#the way i SHRIEKED when i found this on ACCIDENT

[broadway-heere-i-come]

James Lantz updated his website and now we have a brand-new, high-res photograph of Ian and Jordan kissing in The Bus

[pensbridgerton]

On the sixth of April, in the year 1812—precisely two days before her sixteenth birthday—Penelope Featherington fell in love.

It was, in a word, thrilling. The world shook. Her heart leaped. The moment was breathtaking. And, she was able to tell herself with some satisfaction, the man in question—one Colin Bridgerton—felt precisely the same way. Oh, not the love part. He certainly didn’t fall in love with her in 1812 (and not in 1813, 1814, 1815, or—oh, blast, not in all the years 1816–1822, either, and certainly not in 1823, when he was out of the country the whole time, anyway). But his earth shook, his heart leaped, and Penelope knew without a shadow of a doubt that his breath was taken away as well.

For a good ten seconds.

Falling off a horse tended to do that to a man.

It happened thus:

She’d been out for a walk in Hyde Park with her mother and two older sisters when she felt a thunderous rumbling under her feet (see above: the bit about the earth shaking). Her mother wasn’t paying much attention to her (her mother rarely did), so Penelope slipped away for a moment to see what was about. The rest of the Featheringtons were in rapt conversation with Viscountess Bridgerton and her daughter Daphne, who had just begun her second season in London, so they were pretending to ignore the rumbling. The Bridgertons were an important family indeed, and conversations with them were not to be ignored.

As Penelope skirted around the edge of a particularly fat-trunked tree, she saw two riders coming her way, galloping along hell-for-leather or whatever expression people liked to use for fools on horseback who care not for their safety and well-being. Penelope felt her heart quicken (it would have been difficult to maintain a sedate pulse as a witness to such excitement, and besides, this allowed her to say that her heart leaped when she fell in love).

Then, in one of those inexplicable quirks of fate, the wind picked up quite suddenly and lifted her bonnet (which, much to her mother’s chagrin, she had not tied properly since the ribbon chafed under her chin) straight into the air and, splat! right onto the face of one of the riders.

Penelope gasped (taking her breath away!), and then the man fell off his horse, landing most inelegantly in a nearby mud puddle. She rushed forward, quite without thinking, squealing something that was meant to inquire after his welfare, but that she suspected came out as nothing more than a strangled shriek. He would, of course, be furious with her, since she’d effectively knocked him off his horse and covered him with mud—two things guaranteed to put any gentleman in the foulest of moods. But when he finally rose to his feet, brushing off whatever mud could be dislodged from his clothing, he didn’t lash out at her. He didn’t give her a stinging set-down, he didn’t yell, he didn’t even glare.

He laughed.

He laughed.

Penelope hadn’t much experience with the laughter of men, and what little she had known had not been kind. But this man’s eyes—a rather intense shade of green—were filled with mirth as he wiped a rather embarrassingly placed spot of mud off his cheek and said, “Well, that wasn’t very well done of me, was it?”

And in that moment, Penelope fell in love.

When she found her voice (which, she was pained to note, was a good three seconds after a person of any intelligence would have replied), she said, “Oh, no, it is I who should apologize! My bonnet came right off my head, and . . .”

She stopped talking when she realized he hadn’t actually apologized, so

there was little point in contradicting him.

“It was no trouble,” he said, giving her a somewhat amused smile. “I— Oh, good day, Daphne! Didn’t know you were in the park.”

Penelope whirled around to find herself facing Daphne Bridgerton, standing next to her mother, who promptly hissed, “What have you done, Penelope Featherington?” and Penelope couldn’t even answer with her

stock, Nothing, because in truth, the accident was completely her fault, and she’d just made a fool of herself in front of what was obviously—judging from the expression on her mother’s face—a very eligible bachelor indeed.

Not that her mother would have thought that she had a chance with him. But Mrs. Featherington held high matrimonial hopes for her older girls. Besides, Penelope wasn’t even “out” in society yet.

But if Mrs. Featherington intended to scold her any further, she was unable to do so, because that would have required that she remove her attention from the all-important Bridgertons, whose ranks, Penelope was quickly figuring out, included the man presently covered in mud.

“I hope your son isn’t injured,” Mrs. Featherington said to Lady Bridgerton.

“Right as rain,” Colin interjected, making an expert sidestep before Lady Bridgerton could maul him with motherly concern.

Introductions were made, but the rest of the conversation was unimportant, mostly because Colin quickly and accurately sized up Mrs. Featherington as a matchmaking mama. Penelope was not at all surprised when he beat a hasty retreat.

But the damage had already been done. Penelope had discovered a reason to dream.

Later that night, as she replayed the encounter for about the thousandth time in her mind, it occurred to her that it would have been nice if she could have said that she’d fallen in love with him as he kissed her hand before a dance, his green eyes twinkling devilishly while his fingers held hers just a little more tightly than was proper. Or maybe it could have happened as he rode boldly across a windswept moor, the (aforementioned) wind no deterrent as he (or rather, his horse) galloped ever closer, his (Colin’s, not the horse’s) only intention to reach her side.

But no, she had to go and fall in love with Colin Bridgerton when he fell off a horse and landed on his bottom in a mud puddle. It was highly irregular, and highly unromantic, but there was a certain poetic justice in that, since nothing was ever going to come of it.

Why waste romance on a love that would never be returned? Better to save the windswept-moor introductions for people who might actually have a future together.

And if there was one thing Penelope knew, even then, at the age of sixteen years minus two days, it was that her future did not feature Colin Bridgerton in the role of husband.

She simply wasn’t the sort of girl who attracted a man like him, and she feared that she never would be.

Romancing Mister Bridgerton - Prologue

[amongemeraldclouds]

sweet dreams

It should have been simple: boy meets girl then falls in love. Except everything only happened in his dreams. Can Theodore Nott bridge the gap between fantasy and reality to get the girl of his dreams?

Inspired by Taylor Swift's song, Guilty as Sin?

Theodore Nott x f!Reader

Warning: Fluff, some smut so 18+ only MDNI, characters are aged up. Uses a magical concept that deviates from canon.

✿ Masterlist | 2.9k words

Prologue

The door creaked as you swung it open to leave The Three Broomsticks, eager to breathe in the cool evening air. You scrunched your nose as smoke invaded the fresh air you hoped for and turned towards the culprit, Theodore Nott. You didn’t know him personally, but guys as popular as him did not need introduction.

He didn’t notice you as he took another puff and the streetlamp cast him in a soft halo. It was not fair how some people could look so effortlessly gorgeous. 

“Want one?” He reached out when he finally saw you staring, offering you his pack of cigarettes.

You huffed, “No thanks, I was hoping for some fresh air.”

He simply shrugged and turned the other way, smoking in a different direction and out of your way.

You hoped the cool air could return some of your sobriety, but nothing was as effective as a good ol’ near de*th experience. You looked up when you heard someone shrieking from the distance, growing louder and louder until you saw a broomstick zig zag across the sky that was quickly hurtling towards you and Theo.

Theo was quicker than you, holding his wand out and casting a spell just fast enough to redirect the impact to an open space. By the time you held your wand out, you had enough wits about you to cushion the witch’s fall.

You ran towards her to make sure she was fine. She laid on the ground as if she was peacefully sleeping, oblivious to the accident. You crouched beside her, arm outstretched to wake her when-

“Oh bumbling broomstick!” She yelled out and sat upright. You yelped in surprise, yanking yourself back and landing on your bottom. Theo was there within seconds, offering you a hand.

You took it and it was unbelievably soft, his grip strong as he supported you back up from the ground. You registered the smell of alcohol and cigarettes with a subtle hint of expensive cologne. You wanted to take another whiff, but reminded yourself to focus.

“A - are you okay?” You turned back to strange woman, careful to keep your distance this time.

“That chap knows sod all about wizard engineering. Mixing magic and muggle work - ridiculous!” she spat in disdain, dusting off her dress.

She turned around, catching your worried look and Theo’s stoic expression, noticing you both for the first time. “Oh my, where are my manners?” She asked, straightening her back and introducing herself.

“I’m Miss Amelia Adams, thank you for rescuing me,” you shook hands and smiled at her politely, introducing yourselves in return.

Your eyebrows knit together as she fished around her bag, looking for something.

She beamed when she found it and held out a daisy for you. “To properly thank you, please accept this flower,” she then leaned in conspiratorially, “it grants a wish.”

She winked before gathering herself and her ‘bumbling broomstick’ as she called it. “Well, I’m off,” she declared, walking away as quickly as she had come before you had any chance to say goodbye.

You were stunned, holding the flower in your hand. You scoffed at the idea of wishes, the only way to get something is to go out there and take it. Hard work and strategy was far more effective than any wish. After a few moments of awkward silence, you turned to Theo. “That was…” you trailed off, trying to find the right word.

“Odd,” he completed for you, just as stunned as you were.

“Are you okay?” You asked Theo. He grunts and you reassured him you’re fine in return.

“Have this flower, you saved us first. Thanks, by the way. You should get the wish,” you said casually, only half believing the mysterious Miss Amelia.

He accepted it and placed it in his coat, stoic expression still in place. When he said nothing else, you turned on your heels to go back to your friends in the pub.

You paused when Theo called after you as if saying goodbye as an afterthought. “See you at school?” He said. It seems he recognized you too.

You turned around and gave him a friendly grin, “in your dreams,” you said in a playful tone. Despite being school mates, you and Theo revolved around different orbits. You experienced just enough failed relationships to know better than to start a friendship with Mr. Emotionally Unavailable.

He just smirked and watched you go before returning to his cigarette. Had he held the flower in his hand, he would have noticed it glow before bursting into tiny glitters, a wish about to come true.

That night, Theo first dreamt of you.

Main story, months later

The booming party music faded when Theo heard the familiar sound of your laughter. He shifted in the Slytherin common room couch as his entire focus gravitated towards you like you were the sun his planet revolved around.

It was always disorienting, he thought, to hear and see you somewhere outside his dreams. Mostly because you never looked his way here but in his dreams, you’ve given him everything he ever needed and more.

He recalled the first words you ever said to him in his dream, “you again?”

“Is that such a bad thing?” He asked with his boyish grin, amused. He wasn’t used to seeing this reaction from others except for his friends.

He no longer remembered the rest of that conversation, but one minute you two were laughing at something silly and the next, he was tucked comfortably in bed. It was then he realized it was all a dream he could just laugh off and forget about. It was no longer funny by the third night he kept seeing you. 

You both discussed how absurd this all was until you realized how fun it could also be. So you tested different ways you could take your power back and control the dream you found yourselves in. He discovered you were smart and funny, it warmed something in Theo’s heart that he did not care to examine.

Soon enough, he was flying with you through the sky, swerving through clouds as the stars blurred past like strings of fairy lights. You both flew like it was the most natural thing in the world, no broomsticks needed. He felt like a kid again, fearless and free.

One time, he went to a muggle amusement park you heard so many great things about. You rode on roller coasters and ferris wheels then ate candy floss. You would have gotten a fever the next day from all the sugar and shouting if not for the fact this all happened in your dreams. He had never felt happier.

On quiet nights, you laid on cool grassy hills enjoying the evening breeze. Sometimes, you watched sunsets on the beach while listening to the ocean waves. Those were his favorite days. You told him about your big plans and ambitions. He tried to stifle his smiles, but your energy was so infectious. The world felt bigger and brighter when he was around you. 

He’d tell you about his mother. How close they were before they were permanently separated. He said he kept her alive by remembering their happy moments that he’d tell you stories about. He also talked about his strained relationship with his father and how silly his friends were, but oh how he’d d*e for them.

He found himself spilling thoughts and secrets he could never tell anyone else. He stammered every now and then, not used to opening up, but you were so patient. He felt safe with you because you’re a good listener. Besides, wasn’t he basically just talking to a figment of his imagination? He tried not to overthink it.

Theo felt the couch beside him dip as the familiar smell of smoke and cologne announced Mattheo’s presence. “Want to go for a smoke?” He asked with a smirk as he flashed a joint.

“Later, okay?” Theo replied distracted, his focus still on you.

A student rose from the couch and moved away as Lorenzo approached. Thanks to their popularity, the boys always seemed to find a convenient seat when they needed it. He joined the two with a grin, drinks in hand. Mattheo took in Enzo’s disheveled hair and loose tie. He accepted the drink and gave him a high five knowing he already had his conquest for the night. Theo accepted the drink and just held it.

“Who’s the lucky girl?” Mattheo asked, taking a swig from his cup.

Enzo blushed and took a sip of his drink. “You know I never kiss and tell.”

Mattheo rolled his eyes in response, “until you’re drunk enough.” He pushed Enzo’s cup back to his mouth. “Come on, drink up.”

Theo tuned out the conversation and he saw you dancing with your friends, your hips moving to the beat of the music. His eyes darkened as he remembered how those hips rocked into his. It didn’t take long before you first kissed him under the stars when the conversation died down, simply because there was nothing else to say.

All other thoughts and sentiments could only be expressed in the way your fingers gripped his wavy hair, when he bit your bottom lip and you moaned against him. Before he knew it, you were reciting his name like a prayer even though it felt anything but sacred when he slammed his hips into your dripping cunt. He savoured the way your nails scratched his back. He didn’t know until then how someone’s grip could make him feel so wanted.

He always made sure you knew he how much he appreciated you:

“Fuck, you’re taking me so well amore.” 

“I’ll make you feel so good principessa, I’ll ruin you for anyone else.”

“You’re so beautiful when you’re on your knees,” he’d say as he stuffed his hard length down your throat.

He memorized your shape and knew just where to touch you to be rewarded with your filthy moans and curses. He liked making your eyes roll to the back of your head. Loud screams, sheets gripped, chest heaving. He took delight in the way you came undone for him, your little whimpers were so cute he could not resist thrusting faster into you so he could feel you clench against his desperate cock again and again.

His favorite part was after he came inside you when you swiped your finger on your upper thigh and brought his spilled seed to your lips. You said you loved the way he tastes. He always said you could have as much as you want, he was all yours and you were his.

“Theo, mate?” Blaise called out to the unresponsive boy who gazed intently at the crowd.

He turned to Mattheo and narrowed his eyes, “how much weed did you give him?” Blaise couldn’t help but worry about his friends, it was exhausting really. Mattheo pushed Theo outside his comfort zone whereas Theo pulled Mattheo back in when he went to extremes. They always kept each other in check, but he was worried that balance could tip off at any moment. 

“Easy on the accusation, he’s a big boy. He can do what he wants,” Mattheo replies defensively. “Besides he hasn’t taken any green, he’s too high on that girl already. Been eye fucking her all night.” 

Mattheo’s harsh words finally cut through Theo’s daydreams and his jaw twitched in annoyance, “I’m not. You should talk about her more respectfully.”

Enzo chimed in, “you know I hate agreeing with Mattheo, but he’s right.” Ignoring Mattheo’s de*th glare, he continued, “there’s nothing respectful about the way you’ve been looking at that poor girl.”

Theo just rolled his eyes and groaned, not wanting to discuss this with his friends. Even if he did, he wouldn’t know where to start. Instead, he stood up and said, “I’m going out for a smoke,” and walked away before anyone could protest or go with him.

As he walked, his thoughts returned to you. One day, you laughed because of his jokes. He laughed because he was in love with you.

It was all so ridiculous, but it had been months and he could no longer deny his feelings. He always thought love was overrated. How can others go out there declaring love like it’s a wild adventure you’re about to embark on? Love that you would fight and break for? He didn’t want an adventure nor a battlefield.

Then there was you and he realized everything he knew about love had only been one version of it. Being with you restored his breath and calmed the butterflies in his stomach. It’s a love that did not challenge him to be better, but instead told him he is already good enough. That he was always enough. It’s the kind of love that felt like home. It’s what he never knew he needed.

You haunted him even when he was awake. He was always tempted to approach you to see if the things he saw in his head could be real. His only clue was the way you wore ribbons in your hair and how it matched your mood to the stories you’d tell him.

He noticed you wore red when you were angry like the time you had to do a group project by yourself. You wore blue when you felt sad and green when you felt generally peaceful. His favorite was pink because it meant you were happy. He noticed how the closer you got, you wore the pink ribbon more often. But today, you wore a black ribbon. He had never seen it before and it worried him. Then again it was only a theory, maybe it didn’t mean anything.

So he always talked himself out of approaching you. Theodore Nott was used to broken things whereas everything with you and about you was perfect. He knew at the very least to leave it well enough alone.

His thoughts carried him to the Astronomy Tower where he lit his cigarette and stared at the evening sky.

“You always seem to be polluting the fresh air I go out for.” Something in his heart froze and then burned brightly. It was you. He heard the smile in your voice before he turned around to look at you. Salazar, you were so beautiful.

“You always seem to find me when you need fresh air. Are you sure you’re not just looking for me?” He teased, but nevertheless moved to extinguish his cigarette. 

You chuckled at Mr. Arrogant who always knew his way around girls. “I was joking, keep your cigarette though your lungs probably hate you.”

He scoffed, he already hated himself. But mostly, he hated how desperately he wanted to reach out and kiss you without being a total creep. “I’ll survive,” he replied, taking a final drag before snuffing it out. “What brings you here?”

“Aside from the not-so-fresh air?” You grinned before turning serious. “This is a nice place to think.”

“Penny for your thoughts?”

Salazar, he’s relentless. “I’m in an impossible situation and I’m starting to lose hope,” you admit. So that’s what the black is for, Theo realized.

He scrunched his nose as he thought twice about what he was about to say. It was so silly trying to hold back when he’d give you the moon and the stars if you asked for it. “Whatever it is, you shouldn’t lose hope.”

You laughed at him and let out an exaggerated gasp, “coming from Mr. Emotionally Unavailable?”

He laughed in return, “ah, my reputation precedes me.”

“Exactly, so don’t go around saying things like that. People might think you have a heart behind that big brain of yours.”

“Wouldn’t want that, would we?” He leaned in conspiratorially.

“No, everyone would stare at you then.”

“You know it’s rude to stare.”

“Oh yeah? What should I do instead?” You challenged.

“Kiss me,” he said with a smirk, a half joke and a half plea.

You laughed and took a step back, placing distance between you. So this was how he got girls, you mused.

Salazar, he was losing you. If he was going to try, he had to be sincere. No charms, no masks. “Amore, I…” he began but grew self conscious at the nickname. “I mean, I wanted to…” he started then stopped. “I wonder if…” he tried again.

“I know,” you said, fire burning behind your eyes at recognition. This was the boy of your dreams. Awkward when he tries to be sincere and it was so adorable. It always made you feel special because you knew he had walls for the rest of the world. But with you, he was at home.

You closed the distance to meet his lips and the kiss said everything he needed to know. All those evenings together talking beneath starlit skies, exploring flesh and soul, falling in love. They were real.

His hands found the curve of your hips so naturally as he pulled you closer against him, just like he’s done countless times. He savoured the way your fingers made their way through his hair. Everything felt electric, at once new and familiar. It was better than anything you had dreamed of.

When you both broke for air, you found yourself blinking in disbelief. “How do we both have the same dreams?”

Theo just shook his head as if to say he didn’t know but then he remembered your first meeting. There was a witch with a bumbling broomstick and a flower. His eyes widened. “The flower from all those months ago.”

Your eyes lit up with remembrance, “the mysterious Miss Amelia!” You brought your hand to your lips, “I didn’t think it was real. I said you’d see me in your dreams.”

“And now you’re my dream come true, amore,” he said, pulling you in for a hug.

 You giggled at how sweet Mr. Not So Emotionally Unavailable could be. “And you’re mine. See you tonight then?”

He chuckled, “and then tomorrow I’ll take you on a real date?”

You scrunched your face, “but now we can’t fly through the stars anymore.”

“Oh, I have other ideas,” he whispered in your ear.

Your heart leapt to your throat and anticipation hummed in your veins. After all, some things were sweeter than dreams.

✿ Masterlist

A/N: I've mostly written for Enzo and Mattheo until now but when I thought of this plot, I just knew only Theo could do it justice. So this is how I wound up writing my first Theo fic. Hope you liked it!

[notquitecanon]

Call Me... // Matt Murdock x Reader

Summary: You're the Devil of Hell's Kitchen's favorite late night nurse, but he's been avoiding your fire escape since an unfortunate accident. You both miss each other just enough for some emotions to slip through the cracks. You don't even know his name, but you'll settle just to know he's alright.

