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yousaydisco · 1 month ago

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Finished rated E Harry/Kim ficlet that I don't want to post to my ao3. 4.2k words, first time, Harry and Kim meet up a week after Martinaise and their relationship turns from platonic to decidedly not.

It is late evening, a time when children are put to bed and delinquents are looking at themselves in cracked mirrors getting ready for a night of raising Hell and feeling at peace with themselves, when Kim's phone rings. He gets up from his well-loved armchair (the one that has cracks in the faux leather that are irreparable) to pad across to it but doesn't rush himself. It is partially on its second ring when he answers with "This is Lieutenant Kitsuragi."

When the voice on the other end answers with a resounding "Kim!" a small part of his gut regrets that it took him so long to answer. Harry sounded like a lot of things: exhausted, no doubt still recovering from Martinaise, elated to him from Kim again, but mostly he sounded overwhelmingly relieved. Like maybe he hadn't remembered Kim's phone number correctly and wasn't sure if he was going to get the right person.

Or more like he thought Kim wouldn't answer the phone at all. He could still hang up, having heard Harry's voice and wanting to come clean of him completely. Write off their entire meeting as something to forget, but that's something that Kim would only do in his nightmares. If given the opportunity he would like to keep a hold on the strange man he met in Martinaise.

He had carved out a life for himself that purposefully leaves little room for anything besides the RCM. It allows him to more easily find comfort in routine: work, home, sleep, back to work. He's never been good at people - people who can be unpredictable or needy or any number of things that would disrupt his routine. So he doesn't have people in his life. Any loneliness that lingers is just the price to pay for the most powerful feeling of comfort he can afford himself. Except. . .

"Hello, Harry." he doesn't use 'detective' because that would be too formal over the phone. But for some reason using 'Harry' also feels like the wrong decision. Well, no, it's not actually about using his name, it's about how Kim was so beside himself at hearing the gravelly voice again that he let himself smile wide. A full-tooth smile that is far too intimate. Too revealing. Just as quickly as it appeared on his face he bites it back down again.

It has been one week since he has heard from Harry and it feels like a hell of a lot longer than that. But also shorter, which makes no sense at all but still feels very true. Before he was sent on the case, and briefly before Harry called him, he was reading a novel called Time-Sickness, which takes place in a world where the privileged class of people have the ability to time-travel as they please but they quickly figure out that doing it too much causes the traveler to get horribly, horribly sick. Not fatal, if they take breaks, but inconvenient. It wasn't long before they got the idea to pay other people to time-travel for them while they wore specifically made glasses that allowed the rich to view the adventures through the eyes of 'the hired help' as they were called, and since they were hired for a job it is usually taken on by people who can't afford to take breaks between traveling. The descriptions of the time-sickness reminds him a lot of how his past week has felt without Harry. An impossibly long-short stretch where all he can do is try to go on a normal life until time eventually starts working again.

His wandering thoughts are easier to suppress than his smile was and together they huddle in the back corner of his mind.

Too late. Harry, in the supra-natural way he just knows things, has caught it. "Did I interrupt your reading? I'm sorry - I can call you back."

He placed the book closed on the table with his phone. "No, that's alright. I wasn't very invested in it. How have you been, Harry?"

A shaky breath makes its way through the receiver. Kim unconsciously pressed the phone even closer, as if he could hear what made Harry so unsteady. "It's been a lot. Bed rest. You know how it is."

On one hand, as a workaholic, he does know how it is. To be left idle when you know there's a mountain of work to do, that other people are doing and no doubt cursing your existence out for leaving it to them, is its own form of torture. But on the other hand as someone who isn't recovering from both a bullet wound but also severe memory loss, who is possibly trying to stay sober after years of succumbing to various addictions, and who is facing the very real possibility that after bed rest is complete he may not actually have a job to go back to, he doesn't really know how it is.

"I've missed you." The pure sincerity of the statement made Kim's defenses raise as much as it warmed him.

"It's only been a week." He tries to put in a teasing note to the words to hide the fact that his default would sound too fond.

"We did great work together. Really, really good stuff."

Harry had invited him to transfer to the 41st before they separated and Kim had said something positive, though rather vague. He had filled out the transfer form at the start of the next day but didn't turn it in quite yet. That night he had attempted to call Harry himself. It eventually rang out. He did not leave a message. He did not try again.

A part of him, something that has lingered ever since he was a teenager with no friends, had anxiously told him to rip up the form. That he has yet again misread a relationship into it being more than it is, that any sense of intensity is actually one-sided, and that he has overstepped a boundary. That the offer was, in all actuality, given out of politeness instead of sincerity and Kim was not supposed to take it literally.

He couldn't rip it up. It's still sitting on his kitchen table.

But Harry is on the phone with him now. He is real again, not just a figment of his memory fading faster than he wants it to. In the back of his mind there is still a twinge of fear that he had made up the mad, drunken man from Precinct 41. That in his loneliness and grief he had conjured a man so hurt, so lost, so desperate that of course he would think Kim is cool. A man with no memory of anyone else in the world, so there's no excuse but to latch onto Kim in the way that he had. Even in his harshest moments of self-critique, he wouldn't think that he was capable of something so pathetic, but that missed phone call really got to him.

"I can't believe you're real." Harry almost whispers. Did he catch that thought of Kim's too? Or is it all his own? He can't ask. He will just have to die not knowing.

They talk for hours that night. And then again two nights later. About a lot of things. There is not a lot that Harry can share about his past but that is okay, he is content with sharing the bits of pieces he is learning on his own. But mostly he wants to know about Kim. Which is terrifying. The idea that there is someone that wants to know him deeply, know every crevice there is, and that he no longer has a real barrier against that. He doesn't tell Harry everything but he tells him far more than he would have told anyone else pre-Martinaise.

"Please, Kim can I - can I see you?" Harry asked a week into their nightly phone calls. His voice sounds desperate like he is a man dying in the desert who doesn't believe he deserves a single drop of water and yet is still asking for a drink. And Kim is the one holding the pitcher.

His fingers twitch to reach for his car keys. It is almost one in the morning. "Khm." He hums in consideration, practically feeling Harry sweat through the phone. As if Kim would say no. "I am free Sunday."

It's Wednesday.

They still talk on the phone every night until then and when Sunday comes Kim almost cancels. Not because he wants to but because there is a layer of something magical, something supra-natural almost that has fallen over the two of them and meeting would break that. Almost like he got his one chance to hang out with Harry in person and he shouldn't ask for more. Almost like if sees Harry again, or continues to let him know things about his life, then he will eventually realize just how mundane he really is.

But he doesn't cancel. They meet up again.

They meet up for lunch at a place that Harry had said was amazing. Swore up and down that they served the best food. Kim knew to keep his expectations safely low when he noticed the health rating posted in the front being. . . acceptably high. Just barely.

Kim was early. Almost thirty minutes before their agreed-upon meeting time. He's aggressively punctual in every aspect of his life but usually not so early. He's just. . . happy to have someplace new to try, he would say. Surprisingly, Harry is also early, arriving maybe ten minutes later walking on a cane. Still recovering from the gunshot wound. Kim stood up from the booth as soon as he saw Harry enter the restaurant and smiled, his smile growing wider when Harry brightened up like the morning sun at the sight of Kim.

He had walked to Harry with his hand out, intending for a handshake (safe but still sincere) but Harry didn't hesitate before grabbing him by the forearm and pulling him into a deep hug, one hand still on his cane. Kim wrapped his arms around Harry's middle and returned the deep embrace. Thankfully Harry had taken a shower since they last met, and was wearing freshly washed clothing, and so he actually smelled. . . very good. Husky, almost spiced. Kim did not take a deep breath but he did mentally jot down the notes with the intention of writing it in his notebook. For later.

It was briefly stilted after they sat down together. Both looking at each other in a way that you would think that they had been separated for years rather than two weeks (more like a week and a half, but who's counting?). But Harry was the one to break the tension.

"I think we were meant to meet." His eyes shine with intense sincerity and vulnerability. He looked like he could cry. Kim's gloved hands twitched but he tried to look open and comfortable. "I wouldn't have been able to pull myself out of the hole without you. I wouldn't have. I'd be dead."

"I doubt that." Kim pulls his hands together to hold them steady and looks Harry in the eyes. "You've always had it in you to be better. You just finally wanted to."

Conversation flowed much easier after that. They stayed in that restaurant, in that booth, far beyond lunch. When they eventually left, after the manager had started walking by and silently gesturing to the clock, Harry looked at him in the far-off way that he does when he's thinking. Kim patiently waits, trying to not obviously check him out.

Harry had been able to remain sober even without a case distracting him. His eyes were no longer glassy and his breath no longer reeked. He hasn't gotten a trim yet so his hair is still a bit unruly but it's clear he has run a comb through it. His face is pale, unhealthily so, but no longer flushed a permanent, angry red. The swelling in his nose has all but disappeared but there is a noticeable, but not intense, shake to his hands.

All in all Kim sees a very handsome man on the road to recovery.

"Can you give me a ride home?" Harry asks. "I'm sorry to ask - I took the train here and it's still running I'm just - " he falters off momentarily, embarrassed. "It's a long walk. I'm not used to a cane yet - "

"There's no need to explain." Kim, standing at his default parade's rest, faces him completely. "Of course I'll drive you home."

He could not deny that there is a certain tension in the air. A spark of electricity that is threatening to burn the both of them inside out. Something that has changed since working on THE HANGED MAN case. Or, more accurately, something that was planted during their time working together and now they are starting to see the fruits of their labor. Kim could not keep from glancing at Harry in the backseat through the cage of the Kineema and it was obvious Harry could tell. Probably even without his can-opening abilities. Every time Kim glanced at him through the rear-view mirror, Harry squirmed and looked out the window, blushing.

Kim gripped the steering wheel tightly and looked back at the road. Then glanced at Harry again just to see more pink dusting his cheeks.

If he were dropping Harry off and speeding away he might have just pulled up to the curb. Maybe. But that would be rather ungentlemanly, to make someone with a recent and serious injury walk that much more steps to their door. That's the excuse he would use if Harry questioned why he went out of his way to grab a spot in the actual lot meant for overnight visitors only.

"Do you - um." He started the sentence off strong but when Kim looked at him, still through the rear-view mirror, he faltered. "Coffee? Is that something you drink? Probably right, I mean that's the whole thing. With cops. That we drink a lot of coffee."

"Khm." Kim nodded. "And donuts."

"Right! Coffee and donuts." He smiled, pleased that Kim caught it. "So would you like a cup? Of coffee. I don't have a cup of donuts."

"You're not asking me for coffee." Because he may not be a can-opener but he is still an investgator. He probably doesn't need to be an investigator to read Harry though, since his nervousness is obvious from a mile away. It's been forever since a man was so eager for Kim's approval, nervous because he might say no or not be as interested. The only reason that he couldn't sit here and bask in the feeling forever is because that would mean never saying yes to Harry, who he wants to just give things to. Anything he wants. The initial hint of denial is made that much sweeter when he knows that they both are going to get what they want in the end.

"I'm not asking you for coffee." Harry gulps. "Come in with me anyway?"

What was that about denial?

Kim is a gracious man. He does not kiss Harry until they are both inside, front door closed, and not until he pushes Harry to sit on the couch.

"Kim," he whispers reverently and looks up at him with bright, clear eyes. Clearer than Kim has ever seen on him before. The green in his eyes were turned to a thin sliver with how aroused he was, looking up at Kim.

Kim pushes Harry's legs far enough apart for him to stand between them and slowly takes his gloves off, smirking at how Harry's eyes trace every tiny movement of his hands. When they're freed he gently cradles Harry's jaw in one of his hands, then finally leans down for a kiss.

Harry's dry lips practically melt against Kim's and he makes a whining noise, faintly like a dog begging to be let back in the house, except it's ecstatic and hot and leaves a spark at the base of Kim's spine. Harry snakes up his arms underneath Kim's jacket, his shirt, so that he's making contact with his bare skin already. Kim pushes Harry until he's lying back on the couch and he lays on top of him, careful to not put weight on Harry's bad leg, never breaking contact with his mouth during the entire transition. He takes off his jacket and lays it so it's hanging on the nightstand next to the couch, more careless than he usually is with his things but he doesn't particularly care to fold it or leave Harry to hang it on the hook.

He's so solid underneath Kim's hands. So real. Everything he needs to touch to dissuade all fears that the week in Martinaise didn't happen, that they never actually met, and that Harry is a figment of his lonely and horny imagination. He needs more.

"Kiiiiiiim." Harry whines when they separate and Kim knows that he cannot keep how much the sound of Harry whining his name is affecting him off of his face. Judging by the fact that Harry's face gets even more red, it is well-received.

