her. “No matter what, it’s okay. You can tell me.” 

“I,” her voice cracks and you wish that you could do something more than sit here on the phone with her. “What I need to talk to you about is better done in person,” she finally says through her sniffles. 

“Okay, um where do you want to meet?” You ask. “I don’t have Rachel this week so you could come over to my place because it's a lot more private than yours or if you don’t want privacy I can go to your place after work. Um or we can meet somewhere public. I’m willing to do whatever you need.” You softly offer her options. Your heart is pounding from the anticipation. What could be so bad that she had to see you in person?

“I’m okay with coming over to your place,” she replies. 

“Okay,” you state, “does seven-thirty work for you? I’ve been working twelve to thirteen hour shifts to pay those pesky hospital bills.” 

“Seven-thirty works,” she answers. “I’ll see you then.” 

“I’ll see you then,” you say as the call ends. You sit on that park bench a little bit longer as you fear what Daisy has to say. What could she possibly be holding on to? What has her in tears? What can’t she say over the phone? Your mind races as you eat your lunch. It continues to run as you get back to work and think about what Daisy needs help with.

Wanda laughs with Tony as they sit together in a nice restaurant. Her pitch went well and Tony said that he would consider hiring her for the project. Then he offered to take her to lunch to celebrate. Now the two were discussing highlights of Vision’s finest moments during past holidays. “Oh, remember that time he convinced your dad to let him cut the turkey and he nearly cut his finger off?” Wanda says. 

“How could I forget? I’m the one who pointed out that there couldn’t be that much blood on a turkey!” Tony laughs as he lifts his glass from the table and swirls it around. He shakes his head. “I have no clue how I’m related to that man.” 

“I don’t know either,” Wanda says. “You are way more fun to be around,” she compliments and they clink their glasses together as they cheers to that. 

“You know, Wanda,” Tony starts as he leans in closer. “Why are you wasting your talents working for a company like Nexus Developments? You are family,” he puts his hand on top of Wanda’s. “We could have helped you land a job with the company we usually use or hell, we could have made a branch for you.” 

Wanda taps Tony’s hand as she pulls away and slumps back into her seat. “I know that you would have. But I couldn’t ask that of you or your family. Vision would have made it about him some how and lately,” she shakes her head as she feels tears building up. She takes a deep breath. “Lately, whenever your brother doesn’t get his way, my kids pay a price. Hell, even when he does get his way, my kids still suffer.” 

Tony nods and takes a drink from his glass, he sighs as the aged scotch goes down smoothly. “I understand your position. Just know that if you ever need help, we are still here for you. Vision can go fuck himself,” he tells her. Wanda laughs a softly as she agrees with his statement. “Who knows, maybe I’ll be able to convince you into a Maximoff and Stark partnership once again. This one being a profitable business instead of an emotional headache.”

Wanda shrugs, “We’ll see. The future is quite unpredictable after all.” 

As you walk through the your apartment building you run through the possibilities of the impending conversation over and over in your mind. The scenarios don’t stop until you see Daisy pacing in front of your door. You check the time on your watch and fill with relief that you’re not late, she’s early. 

“Hey,” you say as you sort through your keys to find the one that will unlock the door. Daisy startles as you announce your presence. “Sorry, I didn't mean to,” you notice that she doesn't look too good and you just move to open the door. “Let's just,” you hold it open for her and she walks right past you. “Would you like anything to drink? Water maybe?”

Daisy shakes her head. “No, I don't know how long you'll want me in here after I tell you what I need to tell you.” 

You make a face, unsure what she could possibly say that would have you kicking her out of your home. “I have a feeling this is something we should sit for. Come on,” you sit down on the couch and wipe the sweat from your forehead.

“Are you sure you don’t want to shower first? You’ve been working hard all day and I know you how much you hate sitting in–” Daisy rambles on as she paces the living room and you have to cut her off. 

“Daisy, I hate waiting even more,” you tell her. “Come, sit,” you pat the space next to you on the sofa. 

Daisy stands still and frowns at you. “No you don’t. You are the most patient person I know.” 

You nod your head slowly, “I can be patient, that’s true. But I still hate waiting.” You admit to her. “I’ve been worried about you all day, Daisy. I don’t want to be pushy but I want to be able to help you. I can’t do that if you don’t stop stalling and tell me what’s wrong.” 

Daisy sits next to you and drops her face into her hands. You sit there and wait for her to collect her thoughts and say something. Anything that will explain her behavior. You bounce your leg as your body decides to show your impatience. The movement has Daisy moving her hands from her face through her hair. “The night we broke up I,” the area around her eyes are red and her nose is pink. She doesn't face you because she can't say this and have you look at her differently. She doesn't know where you stand on a topic like this because every conversation the two of you had on the matter was purely hypothetical. She wanted to keep this to herself because she didn't want you to change in her eyes. She likes you the way you are. “I found out that I had um, sorry this is difficult for me to say.” 

You hold your hand out to her, “Daisy, it's okay. Whatever it is,” you trail as she turns her head away from you. “Are you sick?”  You ask softly as her shoulders shake. 

She turns her head to stare in front of her as she shakes her head and wipes her tears. “No, I'm not sick. That's not the kind of results I had received,” she reaches for the box of tissues in the coffee table and blows her nose. “I found out that I was pregnant,” she finally says. 

You feel your heart stop beating and drop to your stomach. You grow nauseous at the news. “Oh,” you grab onto the arm of the couch as if you're going to faint. “I um,” you blink a couple of times. “Is it someone else's?” The words stumble out before you can process the implication. 

“I never cheated on you,” she states sharply and she looks at you this time. 

“I'm sorry, I shouldn't have… I mean, can you blame me for asking? You didn't tell me until today. You broke up with me instead of telling me. I can't think of why you would do that unless the baby wasn't mine or —” you stop talking as you look at her and clamp your mouth shut. Daisy avoids your eye contact as you recall her behavior that night. She didn't want to be a mother. She kept telling you that as she tried to leave. “Oh,” you react again. The tension in your body releases and you try to figure out how you can address this conversation respectfully. “You decided not to go through with the um the uh pregnancy? Is that what you're telling me?” You try to keep your tone even and your features neutral, trying to avoid showing any insensitive emotions out of respect. 

Daisy closes her eyes as she starts to sob. “I couldn't go through with it. I'm not ready.” She says through her tears. You nod your head because you don't know what to do or how to properly react. “It wasn't an easy decision, you know? I thought about it for a couple of weeks and I thought about telling you but I was so scared that you would be happy and I would have the baby to please you and I just —” 

“Daisy,” you call her name until she stops rambling and you enter her personal space, pulling her against your chest to let her know that you are there for her. “Daisy, I get it. It's okay. I’m not ready for another kid. Shh, shh, it's okay. It's your body, I would have never asked—” 

“I know you wouldn't have but I would have done it! For you!” She interrupts. “Because I know how much you love kids and you're a great parent. You're so great with Rachel and I know how much she wants siblings and I just couldn't. I couldn't be the one to give you that. But if I told you, I would have gone through with it and I would have been miserable,” she continues to ramble. You pull back and get her to look you in the eye. 

“Daisy, you're not listening,” you say calmly. “Breathe with me. Okay?” She nods with you and you count to four with your fingers as you inhale through your nose. Then you put down the four fingers as you hold. You lift them back up as you exhale. And you repeat the process with Daisy until she appears a little more relaxed. “Daisy, recently I've been asked by my ex-wife to have more kids with her and I told her no. I — this is going to sound horrible but — I wasn't ready to be Rachel's parent. I love her, she is my world. But it took me longer than anyone realizes to be comfortable being her parent. I wasn't ready and I know that a lot of parents will tell you that none of them were ready and that's,” you wave your hand to the side. “It's quite clear that they weren't and I don't think it should be that way.” You shake your head. “Daisy, I'm telling you right now that I'm not ready for another child. When you told me about the pregnancy right now I nearly threw up. You made the right decision. I'm not mad at you. I don't hate you for making this decision on your own. It's your choice, I'm just sorry that I didn't make you feel like you could come to me about this. I'm sorry that I wasn't there for you.” Daisy closes her eyes and leans against your chest. 

Neither of you talk for a moment. Allowing yourselves to process and accept the truths that each has shared. You think about how that night might’ve gone differently. You wouldn’t have lived with Wanda for almost two weeks. You wouldn’t have gotten as close to Wanda as you have. You would have been having back-and-forth conversations with Daisy. You would have developed a stronger relationship. Maybe. It could have turned sour. She could have grown distant and resented you or herself for the decision. Who knows? That wasn’t what happened. So it doesn’t matter now. But you can’t help but think where you could have been now had things happened differently. 

“Did you deal with this alone?” You eventually ask her. Daisy shakes her head against your chest. You’re surprised she is still resting against you because normally she couldn’t stand the smell of your sweat and the other odors that come from manual labor when the two of you were together. “Jemma?” She nods against you. “Can I ask, uh, what… or why did you bring this to me now?” You ask carefully. 

You feel Daisy take a deep breath and this is what pulls her away from you. She wipes her face and sits against the back of the couch. She plays with the rings on her fingers and flexes her jaw. “I didn’t get the abortion until a couple of weeks ago,” she admits. “I almost went through with the pregnancy because,” she takes another shaky breath. “Jean was at the same clinic I was at to make the appointment. I spilled my guts to her because Jemma had to leave halfway through since it wasn't the appointment and Jean was there when I had second thoughts. It took me a couple of weeks to even go in because I was in denial for a bit. I didn’t want to believe it was true. Then I saw the sonogram and I,” she shakes her head and looks up to the ceiling. “I had second thoughts.” She shrugs her shoulders and you take one of her hands to offer your support. It’s not an easy decision for most. That's assuming that it's ever an easy decision for anyone. “Jean offered to pay for my doctor bills and prenatal care if I decided to follow through with the pregnancy and gave her and Anna the baby and never told you about any of this.” You drop Daisy’s hand and turn away from her. 

You stand up with that nauseous feeling again, not sure what to do about a betrayal of this caliber. You know that Jean has a tendency to do anything and everything to get what she wants when she wants it but… This was too far. “I can’t fucking,” you shake your head. You want to punch a wall or break something but you can’t. You can’t afford the injury. You can’t afford the plaster to fix the wall.  You can’t afford to replace the things you have. You can’t afford any of this because you thought you were paying off debts before interest can build on them. You thought you were doing everything right. You thought you could trust Jean. You can’t believe she would go so far as to put Daisy through something like this. 

