#the writing hiatus

[gay-mirrorball]

i just ran out of fics to read 😣😣😣 can u guys send me some recs

(preferably jegulus and wolfstar fics)

also feel free to send some prompts if you’d like, i think writing would be helpful rn

[gay-mirrorball]

so um i saw this and immediately opened my laptop…. would it be okay if i wrote a fic with this theme ? 😨

jegulus au where regulus becomes the first chair violinist and the conductor is none other than the famous effie potter

the catch? effie’s son is there every rehearsal and reg gets easily distracted with the handsome man’s unwavering stare.

[acid-ixx]

a loving family, an unpalatable desire

reblogs and interactions are encouraged and appreciated.

a/n: would anyone hear me out if i ever wrote romantic yan! bruce (ft. platonic yan! batfam AND romantic yan clark kent alongside the superfam ofc) with a neglected spouse reader... because uhm, i've been thinking about it lately just yk... so anyways PLSPLSPLS send in asks about this, ive been thinking about it so much lately.

imagine wanting to raise a family so badly with a man who adopts problem children as a side hustle. you're not some invasive spouse, you've always been good, always been loving, so... so accepting, never questioned where or how he picked them up from the side of the streets, never once complaining about the hickeys on his neck or the once neat tussles of his hair now tangled accompanying lipstick stains on his white suit.

you love your children, you tell yourself all the time. you love them, you love bruce— even if he doesn't love you. you said it in your vows, despite it being scripted, despite your family finally sighing in relief in the sidelines at finally being able to sell you off to one of the wealthiest man in the world, rather than being wasting off under their care— your vows are real.

you wanted someone to love you, unconditionally, so viscerally eternal that it eats you up.

really, all you wanted was to play that fantasy life of trophy house spouses. all you wished for was a loving, healthy relationship. the american dream: the picture perfect family frames, your husband kissing you on the cheek as he leaves for work, your children bickering at the dining room, with the scent of homemade meals wafting about the vicinity. all you wanted was the warmth in your chest to flicker like candlelights. all you dreamed about was that domestic life, an escape from the abusive household you were raised in.

yet the manor is too cold, too unforgiving for a soul such as yours.

the longer you stay inside claustrophobic, yet oh-so large hallways, the quicker you drown in a neverending pool of self-hatred.

but you're not allowed to show them your sufferings. they've been through much worse, you tell yourself. they've suffered more, and as what good spouses do, as what you're taught, you stay silent, enabling them to turn you into their own emotional punching bag.

you only allow yourself to cry at the dead of the night, under the sheets of your too-cold blanket and your too-hot pillows. when the manor is filled with deathly silence and a looming sense of dread and ill fitting thoughts of ifs and when they'll come back in one piece, will you grant yourself temporary respite; worry for a family who never even called you their parent.

yet you've always been so considerate. despite the pang in your chest every time bruce flirts with anymore potential love interest at a gala, you chose to instead monitor your chaotic children, who have always never bat an eye on you despite you always gazing lovingly at them.

you know of their interests, they don't know yours, yet you still give them extravagant gifts on their birthdays, with tired, yet glinting eyes, and a silent excuse to return to your room; one separate from bruce.

you know of bruce's hardships, but you don't push too hard, don't force him to talk, only provide him your silence and an offer to serve him dinner; all the time he refuses without looking at you. you give him comfort only if he ever allows you, only if he allows his walls to crumble— but not even his spouse can amount to a warm, crackling fireplace. to him, you're probably only a matchstick under the deadbeat glaze of the snow in a winter night.

maybe that's why you're such a ghost in the manor, stalking through the hallways, looking out for any of your children in case they come across you with any injuries. maybe that's why eventually your resolve weakened.

and maybe the absence of familial love led you to find comfort in another man's arm.

''til death do us part,' is such a tragic saying in your case, because you know it in your fragile heart that bruce's love for you was never alive in the first place. and yet you allow him to play you like a fiddle, allow him to slowly allow you to slip away from his nonexistent grasp.

and now, you're a stand-in parent for clark's son, jon, after the tragic loss of his wife. now, your world seems a lot less bleaker, as you play the fantasy of a loving house spouse, fully abandoning the life you left behind, a life you've never been gifted with until now. you want to feel guilty, you want to feel absolutely terrible but the heartache of neglect has become too much and all you do was allow clark to warm you up each night, kissing away your tears and spooning your deep-seated anxieties away.

you don't let the past eat you up, not when the present is too perfect, too freeing, too delusionally beautiful.

your son, jon provides you every joy a parent could have. parent's day gifts, heartfelt letters at every nook and cranny of your shared bedroom with clark— even reading him bedtime stories, allowing him to sleep in your lap after he slowly nods off, with clark knocking softly on polished wooden doors, greeting you with a loving kiss on the lips and a bouquet of your favorite flowers in hand—

it's everything a parent wants, needs even.

and you're everything clark, and especially jon wants, needs in their life.

so it's such a stupid mistake, really. a slip of the tongue, a too-enthusiastic smile, incredibly bright, shining eyes. it's not jon's fault, you still love him either way. but it's an error still— one a complicated matter at hand, so dreadful for you, that jon accidentally, all-too-suddenly, mentions you as his parent to damian.

a loving, wonderful parent, he says, with a picture of you in his wallet shoved right in front of his friend's face.

[clarionglass]

here we go :) part one of three, updates to be released weekly!

---

sam says 4 (game master cinematic universe, part 3)

Ruby was at her mum's for a family dinner she couldn't miss on pain of death, apparently, and the Doctor was many things, but a family dinner kind of guy wasn't one of them—particularly when Carla had already slapped him once in the short time he'd known her. He thought he'd broken his streak of bad luck with mums, but… well, seemingly not. So he was companionless for a few hours, and while he could wait for her to get back, maybe catch up on his reading—what was the point of waiting when you had a time machine? 

He ran his hands over the TARDIS console, marvelling at her clean lines and metallic flourishes, the way that even now she felt brand new but familiar, and paused. He’d just pop off for a quick adventure, nothing too dangerous, but—where to go?

He could scan for a distress call nearby, and pitch in to help. He could drop in on Donna and Shaun and Rose, beautiful Rose, and see how they were all doing. Or he could just hit the randomiser button, and jump in feet first wherever he ended up.

He remembered a conversation from a long time ago, when he wore a different face, and his gorgeous TARDIS wore a face too, for the first and only time.

“You didn't always take me where I wanted to go.”

“No, but I always took you where you needed to go.”

He grinned. Who could resist an offer like that? He pressed the button and whooped as the time rotor spun into action, ready to see where the universe would take him.

---

Apparently, he was needed pretty close to where he already was. Earth, 2024. Huh. Same planet, same time—within a few months of where he’d left Ruby, even. The main thing that had changed was the location: he was now in the good old US of A. California, to be more specific, and Los Angeles to be more specific still. And to really narrow it down, the Doctor discovered as he poked his head out of the TARDIS doors, he was in… a broom closet. Not bad, as a parking spot—a bit squeezy, but out of the way. And as he poked his head out of that door, he could finally see he was in the backstage corridors of a studio of some kind. Film or TV, if he was to hazard a guess, it was a different vibe from Abbey Road.

With a shrug, he decided to go exploring.

It couldn’t have been more than a minute before a young woman wearing the full-black outfit, headset, and permanently stressed expression of a production assistant came running up to him.

“Are you the fill-in Sam organised?” she asked breathlessly, and honestly, seeing the look on her face, the Doctor didn’t have the heart(s) to tell her no. And really, what was the Doctor, if not a professional fill-in? This, this was why he had a randomiser button on the control panel, because whatever he was about to get himself into was going to be fun.

“Sure!”

“Oh, thank god,” sighed the production assistant, relief dawning across her face. “When Ally tested positive this morning, I thought we were sunk for the record, because we called around and we couldn’t get a hold of anyone. But then Sam said he could get someone in, and, you know, here you are, and just in time, so—ah, yeah, if you could follow me this way?”

Smiling all the way, the Doctor followed his guide through to hair and makeup, looking around as they went. The studio seemed to belong to a company called Dropout, according to the branding scattered around, and things seemed, at least on the surface, to be… well. Fine. He couldn't tell why he'd been brought here yet, which meant that when he found the reason, it was going to be particularly tangled. He couldn't wait! 

And then he looked back at his guide, still engulfed in a miasma of anxiety, and realised he'd been too busy looking for clues to notice the person right in front of him. 

“Hey, it's cool, you've found me,” he started with a gentle smile. “You can relax. Hi, I'm the Doctor. What's your name?”

“Oh!” she said, startled. “The Doctor, yeah, of course. Um, hi, I'm Kaylin. Look, sorry, it's just that I've been so busy this morning, I'm so distracted… Shit, and I would've completely forgotten to get your details too. There's paperwork to fill in, but you can do that later. Um, just for now, though, can I get your pronouns?”

The Doctor thought for a moment. “He/him, for now.”

Kaylin nodded, making a note on her phone. “Okay, cool! And do you have any socials?”

“Not me, babes,” he replied. “I'm hardly sitting down long enough to be able to update, you know?”

“On a day like this, I know exactly what you mean,” she said. “That's okay, Lou didn't have socials either for the longest time. Right, so if you go through there, the team will get you sorted, and once you're done, someone will take you up to the greenroom. All good?”

“All great,” the Doctor replied. Kaylin flashed him a quick, relieved smile, then hurried off.

Hair and makeup was a fairly quick process, the sound mixer fitted him with a microphone, and before too long, Kaylin was back to take him upstairs. 

“This is the greenroom,” she said, pushing the door open. “The rest of the cast for the episode are already here—they’re great guys, and they’ve both been on the show a lot, so they’ll be able to help if you’ve got questions. And if you need anything else, just come find me or any of the other PAs, okay?”

The Doctor nodded, beamed at Kaylin, and walked in.

---

The greenroom was small but comfortable, and its occupants, two men around the same age as the Doctor appeared, looked up as he entered.

“Oh, you’re new,” the taller of the pair said, clearly giving him the once-over.

The other sighed with a mixture of fondness and exasperation, just as clearly used to his friend’s antics.

“Hey, I’m Brennan,” he said, levering himself up to standing from his perch on a chair arm, and holding out a hand. “That’s Grant.”

The Doctor took it warmly. “The Doctor. Just passing through, and happy to help.”

Grant’s eyebrows quirked. “Doctor… something?” he prompted.

“Or is it just ‘the Doctor’?” Brennan asked.

“Just ‘the Doctor’,” the Time Lord confirmed cheerfully. “You’ll get used to it, everyone does.”

Grant didn’t look convinced, but—

“Copy that,” Brennan shrugged, and settled back on the arm of the chair, returning his gaze to the door.

Grant, in turn, looked at the Doctor and rolled his eyes in a clear expression of ‘no, I don’t know why he’s like this, either’.

“Okay,” the Doctor said after a moment of watching the watching. “I wasn’t going to ask, but now I think I have to. What’s up with the door?”

Brennan huffed a laugh. “Well, the last time there was one of those up—” he pointed to the Out of Order sign stuck to the bathroom door, “—we got locked in here for the game.”

“He’s paranoid,” Grant interjected.

“Well, yeah, maybe,” Brennan retorted. “Or just cautious. Because Sam’s been acting weird lately, and we’re coming up to the last few records of the season, so he’s probably planning something way out of the box for the finale. And the original cast was you, me and Beardsley, so…”

He shrugged one shoulder meaningfully, and Grant nodded, conceding both the point and the potential for chaos.

“So if Sam comes in to give us the briefing, rather than waiting til we’re on set,” Brennan continued, “or there’s anything else weird going on, I’m gonna know about it right from the beginning.”

He turned to the Doctor. “The only reason I'm not quizzing you is because I know for a fact Beardsley was genuinely scheduled for this, so you can't be a plant by the production team. No offence.”

“None taken,” the Doctor smiled. “That sort of thing happen often, does it?”

Grant and Brennan exchanged a look. 

“More than you'd think,” Grant answered with a grimace. 

“Alright,” the Doctor said slowly, then brightened. “So what is it we're actually doing?”

Grant gave him a disbelieving glance. “You don't know—?”

“Very last minute fill-in,” the Doctor said breezily. “But don't worry, I'm a quick study.”

“Well, you're not that much worse off than the rest of us,” Brennan said encouragingly. “You know about Game Changer, obviously, if you know Sam, and we only find out the rules of the game once we get on set. Hopefully,” he added, with a dark look back at the Out of Order sign. 