"You have to be patient, detective" Kim moves to start mouthing at Harry's neck and shoulder as his hands start making quick work of unbuttoning his shirt. Harry is so tantalizing warm that it's like he has a red-hot molten core and Kim is approaching it with disregard for either of their safety. "Can you be patient for me?"

Harry nodded so fast that Kim was vaguely worried that he was about to give himself whiplash, but the nodding stopped when Kim started mouthing at his collarbone. He could feel the form beneath him shaking with a barely concealed effort to keep still as more and more whimpers fell out of Harry's mouth as Kim explored more of his chest.

Something that he didn't get the chance to fully and truly appreciate in their brief time together was just how - khm - hairy he was. Kim resisted the urge to stuff his face right in the middle of his chest and breathe deeply and instead, he raked his nails down the entire expanse of the area, not too rough but not gently either. His nails tinged the areas of exposed skin slightly pink and caused the affected areas to swell in animalistic lines underneath his hands.

The noises that Harry makes sound like a symphony.

Harry still having his shirt on as much as he did was starting to become very irritating to him. Kim did not roughly rip it open, he has more care for other people's things than that, but he did make unbuttoning it his top priority until Harry's chest was fully exposed. Kim leaned back for a moment so he was sitting on Harry's lap, his sinewy frame being comforted by Harry's strong thighs, just to peer down at him, admire him, until eventually Harry squirmed uncomfortably.

"Um," he mutters, then tries to put on a semblance of a confident smirk. "Like what you see?" in a tone that made it obvious he could not believe that Kim was liking what he was seeing.

Kim leaned forward and smashed a hot, bruising kiss onto Harry's mouth. "Yes. I 'like what I see' very much."

Harry whined softly at his words and those whines turned into loud, shameless moans when Kim went back over the red lines still visible on Harry's chest with more, dragging his nails tantalizingly slow over his chest. Sometimes, briefly, overlapping the raised marks but mostly making new ones. Bringing the blood to the area without threatening to break the skin, making his skin hot and sensitive to all stimulation.

But it's more than that if he's being honest with himself. It's the fact that Harry is now covered in evidence that Kim was here. That the marks and Harry's reaction to them are Kim's doing. That they haven't even taken their pants off and Harry is marked by Kim, not belonging to him but it'd be clear for the days if not weeks to come that he was here to anyone else who got to see.

"Kim, fuck - Kim." Harry gasped. "Please, f-fuck me. Or let me suck you off. Touch me. Do something. Please. I'm about to die."

"We can't have that." Kim smirked and Harry flushed even redder, which shouldn't have been possible.

Kim vaguely recalled Harry talking about heart problems back in Martinaise and thought that he should show some mercy, in case Harry wasn't lying and he could actually have a medical emergency from all the teasing.

So he quickly unbuttoned Harry's pants while Harry unbuttoned his own and in no time at all they were exposed from the waist down. Harry's cock, like the rest of him, was large. Though less in length and more in girth, with the tip being vibrant pink and already leaking profusely. Kim thought it looked rather nice nestled next to his own, cradled in his hand, as he jerked them both off.

Harry was made speechless by this, only letting out moans and whines and breaths so aroused that they could almost be described as anguished. He was trying to lean up, supporting himself with his strong arms, so he could look at Kim's ministrations. Grey-green eyes locked on every movement, actively trying to fight against the urge to lean back and fall into the pure pleasure of it all.

He let Harry do that for a few moments, still feeling merciful, before he used his free hand to grab Harry by the chin and gently direct him to look up at his face. Then, while not breaking in rhythm where he was still jerking them off, removed his hand from Harry's chin and swiped a healthy amount of pre-cum off of their tips, and shoved two fingers in Harry's open mouth.

Harry let half a moan slip before it was cut off by him suckling Kim's fingers, tongue curling around them enthusiastically. Kim maneuvered them so that he was gently fucking Harry's mouth and then eventually, testing it since he had no idea of Harry's experience but guessing by how repressed his Whole Thing is that it isn't a lot, barely teasing his throat. Mostly a promise for the future. If he's good. And he is - he takes it like it's the only thing keeping him grounded to reality at this moment, like this was something he had secretly had a thought project about and was finally fulfilling something.

Kim could feel the tell-tale heat build up in his stomach and he sped up, removing the other hand from Harry's mouth he returned to the scratch marks on his chest, latching onto one that appeared the most red and tender and pressed on it. "Cum for me."

Harry finally slumped back, unable to hold himself up anymore, and with a mantra of just Kim repeated as many times as he can fit into one breath he cums, most of it spurting onto his own chest but a surprisingly large amount puddling onto Kim's hand. It wasn't too long until Kim was following after him, deliberately aiming to make an even bigger mess on Harry's chest.

They sat there for a few moments, breathing heavily, before Kim stood up on shaky legs. He situated himself back into his pants before walking down the hall and hoping to find - ah, yes. The bathroom. He grabbed a clean towel and returned to Harry, still in the same position on the couch in the living room with a completely dazed look in his eye. He seemed to barely notice Kim cleaning him up, except for a fond smile breaking out across his face.

'Khm." Kim cleared his throat, suddenly embarrassed. "Apologies for - " he wasn't sure how to word it so he only gestured to the several red and angry scratch marks still present on Harry's chest. He had, admittedly, lost control in the heat of the moment.

"Noooo, don't apologize." He finally looked at Kim, slowly coming back to himself. "That was the sexiest thing that has ever happened to me. You should, um. Do it again. Later! If you don't have the energy for round two. And only if you also liked it. That would be very disco."

Kim smirked down at Harry, who was looking up at him with eager eyes. "Do you have the energy for more, Harrier?"

He shivered. "I don't know. Probably not. But I'd really like to."

"You're completely insatiable." Kim said before reconnecting their lips again.

#disco elysium #harrykim #fanfic #don't judge me too hard bc i agree this isnt my best work

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stargazer-sims · 4 months ago

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Somewhere In Time

♫ Somewhere In Time - David Mallett ♫

__________

"At which point are we going to address the elephant in the room?”

"Hmm?" Nikolai looks up from his book. He'd discovered fairly quickly that Iryna doesn't like him to read at the table at mealtimes, but he's not about to break a lifelong habit just because she shoots him dirty looks whenever he does it. It's her turn to make breakfast. She's standing at the stove and she's not looking at him. "What elephant?"

"You know what I'm talking about," Iryna says.

"Suppose you enlighten me?"

"I know who you are."

"I should hope so," he says. "You've been living with me for nearly a month now."

"Nika—" she begins, but then cuts herself off with a disgruntled sigh. "No, never mind. If you want to feign ignorance, then be my guest. We'll pretend to be strangers until you get tired of the game."

Up until Iryna moved in, he thought he'd grown too old to experience the sudden tingle of pleasure he'd always associated with young love, with infatuation and crushes and fantastically-imagined scenes of the future. Yet here it is; a tiny zap of joy at hearing her call him by such a familiar name as easily and naturally as if she'd been doing it all her life.

The truth is, he does know who she is. He hadn't recognized her when he saw her outside his door that first day, but he supposes that wasn't unexpected, given they hadn't laid eyes on each other in nearly sixty years. Minutes into their meeting, however, realization came crashing in.

He was actively in denial of it initially, telling himself that it was nothing but an old man's wishful thinking. He insisted to himself that she couldn't possibly be his Ira. After all, what were the chances that she'd not only immigrated to the same country as him, but also ended up living in the same city? But, as time has gone on, he's found it more and more difficult to ignore all the long-buried memories that float to the surface of his mind, and all the little cues that make his certainty of her identity grow stronger.

He sighs too, but not with impatience. "No, you're right. We do need to talk about it. Just... not over breakfast, if that's all right with you."

"All right," she says. She expertly flips the two pancakes in the frying pan before aiming a look over her shoulder at him. "Why don't we go down to the beach after we eat?"

He nods. 'Yes, I'd like that."

They don't talk much during breakfast, but he does her the courtesy of putting his book away. He wonders what she's thinking. Is she as awestruck as he is by the incredible coincidence of their reunification? Or maybe she's remembering a time before that one bad decision they'd made had sent their shared timeline spinning so drastically out of control.

How different our lives might've been if we'd only exercised a little restraint, he thinks. If they'd waited a little longer, he might've asked her to marry him, and she might've said yes. They could've raised their children together and had a pleasant life.

But no... if things hadn't gone the way they did, he wouldn't have his wonderful son Mikhail. He wouldn't have his adored grandchildren Kolya and Natasha, and his sweet grandson-in-law Mishka. Raising his son on his own hadn't been the smoothest ride, but he has no regrets. Given the chance to go back and do everything over again, he might make other choices, but knowing that rewinding time is an impossibility, he's proud to have made the best of the hand he was dealt.

After they finish eating, he tidies up the kitchen while Iryna goes to shower and change. By the time he's done, she's in the midst of applying her makeup. Thankful that they've got two bathrooms, he climbs the stairs to go to his and put himself together for the day.

They decide to walk to the beach. It takes a bit longer to reach the shore from his current home than it did when he lived with Mikhail and Elena, but he doesn't mind. He and Iryna are both healthy and fit for their age and they enjoy walks. Plus, the weather is ideal for an outdoor excursion. It's sunny but not too hot or humid, and there's a nice westerly breeze.

They make awkward small talk for a few minutes as they head toward the waterfront, but the halting dialogue quickly fades away, as they both know it's only an attempt to distract themselves from the real conversation that's yet to come. Nikolai tries to figure out if he should let her bring up the subject first, or if he should just plunge in. It might be easier for her if he starts, but she was the one who asked to talk, so maybe...

He rolls the problem over and over in his head on the way downtown and all the way to the end of the waterfront boardwalk. The boardwalk terminates abruptly with only a set of wooden steps that lead down to the beach.

The stairs have seen better days. There's no railing, so he holds out his hand to support Iryna as they descend.

She glances at his hand and then looks up shyly at him, and for a second he thinks he catches a glimpse of the blushing twelve year old girl he'd met at the rink decades ago. He pictures her with long strawberry-blonde hair spilling out from under her blue knitted hat as she reached for the hand of his twelve year old self who was prepared to steady her as she stepped onto the ice for the first time in her brand-new skates. The image is only in his mind's eye, of course, but the recollection is as clear as if it'd happened yesterday.

"Don't worry," he says, just as he did back then. "I won't let you fall."

He can't remember what she'd said in response at the time, but in the present she places her hand in his and says, "I trust you."

When they reach the bottom of the steps, she doesn't release him immediately. Nikolai doesn't try to pull his hand away either, rather enjoying the feel of her slender fingers wrapped around his and waiting to see how long it will be before she lets go.

They wander for several more minutes in silence until they encounter some large rocks. The stones are smooth from millennia of exposure to ocean water, wind and rain.

"Let's sit," Iryna suggests, and finally slips her hand away from his.

He nods, and lowers himself carefully next to her on the worn rock. It's not like his sofa at home, but it is surprisingly comfortable.

"So..." he begins.

"I think we're in the midst of a story one couldn't make up," she comments.

"That thing about truth being stranger than fiction?"

"Admittedly, it probably would make a great plot for a novel."

"So," he says again. "Tell me something. When you answered my ad for a roommate, did you already know it was me?"

She shakes her head. "No, I had no idea. When I saw your name, I thought it was just a funny coincidence. I replied to your ad out of curiosity, if I'm being honest."

"You didn't intend to move in?"

"Not necessarily with you, no. I did need a new place to live, and I'd lined up a few other places to view, but when I saw you..." She directs her gaze away from him for a second. "I'm not sure if I was ready to believe it."

"I understand," he says. "It was the same for me. When I realized it was you, I told myself that couldn't possibly be right because..."

"Because you thought I was half a world away?"

"Because I didn't know anything, whether you were still in the old country or even whether you were still alive, or... anything."

"I'm very much alive."

He smiles. "Thank the fates for that."

"When did you know it was me?" she asks. "Surely you didn't recognize me on sight."

"No, I didn't," he admits. "You're still beautiful, but you don't look the same as you did when we were sixteen."

She laughs. "Neither do you."

"No escaping the steady march of time, is there? If you want to know, the giveaway for me was when you said you used to know a boy named Nikolai whose mother called him Nika. The way you said my name... It triggered something in my brain. You still say it exactly how you used to."

"You know, that was the moment I recognized you as well," she says. "The way you reacted to me saying your name."

"You and Mother and my sisters are the only ones who ever called me Nika. My ex-wife tried, but it always sounded wrong coming out of her mouth."

"You were married?"

"For a while, yes. Her name was Ivana."

"Did you have children?" she inquires.