“Please don’t hate me,” Daisy begs, “I was confused and I wasn’t sure what I wanted. I only said yes at first because I thought you would be allowed to be in their life and I thought you would like that and–” 

“I’m not upset with you,” you cut her off. “It’s not your fault,” you try to focus on your breathing but you can’t calm down. You can’t focus on anything. You don’t know how someone can be so deranged. You look at Daisy and you feel so guilty for what happened to her. The position she was put in. It makes sense why one day Jean is ready to cut your head off for saying no and then next she’s perfectly fine. What kind of person could be so deceptive? What kind of person… you huff through your nose. “I’m sorry that you had to go through that,” you say to Daisy in the softest tone you could muster up. “You shouldn’t have… She shouldn’t’ve…” you shake your head and close your eyes. 

Daisy stands up and takes your white-knuckled fist and massages the tight skin until you release your grip. “I am going to be okay. I probably shouldn’t have told you. I just, I don’t know. At first the offer was that I just give them the baby. I wrongfully assumed that also meant giving you the baby. Then she eventually told me that you would not know that the baby was even yours,” she shakes her head. “I couldn’t put myself in the middle of this. I couldn’t put anyone in the middle of that. I didn't want to be part of why Rachel’s parents grew to hate each other. You guys are such healthy examples for her.” You begin to grow upset again thinking about how Jean deceived Daisy. How she was ready to deceive you. It was one thing to ask you to knowingly not be allowed in your child's life. But to go behind your back and essentially kidnap what almost was your child… you couldn’t believe it. 

“When I had the chance to think about it, I didn’t want to give birth. I couldn’t go through with it so without telling her, I went through with the abortion because that’s what I wanted.” Daisy closes her eyes as tears slip out and she continues to rub your hand. Something she learned that can keep you grounded. “The only thing that has been tearing me apart about this whole thing is how much of it was being kept from you. I haven’t been able to sleep because of it. You deserve to know.” 

“Thank you for telling me,” you state as you watch her rub your hands. You clench your jaw as your eyebrows knit together. Normally an action like this would calm you down but the information was far too upsetting. “I need to go for a walk or something. I don’t know. I just can’t be here right now.” You pull your hand away. 

“I don’t think you should be alone,” Daisy tries to pull you back to her. 

“Trust me, right now, that’s what’s best for everyone,” you say as you hold your hand up to stop her from coming any closer to you. Daisy stares at you, wanting to be in your arms again. Wanting to feel that comfort that you brought her. Both in the past and just before she dropped the bomb on you. But you weren't someone that sought after touch when you were going through something. You retreated. You isolated yourself. At least, that's what you did when you were with her. She might never know that there are other sides to you. Especially not after tonight. 

“Okay,” she says just above a whisper. “Okay,” she repeats as she walks to the exit. “I'm sorry for everything, again,” she says as she steps into the hallway. “Please, don't do anything stupid.” She disappears, leaving the door open. 

You stare at the door as you think of what you want to do. You think about getting into your car but you're afraid that if you do, you'll drive into a tree or worse. You'll drive to Jean’s house. You couldn't do that to Rachel. You check that you have your keys, phone, and wallet in your pockets and then you lock up your apartment on your way out. Stepping out onto the concrete sidewalk outside of your apartment building you look every which way. There are bars and restaurants down each way. You could easily find somewhere to drink but that's not what you want to do. So you start walking. 

You walk aimlessly for a long time. You walk until your legs begin to ache and your feet begin to hurt. You find yourself at a dock, there are many boats parked but you find a space without one. You sit at the ledge and look out to the water and breathe. The smell of the salty water is calming. You watch as the water moves causing the reflection of the lights to dance. You allow yourself to grieve because even though you didn't want another child, you contributed to almost bringing another life into the world. It was a weird feeling. You're not upset with Daisy for making her choice, you are grateful to her. But you still feel the loss. You didn't understand the feeling but you let yourself feel it. Because even though you don't understand why you feel the way that you do, you don't have to justify or explain it to anyone. You can just allow yourself to feel whatever you want to. 

Then you grieve the relationship you thought you had with Jean. You can't believe she would pull something like this. You don't understand where an idea like that would come from out of her. You don't know how you'll be able to move past this. You feel like she took everything the two of you built together over the years and tore it apart bit by bit. You feel disgusting. You feel used. You take deep breaths as you feel it all. Hoping to release it in a healthy way. It was done, there wasn't much else that you could do about it now except to confront her. You couldn't do that until Sunday.

When you stand up to leave, you slip and fall into the water. You don't try to swim at first. You let the water move you. Trusting that it won't take you away. That it won't pull you under and shorten your time on this planet. You just float in the water. Eventually, the need for air is too great and you swim up until you break the surface with a big gasp. 

You pull yourself up onto the dock and start walking home. You are grateful for the bulky phone case when you pull it out of your pocket to find that the phone is perfectly fine. You use the map application in order to navigate your way home. When you arrive at your destination you shower and eat a microwavable meal. You fall into your bed after taking a sleep aid and fall asleep. 

The next day, at work, Wanda stops by the job site around lunch time. You walk into Pietro’s office and find the two of them laughing with takeaway meals in front of them. You still feel horrible from the night before. But hearing her laugh heals the wounds inside your heart. 

“Y/n!” Wanda grins. “I brought you something too,” she holds up a container. You look at the container and try not to show that you have anything wrong with you by forcing on a smile. 

“You didn't have to,” you say as you move to the sink to wash your hands before you join them. “I appreciate this. Is there an occasion I'm not aware of?” You ask as you open the container. The aroma of your favorite food should have made you happier, instead you began to feel nauseous again. It has nothing to do with the food or Wanda's presence and everything to do with the feelings that you're suppressing. 

“No, I had lunch with Tony yesterday and it reminded me how much I enjoy having lunch with other people,” she shrugs. “Isolation can become a bit of a downside when it comes to working from home for me sometimes.” 

You nod, “Makes sense. Why don't you do the hybrid method? That's what Daisy did with school. She would do online classes and in-person classes,” you suggest before you take a bite. You chew slowly because you do need to eat. No matter how sick you're feeling. 

“That's a good idea,” Pietro agrees. “You could finally get better acquainted with the rest of the staff.” 

Wanda makes a distasteful face, “I don't know. Getting to know people always leads to getting stuck in the middle of their drama.” She shakes her head. “I think I have enough of my own.” 

Pietro shrugs, “You never know. Sometimes it's good to hear about other people's drama. It makes your life sound better. Why do you think I still talk to you? Just because you're my sister?” Wanda’s eyes widen and she punches her brother on his shoulder. “Hey! It's not my fault, you have the most dramatic life out of anyone I know! Y/n,” he nudges you, “back me up here!” 

You are snapped out of your head and try to catch up with the conversation. You look between them cluelessly. “I'm sorry, I probably have her beat when it comes to a dramatic life.” 

Pietro shakes his head, “What are you talking about? Other than that baby thing, you are relatively drama free. That drama even ended pretty well from what I remember.” 

You feel a little light headed as you are reminded by the development of that issue. That there is a new ending to the situation. But you don't tell him. You don't want to tell him. You're not even sure you want to tell Wanda. Not right now at least. You nod, “Yeah, I guess you're right.” You turn to Wanda with a playful shrug. “Sorry, I tried.” Wanda shakes her head and the three of you share a laugh. 

“Whatever,” Wanda mutters as she stabs her salad with her fork. 

When lunch is over, you walk Wanda out to her car. You're quiet as she talks to you about her current project and updating you on her boys. Then she asks you if you are okay because you seem a little off. You shrug and stop when you reach the car. “Um the other day, Jean and Anna asked me to move my workshop out of their shed,” you scratch behind your ear. Feeling queasy saying her name. 

“Your workshop?” Wanda asks as she unlocks her car. 

“Yeah, just my tools and some leftover materials that I used on my last order,” you explain as you open the car door for her. 

“Last order? What do you mean?” Wanda reaches over and sets her purse on the passenger seat but she doesn't sit in her car just yet. 

“I have a little side business. Haven't I told you about it before?” You are surprised with yourself that you haven't mentioned this to her before. You try to think of a time that you might've brought it up before but you come up with nothing. There just hasn't been a reason to. Wanda shakes her head as she does the same. “Ah well, I have a small business. I take custom orders. Anything that someone wants built, I build it.” You pull out your phone and show her your website. “Just something to help with the bills whenever I can't get a lot of hours.” She takes your phone and nods, impressed by the stuff you have built in the past. “Anyway, the reason it's on my mind, they want me to move my stuff out of the shed. I can't really afford a place to be able to store everything and be able to have the space to work on orders.” 

“I have a shed that, admittedly, could use some care,” she says as she hands you back your phone. “You could set up shop in there, at no cost, of course.” 

“Wanda, I can't take you up on that offer,” you resist. 

“Yes, you can,” she insists. “Why couldn't you?” 

You look away and lick your lips as you are reminded of the night she rejected you. “I would need a lot of access to it when or really if I get another order. I don't know if it's a good idea for us to spend that much time together.”

Wanda nods as she understands where you're coming from. “Technically we wouldn't be spending any of that time together. You'd be working and I would be inside my house or doing something. Come on, we're friends. Let me help you with this.” 

You focus your eyes back to hers and you think about just how much she has been helping you. It doesn't feel like there is a balance in the friendship with how often she helps you compared to how often you help her. “I don't know Wanda,” you say as you bite your bottom lip in thought. You can't think of a good reason to say no so you don't. You shrug and nod at her. “Okay, yeah, I will take you up on that offer. Thank you, Wanda. I really appreciate it. Is it okay if I bring it all by on Sunday?” 

Wanda smiles and nods, “Of course, come by then. I'm sure the boys will be happy to see you and Rachel again. They were pretty upset about not having you guys there last week.” 

“Yeah, Rachel wasn't happy about it either. She prefers cooking with you a lot more than she does with me,” you say with a soft laugh. Wanda smiles at her shoes as she thinks about how much she prefers cooking with you over anyone else. She looks back up and locks eyes with you. She feels like an idiot for pushing you away but she doesn't feel ready to tell you how she feels about you. 

“I'll see you on Sunday,” she says and you nod as you repeat her departing words as you step away from her. You wave as she drives off and you go back to work without thinking about your problems with Jean and instead thinking about Wanda and how pretty she looked today. 

Saturday night you can't sleep. You toss and turn even after taking a sleep aid. Your heart pounds as your mind races about seeing Jean the next day. You can't stop running through scenarios of confronting her. Are you going to do it right away? Are you going to choke? Is the sight of her going to make you nauseous? Or worse. Is it going to cause you to actually vomit? Will you be able to see her without getting angry? You're going to have to be there longer than you want to because you have to load your truck with your stuff but are you going to make it through? You don't know. And you're exhausted by the anticipation. 

You are lucky to get in a nap before you have to pick up Rachel. You have to drink two cups of coffee before you feel awake enough to drive. On the drive over, you are yet again practicing what you're going to say when you arrive. You yawn as you park and shake your head to get you ready to knock on the door. You stare at the house as you try to remember that she is your friend. She was your favorite person once upon a time. You loved her. But it's all tainted now. She has slowly burned you out and ripped you to shreds. 