The Doctor nodded. No, he didn't know Sam, and he didn't know Game Changer, but he could work out the situation from context clues. This was a game show. And with the Toymaker banished, and Satellite Five not coming into existence for another 198000 years, give or take, he found himself smiling. Maybe third time would be the charm. 

“Mmm, hopefully they aren't going to throw you in the deep end,” Grant said. “Because Brennan might seem lovely now, but as soon as we get out there, he's a whore for points. He'll stab you in the back and won't even blink.”

Brennan barked with laughter. “Yeah, and you wouldn't?”

“Excuse you, I'm always a goddamn delight,” Grant replied, the very picture of injured dignity. 

“Oh, absolutely!” agreed a new voice. The Doctor turned to the now-open door to see a bearded man in a pinstriped suit smiling broadly. “That's why we keep inviting you back!”

Grant bowed sarcastically. “Why, thank you, Sam. Good to know I'm appreciated by someone here.”

“Always,” Sam replied, gently but firmly ending that particular path of the conversation. He scanned the room, and his eyes lit up when they landed on the Doctor. 

“Ah, you must be the Doctor!” he said with obvious delight, walking over with his hand outstretched. “I'm Sam—thanks for filling in for us, you've made sure we're going to have a good show. Seriously, it's a pleasure to have you here.”

“Aw, cheers!” the Doctor smiled, shaking the offered hand. “Glad I could help out, I'm really looking forward to this!”

“Well, great!” Sam exclaimed, then took a step back, regarding all three players in turn. “Now, folks, I'm just letting you know that we're just about ready to start the record, so if you can start heading down, that'd be great.”

Grant and Brennan nodded—Brennan, the Doctor noticed, with relief. 

“See you down there,” Sam said, smiling. “Have a great show, and—”

His eyes caught on the Doctor's for a second, twinkling. 

“Good luck.”

---

Backstage, the Doctor, Brennan and Grant were marshalled into podium order and given a final briefing from the crew. And then, with a thumbs-up from Kaylin, that was it.

Showtime.

“Get ready for a Game Changer!” came Sam's voice from onstage. “Tonight’s guests: he can shoot off a monologue with laser accuracy; it’s Brennan Lee Mulligan!”

Brennan, his back to the camera as the curtains opened, spun on his heel and, with a stone-cold expression, pointed finger guns straight down the barrel, before letting the facade crack open. “Hi!” he exclaimed, and walked over to the leftmost podium.

“It’s his first appearance, but he’s already on fire; it’s the Doctor!”

The Doctor leant against the archway to the stage and flashed a broad smile towards the camera, then in a few skipping steps, had bounded over to the next free podium. What the hell, why not make an entrance?

“And even in the toughest of mazes, you’ll always be able to find him; it’s Grant O’Brien!”

Grant dipped his lanky frame into an approximation of a curtsey, spreading his arms wide, then sauntered over to the closest podium with a grin.

“And your host, me!” Sam announced, a ring of manic white showing around his irises as he beamed down the barrel of the camera. “I’ve been here the whole time!”

“This,” he continued, pushing his microphone shut and stowing it in his jacket pocket, “is Game Changer, the only game show where the game changes every show. I am your host, Sam Reich!” 

As he said his name, he looked at his hands, front and back, as if he was pleasantly surprised to be himself, then gestured towards the three podiums.

“I am joined today by these three lovely contestants! Now, you understand how the game works.”

“Of course not,” Grant started. “You know we don't.”

“We can't, Sam, that's the whole point of the theatre you've set up here,” Brennan said over him. 

“Not yet,” was all the Doctor said, anticipation starting to drum a tattoo of excitement against the inside of his ribcage. 

“That’s right!” Sam said brightly, shooting finger guns at the camera. “Our players have no idea what game it is they’re about to play. The only way to learn is by playing. The only way to win is by learning, and the only way to begin is by beginning! So without further ado, let’s begin by giving each of our players fifty points.”

The Doctor, biding his time, watched the reactions of his fellow contestants. Grant looked at the front of his podium, checking the point total, and nodding approvingly when he saw that yes, it was sitting at a round fifty. Brennan, on the other hand, was starting to frown.

“Players, Sam says: touch your nose,” Sam began, and Brennan sighed the sigh of someone who wasn’t happy to be proved right.

“Oh, no,” he groaned. “Oh, you son of a bitch. Wasn’t one this season enough?”

He touched his nose anyway, as did the others, and Sam smiled encouragingly. “Sam says: touch your ear.”

When they all did, Sam nodded. “Touch your other ear.”

Everybody held still, fingers on the ears they had originally touched.

Sam beamed. “Easy, players, right?”

“You say that now,” Brennan said darkly. “Which makes it worse, because all you're doing is setting us up for failure.”

Sam gasped, pretending offence. “Would I do that?”

“Yes,” Brennan and Grant replied in unison, which drew a grin from the Doctor and set Sam off chuckling.

“And I'm not having it,” Brennan continued, leaning his elbows against his podium and pointing at Sam with the hand not touching his ear. “You better watch yourself, because I know how this game works, and you're not going to get one over on me.”

“Strong words, Brennan!” Sam said, clearly delighted by this response. “Okay, then, let's start making things a bit more interesting!”

The game continued as per Sam Says usual, some rounds done as a group and some individual. Points were won, sure, but lost slightly more frequently, and even the Doctor found he was having to concentrate to avoid getting caught in the host's traps. 

It was fun. Genuinely, it was like playing a game with friends, and the Doctor felt himself leaning into it. There wasn't any sign of danger—maybe there wasn't a mystery to solve at all, and the TARDIS just decided he needed a total break. 

Well, probably not. But the way things were going, he was able to let himself hope. 

“Alright, players,” Sam said a good few rounds in, just as pleasantly as he would start any other question, and the screen behind him dinged as a new prompt popped up. “Survive the death beam.”

For a second, everything was frozen perfectly still. 

And then came the crash, the explosive noise of heavy machinery moving relentlessly through a drywall set.

The Doctor was already moving. “Everyone down!”

“Duck!” Brennan yelled at the same time.

The two of them hit the ground within milliseconds of each other, but Grant was still paralysed in the face of the giant, science-fiction type laser cannon that had just ploughed through the wall. 

It whined ominously, screaming its way to fever pitch. And then a sharp pain in Grant’s ankle made him stagger, pitching forwards onto the carpet behind the podiums as the Doctor rolled away to avoid getting pinned.

“Sorry, babes,” the Doctor whispered. “But it was either kick you to get you down, or—”

A hideous metallic screech ripped through the air, and all three of them could feel the crackle of ozone as a beam of energy swept across what had, moments ago, been neck height.

“…Or that,” the Doctor finished with a grimace.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Grant breathed, suddenly very conscious of every inch of his 6’9 frame. “Thanks.”

“Well done, players!” Sam exclaimed delightedly from above them. “But… sorry, I didn’t say ‘Sam says’, so that’s a point off for everyone.”

“What the fuck!” Brennan snapped.

“Are you actually insane?” Grant demanded at the same time, his voice overlapping with Brennan’s.

In response, Sam just wheezed with laughter. “You can come back to your podiums,” he said, cheerfully ignoring them.

Nobody moved.

“Very good!” he acknowledged, and even without seeing his face, the grin was obvious in his voice. “Okay, Sam says: come back to your podiums.”

Although the words were innocuous, and his tone was just as light and breezy as usual, there was nevertheless an edge hiding just underneath the surface. And while the death beam loomed large in the minds of all three players, it was impossible to consider disobedience as an option.

Slowly, they stood, returning to their places. Now they had the time to look at it properly, the death beam was even more sinister, and Brennan and Grant both kept flicking nervous glances its way, ready to move if it looked like it was charging up again.

The Doctor, however, was focused purely on the man standing in front of them. Unbothered, Sam met his gaze like a challenge, a mischievous smile playing about his lips.

“Oh, you’ll love this one,” he said, and the screen changed. “Sam says, starting with Grant: say my name.”

Grant frowned in confusion, but answered quickly nonetheless. “Sam Reich?”

The man himself shrugged tolerantly, moving on. “Brennan?”

Brennan just stared at him coolly. “Do you take me for a fool?”

“Well caught, Brennan!” Sam said happily. “Sam says: say my name.”

“Sam,” Brennan replied, suspicion clear in his voice. “Samuel Dalton Reich.”

He nodded, still with a hint of indifference. “And lastly, Doctor.” His smile broadened. “Sam says: say my name.”

It was easy. Too easy. And as the Doctor looked into the eyes of the man calling himself Sam Reich, he felt his hearts stutter in recognition, because something had changed. He wasn’t hiding himself anymore, and while the face was different yet again, the Doctor would know the shape of that soul anywhere. It was impossible. It was inevitable.

“You can’t be,” he breathed. 

Sam smirked, leaning in across his podium. “Oh, but Doctor… I’ve been here the whole time,” he stage-whispered with a wink.

“He said you lost,” the Doctor said, shaking his head, looking wrong-footed for the first time that Brennan and Grant could recall. “You lost, and he trapped you.”

The other two watched, uncomprehending, but Sam just smiled, drumming his fingers against the podium with an audible beat, fast but distinct. Four taps, four taps, four taps. “I’m waiting.”

The Doctor took a slow, deep breath. Set his jaw. 

“Master.”

---

missed an installment of the game master cinematic universe?

original idea by @ace-whovian-neuroscientist: x

art by @northernfireart concept: x scissor sisters sketch: x sam and his doppelganger: x

writing by me (!) part one (escape the greenroom): x part two (deja vu): x part three (sam says 4): you are here!

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Thank you all for an incredible 500 days of love and support. I offer you: answers to questions that no one has asked.

(As always, more can be found in the tags <3)

[kaiser1ns]

#. NOTHING EVEN MATTERS

featuring 𝗶𝘁𝗼𝘀𝗵𝗶 𝘀𝗮𝗲 𝘅 𝗳𝗲𝗺!𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿

fluff. you had one more week with sae before he left for spain and it was those moments that you both would miss very much.

For as long as you can remember, you've always been with the Itoshi brothers—from the moment you woke up to play football and get popsicles, to when your mom tucked all of you under the soft blanket that Rin always stole for himself, leaving you and Sae to cuddle together under a separate one.

Now, years later, not much had changed.

The three of you squeezed into the small bed, the room was dark except for the faint moonlight seeping through the curtains. Rin was already knocked out, sprawled out like he owned the bed, occasionally letting soft snores. Meanwhile, you lay there, wide awake, staring at the ceiling.

"If I score a goal against you tomorrow..." you whispered, not wanting to wake the younger sibling. But knowing him, he was probably too deep in his dreams to notice. You turned your gaze toward Sae, to your embarrassment, he was already watching you, his teal eyes shining as you felt your cheeks heat up and were grateful that it was dark. "Would you stay here instead of going to Spain?"

Sae sighed, you’d asked him this before, countless times. He didn’t answer immediately, knowing how much you wanted him to stay. And honestly, a part of him didn’t want to leave either. But his dreams were calling him, even if it meant leaving you and his brother behind.

He remembered how you'd tried to score a goal, how he always held your hand afterward and led you to the beach as you munched on the icy popsicles. He always let you win the stick game, grinning when you got another sweet treat as he sulked. This was the day you kissed his cheek, confessing that you liked him and would miss him more than anything.

“I won’t be gone forever, you know,” he said softly, shifting under the covers, pulling you closer until your head rested against his chest. His fingers brushed against your hair, and you felt his lips press a gentle kiss there. "Why don't you move to Spain instead?" His question was sudden, and you blinked up at him in surprise. He wasn’t serious, was he?

"At thirteen?" you whispered back, trying not to laugh. "I don't think that’s an option." You couldn’t just pack up and follow him to another country. But a part of you desperately wished you could.

Sae smiled, a rare and precious smile that you are going to remember forever. “Doesn’t matter how old you are. If you’re with me, nothing else matters.”

You wanted to respond, to tell him that you’d follow him anywhere if it were possible.

"Don’t think too much,” he murmured, his voice soft against your hair. “You’re going to beat me tomorrow, right? So stop worrying about Spain.”

The warmth of his arms, the rhythm of his heartbeat, and the soft rumble of his voice lulled you into joining Rin in Dreamland. Without realizing it, you drifted off to sleep against him. Sae noticed immediately, his gaze softening as he looked at your peaceful expression.