TW: blood, canon typical injuries, kind of hurt comfort, Matt's a self sabotaging martyr as usual, kinda sunshine!reader??? maybe if you squint

Bolded line is from a prompts list from several months ago so I lost the link. If it's yours let me know and I'll link it!

"I haven’t seen you in weeks… I’m worried you’re in another dumpster somewhere. Just call me back…please?" You whispered harshly into the phone’s receiver, burner cell jammed between your ear and shoulder as you fumbled with your keys. 

It was true. The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen hadn’t graced your apartment in weeks after three months of near nightly visits. At first it was serious stuff, stab wounds and splinted bones. It took two weeks for him to crack a joke. But once that stone cold exterior cracked, it was shattered. He was kind, sweet even. Every few visits, he’d bring by supplies to replenish your kit and, usually, with a bottle of wine in the bag.  Emergencies turned to what he called ‘urgencies’- wounds just barely deep enough to justify stitches and dislocated joints. Which then turned into stopping by at the end of his nights for a ‘check up’, where he took advantage of your central heating, warm beverages, and warmer presence. Then, some Yakuza jackass appeared on your doorstep three weeks ago, fortunately your devil hadn’t been far behind. He took care of him, and you figured the thug, now minus fifteen teeth, would have a hard time telling anyone where to find you. Nevertheless, you found the ‘available apartments’ section of the newspaper taped to your seventh floor window. That had been the last night ’the devil’ had paid you a visit. 

"Anyways… I guess I'm asking for a sign of life? Something? Please? Bye." You pleaded, voice kinder this time as you managed to finally unlock the door and slip inside. Locking the knob, deadbolt, chain, and newly installed jam that had been mysteriously delivered not too long ago. With a huff, you discarded your keys, and bag in the entry way before delving deeper into your dark apartment, flicking lights on as you went. 

"You really need to start locking your windows." A deep voice sounded as you rounded the corned into your living room. Heart jumping to your throat and stomach dropping, you let out a yelp as instinct took over. The familiarity of the voice didn’t register as adrenaline flooded your system. 

"SHIT!" You shrieked, flinching backwards so fast that the hallway runner rug caught under your feet, sending you careening into the wall. Without thinking, you put the Yankee’s starting pitcher to shame as you pitched your phone at light speed towards the voice. Of course, the shadow effortlessly caught it.

"Shit!" The intruder mirrored at your fall, and it was then that you realized who it was. As you collected yourself a slew of curses slipped out, looking into the dim living room to find the Devil of Hell’s kitchen slowly rising off the couch, he was already sans black shirt and mask, "I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you." 

"Yeah, well, mission failed." You muttered, pressing a hand to your chest as if that would still your pounding heart. Slowly, you finished your shuffled into the living room, flicking on the overheads as you went. "Shit, you could have called. Sit back down."  

You could have used the heads up, the gash across his chest looked serious, and not in the cute excuse to see each other way ’serious’ had meant last month. He breathed a sarcastic laugh, tossing your phone back to you before producing a shattered burner cell with a… bullet hole?

"You have a funny way of saving my skin when I least expect it." He tried a cheeky smile. You rolled your eyes, picking up your pace as you retrieved your first aid kit from under your kitchen sink, "Consider this a sign of life?" 

"A sign of barely alive, more like." You answered, rounding back around the couch to sit across from him. Harshly pulling on a pair of rubber gloves and splaying out an array of supplies both his lap and yours. "You’re unbelievable. Almost a month of no contact and then you just appear and leak blood on my couch." 

"I’m sorry." He breathed, face angled to where your knees now touched. You rolled your eyes, ripping into a packet of gauze and setting to work dabbing the blood. And he sounded sorry, pitiful even, looked it to. His unseeing eyes stared straight past you and yet somehow straight through you at the same time, mouth settled in a puppy like frown. He told you once that he was catholic, and you now wandered if that’s why he was so good at looking guilty.  

"If it wasn’t for the newspapers, I would have thought you were dead." You drove your point home, with a small voice, too angry to be a whisper and yet too concerned to be a hiss. The evidence of his activities was written across his bare torso in older cuts, new and fading bruises, and a couple of bandages that he’d obviously applied himself, "And you’ve obviously been busy." 

"Figured out how the Yakuza found you. Handled it. Didn’t want to lead anyone else back here." His explanation was strained, pushed through gritted teeth as you applied antiseptic to the largest, freshest gash. You cooed small apologies, irritated as you were with the vigilante, you hated being the source of his pain. You picked up a suture kit, quickly threading the needle. 

"Well, as far as excuses go, that’s not the worst." You muttered, half joking and half touched he’d go through this for you. You’d known he was a walking martyr from the moment you’d met him, but still. He’d taken the beatings so you’d sleep safe. 

That was something else, "Lean back, gotta stitch you up." 

He complied as you stood, using your shoulder to nudge the floor lamp so the light was better for you. Even then, you position on the coffee table wasn't cutting it as leaning forward cast a shadow over his chest. Neither was kneeling in front of him, as the gash was too far up his chest for your position to be adequate. You muttered a quick apology as you flitted around him, trying to find the best place to plant yourself. Beside him on the couch might work, but you’d be straining to hold yourself up at that angle and keep your hands steady. 

Bloody-knuckled hands found your waist with amazing precision for a blind man, easily lifting you and placing you over one thigh after he spread his legs a bit wider. He held you steady, angling his eyes to the ceiling to give you the broadest view of his chest. One of your knees pressed into the couch cushion between his legs and the other pressed into the outside of his thigh, caging the his black-clad thigh between your own like a seat. If your weight bothered him, he gave no indication. He did however turn his ear ever so slightly towards you and smirk ever so devilishly, "How’s that?" 

"Very convenient, thanks." You forced your voice to be flat instead of the breathlessness you felt. Stupid charming vigilante. To his credit, it gave you the perfect access without blocking the light. And if you got to feel ever twitch of his insanely muscular thigh between yours? Added benefit. The devil, even bruised and bleeding, was insanely warm and smelled like something out of a terribly sinful romance novel. The manly small of musk and sweat should have been revolting, but the way it mixed with a fading aftershave would have been distracting if you weren’t so focused on the drip of crimson down his toned abdomen. Before your train of thought could derail again, you gave a quiet warning watching your patient steel himself before you began running the needle and thread through the torn skin.  Other than an initial hiss and the clenching of his fists against your waist, he went silent as you worked. 

The two of you sat in an almost tense silence. He could feel how close your face was to his chest, the waves of breaths washing over his skin, the smell of shampoo in your hair faint enough to know you’d put off washing it, the sound of your heartbeat slowing back down after he’d gotten you excited, the slight sound of your teeth worrying the inside of your lip. He knew he shouldn't be here, Claire could have patched him up, probably would have if he asked really nicely. He probably could have if he really tried, but he’d just missed you. Between Fisk and the Hand and the law firm… everything was messy. You were still simple and sweet and far more caring than he thought he deserved, a balm just to be near you. 

"Could you talk to me?" He asked, so quietly you almost missed it in your focus. You tied off another knot, seeing him wince. 

"Hmm?" You hummed, pausing to look up from the half stitched wound. His eyes lowered to your face, his clenched hands at your waist loosening to rub the fabric of your shirt between his fingers. You always wore such soft things, he wondered if you’d be so soft underneath. You took opportunity in the pause to wipe some of the blood from his skin. 

"I’ve missed your voice, even if you want to yell at me or be upset with me, just let me hear it." His voice was like a prayer, so sincere it made you shift on his leg. What was in the holy water at his church? 

"I’m not going to yell at you, honey. I’m not going to kick a man when he’s stabbed." You shook your head, rearranging yourself to get that optimal view again, grazing a gloved finger over a purple bruise on his ribs, "Besides, someone beat me to it." 

He chuckled at the lame joke, leaning his head back against the back of the couch again as you began stitching once more. Instead of scolding him, you caught him up on all the details and minor drama that he’d missed over the last few weeks. The funny things and annoyances from work, things your family had sent you, what your friends had been up to, your opinion on current happenings in the city. He listened to you like it was the most interesting thing he’d heard all year, chiming in with questions and quips of his own. You’d missed his voice too, not that you’d boost his ego by telling him that. 

"There." You finally finished, tying the last stitch and taping a bandage over it. The vigilante under you didn’t make a move to leave, instead his hands kept you still on his lap. You breathed a laugh, moving on to everything else. You removed the old bandages, giving half healed wounds a thorough cleaning. You applied comical Disney bandaids to the more minor cuts on his hands and were even brazen enough to kiss his split knuckles. The vigilante seemed to preen under you attention as you cleaned and applied Vaseline to his busted lip. As if it was too good to be true, his lip twitched downwards as his eye brows furrowed. His face angled away from yours, his unseeing eyes falling on the window he’d come through. 

"You know, the burner phone's been broken for two weeks now. Took the bullet not too long after the yakuza paid you a visit. Couldn't bring myself to throw it away, a little piece of you." He admitted, a pitiful smile twitched up before pulling downward again. He groaned, starting to shift you off his lap, “I shouldn’t be here, it’s not right.”

You allowed yourself to fall to the cushion beside him, but snatched the black shirt away from him before he could make a move for it. He’d been too busy letting his hands linger on your waist. 

“Why not?” You asked sternly, tucking the shirt behind your back as if the vigilante in front of you couldn't probably drop you six ways to Tuesday if he wanted to. Not that he could ever consider raising a hand to you, “You got hurt, I patch you up. Seems right to me.” 

The devil tensed, first leaning away and then leaning really close. His freshly bandaged fingers tapped your knee as if to emphasize his point, “I don’t deserve this kindness. And even if I did, if I could, if I was good, I would stop coming here so you could live in peace.” 

You were a silent for a moment, wanting to make sure your response was exactly how you wanted it to come across.  

“The third time you fell through my window, you told me that if I ever wanted to be left alone, all I’d need to do was change the candle I keep by the window.” You recounted his words. You hadn’t known about his senses at the time, he was still cryptic and mysterious. But you’d never changed the candle, buying new ones of the same scent when it would burn out, “You warned me what might happen. You gave me an out, one that I continuously chose to ignore. You did everything in your power to protect me when that choice had consequences. That was good, because you are good. And good people deserve kindness. You put too much on yourself, honey.”  

As you spoke, you laid your hand over his on your knee, giving it a slight squeeze to convey your own point. The crimefighter listened to your voice, your heartbeat, the quickness of your breath, finding no deceit and even if he didn’t believe you words, it was nice to hear them. Your kindness washed over him, letting him relax for just a second before he shook his head, laughing sarcastically to deflect the dangerously sappy emotions you stirred. You called him honey like it was his name, and part of him wondered that if you knew his name if you would still call him honey. 

“You barely know me, sweetheart.” 

His own nickname slipped out by accident, usually just something he called you in his head when he allowed fantasies about telling you everything, coming home to you as the vigilante and the lawyer, seeing just how far your good grace could take him. His lips quirked up in time with the uptick of your pulse and the way your breath caught for a moment. 

“I know enough to know you deserve some good.” You whispered earnestly, reaching up to graze the Star Wars bandaid you’d stuck across his the cut on his cheekbone. Almost instinctively, he leaned into the touch. You smiled softly, maybe you’d both missed each other a bit. The combined concern for the other and the time between his last visit making you both a little sappy, or at least more honest about it, So, you breathed a laugh, making another lame joke just to earn one of those chuckles you loved so much, “Besides, I know you well enough to have your blood on my hands.” 

But he didn’t laugh, instead, he pulled his face from your palm, his own bandaged hands taking your bloodied gloved hands in his own. Gently, he pressed your hands together, your loose fists creating almost heart like shape as he pressed reverent kisses to each bloody hand. The vigilante was kind always, flirty and joking, occasionally flirtations bordering on something else. But this? This was different, it was new. Intimate. You’d almost feel like a voyeur for watching the scene if it you weren’t playing a starring role. Your mind flashed to those romance novels you’d thought of earlier, this put all of them to shame. So much so that your hands started trembling against his lips. 

He held them tighter, but not in a constrictive, cage like way. More in a ‘let me hold you together’ kind of way before gently peeling the dirty gloves off and, again, kissing your clean hands underneath. His face angled to yours, nothing but sincerity lacing his features. 

"You know my blood better than my own heart does.” 

“God…” You whispered, letting your head fall against his shoulder, your nose nudging his collarbone and your eye lashes fluttering against his neck. His stubbled cheek fell to the crown of your head.  You cleared your throat again, "I know your blood, but not your name. For someone I care so much about, that’s kind of sad.” 

It was the first time you’d ever admitted it out loud in such certain words. The vigilante ran gentle hands up and down your arms, silent as a million thoughts went through his head. You heart was racing, not from lying, but in anticipation. Despite your racing pulse, you seemed almost totally at ease with you skin against his, one of your hands pressed to a bandage on his ribs and the other holding purchase at the waistline of his black pants. Nothing sexual, just the perfect place for your soft hand to land.   

Despite the million thoughts, he really had two options. Keep his secret, and keep you at an arms length, to keep things sweet and simple and not too deep. Or. Let you in a little deeper, he'd swim oceans to keep you afloat. Enjoy your sweetness, even if things were complicated. He kept still, holding you as gently as you had touched him, a promise to himself that he could be gentle and soft, just as he could be lethal and ruthless.  Two sides of a balanced scale.  

Your heart had slowed down again, the soothing motion of his hands on your arm lulling you. You had been worried about his response. You’re confession had gotten too real, you were worried he’d jump out the window and disappear again. And you’d be left with nothing but bloody gloves and the thought that maybe you’d just imagined the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen. 

"Matt.” His voice was quiet, just barely above a whisper, “You can call me Matt. Just don’t stop calling me."

[dwobbitfromtheshire]

When Robin couldn't get a hold of Steve, she immediately started biking over to his house. He was still homing a newly turned vampire Eddie, and while she trusted Eddie not to hurt him, she also knew that accidents happened. So, when she walked into his living room and found Eddie's mouth attached to Steve’s neck. she immediately thought the worst. Robin shrieked, causing Eddie to pull away, and she tackled him. She raised the stake she had made and moved to stab him when Steve screamed.

"ROBIN! STOP! STOP! HE WAS KISSING MY NECK!" Steve yelled.

Robin froze, her knee still pressed to Eddie's chest.

"What?!"

"He was kissing my neck, Robin," Steve said. "We were making out."

"You like women!" Robin exclaimed.

"And men!" Steve exclaimed.

"Since when?!"

"Robin! I told you!"

"The hell you did!"

"Robin, I told you that I thought Tom Cruise and Eddie Van Halen were hot!" Steve exclaimed. "I said I like both!"

"I thought you meant like, objectively!" Robin shrieked. "I missed my best friend coming out to me! Oh my God, it's me. I've been calling other people dinguses this whole time when it's been me. I'm the dingus."

"Well, when you think about it, aren't we all a little bit of a dingus?" Eddie asked. "By the way, you're still on top of me and pointing that stake at me."

"Shit, sorry," Robin said and helped him up. "I'm sorry about, you know, trying to kill you."

"To be fair, what were you supposed to think?" Eddie asked. "I think it was so metal of you that you were willing to kill me to save your best friend. That was a perfect tackle. By the way, can I keep the stake?"

"Oh, yeah," Robin said and handed it to him. "The least I can do. I have nothing against you! I actually really like you, and I think you guys are super cute. Maybe I wouldn't have tried to kill you if someone answered their phone."

"No worries, Buckley. We are all good," Eddie said as he pointed the stake around the living room like a sword.

"I took it off the hook," Steve shrugged. "I didn't want any interruptions."

"Hm. That worked out well," Robin said. "And really, Eddie Munson? He's such a dud. He even looks like a muppet."

"Okay, I feel like that's in reference to something that I wasn't there for, so I'm just going to ignore that," Eddie said and proceeded to trip over his own feet then over the coffee table. "Shit! Goddamnit! Steve! Steve! The stake is stuck in a place where it shouldn't be! It doesn't feel like what we did last night! Take it out so I can heal! Steve! This doesn't feel good! STEVE!"

"Coming, baby," Steve said, struggling not to laugh.

Robin sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose as she closed her eyes against the sight. She burst into laughter.

"Eddie Munson, the hero of Hawkins."

[upsidedownwithsteve]

Love Sucks I. The Beginning

Vampire!Steve Harrington x fem!reader He's just a gloomy, little guy.

The Masterlist 🩸

You found him in a graveyard. 

Mournful looking, as one normally does when visiting a loved one. Skin a little sallow, a perpetually faded tan that you noticed never seemed to return, not even on the warmest days. Brown eyes, sad eyes. Honey hair with a small white-grey patch in the midst of it all, only found when you hunted for it, a clue to his past, of what had happened to him. He was tall, pretty. 

Really pretty, in a gloomy sort of way. Melancholy, maybe. And you realised as you passed, laying flowers by your grandparents names, that the boy wasn’t visiting any grave at all. He was lingering by the tree line in a way that should’ve screamed ‘danger!’ but he was kicking a rock and pulling leaves from the shrubs, shredding them as he sulked. He stopped when he saw you, only a few feet away, his eyes wide, as if he was surprised you were seeing him at all. 

Maybe you weren’t supposed to. 

“Hi,” you called out, cautious, concerned. You raised a hand, a small wave, a gentle surrender, the summer breeze picking at your hair and blowing the smell of your citrus perfume over to him. 

The boy raised a hand back, eyes still shocked. He pressed his lips together and stayed in the shadows that the trees gave before he answered. “Hi.”

And that was it. 

He walked with you to your car, a slow, lazy pace that both of you didn’t hurry, too busy sharing shy glances to want to part. He was called Steve and he didn’t live around here, not usually. He was your age, or there about and he was only in the graveyard because it was quiet. 

His vague answers were as much as you could get out of him, everything told to you in a soft, tired sounding voice. He had bags under his eyes, lilac coloured things that made him look like he hadn’t slept for a decade and when his hand brushed yours by accident, he was colder than he should have been for someone standing in the sun. And when you finally got to your car, the front seat still smelling like lilies and lavender, Steve tilted his head and looked sad at the thought of you having to go. 

You asked him if he had dinner plans that night, he gave you a shadow of a smile and touched his fingertips to his lips, almost as a subconscious thought. He shrugged, looking gloomy once more, saddened at the thought of having to tell you:

“Kinda, yeah.”

But then he told you he’d be around tomorrow and maybe you could meet then? Maybe go for a walk, a coffee or something. So you said yes, barely concealing your smile, unsure what it all meant since the boy hardly seemed flirtatious but when you clambered into the front seat of your car, you let out a squeal all the same. 

It didn’t occur to you that it was odd the boy had disappeared by the time you’d looked in your rear view mirror, nothing but air and the slowly falling leaves from the old oak trees, a sign that fall was coming soon. 

After that, Steve was yours. And you were his, one not usually anywhere without the other and his melancholy was lifted with your contagious joy, your overwhelming excitement calmed by his gloom. A ray of sunshine and a rain cloud. 

A girl and her vampire. 

Not that you knew that, not yet. Not quite then. 

Then one day, maybe a month or so later, Mike and Lucas upset El and the shelves she was standing next to fell to the floor, books ripped at the spines, screws scattering across the floorboards. And everyone had looked at Steve with wide eyes, ashen faces. It had taken a little bit of time to explain and the boy really hadn’t shown much surprise. 

And just when you were ready to approach him, kneeling onto the couch cushions beside him, hand offered in support, Steve had blinked and looked up at everyone just as he parted his lips and let his canine teeth stretch out from his gums, sharp, brilliantly white and pointed. 

Nancy had gasped, some of the kids shrieked, Eddie had cackled wildly and you’d waited a beat before reaching out to skim a finger over Steve’s bottom lip, the pad of it grazing the end of one fang. With one supernatural kid already under your wing - along with a boy who’d once wanted to keep a demogorgon as a pet - no one in the party was in a position to judge. 

When you asked, “how?”

Steve could only shrug. He said he was sure he had died, maybe, only just. Hit on the head, or maybe he’d fallen. Or he’d been brought back by something or someone he didn’t know. And when asked for how long, Steve shrugged again, rubbing his tired eyes and telling everyone that it could’ve been a week, it could’ve been ten years - he only really started counting the days since he met you. 

He’d been lonely, moving from town to town until people stopped asking questions and he could blend into grey buildings and tall trees. No one in Hawkins had spoken to him before, not until the pretty girl in the graveyard said ‘hi.’ And it all made sense, really. Because Steve never ate meals with you, just chugged coffee like it was going out of style and snacked on anything dry and crispy. You just figured he was a little strange, maybe trying out for the swim team, or something. 