You step out of your truck and knock on the door. You look at the welcome mat to keep yourself calm as you wait. When there's no response, you ring the doorbell. You take slow breaths as you try to clear your mind. You can't think about what Daisy told you in front of Rachel. 

Anna is the one to open the door. Since Daisy hadn't mentioned her, you can tell yourself that she isn't someone that you should be upset with and you can tell yourself that she has no idea. At least until you can figure out when to confront them about this. You walk through the house to get to your stuff in the backyard but when you bring the tools to your truck you go through the gate that leads to the front instead of going through the house. You don't say anything to Anna, you don't even ask why she's the only person you've seen so far. You just focus on your task. Move your tools from the shed to your truck. When you're done, Rachel greets you with a tight hug that you are happy to reciprocate. It's a relief to see her and to hold her. 

Jean is on the phone in the kitchen and you don't feel the desire to interrupt her conversation just to confront her. You decide to leave it alone. You take Rachel to the car and help her get inside. “Did you hear the good news?” Rachel asks as you get settled in the driver's seat. You shake your head and ask her what the good news is. “I'm having a baby brother! My mommies said so. I'm going to be a big sister!” Your heart stops as your entire body freezes. How could they tell her something like that? How do they even know what the gender would have been? 

“Wait right here, I need to ask your mommies something,” you tell your daughter with a tight voice. You climb out of the truck and walk to the front door. This time, you enter without knocking and walk up to Jean as she ends her phone call. “How dare you,” you start bitterly. Jean is thrown off and her confused smile drops. “How dare you put Daisy in that kind of position. How dare you tell our daughter that she's going to be a big sister before there is a baby. There isn't going to be a baby! There never should have been. You shouldn't have tried to talk Daisy out of her decision. You are a cisgendered female, you should have some respect when it comes to another woman making a decision about her life and her body. Not only that, you are my best friend. Or at least you used to be. I thought you would have enough respect for me to tell me the moment you found out about Daisy's pregnancy. I was mistaken to believe the lies you told me but I will not allow that behavior to affect our daughter. So you better be a thousand percent certain when it comes to something as big as a sibling coming into her life before you tell her anything!” You take a split second to decide whether or not to continue and with how upset you are, you can't stop yourself. “And I was going to let Daisy tell you this herself but I will do what you should have done. She went through with her decision. There won't be a baby. Now I suggest that you either start looking into fostering or adopting — no. You should get your fucking head checked be clearly you are out of your fucking mind, Jean!” Jean slaps you clear across your face. The slap was loud and the impact was hard. It stings and you lift your hand up to your face in shock. 

“Get out!” Anna shouts from behind you. You are shaking with anger. You weren't aware that you had gotten so furious with the situation. You try to say more but Anna won't let you. Jean is in tears and looking down at her hand, shocked by her own actions. Anna steps in between you and her wife. “Get the fuck out of my house Y/n! Get out! Get out!” She starts pushing you backwards. You hold your hands up and shake your head. 

“You're both unbelievable. I'm going,” you walk out after Anna's last shove. You can't believe the reactions. You can't believe the lack of accountability. You storm across the yard and climb into the truck. 

“What's wrong?” Rachel asks in a scared little voice. You feel terrible seeing her shaken up. You sigh and close your eyes before you look at her. 

“Nothing sweetheart,” you say as softly as you can. “Nothing, let's just… we're going to go home and I'm going to go for a run and then maybe we'll stop by Wanda’s house to drop all of this stuff off later. How does that sound?” You try to make her feel more at ease. 

“Why can't we go to Ms. Wanda’s first? I really want to see Tommy and Billy and tell them about the good news!” She asks innocently and you have to close your eyes to calm down. You open them and start the engine. You need to distance yourself from this house. From Jean and Anna. You're starting to wonder if your ex’s behavior is being instigated by her wife. You aren't sure how you can find out. But it's definitely something to look into with the lengths she's gone through to make this idea of theirs happen. 

“Honey, mommies were mistaken. You're not going to be a big sister,” you correct her. 

Rachel frowns, “Yes I am. They said so. My mommies don't lie to me, Baba.” 

“I know that sweetheart, that's why I said that they were mistaken. That's not the same as lying, it's more like they didn't know what they were telling you wasn't true,” you take a second to glance at her. “Does that make sense to you?” Rachel nods with tears building in her eyes. “Awe baby girl, what's wrong?” 

“I really wanted to be a big sister,” she says as she wipes her tears. You feel bad as you continue to drive. 

“I know sweetie, I know,” you sigh as you start to reconsider their proposal. But you quickly shove that thought out of your mind. You cannot allow your daughters disappointment to change your mind on a matter of this magnitude. “Do you still want to go to Wanda’s first?”

“Yes please,” she says as she continues to wipe her face. “I want to see my friends.” You want to calm down before you see Wanda. You don't want to pull her into more of your problems. But you feel bad enough for taking away your daughters smile. So you suck it up and drive to Wanda’s house. You text her that you're on the way when you stop at a red light. 

When you pull up the driveway, Wanda is waiting outside with a smile. She knocks on the window and talks as you roll it down. “I don't care what you say, I'm helping you move the stuff into the shed.” Her wide smiles drops to an expression of concern when she sees the red mark on your cheek. She looks further into the truck and sees Rachel's face is red from crying. “What happened?” She looks you over and you shake your head. 

“Nothing, why do you ask?” You say, oblivious to the evidence on your face while you try to hide your frustration from the day. 

Wanda leans in as close as she can get. “Have you looked in the mirror?” She says in a low whisper. 

Your eyebrows knit together and you frown before you drop the visor mirror to check yourself out. Then you see the mark and you shut it. You want to curse yourself for not going home first. “I can't talk about it right now. Can we start moving this stuff?” Wanda nods and allows you to get out of the vehicle. You walk to the other side to help Rachel down before you start to take stuff down from your truck. You hand some boxes to Wanda and she leads the way to her shed. She talks the entire way about how she spent her entire Saturday reorganizing the entire space. You hardly listen as your mind replays the last hour. How Jean slapped you and Anna pushed you. How angry you felt —  no, feel. 

Once the pair of you set the boxes down Wanda asks again what happened and the words come out of you before you can stop them. You tell her everything from running into  Jemma to what happened with Jean just moments ago. Wanda is quiet as she stands there and processes. She doesn't look at you as she does. You shift your weight uncomfortably as you wait for a response. When she finally moves you don't expect her to hug you the way that she does. She holds you tightly in a warm embrace that breaks your walls down. 

“I'm so sorry,” she whispers against your chest as you break down in tears and she rubs your back. You let her hold you and comfort you in ways that you hardly ever allowed anyone to take care of you. You allow her to witness a side of vulnerability that you rarely let many see. 

After a bit of time the both of you stop crying. You and Wanda sneak into the house and each go to a bathroom in order to wash your faces and then get back to work. Together the truck gets emptied of the tools and materials in an impressive amount of time and was put away in the shed. When the both of you finish, Wanda gets a phone call and excuses herself to answer. You follow her inside to wash your hands. 

You get a message from Nebula and you feel slightly guilty when you do. You open the message and you clench your jaw as she admits how much she likes you and asks when she can see you next. The two of you went out on a date shortly after Wanda rejected you. It was an okay date but with everything going on, it doesn't feel right. You close your phone and head upstairs to check on the kids. As you do so you pass Wanda's office. Her door is slightly ajar. You don't mean to listen in but when you hear the words,  “Thank you for introducing me… yeah he has made me feel things I haven't felt before,” and,  “I feel like he understands me better than I understand me.” You feel your heart sink. You continue to walk to check on the kids as you try to tell yourself that you didn't hear the entire conversation so you couldn't possibly know what she was talking about. But a small voice in the back of your head is telling you that she rejected you because she found someone else. A reality that you'll have to accept if you and Wanda are going to continue to be friends. 

After you check on the kids you schedule another date with Nebula for the next Sunday after you drop Rachel off. Then you continue on with your night with Wanda and the kids. Doing your best to keep your mind off of everything else.

Chapter 19

Taglist: @princessprudy @sayah13 @agaymilflover @awkwardmandalorian @bentleywolf29 @thatshyboy1998 @artisannat @thisischaismagic @wqndanat @madamevirgo @likefirenrain @tearsofglitter @feltlikethat @the-writer-arcane @natashasilverfox @karsonromanoff @aloneodi @lovelyy-moonlight @red1culous @jovialsublimecomputer @natasha-maximoff @iliketozoneout @doudouneverte @druggedduck @notbornbutforged @when-wolves-howl @lifespectator @justyourwritter69 @wandaromamoff69 @awesomelygayasf @nekoannie-chan @diaryoflife @wuwu96 @wandanats-goodgirl @sincerely-indi @blueredg52 @sisiofthemultifandom @fuzzyuniversityeclipsefriend @arcturusseer @scarlettwidow34 @chasethemoon @raven-ss @canyonyodeler @sokovianbaby @alexawynters @bittysworld @hopeless-romantic17177 @spongebobtentacles @the-ox-fan20 @shaniiwm

[jacarandaaaas]

What you hate about each Encanto character and what you love about each Encanto character?

oh this is such a fun ask! a hard question as I love all the madrigals and the fact they’re so flawed makes them more fun to follow!

alma: i love her commitment, how she vowed to protect all these people even sacrificing her own needs to provide for others, how she promised these people a place of refudge and was always there to provide.

dislike: An obvious one here but I dislike how controlling alma can be, how her need for perfection can blind her and lead her to disregarding her own families feelings as well as her own! Her generally dismissing a lot of the problems of her family like telling pepa to control her emotions or not realizing how hurtful her comments are to mirabel.

pepa: i love how emotional she is! when pepa loves she loves with her entire heart she pours her all into every interaction and she wears her heart on her sleeve! she’s so compassionate! pepa truly is an open book and I love her for it!

dislike: i would probably say how she can get irrational very quickly and cause situations to elevate fast! Although I really can’t blame her for this based on the circumstances!

julieta: i always describe julieta as warm and i feel like no other word can capture her comforting nature and gentleness. I just love her warmth and her soothing energy!

dislike: I would say how she tends to coddle mirabel a lot. I know it comes from a place of love but you can see it doesn’t help mirabel and only makes her feel more insecure because julieta doesn’t understand her.

bruno: for bruno I would say I love how selfless he is. It’s a big thing to sacrifice your own sanity like that for someone else and it’s touching how much he truly cares about mirabel to want to protect her like that.

dislike: i would have to say how he’s timid a lot of the time. It’s sad to see him become so resigned and almost accept his fate and stay in the walls possibly forever. He had no fight left in him.