He chuckled, his chest rising and falling beneath your head. "I like you too..." he murmured to himself, though he made no effort to move you. His eyes drifted to the creaky bed that somehow still held the three of you after all these years. How hasn’t this thing broken yet?

But in the end, it didn’t matter. Because the world stops when he puts his arms around you. As long as he could hold you close, even for a little while longer, he promised himself that no matter how far he went, no matter where life took him, you would always have a special place in his heart.

©2024 kaiser1ns do not copy, repost or modify my work

[rinnstars]

kiss me right!

in which itoshi rin gets a tongue piercing

itoshi rin x reader: fluff, suggestive (making out), drabble, not proofread + likes n reblogs r appreciated!

it was out of impulse rin thinks, or so he likes to believe.

pictures on your pinterest pinned on a board of piercing — snake bites, helix, central eyebrow piercing that rin can’t help but scroll through. its a habit he’s kept up, scrolling through your pinterest boards for ideas: from clothes idea to buy online for you to surprise especially for matching outfits like the chikawa jacket that he’s even wearing now on his bed, from photo ideas that fills his camera roll and polaroids that prints out to be pasted right on the walls of his bedroom for him to admire and unconsciously grin to himself, from date inspiration for him to take you out on on his rare days off without training.

and now he’s lying on his bed right beside you — a silver circle pierced through his tongue awkwardly as he fiddled with it inside his mouth, looking at you who’s lying right next to him on your phone, undoubtly scrolling through pinterest looking through piercings again and its killing him inside. sure, its his second day with his piercing and he probably shouldn’t do anything drastic in case of an infection. yet, he’s getting all fidgety, his hands fiddling with his phone with no purpose, scrolling through his socials that are practically empty or filled with boring football game videos, his legs fidgety and rubbing against yours as a habit and to warm both you and him up in the slightly chilly room, his teeth habitually rubbing against the cold metallic jewellery right in his tongue that he sucks against that was still slightly sore.

what would you do if you see his new piercing? would you look at him in surprise with him never indulging in such fashion stuff with most of his mind filled with football — his accessories pilled on him all belonging to you, his sweaters that are picked up by you or inspired from your pinterest board, his closet either that or only consisting of football jerseys and hand me downs for sae. would you be into it — you clearly like those cool piercing evident from your pinterest board, you always fawn over him whenever he tries something new whether it was that one time where he sported your sanrio hairpin for the first time or wore yours and his matching ring outside with you, your flushed face and stuttering words as you look at him that makes his heart swell.

“hey. i wanna try something.” if there’s anything rin can’t help but give in, its when its regarding you — whether it is when you look up at him with those puppy eyes even as a joke to go to the arcade with you once again to try yours and his luck in the claw machine that’s clearly rigged (and yet he spends his allowance there still anywhere for a chance for you to beam at him), or whenever you ask him of anything from helping you to tutor you in english or to share his food, or in this case giving in to you who’s right beside him. after all, he might not get the chance to see you when it recovers anyways — with your exams season approaching and his football competition season colluding soon as well.

and he thinks its already worth it even though you’ve just looked up from your phone, your eyes blinking as you tilt your head to face him, and he can’t help but smash his lips right against you.

its brash: its as if he’s kissing you for the first time, yours and his forehead knocking slightly against each other, his hands always finding its way to linger on your chin, pulling you even closer right into him as though he wants to melt you and him together, biting on your lips still as yours and his blood merge together. and as usual, his tongue makes his way and finds its home right inside your mouth, as though interlocking with your tongue that’s warm in contrast to his cold metallic piercing that’s even more sensitive than usual when it touches against yours. and he can guess you like the new change: with the way your eyes widen and your grip on his shirt tighten as your noise gets swallowed by his passionate kiss, the way your tongue keeps finding its way to touch the cold jewel and linger right on the sensitive spot of his tongue, the way you too pull him even closer by his shirt as you and him melt even closer: only pulling away slightly panting with drool strings connecting you and him.

“do you like it..?” rin can’t help but ask even if he knows the answer: his voice slightly shaky and breathy from the make out session, his cheeks burning still with yours and his face merged against yours, his hands still lingering right on yours as though needy and in need of your affection that he’s practically addicted to at this point.

“yeah.” one word, and you crash your lips against his once again — and rin thinks this might just be the best decision he’s ever made so far.

with the way your tongue feels right against the sore spot on his tongue that makes him whine against you, vibration sending through yours and his mouth that makes his grip your shirt a little tighter as you tug at his jacket as though still pulling him closer as though you and him aren’t practically merged together, and the way you are practically going crazy in contrast to how you usually let him take the charge as your hands find your way in to his hair that earns a whimper from him, as you shift yours and his position into a more comfortable one: all whilst not disconnecting yours and his as though it would practically kill you to separate you and him.

and as saliva drools down as he kisses you back, euphoria practically filling him — rin thinks this piercing might be the best thing and he’s sure you think so too as you unzip his jacket with your spare hand.

[myokk]

clumsy

pairing: Sebastian Sallow x f!MC

word count: 9,1k

summary: sebastian is clumsy

cw: fluff, mutual pining, idiots in love, two really stubborn idiots in love to be exact, sir cadogan guest appearance, anne and imelda are the gremlin best friends every girl needs, smut (18+ ONLY), oral (f. recieving)

a/n: or: two stubborn brats make things more difficult than they have to be. I've been working on this for a MONTH more or less, ever since I drew the sketch that inspired it🫶 (I'm the world's slowest writer)

The first time Sebastian Sallow interacted with her after the fateful events of their fifth year, he fell for her.

Quite literally.

Maybe fell on her is more aptly put - Sebastian Sallow is not one to mince his words or say what he doesn't mean, after all. But, in the years to come, he always insists that he fell in love in that moment.

It was inexplicable. One moment, he was walking around, perfectly content with his loveless, boring life, and the next, his every waking moment was painful. Nobody had ever told Sebastian that being in love would physically pain or consume him so.

It all started like this: one moment, he's walking (well, striding) to Crossed Wands. Fine, he's running. Running late already, for the first meet-up of his last year. But - he isn't to blame for being late. He needed to check on something in the library - during his Transfiguration lesson, he had a hunch about something Professor Weasley had said in passing, and of course he had to go and check to see if he was right before he could even think about besting Leander in the inaugural duel of the Crossed Wands season but now, with how late he is - how many minutes ago had it started? - oh, Merlin, it's already been ten whole minutes and what if they've started without him (not that he can blame them) and -

Sebastian is abruptly pulled out of his thoughts when he collides with a strange obstruction in his way. He was just checking his father's old pocket watch, had only looked away for a split second and he could have sworn that, unless he was mistaken (which he never is), there wasn't a statue in the middle of the suspension bridge. And yet, he has run headfirst into something or someone, and now they are both flying through the air, books whirling around them in a flurry of pages and Sebastian unconsciously puts his arms out to grab her before they hit the ground and now he's holding her tight against him and they land with a loud, ungraceful thud, but at least she's not hurt.

Sebastian shakes his head to clear it after the impact that - miraculously - doesn't seem to have been as bad as it could have been, all things considered, and -

He freezes.

What has he done?

He's pressed up against the most impossibly lovely person he has ever seen quite possibly in his life, holding her tightly in his arms as she glares up at him in indignation, a faint flush spreading across her cheeks, making her face glow. Is this what the muggles mean when they say that they were struck by Cupid's arrow? Her hands scrabble uselessly at his chest as she tries to extricate herself from his grip. It's useless. Sebastian is completely frozen in place as he stares down at her, and he can feel his own face heating up at his inability to get off her. What's wrong with him?

"Sebastian," she repeats, and this time her voice registers in his brain. He realizes she has been talking to him this whole time, and as he stares at her face without comprehending - he couldn't have a coherent thought right now even if he wanted to - he sees her eyes dart quickly down, looking at where their bodies meet before she brings them back to his face, a deeper blush coming over her. "You -"

Oh, Merlin. It's her. He blinks and it's like the fog has cleared from his mind - almost, but-not-quite - and he realizes who he has unceremoniously crashed to the ground with him. The spines of the textbooks they are lying on top of dig into the arm that's pinned under her body and his other hand...he realizes (to his almost-horror) that to any students or professors walking by, it would seem as if they were caught up in quite the scandalous extra-curricular activity because his other hand is actively caressing her breast. Well, that's how it would look to any passerby, anyways.

Because there is no way he would be caught dead in such a compromising position with her.

The two of them haven't spoken since the events of their fifth year - the Year-That-Shall-Not-Be-Remembered-or-Acknowledged - and he had been perfectly content with his plan to continue this strange sort of ignoring that they had played all last year. Both of them pretending that they hadn't become impossibly close after only knowing each other for a few months - a closeness that he had gone and ruined by not knowing when to quit. All he had known to do back then was push push push because why couldn't she see things the way he had? The betrayal he had felt when she had gone behind his back to find her own way to cure his sister, and that one stupid word uttered in the heat of the moment, had caused an irreparable rift in their relationship and he would not allow himself to think about how much he missed her. Still misses her.

Just like he will not think about the fact that she is pressed beneath him in a compromising position, her chest rising and falling rapidly as she glares up at him in indignation. He continues to stare at her. Maybe his mouth is agape. She's stopped trying to get out of his grip and is resting her hands on his chest, seemingly waiting for an opportunity to push him off of her.

"Sebastian. Your hand," she repeats. "You're -"

Finally his idiot brain decides to wake up and Sebastian realizes with horror just how aroused he is at the moment and how did he never see her like this before? He gets up in a flash, pushing her back against the pile of books they're lying on top of, wondering if he can subtly adjust his robes without her realizing and then he makes the very grave mistake of looking down at her and she's still very much red-faced, propping herself up by her elbows and she looks so disheveled and lovely lying on top of the pile of books.

His idiot brain has now woken up completely, and how is it possible for one hormonal, eighteen-year-old wizard to be so embarrassed? He knocked her to the ground, pushed her further back in the books in his desperate attempt to get away from her, and now all he can think about is how to hide his arousal. Shameful, really. Sebastian quickly crouches down to help her pick up all of the books but she shoves him away and glares at him with an annoyance that he's never seen before.

"I can do it myself, thank you very much," she says with a huff, gathering everything they spilled up into her arms. She grabs the book Sebastian is holding out of his hands and he inhales sharply at the touch of her fingers grazing his.

Did someone - Garreth, maybe - spike his pumpkin juice with Amortentia during lunch? It's the only explanation he can think of as he stares blankly down at her. How else would he find her so beautiful, so breathtaking, when the last time they had interacted, Ominis and Anne had had to act as intermediaries for the two of them?

"Well," she says finally, slinging her school bag over her shoulder once all of her books have been unceremoniously shoved inside of it, "it's been...nice seeing you again, Sallow. I hope you had a good summer holiday."

And with that, she quickly turns and walks away in the direction she had been coming from, leaving a very confused Sebastian behind. He watches her as she walks away and her long, swishing braid is the last thing he sees before the door closes behind her at the far end of the bridge.

Eventually, he gathers his wits and wanders away.

He does not go to the first Crossed Wands meeting that afternoon after all.

She has not had a full-night's sleep since he somehow cursed her mind and her thoughts a week ago, and she can feel herself slowly slipping into insanity. A curse is the only answer that makes sense, the only thing that gives a conceivable answer to all the wicked dreams she has been having since that moment, dreams that cause her to wake up sweaty and breathless and needing him in the middle of the night in a way she has never felt before. She has been an absolute mess, a disastrous version of her normally quite put-together self, and she is not happy about it.

He's sitting next to her now - they were partnered up by the evil Professor Onai in their first NEWT Divination class of the year - and she's holding herself rigidly, arms tight across her chest, in an attempt to not accidentally touch him. Lately, every single time they make fleeting eye contact across the table during breakfast, or when they pass each other in the hallways, a shiver runs down her spine at the unfamiliar look in his eyes and she has to avert her eyes before it's too much.