Not that he went to school. Or a job. Or… well, anywhere. 

So you blinked and nodded, accepting the fact your boyfriend was a vampire as easily as you accepted that one of your friends kept military level weapons under her bed because other dimensions existed and monsters were real. 

Shit happened, y’know?

[nowimjustastranger]

Just a little gift for my bestie Phoenix, aka @flame-cat, because they were in a car accident recently. But thankfully they're okay! This was actually inspired by an outline for an interaction between the brothers that they shared with me privately, so enjoy 1.5k words worth of stangst y'all!

Ford scrubbed a hand over his face with a frustrated groan, fingers knocking his glasses askew. He couldn’t afford to have his body fail him now, not when he had an exam to study for. But what he wanted didn’t change the fact that his eyes had started to outright refuse to focus on the words in the textbook five minutes ago, an annoyingly persistent migraine pulsing behind his eyes.

To make matters worse, the landline rang. The shrill sound made the bothersome migraine go from a mild three all the way up to a solid eight on his tolerance scale, which made his temper flare. Ford snatched the handset off the cradle with a growl, reluctantly bringing it to his ear.

“Stanford Pines.” He bit out, adjusting his glasses with his free hand so they sat on his nose properly. When his prickly greeting didn’t garner a response outside of what sounded like labored breathing, Ford scowled. Great, it was his mystery caller again. Just what he needed on top of an already stressful day.

“I refuse to keep entertaining these prank calls, so if you call again I’ll be notifying–” Ford began in a stern tone, but he was interrupted by a familiar voice.

“Stanford.”

Stanley. That was Stanley. Why was his brother calling him at –Ford stole a glance at the clock– two in the afternoon? What could he possibly want? Well, whatever it was, he wouldn’t be getting it from Ford. He had already given up so much because of Stanley’s selfishness, he wasn’t about to give him the opportunity to worm his way back into Ford’s life–

“…Sixer?” Stanley asked, a breathless quality to his voice that brought Ford’s anger back down to a simmer. Why did Stanley sound like that? His breathing was short like he wasn’t taking full breaths, but there was still a measured quality to each inhale and exhale like he was breathing that way on purpose.

“How did you get this number?” Ford asked bluntly, bracing his elbow on his desk before letting his forehead drop into the palm of his hand, resigning himself to having this unexpected yet long overdue conversation with his estranged brother. Maybe Stanley had realized the error of his ways and called to apologize? Yeah right, fat fucking chance of that.

“Ma passed it along.” Stanley grunted, his tone laced with pain, and Ford could certainly relate. He didn’t want to be talking to Stanley any more than Stanley wanted to talk to him, which begged the question: why exactly did Stanley call him?

“Of course she did.” Ford grumbled, suddenly feeling every hour of lost sleep hitting him all at once. He was exhausted. He was tired of trying to fend Ma and her mission to reconnect him with his brother off, tired of walking on eggshells during his monthly calls home just to avoid saying the wrong thing and causing unnecessary drama, and he was tired of putting up with the part of him that still cared about his brother.

“I… I think my ribs are broken.” Stanley said quietly and Ford’s brain shrieked to a standstill, his grip momentarily going slack on the handset as he tried to process the implications of such an ominous statement, forcing him to fumble with it until he managed to press the receiver back against his ear.

“What?” Ford barked, tone incredulous and concerned in equal measure. He resolutely ignored the way that his hands trembled, his grip white-knuckle tight on the handset.

"My ribs. I think–” Stan cut himself off as his breath hitched, a pained hiss following shortly after. Ford found himself leaning forward, blankly staring into the middle distance as he strained his ears to hear every little shift in Stanley’s breathing, trying to assess his brother’s current state. “Nevermind. Shit. Not important right now.”

“Not impor– You can’t be serious, Stanley!?” Ford seethed, lurching out of his chair, uncaring as it tipped back and crashed to the floor as he began to pace. He made sure to stay within the range that the cord allowed him, but he simply couldn’t sit still when Stanley was hurt and possibly even suffering from a head wound considering that he wasn’t making any fucking sense–

“I’m fine. It’s fine. I just…” Stanley spoke in starts and stops, his breathing strained as he spoke through what sounded like clenched teeth. “I need…”

“What? What do you need? What happened?” Ford prompted with urgency, fingers curling and uncurling anxiously. He had to know. He couldn’t estimate the severity of Stanley’s injuries without more data, right now he was left with what his imagination could produce. He needed facts in order to combat the increasingly horrible scenarios that his mind was dredging up.

“Car crash.” Stan said on an exhale and Ford nodded even though his brother wouldn’t be able to see it, pinching the bridge of his nose as his useless brain fixated on those two words.

“What else hurts? Or is it just your ribs?” Ford asked tersely, moving back to his desk with a determined stride to grab a piece of paper at random along with the pen that he had tucked behind his ear earlier. He scribbled down Stanley’s comment about his potentially busted ribs and then let the pen hover as he waited for Stanley’s –hopefully detailed– analysis of his person.

“I dunno… stomach hurts. Kinda swollen.” Stanley mumbled, sucking in a sharp breath as he presumably prodded at the area in question.

“Lightheadedness? Nausea?” Ford pressed, his heart lurching into his throat as several injuries came to mind, internal bleeding being the most likely explanation. Stanley had already displayed textbook signs of internal bleeding, such as disorientation and shortness of breath.

“Both? Feelin’ a bit sluggish too.” Stanley admitted, the muted rustle of clothes indicating that he had adjusted.

“Is the cord long enough for you to sit down?” Ford asked, looking up when the door opened and Fiddleford stepped into the room. Ford frantically waved him over, writing a message for Fiddleford in the notebook before sidestepping so he could read it when he hurried over.

“I think so? Lemme just…” Stanley huffed, Ford splitting his attention between the sound of Stanley gingerly lowering himself to the ground and Fiddleford’s rapidly paling face as the man read through Ford’s notes of Stanley’s wellbeing.

“Stanley? Stanley, are you there?” Ford prompted when there was nothing but harsh breathing for several seconds, sharing a look with an equally rattled Fiddleford.

“Yeah… yeah ‘m here.” Stanley panted, his speech slurred, and Fiddleford hurried from the room to contact emergency services with a different phone. As soon as Ford got a location, he would relay the address to Fiddleford and then stay on the line with Stanley for as long as he could before the call cut out.

“Where exactly is ‘here’, Stanley? Where are you?” Ford asked, rapidly tapping his pen on the notebook just to have something to do since he couldn’t get his hands on his brother like he desperately wanted. He hated feeling so useless.

“Uh… outside a 7/11.” Stanley said weakly, his voice barely a whisper.

“Which 7/11?” Ford demanded, his eyes narrowing. Either Stanley was losing consciousness, or he was losing his grip on lucidity. Neither were ideal considering the circumstances. Ford didn’t have enough information to confidently deduce how hurt his brother was. These could be Stanley’s last moments and Ford was wasting his breath giving him the third degree instead of saying anything of value–

“Um… I dunno.” Stanley said with the vocal equivalent of a shrug and Ford suddenly felt the inexplicable urge to scream.

“An address, Stanley.” Ford clarified in a clipped tone, impatiently tapping his foot as emotions built up in his esophagus, bubbling up despite his best efforts to stuff them back down into their vault. This could be his last opportunity to say something. Anything. Ford couldn’t squander this rare chance, couldn’t let Stanley fade away without knowing that his big brother lo–

“I dunno, s-somewhere in New Mexico, I guess.” Stanley murmured, sounding a little less strained but just as tired. Sitting down had eased some of the stress that his body was under then. Good.

“Just stay there, Stanley. You hear me? Don’t move.” Ford said sternly, speaking slowly and clearly so Stanley’s muddled brain could register the words and damn well heed them. Ford knew that Fiddleford could triangulate Stanley’s position using the phone call, but he wasn’t going anywhere until the call ended.

“M’kay.” Stanley agreed, his voice so quiet that Ford wouldn’t have caught it if his entire focus hadn’t been on his brother. Ford ran a hand through his hair, gripping it at the roots and tugging as he stared down at the notebook, bloodshot eyes roaming over his messily scrawled notes.

“I’ll meet you at the nearest ho–” Ford assured, unceremoniously cut off when the line abruptly went dead. “–spital.”

Fuck.

Fuck.

“God fucking damnit!” Ford snarled, slamming the handset onto the cradle with excessive force before turning on his heel to sprint out of the room and track down Fiddleford. Then Ford would take over the call with emergency services while his roommate used his skills to locate Stanley, sending an ambulance to him.

College could wait, Ford’s brother needed him.

[justporo]

Changing Trajectories (Stars that collide)

A while back I wrote this drabble about ascended Astarion suddenly interrupting one of Tav's jobs as a thief - almost ten years after they've parted ways. The title was How to Catch a Mouse

I've come back to it and decided to turn it into a longer story. So, we'll be right back at the moment where the first (very short) part left off: Astarion with his hands on Tav, interrupting her from stealing her target object. Turns out the vampire lord didn't happen upon Tav on accident this fateful night.

Song: Devil May Cry (Apashe & Sofiane Pamart)