"Three," he replies. "All girls. Zara, Anastasia and Tatyana. I don't see much of them, unfortunately. After the divorce, Ivana made it clear she didn't want anything more to do with me, and that included giving me time with the girls. Since they grew up, we exchange letters and emails and pictures, but it feels like they're my distant relatives instead of my daughters."

"I'm sorry," Iryna says. She takes his hand again. "That makes me feel like a terrible person for complaining about my son." She squeezes his fingers in what he's sure is a reflexive motion and adds quietly, "My younger son."

"I don't think you'd find a reason to complain about your older son," he tells her. "He grew up to be the sort of man any parent would be proud of."

"You... you know where he is?"

"He's here in town."

She practically whispers her next question. "What's his name?"

"I named him Mikhail," he tells her. "Both our names are on his birth certificate."

Her reaction isn't what he expects. She stands abruptly and turns away from him. Before he can say anything further, she starts to run. She makes it several meters down the beach before she drops to her knees.

It takes him half a minute to realize that she's crying. He gets up from the rock and jogs the short distance to where she's kneeling in the sand.

"Iryna," he says, as he kneels in front of her.

She raises her head, and he sees that her tears have smudged the makeup around her eyes. Her voice breaks as she says, "He was right here the entire time. Both of you were. You and... Mikhail. I've been in Canada for years, and I came to this city ten years ago. I could have—" The remainder of the sentence is lost in her tears.

Nikolai slides closer to her and pulls her into his arms. He doesn't even pause to consider whether this is the appropriate thing to do. He's simply operating on instinct.

She doesn't resist his embrace. She melts into it, wrapping her arms around his body and leaning her head on his shoulder.

For a moment, he feels as if they're the only two people in the world. He closes his eyes and listens to the gentle, rhythmic splash of waves against some nearby rocks. Somewhere over the water, a seagull calls mournfully. The light wind stirs his hair and carries the distinctive scent of seaweed and salt. The noise of cars from Harbourside Road is a faint swish in the distance, and from here he can't hear any footsteps or voices on the boardwalk. It's just him and Iryna, alone at the centre of the universe.

"You didn't know," he murmurs. “It's not your fault. None of it is. I need you to know I never blamed you for any of it, not for an instant."

"What about Mikhail?"

"He knows it wasn't your fault. When he was old enough to understand, I told him what happened."

"I didn't want to give him up, but my father—"

"I know," he whispers. "You had no choice. No one blames you."

"I blame myself."

He doesn't know what to say, mostly because he can only guess at what it must've been like for her to have her newborn baby literally taken from her arms and given away. She'd carried him inside her for nine months, and despite knowing that her parents would never let her keep him, she must've dreamed of the future they might have. She was sixteen and Nikolai was a few weeks away from his sixteenth birthday when Mikhail was born. Making plans for their little family was unrealistic, although that didn't stop him from dreaming too, regardless of the futility of it.

Mikhail was born at home because Iryna's family had been too ashamed of her condition to dare venture out in public with her, and as if the humiliation and shame of being an unwed teenage mother in the 1960s wasn't enough for her to bear, her parents told her that they had no interest in supporting her bastard child. Her father decreed that the baby would go straight to an orphanage after he was born.

When Nikolai told his parents, they were outraged. They hadn't been pleased when Nikolai confessed to them that he and Iryna had slept together and that she'd fallen pregnant, but they weren't so unreasonable as to expect him to give up his child to strangers.

"We'll say the baby is your brother or sister," Mother had declared. "No one but our family will know. But, Nika—" here, she'd paused to make sure he got the point— "This baby is your child, not mine. I will help you, but you are ultimately responsible. Do you understand?"

He'd thrown himself into her arms, weak with relief and gratitude, and she'd hugged him tight. "I'll do everything. I'll make you proud of me."

She'd leaned in close and said quietly against the top of his head. "I'm already proud of you, my little mouse. Even when you make mistakes, you take responsibility for them. You always find a way to make it right."

But, he wasn't at all sure he could make that situation right.

He recalls standing on the street in front of the Komarov house with baby Mikhail cradled protectively against his chest. It was December, and the baby was covered by nothing but a one-piece pyjama and a green and white blanket Iryna had knitted before he was born. Mr. Komarov hadn't seemed the least bit concerned about shielding Mikhail from the cold. He'd thrust the day-old baby into Nikolai's arms as if he were disgusted by Mikhail's very existence.

"Take it," he'd said. "Do whatever you want, but don't come back here any more." As he ascended the steps to re-enter his home, he turned to look back at Nikolai and added, "If I catch you anywhere near my daughter again, I will kill you."

Nikolai hadn't doubted the threat. There were rumours about what Mr. Komarov had done to grown men twice Nikolai's size. A scrawny, awkward fifteen year old would be no match for him, if he chose to make good on his word.

Too frightened to speak, all Nikolai could do was stare up at Mr. Komarov and pray that he could communicate his understanding by his expression alone.

Mr. Komarov went up the last few steps, and Nikolai started to leave, but when the older man swung the door open, Nikolai could hear Iryna inside. She was screaming. Never in his life had he heard anguish distilled into such a pure form. There was no other way to describe it. If the deepest pain known to humanity could've been represented by a sound, that was it.

Mr. Komarov bellowed into the house, "Shut up, girl! It's done!"

Nikolai had tried his utmost to restrain himself, but Iryna's desperate cries were too much for him. Before he could stop himself, he was shouting her name. "Ira! Ira, don't worry! Some day we'll all see each other again, I promise!"

He knew he'd done precisely the wrong thing even before all the words were out. Mr. Komarov whirled and came charging down the stairs again, straight toward him. The roar the older man let out was wordless and almost as feral as Iryna's wails of grief, and it terrified Nikolai to his core.

Clutching baby Mikhail against him with both arms, he ran down the snowy street, away from the house. He was shaking so violently that he worried he might fall, and his eyes were streaming tears to the point that he could barely see where he was going. He didn't stop until he reached the end of the street and turned the corner.

Still trembling, he dropped to the sidewalk and then laid Mikhail carefully on his lap so he could take off his scarf and unbutton his coat. First, he wrapped the scarf around Mikhail like a swaddle and then wriggled out of his coat and bundled that around the baby too. He hoped that it'd be enough to keep little Mikhail safe from the unforgiving winter air until they reached home.

He was never more grateful for anything in his life than he was to walk through the front door of his own home and straight into the embrace of his mother and sisters. Mother took Mikhail from him, and the very next second his older sister Dasha was throwing a quilt around his shoulders and leading him into the blessedly warm kitchen.

"It's going to be okay now, Nika," Dasha assured him. "Mother knows what to do, and Katya and I will help."

It would be a long time before he was able to believe everything really would be okay, but eventually he accepted it. He never forgot Iryna, but for Mikhail's sake, he'd had to move on with his life. He'd finished school, went to university, and worked to support himself and his son.

When Mikhail was seventeen, they immigrated to Canada for a better life, and he can say that the past forty years have indeed been the good life he'd hoped for, all things considered. He couldn't completely let go of the thought that he and Iryna might meet again some day, but he'd long ago given up dwelling on the idea. The secret to happiness, he's learned, is to focus on things that are present and real; family, home, work and hobbies. Longing for unreachable things is the way to ensure that a broken heart will never heal.

Things that are present and real. Ira is present and real, here in my arms.

His face is wet with his own tears.

Iryna shifts slightly and says softly, "Nika?"

"I'm here.”

"You said you didn't know what love was," she says. "The day I came to see about the rental, remember? You said that when you were a teenager, you were too young to know what it meant."

"Yes," he agrees. 'I said that."

"You were wrong."

"Was I?"

"You knew," she says. "You wouldn't have raised our son if you didn't."

"I couldn't abandon him. He's part of me."

"And me," she says.

"Yes, and because of him, we're linked together. Even if I didn't know where you were, I could always see a little of you in him."

She pulls away from him slowly, and wipes her eyes with the back of her hand. "Can you tell me about him?"

"I could talk for days about him," he says. He takes off his glasses and rubs at his own eyes. "He's an amazing son. He's clever with machines, like you. He likes fishing and hockey and rebuilding old cars. He's been married to the same girl for over forty years, and we've got two grandchildren, Nikolai and Natalya. Kolya and Natascha, we call them. They're twins."

She lets out a tiny gasp that seems to him to be a mixture of joy and astonishment. "Oh! Grandchildren!"

"And perhaps a great-grandchild next year," he says. "Kolya and his partner got married in July, and they're planning to grow their family."

"I... I'd like to meet them."

"You should," he says. "Mikhail and Elena and the twins know about you. That you're my roommate, I mean, but they don't know who you are. Give me a chance to talk to them first, and then I'll introduce you properly. Would that be all right?"

'Yes," she says. "I think that would be best. It might be a shock if I suddenly appeared out of nowhere and announced that I'm their mother and grandmother."

"Elena and Natascha wouldn't believe that."

"And Mikhail?"

"Let me talk to him."

"All right," she acquiesces. "In the meantime, do you have a picture?"

"I do. I've got loads on my phone, and our family portrait is in my bedroom at home. My phone's in my pocket. Let's see if we can help each other up, and then I'll show you."

It doesn't take all that much effort to get up. Nikolai's knees ache a little, but he's otherwise unharmed, and Iryna doesn't seem any the worse for wear either. He spends a fruitless minute trying to help her brush the sand from her dress before they both give up, laughing.

"Never mind," she says. "Most of it will dry and fall off by the time we get back to the cottage, and then I'll change my clothes and throw this into the washing machine."

He swipes at the leg of his shorts. "These as well."

"Those as well."

Now that he's standing, it's easier to slide his phone from his pocket. He opens his photo gallery and hands the device to her. "Take a look. Oh, and feel free to ignore the pictures of Fish."

They stroll back to the rock they'd been sitting on earlier, and Iryna spends several minutes scrolling through photos and asking Nikolai to identify all the people in them. She exclaims over how much both Mikhail and Kolya resemble him, and gushes over all his candid snapshots from Kolya and Mishka's wedding reception, and she's even interested in the pictures of Kolya and Natascha's friends.

"Your family is beautiful," she says at last, passing the phone back.

Her fingers brush against his as he reclaims the phone, and he gets that same flutter of happiness he experienced at breakfast. He gazes at her, taking in every perfect line of her face, changed so much from when they were young and yet so achingly familiar.

He smiles at her and says softly. "Not just my family. Our family."

__________

TO BE CONTINUED

#writing #somewhere in time #dr. nikolai pavlenko #ira komarova bowden #stargazersims

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just-a-wondrous-wanderer · 1 year ago

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"Before the coffee gets cold..."

Just three days ago, I turned 25, and out of all the years, this one had me the most excited about my birthday. Perhaps it's because I've read that our frontal lobe is fully developed when we reach the age of 25, and I am genuinely looking forward to finally making sound decisions, as many years were spent being indecisive. HAHA, for real!

This year also marks the first time I celebrated it outdoors. In previous years, my birthday was always during an exam week, and when I graduated, the pandemic hit, forcing us to stay at home. Considering it's my silver year (25-ish, tehee), I was truly ecstatic. I received gifts from my friends and countless birthday greetings.

On the first day of being 25 years old, I made it a goal to finish the book "Before the Coffee Gets Cold," a gift from Danica. At the beginning of the year, I had written down my goals, one of which was to finish four books. I had four books on my list, but I hadn't found the energy to finish them all. However, this book given to me felt like a good omen, assuring me that I could still achieve that goal. Maybe my inner self is healing, haha.

The book was fantastic. Though I got the impression that some might find it boring, if we truly absorb its message, it isn't. In a nutshell, the book is about making the most of the present moment and not letting fear of the future or regrets hold you back, which is very relevant to what I am experiencing right now. The days following my birthday felt okay. It wasn't as lively as I had imagined, as there were moments of vibrancy followed by stillness and solemnity. But the thing about being 25 years old is that if I were to compare it to my younger self, I might have found myself in a pity party, defeated by loneliness. But now, I am fully aware of what triggers me, and I know exactly how not to be defeated.

A thing… Well, a person who once made me happy now turns to making me sad. Out of all the birthday messages I received, the one that my mind always wanders to is nowhere to be found. The one that my mind remembers so much did not remember me. And I don't complain so much; instead, I validate my feelings that I am experiencing. If this had happened before, I would probably be questioning myself, and the growing insecurity would have flourished. But now? There's a shift. I realize that I am capable of so many things to give. I have so much love to give. My intention will always be pure, and there's nothing I have to change just because the other person cannot meet me halfway, thus giving only mixed signals when I am certainly centered.