Divination has never been a favorite subject of hers - too impermeable for her tastes. She is only taking it at the NEWT level because, during her career counseling with Professor Ronen at the end of her fifth year, he had said that if she wanted to be an Unspeakable she couldn't just work with logic (a preposterous thought, but as a sixteen-year-old she hadn't seen any recourse in arguing with the Ministry's requirements). She supposedly needs to get comfortable with the intangible as well. It doesn't mean she has to enjoy it, though: she doesn't, and never will. The Divination classroom is dark and stuffy, tucked away in one of the highest towers of the castle, and the nauseating smell of incense always coats her nasal cavities long after the class has finished. She finds her thoughts getting muddled in the haze of candle smoke and swirling orbs on the shelves around her - magic somehow always feels thicker up here - and the presence of a certain someone whose knees keep brushing hers under the tiny table they're sharing, a certain someone who has - improbably, inconceivably, impossibly - hit a growth spurt that summer and now towers over her and had encompassed her completely when he knocked her to the ground, isn't helping her concentration at -

"This week, we are going to review everything we learned together last year," Professor Onai says, after the class had rearranged itself based on her instructions. Sebastian shoots a look at her as she shakes her head in an attempt to clear it and sits up straighter. She hopes that Onai's lecture will help her concentrate and clear her mind a bit. If she has something to focus on, to try and think of and remember, it will be better than him. Anything would be better than Sebastian. Onai gives an appraising look to each table before continuing her speech. "As your NEWTs are at the end of the year, we need to make sure you are as prepared as possible. Open your books to page two-hundred and thirty. Today we're going to review the art of palmistry. I should hope that you do not need the aid of your textbook to help interpret the lines in your partner's palm but in the case that you do -"

She chances a glance at Sebastian before getting out her copy of Divining the Undivinable from her bag and wishes she hadn't. He looks uncomfortably big sitting on the tiny tea chair across from her, barely any hints of the boy who had completely swept her away two years ago visible on the sharper planes of his face. When had he - had they - grown up?

Sebastian Sallow was - is - charming, and that had been her downfall. She had successfully avoided his charms the year before, and she wasn't going to let that happen this year, no matter how much her body rebelled against her mind and resolve. Because, as she reminds herself, Sebastian Sallow is also manipulative, and cold-hearted, and selfish.

"Well," she says archly, opening her book. She will not look at him. "I suppose I am still quite ignorant of the practice of Divination, so do forgive me if I have to double-check my readings in the textbook."

He says her name as she opens the book, and she ignores him. He says her name again. She continues to ignore him. He grabs the book from her hands and puts it the correct way for her. She was looking at it upside-down. Her cheeks heat up and she continues flipping through the pages, as if nothing has happened. She finds page two-hundred and thirty. She pretends to be interested in what she sees.

(Divination is unfortunately not interesting.)

Oh, fine.

"Do you want to start, or should I?"

These are the first words she has voluntarily spoken to him - not including the events of last week, which do not count as they were most decidedly not voluntary - since he called her ignorant a year and a half ago. He somehow looks surprised to see that she has addressed him, and for some reason this fills her with rage and a strange sort of confidence. Why shouldn't she be able to talk to him?

"Here," she says, putting her hand out towards him, palm up, ignoring the strange fluttering feeling in her chest when he gently grabs it with one of his. Sebastian looks up at her, waiting for her to continue speaking, and were she not looking at him so intently she would have easily missed the bob of his throat as he swallows nervously. "Show me how it's done."

Her breath catches in her throat at the small, mischievous smirk he shoots to her before he bends over her hand and gently starts tracing the lines on her palm with the fingers of the hand that's not holding hers in place. His touch is feather-light and somehow soft, despite the roughness of his fingers as they drag over her palm. Every nerve in her body seems to have moved to wherever he touches and all of the bravado and anger she had just felt is quickly melting away. When she finally finds her voice, she hates how soft and breathy it sounds. She can't look away from the sight of his larger hands caressing hers.

"Well? What do you see? Do you remember the different lines? Because I -"

She falters. The murmurs of their classmates blend together in the background and the dim lights of the candles...the hazy, thick atmosphere and his proximity and the barely there touches of his rough fingertips on her sensitive palm are altogether too overwhelming and she needs to get out of there. She's supposed to be angry with him. Furious, even. Holding this grudge has been the only way she has been able to have any sort of power over him this past year, and yet...all she can think about at the moment are the sinful dreams she's been having lately where he presses her against a wall, desperately kissing her lips, her neck - even she knows that there has to be more to it - but what?

Sebastian blinks as she snatches her hand away like it's been burned and - oh, Merlin - she shoves the textbook back into her schoolbag and almost knocks the candle on the table over and wouldn't it be awful if she had started a fire? But she can't think about any of that now in her haste to just get out of the claustrophobic Divination tower.

Vaguely, she can hear Professor Onai asking her if everything is fine and she's not sure but she thinks she mumbles something about needing to go to the Hospital Wing - that's a good enough excuse to leave, isn't it? - but then she hears his voice, deep and cutting through the fog in her mind -

"Don't worry, I'll take her and make sure she gets there fine." A muffled response from their professor and then his voice, just as clear as before. "No, I don't know what happened..."

She hears him calling her name as she flees down the spiral staircase, almost tripping over her feet in her rush to get away from him, but he catches up quickly, reaching out to grab her arm in an attempt to slow her down. She stops running immediately - she supposes her traitorous body wants to see what he has to say, or maybe it just wants to bask in his intoxicating proximity. He crowds her space, and she sees that unfamiliar look in his eyes again. So very different from the cold disdain she had seen the last time she had been this close to him, during the argument that had ended their friendship.

"Let go of me," she whispers, but there's no conviction in her voice as she gazes into his deep, brown eyes. He can tell she doesn't mean it and doesn't make any move to listen to her. Why can't she hold on to the rage? A muggle quote about anger floats through her mind: Holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. What a sweet poison her anger at Sebastian had been, while it lasted. She tries telling herself that he must still feel the same as the evening he had called her ignorant (ignoring the small voice in her head that reminded her of the letters of apology he had sent (that she had burned without reading), the times he had tried to get Anne or Ominis involved and apologize for him) - because why couldn't he just tell her himself? Maybe she had shut down any and all attempts he had made to repair the rift that he had caused in the first place, but she had been right to be so angry with him.

But oh, Merlin, he's getting closer to her, and she can now clearly see the freckles dusting his cheeks and nose and forehead and then before she knows it, his hand is sliding up her arm, leaving goosebumps everywhere he touches and then he's caressing her jaw with his rough thumb and he pauses. Her eyelids flutter closed as her head tilts towards him - she couldn't stop herself even if she wanted to (what does she want?). She can feel his warm breath ghosting over her lips and she has the improbable, ridiculous thought - how is he remembering to breathe? - before he speaks. His lips brush against hers with every soft word and a deep shiver runs through her body.

"I," she hears him say, his voice so, so low, "haven't been able to think since last week."

That's all she needs to hear, the brush of his bottom lip against hers all she needs to feel, to push her into closing what minuscule distance there is between them and then his lips are on hers and it's better than anything she's been imagining. His mouth is soft against hers, insistent, and her hands go up to grip the collar of his plaid jacket to make sure he doesn't go away or disappear on her.

She knows she's behaving wantonly, snogging Sebastian Sallow in the middle of the hallway where anyone could come across them, but third period has only just started and besides, she has had a week of restless nights being tortured by thoughts of him. A week of a few hours of sleep found here and there. Just one kiss should be enough to help her get over these strange feelings, right? She only feels like this because having him lie on top of her after he crashed into her - that satisfying weight of him - the friction of his thumb brushing against her nipple - had made her realize just how stupid she had been, holding this grudge against him for -

She whimpers in protest but it quickly turns into a moan as his mouth moves away from hers and down to her neck. He pulls at her tight collar desperately - she hears some seams ripping - to give him better access to it, and she finds herself arching her back and pushing her body closer to his as he nuzzles her neck with his nose before giving it open, sloppy kisses. When he hears her, he moves back to kissing her, greedily capturing every breathy moan that comes out of her mouth, but the noises coming from him are matching hers, and at the sound she feels an unfamiliar clenching deep in her stomach. Her fingers come up to his hair, going through the silky curls over and over - how are they as soft as his lips? - and he slowly pushes her back until she's sandwiched between his warm body and the cold stone of the wall behind her.

He lets out a low, frantic growl as a hand goes to grip the back of her head, holding her in place as he slants his mouth over hers. He tastes like cinnamon and...like something forbidden. What has gotten into her? She hates him, and yet...

They have abandoned any pretense of propriety - had they ever even been trying? - by this point. His tongue swipes across her lips and then she is completely lost to him, to every sensation of his mouth, and tongue, on hers. His large hands - the wicked hands that had been caressing her palm and had caused this whole mess in the first place - have moved to her waist and are pulling her even closer to him. When he pulls away briefly, she whines in protest, opening her eyes to glare at him. The sight of him, flushed and breathless, his eyes wide and pupils dilated - must match her own appearance because she sees the same hunger she feels in his eyes. She has never seen Sebastian Sallow so disheveled, but she finds she quite likes it and tugs on his curls with a whine. He obliges eagerly, bringing his mouth back to hers.

She's pressed as tightly against him as she can possibly be, and yet it still isn't enough. Her back arches once again, trying to find something, and then he slots one of his knees between her legs. She moans at the friction caused by his movements, can feel an unfamiliar slickness forming at the juncture between her legs, and this seems to spur him on further as his kisses get more desperate and sloppy. She moves against his leg, trying to relieve some of her discomfort, gasping into his mouth, when -

They freeze. Even if they are fully, completely, absorbed by...whatever this is, they can't ignore the strange, metallic clanking sound coming from their left. Sebastian pulls his head back from her slowly, reluctantly, breathing heavily, and looks over to see what the noise is. She wants to, but all of a sudden the horrifying reality of what they've been doing sinks in and oh god what if the noise is a person? Someone who has now seen her in what might possibly be the most mortifying moment of her life - desperately snogging Sebastian Sallow - and she finds she can't look over. She tucks her head into his neck to hide her face as she listens.

"I demand that you get away from her at once, you knave! Cease your attack!"

The voice sounds vaguely familiar, but she's certain that it doesn't belong to any of her classmates. He almost sounds...medieval, but -

"I made haste when I heard sounds of distress coming from down the hallway," the voice continues, "and it appears I have arrived not a moment too soon!"

She brings her head away from Sebastian's shoulder but still refuses to look over at whoever is speaking, instead choosing to stare at Sebastian's face. He's still deliciously flushed from their snogging, still breathing heavily, but now he looks terribly confused. His brows are furrowed, mouth opening and closing as he tries to come up with a response to the outrage currently being directed at him.

The unknown man is continuing his diatribe, almost not even stopping to breathe as he gets more and more worked up, and she hears some more clanking as he reaches a particularly exciting moment in his rant. Sebastian looks increasingly confused, but still shields her with his body, not moving away from her at all despite the accusations.

Her curiosity gets the better of her and she peeks over to see who it is.

The man who has been reprimanding Sebastian so boldly is none other than Sir Cadogan. Although she's never interacted with him directly, she often hears him yelling at his pony as she passes his portrait on her way to Divination. The knight is standing between two witches having tea, who are glaring at him quite angrily as he gesticulates wildly - every movement of his sword comes dangerously close to their display of cakes and sandwiches and it looks like he has already broken some plates. His armor is ill-fitting and loose on him, which explains the terrible noise.

"You rascally knave! I assure you that you do not want to find out what will happen to you if you do not unhand the fair maiden."

He brandishes his sword again, and the woman closest to him quickly snatches her tea cup away to save it from being broken as well. "Come now, Sir Cadogan," she says, exasperated. "Can't you see that these two are in love?"

The other woman joins her protests, nodding vigorously. "Yes, exactly that. Leave them be!"

"Nonsense," he exclaims. "I too have succumbed to my baser instincts on occasion and I can assure you that this is decidedly not what is occurring."

As Sir Cadogan continues to alternate between lecturing her and Sebastian, and directing his two attention to the ladies who are defending them, she looks back to the boy in question. Sebastian is looking down at her, a bemused smile on his lips and she feels a twinge in her chest. His face is still so close to hers that if she wants to, they could be snogging again with barely any effort and her eyes briefly flicker down to his tempting mouth before going back to his eyes, but...

What had gotten into her? What is she doing?

He had somehow managed to manipulate her again, because there is no way that this situation could have happened otherwise. All of a sudden, the anger she's been feeling for the past year and a half - that had left for a brief, blissful moment - surges again, and she pushes Sebastian away from her with as much force as she can muster. She almost feels bad as the happiness in his face turns to confusion, then frustration as he realizes she's getting away from him.

"Stay away from me," she hisses, picking up her discarded schoolbag from its spot on the ground. As she stalks down the hall, she can hear Sir Cadogan cheering on her bravery over the ringing in her ears.

She has a lot of thinking to do.