Pairing: Ascended Astarion/Fem!Tav (You) Warnings: Graphic descriptions of violence, angst Note: This will not be like the usual fluff I write. In fact it will probably not be fluffy at all

~~~

You were pulled back by the hands firmly gripping onto your waist. You couldn’t help but let out a little shriek as you collided with the upper body of the person standing behind you. His presence was overwhelming now.

You could take in his scent now: he still smelled of bergamot and rosemary and the scent immediately unveiled memories you had desperately tried to forget, to hide in the deepest, darkest corners of your mind, to strangle so they wouldn’t haunt you anymore. But images flashed through your mind: of the close moments before, ten years ago, when you had thought you had found your soulmate.

Hands were still gripping hard on your waistline, holding you in place, pressing you against a firm body.

“Hello, my darling Tav”, you heard the voice purr again and felt his breath as it was leaning over your neck. No lips were touching your delicate skin, but you could almost feel the grin that bared fangs right above your quickening pulse.

“Astarion”, you whispered spiritlessly because it was the only thing you could muster. You knew you should feel terrified that you had fallen – quite literally – into the hands of one of the most dangerous creatures of the Sword Coast if not Faerûn. But all you could feel at the very moment was deep desperation and overwhelming sadness as more memories flooded you from a different time.

“Is this the way you’d like to greet me after all this time, love?”, Astarion said with a tinge of anger when there was nothing else coming from you. His hands spun you around, made you face him. His hands grabbed your elbows now, holding you in place.

Again, you couldn’t help but gasp. He was as strikingly handsome as you remembered, even more so! Ten year old memories couldn’t do justice to the vampire lord’s glorious beauty: his chin lifted arrogantly, every white curl perfectly in place, ruby eyes striking, piercing, boring into your soul and soft lips perpetually curled into the smirk that once had almost made you give everything to him.

And suddenly you felt rage overcome you, drowning out all other emotions you had felt before.

The element of surprise on your side you pushed him away, startling him. It was only a split second, but it was enough for you to step out of his reach.

“Don’t fucking touch me!”, you screamed at him and took more steps away from him – until you collided with the small stone pillar behind you. The amulet on it fell to the ground with a clattering sound. But you couldn’t care less in this very moment.

Astarion’s face had become a mask of rage, his eyes almost blazing with it. “You dare speak in that tone with me?”, he screamed back. Power rang in his voice and struck primal fear into you immediately.

You immediately scurried around the small stone column at your back and slowly took more steps backwards, trying to get away from him.

You realised two things: firstly, that it was very likely no one in their right mind should speak with this mighty monster in this tone because secondly, he could absolutely kill you and splatter you all over the ground if he wanted to. It probably wouldn’t even cost him that much of an effort. And he’d probably walk out of here with not a hair out of place.

You gulped as fear filled you as a delayed reaction to Astarion’s appearance.

The vampire meanwhile closed his eyes and took a deep breath in as he obviously tried to gain back his composure. He rolled his head and shoulders as an arrogant – and very fake – smile entered his face and he opened his eyes again to watch you again.

You stopped wandering back – there was no use to it anyway, Astarion was blocking the only way out of the room.

“I do apologise, it’s been a while since someone has been foolish enough to cross me.” His tone was civilised, polite even. His gestures that of a bored noble merely having a dull conversation. But the way the smile grew into a wicked grin baring his fangs was still a bit too predatory for his masquerade.

And still your heart couldn’t help but flutter again as he looked at you again – this time again not out of fear. He angled his head and looked you up and down.

“You look incredibly beautiful, my darling, even more so than I remember.”

Unbelievably enough, he sounded genuine. His gaze lingered on you, seemingly far away for a moment. It seemed you weren’t the only one taken aback by a sudden flood of memories.

“So do you”, you whispered before you could think better of it. His gaze snapped back to yours, a knowing smirk playing on his lips now. He looked a lot less intimidating now and much more like you had kept him in your memories.

Back then, you had always told him how beautiful he was. At every given opportunity. And each time he had smiled at you and given you a loving kiss.

Your chest started to ache as you lived through one of those memories.

“What are you doing here?”, you asked him before the pain of it could close up your throat.

“Ah, I could ask you just the same, couldn’t I?” He inclined his head a little and his smile grew making it even easier to mistake him for what he really was. He watched you carefully, noting how you had taken several steps away from him, but he didn’t move closer again. “But then again, I know very well what you are doing here, seeing as I was the one who had the cheese laid out for you”, the vampire explained and pursed his lips. His eyes twinkled mischievously.

Your jaw dropped: “You are the client behind this contract?” Obviously, you internally rolled your eyes at yourself. Why else would he have put up a show with the whole cat-mouse-thing. But you had been too starstruck in the beginning to make sense of it all.

That you hadn’t known the true identity of your client wasn’t that much of a surprise though. You only had had contact via messengers that had kept the identity of your customer hidden – but that was very usual in your line of work.

Astarion’s eyes started to sparkle even more as he watched the gears in your head turn and while his smirk grew, he started to saunter towards you again. He kept silent as he approached you once more as you kept feeling more and more alarmed.

This wasn’t good. In fact, it was terrible. This meant he hadn’t just happened upon you. He had specifically sought you out.

“Why?”, you simply asked as the vampire lord strode closer to you with the languid elegance of a cat.

He threw out his arms in a dramatic pose: “Why indeed? Because I wanted an artifact stolen, obviously.” One of his eyebrows twitched and he let his tongue roll in his mouth. He was so obviously enjoying keeping you on thin ice. Another flare of anger rushed through you.

And to add to your misfortune, you suddenly heard shouts and the stomping of heavily armoured boots outside the room.

You must’ve been found out.

Your eyes darted to the door, then back to Astarion who must’ve heard the same. His grin had become feral again.

“Oh oh, my dear, looks like you’re about to be caught in flagranti”, he said as he had almost reached you. Your heart and mind raced, searching for an impossible solution.

“Come with me”, Astarion whispered in a deep, sinister tone when he was close enough to reach out to you and elegantly offered you one of his hands.

Your eyes jumped between the door, his face and his offered hand. Outside the steps came closer. You were indeed between a rock and a hard place – and you couldn’t decide which option was more daunting.

“Rot in a dungeon until you die or take my hand, your choice”, Astarion said, his tone now cold and sending new jolts of icy dread through you. And you were suddenly sure that if you were caught and indeed thrown into a dungeon, he would make sure you would die there. So, you probably did not have a choice from the moment you had entered this room.

With your heart racing you took his hand and he immediately drew you in close to him: his forehead almost touching yours in a delicate way. Another gesture you remembered well from him. Emotions swinging wildly from incredible fear to bittersweet melancholy and back again.

“Glad to see you still made the right decision”, he mumbled. His red eyes dropping to your lips for a moment before looking in your eyes again. You weren’t sure you would agree with him.

As he made to turn, you remembered that there was still an amulet to steal. You were a thief after all and even though your client was an evil vampire lord and your former acquaintance you’d rather forget, you sure as hell wouldn’t miss out on the gold – not if you had gotten so close.

Astarion must’ve sensed your intention as your head turned to where the amulet had fallen to the ground. “Oh, don’t worry about that, my love”, he said with a wink at you. “That’s only a replica, I had the real one stolen and replaced months ago. And you should be glad about it because two of the three thieves that were sent didn’t make it out alive”, he continued to explain and let out a laugh at the end as your eyes widened in shock and you felt goosebumps all over your body.

You let yourself get dragged towards the door as your mind tried to make sense of what he had said. This whole situation was becoming worse by the minute. So – not only had he specifically sent you on a quest, but the job hadn’t even been his motive… “Was this whole shitshow just an elaborate setup to get to me?”, you asked the vampire and dragged on his hand that was now firmly held by his, fingers crossed. As soon as the words left your mouth you wanted to bite your tongue off realising you had shouted at him angrily again – and you feared how he would react.

But this time Astarion only grinned at you, lifted your arm and made you turn beneath your joint arms as if dancing until you were chest to chest with him again. “Oh yes, you’re only now getting this? I mean, I could have let you be taken by my servants or broken into your home for a quick little visit, but this is way more fun, isn’t it?”, Astarion drawled. You could only stare at him in shock as hot and cold shivers ran down your spine at his casual explanation of how easily he could have threatened you.

But more than anything you wanted to know why he had taken such elaborate measures to get to you.

But you had no time to voice your question as the door flew open and a bunch of heavily armoured city guards stepped in followed by a bald servant from the estate.

The guards took in the scene and immediately levelled their halberds at the two of you. Astarion let go of you and nonchalantly stepped in front of you and the very pointy and sharp-looking weapons. He casually crossed his arms over his chest – not a care in the world it seemed. But somehow his posture was still that of a threatening predator not that of prey backed against a wall. Maybe it was the way how he held his back straight and slightly leaned forward as if ready to strike at any moment or his absolute stillness as he confronted the guards.

Before any of the guards or the obviously terrified servant could say something, Astarion spoke up: “Care to explain why you are so rudely interrupting this sweet – and dare I say private – moment I was sharing with my beautiful lady?”

His voice was cold now and made the hair at the back of your neck stand up. You’d been the focus of this voice once this evening and deeply wished to not be it again.

“Well, do you care to explain what you and your lady which is also a wanted thief are doing here?”, one of the guards answered – seemingly the captain of the six men and women lowering their weapons at you.

“In fact, I do not. But – I feel rather generously today, so if you’d be so kind as to let me and my lady pass through, then we can all forget about this and go about our lives”, Astarion offered throwing out his arms and then clapping them together again.

The captain threw his head back in laughter and his guards joined in with chuckles. “Who do you think you are?”, the captain replied after a few heartbeats.

The vampire lord lifted one of his hands quickly. You could see it was surrounded by a soft red glow.

With lightning quick motions every single one of the guards had moved and were now pressing their halberds beneath their chins, the metal points already drawing blood for some of them, their eyes filled with the same red glow.

The servant screamed and tried to scurry away, but Astarion’s eyes shot to him and enclosed him in this sort of spell as well: making him grip his own throat with both hands and squeezing.

“I think”, Astarion spoke, his voice filled with otherworldly power “I am someone you don’t want to threaten.” He flicked his hand and the guards parted into a grotesque row for you, their weapons slowly pressing harder against their skin, cutting flesh now. Their faces distorted as they felt the pain.

You had become a statue, horrified by the casual display of violence. You were no stranger to bloodshed, by no means, but this… this was different.

“Come now, my love, before we’re further inconvenienced”, Astarion said as he turned to you again. His demeanour was that of bored arrogance again. He stepped over to you, put his hand on the small of your back and pushed you towards the door – you did not have it in you to resist. Too shocked, maybe, or too scared he’d do the same to you.

You passed the men and women quickly as they were silently suffering. Only as you were past them did you dig your heels down and tried to turn around.

“Let them… let them go”, you demanded shakily. The vampire turned to you, his face a sneer. “Tss, if it makes you happy.” He snapped his fingers and you saw how the spell broke, the tension in the guards’ bodies broke and they toppled over, gasping, screaming. Astarion snapped again and the door flew shut, blocking your view of the men and women. You turned to the vampire lord who was carefully observing you, still holding on to you with one hand.

“Don’t tell me you softened up, my love. After all you were the one pushing me to sacrifice seven thousand souls to become this”, Astarion sneered moving closer to you until his nose was almost touching yours. “Don’t tell me, violence shocks you know, Tav. You’re no innocent lamb.” His eyes sparkled with challenge; his lips curled in slight disgust.

You tried to hold his stare, but you couldn’t. Only after a few heartbeats you had to lower your gaze; because he was right.

He dragged you on. “Come on now”, he demanded, no room for disobedience.

The two of you walked through the giant mansion for long minutes. You weren’t even entirely sure how much time passed as you were too deep inside your thoughts and also kept coming back to notice how gently Astarion was holding your hand as he led you very purposefully through this maze of a place. There was no need for him to still keep holding on to you. You knew you didn’t have a chance to get away from him. But it seemed he enjoyed this method much more than other means.

Then, before you could round a corner, you heard voices coming towards you.

Astarion lifted his free hand again. “No”, you whispered almost out of reflex, your tone pleading. The vampire looked at you in annoyance but simply dragged you to a nearby, small alcove and with a quick mumbled incantation shrouded you in shadows for passing eyes as he pressed his body against yours.

Two servants passed, focused on their idle chatter, as you were painfully aware of the closeness of Astarion’s body: closer than you had been the entire night. You could smell him again as he carefully observed the two passing persons and you kept staring up at his face.

You knew the line of his nose or the way a deep wrinkle formed between his brows when he furrowed them as well as the back of your own hand. Despite everything that had happened this night you couldn’t deny how your body and not least your mind and heart reacted to being so close to Astarion after a decade of mourning him and yearning for him.

The way his body pressed against yours, making you remember how it had felt like to be held by him or kissed. Just how effortlessly close the two of you had been. Whole nights wasted away with laying around naked, talking, embracing each other - not even always ending in sex.

You had felt the walls of the fortress you had built around those memories and feelings start to crumble from the very first moment you had heard his voice again. But the stones started crumble dangerously fast now.

When the servants had passed, Astarion looked at you with a grin, but not seeming inclined to move away. In fact, he even pressed you harder against the wall with a cheeky grin.

You gasped, eyes widening at him as your heartbeat thundered and you realised that you absolutely were the dove facing the dragon and yet craved for this continue – to go further actually.

And Astarion must’ve seen something in your gaze as you looked up at him with doe eyes. His expression changed from playful and cruel to something that almost made your heart stop.

For a moment it seemed in his crimson eyes like something was desperately trying to claw its way up to the surface. Something that had been thought lost almost a decade ago. But the moment passed.

Then Astarion pressed his open lips to yours, taking them in a possessive kiss. His tongue slipped into your mouth, dominantly taking it for himself as one of his hands pressed to your chest on the naked skin of your neckline. With so much force it hurt, his hand wandered up your chest to your neck until he could almost wrap his fingers around your throat.

You could not help but moan into his open mouth in heedless pleasure as the kiss continued aggressively, all teeth and tongues, his fangs grazing your bottom lip and drawing just a single drop of blood.

Tasting you again after what had been ten years of abstinence almost made the vampire lord lose control.  He moaned and his leg pressed between your thighs making you feel embarrassingly hot within in mere moments.

But then something changed. Almost as if an echo of what you had seen in his eyes for a heartbeat or two had come back to haunt him.

The kiss softened, his leg withdrew slightly and the hand on your neck wandered up further to softly cup your cheek. It became something sweet and slower until it was almost delicate and chaste, his thumb on your face caressing it with a featherlight touch.

And you felt your walls not only crumble but turn to dust – all the work of keeping these emotions out, for nothing. You were helpless under his touch and as it felt like something that could almost have been.

Suddenly, Astarion broke the kiss and stepped back – way more than necessary, as if he had suddenly an urge to get as much distance between you as possible. For an instant you saw confusion on his face, but a mask of teasing mischief was slipped quickly back into place.

“So, you do still want me”, the vampire said with another grin. “Interesting”, he whispered as one of his eyebrows twitched and his smirk grew. “Very interesting”, he said louder as he turned away and you asked yourself if he was doing it to keep a safer distance from you now.

“I trust you can find the rest of the way yourself, you’re a capable thief after all”, he said and threw you a last glance before he started to saunter off. “And don’t worry, I’ll be checking up on you again, very soon, my love.” He drew out the last words as he walked away without another look.

Of course, he hadn’t asked if you wanted that, but you had already realised that none of this had been your choice after all; it never had been.

And so, the vampire lord strode away, deep in thought about what kind of storm he might’ve started. While you kept standing there some long moments longer feeling helplessly violated by the events of the night.

But in your heart… In your heart you felt foolish and stupid and yet delicately warm hope rising up, slowly.

[hypnoneghoul]

Symbol on the Surface Chapter 10

WC: 1,3k

Relationship: SwissAlps

Tags: Transmasc Swiss, Pregnancy, Ghoul Nature, Possessiveness & Protectiveness, Violence, Blood and Injury, PTSD, Flashbacks, Hurt/Comfort, Healing Magic

Swiss doesn’t know who to turn to. Mountain has tears streaming down his face and he rids his mate of having to make a choice as he runs away. He presses his hands to his ears so as not to hear Aeon’s sobbing and babbling.

Notes: Tysm to @jimothybarnes for beta reading :3

Chapter 1 here or on AO3.

Read chapter 10 under the cut or on AO3.

Mountain’s possessiveness and protectiveness is growing just as steadily as Swiss’ baby bump.

Everyone has been warned by Omega not to come too close to the multi ghoul when his mate is around—which is all the time, nowadays��and most definitely not to do it without warning.

Aeon is forgetful, though.

Especially when he’s excited.

That’s why he’s not thinking when he goes to Swiss and Mountain’s room all giggly and excited to show them adorable bat onesies that he’s found and would love to get for their kits as a gift so the babies could match with him.

It’s just a horrible coincidence that the pair is on their way out of said room at the same time, with Mountain’s hand hanging over the doorknob when the young ghoul barges in.

It’s only a flash of claws, a rumble of a snarl, and a pained shriek before Aeon stumbles backwards with a slashed open arm, dripping blood onto the ground.

Aeon, poor little Aeon who has suffered so much in the Pit, hurt again.

His back hits the wall before sliding down it. His eyes are wide and stuck at the wound and all the blood leaking out of it. Swiss can see how Aeon’s spiraling into a panic attack; his head surely filled with the images of his past abuse in the Pit by now.

“You–you all t–told me I was–I was safe here. You s–said I wouldn’t be h–hurt again, you–you promised, and–and I’m…he–he hurt me,” the quintessence ghoul chokes out, lost in the flashbacks.

Swiss doesn’t know what to do, who to turn to. Mountain has tears streaming down his face and he rids his mate of having to make a choice as he runs away to their bathroom and slams the door shut. He curls in a corner and presses his hands to his ears so as not to hear Aeon’s sobbing and near delirious, panicked babbling.

The multi ghoul, being cut out from Mountain, drops to his knees by Aeon, grabbing his face and trying to ground him.

“Bug? Buggy, breathe. It’s okay, breathe, you’re okay. I’m right here, you’re okay,” he tells him. Except…except he’s not okay, and Swiss knows Aeon is not going to be able to calm down until he’s healed and all the blood is gone. He can’t leave him, though, so his only choice is to yell. “AETHER!!! GET ME AETHER, RIGHT NOW!!! AEON’S HURT, WE NEED HELP, GET AETHER!!!”

Swiss screams until the older quintessence ghoul gets there—fortunately he was down in the den, and not in the infirmary or outside.

“What the fuck happened!?” he asks, already by Aeon’s side and taking care of the huge and deep slash across their forearm that’s all but gushing blood.

“Mountain,” the multi ghoul breathes out and Aether turns to him with disbelief painted on his face. Swiss goes to explain, “Aeon surprised us and Mountain didn’t–there wasn’t even time, he just saw a threat and–and this happened.”

“Accidents happen,” the quintessence ghoul sighs, nearly finished with healing the other one. Aeon seems to be completely dissociated now, no longer in pain, but still trapped in his mind. “I’m gonna take him with me, you go to your mate. I’m sure guilt’s eating him alive right now, he needs to be taken care of, too.”

Swiss nods and waits for Aether and Aeon to leave before he goes to get up. He struggles—cursing under his breath as he grabs onto the nearest piece of wall and digs his claws in. His stomach hurts a little, but he ignores it when he finally stands up; running straight to the bathroom door. He finds it locked.

“Mounty? Sweetheart? Are you okay in there? Let me in, please,” he begs. No answer comes, so Swiss puts his ear against the door. He hears shaky breathing and little choked out sobs—Mountain sounds like he’s about to run out of air.

Swiss’ heart aches as he can do nothing but listen, begging once again. “Aeon’s with Aeth, he’s healed him already. He’s a little shaken up, but he’s fine. Please, open the door, my love. You didn't do anything wrong, no one’s angry at you. It was an accident.”

Still no answer.

He rests his forehead on the door and lets his own tears of stress and worry and frustration flow. His breath hitches and he just–doesn’t know what to do. It’s been barely five minutes since Mountain lashed out at Aeon and so much has happened.

Swiss cries against the wood, not hearing his mate move on the other side. Suddenly the lock clicks and he pulls away so he doesn’t fall as—if—Mountain opens it.

The earth ghoul lets out a pained whine when he sees Swiss’ reddened eyes and puffy cheeks. He reaches out with a shaky hand and cups his mate’s face.

“No c–cry,” Mountain mutters. He struggles with it, clearly going into a verbal shutdown from all the stress. It makes Swiss smile—albeit a little sadly.

“I’m okay, my love,” he assures, “and Aeon is, too.”

The earth ghoul nods and dips his head to look at Swiss’ bump before moving to place a hand on it. He flinches back, though, when he notices Aeon’s blood under his claws.

Swiss covers them and pushes the bigger ghoul back and towards the sink. “C’mere. Don’t have to look.”

He grabs the soap and turns on the tap and in no time at all the blood is washed away. The multi ghoul takes Mountain’s hands, then, and brings them to his belly again.

“M–m–mine,” Mountain mumbles.

“Yours,” Swiss agrees before tipping his head back to kiss the earth ghoul. “You were just trying to protect what’s yours, yeah?”

The other nods. The guilt won’t go away for a while, but the comfort of his mate is certainly helping.

“Yeah, I know, sweetheart. It’s alright.” The multi ghoul forces another reassuring smile despite some worry settling in the back of his head. His stomach is hurting.

Still, he decides to ignore it—at least for now—and get Mountain to bed. He leads him to the nest and makes him shuck off his clothes, then his own, leaving both of them in only their underwear. The earth ghoul curls around Swiss and nuzzles his face into his neck, clinging onto him just a little too tight.

They just…are for a while, both trying to breathe normally again; neither speaking.

Mountain jumps when Swiss’ phone buzzes on the bedside table and the multi ghoul coos to him as he reaches for it. A message from Aether—he reads it first before deciding to share it with Mountain.

“Hey, Aeth texted,” he whispers, not to startle the earth ghoul again, “Aeon is alright, they’re watching a movie right now. He says you shouldn’t feel too guilty and asks if you would be up for a walk outside tomorrow.”

Mountain lifts his head and Swiss can see some conflicting feelings flash through his eyes, but then the corner of his lips twitches upwards and he nods. The multi ghoul leans down to kiss him on the tip of his nose before replying to Aether.