"If you could go back to the past, who would you want to meet?" My younger self would probably have a lot of options, and the number one thing that she'd do is the thing she thought she could have done. But the version of me now? I won't force myself to change a thing. Maybe I will try to see what would happen if I said or did a different thing. I will also be intrigued about the future, but the difference now is I know I won't weep and blame myself. I will now move on and remind myself of my worth. I know fully now that there are things that are beyond my control, and if something is meant for me, it will never pass me by. I just have to focus on bettering myself, making my goals real, and increasing my faith in God.

I hope that this… this new era of myself will be wiser. I hope I won't get back down by my old mistakes of self-doubt. I hope that I will have the patience to wait for things to happen. I hope I will be the person that I always long to be. I hope my intention will never hurt anybody. I hope that I will still have the love I pour into people. I hope I will always have the courage to stop things that are no longer serving me or the courage to continue when things get tough, or even in the simplest things… even after the coffee gets cold.

Here's to another year!

#writing #writers #spilled thoughts #spilled words #books and libraries #spilled ink #nature #written #music #writeblr #writers on tumblr #writers and poets #poet writings writers spilledink inspiration spilled words thoughts mywritings #thoughts #random things #random thoughts

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gyoobies · 2 years ago

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Voila Magic!

Pairing: Kun x Fem Reader

Genre: Smut, fluff, fated lovers, strangers to lovers

Warnings: Minors DNI, unprotected sex (wrap before you tap folks!), first date sex.

Summary: After You and your friends miss your flight back home you decide to spend your extra day in Vegas doing a little sight seeing, but when a peculiar stand attracts your attention you find yourself in a small magic show off the Vegas strip. (leave me alone I tried. Y’all know I hate summaries lol!) I didn’t intend for this to be this long but Kun, I- ...Dah welp!🤷🏾‍♀️ Word count: 5798

It’s kind of proofed but also I was a lil tipsy when I did it so.... yea.

Oh come on! It's not that bad; so what we missed our flight, at least we were all able to book our rooms another night and we're in Vegas! Let's have one last hoorah before Tiffany jumps the broom next week!

You rolled your eyes at your friend, annoyance oozing from your pores at their statement. "Tiffany's not even here; she was able to make her flight unlike us."

"Sorry for enjoying sin city."

"Oh was that his name?” Your other friend laughed, breaking the tension.

You sighed, and laid back on your friend's bed. " I guess the silver lining is at least now I can see the things I wanted to."

"Uggghhh you mean the boring things don't you? Do we really have to waste our extra night in Vegas doing those kinds of things?"

You sat up with a smirk, "Absolutely not because You're not invited!" You got up to make your grand exit, dodging the pillow she chucked at you on your way out the door of her room.

Trying to make the most of your last day in Vegas you planned out your whole day, ALONE. It wasn't that you didn't love your friends but 4 days straight of partying was enough, today you had a mani-pedi booked, brunch at a tea house and a little shopping to do before picking what show you planned to see this evening.

There was no shortage of entertaining messages in the group chat between you and your friends.

🎭: can you believe she ditched us to go to exhibits and shows?!!! It's Vegas! You're supposed to party!

👰: this is probably why she ditched you both.

🍒 : I like to believe that I had very little to do with her decision to fly solo today.

🎭: wooooow! Traitor.

🥱: lol!

🥱: da fuck?! Why is my cat emoji now the yawn emoji?

🎭: Because you're boring.

👰: 🤣

🍒: 💀

🥱: I would be upset if I wasn't enjoying my day so much ... you ass.

You shook your head, laughing to yourself, as you admired the shimmering rose gold color on your toes. You'd considered getting your nails done in the same color but the wedding was only a week away so you decided to get French tips instead, as requested by the bride. As you exited the salon into the upscale surroundings of the shops inside the hotel, you took notice of a small stand, so small if it hadn't been for the colors you'd have easily overlooked it. Seemingly out of place with It's bold black color and red trim accompanied by pure white text that simply read "Voila!" Before you knew it your feet were moving in the direction of that oddly placed little stand almost on their own. Now standing before the little stand, you reached out to pick up the only thing displayed on it, a flyer.

"Voila Magic! shop & show." You giggled a bit thinking about how there were promoters of every kind lining the streets of the strip and yet it was a simple stand, with a simple flyer that stood out in the oddest way amongst all the flashy, lavish shops surrounding it that captured your interest. You took the flyer with you folding it in half and tucking it in your purse before continuing on your way to do a little shopping.

As the day went on you didn't regret one second of your alone time especially when the "wish you were here" message came through your phone with a photo attached, and of course it was a photo of your wonderful friends in a pool with 2 attractive men, nothing shocking there. They had made it their goal to conquer any hot guy that crossed their path. You took a little while to send a reply, not because you had to think of what to say, but because someone in the background of their photo had caught your attention, much like the odd little stand had not too long ago. You couldn't see his face, but his vibrant red hair and well sculpted shoulders had garnered more of your attention from the background of a photo than anyone had since the trip began.

You typed a quick reply, “The strawberry in the back?” and hit send waiting briefly for a response. It didn’t take long to get one.

“HE’S SO HOT! But he’s not with our guys.” 🙁

You sent a simple response, “Unfortunate” before continuing on with your shopping.

This was the way you preferred to enjoy “sin city”, spas, shopping and now a five star lunch. It wasn't at the Tea House like you had wanted, but you were in no mood to wait an hour to be seated and this place looked promising. You sipped your cocktail on the restaurant's patio while you waited for your food, the red umbrella sticking out of the drink sent your mind racing back to the handsome stranger with the red hair in the background of the photo. Sure you'd never seen his face but you figured he had to be handsome, who would dye their hair such an attention grabbing color if they didn't have anything to show off? It also helped that your friend confirmed your suspicion. The voice of the waiter speaking to you as he placed your food on the table is what pulled you from your thoughts. You quickly thanked him and began to eat, wondering why it seemed so hard for you to shake thoughts of a man whose face you couldn't see, and you'd never meet from your mind. The flyer you'd kept from the curious little stand fell to the table, once again grabbing your interest as you took out you wallet to pay for your meal.

"A magic show?!" Your friend yelled from the other end of the call you were currently on as you got ready to head out for the evening.

"You're seriously not going to hang with us at all today?!"

"Well the two of you could always come with me."

"Pass" They replied in unison.

"Your show starts pretty early, just meet up with us after. I just sent you the address."

You groaned at the location but agreed to meet your friends at the club after your show was done anyway.

You had no idea why but there was an almost electric feeling in the air as you made your way down the aisle of the small theater to locate your seat. Your heart raced wildly, adrenaline surging through your veins as the rest of the crowd filed in. You were almost overwhelmingly excited, although you weren't exactly sure why. Maybe it was all the time you'd spent as a child attempting to pull a rabbit out of a hat or master a card trick, whatever it was, you felt like it was meant for you to be there in that moment.

The lights went dark and a booming voice came from the shadows of the stage. The atmosphere buzzed with excitement from the crowd as a spotlight illuminated the magician at the center. You, along with the rest of the audience were enthralled by the showmanship of the magician and you thought for a moment that if your friends had taken you up on your offer they'd have enjoyed the experience too. Oh well, their loss. All too soon the show was over, but not before the magician performed one last trick, seeming to make a door to the magic shop that was advertised on the flyer appear out of nowhere. Cautiously you followed the lights along the floor of the theater to the entrance of the shop.Inside, your curiosity was set free as you walked the aisles of the shop that was much bigger than the theater, your inner child was absolutely elated. You moved further to the back of the shop finding an area filled with books and miniature dioramas of magicians on stage performing different tricks.

The warm lighting and the aesthetic of the shop called to you, begging you to indulge in a few well angled selfies for social media. You took a quick glance around to be sure there wasn't anyone around to see you be "that person", satisfied that you were alone in the area you snapped a couple selfies. Pleased with the outcome you continued to explore, stopping to admire the knickknacks and beginner friendly magic kits that filled the spaces of the bookshelves around you. You ran your fingers along the edge as you made your way through the aisles, only stopping when a book bearing a title that was almost exact to the name of the show caught your eye. "VOILA! And That's Magic" you felt the need to buy it, even if it was for nothing else but to have a physical reminder of tonight's enchantment. You reached out to remove the book and were startled when you were met with an eye looking back at you.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you." He laughed.

"It's ok, I just wasn't expecting to move a book and see an eye."

"That's fair, the odds that two people would remove two different books, on opposite sides of a bookshelf, at almost the same time, from the same spot, have to be pretty low."

You laughed at his statement but agreed with his assumption.

"Beautiful"

The single word caught you by surprise.

"Huh?"

"Beautiful, you're beautiful." The first part of his statement comes out a lot more confident than the last.

You couldn't help but to laugh at his sudden admission. "How would you know? You can just barely see half of my face."

You watched as he slowly tapped under his eye, reminding you of the gems you had used to add a little something extra to your eye makeup tonight.

"Your makeup. I recognize the eye makeup of the woman that sat two rows down from me, that's how I know you're beautiful."

You stood there speechless at his words, trying to think of what to say in response. Clearly malfunctioning, your lack of a timely response made the stranger behind the bookshelf feel like he may have creeped you out.

"I'm sorry I didn't mean to come off weird or anything. I'll let you continue." And as he stepped away you caught a glimpse of bright red hair and felt your heart begin to race.

"Wait!"

Almost immediately he was back at the narrow opening in the bookshelf.

You narrowed your eye at him.

"Were you just waiting out of view?"

He began to blush. " I- I didn't want to walk past your aisle after embarrassing myself."

Butterflies? Were you seriously getting Butterflies over a blushing eye?!

"I'm not creeped out or uncomfortable, I was just surprised to know that I had an admirer, but it's not fair you know what I look like but I'm only acquainted with an eye." You said as you quickly glanced down at your phone screen to see a text from your friends, undoubtedly asking when you'd arrive at the club they gave you the address to earlier, when you looked back up he was gone.

"Hello! Are you there?" Nothing. Placing the book back on the shelf, you let out a sigh and began to make your way down the lengthy aisle to leave the shop. "Maybe he wasn't cute and didn't want me to know." You said to yourself as you stopped briefly to type a reply to your friend.

"Wow, did you just call me ugly?"

You snapped your head up from your phone to see probably the most attractive man you'd seen this entire trip smiling down at you. That buzz, that electric feeling in the atmosphere was back and you could feel your heart thumping against your chest as he stared dreamily at you.

"Where's your book?"

"I- um, I wasn’t sure if I really needed it or if I just wanted it"

"Wants and needs, they’re basically the same thing. Wait here" he said as he made his way to retrieve the book.

This was unlike you, how could someone you'd only just met have such an effect on you? Then again, he had this effect on you even before you'd met him. As he made his way back to you, you realized that there had been a magnetic feeling drawing you to him since you'd spotted him in the background of your friend's photo maybe even before then. You thought back to the way the stand advertising the "magic shop and show" you were now standing in the aisles of seemed to pull you in, and just as you were finishing that thought he was back in front of you, book in hand.

"Thank you." You said as you reached for the book, only to have him pull away with it.

"Let me." he said, a beautiful smile beaming, dimples on full display.

You gave him a questioning look, confused by his actions.

"Let me buy it for you, this way when you look at it, you'll think of me."

"Wow! You are really taking it there and you haven't even told me your name."

His smile faltered and his face began to turn the softest shade of pink, as he shyly rubbed the back of his neck.

"Sorry, I'm Kun and I'm horrible at flirting apparently"

"I don't think you're horrible at it, you're just .... yeah it's bad I can't even lie." You laughed.

"Well you're bad at it too because you haven't told me your name yet."

"But who said I was flirting?" You quipped.

"Oh, that's how you wanna play it?"

The moment your phone rang, you rolled your eyes and sighed. "One second I should answer this."

Of course it was your friend yelling your name at the top of their lungs.

"That was highly unnecessary." you responded.

"We have a VVIP booth! When will you be here?"

"Isn't 10pm a bit early for you two to be this drunk already? You whispered as you looked over to see a very amused Kun.

"So that's your name?" He asked as he stepped closer to you after noticing the way you let your eyes trail over him. There it was again that feeling, like this is where you should be, you wondered if he felt it too.

"WHO THE FUCK WAS THAT?!" Your friend yelled.

You didn't immediately answer because he was now leaning so dangerously close to your face.

"You going to tell her or can I?"

You quirked your head curiously, wondering what exactly he'd tell her, so you handed him your phone. He introduced himself and immediately the shrieking voices of your friends could be heard through your phone. He quickly returned it to you.

"What's wrong?" You giggled.

"I think my eardrums are vibrating."

"UM HELLO! WE'RE STILL HERE!"

You turned your attention back to your friends, offering a quick "I'll text you." and ending the call.

It was silent as the two of you stood there just staring at each other, neither of you remembering where your original conversation left off before your call.