Sebastian Sallow's List of Priorities (in no particular order):

Figure out what the hell I'm going to do when I graduate;

Figure out how the hell I'm going to finish this bloody Charms essay before tomorrow; and

Figure out what the hell is going on between us

Sebastian sits in an undisturbed corner of the library - nobody ever comes to this table because it's tucked away between shelves of incredibly dense magical theory books - and is twirling his quill in his fingers, watching the ink splatter on the list he spent his precious time writing instead of the Charms essay he should be working on. He's far away from the first-years who like to congregate by the windows and watch the leaves fall softly to the ground rather than study for their classes. He's made especially sure that he is far, far away from her.

It's not his choice, mind you, but he needs to be a gentleman about these things. If she needs some time and space to figure out that she's as crazy for him as he is her, fine. But even Sebastian Sallow's patience runs thin, and he's not sure how much longer he can give her to come to her senses before he snaps and takes matters into his own hands. If things were up to him, the two of them would be sitting far too close together now in this secluded corner, and maybe he would need to put a hand over her mouth to ensure her complete silence as he runs a hand up her thigh.

Now that he knows what delicious sounds can come out of her mouth - sounds that he caused - he's been having a hard time concentrating on, well, anything. Sebastian surreptitiously glances across the library to where she's sitting and studying with his sister and Imelda. Ever since the events after their Divination class, Sir Cadogan has taken it upon himself to follow Sebastian around the halls of the castle, tripping through frames and disrupting their inhabitants as he lectures Sebastian on love. The tea party women had managed to convince the knight that he had disrupted an amorous exchange, and Sebastian fervently wishes they hadn't.

The whole school is abuzz with rumors about who it could be. Nobody has even come close so far with their guesses, but Anne and Imelda are having too much fun teasing him about it. Somehow, she has managed to avoid suspicion - he wonders how this is even possible, since she's never been able to hide what she's thinking. He makes eye contact with her - has she been staring at him this whole time? - and she flushes before looking over to Imelda, who's laughing too loudly at something Anne's just said. Sebastian can't tear his eyes away from her profile, his eyes following the curve of her eyebrow, the slight upturn of her lips as she smiles at her friends, her eyes as they dart back to him, her cheeks as she turns an even darker shade of red as she realizes he's still watching her. She tucks a lock of hair behind her ear, and rests her chin on her hand as she tries to look absorbed in what Anne is saying to her.

Sebastian wonders if she's thought about him as much as he's thought about her. Judging by how she had snogged him back, he's positive that she feels the same way, but then he remembers how she had looked at him before she fled, and he's not so sure. He sighs as he looks back to his list, bringing his quill back to the third item and ripping the paper as he crosses it out again. His mind has been going in circles since that moment and he doesn't know what to think. He slowly puts everything into his schoolbag before heading out of the library for yet another freezing cold shower that hopefully tempers his now-permanent state of arousal whenever she's around.

He doesn't notice her eyes following him as he walks out of the library.

He doesn't hear her hurried excuse to Anne and Imelda as she shoves her things into her bag and rushes to follow him.

He doesn't hear her light footsteps as she gets closer to him.

When she puts a hand out to touch his arm as he waits for the moving staircase to stop, with a soft, "Sebastian" accompanying it, he nearly jumps out of his skin. He was so absorbed with thoughts of her, that to see her standing at his side, closer than she had been since they kissed was almost his snapping point.

"Can we talk?" she asks, looking almost embarrassed as she avoids his eyes. She instead looks determinedly at his collar. He thinks she probably notices that he swallows nervously before acquiescing, but she says nothing as she turns and starts hurrying away from him without waiting to see if he follows her.

She must know that he would follow her anywhere at this point.

They weave through hallways - Sebastian vaguely wonders where exactly they're going - before reaching a little alcove, hidden by a suit of armor. She looks around before pulling him into it. It's almost curfew and the halls are never that busy when the weather is as beautiful as it has been these days - the end of September seems to be clinging on to the summer for as long as possible.

Her lips are on his before he can even ask her what she needed to talk with him about, hungry and desperate. Sebastian is too stunned to pull away - not that he would actually want to. Her arms wrap around his neck, keeping Sebastian close, slender fingers sliding through his hair.

"What," she says breathlessly between kisses - almost not even moving her mouth away from his enough to be able to enunciate properly, "are you doing to me? I haven't been able to think for the last month."

Sebastian smiles into her mouth, wondering if she knows that she's repeating the very thing he told her two weeks ago. Maybe she has been thinking of him all this time - he almost hopes that she's been suffering as much as he has. Instead of responding, he moves a hand to cup her jaw, deepening the kiss. His other hand moves to her waist, gripping it tightly, pulling her flush against his body and she gasps into his mouth. He slowly moves her closer to the window alcove behind them, snogging her senseless the whole time. She moans into his mouth which just spurs him on further - her skirt rides up to her hips as Sebastian trails a hand up her stockinged thigh and they both gasp when his hand reaches skin. Her skin is so, so soft and her breathing gets faster as he continues to caress her inner thigh, closer to the bend between her thigh and her center. Sebastian wonders if she's ever been touched there before by someone else and jealousy flares up inside of him at the thought.

In one swift move, he scoops her up and places her so that she's sitting on the window-ledge, the dusky light of the sunset illuminating her from behind and making her wispy flyaway hairs a golden halo around her. Sebastian's breath catches in his throat - has he ever seen anything so beautiful as her in that moment? - she's staring up at him, her fingers playing with the hair at the nape of his neck, her breathing shallow and anticipation in her eyes. "You're," he starts saying and his throat goes dry. He brings a hand up to tuck the errant lock of hair - the one she had tucked earlier in the library - behind her ear and she leans her head into his touch, closing her eyes briefly before looking up at him again with wide eyes. "You're perfect."

She smiles faintly and pulls his head back down towards hers and now she's brushing her lips against his, teasing him, before it's too much and he grips the back of her head, holding her in place as he crushes his mouth against hers in a bruising kiss. Her knees are on either side of his waist, and she desperately grinds her core against his throbbing erection and they both groan at the friction. Sebastian moves his hands down to her thighs again as he kisses her, slowly caressing his way up and pushing her skirt up further until it's completely bunched around her waist. She gasps into his mouth at his first tentative touch after he pushes aside her undergarments. Sebastian swipes a finger up her slit, through the slick that coats it, and then he starts circling her clit with slow, even strokes. She shivers against him - at his touch - clinging tightly to his shoulders and gasping into his mouth as he continues.

Every little noise coming out of her mouth, feeling how wet she is, how the slickness keeps growing growing growing makes Sebastian hungry for more - it isn't enough -

Slowly - so slowly - he wants to savor this moment - he lowers himself until he's kneeling between her legs and he looks up at her. Her face is deliciously flushed, all swollen lips and hair in a wild cloud around her face and all she can do is stare down at him. Her chest is heaving and she tries to close her legs - hide what is exposed to him - but he holds her thighs firmly in place on either side of his head. He turns his head and kisses her inner thigh, maintaining eye contact as he swipes his tongue across where he's just kissed, moving closer towards her slick center.

"Oh," she breathes, not-quite-a-word, not-quite-a-gasp, when his mouth reaches her center and hovers over it, lips slowly teasing her the way she had just teased him. Sebastian tentatively runs his tongue up her slit; the loud moan she lets out when he reaches her clit makes him stay there, applying light and not-so-light pressure in equal measure.

Her hands are scrabbling at his hair, digging into his scalp, ruining his earlier attempts to make it look presentable, hopefully attractive, for her these days. She's pushing his head deeper into the space between her legs, starting to rock herself slightly on his mouth, and Sebastian is happy to oblige. He eagerly laps up her slit, and the obscene wet noises as he continues combined with her whimpers and barely-spoken profanities "oh-yes-fuck-yes-there-please-" are making him hard beyond belief. He's straining against his trousers, begging to be let free. Without moving his face from her, he unbuttons his trousers and starts palming himself, using the slickness weeping out of the tip as lubrication.

She's abandoned all control at this point, grinding herself into his face as he laps her up, and it's driving him wild - knowing that he's doing this to her - causing her to be so undone. Normally she's so poised and aloof, never letting any real emotion flicker across her face, so to see her so desperate and needy and wanting him so -

Sebastian's gasping into her, tongue deep inside of her, "ohmygod" he hears her whisper, her hips driving into his face when she shudders and goes still, pulsing around the tongue that's deep inside of it. He slows down, smiling as he continues to run his tongue up her slit until she's responsive again. He kisses her inner thigh and hears her moan before getting up, caressing a finger down her love-struck face and leaning his head down to kiss her deeply. With his other hand he's still touching himself - the thought that she can taste herself on his tongue driving him crazy - and he starts rubbing its blunt head against her swollen clit. She takes it out of his hand- he groans at the feeling of her soft hands (the hands he had held a week ago in Divination and pictured doing this exact thing) tentatively caressing his length before she begins to slide it up and down her slit, coating it in her wetness.

Sebastian has surrendered all control to her - resting his hands on either side of her hips on the windowsill, tucking his head into the crook of her neck and thrusting with her movements as he loses himself in the sensation of sliding through her slick folds. He can feel his release building building building, and when he finally comes, all over her perfect, pink center, it feels like a finally.

Sebastian feels so, so heavy as he pulls his head away from her shoulder, as if he could fall into a blissful sleep right there, in the little window alcove where they've hidden themselves away. The sun has now set completely and they're in shadow as they stare at each other, the sound of their ragged breathing filling the tiny space.

"Sebastian, I..."

She's staring at him with an unfathomable expression on her face, still holding him in her hand, her other hand playing with the hair at the nape of his neck. They look down and he feels his face heat up even more at the mess he's made - he quickly pulls out his wand and cleans her up, before looking back at her, giving her a wry smile as he buttons up his pants and helps her off the ledge. "What did you want to talk to me about, again?"

She gives a slight shake of her head and looks away, but she can't hide the small smile that's growing on her face just like she can't help her eyes that keep wandering over to his. He knows the growing smile on his face matches hers - did that really just happen? She reaches over to lace her fingers through his as they walk around the suit of armor. "I - it's not important."

"Come on," he says, not being able to resist the opportunity to tease her - he's somehow managed to break through the barriers she's set up around her, and he's not about to let the opportunity slide. "Surely that's not what you had in mind when you..."

Sebastian trails off as he sees the expression in her face turn to one of horror - he didn't think his teasing was that bad, was it? - but she's also pulling her hand out of his like she's been burned and -

He follows her gaze, to where it's fixed at the end of the hallway and he knows that once again his face mimics hers. He will never live this down.

Standing at the end of the hallway and looking like two cats who've just found a huge dish of milk, are his sister and Imelda.

Misery.

Complete and utter misery are what she's feeling, if she has to put it into words, which she does. Writing things down always helps her out, helps her organize her thoughts into some sort of order. Except...this time around, it's not really helping. She can't seem to make any sense of her feelings for Sebastian.

She looks over the muddled mess of words she's written down - stream of consciousness, incomprehensible babble - and sighs. She's been dreaming of falling in love since she was a young girl - Jane Austen will do that to you - and can't believe that now that she's had her opportunity, it has to go and be with Sebastian Sallow. Because it has to be love, hasn't it?

There can be no other explanation for the painful way her stomach twists itself up whenever she catches a glimpse of him these days, the way he's consuming her every thought - even when she's dreaming she can't escape him. She can't get the sight of his tousled curls between her legs, his mischievous, warm brown eyes looking up at her as she had the most mind-numbing, toe-curling orgasm of her life - none of the times she's touched herself have ever come close to the sensations he managed to evoke.

Every time she's walking through the hallways between classes and hears his loud voice as he jokes with Garreth, or Ominis, about quidditch or Merlin-knows-what her eyes snap to his face as if he were the sun, and she a sunflower searching for its warmth. And he is most decidedly not the sun. He has the tendency to snort when he laughs, and he laughs too much, especially at his own jokes. Sometimes he talks while he eats. He always twirls his quill between his long fingers in the most annoying way, splattering ink onto any parchment unfortunate to be caught underneath. But he also...