felix: I adore how felix is just the epitome of life of the party! he’s so uplifting and I love how he never gives out to pepa for her emotions. He’s the best at cheering people up and a sunshine in everyone’s lives!

dislike: about felix? that’s hard to say I feel like we don’t see enough of him for me to really base my answer on anything so I’m just gonna say how he told pepa about the vision at dinner😭 dude that was the worst idea!!

agustín: i love how supportive he is! He continuously supports julieta he runs after luisa when she’s upset and he promises mirabel he would hide the vision to protect her! the fact both he and julieta tried to go after her when she ran for the candle too! He also fiercely stands up for mirabel in such an iconic way and he doesn’t back down!

dislike: I would have to say how he can often hammer in the fact he is also unexceptional to try relate to mirabel but it makes the situation worse.

isabela: I love how loyal isa is. She was doing everything for the sake of the family and was willing to sign her entire life away just to keep them happy. Her loyalty knows no limits and I just feel it’s such a defining trait for her.

dislike: probably how smug she can be at times a key example being the apologize scene! it is funny but it’s also infuriating how smug she was making mirabel apologize for something she didn’t even do. Also how she tells mirabel to shut up and her general rude remarks to her!

dolores: for dolores I would say I love how attentive she is! small scene but how she immediately notices alma needs help and goes to offer her support! She notices the small details even without her super hearing! Like how she points out how mariano talks loud even though she hears everyone’s voice his always stuck out to her <3

dislike: probably how she blurts stuff out without thinking it through! like we know she was trying to be helpful when she told the kids mirabel doesn’t have a gift but she didn’t consider how mirabel would feel about that.

luisa: I love how kind luisa is! she was always willing to lend a hand to the people who need her even when they absolutely could deal with a lot of issues themselves! She’s also very sensitive and soft and I love when she allows herself to be vulnerable!

dislike: this might be unexpected but for dislike i would have to say how she kept ignoring mirabel when she wanted to talk. I understand she was stressed and mirabels being irritating but she could atleast look at her, mirabels already ignored a lot already and all she wanted was to talk to her sister about an issue.

camilo: like how mirabel says in the opening song I love how camilo won’t stop until he makes people smile! whether it be through his humor or his compassion I get the impression he would always be there for people. the scene where he comforts pepa is such a key example of this!

dislike: he can be a bit too blunt at times where it’s definitely not called for! he also has a tendency to exaggerate the truth for dramatic effect!

mirabel: have always said this and always will mirabels core trait is her empathy! Her ability to see others perspectives and empathize with them is so important! I always think of the “I need you” scene as a key example of this. She put aside her own feelings and focused on supporting antonio making sure he’s ok! how when she learns of the other madrigals struggles she tries her best to help them or comfort them! empathy is such a strong defining trait for her!

dislike: when it comes to mirabels negative traits I would have to say her stubbornness is the most prominent. the entire scene in isabelas room is proof of this she would have rathered let that house collapse than apologize or even listen to isabelas struggles the fact she was supportive and empathic to everyone’s issues but isas (at first) she was too stubborn to put aside her issues with isa! but also her recklessness and impulsiveness tie into this as well.

antonio: I love everything about him he’s so sweet and caring and I love how he returns the support mirabel gave to him! he always believed in her and was her biggest supporter and best friend! also how offered his plushie to comfort bruno when he was nervous! antonio is just such a caring kid!

dislike: nothing literally nothing how can u dislike this baby?

[woso-fan13]

Whumptober 2023: 21 (Barca)

No. 21: “See the chains around my feet.”

Vows | Restraints | “Don’t move.”

The first thing you became aware of was a persistent hand tapping your cheek. The second thing you became aware of was an intense pounding in your head. Neither of those things were pleasant. 

The next thing you became aware of was slightly more tolerable, that being the voices of your team moms. It didn’t help with the pain in your head, but it was a reassurance to know that you had people there for you. It was a reassurance to all of your teammates when you finally opened your eyes. 

“Hola, bebé,” Mapi coos, the relief evident in her voice, “you’re okay, estas bien.”

You whine when you hear her voice, desperate to convey your discomfort to her. Her hand cups your face, her thumb gently rubbing your face. 

“Lo sé, lo sé,” she acknowledges your pain, “help is coming, yeah?”

You try to move closer to her, needing comfort. You want someone to hold you when you feel so bad. Your plans are stopped though, by a pair of firm hands pressing your shoulders down into the pitch. 

“No, sweetheart, stay still. Don’t move, not until the medics say it’s okay.”

It’s Ingrid this time, entering your vision from above your head. She must have been there the whole time, it’s shocking you hadn’t noticed her yet. 

“Wh-” you start, trying to catch your brain up with your mouth and express your confusion. 

“Your head had a nasty collision with a shoulder,” Ingrid explains, “we’re just making sure everything’s okay.”

You blink, trying to understand. 

“Hurts,” you manage your first word since the accident. 

Neither woman responds verbally, frowning as they look to where the medics are. Mapi does bring her other hand up to cradle your face between her palms while Ingrid rubs her thumbs across your shoulders. She knows you too well to trust you not to move if she lets go.

—-

Once the medics come and you’re cleared of any major spinal injuries, you’re taken off the pitch. Your teammates knew that it was bad when they saw that you were too out of it to resist the stretcher. 

Luckily, testing goes relatively quickly and you’re diagnosed with a major concussion by the time the game ends. While it’s far from good news, you’re grateful it’s not more serious. Mapi and Ingrid are grateful this means they can take you home and simply snuggle you back to full health. You’re also grateful for this. 

The women come rushing into the room, desperate to see you. In seconds, they’ve joined you on the bed- sandwiching you between them. You move to basically lay on Mapi, burying your head into her throat to try to block out the light. Ingrid moves behind you, wrapping her arm around you and rubbing her hand up and down your side. For the first time since you woke up, you’re completely relaxed. 

[dollgxtz]

Why’d you write Sylus so crazy? You’re turning him into one of those booktok men and he’s anything BUT that. I just don’t get it :/

Hi anon! I know my yandere!Sylus story is disturbing. And while yes, I do take great pleasure in writing such topics such as kidnapping n such, I genuinely just wanted to write a dark Sylus fic exploring a different version of him where his desires and upbringing lead him to hurt even the people he loves. I love tragic characters and stories!

Think about if you watch a horror movie. You know murdering and killing is bad and yet you still watch it for entertainment, to see what happens!

By the way, this isn’t to argue or call you out anon, just hoping to shed some light on my perspective as the author. I love when people ask about my work, and I’m happy to answer regardless of the context! My ask box is always open if any of you have questions!

Below is a breakdown of some of the complexities I wanted to portray!

Yandere!Sylus Breakdown

I envisioned him as a deeply complex character—not necessarily in his emotions, because yandere!Sylus always knows exactly what he wants—but in the way he rationalizes his actions and interprets his “wrongdoings.”

On the surface, his actions are undeniably wrong. Kidnapping a girl, forcing her into a life of isolation, and desiring to have children with her while keeping her away from everyone she’s ever loved is, by all moral standards, reprehensible. However, Yandere!Sylus doesn’t see it that way. To him, these actions are justifiable as long as they fulfill a purpose in his grand design.

He operates with a calculated mindset, never doing anything unless he believes it will ultimately benefit him, even if it means causing immense suffering. The fact that the reader might hate him only reinforces his resolve; he views it as a challenge, something to be overcome or “fixed” rather than a deterrent.

This doesn’t mean he doesn’t love reader, he does. But he is inherently selfish at his core since that was what was needed to survive. I intend to break this down further!

In yandere!Sylus’s twisted logic, he genuinely believes that if he can get the reader pregnant, she will inevitably develop a bond with the child. He sees this as a means to an end—a way to “tame” her, to anchor her to him emotionally.

He is convinced that motherhood will soften her resistance, leading her to accept the life he has meticulously crafted for them. To him, this is not just a strategy but a deeply held belief that love, however twisted, can be cultivated through shared ties, like the birth of a child.

This version of Sylus is driven by a yearning for the idealized version of happiness that society often romanticizes—the “big happy family” with “children running around” and a “loving wife.” It’s a vision that he clings to desperately, not because he understands it in the way most people do, but because he was denied such love and stability as a child.

Sylus grew up in a world where love was scarce and survival was paramount, as depicted in the original story. This lack of nurturing has warped his understanding of love and family, leading him to believe that these things can be engineered or forced into existence.

In blending elements of the original story into this version of Sylus and the reader, I wanted to show the core aspects of his character while exploring new dimensions of his psyche. However, I didn’t want it to be an exact replication, as the reader in this version isn’t the canonical main character from the original universe. Instead, she represents an alternative narrative where Sylus’s obsessions and desires manifest differently, yet still retain the disturbing intensity that defines his character! ^o^

All in all, if this story isn’t for you. Don’t read it please. I write for a certain demographic of people who enjoy twisted media. It’s fiction after all! No one is truly getting hurt. I hope this helps with your confusion anon!

[specialagentlokitty]

Carlisle x Teen!reader - my family

Hey could you do one with the Cullens and a female teen reader, like maybe they save her from other vampires that are hunting in the area, but then she’s scared of them because she knows their secret, and they’re like reassuring her that they’d never hurt her, and maybe adopt her? With some emphasis on Carlisle because he’s like the sweetest dad 😅. Thanks! 💜 - @marvelfanfn2187a113 💜

You had no idea what happened, one moment you were walking home from your part time job, and the next moment you were screaming and in pain from being slammed against a building.

“Oh you humans are so annoying when you scream.” The man scoffed.

His red eyes pierced yours, and he crouched down in front of you, gripping your wrist tightly in his hand and no matter how hard you tried you couldn’t pull it away.

Before he could hurt you, he was thrown away, and a woman was helping you stand up.

“Come on, quickly now.” She said softly.

She ushered you towards her car and put you inside and she got in the drivers side.

“What about them?” You asked.

“They’ll be alright don’t worry.” She smiled.

You nodded your head, you were dazed, and in the pain you didn’t really think about not getting in a car with a stranger.

But your vision was fuzzy, and you head was pounding, and before you knew it you had fallen unconscious.

When you came too, the pain in your head wasn’t as bad it was before, but it still hurt.

“Hey, you’re awake. How’re you feeling?”

You furrowed your brows a little and sat up, rubbing your head, and your fingers brushed against some stitches and you stopped.

“You only need a couple, it’ll be healed in no time don’t worry.”

You looked at the voice and your confusion grew.

“Dr Cullen?”

You looked around.

“Where am I?”

“My house, my wife brought you here when you passed out in her car. Do you remember anything of what happened?” He asked.

You thought for a few minutes before slowly nodding your head.

“All of it.. he… red eyes… he was so fast… and strong..”

Carlisle sighed heavily, looking back at his family who were standing behind him waiting to hear what was going to be said.