"Um, so what brought you to this show tonight?" He asked.

"Actually it's a bit of a long story."

"Well this is a big shop, I've still got plenty I want to see, and if you're willing, I'd love to hear it while we look around."

The two of you spent the next hour chatting, well, you did most of the talking, filling him in on how you missed your flight and how you ended up at the show. You explored many areas of the shop together, until a voice rang out over the speakers. "Can two lovebirds kindly make their way to the front checkout at this time? We'll be closing up soon."

You looked at each other and laughed.

"I guess we've overstayed our welcome."

Kun laced his fingers through yours almost instinctively and pulled you along to the front. The two of you apologized to the man at the register as Kun placed the basket on the counter.

"Don't worry about it, this place is so full of magic people could get lost in here for hours."

You looked over at Kun as he paid for all the items that made their way into the basket throughout the evening, and found yourself admiring his features; the curve of his lips, the way his dimples appeared and eyes scrunched up as he smiled. You took one last look before turning to the man behind the counter and giving him a thank you before the two of you left to exit.

"Ah I love this feeling!" The man said before you reached the door causing you to both turn at his peculiar statement, though you were certain you knew the feeling he was talking about, the same feeling you'd been feeling since entering the theater.

"The electric feeling?"

You snapped your head in Kun's direction, he had felt it too. The old man waved his hands in a grand manner and the doors of the shop opened behind you.

"Last time I felt the air filled with this much energy was when I met the love of my life." And with one final wave he disappeared in a cloud of smoke, the final trick of the evening.

You missed the way Kun stole a glance at you after the old man's statement, but felt the gentle swipe of his thumb over the back of your hand as he led you out the exit of the shop, the doors closing by themselves behind you.

As if right on cue you received a text from your friends.

“At least send us a photo of what he looks like and where you're going for safety reasons.”

You stared at the message for a moment unsure of how to respond. He hadn't asked you to go anywhere with him, so asking him for a photo might be a little presumptuous.

"There's a Yakiniku place nearby, I forgot the name but you can tell her when we get there."

You looked up from your phone with wide eyes.

"Wow! Do you know what privacy is?"

"Of course!" He said as he bit his bottom lip.

"Did you just undress me with your eyes?!"

"Well, you did it to me earlier so I figured I'd return the favor."

"I did not!"

"If you say so."

You watched him as he moved about. "What on earth are you doing?"

Trying to find the best lighting for the photo you need to send to them so we can finish our date."

"Date?"

"It didn't start out as one but I'd say it's one now." He said as he put his arm around your waist pulling you close, and taking out his phone.

"Let's take one together"

His scent was intoxicating, warm, inviting and you couldn't stop wondering if he'd taste as good as he smelled. You were obviously swimming in your thoughts because you hadn't even realized he'd already taken the picture.

"What were you thinking about so intensely?" He said as he showed you the photo of the two of you. It was pretty obvious your mind was elsewhere.

"Eww, delete that! Let's take another."

He just laughed and wrapped his arm around your waist again, but this time you were determined to stay focused on taking a good photo and not on how delicious he smelled.

"Perfect!" He said as he examined the screen. "I'll send it to you. What's your number?"

You scoffed at the realization of what had just happened. He had really just played that so smooth, you were almost annoyed at how easily you fell for it, especially when you noticed the smirk on his face as he waited expectantly. You took his phone and typed your number, rolling your eyes as you handed it back to him.

"Thank you" he said as he grabbed your hand and began to lead you in the direction of the restaurant. Once you arrived you sent the name of the place along with the photo to your friends.

The hostess escorted you to a booth in the corner of the restaurant at Kun's request. Just as you took your seat, your phone began to vibrate almost nonstop, and you were pretty sure you knew why. You excused yourself to the restroom where you quickly opened the messages from your friends.

🎭 : Biiiiiiiiiitch

🍒: 😩 it's the guy from earlier

👰: I opened this photo and almost got a divorce before I even got married 😅

🎭: Omg it is him!

🥱: lmao you guys sent it to Tiffany?!

🎭: Fuck yes we did! Who would believe us if we said you met some sexy ass guy at some little magic show without receipts?

🍒: MOUNT HIM! He ignored so many advances from women at the pool today.

🎭: Seriously, he must have been waiting for the one.

👰: Not you finding a plus one for my wedding during my bachelorette trip!

🥱: we're done here. Bye! I can't stand y'all.

🍒: BYE! See you in the morning 😏

Little did you know Kun had also sent the photo to his friends and at the same time you were dealing with your friends, he was having a similar conversation with his.

Ten: Give her to me!

YangYang: I can't believe you actually found her!

Xiaojun: If he'd have approached her when he first saw her in the café that day, LIKE I SAID, he could have spent more than just tonight with her. You're just lucky she missed her flight.

YangYang: And of all places, a lame magic show. It must be fate.

Ten: I'm ok with sharing.

Kun: She was literally in the middle of a group of her friends giving the bride gifts, and magic shows aren't lame!

Xiaojun: You act like it was the actual wedding. You literally spent almost everyday hoping to see her since.

Kun: I did not!

Ten: You did go to the pool hoping she'd be there when you saw her friends headed that way earlier.

Xiaojun: SIMP

"What's got your eyebrows all furrowed?" You giggled as you sat down, startling Kun a bit.

"Oh nothing! Just my friends being annoying as usual."

You hadn't realized until he said that, that you hadn't actually known why he was in Vegas and who he was there with. So, you decided to be as nosey as he had been. Kun was an open book, he told you about this being their annual friends trip and a little bit about each of them. You learned of each other's careers and hobbies, he was more than happy to show you a few magic tricks before your food came. He even taught you a card trick that you had wanted so badly to learn as a kid.

Dinner now finished, you found yourself with a decision to make as the two of you made your way back to the hotel. Kun tipped the driver and got out first, extending his hand to help you out next. Hand in hand you entered the hotel lobby walking across the casino floor to make your way to the guest elevators. Just before reaching the guest checkpoint that leads to the hotel elevators, Kun stopped and turned to you.

"I know it's late, but do you want to go for a walk through the rooftop garden? I'm not ready to say goodbye just yet."

That's when you made up your mind. You had been the responsible one this whole trip, made sure Tiffany’s itinerary was followed, kept watch over your friends when they got a little too drunk, made sure they stayed hydrated, not an easy task with a bunch of thirst buckets. Now you were going to do something a little out of the ordinary for you.

You gave his hand a gentle squeeze, fingers still intertwined with yours, and made your way through the guest checkpoint, scanning your key card to gain access. You didn't look in his direction as you waited for the elevator afraid you might not be so bold if you looked at him. The minute the elevator doors opened you pulled him inside, hit the number 7 and then the “close door” button. You had avoided looking at him since leading him to the elevators, but now inside one completely covered in mirrors you had no choice, and when you finally looked over to his reflection he was looking back at you. The elevator bell dinged signaling you had reached your floor, so you took a deep breath and finally turned to face him.

"You can say goodbye now or you can tell me in the morning."

It was dizzying the way he lifted you into a kiss so suddenly, as if he had been waiting for permission all night and once he got it, he let go of any restraint he had. Your legs immediately wrapped around his waist as he carried you out of the elevator. You pulled away from the kiss to tell him your room number clumsily making your way down the hall as he carried you. You left a trail of kisses up his neck running your tongue across his Adam's apple indulging in your curiosity about the way he’d taste. Kun groaned at the feeling of your mouth on his skin, knees nearly giving out when you nipped at the spot beneath his ear. Finally reaching your room he pressed your back against the door and stole your breath away with kisses. Blindly you searched for your room key as he returned your love bites, hardening dick grinding against you through the fabric of your clothes.

"We'll never make it inside if you keep doing that, I can't focus."

He let out a soft laugh and put you down. You took a deep breath to calm yourself enough to find your key, the minute the door was open you were all over each other again. There was no time for foreplay, no time for words, only needy kisses and soft moans as you walked him backwards towards the bed. When the back of his legs hit the edge you undid his pants and pushed them down just enough to let gravity handle the rest. You pulled away from the kiss to give him space to remove his shirt and once he had done so you took the opportunity to push him back onto the bed, watching as his body fell into the plush blankets and his bold red locks danced away from his forehead. Undoubtedly this mental image would stay with you forever.

You peeled your shirt off and shimmied out of your pants, revealing red lace panties and a matching bra almost the exact same red as his hair. Kun let out a groan at the sight of you practically naked and climbing onto the bed to straddle him. You weren't on top for long before he rolled you over so you were under him. He gently ran his thumb over your lips and when you parted them to take his thumb into your mouth he let out a soft sigh as he watched you. You looked up to him with pleading eyes as you pushed at the waistband of his underwear. Taking the hint he pulled his thumb from between your lips and quickly discarded his underwear, ridding you of yours soon after. Now completely naked Kun hovered over you kissing along your shoulder as he unclasped your bra and tossed it to the side.

You wrapped your legs around his back and pulled him closer to you, drawing out a chuckle from him. He lifted his face to look into your eyes. "So impatient" he said as he moved his hand between the two of you dropping his head to the crook of your neck with a sigh when he discovered how wet you were. He lifted from you slightly to line himself up with your entrance, letting his head fall back to the crook of your neck as he pushed into you.

You gasped as he bottomed out, the electric feeling that had been in the air now surging through you from head to toe. Slowly he began to move, thrusting in and out of you. Moans of pleasure flowed freely from your mouth sending messages that only he could understand, messages urging him to move faster, harder, deeper, to make you his, to keep you by his side forever. And so he did, he thrusted faster, harder, deeper. Enjoying the way your breast bounced with each thrust, the way you moaned his name was music to his ears, the way your fingers gripped him as your nails dug into the flesh of his back. Xiaojun was right, this could have been the two of you all week but he missed his chance, now he was determined to make up for it. He'd give you all he had even if it was just for one night but he hoped for so much more.

He kissed you with a tenderness that set your heart ablaze, a stark contrast to his relentless thrusts that were threatening to break you at any moment. He wrapped one arm under your thigh, giving him a better angle to thrust even deeper into you. Your mouth hung open as you threw your head back, gasping out praises, and he watched with hungry eyes as your chest rose and fell with each panting breath.

"I- I'm gonna cum" you barely managed to form the words between breaths.

" You're so wet I thought you came already."

He smiled against your neck as you whimpered, partly from embarrassment but mostly because you really were about to cum.

A few more deep thrusts and your walls began to flutter around his dick, causing him to moan your name in response, filling the room with praises for you as your pussy sucked him in even more, soaking his dick and dripping onto the sheets as you chanted his name.

Kun quickly followed, pulling out and painting your stomach with his cum. Kun took a moment to catch his breath before going to retrieve a washcloth to clean up his mess.

"Where are you going?" You pouted.

"To wash this out, I'd feel bad knowing some poor housekeeper had to pick up a towel covered in my cum."

You laughed as you closed your eyes, he had a point. You didn't even want to think about all the cum covered everything they had to deal with on a daily basis. You soon felt the bed dip as Kun snuggled up to you, adjusting your position so that your face was tucked into his chest. There was so much he wanted to say, but you were already half asleep. He was sure you had felt the connection, felt the electrical charge in the air that only seemed to get more intense the closer you got to each other, but a small part of him worried that maybe he was being a hopeless romantic, that all the things that happened leading up to your meeting was just a coincidence, that this was going to end up being one of those "the one that got away" stories. He was so lost in his thoughts that he hadn't realized you were awake until he felt your lips against his.

"What's wrong? You said barely above a whisper as you studied his features in the soft light provided by the reading lamp on the nightstand. He looked at you with soft eyes and threw your leg over his hip, pulling you even closer.

"Want to know a secret? I've been hoping to run into you for a few days now."

"What?"

"Our first day here, I saw you with your friends in the café. I wanted to approach you then."

You thought back to that day, you remembered that day felt strange, like something was going to happen although it never did. Now having felt that same feeling today, and learning he was in the café that day, you were sure it was him that you were feeling.

"Why didn't you?"

"I didn't want to be rude."

You nodded in understanding. "So you've been hoping to run into me?"

"Yea, I even went to the pool today when I saw your friends headed that way, thinking you'd probably be there too." He gave a small but nervous laugh.

Your heart skipped a beat at how cute and honest he was being. You got out of the bed to get your phone and he worried for a moment that he had said too much until you climbed back into bed and snuggled in close to him again.

"Haven't been looking for you, but since I saw you at the pool I was drawn to you." You laughed at the confusion on his face until you showed him the picture of your friends, and pointed to him in the background.

"I even asked if you were friends with the guys they were with."

You watched as Kun's face lit up with amusement just before he leaned in to kiss you, a smile still playing on his lips. YangYang had to be right, this had to be fate.