S: he’d love to, i think it’ll help him to see that buggy really is okay

A: I agree. Have a good night, you two.

S: you too :)

Swiss’ phone feels heavy as he turns on DND before dropping it back onto the bed. He sighs before curling more into Mountain’s embrace and letting his eyes fall shut.

He’s ready for the day to end.

Taglist: @arkeusruin @skele-bunny @everybodyshusband @ratsummer @jazz-bazz @mac-and-thefox @karmicbias @wine-irytatus

[grandline-fics]

Forget-Me-Not

DESCRIPTION: Sometimes things happen beyond our control. After an accident occurs your relationship with Zoro is turned on its head and changed forever.

WARNINGS: angst

CHARACTERS: Zoro

WORDS: 2,410

A/N: I've been slow on this because of being unwell but part two is finally here. I hope you all enjoy it as much as you liked part one

*REQUESTS ARE OPEN*

MASTERLIST | PROMPT LIST

Chapter One | Chapter Two(here)| Chapter Three | Chapter Four | Chapter Five | Chapter Six | Chapter Seven(coming soon)

———————

“Zoro hurry! We’re over here!” Zoro stumbled through the rain-slick uneven terrain of the forest, racing towards the direction that Usopp’s calls were coming from over the sound of the shrieking winds and rolling thunder. He broke through the branches and slid to a halt to see Usopp and Chopper knelt by your prone form. Usopp’s role was only to assist Chopper who was frantically tending to your injuries that required the most dire attention first. Zoro’s heart all but stopped as he took slow, heavy steps closer. His chest ached with the breath he wasn’t aware he was holding. In that moment you looked so frail and small. The rainwater managing to break through the small shelter Usopp must have constructed hastily was slowly washing the blood and dirt from your body that was broken. 

Looking away in the sudden flash of lightning Zoro could see how this happened. The displaced dirt and stone made him follow his gaze upwards to see the steep incline with the dilapidated ruins that had been hidden in the overgrowth of the forest. With the storm hitting out of nowhere it was far too easy for the ground to crumble and give-away without warning and you were the one to suffer for the moment none of you could have predicted. With heavy limbs he sank to his knees beside you, just wanting to hold your hand or caress your face and tell you that he was there but he couldn’t bring himself to move out of fear he’d hurt your already injury heavy body or get in Chopper’s way. For all the training he’d done in this moment he was utterly helpless. 

Zoro woke with a jolt at the loud snap of thunder coming from outside. As the memory of your accident lifted from his sleepy state he slowly looked to your bedside. He’d hoped that the image would have changed in the short amount of time he’d slept, sadly you lay there just as always. It had been a week since that day and you’d yet to open your eyes. Chopper had done his best to reassure him that you being unconscious would be best for your body to have this time to rest and heal. He let out a small sigh and reached across to take your hand into his when another flash of lightning hit and a strong wave rocked the ship.

These storms were like clockwork, it’d be bright sunshine and summer weather only for storm to hit hard for two hours and then dissipate like nothing had happened. Just another day and the Log Pose would be set and they could finally leave this island behind them. He knew he shouldn’t blame an island for what happened to you but he did. He also blamed himself, he should have made more of an effort to spend the time with you. Franky and the stupid cook were more than enough to have gone with Luffy that day. Had he been with you that day part of him believed he could have been able to save you. Getting agitated again, Zoro rose from your bedside and roughly ran his hand through his hair. He needed to do something, anything. 

Chopper had said that speaking to you even while you were unconscious could help. Originally he didn’t want to out of his own hate of seeming vulnerable but then he took to reading your favourite book to you but that was finished. So he went to your shared room to find another you’d loved. What he hadn’t been expecting though in the time it took for him to return to the medical room he found the bed you’d been lying in was empty and there was no sign of you. Dropping the book he turned on his heel and went in search of you in desperation. There was no way you were ready to be out of bed, if you put too much strain on yourself your wounds could reopen. In all the times you’d been hurt before it wasn’t like you to do something this reckless. Where were you? 

As he walked down the hallway he felt a chill creep over his skin. Who’d left the door open leading to the deck? No one would be that stupid with the storm still going on outside. Prepared to go out and shout at whoever was to blame, Zoro froze to see you weakly stagger to the railing and stare out at the storm. He couldn’t contain his excitement and relief to see you awake but concern also gripped him. Even from here he could see the pain in your eyes. Quickly he approached and set his hand on your shoulder, freezing to hear you let out a scream of surprise. He was going to apologise for startling you but another more pressing question came instead.

“What are you doing out here?” He asked in concern. He could see the rain soaking into your skin and the bandages that would now need to be thoroughly changed. Zoro could feel the tremor in your body and the haze in your eyes. Desperate to keep you from further strain he spoke again. “Come on, we need to get you dried off before you get sick on top of injured.” He lightly flexed his fingers on your shoulder to begin leading you inside but you didn’t move and then the new devastating hit came when Zoro heard you speak.

“Who are you?” You asked, your voice so weak and scared that Zoro could only stare at you with widened eyes, trying to stay calm. “Where am I?” This question was no better than the last and for a brief moment Zoro had thought he’d misheard you but no, it was clear you had no memory of the accident, no memory of him, the crew, or the ship that you’d called home since the day you joined the crew. At that thought a new worry took hold. You had no memory of how you met any of them. He needed to keep you calm or things would only get worse. 

“Just please come inside otherwise you’ll get sick and your wounds could reopen.” Zoro urged as gently as he could but his request only served to make you frown uneasily at him. When you didn’t move he spoke your name as a sign he knew you and that made you hesitate in your suspicion. “Please come inside and I’ll tell you everything you want to know.” 

Zoro watched the conflict and uncertainty flicker in your eyes as you searched his face, trying to force yourself through the pain to try and find something recognisable in his features. You were about to relent to his request when the door to the galley slammed open. 

“Hey moron what are you doing out in the storm?!” Sanji shouted only to stop his lecture to Zoro when he saw your face, his expression lighting up immediately. You flinched as yet another stranger called out your name in an all too friendly tone. You watched the blonde approach the staircase as he continued. “It’s a relief to see you awake! You should still be in bed though!” 

You glanced past him and stared in mounting horror as an emblem caught your eye. Your breath hitched and you took a small step back only to find the railing stopped you going any further. With trembling lips you could only move to the side, stepping out from the first stranger’s touch. Zoro felt you move and turned away from Sanji to see your horror filled expression and he knew it was too late now to avoid where you realised you were. Zoro tried to take a step toward you but finally your gaze returned to his face and the fear made him stop. 

“Pirates…” you choked out. “You’re pirates.” Desperately you looked around as the rain above you began to lessen and the winds began to ease. Swallowing hard through your pain and fear you could see the island the ship was docked at which only mounted your overwhelming emotions. “That’s not my home. That’s not my island. Where did you take me!?” You shouted only to double over in agony as your vision blurred. Holding your side you coughed hard and winced when you felt the still healing skin pull. Letting out a shaky breath you looked at the two mean staring at you with worry and desperation. “What did you do to me?” You asked as you felt your head spin and vision crumble under the weight of the physical and mental distress. 

Zoro was quick and caught you with ease. With the utmost care he cradled you close and stared down at you in heartache and regret. He wished all of this was just a horrible nightmare, he wished that if he could trade places and take all the pain you were suffering just as he’d taken for Luffy on Thriller Bark then he would do it one hundred times over because seeing that expression on your face was more painful than anything he’d ever had to endure in his life. Without taking his eyes off of your face he headed towards the doorway. “Get the others.” Was his only instruction to Sanji as he carried you back to the medical quarters, relieved to see Chopper there who was frantic about where you’d disappeared to. 

—————

As you lay sleeping in the medical room, Zoro and the rest of the Strawhats stood in the dining room, silent and taking in the revelation that you’d woken with no memory of them. As difficult as it was to process there was the added complication of your reaction. 

“They won’t trust us.” Nami murmured sadly, finally being the one to break the silence, her fingers absently tracing the scar of Arlong’s mark now hidden by her tattoo. “We only won their trust the first time because we helped them defeat the pirates that terrorised their island. They won’t just take our word this time that it all worked out and they joined us willingly.”

“We can’t overwhelm them.” Chopper spoke up sternly. “Head injuries like theirs bring their own complications, amnesia being only one aspect of that. They need to take things as slowly as possible, any form of added stress could severely worsen their other injuries too. It isn’t wise to just throw everything at them as once, we can’t even know for certain if their memories will ever return. For now the priority is their physical injuries healing.”

“We have to prove we’re friend though!” Luffy protested with a pout. “We’d never hurt them. What if we show them their bounty poster?”

“This can’t be about what we want. They come first so don’t crowd them when they’re awake.” Zoro finally spoke, glaring at the wall. “They tell us to get the hell out of their room, we leave. Even if we’re telling them the truth just saying they joined the crew willingly and that we’re friends is going to magically make it better. Let’s just do as Chopper says.”

“More than friends in your case, Zoro…” Robin spoke softly. “Are you okay with them getting well physically and then wanting to leave?”

“If that’s what they want.” Zoro answered numbly as he got to his feet. “I’m going to the Crow’s Nest. I mean it, don’t crowd them.”

————— 

You woke slowly, feeling the pain you remembered had greatly dulled enough for you to be able to breath easier but still you couldn’t shake the fear pressing heavily on your chest. You couldn’t shake the image of the strange Jolly Roger and the two strange pirates from your mind. So many questions swirled in your head and you feared how blank your mind was. Slowly you sat up in the bed and met the stare of the peculiar but adorable reindeer sat at the desk on the other side of the room. At first you thought it was a pet but you could clearly see it was working with herbs on the table it was sat at. “Um…hi?” You offered cautiously, startled when the reindeer’s expression lit up and it approached your bedside.

“I’m glad you’re awake.” You didn’t know what to do when they spoke except stare with wide eyes. “I’m Chopper and I’m the doctor…your doctor. I know you don’t remember but I promise I just want to help you get better. Is it okay if I check your bandages?” 

Slowly you looked at the bandages visible on your arms and felt them against your body. Comparing how much easier it felt to move and breathe to when you’d woken up you were willing to let this reindeer continue his treatment if he was the reason for the pain to have lessened like this. Still the reality of a reindeer being a doctor was difficult to wrap your head around so you only gave a tiny a nod. You noted the relief and optimism light Chopper’s expression at your acceptance and you nervously bit your lip while he hopped up onto the bed and began his examination. “How did I end up here?”

Chopper looked up at you with apprehension, his large expressive eyes carefully assessing you. 

“There was an accident.” He answered. “We were in a forest when a storm hit. You fell.” Fell. You obviously had no memory of the incident and while you couldn’t bring yourself to argue with Chopper for proof you also couldn’t completely bring yourself to believe him entirely either. He was a pirate after all. Would he stop treating you if you became difficult? Possibly. 

You knew pirates at their core were selfish and the ones that plagued your island were crueler than these ones seemed but still you refused to trust them. This friendly demeanour could be an act and they could be looking for something from you. For now you would have to pace yourself, you would be compliant and gather your strength. Then when you were able you were going to escape this ship and these pirates. You needed to get home and nothing and no one was going to stop you. When Chopper finished his examination you had to force yourself to offer him a small smile. When he beamed back at you, you hoped that the others could be as easily swayed as him.

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

TAG LIST (If I've missed anyone or if you want to be added just let me know) @3v37773, @tsaaps , @i-am-all-love-puns-and-lazy , @sanemisnonexistenteyebrow , @fiery-captain-spider-santa , @vikispike , @portgasmyass

[rcbdo]

mess it up - sakusa kyioomi x f!reader

TW: implied history of abuse, injury - mention of blood

It was late in the evening when Sakusa Kiyoomi finally woke up. He reached over and found Atsumu’s side of the bed cold and undisturbed. He rolled his eyes; the idiot was probably still at the gym, undoubtedly pushing himself too far. Atsumu rarely took matters of health and wellbeing seriously, much to Sakusa’s chagrin.

A pleasant aroma had filled the apartment. As Sakusa rubbed his eyes, he picked up on rustling sounds coming from the kitchen. Maybe Atsumu was home after all.

Sakusa slipped on his sweatpants before making his way down the hall. Sure enough, something was being prepared. The savory aroma seemed to awaken Sakusa’s appetite; he hadn’t eaten much today. He smiled softly at the humming coming from around the corner.

He took another step forward, then froze.

It wasn’t Atsumu.

It was you.

He frowned, frustrated to find himself alone with you again. It’s not that he didn’t like you; in fact, he was surprised how much you had grown on him in these past weeks. No, it was the longing within him that frustrated him. He was finally happy. He loved Atsumu and the life they had built together. But something in him yearned to reach out to you, to be something more. And that terrified him.

Lost in his own thoughts, Sakusa didn’t think to announce his presence. You turned, and shrieked in surprise.

Sakusa started as well, first at your scream, then at the sound of the wine glass you held shattering across the floor.

After glaring down at the mess, his eyes returned to you, looking like a deer in headlights.

“I’m so—” you began.

“What the hell?” Sakusa snapped, trying to control his temper. It was an accident, he knew that. But he was sick, and tired, and now had this mess to deal with.

“I’m sorry,” you repeated, shrinking further back. “I’m really sorry. I’ll clean this up now.”

You crouched down and began to pick up pieces of broken glass. Sakusa noticed you trembling. Fuck, he hadn’t meant to startle you so badly.

He exhaled, taking a moment to compose himself. “Here, let me help,” he said as he stepped into the small space.

“It’s ok, I’ve got it,” you said, your voice strained.

Sakusa continued forward, reaching his longer frame over you to pick up a towel from the counter.

“No!” you cried out as he loomed over you. Sakusa watched, horrified, as you hurried to scramble away from him. Right through the shattered glass.

He froze. Again. His mind was racing, but he could seem to form coherent thoughts.

You were huddled in the corner now, clutching your wounded hand against your chest. Tears began to slip down your face, but your eyes never left him.

“Why did you—are you ok?” he finally managed to ask.

“I’m sorry. Just give me a second. I’ll clean it up,” you replied meekly.

“It’s ok,” Sakusa said softly, crouching down to your level. “Can I look at your hand? That looks pretty bad.”

You looked down at your hand, eyes widening as if you were just now registering the injury. Blood had already begun to drip down your forearm.

“It’s ok,” Sakusa repeated, feeling like he was talking down a skittish animal. “I have a first aid kit, but you may need stitches. Can I take a look?”

He inched himself forward, but you immediately flinched. He paused, not knowing what to do. Were you really that scared of him?

“I’m so sorry,” you whispered, then rushed past him and down the hall before he could register what was going on.

He jumped up to follow you, but heard the bathroom door shut and the lock click.

Still, he tried the doorknob. Sakusa called your name, knocking gently on the door.

“Please. I just want to help.”

No response.

Sakusa paced back in forth in front of the door. He tried to get you to respond a few more times, to no avail. He then glanced back and noticed drops of blood on the floor. Should he break down the door? What if you lost too much blood and passed out?

As Sakusa’s thoughts began to spiral, he knew he had to act. He ran back to the bed room and grabbed his phone, calling Atsumu. You were his friend, his ex, after all. He would know what to do.

No answer.

Sakusa dialed again.

Still no answer.

He tried a third time and felt like throwing his phone against the wall at the sound of Atsumu’s stupid voicemail greeting.

My name is Miya Atsumu. I’m your favorite volleyball player’s favorite volleyball player. And I’m serving exactly what you are. Cu—*beep*

“Atsumu, call me back as soon as you get this,” Sakusa seethed, then hung up to text him the same message. Atsumu was notorious for neglecting his phone during practice. Who knows when he would respond. Sakusa had to figure something else out.

Osamu was his second choice, but he was all the way back in Hyogo. Sakusa pinched the bridge of his nose and made another call.

“Hey cuz!” Motoya answered cherrily. “What’s up?”

“Hi. Do you have Suna’s number?” Sakusa asked, cutting straight to the chase.

“Uh, yeah. I can text it to you. Is everything ok?” Motoya asked warily.

Sakusa hesitated. The situation felt like something you wouldn’t want shared with strangers, but he was in way over his head. He needed guidance, and he trusted Motoya. He quickly relayed the situation, keeping his voice low so you wouldn’t overhear.

“Shit, that does sound bad,” Motoya replied, “Good call on reaching out to Suna, he always has his phone on him. I’ll text you his number and let him know to get in touch with you.”

“Thank you, I appreciate it,” Sakusa sighed, feeling relieved to have a plan coming together.

“Of course. Do you need me to come over?” Motoya offered.

“No, not right now. I don’t want to make it worse,” Sakusa answered.

There was a pause, then Sakusa phone buzzed as Suna’s contact information came through.

“There’s Suna’s number,” Motoya said, “And Omi—I know you’re trying, but be gentle with her, ok?”

Sakusa’s heart clenched. Even Motoya, a complete stranger to you, showed more compassion than he had been able to.

“Yeah. Thanks again,” Sakusa said before hanging up. He slumped against the wall and took a deep breath, glancing back at the closed door. You still hadn’t emerged, or made a single sound for that matter.

Before Sakusa could spiral further, his phone began to vibrate.

“This is Saku–”

“What did you do?” Suna Rinatoru asked harshly.

“I don’t know!” Sakusa snapped, then quickly lowered his voice. “I don’t know. I startled her, then tried to help clean up a broken glass and startled her again. She literally crawled through the glass to get away from me, Suna. Now she’s locked herself in the bathroom, and Atsumu won’t answer his goddamn phone, and I don’t know what to do!”

“Fuck, ok, calm down,” Suna replied, his tone much softer, “I’m leaving now, I’ll be there in 15 minutes. Can you slide your phone under the door? Or put me on speaker?”

“Yeah, I can put you on speaker,” Sakusa said as he stumbled towards the door. He knocked gently, then set his phone down.

“Hey, Baby,” Suna said, using the nickname Sakusa didn’t have the courage to employ himself. “I’m coming over, alright. You doing ok?”

The silence between the two men was thick.

“Uh...can she hear me?” Suna asked.

“I think so,” Sakusa whispered back. He could hear the sounds of the city in the background as Suna made his way towards the train station.

“Hmm. Oh! One tap on the door for you’re ok, two taps for you’re not ok,” Suna suggested. Sakusa held his breath, hoping you would answer. Hoping that you were ok, and not bleeding out alone on the floor. He needed you to be ok so he could fix this.

Tap tap tap

Sakusa straightened up, then looked down at his phone.

“Did I hear three taps?” Suna asked.

“Yeah. What does that mean?” Sakusa asked.

“I dunno man, I didn’t make up a code for three knocks. Babes, you lose too much blood in there?”

Tap tap

“Should I take that as no you didn’t lose too much blood or no you’re not ok?” Suna asked worriedly.

Tap

“Ask yes or no questions,” Sakusa huffed.

“You ask them, man! You’re there,” Suna snapped back, “Geez, she was probably telling you to fuck off.”

Tap

Sakusa’s eyes widened. Suna chuckled over the phone.

“Baby’s got jokes, then. Sakusa, I’m hanging up and getting on the train. I’ll be there in a few minutes. It’s gonna be ok.”

Sakusa ended the call, then stared at his reflection in the blank screen. He realized how intensely his brows were knitted, which probably wasn't helping his pounding headache. He took a deep breath, trying to ground himself before even more chaos ensued.

In the silence of the apartment, Sakusa hoped. He hoped Suna could help you. He hoped Atsumu would come home and smooth things over. He hoped you would be ok. But most of all, he hoped he hadn't irrevocably messed up what was between you before it even had a chance to start.

[blurredcolour]

Lavender's Blue, Lavender's Green

[One-shot]

Lewis Nixon x Enlisted!Female Reader

After you wind up injured in a freak accident, your relationship with Captain Nixon is forever altered.

Warnings: MAJOR Canon Divergence, Minor Reader Injury, Detailed Descriptions of Pain, Language, Alcohol Consumption, Weapons, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Oblique References to Nixon's Alcoholism and Infidelity, Inevitable Historical and Military Inaccuracies, Mature/Explicit Themes [oral sex - m/f receiving, unprotected vaginal sex] - 18+ ONLY.

Author's Note: Self-indulgent canon divergence with little explanation ahead, read at your own risk. Some liberties were taken in describing reader's family life/personal history for the sake of plot. No physical descriptions or y/n used. This is a work of fiction based off the portrayal by the actors in the HBO series. I hold nothing but respect for the real life individuals referenced within.

Word Count: 8358

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

The floorboards creaked beneath your jump boots as you followed O’Keefe into the backroom of the half-destroyed café in Thalem. You could hear the strains of a string quartet rising from the square below, and the conversation between Luz and Nixon a few rooms over. O’Keefe had shown up as a replacement during Easy’s second stay in Mourmelon-le-Grand, wide-eyed and eager to get his hands dirty. The rest of you had just been glad to make it out of Haguenau alive.

But there was something about the naïve boy that reminded you of your little brother back home, the youngest of four siblings born after you, last to join the party, the most eager to experience life when the rest of you were all jaded by the loss of your mother during his birth. Add in the fact that you too had been a replacement once, joined Easy in Aldbourne for Operation Market Garden – one of twenty-seven women selected as the first female paratroopers to join the 506th – and you had felt a certain protectiveness over the kid. Which was why you found yourself watching over him now, even in this relatively harmless town.

Another groan of wood had your eyes flicking to the floor, something about the pitch of the slats not sitting right with you, but before you could open your mouth to warn him, there was an ominous ‘crack’ beneath O’Keefe. He let out a horrific shriek as the boards beneath him began to give way and you lunged forward, snapping out your left hand to grab onto any part of him you could. Seizing him by the back of the collar of his ODs, you landed flat on your stomach with a grunt with O’Keefe dangling through the newly created hole in the floor. Your helmet tumbled from your head, bouncing off his and crashing onto the tiles below.

Your arm was aching under the strain of his body weight but as you tried to spread some of the load onto your second hand, you realized the butt of your rifle was jammed between the floor and your body, pinning your right arm against you by the strap over your shoulder. The sound of multiple sets of boots running into the room was quickly followed by several pairs of hands pressing against your calves, bracing you to keep you from following O’Keefe through the hole.

“I gotta let you go, Patty.” You grit out. “It’s not far, ok?” You assured him, able to see through the ragged gap in the wood that he was dangling only a few feet from the floor below.

His response was not what you were hoping for. “Don’t let me fall!” He cried out, looking up to you with wide, calf-like eyes. “Please don’t let me go!” He began to clutch at your arm, flailing his legs as though he wanted to climb back up.

His body swung like a pendulum, bouncing and jerking before ultimately wrenching your strained shoulder from its socket and careless words born of pain from your lips.

“Augh! Jesus Christ, you fucking meatball! It’s only two feet! Let go!” You cried out, clenching your eyes shut against the blinding pain, your grip failing as your arm started to go numb.

He continued to whimper nonsensically and thrash about as heavy footfalls sounded on the stairs followed by a set of lighter ones.