“We should probably have a talk.” He said softly.

He didn’t want to, but at this point he had no choice but to explain everything to you, you already knew too much.

And while he was explaining everything you slowly stood up, backing away from them, tripping over something.

Esme acted quickly and without thinking, she was behind you in a second and you pulled away.

“Don’t touch me!”

“Okay. Okay I’m sorry.”

She backed away and Carlisle stood up, holding his hands up as he slowly moved around the couch.

“We’re not going to hurt you.” He spoke gently.

“You’re vampires… you hurt people…”

“No, no, we only feed in animals. I promise, it’s why we have different eyes.” He explained.

You still hesitant, and he understood it.

If he was in your shoes he’d be terrified as well.

“We wouldn’t hurt you (Y/N), you trust us right? We always hang out at school.” Alice smiled.

You turned to look at the Cullen children, and you stared at them all.

She was right, you were usually with her or Emmett during school, they were your two best friends and they had never hurt you.

They had always made sure you got home safe, got you food if you were hungry, helped you with homework and things you didn’t quite understand.

They were your best friends.

But they were vampires.

And you were conflicted.

“We haven’t hurt you before have we?” Emmett asked.

You shook your head and he grinned a little bit.

“So, you can trust us now right?”

“You’re vampires… oh god there’s vampires in my apartment building… I thought they were wearing contacts…”

“What?” Rosalie asked.

You looked at her with wide eyes.

“A few people moved into the apartment building… there was a few empty apartments and they were rented out… I thought it was just party people… contacts…”

“(Y/N) is there anyone else in your apartment? Parents?” Carlisle asked.

“No… it’s just me…”

He quickly nodded his head, and he walked over, placing a hand on your shoulder.

“We can’t do anything about it yet, it’s too dangerous. You can stay here for now, okay?”

You looked up at him and slowly nodded your head.

You wanted to go home, but you felt safer there then you did in your apartment complex now.

So they set you up in Alice’s room, they got you a bed and anything else you might need, and you stayed with them.

At first, you stayed away, but soon you grew to accept them, and got used to them.

They were working on a way to safely and quietly get rid of the other vampires, and you had all your stuff moved into the Cullens home.

You basically lived there now.

Sitting in the kitchen, you watched as Carlisle made you some lunch.

“You can cook really well for someone who can’t eat it.”

He chuckled a little and looked at you.

“Have to blend in somehow.”

“True. That’s very true.”

You looked at your homework, finishing off the questions.

“Mr Cullen?”

“You can call me Carlisle you know.”

“I know. It’s weird though, but… I want thank you for looking after me…”

Carlisle stopped what he was doing and walked over, resting his arms on the counter and he took your pen so you looked up at him.

He smiled softly at you.

“You don’t have to thank me, if anything I should be thanking you for taking our secret and accepting us for it. I know they would be devastated if they lost you as a friend, especially Alice and Emmett. Do you mind if I ask you one thing?”

You shook your head.

“Why do you live alone (Y/N)?”

You sighed a little.

“My uh.. my parents passed away a few years back… I’ve been working since I turned 16 and moved out of the care home to live on my own…”

He nodded a little.

“You must be exhausted.”

You shrugged a little.

“Got to work for what we want in life.”

He hummed a little and got up to finish making your lunch and he set it in front of you, moving your homework out of the way.

“You can stay here if you’d like.”

“As in live here?”

Carlisle nodded as he washed up.

“We’ve got the room, we can clear one of the other rooms into a bedroom just for you.”

“I can’t do that, it’s okay. I suppose I don’t mind living on my own.”

“You wouldn’t have to work, you’d just have to attend school that’s all, plus I know everyone loves having you around.”

“I dunno…”

Carlisle chuckled a little.

“Just think about it, alright?”

“Okay.”

So you did, you thought about it for a few days and finally you agreed, and you got your own room.

They became your family, and you finally had time to relax and rest after nearly a year of working nonstop.

Months passed, and you were cooking yourself something to eat for dinner when everyone came filing into the room.

“It’s weird you guys watching me cook.”

Everyone laughed a little.

“We’ve actually got something for you.” Esme said.

You turned around and walked over.

“For me?”

You looked at the vampires all grinning from ear to ear, and Carlisle handed you some papers and you carefully read them.

“You.. want to adopt me..?”

“We do. You’ve become part of the family, you’re our daughter now.” Esme smiled.

“You don’t have to become a vampire if you don’t want to.” Jasper said.

You glanced at him then back to Esme and Carlisle.

“This is all your choice, but the offer stands no matter how long you want to think about it.”

“Yes.”

You set the papers in the table.

“I want you to adopt me.”

He smiled brightly and hugged you, and everyone joined for a group hug and you smiled brightly.

This was your family, and they would forever be your family no matter what

[am-i-interrupting]

please could you do something for arcane where reader comes home in a sling and is like "haha funny story" and it turns out they fractured their elbow? i fell off my bike at 8am yesterday morning and biked for idk how may miles and did farm work before going to the hospital roughly 7 hours later. turns out it wasn't a bad bruise like i thought lol. now im in a sling for 6 weeks and it was kinda sus that i was losing mobility in my arm throughout the day before i went to the hospital

Caitlyn

She will go into protective mode immediately.

She is by your side as much as you’ll allow her, getting you everything you need and more.

She will buy you sweets and get you your favorite drink every day during your recovery.

Will be giving you a lot of face kisses when she gives you something or does something you can’t do at the moment.

If anyone gives you the pity look and starts treating you differently she is glaring at them with a stare so hard and cold they stop immediately. Don’t say anything just half, turn around, and walk away.

Ekko

He will immediately check you over for any other bruising or cuts as soon as the news is broken.

He’s extra doting during your recovery, many kisses and cuddles, will fret over whether or not you’re actually comfortable laying with him.

He’s not the tallest individual so if he can’t get something for you, he is asking the other Firelights to get it for you.

On that topic, when he’s not around he has asked several of the Firelights to not smother you but stay near in case you need something.

Just super sweet and helpful during your recovery all around.

Jinx

She is immediately asking who hurt you and when you reveal that it was your own clumsiness, she takes a breath and jokes about it.

She will try to act like it’s no big deal but always has you in the peripheral of her vision.

She’s not as good as she thinks she is at hiding her hovering habits during this time.

She is making and stealing you so many pretty things during this time just to see you smile.

She will also do your hair for you if it’s long enough to style and she is joining you in the bath to wash and brush it.

Silco

When you explain what happened, he will act like he’s scolding you but in reality it’s simply a rouse to disguise his concern. It’s not easy at the best of times, much less when you’re injured.

He will be giving you the best medicine available for any pain.

He’s also making you teas that are supposed to help soothe pain as well. Where he got such high quality tea? He won’t tell you but it’s there.

It’s also like he can read your mind because if you even think of getting something it’s already on the table in front of you.

You’re also not going to work for the entirety of your recovery. It doesn’t matter if you work for him or someone else. If you work for someone else and they refuse to be accommodating, fine you’ve got a new job with Silco waiting for you when you’re better.

Viktor

He is absolutely worried for you but understands how annoying it can be to have people try to do things for you because you’re in pain.

He will only get things for you if you ask and he is happy to do so.

He will massage your shoulder if it starts to hurt from the sling.

Is giving you alternative pain meds to try if the ones you have aren’t working.

He will also hold ice to your elbow so you don’t have to since it can be a pain.

[hidden-behind-the-fourth-wall]

Chains of Destiny - The change (Ch.4)

Summary: I don't really know how to summarise this chapter, so please have this quote from this part: “You know you can tell me when I’m being a jerk, right? Call me out on it. I probably need it.”

Content warning: Angst, fluff, Logan actually has a heart in this one, supportive Logan.

Authors Note: So Logan isn't always going to be a jerk. He's actually a soft teady bear that secretly cares.

Tags: @danicl25 @mxrtiaxv @ayamenimthiriel @jinndesu

Eva's footsteps echoed faintly, a rhythmic tremor in the hollow quiet of the hallway. She stumbled forward, breaths shallow and broken, her heart hammering as if it might beat its way free. Each wall seemed to close in on her, the shadows pressing, darkening her vision until the way back to her room was little more than a blurred path. When she finally reached it, her fingers fumbled with the lock; her hands shook violently as if they carried the weight of all her failures. She pressed her back against the door, sliding down as though that fragile barrier alone could keep out the memories clawing at her mind—the pain, the gutting fear, the gnawing sense of unworthiness.

She sank to the floor, her vision splintering as she gasped for breath. Why am I here? The thought pierced her, sharp and unforgiving, stabbing straight to the heart of her doubt. What made me think I could change? She pressed her fists against her temples, willing the noise to stop, but it only grew, a relentless chorus of her insecurities. Each thought, each whispered doubt, pounded in rhythm with her pulse.

Then, in the quiet, she felt it—a presence just beyond the door. A soft knock interrupted her spiraling thoughts, followed by a voice, gentle yet clear. “Eva,” Charles Xavier called, his tone as calm as a hand on a storm-tossed sea. “May I come in?”

For a heartbeat, his words didn’t register, lost in her frantic haze. Her power stirred in response to her distress, and before she could contain it, a pulse of energy rippled outward, an unrefined surge that shoved Charles back. She recoiled, wide-eyed, her breath catching in horror. “No—no, don’t!” she stammered, backing away, her body tight with the dread of her own strength, as though it were something separate, wild and uncontrollable.

Charles steadied himself, his expression unshaken, radiating a patient understanding. He wheeled closer, undeterred, his gaze as steady as his voice. “Eva,” he said softly, “I felt your struggle. You don’t have to be alone in this.”

Her face twisted in a rush of anger and despair, her voice breaking as she spoke. “You all think you can help,” she choked out, the words brittle and jagged. “That you can just fix me, make me into some sort of—of project.” Her voice caught, and she bit down hard to keep from crying, her shoulders tight with the weight of it. “I never should have left that place. At least there, no one pretended to care.”

A shadow of sadness crossed Charles’s face, the fine lines around his eyes softening as he listened to her words, absorbing the pain in each syllable. “Eva,” he said, his voice calm but firm, “you’re here because you have a future far beyond what they led you to believe. But you have to give yourself time. One session doesn’t define who you are.”

She pressed a hand to her mouth, willing back the flood of memories rising like dark water, images of faces, flashes of voices, all drowned in her shame. “You don’t understand,” she whispered, her voice barely a tremor. “Every time I use my powers, I see them—all those people I hurt, the ones I couldn’t save. I hate it. I hate this feeling. I hate... who I am.”

From down the hall, Logan felt the force of Eva’s anguish like a heatwave, the sharp ache in her aura guiding him toward her. He didn’t need to hear her words to feel the depth of her despair, but her voice reached him just as he arrived, filling him with a pang that ran deeper than anger. He lingered at the doorway, silent, his rough exterior softened by the sight of her pain.