Morning goodbyes came too soon for either of your liking, but sweet kisses and promises to call, text & visit made them seem slightly less bitter. The flight home was filled with thoughts of the man who had possibly stolen your heart with dimples and cheesy magic tricks. You were sure that when you slept that night he'd be in your dreams too. Finally arriving back at your home after a short car ride from the airport with your friends, they made sure to remind you that once you had all settled in you'd have to tell them everything about Kun.

As you made your way into your front door, you remembered you hadn't taken your phone off airplane mode. The moment you did it your phone buzzed with 3 new messages, all from Kun. You smiled to yourself as you opened the 1st message. A simple "have a safe flight" on your screen. The next message was a photo of him out at breakfast, a mountain of French toast in front of him, and a big smile adorning his face. The final message sent a wave of excitement through your body.

" I hope this doesn't seem too forward, but we leave Vegas tomorrow and if you don't mind I'd like to extend my vacation by a few days and spend it with you."

Before you had a chance to respond you received another message.

"Thank you for visiting Voila Magic! We hope you enjoyed your evening. If you did, please take a moment to leave a review."

You took this as a sign from the universe to accept Kun's offer. You quickly pulled up his message again to respond.

"I'd love that"

You two spent the next few days together and by the second day you started to believe maybe magic was real.

#nct smut #nct fluff #nct wayv #nct kun #nct x reader #kun x reader #kun smut #kun fanfic #kun fluff #kpop smut #wayv smut

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606nox · 3 years ago

Text

Vil X fem reader with beauty trauma

Hey you guys I wanted to try my hand at writing a fan fic so feel free to give tips or advice it wouldn be really nice thanks!

Vil wasn't to fond of you and you weren't to fond of him but after a while he started to wonder why you didn't like him . most people would find him beautiful or even think he was hot but you seemed to hate him you loathed everything about him but he himself didn't know why. So one day he decided that he would find out . but the first thing he needed was to find a way to know more about you. So he started with getting rook to spy on you

Rook I need you to do something

And what could that be ra da poison

I want you to "watch yuu"

If I may ask why do you make this request

Because I would like to get to know yuu

After that rook was off to "watch" yuu he watched yuu for days and he got a bit of info but not a lot

But after a few more days he noticed that you always have a note book with you . so he tries to take any chance he has to look at it when one day yuu left it at the ramshackle. So rook decides to look through

Ahh trickster you heart my heart with the way you think of roi da poison but soon I shall know why

When rook opened the book it seemed to just be stories random one but nothing that would indicate why you didn't like vil. That was until he saw a page called

Vil likes beauty

The more he read the more he understood but he didn't fully understand so he kept reading and he found another poem called

Mother why?

After he read it he fully understood yuu. Hadn't seen what beauty actually was . they were lied to they were told that beauty was physical and mental pain. And they wanted to forget that but vil made it all come back

Trickster I did not know I am sorry

Rook decided he would take the book to vil and then return it later. When rook arrived back he was met with the usual vil

Rook did you find anything

Of course roi da poison

Well show me

As soon a rook took the book out vil snatched it

How did you even get your hand on this book they always keep it with them

Rook knew the question was rhetorical so he didn't answer. As vil flipped through the pages. Rook could tell he was looking for his name. And when he found it he could tell

Vil likes beauty. Well this explains it a bit but

Roi da poison look for one called mother why

When vil found it he finally understood. They were lied to. beauty isn't physical or mental pain.

Thank you rook please return this and don't let yuu know we took it

Rook could tell that vil felt a bit bad. And rook knew why.

Vil why don't you try a different approach to trickster

Rook soon left to return the note book. He carefully put the note book back in it place and left. The next day vil took rooks advice and took a different approach

Hello potato how are you doing

Hello vil is their something you need

Vil could tell that yuu was annoyed by him already

No I was just wondering how you were doing potato

Oh well I'm doing good today

Yuu had seemed to relax a bit with just that

How are you vil I hope your doing good

Huh I didn't know that the potato had some manners

Although vil has made the decision to say it. But he was regretting because now you looked annoyed even more. But you still took a calm voice with him

Well I was raised that way

Well it's nice to know that

See ya vil I have to get to class

Before vil could respond yuu started walking away. One thing that vil could say he liked about you is that you always tried to be a good student weather it be showing up on time or just walking in the halls. You always tried to follow the rules. That's what vil loved about you

#twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland dorm leader #twisted wonderland pomfiore #twisted wonderland vil #twisted wonderland pomfiore vil #x reader #twisted wonderland vil x fem reader

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babymetaldoll · 3 years ago

Text

DIWK - Chapter ten: "Set me free my honey bee"

Word count: 11,6K

Summary: Let's jump 19 months in time and see how painful it has turned for reader and Spencer to hide their feelings for each other. JJ leaves the team, and a new member joins the BAU.

Warnings: Angst and hurt. Fools being assholes. Cursing, of course. Mention of CM cases and spoilers on S06E11.

A/N: Please don't hate me. Just remember things usually look like the shit before they get worst, and then everything is better. I hope.

Masterlist

┅┅┅┅┅┅┅༻❁༺┅┅┅┅┅┅┅

(Y/N)'s point of view

Time is a weird thing. I remember when I was in school and time didn't pass fast enough. Semesters were eternal. It felt it had been years by the time summer vacation arrived. The complete opposite happened to me at the BAU. Suddenly, time passed too quickly. A whole year and a half went by in the blink of an eye.

I told Spencer about it, and he sent me a paper published by Professor Adrian Bejan that presented an argument based on the physics of neural signal processing. He hypothesizes that, over time, the rate at which we process visual information slows down, and this is what makes time 'speed up' as we grow older.

My answer was that I thought it happened 'cos as we grew older, we did things that actually gave us joy, which made us feel the time was passing faster than before. So we argued a whole Saturday afternoon about it and created our own theories for that event.

My theory was my personal favorite, 'cos it was the only one that could easily explain why so much time had passed in the BAU, and it felt like it had been just a few weeks.

It hadn't been easy, though. Those nineteen months had been filled with some of the worst situations we had been through as a team.

After I got shot, JJ finally admitted her relationship with Will and got pregnant. That was shocking, the first BAU baby: Henry.

Sadly, Henry was the only little good thing that happened that year. Because to sum it up, a bunch of awful shit happened to all of us: Hotch was in a car explosion that almost killed him. Spencer and Prentiss got trapped in an undercover mission into an underground cult to investigate child abuse, and Emily was beaten up pretty badly. Also, Spencer got infected with anthrax and nearly died. That was probably the most agonizing moment I had lived since the whole Tobias Hankel situation two years earlier.

Also, that year Prentiss had to investigate the case of the death of one of her best friends, and I was in a pretty nasty fight with an unsub that got me out of the field for three weeks. Not to mention, Spencer was shot in the leg.

Hotch was stabbed by the only unsub that has actually won against the BAU: Foyet. He attacked Aaron and got on the lose for months, but we all knew his next move as torture Hotch's family. That's why his ex-wife Haley and his little son Jack had to go into protective custody, and he couldn't see them for months while we tried to catch Foyet.

Things didn't go as planned. And without a doubt, the worst moment that year was the day Haley died. Foyet killed her, and Aaron lost it. He literally killed him with his bare hands the moment he got him. For a solid week, I was sure Aaron Hotchner wouldn't be the unit chief anymore. Strauss actually opened an investigation related to everything that happened that day. But in the end, somehow, she understood the "bloodbath" that had happened in that house was all in Foyet's hands.

However, there's no way to deny that the whole team had changed in many ways after that year. The concept of being a family was now more present than ever. After chasing Foyet for months, we were all onto him as if he was chasing our own family, because he was.

You don't work this kind of job with a team like mine and don't get attached to them. And this goes beyond how in love I was with Spencer. The (Y/N) who first stepped into the BAU, scared to show her true self, was long gone. And despite my deepest fears, letting them in and showing them who I really was had been one of the smartest decisions I have ever made.

Do you want to know which was my stupidest decision? Falling in love with Spencer Reid. It hadn't actually been my choice. I just didn't fight the feeling either. I don't think I could have even if I tried, though. Those nineteen months brought us so close, my mom thought we were living together, and the teasing from our friends was so common we weren't even affected by it.

For Christ Sakes, even Strauss thought we were dating! She forced us to attend a seminar on fraternization, concerned after she realized we always took our vacation together. We had a lot of fun trips, though. First, we visited his mom and had an amazing weekend in Las Vegas. Then we took a few days off after the anthrax incident and went to Hawaii. Picture Spencer Reid in an "all-inclusive," drinking all the coffee and eating all the pastries possible while reading a million books underneath an extra-large umbrella. We had fun that week, did some local touring, but most of all, sleeping in and relaxing. Spencer hates the beach but got those tickets anyway.

Did everybody think we were a couple? Yes

Did it help that we shared rooms, 'cos we were already used to it? No

Did it feel like a honeymoon without sex? Yes

Could I stop thinking about sex with Spencer? No.

And all that led us to the nightmare our relationship was going to become.

Penelope Garcia was drunk. She kept pouring shots and pushing them to us. Emily was wasted as well. But she kept acting like the classy lady she is. Not like JJ. My poor baby had mascara smeared under her eyes after crying for like an hour.

We found out she was leaving the team, and it was a hard blow on us. And by hard, I mean the worst thing that had ever happened to us. We had suffered without JJ when she was on maternity leave. And we struggled without her. Now knowing the Pentagon had taken her away from the BAU was torture.

We had a goodbye party for her at Rossi's, but this was our goodbye girl's night, and neither of us was holding anything back.

We had cried, we had sung sad songs. We drank all the champagne, wine, and vodka we could find. And now, holding our tequila shots, we knew it was time to call it a night.

- "I just love you girls so much,"- JJ whispered, crying- I don't wanna work without you.

- "Boo, come here!!"- I opened my arms and wrapped them around my friend, kissing the top of her hair a few times- "I love you too, and you are going to come back so soon you won't have time to miss us. You'll see. Papa Rossi and Dada Hotch are gonna fix everything."

I was drunk. Seriously drunk. But that wasn't the reason why I was so sweet with JJ. The truth is, I was broken-hearted. Like Penelope and Reid, I didn't manage change very well, and the fact that JJ was forced to leave made me feel frustrated and mad. But most of all, it made me think of every time I had been a little bitch with her during the years. And I regretted each one of them.

- "And we won't be far!"- Emily added and caressed JJ's arm, smiling kindly- "You will still be in town, and we will not leave you alone"- JJ chuckled and nodded.

- "I know, girls. Shit, I love you all so much!"

- "We love you too!"- Penelope sobbed and moved closer, wrapping the three of us in her arms.

- "Please, take care!"- JJ wiped off the tears from her eyes and looked at us- "Emily, don't do anything stupid! Don't rush in the field, and please don't take your fucking vest off!!"

- "I won't! I promise!"

- "You have to live to be Unit chief one day!"- JJ added, and Prentiss widened her eyes, shocked.

- "That's not really my gold."

- "But you'd be queen, baby!!"- Jareau added and turned to Penelope- "And you, please make sure Hotch eats. I kept a stack of granola bars on my desk to keep him fueled during the day. He usually forgets lunchtime and skips dinner, so..."

- "Don't worry, JJ,"- Penelope nodded, and we all felt our heartbreak a little thinking about all the things JJ did in her daily basics to take care of the team, and we didn't even know.

- "How are we going to survive without you?"- I mumbled, pouting. JJ chuckled and held my hand.

- "You are a rock, and you will do a fantastic job keeping this team together. Just, please, can you and Spencer start dating now?"

I wide opened my eyes and stared at JJ. The comment surprised me. I shouldn't, 'cos the whole "you and Spencer should start dating" joke was getting old. Only this time, JJ wasn't joking. She held both my hands and looked right into my eyes.

- "(Y/N), he loves you"- I was about to argue with her, but she covered my mouth with her Cheetos smelling hand.

- "Don't say a word! Spencer loves you so much you really must be blind not to see it. And I know you love him too. It's implied in all the little things you do for him every day. So don't take it for granted. Don't think this will last forever 'cos look at me! A week ago, I was happily working at the BAU, and now I'm drinking at my goodbye party! So don't waste any more time! You are in love with Spencer, and he loves you! It doesn't take a profiler to see it. So please! Act on it!"

There was a dramatic silence after. I didn't know how to break it. I could just joke around, but somehow, it didn't feel right. It had been too quiet for too long, and that made everything harder to deny. Finally, Emily put her hand on mine, just like JJ was still doing, and smiled at me.

- "There's nothing to be ashamed of, (Y/N). You are not the first person to fall for her best friend."