He also always goes out of his way to prepare Ominis's Potions ingredients (why Ominis decided to take and was accepted into NEWT level is a mystery to everyone), occasionally stops to play a round of gobstones with Zenobia when he has the time. Sebastian can often be found in his favorite armchair in the Slytherin common room, resting his face on his hand as he idly flips through the pages of some book, looking altogether too handsome as he does so. And when he stretches and yawns at the end of every Arithmancy lesson - like he is now - his shirt lifts up a bit and she can see a tan sliver of his stomach and -

Snapping in front of her: she blinks and looks over: when she sees it's Imelda her face immediately turns beet red and she grabs the paper she's been doodling on and rips it to shreds as fast as she can.

"Are you fantasizing about a certain annoying someone?" Imelda asks with a wicked grin, dramatically looking over her shoulder at the certain someone in question. He's still stretching, blinking sleepily; when he notices the two girls watching him he flushes deeply. Her stomach twinges again at the sight of him noticing her - has he thought about her since that moment as much as she has? What would she do if he had? Or...if he hadn't? - and she focuses instead on the paper she is currently destroying.

"Imelda," she hisses, glaring at her best friend, "stop."

Imelda does not stop.

Imelda doesn't stop during their walk to Herbology, and she does not stop as they set up their planting stations, and she most certainly does not stop as they mutter charms over their plants.

Ever since she experienced the most wonderful moment in her whole life, followed by the most mortifying, Anne and Imelda have not stopped pestering her about it. They've finally solved the 'Sir Cadogan Puzzle' - I knew it was you all along, claims Anne - but if they truly knew what had happened between her and Sebastian, she's afraid the two of them would simply combust. She loves them dearly, but they never know when to stop, and they've been pushing and poking and prodding her for more information the whole week. She has managed to remain tight-lipped and, she hopes, mysterious about the whole thing, but she's getting tired of the teasing.

"Really," Anne says, wiping her forehead and leaving a trail of dirt behind, "if you would only talk to him, I would stop bothering you. Promise."

"Yes," chimes in Imelda, on her other side, wrestling the leaves of her own plant into submission. "You know, after we saw the two of you holding hands and looking at each other with stars in your eyes, I'm really starting to doubt that you hate him as much as you claim."

"Were the two of you snogging in secret all of last year too? Because, I'm starting to get annoyed thinking of all the times I had to talk to my brother for you because of your stubborn pride."

Does she still hate him? She certainly thinks she should, but then her thoughts get terribly confusing as she continues to think about him, and she realizes all of her old hatred has long since faded. Anne has forgiven her brother, Ominis has forgiven him, and all that remains is her.

They should talk, but she doesn't know what to say.

She's afraid that maybe the man she's been inventing in her mind this past month is simply a figment of her imagination - a fictitious being created by an accumulation of stolen glances when he doesn't know she's watching, someone who all of their classmates seem to like, someone who is very different from the fifteen-year-old boy she had that terrible argument with all that time ago. Maybe he doesn't actually exist.

She would be crushed if he's hiding the fact that he still holds on to that desperate darkness that had driven him to save Anne by any means necessary.

And so she keeps her space. She watches him from afar, feeling the hatred slowly melt off of her, falling more in love every day, but too cowardly to make the next move.

Anne and Imelda continue bantering on either side of her, not noticing - or, more likely, not caring - that she isn't participating.

Sebastian's hands are sweating. He wipes them on the inside of his robes as he glances at the girl next to him. She's holding herself rigidly, but she did this to herself, sitting next to him at dinner as she had.

Well, sitting next to him hadn't been completely her idea if he's being honest. He'd been having dinner with Anne, and the two of them were dying of laughter as she recounted seeing Duncan Hobhouse get tormented by Peeves earlier that day. One moment, Anne had been demonstrating what she had seen using her potatoes and green beans as props, and the next, a particularly evil grin had lit up her face as she pushed her plate away with gusto and jumped to her feet, calling her over.

"It would be such a shame for these potatoes to go to waste, seeing as I have a very important meeting to attend," Anne had said, after pushing her friend into the very tight space at Sebastian's side. "Never mind the mess, I can assure you I didn't actually eat the food..."

And with that, Anne had flounced away, Imelda on her arm, the two girls cackling to each other as they snuck wicked glances over their shoulders at the couple.

A couple who is now steadfastly avoiding each other and trying their hardest not to even brush elbows. Sebastian is altogether too aware of her presence, has been for the better part of a month, and his patience is dangerously close to snapping. He keeps getting maddeningly close to finally getting her to open up to him - had actually achieved it for a few blissful moments - just to have it be taken away again. It's almost embarrassing how many times he's thought about their encounter. She had been everything he'd been dreaming about and more - soft, responsive, just as desperate as him - so why has she been avoiding him so thoroughly?

Yes, he's caught her staring at him more times than he can count, with that same unfathomable expression she had before, almost dreamy - wistful - could it be love? But he knows that it's preposterous, wishful thinking on his part. If it were love - if she felt the same crazy, tumultuous emotions that he was feeling constantly - she wouldn't be so cold towards him. Even if she was staring at him more than ever before.

He doesn't notice as she slips a folded paper into the book sitting next to his plate, but he does notice that she sits next to him for barely five minutes, not even touching the food that Anne has so graciously left her, before she gets up and slips away without so much as speaking a single word to him, or even looking in his direction at all.

Sebastian's sitting in a nearly empty common room after curfew, flipping through his book as he normally does this time of day, when she sees him pause.

Although she's been waiting for this moment, watching him from the corner she's tucked herself away in, she feels ready to pass out from nerves. Her heart's ready to burst out of her chest as she watches him curiously pick up the letter she slipped in his book earlier, brow furrowed. She wrings her hands nervously as she watches him read the letter and flip over the page to see if there's more, and then he goes back to read it again from the beginning.

She wasn't expecting him to read it a second time, let alone a third time, still with an inscrutable expression on his face. Maybe she should have positioned herself closer so she could see every emotion flickering through his face as he reads - she's too far away to see anything and she curses her lack of foresight. If she moves now, he'll see her, and she doesn't even know what she was thinking when she wrote the letter, when she managed to convince Anne to help her get close to Sebastian earlier that night during supper, when she moved herself to sit in this corner just so she could watch him find and read the -

"Hello."

She nearly jumps out of her skin with a muffled shriek at the sound of his voice so close to her. Why does she feel almost guilty when she looks up at him? She's so, so afraid.

Emotions have never come easily to her. Showing them is something she's not sure will ever come naturally - Anne and Imelda can laugh and shout without a care in the world, but she always holds herself back. Hides a small part of herself away, that only she knows about. Baring herself completely to Sebastian in the letter she feverishly wrote the day before was like ripping out a part of her soul and giving it to him to keep. Once the words were written down, there was no way to take them back, not that she wants to.

But what if he rejects her?

Her eyes get hot and tears cloud her vision as she stares up at him, still wringing her hands together over and over, feeling like she's positively going to burst with the force of the emotions roiling around inside of her. Why did she think this would be a good idea?

Now he's kneeling in front of her, holding her hands in his bigger, rougher ones - reminiscent of that fateful day so long ago in Divination when he had flustered her so - and a thumb is gently wiping away the big, fat tears she didn't even realize were rolling down her cheeks and she lifts her face from watching their intertwined hands and gazes tremulously into his eyes.

They are so, so gentle and warm and full of love, but the emotions are still too much for her and she can't stop crying for some unfathomable reason, so the kiss they share is wet and lovely and full of incredulous laughter.

"I love you too," he whispers between kisses, over and over again, until the words almost lose meaning - but these words could never lose their meaning when they come from him.

  In the years to come, they always bicker about who was the first to say it. Sebastian says that writing doesn't count - that his words are the ones that decide who is the victor in this small argument - but she always just smiles at his insistence, knowing that he's kept her letter tucked inside whatever book he's reading since it first fell onto his lap.

[crazy-ache]

I’ve been interacting with new fanfic writers and also been seeing some folks share the fact that they care about hits, bookmarks, and comments on their work as if they’re embarrassed by that fact.

I’m just here to say you shouldn’t ever ever ever feel that way.

Writing, in this case fanfiction writing, can be a very lonely journey at times. If you’re brave enough to post online, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to receive validation. Because when you don’t, I think that’s the equivalent of playing or singing a song and nobody claps once you’re done. Imagine the Olympics or local sports arena or little league game with empty stands. Not a single soul cheering at the end of a concert. Nobody shows up to the art gallery. Nobody eats the baked goods you made with love at the party. All of those scenarios undoubtedly hurt.

Yes, you did it for yourself. Because you love this passion of yours. Because you’re working on your skills. Because you’re proving something to yourself.

But there’s a reason so many of humanity’s passions happen in front of a crowd.

Art is meant to be seen, music is meant to be heard, and yes, fanfiction is meant to be read.

We all want to know our art made an echo.

And yes, we all want to know somebody clapped for us. It validates us, it encourages us, it motivates us to keep going when we’re burnt out. It’s also just plain fun. All of these apply to world class musicians or athletes. For fan fiction writers, the audience cheering is as simple as a hit or a comment. It’s someone engaging with our work in a positive manner. So if you’re feeling that way and you feel bad about it—remember you’re human. And your passion and hobby is just as worthy of receiving audience reception as anybody else.

Fanfiction is a communal space, not just a solitary act. Give love back. Engage wherever and whenever you can. Open yourself to viewing this as a two way dialogue with other writers and readers. Give yourself grace and compassion when you’re disappointed. And when it’s your turn—don’t forget to clap.

[revasserium]

A request for the prompt "Stolen kisses" + Zayne!! Thank you so much :D

also I love your writing SOO much <3

prompt list reqs are: temporarily closed

49. stolen kisses

zayne; 1,720 words; fluff, fem!reader, no "y/n", whipped!zayne, implied sex, but still very saucy, zayne is hornee 24/7 and hes not afraid to show it

summary: 3 kisses, some stolen, others willingly given

a/n: i believe in my heart of hearts that zayne is barely keeping it together around the mc

one. After dinner, when the pair of you are cleaning up and your sleeves rolled up to your elbows, his arms snaking around your waist to pull you back into him as he presses a kiss to your neck before trailing his lips up to your cheek. Your laughter rings through the kitchen, folding around the pair of you like wings. His smile is soft, is radiant, is tender and absolute as he pulls back to regard you with his searching eyes.

“Good dinner?” he asks.

“The best,” you answer, grinning as you trail a finger along his jaw to tangle your fingers in his hair.

“Good…” he breathes the word against your cheek, leaning in, the ends of his bangs tickling the skin of your face. You make to pull back, but his arms loop tighter around your waist, pressing you close, holding you against the solid cool of the marble countertop.

“But we haven’t yet had dessert.”

Heat flushes up your neck and up, up, up till you can feel your face burning, as you blink up at him from beneath your lashes, feigning innocence.

“I didn’t know we had dessert planned on the menu.”

His grin goes sideways, his eyes taking on a darker, more dangerous light.

“It’s not always planned but…” his voice trails off as a tingling shiver races up your spine, “It is always… considered.”

And then, he leans in to kiss you — and he kisses you with a hunger that has nothing to do with the scrumptious meal you’ve just shared and everything to do with the pulsing heat coalescing between your bodies as he lifts you up onto the counter.

He kisses you like he wants to ruin your mouth for all other tastes but him; he kisses you as if he’s already been ruined by the taste of you.

two. It is unprofessional; you know — and so does he — to do this here, with your back pressed against the wood of his office door, his white coat slipping off his shoulders, his glasses nearly knocked askance by the force of this kiss.

You’d always known that just beneath his smooth, tempered glass facade is the kind of roiling heat that makes up the heart of the earth, the kind of passion that licked at the mouths of volcanoes and rends the sky into nothing but a devastation of ashes.

But here, now, the only rending is his fingers pressing into the dip of your waist, the only devastation his tongue as it traces along the inside of your teeth. You hear yourself make a low, wanton noise and feel him react, his fingers tightening impossibly, his mouth ever and ever more demanding.

“Z-Zayne… we —” but the words die on your lips as he drops his to the bare skin of your neck. You can’t help the gasp that tumbles from your mouth, nor the sudden flash of memory — crystal clear and sharp, as if carved from ice — of the night before, when he had sunk his teeth into your bare shoulder and twisted your hair with trembling fists. It had been pain and impossible, improbable passion. All urge and fire, desperation and need.

“Shhh…” Zayne murmurs against your skin, groaning softly as he finds your lips with his own again. And you are helpless all over again. Weak against the burning need of his embrace.

A soft knock shocks both of you from the frenzied passion soaking through your bones, threatening to blot out your good sense entirely. You pull apart, gasping. From the other side of the door comes the muffled voice of a nurse -

“Dr. Zayne? Your next patient is here. Shall I let him in?”