Logan stood in the doorway, watching her from a distance. The raw vulnerability in Eva’s voice—the way she bared her fears and self-loathing—hit him in a place he thought he'd locked away long ago. She was terrified; he could feel it in the air, thick and suffocating, as though her pain radiated from her in waves. It stirred something deep within him, a flicker of recognition, as if he were staring into a mirror of his own past.

Her voice grew softer, but the desperation in her words cut straight through him. “I don’t want to be a weapon. I don’t want to be someone’s victim, either. But I don’t know how to do what Logan expects of me.” She looked up at Charles, her eyes wet with unshed tears, shimmering with the weight of her doubt. “I feel his anger, like a force I can’t escape. Every time he’s near, it’s like he resents me. And I don’t even blame him. I don’t want to be the reason anyone else suffers—just by being around me.”

Before Charles could respond, Logan stepped forward, his presence filling the space. Eva’s head snapped up, her expression raw, startled. She looked at him as if he were another threat, yet her gaze held a faint glimmer of hope. Charles glanced between them, offering Logan a knowing nod before stepping aside.

“Mind if we talk alone?” Logan asked, his voice softened by an unfamiliar gentleness. Charles gave Eva one last encouraging look before quietly leaving the room.

Once the door closed, Logan took a step forward, but when he saw her flinch, he paused, letting the weight of her fear settle around him. Slowly, he lowered himself to sit on the floor beside her, careful to give her space, his posture relaxed, open.

“Look,” he started, his voice low, gravelly, though touched by an edge of kindness. “I know I’ve been… well, a bit of a jerk, to say the least. And I’m not about to make excuses for it. But there’s something I need you to understand, Eva—I’m not mad at you. Not in the way you think.”

Her gaze remained on the floor, her hands twisted tightly in her lap. “Then why do you look at me like that? Why does it feel like… I’m just a burden?”

Logan exhaled, raking a hand through his hair as he searched for words that wouldn’t come out rough. “Because, kid… you remind me of a part of myself I’d rather forget,” he said, voice barely above a whisper. “The anger, the pain, the way you push people away to keep them safe—that used to be me.”

She glanced up, surprise mingling with the doubt in her eyes.

“When I first got here, I didn’t know who the hell I was supposed to be,” he went on. “I knew how to fight and survive, but not how to live. And controlling my own powers?” He chuckled softly, a dry, self-deprecating sound. “Let’s just say, I thought Charles was out of his mind for letting me through the door. But he showed me that maybe, just maybe, I could be something more.”

A tentative look softened her features, curiosity mixing with lingering disbelief. “But you know who you are now. You’re strong. You’re… not broken like me.”

Logan shook his head slowly, a bitter smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Kid, I don’t think you get how broken I really am,” he replied, his voice rough but honest. “I may have figured some things out, sure, but I still screw up. You saw that today.” He hesitated, glancing at her fragile posture, the hurt still visible in her guarded expression. “And I’m sorry if I made you feel like you were back with the people who locked you up. That was never my intention.”

She drew in a shuddering breath, her hands twisting in her lap. “I don’t know if I can do this, Logan. Every time I try to control it, it’s like… like I’m slipping. Like I’m losing control. And that terrifies me.”

Logan nodded, a flicker of understanding softening his gaze. “I get that,” he said, his voice calm. “But you don’t have to figure it all out at once. And you don’t have to do it alone.” He met her eyes, a hint of a smile breaking through his usual sternness. “You know you can tell me when I’m being a jerk, right? Call me out on it. I probably need it.”

A small, unexpected laugh slipped out of her, soft and hesitant, but there. Logan caught it, his own smile growing as he watched a touch of light break through the darkness clouding her face. For the first time, she looked at him without the fear that had shadowed her eyes.

“I’ll try,” she whispered, a ghost of a smile tugging at her lips.

Logan leaned back, nodding with satisfaction. “Good. That’s all I’m asking. And if it’s any consolation, I don’t have all the answers either. But I’m here, and I’ll do whatever I can to help.” His voice softened, a rare vulnerability slipping through. “I hate seeing you afraid of me. That’s the last thing I ever wanted.”

Eva looked at him, relief softening her expression, a weight seeming to lift from her shoulders. For the first time, she allowed herself to believe that maybe, just maybe, she didn’t have to face her fears alone.

Logan settled back, easing into the silence that hung between them, content just to sit there beside her. And in that quiet, something unspoken passed between them—a silent promise, a shared understanding forged in the dark, where two broken souls might finally begin to find their way back to the light.

***

Logan walked beside Eva as they made their way back to the training grounds. His usual brisk stride was tempered, his expression calm yet intent. The frustration that had rattled him earlier was replaced by a steadfast determination to make things right. The room ahead felt different now, bathed in a softer light that seemed to lift the weight of tension hanging between them. He glanced at her, hoping to ease the tightness in her shoulders.

“Alright, kid,” he said, striving for a steady, even tone. “I think we got off on the wrong foot here. Let’s start over.”

Eva looked up at him, uncertainty flickering in her eyes, but she was listening.

“Let’s go back to basics,” Logan continued, rubbing the back of his neck. “I need to understand what you can do and how it feels when you try. No pushing yourself too hard—just give me what you’ve got, and we’ll work from there.”

Taking a breath, Eva wrestled with the tangled mess of her powers and the haunting memories of her training in captivity. “I… don’t know if I can do everything they wanted me to. They kept pushing me, pushing until I broke, just to see how far I’d go.”

Logan listened intently, his brow furrowing in concern. He didn’t press her; instead, he nodded, shifting his posture slightly to invite her to continue.

“They taught me to heal, mostly,” she said, her voice tremulous. “That’s what they cared about. If someone’s hurt or sick, I can… take it into myself. It’s like swapping their pain for mine.” She hesitated, the weight of her past hanging in the air. “And if I touch someone, I can feel their emotions and thoughts, like waves crashing over me. Sometimes it’s just too much.”

Logan’s expression was hard to read, but his gaze softened with understanding. “What about when you try to protect yourself? That… force repulsion thing, right?”

She shook her head, anxiety shadowing her features. “That one… it’s tricky. I couldn’t do it back there,” she admitted, her voice barely above a whisper, laced with embarrassment. “I try to focus, but then I get lost in… memories. I see the faces of people I’ve hurt. They taught me to use it to fight, but that’s all I know. When it really matters—” She trailed off, shame flooding her. “I’m afraid of it. Afraid I’ll lose control or that it won’t work, and someone will get hurt. Someone here.”

Logan absorbed her words in silence, realizing for the first time that her powers were not mere tools—they were landmines of pain and memory buried deep within her mind. “You’re doing more than you know just by admitting that,” he said, his voice resolute. “They wanted a weapon, not a person who understands her own limits. That’s why it’s so damn hard for you to use your powers on your own terms.”

She nodded, a hint of relief breaking through her anxiety. “It’s just… hard when I don’t know what I’m supposed to be capable of without feeling like I’m back there.”

Logan rubbed his face, recalling Hank’s words from earlier. “Look, the way I see it, we’re not here to make you into what they wanted. We’re here to help you find a way to control this for you. So for now, let’s focus on things that don’t pull you back into that place, alright?”

Eva met his gaze, a blend of doubt and hope dancing in her eyes. “Okay… I can try.”

“Good. Let’s start with the basics of your healing,” he suggested. “We’ll build up slowly. I’ll help you as best I can, even if I don’t have all the answers.” He shifted his weight, glancing over at her. “I’m not perfect, kid, but I won’t quit on you.”

A faint smile tugged at her lips, and Logan felt something ease inside himself, too. They still had a long way to go, but the flicker of trust growing between them felt significant. Maybe—just maybe—that bond would be enough to help her regain a sense of control, one step at a time.

They stood in the quiet of the training room, the usual intensity dialed down to something softer and more deliberate. Logan observed Eva, noting her quiet tension and the way she braced herself as if anticipating pain.

“Alright,” he said, his voice steady. “Let’s start with the healing. But this time, we’re doing it differently. No pushing, no forcing yourself past what you’re ready for. First rule: if it’s too much, you say no. Got it?”

Eva looked at him, surprise flickering in her eyes before she nodded hesitantly. “But… if someone’s really hurt, shouldn’t I try?”

Logan held up a hand to stop her. “You should do what’s right for you first. You’ve been asked to give too much of yourself for too long, and that has to change.” He softened his tone, almost awkwardly, not accustomed to offering this kind of patience. “If healing someone is going to tear you apart, you have the right to say no. It doesn’t make you weak; it makes you human.”

She absorbed this slowly, trying to let it settle. No one had ever framed her power in terms of her own boundaries. It had always been about whether she could do it or if she had failed. This was the first time she was hearing there was a middle ground.

Logan nodded as she processed his words. “Good. Now, let’s get a sense of what feels manageable for you. Start small. You don’t have to do much—just focus on what you can do without hurting yourself.”

He extended his arm, exposing a fresh gash across his forearm, inflicted during training. Usually, he’d let his body heal on its own, quick to recover even from serious injuries. But today, he let his healing stop, inviting her to take over.

“Alright,” he murmured, nodding for Eva to begin. “But remember, you don’t push yourself for anyone. Not even me.”

Eva nodded, though uncertainty lingered in her gaze. Her hands trembled as they reached toward him. Slowly, she laid her fingers over the wound, her skin barely brushing his. She focused on finding her center as he’d instructed. The familiar surge of her power ignited beneath her skin—warm and comforting—but this time she held it steady, allowing the energy to flow through her hands and into him rather than rushing forward. A faint glow enveloped her hands, and Logan could feel the tingling warmth threading into the wound, mending tissue bit by bit. It was delicate and almost hesitant, but with each passing second, the pain subsided in measured waves, leaving a strange calm behind.

“That’s it,” Logan encouraged, his voice a low rumble. “Take your time.”

Her breaths grew deeper and steadier as her focus sharpened. For the first time, she felt a quiet control over her power, a sense of healing without the usual overwhelming drain on her own life force. She met his gaze for a fleeting second, surprise lighting up her eyes. In that moment, he saw the faintest glimmer of pride—a glimmer he’d never witnessed before.

“That’s good,” he said softly, even as the gash slowly sealed under her touch. “Keep it right there.”

When the healing was complete, Eva lifted her hands, her gaze lingering on the closed wound as if she could hardly believe it was real. She swayed slightly, not from pain or strain, but from a quiet sense of awe. Looking up at Logan, her eyes widened with wonder as she realized she’d done it. She looked at her arm, sure, she felt the wound on it while she healed him, but it was already healing on itself. Apparently, the smaller the wound the quicker she was healing as well. That was new and fascinating. 