“Let go of her you fucking meatball!” You heard Perconte snap at O’Keefe from below and cracked your stinging eyes open to see that Bull had seized the boy around the waist, the thrashing finally stilling before the weight of him was released from your limb as, at last, he let go of your arm.

Relief tingled through you, though did nothing to lessen the raw ache in your shoulder. Afraid to move, afraid to inhale more than tiny sips of air lest you fan the flames of pain, you laid perfectly still with your arm outstretched toward the ground below.

“What a fucking meatball.” You heard Luz giggle from behind you as he stepped forward. “Let’s get you up.” His voice grew closer as he leaned forward.

Mortifying as it was, laying there in denial was not going to make the agony end. Taking a shaky breath, you asked quietly. “George, can you go find Doc, please?” You were hoping not to arouse the suspicions of Webster, Liebgott, and Nixon who were somewhere in the room still. At least one pair of hands was still firmly gripping your calves.

“Uh, the meatball is fine, I mean Bull might tear him a new one but…” He trailed off as you turned your head slowly to look up at him, brow furrowing as lances of pain pierced your neck and shoulder. It felt as though someone were pouring boiling water down the sleeve of your uniform.

“For me, please.” You clarified, perspiration dotting your skin under the strain of masking your discomfort.

The room fell silent, whatever Liebgott and Webster had been bickering about forgotten as Luz shoved his way past them and shot out of the room. You felt the pressure against your calves ease up before Nixon was kneeling on the floor next to you, features etched with concern. “Where are you hurt?”

“Left shoulder.” You exhaled, swallowing at the way his eyes ricocheted over your prone form.

“Think you can get up for me?” He asked, his voice enticingly soft, making your heart skip a few beats as you felt suddenly willing to try anything he might ask of you so long as he kept speaking like that.

“Maybe?”

The smile he awarded you with filled your stomach with bubbling effervescence. “Good, let’s get this out of the way first.” He carefully extracted your M1 from beneath your hip before sliding it off your good shoulder, handing it off to one of the other men in the room.

Sliding his arm around your waist, he started to lift your torso from the floor, punching the air from your lungs painfully. Gnawing on the inside of your cheek viciously you did everything you could not cry out in pain. You were not the first woman in Easy to get hurt – Esther had been hit by shrapnel from a tree in Bastogne and Pearl had been shot during Dike’s disastrous assault on Foy. Both had been awarded a purple heart. You were just a girl who’d tried to hold too much weight – there would be no medal for you, so it would be best not to make a scene.

“Shit you must be in so much pain, I’m sorry.” Nixon grumbled, seemingly at a loss as to how to get your arm out of that hole and you into a more comfortable position.

Roe’s voice downstairs broke through the haze of pain, and you clenched your teeth, willing yourself to hold on a little longer as you heard him hurry up the stairs.

“You two, out.” He said firmly to Liebgott and Webster who left without comment before his hands came to rest on your hips, pulling you backwards. “Bend ya knees for me, that’s it, good job.” He spoke calmly as he worked with Nixon to lift you up into a kneeling position well away from the hole in the floor.

As your left arm drooped, your right hand quickly moved to support it in more or less the position it had been when O’Keefe’s movements had pulled it out of place. A millimetre of movement in any direction had you whimpering pathetically in the back of your throat despite your best efforts to keep the sound sealed behind your lips.

“What’s going on?” Roe asked as he knelt in front of you, taking in the way you were supporting your arm before he started to undo your ODs and then your wool shirt beneath.

“It’s my shoulder, Doc.”

He nodded as he carefully pulled open the collar to take a look, his fingers skimming along the skin of your shoulder and the strap of your undershirt. As they honed in on the hollow where your joint ought to be, you let out a yelp and nearly keeled over backward at the searing pain, grateful as Nixon pressed a hand to your lower back to keep you upright.

“Yeah it is. It’s out of joint.” Roe confirmed the sneaking suspicion you’d had.

There had been something agonizingly familiar about the whole thing, taking you back to a hot summer day when you were ten years old, riding your father’s new horse despite his explicit instructions to wait for him to be done in the field before you tried to mount it. The horse’s black coat had shone almost purple in the sunlight of the afternoon, warm to the touch as the barely broken-in animal had suffered no more than one lap around the paddock before bucking you from its back.

The force with which you had struck the ground had dislocated your left shoulder that day, and the drive into town to see the doctor had been a torturous thirty minutes during which every jolt and bump had sent pain shooting through your body. But as soon as the doctor had put it back in place, the relief had been almost immediate.

“You can put it back, right?” You asked hoping to avoid transport somewhere like this.

“Yeah, I can.” Doc smiled softly and started digging through his satchel. “Let’s get ya some morphine first, alrigh’?”

“Wait, don’t, I’ll be useless.” You said sharply. “It’s just going to hurt when you put it back in, right?”

Roe looked to you with wide eyes, hands stilling before his expression hardened a little. “It’s gonna hurt like hell when I put it back in.” He clarified firmly and you felt Nixon’s hand twitch against your back.

“And then after that I’ll be fine.” You insisted bravely.

Nixon sighed your name, and you turned your head too fast, barely stifling a cry of pain behind trembling lips.

“Maybe you should just let Doc give you the morphine.” He said gently.

“No.” You replied stubbornly despite the fact that he was a ranking officer, turning your face back to Roe more carefully this time. “Just get it over with, please.”

Roe sighed heavily at you, muttering bitterly in French. You caught a word that sounded an awful lot like ‘mule’, but before you could question him about it, he set one hand on your bicep and the other on your forearm. A noise of pain snuck past your lips unbidden, and you clamped your free hand over your mouth as he shot you a knowing look.

“Yer gonna yowl like a goddamn alley cat, take tha morphine.”

You glared up at him stubbornly until he started to move again, bending your arm at the elbow before slowly pushing your bicep in to press along at your ribs. You let out a sob of agony against your palm, aware that the murmur of conversation downstairs had faded away, but helpless to quell your involuntary reactions to Roe’s manipulations of your limb.

You felt Nixon shift at your side, watched his knee slot between yours before he carefully cupped the back of your head to guide your face to press against his neck. Your hand fell to your lap as you burrowed into the collar of his ODs, cheek pressed against his skin, the fabric of his uniform doing a much better job of muffling the sounds of pain spilling from you. His hand sought yours between your bodies, clasping your forearm, and you gripped his tightly in return as Roe turned your left arm out from your body at a ninety-degree angle before pulling downward on your bicep.

A tremendous wail wrenched from your throat with enough force that you anticipated the taste of blood before an audible ‘clunk’ sounded from your left shoulder, resonating through your torso as your joint slid home. The tension melted from your body in an instant as the pain left you, replaced by nothing more than a dull discomfort, slumping against Nixon to take a few deep breaths. Long enough to note the hint of cedar in his aftershave before you remembered yourself.

You had found Captain Nixon handsome from the first moment you’d laid eyes on him, but as he was a married officer with an English mistress you’d also gone above and beyond to steer clear of that mess. Unfortunately, it had done little to dull your body’s natural response to his presence.

Straightening quickly, you frowned to see you’d left wet patches of tear drops on his collar, releasing his hand as though it burned you to try and brush them off.

“It’ll dry just fine.” He assured you warmly and you swallowed thickly, shuffling back a little to turn to Roe.

“Thanks Doc.” You frowned to see him pulling out a sling.

“Jus’ for a few days, can’t have it slippin’ back out.” Roe muttered and unceremoniously wrapped it under your left elbow before tying it behind your neck. “I’ll let Cap’n Speirs know yer on ligh’ duties, he’ll probably send ya up ta Major Winters as a runnah.”

You let out a sigh of relief as hopefully that meant no aid station, no getting separated from the company and lost in some replacement depot. Looking down you frowned at how open the collars of your shirt and OD jacket were and began trying to reassemble yourself one-handed.

“Here.” Nixon offered softly and carefully buttoned you back up to where you usually wore your uniform before he pushed himself to his feet, sliding an arm around your waist and pulling you up as well. “Ok?” He asked and you nodded, trying not to notice the way the warmth of his body seeped through your clothes.

“Thank you, sir.” You said quietly and he nodded warmly in reply.

Grabbing his things, he gestured for you to lead the way out of the room, following close behind. As you reached the main floor, Luz held out your helmet which you took with a nod of thanks, putting it on your head before retrieving your rifle from Liebgott. You could hear Perconte continuing to give O’Keefe shit outside and you frowned deeply, making a beeline for the sound of his voice.

“Hey! I’m fucking fine, knock it off.” You barked tersely before you were beckoned over by Captain Speirs.

The sound of an explosion further up the road had your eyes fluttering open, the ruined village of Thalem dissolving into the sun-drenched back of a transport truck parked on the autobahn in Bavaria just outside the SS resort town of Berchtesgaden that 2nd Battalion was supposed to be taking. You’d been sitting here for at least twenty minutes now, the road blocked by a no-doubt man made rockslide that so far had proven impervious to everything the mortar boys had thrown at it.

Just what had pulled your thoughts back to that afternoon several weeks past you couldn’t say, though it was not the first time you had found your mind wandering there during a lull in activity. In fact, it had become harder and harder to find a time when you were not thinking about Nixon, much to your chagrin. It was not good for your health, even though his impending divorce had become very public knowledge nearly two months ago.

A palpable tension had been born between the two of you that day in Thalem, something you were certain others could sense as you’d spent two weeks at Battalion HQ, running into him more often than ever before. Averted gazes, stiffened postures, cleared throats – neither of you quite knew how to behave around each other anymore when interaction had been so natural and inconsequential before. Something had been changed that day in the café and there was no going back to the way it had been previously.

Shifting higher on the wooden bench you noted a couple of the guys in your platoon were dozing in the truck with you but everyone else seemed to have emptied out to watch impatiently as though the pressure of the entire battalion’s eyes might send the rocks cascading the rest of the way down the mountainside. The scuff of jump boots on pavement pulled your attention to the rear of the vehicle and you smiled to see O’Keefe approaching.

“Hey Patty, got tired of watching the blast boys?” You smirked and offered him a hand to pull him up, swallowing at his hesitation. “Come on, I’m fine I told you.” You chided gently.

He took it carefully and allowed you to help him into the truck and that’s when you noticed his helmet tucked under his arm, filled with wildflowers of all sorts of colours. Your breath hitched in your throat as the sight smacked of summertime at home, a dart of nostalgia and longing piercing through the layers of armor you had carefully layered over your heart to make it through this war.

His eyes followed yours and he beamed as he plonked down on the bench beside you. “There’s tons of ‘em just growing alongside the road. I thought you might like some.”

Looking to him softly you took his proffered helmet, setting it in your lap as you looked them all over, picking up a particularly vibrant purple one. “They’re beautiful, thank you.” You murmured distantly, practically transported by something so simple as wildflowers.

“Do you think that one is lavender?”

A snort from the back of the truck announced Liebgott’s return and you glanced over to see him leaning against the grill of the transport parked behind yours.

“Lavender grows in France, not Bavaria.” Webster corrected O’Keefe, tucking his notebook into his pocket before hopping up to sit on the bench across from the pair of you.

“Isn’t there that song about lavender, though? Lavender’s purple, billy billy?” Perconte squeezed in beside O’Keefe, crowding his personal space.

Ignoring their usual antics, you smiled softly to yourself, hands began to move from muscle memory as plucking the longest stemmed flower you could find before carefully winding the purple flower around it, repeating the process over and over as you started to sing.

“Lavender’s blue, dilly dilly, lavender’s green”

“Yeah, that’s it, that’s the song!” O’Keefe declared brightly.

“Shut the fuck up, meatball.” Perconte hissed through gritted teeth, elbowing him sharply so you would keep singing.

“When I am king, dilly dilly, you shall be queen Who told you so, dilly dilly, who told you so ‘Twas my own heart, dilly dilly, that told me so”

Unaware that your voice was carrying across the rockface of the mountainside, you were lost in the chain of flowers you were weaving from O’Keefe’s helmet, the verses coming back to you easily after years of singing them to your younger siblings.

“Call up your men, dilly dilly, put them to work Some to the plow, dilly dilly, some to the fork Some to make hay, dilly dilly, some to cut corn While you and I, dilly dilly, keep ourselves warm”

A hush fell over the valley, even the mortar team ceasing their attempts to break through. It was not the first time they’d heard you sing, you knew all the verses to ‘Blood on the Risers’ and happily shouted them along with the rest of the Company, but it was the first time you’d sung in such a feminine way before. You’d found the most expedient way to integrate into Easy was to be one of the boys, yet here you were, reminding each and every one of them that you were a woman.

“Lavender’s green, dilly dilly, lavender’s blue If you love me, dilly dilly, I will love you Let the birds sing, dilly dilly, and the lambs play We shall be safe, dilly dilly, out of harm’s way

I love to dance, dilly dilly, I love to sing When I am queen, dilly dilly, you’ll be my king Who told me so, dilly dilly, who told me so I told myself, dilly dilly, I told me so”

As you finished the song, you curled the chain of blooms into a circle and wove it closed with several stems before turning to place it on O’Keefe’s head, blinking as it slipped down over his eyes. A chorus of harsh laughter at his expense broke out around you and you huffed in annoyance.

“Oh shoot, Patty, I put too many flowers in there, sorry about that. I’ll make you a new one.” You gently pried it off his head, setting the large crown aside before setting to work on a smaller one as the sound of a jeep could be heard coming up the road.

You’d barely put the finishing touches on the smaller crown of flowers when Speirs was ordering everyone to form up into their platoons and O’Keefe had to vanish. Mortifyingly, you found yourself standing on the pavement with both circlets clasped carefully in your hand, somehow loathe to leave them in the transport truck to be trampled but also aware that you couldn’t just carry them with you.

“Captain Nixon can look after those for you, Corporal.” Major Winters voice cut through the din of soldiers tramping back and forth to collect their gear and get ready. You turned to see him grinning at you from where he stood leaning against his jeep.

Nixon, for his part, was staring at you with an unreadable look on his face – Confusion? Bewilderment? Shock? Whatever it was it made you want to duck your head shyly, an impulse which you fought hard against as you hustled over to hold out your handmade treasures.

“Thank you very much, sir.” You murmured quietly, swallowing as he hesitated a moment before taking them gingerly, as if they were made of spun glass, while Major Winters watched on with a broad grin. “Sirs.” You saluted and hurried back to your platoon, not wanting to be the cause of any further delay, but still unable to put your finger on just what Nixon’s expression had been.

As it turned out you had quite a bit of time to puzzle it over. After securing the town without incident and cheering on the select few who made it up to the Eagle’s Nest, you ended up on a patrol under Major Winters where he discovered the ruins of Herman Goering’s hunting lodge. Left on guard duty overnight with Patty, you let him ramble on about all the things he wanted to see and do now that the war in Germany was practically over while you quietly tried to decipher the enigma that was Nixon.

Straightening from your lean against the stucco wall as you heard the sound of an engine approaching down the rather rough road, you swallowed painfully to see the man himself, posture quite relaxed as he cradled an open bottle of champagne.

“What is this place?” He asked as he climbed from the vehicle, dressed only in the wool shirt and pants of his uniform.

“Herman Goering’s house, we discovered it yesterday. Had it on double guard ever since.” Major Winters replied.

You nodded in greeting as they walked past you, though Nixon’s sunglasses made it even more impossible to interpret his mood than that last time you’d seen him.

“I can vouch for that, sir.” O’Keefe interjected quickly and you tried not to wince at his endearing awkwardness.

“Oh, anxious to get off duty, O’Keefe?” Winters taunted him.

“No, there’s just so much to see and do, sir.” The boy replied honestly, and you heard Nixon scoff under his breath as Winters unlocked the door.

“Heya meatball.” Nixon grinned in greeting as he followed Winters through the door and down the stairs and that time you really did wince.

O’Keefe looked at you hopefully and you motioned with your head for him follow them, knowing full well his curiosity must be eating him alive. Listening to the wind rustling in the trees, you sighed quietly, soaking in the peace of the moment before Winters made his way back up the stairs with O’Keefe, the boy yanking you into a hug.

“Victory in Europe! The Germans surrendered!” He crowed and you stared at him, stunned speechless for a moment before you hugged him back.

Major Winters chuckled behind him before nodding to you in confirmation, making you realize the bewildered expression that must have been on your face. You pulled back to slap O’Keefe on the shoulder with a grin.

“Gotta go get the others, there is so much booze down there!” He was vibrating with excitement.

Glancing over your shoulder towards the stairs you raised your eyebrows curiously.

“Go take a look, Corporal.” Winters nodded encouragingly before climbing into his jeep with O’Keefe and pulling out.

Hitching your rifle higher on your shoulder you carefully made your way down the stairs, mind still swirling with the news, fingertips buzzing with an odd energy you weren’t quite certain what to do with. As you stepped through the open gate into the expansive wine cellar, stocked from floor to ceiling, your eyes widened, trying to take it all in.

“What’s your favorite drink?” Nixon’s question interrupted your moment of shock, and you looked over to where he stood amid countless bottles of a richly colored red wine.

“Gin.” You replied walking further into the space, sliding your helmet from your head as he made a thoughtful noise in reply before beginning to hunt through row on row of bottles. You unshouldered your rifle to set the butt on the floor, leaning the barrel against a stack of crates before setting your helmet on top of them.

Gnawing on your lip you turned back to admire the intensity with which Nixon approached his task before a small cry of triumph escaped his lips and he pulled a green bottle from the corner, holding it out to you as he approached like the conquering hero. You could not stop the grin that tugged at your lips as you took it from him, looking over the unfamiliar label.

“Genever, from Holland. The precursor to gin. It should do.” He nodded with a self-satisfied smile.

“Thank you, Captain Nixon.” You replied warmly, doubting you’d need a whole bottle to yourself but still appreciating the gesture as you slid it into the jacket pocket of your ODs.

“Can you do me a favor?” He tilted his head.

“Sir?” You stood a little straighter.

“Call me Lewis.” He requested softly, his rich brown eyes seeking yours in the dim light of the cellar.

Swallowing roughly, your heart began to beat a little faster at the intimacy of his request as your mind flitted back to his earlier arrival.

“Only if you’ll do something in return?” You asked slowly.

“What’s that?” He leaned in, the sweetness of champagne still lingering on his breath.

“Can you stop calling O’Keefe ‘meatball’?” You tensed in anticipation of his reaction, your heart plummeting through the concrete floor when he recoiled as if you’d struck him. Guilt bloomed bitterly in your chest, a new crop to go alongside the one you had planted that day in Thalem. “Every time someone says it, I’m reminded of the worst thing I ever said to him.” You rushed to explain your request, cautiously optimistic as his gaze slowly returned to your face. “It…wasn’t his fault he panicked. I never should have spoken to him that way.”

Nixon’s brows furrowed a moment in consideration of your request. “You really care for the kid, don’t you.” He sounded resigned and you found yourself blinking at him stupidly as he made his way back over to continue perusing the shelves.

Slowly, your brain began to process the slump of his shoulders, the forced nonchalance as he examined various labels and added choice bottles to a wooden crate at his feet.

Could he possibly be… No, that seemed utterly improbable… and yet…

All that aside, it seemed as though it could not hurt to clarify your relationship with O’Keefe. “Reminds me of my kid brother, sir.”

Nixon raised his head slowly, turning back to look at you. “Like a brother…” He said thoughtfully and you bobbed your head in agreement. “Well, I suppose I can stop in that case then.” He smirked and you exhaled with a warm smile.

“Thank you very much, sir.”

He raised an eyebrow and looked down his nose at you expectantly.

“Thank you very much, Lewis.” You amended, pressing your lips together as they hummed in pleasure at forming his name.

Lewis’s lips stretched into a lopsided grin as he eyed you warmly for a few moments before turning back to the task at hand, filling the crate and adding it to a growing stack by the entrance before grabbing another one to repeat the process. Shaking your head, you perched a hip onto one of the tables behind you, eyes scanning the room, reflecting on its previous owner, surprised at the sudden tightness in your throat as you remembered the fresh news of the German surrender. Clearly it was going to take some time to sink in, and frequent reminders, but the tears that were threatening to well in your eyes needed to be quashed until you could find a quiet place to unleash them as silently as possible.

Partly out of a desire to simply say his name again, and largely out of a need to distract yourself from the rising tide of your own emotions, you called out to him softly again. “Hey Lewis?”

“Hmmm?” He replied and you found yourself taking far too much pleasure in how quickly he turned back to you.

“I, uh, I was sorry to hear about your dog.” You said meaningfully, that tightness in your throat returning with a vengeance when an unveiled look of fragility overtook his features.

For the first time in nearly a month you were utterly convinced of how Lewis was feeling and more than anything you thought the man was in dire need of a hug. Before your brain even registered you were moving, your feet propelled you across the floor to wrap around arms around him, pulling him close. Almost immediately his arms slid around you tightly in return, one hand clinging to your shoulder as the other pressed some unknown bottle into your lower back, his face burrowing into your neck.

Tightening your embrace, you held him warmly, almost a mirror image of how he had held you in Thalem. You were completely oblivious to the traitorous tears that had snuck down your cheeks until Lewis was pulling back, setting the bottle of liquor aside to cradle your jaw and swipe at them with his thumbs.

“It’s a hell of a dog, but not worth you crying over.” He teased gently and you rolled your eyes, mostly in frustration at yourself, shaking your head as you sniffed.

“Is this…really all over?” You whispered in disbelief, and he pressed his forehead to yours gently as he nodded.

“We shall be safe, dilly dilly, out of harms way.” He uttered and you let out a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sob, burying your face into his shoulder as he pulled you tightly against him.

Your fingers curled into the fabric of his shirt, unable to stop the flood of tears now that they had snuck past your defences, each shake of your frame somehow causing Lewis to hold you tighter as though he might prevent you from crumbling to pieces. The bottle of genever pressed between your bodies almost painfully, digging into your hip, giving you something tangible to focus on as you reined in your shuddering breaths, lifting your head slowly.

“God, I got your uniform all wet again.” You said, voice thick with the aftereffects of your breakdown and he shook his head as you wiped at his collar with your sleeve.

“It’ll dry just fine.” He repeated his assurance from the café with a smirk, and you gave him a watery laugh, wiping at your face roughly.

“Trooper, is that a bottle of Dutch-gin in your pocket or…” He grinned deviously and your jaw dropped before you smacked his shoulder playfully as a peal of laughter escaped your lips.

You shuffled back to put a proper amount of space between your bodies though you noted his one hand remained splayed upon your back. The one that had previously been at nape of your neck dropped to retrieve the bottle from your pocket. “If anyone is in need of a celebratory drink, it’s definitely you.” He murmured gently.