Zayne hisses out another breath before pulling away.

“Yes, just give me five minutes - finishing a report.”

You can't help the amused grin that tugs across your lips as the both of you make to tidy the slight mess you've made.

“So… I'm a report now, am I?”

But Zayne only regards you with a light, challenging look, quirking his brows.

“No.”

You blink, confused. Then Zayne smiles.

“We’re nowhere near finished.”

A fresh wave of heat crests up into your cheeks as you purse your lips, casting your eyes anywhere but Zayne's pleased face.

“Unprofessional,” you accuse, through the word lacks any vehemence, marred by the extensive blush still coloring your cheeks.

Zayne straightens his impeccably pressed white doctor's coat before taking three swift steps into your space, his chest nearly pushing against yours. He reaches out to tilt your chin up towards him and you feel a hitched breath caught like an insect in amber, suspended perfectly between your lungs and your throat.

Slowly, Zayne draws his thumb across the plush of your bottom lip. You feel his breath fanning across it like a wave of summer heat, found at the heart of winter itself.

“Only in front of you.”

He pulls away just as another gentle knock comes at the door, the nurse's voice announcing the arrival of Zayne's next patient. Zayne casts you one last lingering, meaningful look before gently nudging you aside to pull open the door, the vision of a young and promising doctor as he greets his patient with a small smile, the other hand guiding you towards the opened door.

"Don't forget to take your supplements,” he chides in a voice just gentle enough to inform polite company of his fondness for you, but nothing in it would hint at the indiscretions that had been committed only minutes prior.

"Okay,” you say, ducking your head as you brush by the middle- aged man blinking at the pair of you.

"And… see you at home.”

You only manage a nod and a squeak as the nurse chuckles behind her hand and the middle- aged man makes a soft noise of understanding.

three. You are both eighteen, and teetering on the edge of adulthood — though he’s already well on his way to stardom.

“Congrats — on the Starcatcher Award —“ you feel your throat catch around the words, and suddenly, your mouth is dry, your cheeks hot, your fingers twisting behind your back as you rock on the balls of your feet.

Zayne watches you, his expression thoughtfully blank, but his eyes — they’ve always been his tell. You meet them and search them and feel the fire caught behind them. His Evol might be ice, but… his soul has always been something that burns.

“Thanks,” he says, and you can almost taste the unsaid words bubbling just at the back of his throat. You wish he would tell you, but there’s a depthless chasm cut into the air between the pair of you, rough and jagged and —

“Do you know what I received the award for?”

You blink, startled. You purse your lips, looking away. It’d been too painful, too much to look into it, the knowledge of his brilliance always nipping at your heels like an unruly dog. It had pushed you forward, yes, but only out of the fear that if you let up even one single step, he’d race too far ahead and… leave you behind.

“N-no — I haven’t —“

“For my research on congenital heart defects in infants.”

The world slows, tunnels, and tilts around you. Your eyes jerk up to meet his and there — you see it, the blistering heart of all his so-called fire — and you remember suddenly that if it’s cold enough, the body starts to process the sensation as heat. That ice and fire are not so different.

That ice can also burn.

You find your own hands clutched just above where your heart beats inside your chest and you see his eyes flicker down towards them.

“Zayne —“

“I start work at a clinic next week.”

A frown creases at your temple.

“Our first appointment is on Tuesday.”

Your frown deepens.

“What do you —“

“To qualify for the Hunter Program, you need a medical verification of fitness. And… a primary care physician.”

At these last words, his eyes finally cut away. And here, in the dying light of his brand new living room, the sunset turns his glasses opaque for just a second. You’re left blinking in the aftermath of that light, the afterimages will be stained behind your eyelids for hours after — just that look, the firm line of his shoulders, the determined set of his mouth, his jaw, the softness in his fingers as he reached out to tuck a strand of hair behind your ear, his touch lingering against the bend of your cheek.

“L-Lying on reports would be a medical malpractice suit waiting to happen,” you say, your voice shaking with either delirium or emotion, you’re not sure which.

Zayne quirks an eyebrow, “I have no plans on lying.”

“But —“ your fingers clench at your chest.

“I’m just… confident in my own skills, that’s all.”

The shadow of a grin twists his lips and he turns back to you, his eyes cast in threads of molten gold.

“Oh… of course,” you let out a soft breath of laughter, toppling back into the sofa and tossing your arm across your eyes. A moment later, you feel the cushions of the sofa sink beside you.

“Hey, look at me.”

You drop your arm and turn, your head still pillowed against the back of the sofa. Zayne’s gaze flickers over every aspect of your face before he reaches out to take your hand in his. Slowly, he leans down to press his lips to your knuckles, letting his lips linger there till you make a soft, questioning noise at the back of your throat.

He looks back up with a knowing smile.

“Shall we get something to eat?”

You jump to your feet, “Y-yes! My treat — a congratulations gift!”

Zayne considers for a moment before sighing, “Alright, but just this once.”

“What, we’re not allowed to go out to dinner now that you’re a certified doctor?”

Zayne’s mouth twitches with amusement as he reaches for his coat.

“No, we’ll still go out for dinner — you’re just no longer allowed to pay for them.”

[nymphiria]

♱ : 𝐈’𝐕𝐄 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐈𝐂𝐄𝐃… — SUNDAY!

fem!reader, fluff, in love with sunday’s wings, he’s a little floofy, possessive sunday if you squint, i wanna bite him :), definitely didn’t proofread but i came out of the woodworks for this man

there’s something that you’d noticed about 𝐒𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐀��� that for some reason you hadn’t before. it wasn’t the way that he preened himself in the mirror before a meeting, nor was it how he pinched the bridge of his nose whenever an issue was placed upon his desk. the oak family head was pristine — every detail on and of his person was hard to miss. so, how is it that you never took note of it before?

the new dress that you purchased from a boutique in golden hour was simply gorgeous. the ornamentation that decorated the silky garment glimmered under the glow of your bedroom lights. as you admired yourself in the mirror, the soft click of the bedroom door alerted you to your lover’s arrival. you giddily ran into the bathroom before he had the chance to see you.

“dearest?”, he called, brows furrowed at the thought of where you might be. with your voice muffled from behind the door, you answered, “in here!”

moments later, you opened the door and twirled to show off all of the lace and pearls that you were dreaming about wearing for weeks on end. it took an enormous amount of effort to hide such a purchase but you felt that the wait would be worth it. if one thing about sunday was true, it was that he adored seeing you all dolled up — especially for him.

truly, in sunday’s eyes, you looked like the most divine creation that would ever grace the universe with its presence. he wanted every facet of you — body, mind, and soul. part of him wanted to drop to his knees and thank his god for blessing him with your existence, though the other felt a twinge of embarrassment for his internal thoughts. stunned in both shock and revelry, his face only portrayed minimal expression besides his now open mouth and wide eyes.

for a moment, you couldn’t help but feel that he was …disappointed in what he saw. was your dress not pretty enough? did it not suit your body as much as you thought it did? perhaps he felt it was unwise to spend as much money as you did on something as unnecessary as a new dress. before the feelings of doubt could sink its way in, the wings adorning your lover’s head flapped once, then twice — fluffy feathers puffing out and making him look even softer.

“d-did your,” you stuttered in surprise. “did they just…“ the seemingly stoic look on sunday’s face was quickly replaced by a deep flush from his cheeks to his neck. the halovian’s wings desperately attempted to cover his blushing face but did little to help ease his embarrassment.

looking back, you can distantly recall hearing the quiet flutter of feathers the first time you kissed your lover on the cheek. his expression then did little to betray how flustered he truly was on the inside. he remained as poised as he always did only with a light pink dusting his cheeks. just how many times were you oblivious to the sight?

a wide smile spread across your face as moved towards your lover to stroke through his hair. “so,” your hand moved to play with his feathers. “i’m assuming you like the dress, then?”

“of course i do,” he looked away from your playful gaze. “you always look stunning in everything you put on.”

you giggled, “well then, mr. sunday, why have i not seen your wings jump at anything else i wear? you almost flew away when you saw this dress.”

sunday gently removed the hand that was stroking his hair to cup the warmth of his cheek, “simply put…”

“it would be rather improper to show just how weak you make me.”

[gay-mirrorball]

i have an incomplete fic in my drafts and an incomplete fic out on ao3. am i gonna start another fic which will probably never see the light of the day? absolutely yes.

[anna-scribbles]

chapter cards for thirteen: november - april

read on ao3

[acid-ixx]

mild spoilers for chapter six for my series again &. again, but i really feel the need to ramble about this, and i'd love to hear anybody's opinion on this hehe.

as i write outline chapter six (and write for chapter five), i'd like to say i couldn't wait to write the reader's face reveal in bruce's perspective. and it's not just angst, for me, this plays a very pivotal turn for the series— because bruce will spiral to insanity.

to never once see a single portrait of your second youngest child, whose presence has long been erased from the manor, not a single image, nor trace of you is sickening to the heart, even if he scours through the internet day and night for a single memoir of you, nothing— but to find your portrait in alfred's living quarters and seeing you for the first time in forever? graduating a milestone no less?

god, he's in for a ride just analyzing every aspect of your physical appearance.

the color of your eyes, the shape of your nose, the quip of your mouth, the fat in your cheeks; even the length of your lashes! god, does he brand it into the deepest parts of his mind to never forget you anymore. his pearl, his treasure.

the longer he stares, the more he notices and gazes even more, obsessive as he stands lonesome in the room with every bone in his body locking up, his eyes unable to look away from the portrait that showcases his baby child.

and there, there it is that he concludes a detail so small it's unrecognizable for someone who's seen it for his entire life; yet it's all the same triggered deranged emotions deep within him.

— you don't just share him and your mother's traits, no, your smile is also reminiscent of his mother's.

martha wayne, who'd died in his arms, laying in a pool of her blood with a bullet grazed deep inside her body. his loving mother, who caressed his face whenever he'd cry from his nightmares, who'd shown him motherly love that until now he still craves.

she died with her pearl necklace that once decorated her porcelain neck spilling to the ground and stained with crimson.

you wore pearl earrings on your graduation.

the thought alone is enough for him to just snap.

this? this is the child that he's been neglecting far too long? who shares the same, loving expression of his mother's? his child? not even a single memory could be conjured with you but fantasies now do. if your happiest moments were within the picture frame that he holds with shivering fingers at present; could your smile be any wider if you'd be with him?

how come he never once noticed? why is bruce always destined to fail left and right? why, just why is he brimming with jealousy for all the people who must've seen your smile before him, and contempt for himself that he was never there to pick you up from the police station beforehand?

bruce isn't a heckler for favoritism, but a darker part of him is motivated to take you away from wherever you are, and to never let anybody else witness his beautiful, little treasure.

he's gotham's knight, first and foremost. but he's a father, too, with goals to protect his children just like a father should.

and the things he'd do for you, his child, now? anything.

if it means he has to see that smile, then he'll turn the world upside-down.

he has to protect your smile.

[hungharrington]

ok this is filth adjacent but would u ever write a lil blurb or fic about Steve with a gf whose super insecure about her stretch marks and body? And May be she doesn't want to disappoint Steve bc his exes seem prettier

would i ever! i love these type of requests i love ppl getting a little bit of respite and comfort through fic esp in smut! i hope this makes u feel even a little bit hotter babe <3 1.6k, afab!reader, and just filth adjacent sry! MDNI this entire blog is 18+

Steve's mouth is on your neck, his tongue hot where it teases against your skin, and his hands are searching your body with a lustful fervor.

Your head tips back. It's so easy to let him in, let him slide his body closer to yours, to get more of whatever he's giving. The hot press of his mouth on your neck feels damn good enough to make your blood sing—and heat travel between your thighs, wetness beginning to pool.

You want to rub your thighs together, if only for a little relief. Steve's toned thigh between them prevents it. You scrunch his polo between your hands instead, trying to wrestle the courage to slip your hands beneath it.

You're lying back on his bed, propped up lightly by the pile of pillows the two of you had stacked when the evening had begun. The television at the end of the bed runs a film idly in the background, completely unnoticed by this point.

"How we doin'?" Steve's voice rumbles out, barely parting his lips from your skin before he's swooping back in to nip at it again. The bastard.

Your hands flex again, finally mustering the nerve to dive beneath the fabric of his shirt. Steve's warm. You feel the muscles of his tummy shudder as you skim your fingers across it, a pleasurable shiver running down your spine at the trail of hair you can feel leading into his pants. Steve's breath hitches, close to your ear.