- "And the Junior G Man loves you so much,"- Penelope added, landing her hand on our hands too.

- "As his friend"- I corrected and sighed. I guess that was it. After three years, I could probably start facing my feelings in front of my friends.

- "No, (Y/N)"- Garcia tried to argue, but I shook my head and stood up, 'cos all that sudden attention and affection was bothering me.

- "PG, I was in Hawaii with the man, sharing a room, walking around in a bikini, and he didn't do anything."

- "That's because he is shy!"- Emily excused him right away.

- "My bikini leaves pretty much nothing to the imagination. Do you know what he said when he first saw me on it?"- I looked at my friend and poured us another round of tequila- "And I quote, "I don't think I brought enough books. This one is too interesting."

I air quoted with my fingers as we spoke, and the three of them looked at me, speechless. I made my point and drank my shot, feeling the alcohol burning down my throat. My friends opened their mouths but didn't produce a word. I sighed and looked at them.

- "But he hates the beach, and he took you there anyway,"- Emily pointed out

- "Did he give you his speech about how he hates sandy food?"- JJ asked me, and I chuckled, nodding.

- "And about pink skin, limited and unengaging topography, and of course, the real reason he hates the beach: drug-resistant bacteria spread by seagull feces."

- "And the man took you to the beach!"- Penelope argued.

- "But he didn't do anything! he didn't make his move, didn't even hold my hand!!"- I nearly shouted- "That's why, among a lot of reasons, is how I know Spencer is not interested in me! If only I'd tell you all the shit we've been through!"

- "Please!! Tell us!!"- Garcia begged and grabbed one of my legs- "I won't live another day 'cos I won't be able to deal with the mystery!"

- "No! 'cos you are gonna tell Morgan"- I slurred- "And he is going to embarrass and tease my honey bunny, and my honey bunny is gonna get all nervous and nervous around me, and we are never going to..."- I stopped talking and looked at my friends. I was sharing too much.

- "(Y/N)?"- Prentiss looked at me, but I just shook my head and looked down.

- "I think I better go home."

- "No, you can't drive like this,"- JJ argued immediately and held my hand- "I'm not gonna let you go intoxicated. Will is gonna come pick me up, and we'll drop you in your place."

I nodded at her and stayed still. My friends smiled at me, and slowly very slowly, I leaned on JJ's shoulder and rested my head on it.

- "I love you, boo,"- I whispered, and she giggled- "I don't think I'll stay sane without you there with us anymore."

- "Hotch is gonna manage to get her back,"- Penelope assured me, and I just nodded.

- "Meanwhile, we won't replace you, and if anyone tries to push someone new into the team, we are not gonna take them,"- I added, feeling JJ's hand holding mine.

- "Don't be mean with people just 'cos you miss me. If there's a new teammate, it won't be their fault I was pushed out of the BAU."

- "But, JJ,"- I tried to argue, but she shook her head right away.

- "No, (Y/N). You can't be mean to people just because."

Clearly, my friend hoped I could be the better person. The simple question was: did I want to be the better person? Right there, drunk and sad, the answer was no.

Spencer's point of view

I kept finding myself awake at four in the morning, walking around my apartment, not able to read or to write anything. For the last months, at least twice or three times each week, I would stay awake, no matter how tired I felt, and I would haunt my own apartment, listening to my vinyl records.

The sudden lack of sleep wasn't really something weird in me. I have always been nocturnal. Besides, the news of JJ's departure had hit us all pretty hard. I had already shared my share of tears and tried to manage the fury that caused me to know we were helpless to the government's decisions. There was nothing we could do, neither us, Hotch, or even Strauss. Not that she would if she could.

My family was in crisis, and all we could do was hope for the best and stay together.

It was scary losing JJ. It made me think of all the things that could go wrong every day on the field daily. It was bad that we could get hurt or even die on our work. But that they divided us that way made no sense. Like Rossi said: our loss was someone else's winning, and in the FBI, no one cared if we lost.

I poured myself a cup of herbal tea and inhaled the smell of it. It smelled like home. Like (Y/N). She had some of her favorite teas in my apartment. She had a bunch of all her things there, actually. When mom visited, she thought we were living together. She is still sure we are dating and that I don't wanna tell her. I don't longer argue with her about it. It's useless, and it somehow feels good to imagine in another world. It was actually true.

That year my feelings for my best friend had grown in a way that made it all more difficult to deal with. I didn't just love her. I was in love with her. She was in everything I did, in each and every one of my thoughts. I could hear her laughter in my head, like a record playing my favorite song over and over again.

When she was out there in the field, I couldn't stop running all the probabilities of her getting hurt, and most of the time, I would do my best to keep her safe, knowing it could somehow interfere with the case.

Hotch had called me to his office a few times, aware something was going with me. He could read it on my face, I guess. It was scary to know everybody could read my feelings for (Y/N) but her. And it was sad to think of the worst: that she knew how much I loved her, but she didn't feel the same, and she was just being my friend 'cos she was never going to be anything else but my friend.

I drank my tea and hummed the song that sounded in my house at four in the morning: Love is a losing game. Seemed pretty accurate for my mood. I remember the day I got that vinyl. We were out with (Y/N), Frank, and Lu, looking for a present for Mikey's birthday, and we ended up in a record store, getting a million vinyl records for ourselves.

- "Are you getting all those?"- (Y/N) asked me and looked at the seven albums in my hand.

- "Yes, why? I can't?"- I answered and raised an eyebrow.

- "Sassy!"- she giggled and grabbed them- "You can get all the albums you want. But I have to give my approval first. No, you are not getting this!"- she grabbed The Beatles' Revolver and left it aside.

- "What? Why? It's only one I need to complete my collection."

- "I know, but when you get it, you'll force me to listen to it, and I don't like the Beatles,"- she argued, and I just shook my head, taking the album again.

- "Sorry, chipmunk, I'm buying it."

- "Fine. I won't go to your house for the next couple of weeks then."

- "Why don't you tell me which album you wanna listen to when you are in my house then?"- I looked at her, smiling at me and looking for a record on the shelves.

- "This! You need some Amy in your life."

And I did. Now, at four in the morning, all alone walking around, I could see her in my apartment, singing along to her favorite songs while cooking dinner, feeling at home. I wished she was there, with me, doing nothing. Watching tv, or reading. Just hanging out. I knew it wasn't healthy being in love with my friend, seeing her every day, and also hanging out with her every chance I got. But even when I knew she was never going to love me the way I did, I was going to take every chance I had to enjoy her company. If that was all I was going to get.

My phone took me from my thoughts, and I quickly walked to my room to get it. I thought it was Hotch announcing a case, but it was JJ.

- "Hey! JJ, everything ok? Is Henry ok?"

- "Yes, hi Spence. We are all ok."

- "It's four in the morning."

- "Sorry I woke you up... I just..." - she made a pause and sighed at the other side of the line- "Spencer, you know I love you."

- "I love you too. You are one of my best friends. Is everything ok?"

- "Yes, I just wanted to... remember a bunch of years ago, when you asked me to that football game?"

A million years had passed since the one and only time I had asked JJ out. It was the only move I tried to do on her, and I failed incredibly. It was awkward, and she had no idea it was a date, so she invited Garcia to come along. I was so embarrassed I never even mentioned that single event ever again, and our friendship grew after.

- "Yes, I remember, JJ. Why?"

- "When you asked me out, did you have a crush on me?"

- "JJ, are you drunk?"- I had to ask 'cos that conversation was starting to scare me.

- "Yes, but that's not why I'm talking about this. Just answer the questions, Spence. When you asked me out on that date, did you have a crush on me?"

- "Yes, I did."

I closed my eyes, embarrassed to face feelings that were far forgotten.

- "You see, I had a crush on you too back then,"- JJ said and chuckled- "But neither of us acted on it, and life continued, and now I'm in love with Will, and we have a baby, and you are his godfather."

Of all the things I thought I would listen to that day, never in a million years, I imagined I would hear JJ drunk telling me she had a crush on me when we first met.

- "Now, do you want that to happen again?"- she asked, and I didn't get it, 'cos I was still trying to process what I had just heard. So I might have had a relationship with her if only I had said something, act on it. Kiss her, ask her out again?

- "What?"

- "Spence. Do you want to miss the chance to be with the girl you like?"

- "No, but JJ, what are you talking about?"

She sighed, frustrated, and used that tone of voice with me, that very maternal specific tone of voice she used to explain things she knew were hard for me to follow.

- "When you like someone, Spence, you have to tell her. 'Cos sometimes, life gets in the way, and if you don't do what you have to do to be happy, no one will do it for you."

- "Are you ok, JJ?"

- "Yes, Spence, I'm ok. I'm home with Will. We just got here after dropping (Y/N) off her place."

- "How was she?"

- "She might have had a few too many drinks, but she'll be ok in the morning. Maybe she'd appreciate it if you brought her coffee and donuts."

- "She doesn't like donuts,"- I corrected her- "She likes cupcakes and brownies."

- "Sorry. Coffee and cupcakes... just tell her you love her, Spence. She deserves to know."

I held my breath and closed my eyes. I didn't get why JJ was telling me that, but I knew I didn't want to talk about it. So I said good night and hung up.

What was the point of telling me we could have been a couple of years had passed already? Why didn't she say a thing before? Or even better, why didn't she ever say a word about it at all? So I missed the chance to be happy with her. Great. One more regret to add to my list.

I laid on my bed and tried to remember that date. I was so nervous that day, my hands shook inside my pockets as I walked to JJ's door. She looked beautiful that day, especially when she looked at me and announced she had invited Penelope to join us.

That was when I realized she would never see me as a proper date, just like a friend. And I learned to make my peace with that over the years. My crush for JJ lasted a few more months, but it vanished when I fell for (Y/N). What if she had never joined the team? Would I have been in love with JJ forever? Jeniffer always made me feel like her little brother, and I guess that's the mechanic that works for us. We were good friends ever since we met, and yes, I had a crush on her, but we work more like siblings than anything else.

What was the point in telling me I had missed a chance with her now? I just couldn't see it.

(Y/N)'s point of view

The next few weeks were us trying to survive without JJ. The team was making the best it could, but it was hard. Penelope took the lead during the second case without JJ. She turned into our tech analyst and communication liaison, only to collapse under the pressure of having two roles.

No one was going to replace JJ. We all knew it. Literally, no one, 'cos Hotch decided he and Garcia were going to split the job, and we were all going to collaborate as much as we could, 'cos we were a team. A family. And that's what families do.

And families were the target of the unsub we were hunting the day everything changed. Again. I hadn't recovered from the departure of JJ when Rossi and Hotch walked to the bullpen and introduced us to Agent Trainee Ashley Seaver.

My nemesis.

- "Agent trainee Seaver"- Rossi smiled at her like a proud father and looked at us as we stood up, wondering who she was- "Supervisory Special Agent Prentiss, (Y/L/N), and Morgan."

- "I've heard so much about the three of you,"- she said with the sweetest tone of voice I had ever heard. Something about that felt odd.

- "I hope it is all good- Morgan flirted right away, of course."

- "Very, sir."

- "Anything specific? I mean about me in particular?"- I turned to him and failed in holding back my chuckles.

- "Please, don't encourage him, or he will never stop talking,"- I said, and Derek elbowed me playfully. Seaver smiled at us and even blushed a little bit. She was nervous.

- "Agent Seaver is on loan to us from the academy while she is remedial training with an injury."

Hotch announced. And my stomach tightened right away. There was something wrong with that whole scene. I could feel it in my guts. But I didn't know why?

- "Concussion. Hand to hand got a little out of control."- Seaver explained and kept a silly smile on her face.

- "How's the other guy?"- Prentiss asked.

- "Don't ask."

- "I was remediated in the academy also,"- Spencer said, walking over us, and suddenly I understood why I had a bad feeling about everything.

- "Agent Seaver, Dr. Reid."

As soon as I heard Rossi say those words, there was a part of me who just wanted to hold Spencer's hand and push him away from her, even before they could say hi. She looked at him like he was eye candy, and I clenched my knuckles as I stared at the scene.

- "Uhm... What was your issue?"- she asked him, and I could see the pink on her cheek intensifying as he looked at her, confused.

- "What was my issue? Marksmanship, physical training, obstacle course, Hogan's alley. You know, pretty much everything that wasn't technically book related. They ultimately had to make exceptions to allow me into the field."

Seaver stared at him and kept nodding, though I wondered if she was listening to what he had said. Spencer looked exceedingly handsome that day. His hair was very short for the first time in years, and he still had no idea how to comb it, so it was all over the place, making him look as hot as fuck.

I was so in love with him, I didn't know what to do with those feelings at all. It was hard working with Reid at that point. I just wanted to kiss him.