“See?” he said, a rare warmth edging his words. “You’re stronger than you think. You just have to believe in that strength and protect it.”

Eva held his gaze, feeling something shift deep within her—a sense of validation she hadn’t felt in years. She took a step back, her hand still warm, that warmth grounding her in a way she didn’t fully understand but appreciated deeply.

When Logan spoke again, his voice was steady and sincere. “Now, I want you to remember what that felt like. You don’t have to bleed yourself dry to help others. Your strength isn’t just in the healing itself; it’s in knowing your limits. You deserve that control.”

Eva let those words settle within her, surprised at how they reshaped her understanding of her power. It wasn’t about sacrifice—it was about balance.

They practiced like this for a while, keeping everything gentle and within her control. The experience was new and oddly grounding; she realized that healing didn’t have to mean self-sacrifice. It was the first time she felt some agency over her powers. Logan noticed the change in her posture, the way she began to stand a little taller, and he knew they were on the right track.

After a while, Logan gave her a small nod, contemplating their next steps. “I also want to talk about that other power of yours—the touch thing. You mentioned you can feel people’s emotions?”

Eva nodded shyly. “Yes, but… it’s not always easy to control. It’s like I open up too much, and then I can’t close myself off again. Sometimes it feels like it’s swallowing me.”

Logan’s gaze softened, the usual gruffness giving way to something almost gentle. “Alright. This isn’t about powering through. It’s about getting to know yourself first and finding what grounds you so you don’t get swept up in everyone else’s feelings.” He gave her a small nod. “Hank’s been in my ear about this. He says you have to know what calms you down. So, before we train anything, let’s focus on that.”

Eva looked surprised, unaccustomed to having her own needs prioritized. “I… I’m not sure. I’ve never really thought about what calms me.”

Logan offered a reassuring nod. “That’s alright. Start simple—tell me about what you like. What have you enjoyed doing since you got here? Ororo mentioned you’ve been working on your reading. Any chance you’d read something for me?”

Eva looked up, startled, color rising in her cheeks. “I... I only have a few books in my room,” she replied, almost apologetically. “Children’s books mostly. I’m still… learning.”

Logan’s face softened, sensing her embarrassment. “Good,” he said, a faint, genuine smile quirking at the corners of his mouth. “Haven’t read a kid’s book in years. I think it’s about time I catch up.”

Hesitating, Eva studied him to see if he was serious. His expression was patient, without a hint of mockery. She nodded, a small smile escaping as she turned to leave the training room, hurrying to her quarters. A few moments later, she returned, clutching a slim, brightly illustrated book.

She glanced down at the cover, brushing her thumb across it as if smoothing out her nerves. “This one’s called The Giving Tree. It’s… simple.”

Logan nodded, undeterred. “Simple’s fine. Let’s hear it.”

She opened the book carefully, her fingers steadying against the pages, and began to read. Her voice was quiet at first, tentative, but the words soon flowed as she warmed to the rhythm of the story. Logan listened intently, his expression softening, a rare gentleness in his gaze as she read each line with careful, almost reverent attention.

Somewhere in the middle of her reading, Logan found himself drawn in—not just by the story itself, but by her unguarded effort. She had spent so much time locked away in fear and uncertainty. But now, with every sentence, he glimpsed someone discovering something simple and beautiful within herself, even if it was through the words of a children’s book.

As she finished the final page, Eva glanced up, searching his face for any trace of amusement or impatience. But what she found was Logan’s soft smile, a quiet awe in his expression.

“Thanks for that,” he said. “That book… it was worth the read.”

Eva blinked in surprise, smiling back. The moment felt like a small, unexpected gift. For Logan, seeing her like that—shy, sincere, open, and human—was worth more than he could have anticipated.

[dizscreams]

okayokayokay so for a mindy request, i was thinking it would take place on the train.. so the reader would be on the train with mindy and ethan but they are all split up due to how crowded it is. the reader and mindy are kind of keeping an eye on each other because all of the ghostface masks are freaking them out and once the lights start flickering on and off they can see mindy getting more nervous as ghostface approaches her. so the reader starts kinda pushing through to get to mindy and that causes people to shove back. then next thing you know ghostface notices and stabs the reader instead and ducks out as soon as the doors open as mindy starts panicking to help the reader as they’ve been stabbed? sorry if it doesn’t make too much sense

hi anonnn ty ty for the request I love it sm!! I hope i did ur idea justice :)

Ghost Train — Mindy Meeks ★

PAIRING: Mindy x gn!reader

SUMMARY: Mindy, Reader, and Ethan are on the subway. Mindy’s in trouble with Ghostface so reader steps in and helps her out.

WARNINGS: swearing annnd stabbing I think that’s it!

“FUCK!” Mindy yelled when the subway doors closed on her. Separating her, Ethan, and yourself from the others. You put a comforting hand on her shoulder to which she jumped at, “Hey, it’s okay it’s just me. We’ll get the next one okay?” Mindy nodded before glaring at someone behind you. Confused, you turned to see who she was glaring at. It was Ethan, standing there with that awkward smile on his face to which you gave him a reassuring smile that he seemed thankful for. You knew how Mindy was and you knew he was probably definitely scared of Mindy.

Mindy walked away from him pulling you with her. “Don’t be so hard on him, we don’t know him well-“ You started but she interrupted you with an “Exactly! We don’t know him, y/n. You know we need to be careful, with our luck he’s probably Ghostface.” She said while looking at him then looking back at you. You looked at her worried expression with your own doubtful but also understanding one. You knew how she felt, you knew she was scared. “I just don’t want to see you get hurt again..” she said. You gave her a soft smile and replied “I know, I don’t want you hurt again either.” And gently rested your head on her shoulder.

Eventually the next train came and you made sure to grab Ethan so he wouldn’t get lost with the crowd. You both wondered into the train with Mindy in front of you. You sat somewhere grabbing on the pole in front of you and making sure to try and keep an eye on her. With a blink of your eye there were like ten other people who got on and stood in front of you and around you, blocking your vision from Mindy. You tried moving your head to each side to try and see her again. It was so fucking crowded you could barely think. All you wanted to do was find Mindy. You pulled out your phone and turned to your left to say something to Ethan but he wasn’t anywhere to be found either. You quickly texted Mindy to see if she was okay.

Mindy ❤️

hey, you okay? seen just now

Yeah, I’m okay. Are you? And is Ethan (aka Ghostface) with you?

yes, I’m okay and no I lost him trying to find you. :/ seen just now

Reading your text Mindy muttered a curse to herself. Through out the crowd she could see a little bit of you a few ways in front of her on the right side. Then she saw Ethan a little farther than you on her left. She texted Chad she was on the next train then looked up at her phone only to get startled by a Ghostface. “BOO!” The guy laughed while she was holding her chest with her heart beating rapidly. She muttered a quick ‘fuck you’ before leaving her current seat and going farther back on the train. That’s when she started to notice all the Ghostfaces. Her anxiety was through the fucking roof but all she could think of is whether you were okay or not. After a few stops there was less people and she could see you more clearly. She felt relieved.

You noticed her gaze and beamed with happiness while excitedly waving to her. You were so happy to see your girlfriend safe. You turned around to then see Ethan. He gave you a small wave which you happily returned. He then gave one to Mindy and she death glared him. You smiled to yourself before noticing a Ghostface sitting with his head down. Mindy noticed it too. You both looked at each other and she seemed really anxious. They were closer to her than you and something really didn’t sit right with you. Suddenly the lights flickered, just a little bit but when you looked back at the Ghostface they were looking right in Mindy’s direction.

She looked back at you with panicked eyes. You went to grab your phone and text her but the lights flickered more and a little longer this time. The Ghostface was now standing up still facing Mindy’s direction. Your heart sank. You had to go get her. You started pushing people out of the way as you quickly went towards her yelling ‘sorry!’ ‘excuse me!’ every few seconds. Even though it was less crowded than when you first arrived on the train it was still packed. The flickering lights were scaring you, people were shoving you back a little, but you kept going. Mindy was the love of your life and you’d never let anything happen to her, especially not Ghostface.

You were almost there. Almost! The lights flickered more and you saw that Ghostface was closer to her, really close. You were in clear view of her until this one guy wouldn’t get out of the way. “MOVE! Please move my girlfriends in trouble!” “Shut up kid.” “FUCK YOU!” You yelled while shoving him and running to Mindy. “MINDY!” Ghostface quickly turns around and stabs you right in the stomach. You stop right in your tracks while Mindy’s screaming. You’re staring at the knife and then back at Ghostface while they’re just looking at you, their head leaning to the side. You then hear the train intercom signaling you’ve made it to your stop. Ghostface runs off the train while Mindy’s shouting at people to help.

She quickly puts one of her arms around your waist to balance you and carry you out. You’re sweaty, and panicking, and grunting in pain while Mindy’s tearing up whispering “i know baby I know, fuck I’m so sorry.” Ethan sees you guys trying to make your way out with wide eyes. With an “oh shit” he quickly made his way over to help you guys. He puts his arm around your shoulder and they both help you out, dropping you at a pole for you to sit against, while you winced in pain. They both yell at someone to call 911. “Fuck y/n, why the hell would you do that?” Mindy says with tears running down her face. You send her a sad smile and say “To protect you of course. I love you” she returns your sad smile and says “I love you too. You’re gonna be okay, I promise. while putting her hand on your cheek and rubbing it softly. Ethan looks at you both with panicked eyes. The paramedics then come running towards you and put you in a stretcher, Mindy keeping up with them and holding your hand the whole way.

YAYY FIRST REQUEST DONE! hope you enjoyed! <33

[bunnyboowrites]

My Last Wishes (Zoro x Black!Reader)

Summary ~ you’ve known forever of your early grave, and it’s come time for you to inform your crew-mates of the truth about your fate. None of them are happy, especially the one-eyed swordsman.

Warnings - Zoro x Fem!reader, implied POC!reader but not outright, Angst, Smut, M and F smut, oral (F receiving), p in v smut, Loss of virginity, +18 only pls, Zoro is a bit ooc, Bad Writing as Usual!

(Y/n) had been acting strange around her crew lately, her normal bubbly moods seemed to be dampened and no matter what anyone did she wasn’t the same. Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper goofing off to make her laugh? She’d just give a weak smile and walk away. Franky doing cool tricks? A small thumbs up. Brooks songs, Robin's talks about history, Nami’s fashion show, and Sanji’s cooking. Nothing seemed to make her feel better, the extreme fell upon them when Zoro stepped in.

He walked over to her lawn chair on the deck, he glanced around awkwardly and put his hands on his swords “You can touch my earrings now, you know since you asked before..” he felt his skin heat up, he also felt the whole crew watching on as they pretended to be occupied by other things. For the first time in what had felt like months she gave the biggest smile while the green haired man sat down on the chair, pushing her legs out of his way. The crew sighed a breath of relief as they saw the girl reach for Zoro’s golden jewelry.