He nudges your jaw with his nose lovingly, planting another row of sloppy, wet kisses down the expanse of your neck.

"Hmm," He hums, questioningly. "Still doing good?"

You realise you hadn't exactly answered him and something glows in your chest at his insistent checks. Extremely reluctantly, you manage to drag your hands away from his torso, shifting them up to subtly nudge his face out the curve of your neck.

Steve's eyes dart up to your face as he pulls himself back, his expression turning dopey the moment your hands cup his jaw. His cheeks are flushed ruby and his hair has been mussed in all his steamy motions. He looks fucking delicious.

You kiss him — surging up to connect your mouths, warmth exploding in your chest and trickling down, down when Steve responds with a revere hunger. His plush lips scrape against yours filthily, his tongue always so perfectly teasing. You're gasping for air when you pull away.

"So good," You say breathily, finally answering the question.

Steve takes a moment longer to register what you've said—but that dopey look crosses his face the moment he does.

He plants his hands on the bed and shifts his weight back, sitting back on his heels. His thigh is still situated right between yours and you have to shove down the lustful urge to grind against it, lazy pleasure still pooling low in your gut. Though you're pretty sure Steve wouldn't oppose the idea.

Chest heaving lightly, you watch as Steve reaches for the edges of his polo and tugs upwards. It comes off in one smooth motion and you're rewarded with a fine sight. You're pretty sure your mouth actually waters in response. Tan chest, scattered moles, the smattering of hair. Oh god, you want to lick him.

Something in your face must give away your train of thought because Steve laughs. He leans back down, one hand moving to your waist, and nuzzles his nose against yours. He steals a kiss from your lips.

"See somethin' you like?" He says, the smirk evident in his tone. You feel like you might vibrate out of your skin.

"Shut up," You aim for fiesty and fall far, far short. You sound on the verge of a whine when you say, "You know I do."

Steve grins wider. His hand on your waist tucks under your shirt seamlessly, his thumb drawing maddening circles into the skin. Your breath catches, even as your arousal hikes.

"What about you?" He whispers the question between his kisses as he mouths along your jaw again, finding that same damn spot on your neck again. It'll be violet coloured by the morning. "Do I get to see something I'll like?"

He's asking permission. It takes a long moment to realise that—too distracted between the touch of his fingertips skating across your skin and the addicting feel of his lips against your pulse.

You nod without thinking.

Steve pulls your shirt up no more than a few inches before your brain catches back up. Your hand moves abruptly, grabbing his hand and yanking it and your shirt back down in a split second.

Steve's halting in an instant, pulling back from working lovebites on your neck to see what he's done wrong. There's a string of spit connecting his lips to your neck.

Steve frowns in concern, shifting his hand up wipe his mouth with the back of his hand, as he makes an effort to put a little distance between you.

"You okay?" He asks. You're still holding his wrist, which is still holding the edge of your shirt. "What happened?"

Your mouth opens uselessly and closes. You know precisely why you had stopped him and now you're facing up with the fact you have to tell him, lest Steve believe you're actually having second thoughts over being with him.

It's just... you've probably spent far too many hours in the mirror. You've seen it from every angle. Seen it in every lighting. You can't quite ever seem to make your body look good.

You don't look like any of the girls Steve's been with in the past.

Comparison is killer, you're aware of this, but infuriatingly you just can't seem to stop. You think of what Steve will see the moment he gets your shirt off, what he'll realise, and your hand tightens around his wrist subconsciously. Your throat tightens up too.

Steve's face melts into a softer expression, eyes big. "Hey, hey, it's totally fine if you said one thing and- and you realise that you didn't mean it, it's okay."

Words continue to evade you and humiliatingly, it feels more likely that tears will escape you before any explanation will. He's being so nice.

"But..." Steve continues, his tone wary as if aware he's treading on uneven ground. "You seemed like you were into it. Like, comfortable, I mean. Then it was like a flip switched and you froze."

"I-" You finally find your voice. You clear your throat as you try to find the right words, breaking Steve's intense gaze to study the ceiling.

This is worse. This has got to be worse that just Steve taking your shirt off and being disappointed because— because you're goddamn building up to it. Your eyes screw shut and you decide it's better to rip the band-aid off.

"I'm just," You can't quite keep the quiver out of your voice. "I'm not like- like girls you've dated before."

Steve makes a noise of confusion and it's enough to force your eyes open. You glance down, taking in Steve's adorably furrowed brow.

"Okay...?" He says, clearly still a bit confused.

"I mean, Steve," You say, voice a little steadier. Your hand around his wrist finally remembers to relax.

You release the hold on him and tuck your hand under your shirt discretely, covering the skin of your stomach you know is warped with stretch marks. "I don't look like the girls you've dated before. My- my body is different."

The wrinkle between Steve's brow shifts, moving from confused to something a little harsher.

"So?"

You blink. Of all the possibilities that you had run, not one of them had ended with Steve saying that.

"So?" You echo meekly. "So... so you might be like, I don't know, disappointed or think—mfh"

The words get smushed beneath Steve's fervent kiss, stealing one kiss off your lips and all your words with it. You blink up at him again, all your endless arguments of why Steve would be so disappointed suddenly silenced.

Steve grins, evidently pleased with his reaction.

Tentatively, moving slowly so you could intervene if you wished, he drags his hand along the sheets and onto your hip again. This time, however, he pushes the fabric of your shirt up and doesn't pause til it's bunched up, most of your torso on show.

Your nerves gather, gnawing at the edges of your chest. You can't bring yourself to move the hand that's trying to hide part of you, even if a dozen other stretch marks are visible now.

Then Steve leans down and he kisses your skin, right in the middle of your tummy.

"I think," He says, lips dragging across your skin and setting it aflame. He's looking up at your through his lashes, your gazes locked, his eyes dark. Another kiss, this time longer, with just a flash of tongue. "You're hot shit."

Instinct makes you want to scoff. But Steve says it so seriously that you almost believe him off the bat. Believe that he believes that.

He lowers himself onto his elbows, letting both of his large hands settle onto your waist, fingers pressing into the skin lightly. You shiver at the feeling and start to consider the possibility that he actually does think that.

"And I will gladly," He punctuates the word with another kiss, this one evolving into a soft, sensual lick up towards your breasts which peak lustfully in response. Your breath hitches. "Spend all the time needed if you need some convincing of that."

His hands move, sliding down til he's gently knocking yours aside, big warms hands spread across your hips. His thumbs are moving, drawing soft motions down, you realise, towards your waistband. Your pulse jumps between your legs, the heat in your body uncaring about the brief interruption.

Steve kisses your tummy again, further down this time. You acutely realise you've got Steve Harrington between your thighs, looking up at you with darkened eyes and promising filthy things with his fingers. Or mouth. Both if you're lucky.

"So," Steve murmurs, voice raspy and low. His thumbs slip beneath your waistband, just an inch. "You gonna let me convince you?"

You're feeling pretty damn lucky.

[junosmindpalace]

May I request Senku developing a crush on his childhood friend after the petrification? fem!reader if possible (if not gn!reader is completely fine)

hope you have a good day :)

Something is different. 

Senku isn’t referring to his environment, which is so far removed from everything he used to know and love. Instead of brick buildings and concrete pavements, there is seemingly never ending forestry, green and gravel beneath the heels of his makeshift shoes. 

It isn’t Senku’s clothing, which is only some thin tattered animals skins that he had spent days working to hunt down the material for, then skin, then tan, and then stitch together with whatever he could to make the haphazard, ugly garment he wears on the regular to provide him with whatever kind of protection from the elements he can with the resources available to him. It’s a stark contrast to the color he used to wear long ago. 

It isn’t even the new friends (and enemies) he’s made since freeing himself from his petrified state. A whole village of people, now, who look toward him for guidance and instruction, upon him with admiration and reverence. People who help him against the newfound stakes, newfound work, newfound responsibilities that haven’t in the slightest been easy to take on. 

Something is different, and amongst nearly everything in his life becoming dirt and dust nearly overnight, Senku is referring to something different about you. 

But he isn’t referring to the environment he’s used to seeing you in, a school setting, perhaps a park, maybe his own room. There’s no new observation to make about a change in your room or a decoration in your locker, because like him, those things are long gone. 

It isn’t your appearance, a similar reflection of your new environments and state of the world. Random pieces of tanned skin poorly stitched into something that resembled clothing, a Frankenstien’s monster of a garment. More simple and plain assuming compared to the various designs and fabrics you wore way back when you’d spend time on an experiment with Senku. He watched you mature from one phase of your life into the next, and this was no different.

It wasn’t even the new people you surround yourself with, found comfort within. It wasn’t listening to their stories, the things that made these people, so far removed from your time, human. It wasn’t the small, pleasant things that he knew grounded you when you got too caught up in your head, the new habits you made out of retrieving materials, crafting things to keep your hands (and mind) busy, new skills you learned (or were forced to learn) and previous skills you learned to develop.

But for the life of him, Senku cannot figure out what it is that’s different. He drives himself a little further mad each time he looks on at you. There’s something in his mind, almost like an itch, that intrusively takes hold on the rest of his senses when there’s a moment between the two of you, whether it’s a quiet one, whether it’s one of shared excitement or mutual understanding. There’s a warmth and a chill that wash over him at the same time when your gaze settles on him a little too intensely, or when you say something wise and agreeable. There is something he’s missing, and he can’t figure out what. 

Maybe it’s your laugh that’s different, though Senku doesn’t know why that would be a thing of prominent notice, or notice at all. It’s a little rougher, and at times with a little less heart than he’s accustomed to after so many years of hearing it bright and enthusiastic. But it’s still kind, and most of all, genuine. Perhaps something about that makes it distinguishable from another. 

Or perhaps it was your new approach to, your new outlook on, life. No, perhaps it was the way you applied your already existing approaches and outlooks to your new, unique circumstances. To help cope, to help others, to help him. 

It was something different, Senku was sure of it. However, he hasn’t had much time to linger on what could possibly be the source of such…irritation, for very long. 

Perhaps a more irritating point was the fact that Senku could hardly place a time when he first observed this difference. 

At the very least, he could estimate it to be sometime after the both of you emerged from the stone. 

The simplest solution, perhaps, could be for him to just ask you directly. It’s the easiest way to confirm or deny hypotheses’. He would ask if you had gotten haircuts in the past, ask if you had gotten any sleep after noticing prominent circles under your eyes and sluggish movements. This was no different.

But when Senku finds himself hesitating on an evening when the two of you are working in the lab together, Senku thinks that maybe this is the different thing. For some reason, he’s slower to communicating such personal things, despite it being nothing more than simple, casual and menial conversation. 

You’ve had hundreds of conversations about a million different things over the years, from careers you aspire to pursue in earnest to the more daunting topics about love and loss. He’s seen every side of you, good and ugly, he’s heard every side of you. Every insecurity, every point of pride, about every friend who’s come and gone and stayed behind; and in a more Senku like fashion, you’ve heard the same from him, in that straightforward and logical way of communicating that you’ve always been able to see through from the wavers in his voice to the passionate glints in his eyes. 

But something is different. Something has been different. 

Yet the two of you work away in the lab as if it were any other evening, the twinkling stars in the sky he admires so much hidden away by the walls and bamboo roof. It’s what you’ve been doing since you’ve established some sort of lab to work out of ever since the petrification. Senku has felt quite disturbed by this difference of yours, but at the very least, he finds it comforting that it doesn’t affect this routine that the two of you established early on in your relationship. The content, collaborative efforts the two of you put in to create something satisfying, worthwhile; exciting. 

It’s what he’s always felt with you in your relationship. Thrill to indulge in something he’s passionate about together, thrill to create something with you, thrill to be with you--

Senku pauses his work for a moment. He shifts his gaze from the notes in front of him to where you stand just down the opposite end of the table, completely enamored with the tests you were performing. 

Something is different. He thinks, at that moment, that he’s almost figured out what. 

But the realization he was about to reach disappears from him suddenly, and he can’t seem to become conscious of the conclusion when he stares at you. He tries desperately to recall it, reach for it in his mind, through a frantic look at your features. The warm light against your skin, the gentle movement of your hands, the concentrated furrow of your brows. 

His heart feels like it might burst out of frustration the more he looks at you, and he forces himself to turn away. It’s there, it was there!

(And it still was.)

He’ll figure it out eventually.