He tilted it towards you, and you reached forward to tug at the red ribbon as he held the bottle steady, breaking the wax seal over the cork. You let the debris fall to the ground before unsealing the cork with a promising ‘pop.’ You scoffed in playful protest as Lewis helped himself to first sip before setting the genever in your outstretched hand. Taking a swig, you blinked at the complexity of it compared to the dry gin you were accustomed to in England or back home. It burned its way down your throat into your empty stomach, igniting a warm glow from within.

A few rogue droplets had been left on your lips, but before you had the chance to swipe your tongue out to collect them, Lewis’s fingertips were tracing along the sensitive flesh. Your breath caught in your throat at the way his eyes were focused on your mouth as he worked at gathering every bit of liquid whilst also tracing the fullness of your lips before lifting his fingertips to suck them clean. Dizzy from lack of oxygen, Lewis’s proximity, and the way his eyes were now boring into yours, you swallowed tightly as his hand pressed tighter to your back, pulling you closer once more. His lips had barely brushed against yours when a host of voices sounded at the top of the staircase.

“You gotta be fucking kidding me.” He swore against your mouth before you darted back out of his grip, chest heaving as you shoved the cork into the bottle of genever and returned it to your pocket forcefully. You quickly began to look for something to be doing with yourself.

“I’ll start loading these into the jeep, Captain?” You asked, voice tight as a bow string and all he managed in response was a dazed nod as you quickly scooped up one of the crates filled with his choice of bottles, nodding to the newest crop of arrivals on your way up the staircase.

Taking the stairs two at a time, you set the crate into the back of the jeep Winters had left for you and O’Keefe during guard duty, trying to take deep breaths of fresh air to clear your head. Christ that had been close…close to being caught…close to kissing Lewis…You sunk your teeth into your lower lip trying to smother the broad grin that threatened to unfurl on your features. There were far too many people about now to be grinning like the cat that ate the canary. Fishing your canteen from your webbing, you took a deep sip of water before smoothing your hands over your uniform and, feeling somewhat collected, returned to the cellar to move more crates.

Lewis seemed to have regained control of his senses, not that you dared to look at him, but his directions rang out through the cellar to load most of the wine into the trucks that men has just arrived with for the enjoyment of the officers while you continued carting his personal stash up the stairs until the jeep was full to bursting. All in all, he claimed five truckloads for himself and the officers of 2nd battalion. You rode backwards in the jeep, doing your best to stabilize the crates over the rough track back into town, doing your utmost to ignore his proximity in the vehicle.

A very warm welcome awaited your return to the lavish hotel where the officers were billeted, and many hands made short work of unloading all those trucks so they might make another trip for the rest of the men. By the time you’d made your way to Lewis’s room with the last of his crates, there was barely space to move for all the alcohol stashed within. No more than a small walking path from the door to the bed, if you were being honest.

“This is the last of it, sir.” You said as you looked around for a spot to put it and he looked to you sharply.

“We talked about this…” He teased, shuffling forward to grab it from you, hoisting it over to another corner of the room but you barely heard him as your eyes fell onto the two flower crowns sitting on the window ledge beside the bed.

“You kept them?” You breathed in amazement.

He looked to you before following your gaze and he rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. “I was told to look after them for you.”

Picking your way across the floor carefully, you knelt on the bed with your boots hanging off the edge behind you, smiling softly to see they were a little dried out but truly no worse for wear. “You did an excellent job of it, Lewis.” You barely whispered his name aware the door was still open.

Setting your rifle on the floor at the foot of the bed, you put your helmet on the ledge before picking up the larger crown, rolling onto your hip and then onto your butt on the mattress in time to see him closing the door. “I’d bet money this fits you.” You smiled softly.

“Save your money, I already know.” He grinned, ducking down beneath the circlet of flowers before straightening with it perched atop his dark hair.

Your eyes widened in delight. “It fits perfectly.” Your fingers gently straightened it, unable to ignore the softness of his chocolate strands at they brushed against your fingers.

Lewis’s gaze flicked to your lips briefly before looking back to your eyes and you took a slow breath before trailing your hands down to frame his face, enjoying the slight scratch of his stubble against your palms. “Lewis…” You exhaled, and he surged forward to seal his lips against yours firmly.

He settled onto his knees before you, hands gripping your waist as you parted your legs and dropped a hand to his back to urge him closer. Needing no further invitation, he scooted forward, pressing against you as his tongue licked its way into your mouth. You weren’t quite sure who started it, but your fingers were a flurry of activity, pulling at the buttons of each others’ uniforms. All he managed to reveal was the wool shirt you wore underneath, your webbing dangling limply from your shoulders, while you found his bare chest. Growing impatient, Lewis tugged your shirt and undershirt free of your pants and ODs until he was able to slide his hand against the soft skin of your abdomen, making your lips fall back from his with a whimper.

“Damn it why are you wearing so many clothes…” He growled and you pressed your face against his hair to smother your laugh, knocking the flower crown askew.

“Some of us were on duty today.” You muttered back, nipping at the shell of his ear before pushing his shirt from his shoulders, letting your hands skate along his back.

Leaning forward, he pushed you back into the mattress, nipping and sucking his way along your jaw before he methodically began to remove your layers of clothing and webbing, starting with a ruthless tugging on your boot laces, until you were left in your army issue brassiere and underwear. To say that they left a lot to be desired in terms of style was an understatement, but the reverence in his gaze as his eyes raked over his hard-won reward soothed your ego somewhat. Plucking the crown from his head, you tossed it gently onto the windowsill before hugging his hips with your knees and rolling him onto his back intent on returning the favour, your dog tags jangling against his in a metallic collision.

As you tried to slide down to reach the laces of his boots, however, he grunted in denial, hauling you in for a hungry kiss as he pulled your pelvis snug against his, making you inhale sharply through your nose at the feel of his hard length against you. “Gotta get your pants off, Lew.” You tried to speak but he kept interrupting you with brushes of his lips or darts of his tongue into your mouth. Huffing slightly, you rocked forward against him firmly, making yourself shudder, but you managed to get his attention as his head fell back, eyes staring up at you half-lidded, jaw slack in a silent moan. “Gonna start with your boots and then I’m gonna get your pants off.”

“And then you’ll do that again…” He breathed and you nodded licking your lips as he released your hips.

You were admittedly not nearly as efficient as him, fingers made clumsy with want, but through persistence you prevailed in removing his boots, pants, and boxers, adding them to the scattered heap of clothing on the small patch of floor. Skimming your hands up his bare legs you revelled in the way he trembled slightly, sitting up to watch you impatiently as you made your way up from the floor. Halting your progress a moment, you ducked your head to lick a warm, wet stripe along the needy length of his cock where it stood proud against his lower abdomen, drawing a shaky cry of your name from his lips that convinced you to linger between his thighs a little longer.

Wrapping your fingers around him, you swirled your tongue around the tip before slowly sliding his length into your mouth, watching his cheeks flush and eyes flutter close as he wrenched at the bedding violently.

“Oh fuck, sweetheart…” He panted, his abdominal muscles flexing erratically.

Smile curling around him, you dragged your lips up his length only to sink your mouth back down onto him, covering the last bit you couldn’t manage with your fist, allowing your saliva to run freely.

“Christ you’re good at that.” There was the edge of a whine to his voice and suddenly he was pulling your mouth from him, chest heaving. “Keep that up and this’ll be over before it begins…” He muttered and sat up, gripping your hips to guide you onto the bed properly.

His lips latched onto nipple through the thin cotton of your bra before you could open your mouth to apologize, making your hips buck up against his stomach greedily as your fingers delved into his hair. Pulling the cup down he laved his tongue along the sensitive peak, before shifting his attentions to its partner, your soft sighs of pleasure filling the room. Sliding his hands to your back, he guided you up to sit before making quick work of the hook and eye closure between your shoulder blades, tossing your bra aside onto a crate of liquor before pressing you back down into the mattress with a kiss to your sternum, just above where your dog tags rested against your bare skin.

His fingers hooked into the waistband of your underwear, pulling them over your hips and down your legs before they too were unceremoniously tossed aside. “Goddamn sweetheart you are the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen.” He murmured, pressing his lips against the side of your knee before he hooked it over his shoulder as he came to rest on his stomach between your legs.

“Lew I…” You started to protest, embarrassed about the fact that you hadn’t seen a shower in a few days, but the words died on your lips as his fingers ran through your slick folds.

“You’re so wet, did I make you this wet?” He murmured in awe, and you nodded slowly, his answering grin almost blinding in its intensity. “Well, best not let it go to waste.” Lewis winked before sealing his mouth over your core, sucking the very breath from your lungs as his tongue delved hungrily to find your sensitive bundle of nerves.

Throwing your arm over your mouth, you smothered a harsh curse of delight into the crook of your elbow as he slung his forearm across your hips to pin them down so he might better intensify the level of pleasure he was dealing you as his tongue plunged into your heat. His nose took over the stimulation of your clit, while the stubble on his cheeks and jaw made your inner thighs tremble. The sounds he was making between your legs were positively lewd and only heightened the swirling headiness that wrapped around you. You clung to his hair as he began to suck on your clit, making you see stars behind your clenched eyelids, every exhale an eager moan or keen smothered against your skin.

Lewis’s hand slid up along your side to cup your breast, his fingers shifting to pinch and roll at your nipple, vaulting you over the edge as you rambled his name over and over. The tension of ecstasy slowly ebbed from your body, and he lifted his head with a broad grin, swiping at his upper lip with his thumb before sucking it clean. “Someday I’m gonna do that somewhere so remote you can scream at the top of your lungs.” He nuzzled your hair, pressing his lips to your ear as you laughed breathlessly.

“You sound so certain…” You teased, but he merely raised an eyebrow in response, his palm cupping your still-sensitive core, making your eyes roll back in your head.

“I am, yes. Certain that I can make you cum with my hands, my mouth, my cock. Certain that I’d like the opportunity to do so again and again…” You forced your eyes open to look over his features slowly.

“Yeah?” You exhaled, not quite sure what you had been expecting when you fell into bed with him, just knowing it was what you had wanted above all else in that moment.

“Yeah, sweetheart, until you’re sick of me.” He kissed you gently, the salty tang of your release still on his lips.

Gripping the back of his head, you returned the kiss hungrily, shifting your hips to rock up against his length, swallowing his ragged moan as you finally fulfilled your promise to repeat that motion. “Show me.” You whispered, aching to feel him inside you.

Lewis exhaled hotly against your lips before shifting his hips back, the blunt head of his cock pressing against your entrance before he rocked forward to slowly sink into you. He sealed his mouth over yours almost painfully as you whimpered hungrily, his own rumble of pleasure reverberating through your chest. His head fell to rest against your collarbone, his breath caressing your skin once he was fully seated inside you, unmoving.

“Lew…” You whimpered softly, digging your fingers into his shoulders, writhing against him slightly.

“I know, sweetheart just…fuck you’ll be my undoing…” He whispered before he kissed you fiercely, pulling his hips back only to thrust forward once more, earning a moan of delight from you.

Your bodies began the push and pull of carnal pleasure, moving in tandem as though this were your hundredth coupling rather than your first. Grasping your knee, Lewis hiked it higher on his hip, angling his thrusts deeper into your willing body, making you toss your head to the side as you clenched your jaw against the desire to wail in delight.

“Wish I could…hear you so fucking badly…” He grit out before grasping your chin and turning your face back so he could press his mouth to yours as he rut against you firmly, his pubic bone grinding against your clit deliciously.

Your orgasm crashed over you like a tidal wave, the vicious undertow nearly obliterating your ability to think as Lewis quickly pulled out from your convulsing warmth to release across your abdomen with an agonized groan that was admittedly less than concealed before he collapsed onto the bed at your side. The pair of you lay there, speechless, covered in a sheen of sweat, chests heaving with frantic breaths before he shifted to feather soft kisses along the side of your face, reaching for a weathered scrap of green cloth that served as an army handkerchief to wipe your skin clean.

The ferocious growl your stomach emitted in the relative silence of the room had you tense as Lewis cracked up. “Sweetheart when was the last time you ate?”

“Oh, Christ I don’t know…” You muttered, covering your face with both hands in mortification.

Laughing richly, he kissed your knuckles before forcing himself up. “Alright, ok. Food. I’m going to find you some food. And then I’m going to spend the rest of this night right here in this bed with you, so don’t you go anywhere.” He looked down at you with playful seriousness as he stepped into the pants of your ODs, ruining the effect. “Shit.” He muttered.

Giggling into your palm, you shook your head before sighing as you pulled the blankets over your bare skin, feeling the chill of the mountain air now that he’d taken his body heat away from you. “Hey Lew?”

He looked to you quickly, nearly dressed – in his own clothes this time. “Yeah, sweetheart?”

“I’ll be here.” You smiled warmly, the stretch of your lips only widened by the grin of glee he directed at you before climbing back into bed to kiss you warmly. Your poor, empty digestive system growled insistently, and he huffed against your lips.

“Alright, fine…I’ll be back with food.” Lewis kissed your cheek before sliding into his jump boots and stepping out with his laces untied in search of sustenance for you both, fully intent on not making another public appearance until the next morning.

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

Band of Brothers Masterlist

Tag list: @fuckoffthanos

[elryuse]

Yandere Hanni?

Ruined Photos

YANDERE HANNI X MALE READER

The flash from Y/n's camera seemed to momentarily blind Jisoo, a rising starlet with a face like an angel. She blinked, momentarily disoriented, the perfect pout she'd been holding dissolving. Then, a shriek tore through the studio. Jisoo's stylist, a woman perpetually on the verge of a breakdown, rushed at her, face pale.

"The strap! It's broken!" she wailed, frantically trying to cover Jisoo's chest with a flimsy scrap of fabric. The near-wardrobe malfunction sent a jolt of nervous energy through the crew. Y/n, ever the professional, apologized profusely, his brow furrowed in concern. This was the third "accident" in a month.

It had all started subtly. A misplaced earring here, a strategically undone zipper there. Now, full-blown wardrobe malfunctions were plaguing Y/n's photoshoots, all featuring the hottest female idols in Korea. The whispers started – "cursed camera," "bad luck Y/n." His once booming career was starting to sputter.

Meanwhile, Hanni, the Kpop goddess, the woman Y/n had known since her awkward debut days, watched from the sidelines, a manic glint in her usually playful eyes. She'd seen the way other girls – Jisoo included – fluttered their eyelashes at Y/n during shoots. The way their laughter lingered a touch too long after a shared joke. It ignited a cold fury within her, a possessive fire that threatened to consume her.

One evening, after another disastrous shoot with a pouty idol named Seulgi, Y/n slumped onto his couch, the weight of his failing career pressing down on him. His phone buzzed – a text from Hanni. "Feeling down, sunshine photographer?" it read. A small smile tugged at his lips. Hanni was always there for him, a beacon of light in his dark days.

He drove to her apartment, the familiar scent of jasmine incense greeting him as he entered. Hanni, clad in a baggy sweater and sweatpants, a stark contrast to her usual glamorous persona, was curled up on the couch, a tub of ice cream in hand.

"H-hey," Y/n said softly, concern etched on his face. Hanni offered him a spoonful of ice cream, her smile strained. "Everything's going to be alright, Y/n," she said, her voice a low murmur. "I'll help you, I promise."

The "help" came in unexpected ways. Hanni, known for her shrewd business sense, used her connections to secure him private shoots with high-end brands. He photographed her exclusively, their dynamic shifting from professional to…something more. He found himself drawn to the intensity in her eyes, the way she clung to him after shoots, a silent plea in her touch.

Slowly, subtly, Hanni began isolating him. "Those shoots are beneath you," she'd say, her voice laced with a possessiveness he couldn't quite place. "You deserve better. You deserve me." He, drowning in the warmth of her affection after the cold shoulder from the industry, readily agreed.

One night, after a particularly grueling shoot, Hanni led him to a secluded cabin in the woods. It was supposed to be a getaway, a chance to unwind. But the isolation gnawed at Y/n. He missed the camaraderie of the crew, the thrill of a new project. He tried to suggest going back, but Hanni's smile turned brittle.

"Why would you want to leave, Y/n?" she asked, her voice tight. "Don't you see? We're perfect here. Just you and me."

The final blow came when he found a hidden box in the cabin – newspaper clippings about the "accidents" on his shoots, meticulously documented. The realization hit him like a physical blow – Hanni was behind it all. He confronted her, his voice shaking with a mixture of fear and betrayal.

Hanni's eyes, usually sparkling with mischief, were now cold and calculating. "I had to," she said, her voice devoid of emotion. "They were all trying to take you away from me. But you're mine, Y/n. Mine forever."

The cabin became his gilded cage. He was a famous photographer, yes, but only to Hanni's world. The outside world knew him as her personal chronicler, a mere extension of her carefully crafted image. He yearned for the freedom of his old life, but the fear in Hanni's eyes whenever he mentioned leaving kept him chained to her side.

He photographed her beauty, her sadness, her rage, all the while a prisoner of her twisted love. The flash from his camera no longer captured fleeting moments, but a chilling reality. A reality where the line between love and obsession had blurred beyond recognition, Y/n finished his internal monologue with a heavy sigh. He stared out the cabin window, watching the sun dip below the tree line, painting the sky in hues of orange and purple. A pang of longing shot through him, a yearning for the bustling city life he'd left behind.

Suddenly, Hanni materialized beside him, her eyes gleaming with a manic intensity. "What are you thinking about, sunshine photographer?" she purred, her voice laced with a sweetness that sent shivers down his spine.

Y/n forced a smile. "Just admiring the view," he lied, his gaze flickering away from hers. He couldn't bring himself to tell her the truth – that he missed the freedom, the creativity of working with different artists.

As if sensing his turmoil, Hanni cupped his face in her soft hands, her touch sending a conflicting wave of warmth and unease through him. "Don't worry, Y/n," she whispered, her voice thick with emotion. "We have everything we need here. Each other."

The possessiveness in her voice was undeniable, a stark contrast to the playful Hanni he once knew. He wanted to argue, to tell her he craved more, but the fear that flickered in her eyes, a fear of losing him, silenced him. He couldn't bear to see that spark of light extinguish completely.

Later that night, nestled in her arms, a sudden idea struck him. Maybe, just maybe, there was a way to salvage some semblance of his career within the confines of his gilded cage.

The next morning, he approached Hanni with a tentative proposal. "How about," he began cautiously, "we create a new concept for your next comeback? Something raw, emotional, shot entirely here in the cabin?"

Hanni's eyes widened in surprise, then a slow smile spread across her face. "A love story, shot by your loving boyfriend?" she said, her voice laced with a hint of amusement. "Interesting."

Y/n elaborated on his vision, weaving a narrative of passionate, all-consuming love set against the backdrop of their isolated cabin life. He poured his longing for a normal career into creating a masterpiece, a testament to their "unique" bond.

Hanni listened intently, her possessiveness morphing into a twisted kind of excitement. When he finished, she threw her arms around him, burying her face in his chest. "Yes, Y/n," she breathed. "This is perfect. We'll show the world the power of our love."

The photoshoot was intense, charged with an underlying current of fear and obsession. Y/n pushed Hanni to her emotional limits, capturing a vulnerability she'd never shown before. The final product was breathtaking – a series of haunting photographs that laid bare the raw, unfiltered essence of Hanni's love for him.

The comeback was a mega-hit. Fans devoured the concept, praising Hanni's emotional depth and Y/n's masterful storytelling through the lens. He became known as "Hanni's Muse," his career tethered solely to her.

Y/n never regained his old freedom, but he found a twisted satisfaction in his work. He was a prisoner, yes, but a highly respected one. He documented Hanni's every whim, every desire, his camera a constant reminder of the beautiful, terrifying world he now inhabited. He was forever bound to the woman who loved him with a passion as all-consuming as it was deranged. He was Hanni's, and Hanni's alone, forever trapped in the gilded cage of her love.

[thanotaphobia]

stay

hello pissa nation, i'm here to declare that i'm actually in charge of canon now and this is what happens ty xo

CROSS POSTED TO AO3

⋆

Missa comes back to grab his backpack he left and finds Phil in the kitchen.

It’s an accident– he would’ve thought at this time of night the other would be asleep, but he’s wrong. The light hadn’t even been on. Phil had just been sitting in the dark, and Missa had shrieked long and loud when he’d flipped on the lanterns and found him perched on a stool staring at nothing in the dark.

Once he’s recovered from his heart attack, Missa has at least enough decorum to cough and ask: “Why are you awake?”

“Why are you here?” Phil immediately fires back, and that’s when Missa clocks into the fact something is very, very wrong.

Philza looks like a mess. His hair is loose and limp, framing a face that looks gaunter than Missa remembers it being. The eyebags he’s sporting are truly impressive. His wrists look strangely thin where they lie on the countertop, fingers clasped in a knot of knuckles. Phil looks like he hasn’t eaten or slept well in weeks. The tone of voice he uses with Missa is all wrong, edges and sharp angles and accusing words.

“I left– my bag,” Missa says. He shuffles to the side where he had dropped it earlier and forgotten it before dipping and getting distracted by the capybaras. “The last of my things.”

“The last?” Phil asks, and it’s like the last piece of twine holding him together snaps. “So you’re gone, then. For good.”

“Not from the island,” Missa says. “Just– I’m useless, I know you don’t want me here, it’s not like I’m doing anything for you.” Plus whenever I’m around you I go a little crazy stupid, he doesn’t say. He can only avoid Phil for so long– maybe this conversation was a while coming. “I haven’t lived here in a long time. And with Chayanne gone, I don’t see why–”

“Why you have to stay?” Phil asks, then laughs. It’s grating, abrasive. Missa winces.

“He’s not here anymore,” he says. The reminders of Chayanne hurt. They hurt like nothing Missa’s ever felt before. The memories come flooding in unbidden, of warm mornings making breakfast in this very kitchen, wandering around the top of the wall. Chayanne is written into the cracks and corners of this house and that’s fine, but Missa knows he can’t stay here with Phil in the same way they’ve been for the past few months. Not without something changing.

“And so you leave,” Phil says, nodding. “Okay, cool. I see– I get it. It’s fine.”

“I mean…” Missa slings on his backpack. “Are you sure? You don’t look–”

“It’s fine,” Phil repeats. Missa is about ready to run, but something makes him linger and slow down, stepping back towards the door. But Phil doesn’t say anything, just stares at the mess of his own hands. Missa takes another step back, and another.

“Bye,” he offers softly. Phil doesn’t answer, and so after another agonizing moment of waiting, Missa turns. In the same second, his heart shatters.