He coughed and muttered “so what’s got you so bothered? everyone’s noticed and they’re all worried about you.” She looked at him puzzled by the question before a guilty look crossed her face for a quick second. “You’re not worried though?” She asked trying to brush it off as a joke, but he wasn’t buying it. “You usually love that pervy cook’s dessert when you have tea with Robin but you gave it to Luffy.” He huffed and looked at the ground “so I was sort of worried” she sighed and racked her brain on what would be the best way to go about it, explaining to these people she considered her new family that she’d been cursed since before she was ever born. “I’ll let everyone know at dinner, thank you for worrying about me Zoro”

Sanji called everyone to the kitchen when dinner was ready, everyone rushed to be seated finally ready to understand what was hurting their dear friend. She was seated between Nami and Zoro, and she held a stack of envelopes “mailing something?” Brook questioned. She simply shook her head and handed each of them their own personalized envelope. “I’m sorry I made you guys upset” she started, head hanging low her curls covering her usually joyful eyes that were now full of tears. “But I have no clue how to tell you guys”

“No worries (Y/n) you can tell us anything” Luffy exclaimed while grabbing some bread off of her plate. She started to shake with a sob, and now everyone was giving their full attention to her. “I-I have only a couple months left to live” she whispered, she was surprised by the unusual silence of the situation “way before I was even born my family had been cursed, the women in our family were said to contract a deadly disease that had no side affects just death” she wipes away tears that are clouding her vision.

Everyone was frozen, unable to speak or even breathe. Sanji was the first to act “Don’t worry my beloved (Y/n)-San I’ll do anything to help you” his comment was followed by echos of agreement “What are you saying, you can’t leave us like this” Luffy yelled “We need you, without you how are we ever supposed to find our dreams?” She’d never think that Luffy would act this way. But then again how could he not, he’d already lost his brother and he didn’t need any more of his family ripped away.

Chopper hopped into the girls lap “if it’s a disease I promise I’ll cure you, I’ll do everything in my power to help you! What’s good is being the cure for all diseases if I couldn’t save my friend?” he cried, she stroked his back as he hugged her. Glancing around the table she looked drained, fatigued beyond recognition and Robin just hummed “How long have you known this?” she said and Nami nodded her head “ever since I was a little girl I knew misfortune was real and that it was coming for me” she paused and turned her head up towards the ceiling and chuckled “but when we docked on the last island I went to see a doctor and they told me my diagnosis”

Zoro sat with his arms crossed and closed his eye, seeing his crew with so much emotion it made him feel like he was powerless. Everyone was shedding tears hearing this news. He had a question that he wanted answered “Were you just gonna hide it from us until we woke up to find you dead?” Nami turned to him with a concerned look “Zoro?!? Are you crazy, this must have been eating her alive and you’re being too harsh” He huffed “(Y/n) should’ve told us, that’s something that could’ve happened any day since the day she was born but kept it a secret from people she was supposed love and care for, I’m upset so sorry if I’m being harsh” he picked up the rest of his booze and stormed out almost knocking the door off it’s hinges on the way out.

She finished saying her apologies to her family, the hardest thing she ever felt she had to do. “Those envelopes are my last wishes for each of you, I want them to be opened after I’m gone… for when you miss me most” She picks Zoro’s envelope up and sighs “I have to go give this to the hothead” she laughed in a breathy sigh. She walked out of the kitchen to start her search for the swordsman. She checked the men's quarters first and found the room empty and he was nowhere to be found on the deck so her best guess was the crow's nest.

She finally made it to the top and saw him, her heart started to beat a little faster at seeing him. He was shirtless and he was lifting a dumbbell sweat beaded at his forehead and some trickled down his face and neck and down between his defined pecs "Zoro I came to check if you were okay" She moved closer to the man before he gave a grunt "I'm fine sweetheart, but you just did something knowing you had a way out while we get stuck picking up the pieces" She felt the agitation build in her body "You think I like this Zoro? this is my home you guys were the escape from my stupid curse and now it's coming to an end" she pushed his chest he just silently stared as tears began to roll down her face "I never wanted to hurt anyone, but I couldn't have come out and said it when I met you guys id be standing in the way of everyone's dreams because everyone would be trying to find a cure to something I've had forever." she felt her whole body shake as she sobbed. Zoro thought her cries were painful to look at, he couldn't stand not being able to help her.

"I won't be able to have a boyfriend, experience sex or kissing sure but that's for the better because I'd rather have my friends and our adventures" She buried her face into his chest and he sighed and slowly wrapped his arms around her "you havent been with anyone?" He asked as she realized she told her crush that she was a virgin. She felt the embarrassment warming her "i- don't worry about that, you're an insensitive jerk Roanoa Zoro. do you know that?" He couldn't help himself but think about doing those things with her, giving her everything she deserved and more. she wouldn't want a brute like him anyway, he was sure she liked men more like that swirly cook.

Zoro would never admit it but he tried to take care of himself better to please her, weekly baths became every two days he even bought himself cologne on an island they docked at. All of this to impress the girl clinging to him and sniffling in his arms her soft curls and plush body attracting him to her, always making sure she was never alone even if he was napping. He would never admit but he wanted her to fight to stay alive to stay with them, to stay with him. he would sacrifice any and everything for the girl in his arms.

She finally looked him in the eye, her lip trembling and her eyes still full of tears "I brought your envelope, I need you to wait until I'm dead to read it though" her voice was barely a whisper. He scoffed "I don't want that stupid letter I want you to stay with me" he caught his mistake. She felt her heart skip a beat at his words. He wanted her to stay with him? had he felt the same all this time? feeling bold she firmly said "I love you" She sighed "Not like I love everyone else, I dream of you-" She cups his face "I pray in the night, the heavens know whose name I whisper when I sin" Her eyes flutter down to his lips and she pauses.

"(Y/n) I will sacrifice everything for you, we can find a way to fix whatever is wrong with you I promise it," he said feeling his body react in ways he thought would only happen when he thought about her perfect body underneath him. she smiled as she leaned in pressing her plush lips against his, her lips were soft but she was kissing him so softly he needed more after longing for her after so long. after she pulled away for her breath he impatiently pulled her back in for a more this time slipping his tongue into her mouth.

after their kiss she was trying to catch her breath, their mouths connected by the thin line of spit from both of their lips. "That was so much better than what if imagined" she whispered, her core warming in the oh-so-familiar way. he grabbed her hair and tilted her to look at his face "Let me grant those wishes for you, I wanna be everything for you, just like you are for me" his voice was so smooth and he was running his other hand down her neck and over her cleavage. she shivered at his touch and he smirked at her. "do you want this sweetheart? for me to be with you in a way no one else will be able to be?" she nodded with bated breath.

He licked her neck and took a long breath, inhaling her scent it was sweet with something else he couldn't make out. "you're made for me, I need you now" he groaned. She whimpered as he grabbed the hem of her dress and pulled it over her head exposing her to the chilly air of the room. He laid the dress down on the floor using his shirt as a cushion for her head. He caught her lips in another intense kiss their tongues dancing, he ran his hands all over her body cupping her pretty ass and giving it a slap. "Lay on the dress for me baby," he said, his husky tone doing wonders for her wet little pussy.

She laid on the dress and was feeling slightly embarrassed, she was so scared he was just a figment of her imagination. She covered her body unsure of how she would look to him knowing that during his pirate hunter days, he saw many women. He was having none of it though grabbing her hand and placing it on his massive print through his pants. "you do too many things to me for you to be embarrassed sweetie" she whimpered feeling his large dick, there was no way she could take that. she would try her best to please him though. "Zoro please, let me taste you" she moaned. he wore a grin on his face he was delighted that she wanted him so desperately but he had other plans. He hooked his fingers in her underwear, waiting for her permission to continue.

"I've got something even better for you doll" She let out a small whimper as her breathing picked up. His face was so close to her core, she could practically feel him breathing on her wet slit. The first lick of his tongue felt intense, something she couldn't put into words "Zoro-" the moan left her with a jolt, his cock twitched hearing her moan his name. it was filthy on her sweet lips. "oh so fucking good for me, I gotta get you ready for my cock baby" he dove back into her pussy groaning at her taste. She was his salvation, her body sculpted perfectly. everything he loved on his tongue as he flicked her clit with his tongue while slowly sliding a finger into her entrance.

His name was falling from her mouth like a sick prayer, she was getting so close to the peak and he needed her to fall over the edge just for him. "Ungh, I think I'm gonna cum Zoro, just like that oh-" he smirked as he used his fingers to hit the spongey spot in her sweet little cunt. She couldn't hold out any longer and she felt her body snap with the arrival of her orgasm. the buzzing feeling still fresh on her mind, devouring her senses as Zoro pulled his pants and boxers off.

She watched as he stripped, squeezing her thighs for some relief "Are you sure I can't return the favor?" she asked with a certain breathlessness to her voice. "no I need that fucking pussy around me or I might lose my mind" he groaned desperately, his head rubbing through her folds wetting him thoroughly. His head caught her entrance and he slowly bullied his way into her tight little cunt, "I'm gonna be gentle for you, but fuck you are not making this easy on me (Y/n)" he moaned into her neck.

She wrapped her arms around his neck as he began slowly bucking his hips, the burning sensation turning into intense pleasure. it was like static was running through her. through her whole body even her toes. her moans were getting more loud and intense with every passing thing he said into her ear "Oh fuck baby, you're fucking mine forever." "This pussy is only mine by the time I'm done with this virgin pussy it'll only remember me" "I fucking love you, every day I find a new reason to love you" he sped his thrust up when he could tell how fucked out you were. "oh god I lov- Zoro I love you too" he felt a shiver at her confession his balls tightened . "say you'll never leave, tell me you'll fight to stay" "ill stay with you 'ro" she was pretty sure she was screeching now her impending orgasm sneaking up on her. He let out a loud groan and reached down to play with her clit, everything mixing together being the catalyst to her falling apart. squirting all over him moaning for him begging him to fill her up with his cum. "you're so good and fucking perfect" he moaned as his balls emptied, his cock being milked by her perfect cunt.

they were left coming down from their highs while the heaviness of their situation returned. She panted as the dull aching pain came back "Did you really want me to fight for you?" she questioned. She heard him grunt in agreement and she felt herself reach a determined state of mind "I'll do anything to see everyone's dreams come true. My new dream is to stay alive to go on so many adventures with my friends and my love" he nodded and kissed her neck "I love you Zoro" she whispered as he sighed content and tired "yeah yeah let's just get some rest." he muttered, breathing in the night air with a newfound sense of purpose for the both of them.

;0 I actually wrote smut, it was pretty hard so I’ll keep practicing. Bye bye for now