And then–

"No, stop," Phil says, and Missa pauses in the doorway. The pieces of his heart record-scratch on their way to the floor, and slowly– very slowly– start to rewind back upwards. "I don't–"

When Missa looks back at him, Phil is breathing hard, like he's just run a long way. Neither of them move. The words come out next ragged and scratchy, torn out in fits and bursts between teeth. "I don't want you to leave. The house is– so quiet, with them gone."

It's cruel, but Missa doesn't say anything for a moment. Just lets the silence sit between them.

"I think I'm going crazy," Phil says next, clearly nearing desperation. “I keep finding things. Seeing things. I take pictures, but they disappear. I try to show someone, it’s gone. I’m being fucking messed with, Missa, and I can’t– I can’t do this anymore. I can’t be alone.”

“What changed?” Missa asks. He still hasn’t crossed the threshold yet, caught inside. He feels a little bit like a fly trying to escape a glue trap. Like there might be an inevitable conclusion despite his efforts.

“I don’t know,” Phil says, burying his face into his hands and letting out one long whoosh of air. “I don’t– I just can’t do it anymore.”

The glue constricts. Missa feels his throat tighten, his eyes smart. The backpack that had felt so secure on his shoulders just a minute ago loosens, and then slips to the floor. He sets it down gently, taking a few short, quiet steps to where Phil sits on the stool. He hesitates, but only for a moment– Phil is clearly putting himself out there right now. Missa thinks this might be the first time he's seen his husband so honest, so distraught, and it’s that which gives him courage to do the same. He reaches out and catches Phil’s elbow in his hand, the other one reaching up to draw one of Phil’s hands away from his face. He’s surprised to see tears silently falling down Phil’s cheeks, but neither of them say anything for another long second. Missa just holds his arm and Phil looks back.

“I love you,” Missa says. He says it slowly, purposefully. The translator won’t miss a word this time. “Do you know that?”

“Yeah,” Phil says. His fingers grip Missa’s hand, firm and unyielding. 

“No, no,” Missa says. He doesn’t think Phil gets it. He changes his grip, makes it so he’s the one holding Phil for a change. “I love you. Do you get it?”

Phil nods imperceptibly, just the briefest shake of his head. “I know.”

“Then why don’t you say anything?”

“I’m not–” Phil stutters, stops, and then starts again. “I’m bad at…”

“Nothing,” Missa interrupts. He feels strangely calm, weirdly in control. This is a situation he can handle and Phil can’t. It’s not something they’ve run into together before. “You’re bad at nothing and good at everything, Philza. You are strong. It’s part of why I love you.”

Slowly, Phil leans forward. He inches closer until he’s collapsed almost entirely against Missa, his head resting on Missa’s shoulder and staining his jacket with tears. Missa doesn’t let go of his hand or his elbow, cradling him and supporting him as he goes nearly limp. There’s a hot brush of air against his upper arm as Phil says, “I need you.”

It’s a strange feeling, to know you’re needed by the one man on the server who doesn’t need anything, ever. The man who forgave you for running, who treated you with kindness you probably didn’t deserve, the man who has saved your life a hundred times over. The same man who killed a code monster and raised two kids without so much as complaining once needs Missa, the sad sack of an absentee dad who can barely hold a sword right.

I need you is as close as you can get to love with a man like that, Missa thinks. He’ll take it. He tightens his grip on Phil’s arm and kisses the side of his head ever so softly, pressing his nose to the top of his hair and inhaling.

“I won’t go,” he says. He feels the sob more than he hears it, the shuddering that wracks Phil’s whole body, and moves one hand to rub his back in gentle circles. He breathes and makes a promise: “I’ll stay.”

[waitineedaname]

Very specific but I'd love Jiang Cheng being Jin Ling's favorite uncle in aro4aro chengqing au and Wei Wuxian being mortally offended

People seemed to think that Jiang Yanli was completely blind to her brothers’ faults. This was not true. She just generally did not think those faults were nearly as bad as people made them out to be. Most of what other people found bothersome about her brothers, she was charmed by because she was nothing if not a doting sister.

Being doting and fond, however, did not mean she was unaware of how annoying her brothers were. In fact, due to regular exposure to the two of them, she was extremely aware of just how annoying they could be.

Case in point: their tendency to make everything into a competition, including the affection of her own son.

“I’m just saying, if anyone is going to be the fun uncle, it’s obviously me,” Wei Wuxian said, shaking a rattle over Jin Ling’s head.

“He’s two,” Jiang Cheng snapped, bouncing Jin Ling on his knee. “Anything that moves and makes noise is fun to him.”

“Well, I move and make the most noise, so.” Wei Wuxian leaned in and started making faces at his nephew. “Right, A-Ling? Right?”

Jin Ling gurgled happily and clapped his hands.

Jiang Yanli sighed and leaned against her husband. She appreciated her brothers taking her son off her hands for a while, but really, they were enough of a handful themselves. “Don’t fight, boys,” she said, shaking her head fondly. “A-Ling loves you both.”

“Yeah, but he loves me most, right shijie?” Wei Wuxian shot her a grin. Jiang Cheng huffed and smacked the back of his head, making Jin Ling shriek happy peals of laughter. She could practically feel Zixuan roll his eyes behind her.

“Please don’t give my son ideas,” he said in the long-suffering tone he tended to adopt when he had to be patient with his brothers-in-law. Yanli appreciated the fragile civility they attempted these days. “A-Ling, no hitting, okay?”

“Unless it’s your da-jiu,” Jiang Cheng added in a loud whisper, “Then you should hit him as hard as you can.” 

“Nooo, A-Ling would never hit me, he’s such a good boy, isn’t he?” Wei Wuxian cooed, tickling Jin Ling’s belly. Jin Ling shrieked with laughter again and one of his flailing fists collided directly with Wei Wuxian’s eye. 

Yanli only barely managed to hide her laugh behind her hand. Jiang Cheng snickered, and Zixuan let out a quiet huff of laughter.

“Ah, it was just an accident!” Wei Wuxian insisted. “He’s going to be a very strong cultivator with quick reflexes someday, I can tell!” And then, because he never learned to leave well enough alone, he said, “We should just ask him. Just because he’s little, that doesn’t mean he can’t answer questions!” He poked Jin Ling in the belly again to get his attention, “A-Ling, who’s your favorite? Da-jiu or jiujiu?”

Technically, Jiang Cheng should be er-jiu, but he got priority as the one who met Jin Ling first and saw him the most often. It couldn’t really be helped; Wei Wuxian was still unofficially banned from Carp Tower due to his inability to stay out of trouble, which meant Jiang Cheng got to visit his nephew on diplomatic visits, but Wei Wuxian only got to see him during their frequent trips to Lotus Pier. That meant Jiang Yanli was fairly certain she knew the answer, even before Jin Ling said it.

“Jiujiu!” he happily cried, reaching up to grab Jiang Cheng’s cheeks. The betrayal on Wei Wuxian’s face was comical, especially compared to the way Jiang Cheng’s face lit up. Yanli felt a little bad for Wei Wuxian’s feelings, but it was worth it to see her typically dour baby brother beam under his nephew’s uncomplicated affection.

“Ah, come here A-Xian,” Yanli said, sitting up so she wasn’t leaning against Zixuan and could instead summon her pouting brother to her side. “Don’t take it to heart, okay? He’s a baby, he doesn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”

“I know, I know, shijie,” Wei Wuxian sighed, but leaned in so she could pet his hair anyway. “You don’t think I would be resentful of a baby, do you?”

The noise Jin Zixuan made behind her made it very clear that he wouldn’t put it past Wei Wuxian to be resentful of a baby. Yanli reached back and pinched his thigh, but otherwise focused on Wei Wuxian. “The next baby we have, I’ll deliver here in Lotus Pier, how about that? Qing-mei can be my midwife, and you can get first dibs on holding the baby. Aside from me and A-Xuan, of course.”

“Promise?” he said, giving her the pleading eyes that always earned him an extra portion of soup. 

“I promise.” She kissed his forehead, and this seemed to improve his mood, though his eyes immediately narrowed in suspicion in Jin Zixuan’s direction. 

“You’re not already having another baby, are you?” he asked. Zixuan coughed awkwardly, and Yanli pinched Wei Wuxian’s cheek this time.

“A-Xian, be nice,” she said, lightly scolding. “We’ll tell you when we know, okay?”

“Okay, shijie,” Wei Wuxian grumbled, still shooting Jin Zixuan judgmental looks. He turned back to Jin Ling, who was being gently tossed in the air by Jiang Cheng. “A-Ling! Do you wanna go down the river and visit A-Yuan?”

“Yuan-ge, Yuan-ge!” Jin Ling happily exclaimed, clapping his hands. His uncles scooped him up and grabbed the bag of diapers and snacks Yanli had brought, bundling him out onto the pier with promises not to drown their beloved nephew in the lake. 

Zixuan let out a tired sigh as soon as they left the room, taking his turn to lean against his wife’s side. “Why are they always this exhausting?” 

Yanli laughed and petted his hair. “Maybe another baby would give them something else to focus on,” she suggested lightly. Zixuan immediately flushed red and hid his face in her shoulder, making her laugh again. 

Yes, her brothers’ antics could be annoying, but they were good uncles. She was very grateful to be able to trust her son in their hands for a few hours.

[romanoffsbish]

Cooking With Timmy

Florence Pugh x Pregnant!R

Warnings: Brief mention of loss

Florence entered your shared home with a long, drawn out sigh, it'd been a long week away, and all she wanted was a glass of wine, a decent meal, and to fall asleep holding you.

Her plans faltered though when she stumbled into the hallway and peered into the kitchen.

There she found a curious little boy on the floor with an array of seasonings, pots and pans.

"Hey guys!" He shrieked at his iPad that was recording. "Welcome back to Cooking with Flo, I'm Timmy Pugh, her fill in until she returns."

——

Florence bit back a chuckle, as well as a sob because this is the first time he'd called himself by her namesake that she'd heard. It'd been about three years since you and Flo had taken the orphaned boy in, so this was monumental.

Back then your relationship was still fresh, it'd only been a year, and though it was blissful, you'd only just said I love you to each other in a way that mattered before you got the call that changed everything. Being parents one day was a conversation you'd vaguely had with each other while drinking yourselves silly. It was believed to be a far off subject to broach when things got serious. Not on a random Tuesday.

So, when your close friend Laura was in a life ending accident, you couldn't exactly deny her final wishes that designated him to be given to the both of you. His father wasn't around, and her chaotic family wasn't an option. She clearly had faith in your relationship, you confirmed that when you found out she signed you up for parenthood before you were even a couple.

She just hadn't told you since she thought she had time, but the universe is fickle that way.

Florence and you wasted no time, you got your paperwork together, and went down to the courthouse the following morning to legally bind yourselves, it felt rushed, but even with the fear of the moment backfiring in the future it was still easy to say I do. Florence was your forever, you always knew that deep down.

With marriage came the name changes, Y/N Pugh had a ring to it, and it also offered security over the smooth custodial transition of your son, Timothy Pugh, who at the time had only just turned three when you took him in.

It was easy enough for him to trust you since he knew you well, but he still had quite a hard time. Every single day came with blow out tantrums that would put a strain on anyone. Florence was sometimes too exhausted from her long days on set to handle his episodes with kindness, so you decidedly took turns.

When she was clearly at a low energy level you'd send her to relax, then you'd scoop the boy up, and sing him a lullaby you recalled his mom would sing to him. This always worked. Because when it was your turn to be spread too thin Flo would pick up the slack. She'd put the emotional toddler on her hip, and animatedly describe to him her day as she made dinner.

Every time you'd reconvene, and the parent that couldn't handle the tantrum would take him and offer him gentleness as they got him ready for bed. He'd go down in his bed, but without fail he'd wind up between you both.

It was complicated, but with therapy, and the sweet reminders of his mother, things began to look up around his fifth birthday. Once he started grade school he was able to cycle some of his energy into recess or making friends.

Soon enough he was the happy go lucky boy you remembered him to be before he lost his mom. He'd actually been calling you mama for the last year now, you beamed the first time.

Florence however had been met with Flossie. Something he was familiar saying since he was two, so it just carried on, but it always worried her that he didn't feel comfortable calling her mom. She wondered if her work schedule made him feel less valuable, or as if she was only a guest in his home that she partially owned.

Then she heard him continue his monologue, her hazel eyes closed as a couple happy tears streamed down her face, her heart felt full.

"Mommy Flossie is really busy right now," he informed his crowd of zero. "Mama said she is working on a new movie, because she's like a superstar or something. How cool is she?!"

He paused to shake a salt shaker over a pot that was actually empty, but his mimicry of Flo's mannerisms was shockingly spot on. Especially as he lifted a wine glass of juice to his lips, Florence felt a wave of embarrassment at being so incredibly transparent to her son.

"My friend Jackson told me she's British." He frowned as he shrugged, not understanding the implications of his friends words. "But then my friend Amelia said she's actually a superhero," he relayed excitedly, "I like her idea better."

He stirred the faux contents of the pot with a wide grin that Florence admired through the recording on his screen as he rambled on.

"Spying on our son are we?" Florence jumped as you suddenly spawned behind her. She turned to face you immediately, her hands took their rightful place, one on your protruding baby bump, and the other cupped your cheek.

"He's recorded like five episodes today."

Florence deeply pouted, "I'm missing it, huh?"

You shook your head, wrapping your arms around her neck so you could pull her into a soft kiss, your baby bump slotted to the side of her body as she melted into the affection.

"One of us had to work my love," you reminded her. "Acting was always your dream, becoming a parent wasn't on your 2020 Bingo card."

"Neither was a global pandemic that forced us to move into the same house two months into our relationship if we wanted it to work. It was like the world wanted to make sure we never broke up." Florence smiled at the thought.

"Yeah, 2020 was an odd year," you teased, and kissed her smirking lips, the kiss was heatless, but passionate in its own regards. It lasted an entire minute until your sons voice cut in.

"Mama! I want to make dinner tonight."

You stared down at him with a practiced quirk of your brow. Florence watched as the two of you stared the other down until he softly sighed, "Mama, can I please help with dinner?"

"What a polite boy, thank you for offering to help and using your manners baby, but I was going to order in since this one just got home," you gently crushed your sons dreams, you couldn't help it, but you'd been craving a big mac with extra pickles and sauce all day long.

Florence shook her head though, and scooped the much bigger boy up with an ease that reminded you of her Marvel workout regimen.

"I could really use a sous chef so that Mama and your baby sister here can eat something besides Maccy's." Florence evaded your hand as it attempted to slap her in the shoulder. "We better hurry bubby, Mama seems hangry."

Timmy giggled wildly on her hip as she ran the pair of them to the kitchen. You smiled at the scene as it unfolded before you with a hand on your bump. Rubbing it fondly as you saw the wonderful mom your wife was that she herself didn't exactly see. Florence might not always be home, but she was always there when she was, and that alone counted for everything.

"Mama! Go sit down and relax!" You smiled, and shook your head at your sons outburst.

"Okay, you two make sure not to burn my kitchen down!" Florence scoffed, "As if..."

Florence and Timmy started by washing all the pots he'd used as toys, then afterwards she rewarded the boy with a kiss on his cheek that made him giggle and her heart soar. Then she propped her phone up and started up a cooking with Flo. Tim's hands and voice were all she allowed on the tape, your son was aware of his exposure to the internets limits so he didn't take any offense. He happily played his part.

The duo decided to try their hand at making a Big Mac for you, vegan patties of course. This led to the blonde gushing about you and the pregnancy on her story as your son filled them in on the things even Florence hadn't seen. It made her feel guilty all over again for having not been here for huge chunks of your lives.

She knew you were right, that she had a career to build so your family would be secure. It didn't stop her from wanting to quit though. Hearing about how tired you've been from the babes mouth made her wonder if the spotlight she found herself under mattered anymore.

When she had a growing boy who deserved her sole attention before your infant arrived, and you who deserved to rest in this last trimester.

Florence texted her manager as your son set the table all on his own. He beamed up at your wife whenever he felt he did something right, and she always praised him, never letting the argument on her phone interfere with their precious time together. "Mommy?"

The blonde nearly dropped her phone as he directed the title at her. "Yes bubby?"

"Is it true that you're a super hero?"

She smirked, "I'm actually an anti-hero."

Timmy looked at her puzzled, he now stood right in front of her wearing the expression so that she could catch onto his confused drift.

Florence dropped to her knees so she could look him in the eyes as she spoke. "That's when the person is in between good and evil. They are trying to figure out the best way to make things work, sometimes they do good, and others they do really bad things. Way cooler."

"What's cool?" You asked as you settled down at the table, Florence froze as your son enthusiastically cheered, "Being the bad guy."

Florence's jaw dropped, she attempted to fix the moment, but fortunately Timmy did.

"She was telling me about her character."

Dinner went smoothly from there, your moans of appreciation told your wife she'd done the food of your heart justice. It made her happy to take care of you, knowing that she was able to give you what you wanted, while making sure your daughter got the nutrients she needed.

Also, it made her feel less guilty being able to take some of the load off of you. You'd never complained, you simply took it all in stride, but she sees the way your smile is tired, and she catches the hand pressed into your lower back.

Carrying a baby is no joke, she knows that, so she does whatever needs to be done when she's home, and after tonight she plans to be here far more often. In a weeks time she'll be done with her current film, and the other's won't start shooting until after your daughters birthday.

When your son saw you getting up with the dishes he stopped you with a hand on your bump, and carried it to the sink for you. Flo scooped him up moments later, and tickled him until he was unable to breathe right.

"Careful Flossie, don't suffocate my baby." Your lover rolled her eyes, then she made her way over to help your wobbly self to your feet.

"You go take a nice long shower my love, I'll handle his bedtime routine." Florence kissed your cheek, and Timmy mirrored her action as he was sat on her hip. "You deserve it mama."

"Thank you my loves," you couldn't hide the emotional timbre of your voice, your eyes glistened in a direct call out. "Goodnight to you then my baby boy, I'll see you in the morning."

Timmy grinned, "We're making french toast!"

"My tummy is already rumbling," you enthused back, then happily slipped off to your en suite.

After Timmy was clean and in his PJ's, she decided to bring him with her to your room. Where she read him a story as he laid on her, and within a few minutes time he was snoring.

Florence carded a hand through his damp hair, she watched him in amusement as his eyes fluttered beneath the lids. Her tired mind wandered to what he might be dreaming about, the possibilities with him are endless, but she is almost certain it's either dinosaurs or fairies.

His obsession with Tinkerbell was her favorite.

"What's got you smiling?" Florence's lips widened when she saw you toweling your hair.

"I was thinking after the baby is six months we could leave her with my parents and take Tim-Tim here to Disneyland." She placed a kiss to his forehead then went on. "He is big enough to ride things now, and he'd love to meet the characters. We can do the brunch with them."

You smiled at her, delighted by her idea, but then your brows furrowed in confusion. "What about that horror film you were excited for?"

"I told them to push the filming to the end of 2024, or to recast me." Florence shrugged with an air of genuine indifference. "They moved it to October, so baby Pugh will be a year old."

"Baby Pugh," you softly repeated, hand softly caressing your bump as you realized you'd yet to give your daughter a name. Even when she was due to arrive within the next two months. Florence's hand joined yours as you stood beside the bed, and before she could soothe your worries she was gasping, "She kicked."

In all seven months of your pregnancy the little girl had yet to let Florence feel the harsh jabs she subjected you to. One time, when Flo felt like sleeping on the couch, she'd told you that you had to be exaggerating. You weren't, and she knew that now. Sometimes you wondered if you watched Flo's "Fighting With My Family" one too many times whenever you missed her. Because you were now absolutely certain your daughter had the potential to be in the WWE.

"I'm glad that brings you joy," you teased through a wince as the little one kicked again, this time much stronger, your belly even shook.

"Oh darling, I'm so sorry I doubted you," Flo giggled softly as she saw an imprint form under the skin, and you smiled tenderly down at her as you moved to put your hand over hers. "You should be, it's because she hears you talking."

Florence tried to deny it, but you were already two steps ahead of her. Showing her the videos of whenever she kicks, and how it's usually as you rewatched old family videos. Each shake or prod of your belly followed her laugh or words.

Your wife gently moved the boy on top of her onto the mattress, then stood up, briefly she kissed your lips before bending to be eye level with your pregnancy bump. "Hello Lyla," she tried, but she was met with a sudden stillness.

"Okay, how about hello baby Patricia."

"No," you vetoed immediately, then the both of you felt a powerful kick, baby Pugh agreed.

"I'm running out of names little one."

"Florence, that was two names," you laughed and she looked up at you with a tired smile. "I'm jet lagged my love, please do forgive me."

"Come on then," you paused, taking her hand in yours as you guided her to her side of the bed, "We'll discuss everything in due time."

Florence however flipped your positions, and gently helped you into your side. Then she straddled your thighs, leaving you to quirk a distrusting brow at her. She shook her head, then gestured to the sleeping boy beside you before her hands began to bring you to bliss.

Every press of her hands against your bump was heavenly, and in no time you yawned. It was a miracle that you were still awake when she finally finished. Clambering off of you she moved to sit beside you instead, leaning down so she could kiss all over your face before she landed on your lips with a contented sigh.

"I think Samantha could be cute." You both chuckled when a soft kick resounded beneath her hand that was still settled atop your bump.

"Timmy and Sammy against the world?" You both chuckled softly at your sleepy son's voice cutting through the already sweet moment. "We could be like mommy and be anti heroes."

"Where does that leave me?" You inquired, and he sleepily shrugged, a move that brought him closer to you, he easily snuggled into your side. "At home making all of us cookies of course."

"Oh of course," you conceded, but sent your wife a disapproving, heatless glare over it.

"A cookie might make us less evil mommy," he reasoned. "Mommy's are never as sweet."

Florence had already settled in behind your son, wearing a mischievous grin as she leaned in to whisper: "That's cause mama pours the entire bag of chocolate chips into the batter."

"Go to sleep," you barked. "Both of you."

"Yes ma'am," the two giggled in sync and you couldn't help but to smile at their childish camaraderie. "I love you mama," your sons tired whisper of affection made your eyes glisten. "I love you too bug." Then he sweetly rubbed your belly. "I love you Sammy Pugh."

He giggled as she kicked, "She loves me too."

"Of course she does," you reasoned, settling a kiss to his temple. "You're her big brother."

Florence observed the moment with an adoring smile, but it held an obvious longing as well. It wasn't unlike her to watch moments like this between the both of you, it's one of the main reasons she was so adamant on taking a break.

Timmy deserved her time, and she not so secretly craved his reserved affections.

Then he rolled over, she softly gasped as he burrowed into her chest. "I love you mommy." Her arms wrapped around him tightly, and she shakily whispered, "I love you my lil sous chef."

Florence's eyes sought yours out as soon as his soft snoring filled the space. You'd already been looking at them, neither of you said a word, you just admired the other as a steady flow of happy tears trailed down your faces.

This was all either of you had ever wanted. A happy little family, unconventionally formed, but brought to the now by unconditional love.

——

3,135 Words

❤️ K 💋