- "Agent Seaver's going to accompany us to New Mexico,"- Aaron announced, and I couldn't help but question him right away.

- "She is?"

- "As a consultant."- he assured me.

- "On?"- Morgan raised an eyebrow and looked at Hotch, wondering what a trainee agent could help us with as a consultant.

- "She has a unique perspective,"- Rossi tried to explain, but it sounded like bullshit.

- "They don't know?"- Seaver turned to the elderly agents, and they shook their heads.

- "Well, we weren't sure how you wanted to,"- David whispered.

- "Uh... Seaver's not my original last name. It's my mother's maiden name. Mine used to be Beauchamp. My father is Charles Beauchamp"- Ashley was supposed to explain the circumstances of her consultancy to the whole team, but she just looked at Spencer as she spoke.

- "As in the Redmond ripper, Charles Beauchamp?"- he asked her, and suddenly, it clicked. It was like my whole body was telling me I couldn't be close to her for a reason.

- "That's him,"- she whispered and kept her eyes on my best friend as he continued talking.

- "He killed 25 women over 10 years in rural North Dakota. I think that you caught him, right, Rossi?"- and David nodded.

- "Hotch was on that team, too."

- "Based on her life experience, we were hoping that agent Seaver might recognize something in the family dynamics inside the community that could be helpful. We have a plane waiting,"- Hotch announced and looked at us, but none of us said a word.

I kept my eyes glued at my feet the whole time Aaron talked. Then, Spencer nodded and walked with Seaver and Rossi out to the hangar. I couldn't even blink. I think I was in shock.

- "Her father was a serial killer?"- Prentiss asked Hotch, not getting what he was thinking.

- "That's definitely a different set of parameters,"- Morgan added. Neither of them was sold on the idea, which made me feel a little bit better.

- "I don't want her presence to get us sidetracked. It's a long shot that she's gonna see anything helpful. We work it like any other case,"- Hotch was clear, and Prentiss and Morgan nodded.

- "You got it."

But I disagreed with that.

- "(Y/N), is everything ok?"- Aaron asked me, and I tried my best to lie and be cool.

- "Yeah, I'm ok."

- "Ok. We work this like any other case. Wheels up in twenty."

But everything was far from being ok.

I sat next to Spencer on the jet, and we reviewed the case files together. Hotch briefed us, and we all pretended it wasn't weird having Seaver there. And I guess we had to pretend it wasn't odd knowing her dad was a serial killer.

- "You are very young, (Y/N),"- she said and smiled at me. She was sitting across from Spencer and me, and you could tell she had been trying to join the conversation for a few minutes now.

-" Twenty eight,"- I answered and looked at the files again.

- "And you, doctor?"

- "You can call me Reid. I'm twenty eight too,"- Spencer cut her a short, awkward, and nervous smile, and I turned to him.

- "Honey, did I leave my Mets jersey at your house?"- it was the only question that came to my mind at that minute. It was completely random, but somehow it showed a part of our dynamic that Ashley didn't know. Our friendship. Our closeness.

- "Yes, I found it last night,"- he answered and sipped his coffee- "I was gonna bring it over, but then I remembered you always borrow all my sweaters when you are home or when you stay over, so I thought maybe it was a good idea to keep it at my place."

- "I don't know, Batsy. It's my favorite sweatshirt- I raised an eyebrow, and I'm pretty sure I even flirted a little bit."

- "So? You need to keep one there."

- "But I like wearing your clothes when we are at your place. It's extra large and extra comfy."

- "Is that why you keep taking my sweaters back to your house?"- he asked and chuckled- "Last Sunday, I found four of my sweaters in your closet."

- "Sorry, I'm not even sorry,"- I said and laughed- "And what were you doing in my closet?"

- "Lucy, Ricky, can we focus on the case?"- Morgan asked and waved at us with one silly grin on his face- "We love hearing your adorable daily adventures, but we've got a psycho killer to catch."

Spencer blushed and flustered right away. I stuck out my tongue at Morgan and just shook my head. The way Seaver looked at Reid was still driving me nuts, but I felt I had shown her he was mine, childishly.

It's embarrassing to think that's not the most childish thing I did around her those days. Or in the weeks to follow. But I didn't like Ashley, and I didn't want her around my team. And it wasn't just her constant flirting with Spencer. It was the fact her father had killed my mother's sister when she was in college, and I was making my best effort to keep that fact aside from work. My personal life had to stay out of the FBI, especially when working a case.

I had to do some serious mental work trying to remember it wasn't Ashley's fault her father was a sick bastard. She hadn't hurt my family, and her father had ruined her life too. It wasn't her fault.

But one thing is knowing. Another thing is being rational about it. Spoiler: I wasn't so rational about it.

- "So, (Y/N). Do you like working at the BAU?"- Ashley asked me and looked at me through the rearview mirror. We were in the SUV, and Prentiss was driving. I was in the back seat, trying to ignore her, but she made it impossible.

- "Yes, very much,"- I answered and nodded, not taking my eyes from the window.

- "Everybody is very friendly,"- Seaver added and made a pause. I don't know if she wanted me to say something or if she was trying to find a way to say what she wanted to say.

- "Yes, they are,"- I humored her, and she quickly responded.

- "Are you and Spencer dating?"- I could feel the blood raising my cheeks as she spoke. And Prentiss flashed me a look through the mirror as Ashley continued talking.

- "I'm sorry. I don't mean to be rude. I just wondered because of the fraternization policy."

- "Right. Sure. Of course."

Those three words were meant to let Ashley know I wasn't buying her bullshit, So I literally spit them.

- "Spencer is my best friend. We are not dating."

Facing that simple truth had never been harder before, especially after how I saw Ashley's face light up.

- "You just seem to be so close."

- "Oh, they are close,"- Emily smiled at me and winked- "They are so close, they sometimes freak us out."

- "We freak you out?"- I raised an eyebrow and carefully hit her arm, pretending to be upset. But honestly, I was glad she was teasing me.

- "I am just saying, we are all pretty suspicious about you two. I am actually surprised you didn't share rooms tonight. They usually share rooms."- Emily explained to Seaver.

- "He was paired with Morgan,"- I pouted and looked at my phone. I thought maybe I could send him a funny text. I actually wanted to hang out with him.

- "He is very nice,"- Ashley added- "I mean, everybody is nice."

- "Yes, you mentioned it"

I was clearly not being nice. Seaver nodded and looked at the files again. I assumed she was trying to find a way to keep asking about Spencer, and I was making my best not to kill her.

- "Working with a genius must be somehow intimidating,"- she said after a few minutes. Damn it, she wasn't going to let that subject go.

- "It's fun working with Spencer,"- Prentiss said, trying to humor Seaver. And mostly, I guess trying to ease my mood and keep me from killing the trainee agent.

- "I'm sure it is,"- Seaver added. I hated her.

- "He is more than just a genius, he is a nerd."- Emily pointed out and chuckled at her words, making Seaver giggle too. I looked at my book again, but I knew I wasn't going to be able to concentrate on it at all. He was my nerd. Mine.

- "Well, it's very refreshing to be with a group who trusts and works so well together,"- she added- "I had never felt less judged and more welcome in my entire life."

I know I should have felt sorry for her. But I honestly couldn't. That was the day I realized I wasn't the good person I thought I was. There was a part of me that was a scumbag. I'm guessing knowing that is pretty helpful and positive 'cos you can work on your flaws. But I wasn't planning on working on anything at that minute, though. I just wanted to break Seaver's face.

Spencer's point of view

I didn't like working without JJ. I've never been good with change, and that was a massive alteration of our routine. I missed her, and adding Ashley to the team made things even weirder for me, even for a case. I didn't want to be judgemental, but her father was a serial killer. Of course, that would make things weird.

Besides, everybody kept bugging me, teasing me, trying to see if I liked Seaver. Penelope called while we were on the case and started taunting me, saying she knew I thought Ashley was cute. I could see she was beautiful, but I couldn't see her that way. And I didn't want anyone to say those kinds of things around (Y/N).

Why did I care so much?

I didn't want to face it 'cos I knew it was completely platonic, but I didn't want (Y/N) to think I had a crush on Seaver. I knew my best friend didn't have romantic feelings for me, and I also knew I wasn't going to make a move on her or anything. But I didn't want things to change more than they already had. And most of all, I didn't want anything to alter my dynamic with (Y/N).

But at the same time, somehow, it felt everything was already different between us.

- "Hey, honey bunny,"- (Y/N) walked to me and handed me a cup of coffee- "I thought you might need one of these."

- "You are a lifesaver,"- I whispered and sipped the cup. It was perfect.

We were on the jet on our way back home. The whole team was mostly quiet. The mood was weird. Ashley had done something quite reckless earlier and nearly got herself killed. She walked to the unsub's house all alone, not knowing he was our guy. She almost died, and none of us can even imagine what went through her head to do such a thing.

Rossi and Hotch walked to her. (Y/N) looked at me, and I could read on her face that both of us knew what was going to happen.

Ashley was alone when David sat in front of her, and Hotch stood in the middle of the aisle. Maybe that had been insensitive of us. Neither of us tried to contain her. Neither of us really knew her that well. Or at all, as a matter of fact.

- "You were not supposed to go off on your own."- Hotch went straight to the point.

- "I know,"- she whispered, and I could see how (Y/N)'s face changed. I tried to read her, but all I was able to see was... anger? I had to be wronged. She had no reason to be mad at Ashley.

- "You could have been killed,"- Hotch crossed his arms on his chest and stared at her.

- "I know that, too."

- "Why, Ashley? You're smarter than that"- Rossi sounded like a worried father. I didn't look at him 'cos I kept my eyes on (Y/N)'s, still trying to read her emotions. But what I saw made no sense. She really looked like she was angry at Ashley. Like she hated her.

- "I never got to apologize to any of the victims. The families of the women my father killed. I thought if I could just apologize to one family that had been hurt that way..."

And that was when (Y/N) snapped. She jumped from her seat and walked to Seaver. Aaron and David looked at her surprised, and Morgan turned to me, taking off his headphones. Neither he nor Prentiss got what was happening until that moment.

- "Ok. Shoot!"- (Y/N) sat right in front of Seaver, next to David, and looked at her. But she didn't get it.

- "What? What are you talking about?"

- "You just said you wanted to apologize to one of the families. So go ahead. Try."

The silence on the jet was so deep and awkward it felt no one was ever going to talk again.

- "I'm sorry, (Y/N). But I don't get what you are implying,"- Ashley's voice was a whisper. I knew she was sad and affected, embarrassed even. But I also knew (Y/N), and I could read it on her face. She wasn't joking.

- "You said you wanted to apologize to the family of one of your dad's victims, so go ahead. Apologize to me."

My first instinct was to stand up, which I did. But I froze and didn't take a step closer to (Y/N) when I noticed the severe and cold look in her eyes. I didn't know what she was talking about. But I knew she wasn't bluffing.

- "Why should I... apologize to you?"- Ashley asked her, and her voice broke at a certain point, probably scared of the answer.

- "Your dad killed my mother's older sister. She was in college,"- (Y/N) spit each word with hate and looked at Ashley, waiting for her reply. But Seaver didn't know what to do. She widened her eyes and stayed still. She barely kept her breathing steady.

- "(Y/N), maybe we should let Seaver rest,"- Hotch landed a hand on her shoulder, but my friend shook her head.

- "No, Hotch. By making that choice, she put everyone at risk,"- (Y/N) didn't take her eyes from Ashley as she spoke- "As far as I remember when you are at the academy, they teach you that in the field, we are responsible to and for your team."

- "(Y/N)... I had no idea..."- Ashley tried to apologize, I could see it, but it was clear she wasn't going to win that argument- "I am so sorry."

- "I don't know, Seaver. Did you think saying "sorry" would make those families feel better? 'Cos it ain't working here. "Sorry" won't make my mom stop feeling guilty about what happened. And, if things had gotten ugly back there, "sorry" wouldn't have made your mistake go away in case anyone would have gotten hurt. So no. Sorry doesn't help. Maybe it can ease your conscience, but when you really fuck it up, it never makes things better."

(Y/N) stood up and walked back to her seat in front of me. I let her pass and didn't say a word. I knew she wouldn't want to talk about it there. And, of course, Seaver didn't say a word. She just stood up and walked to the back of the jet, to the bathroom. Rossi and Hotch looked at each other and then looked at me.

David poured a glass of whiskey and walked to (Y/N) slowly. He didn't say a word, he just handed it to her, and she just took it and sipped it with shaky hands.

- "Thanks,"- she whispered, and Rossi nodded. Hotch raised an eyebrow, and for a moment, I thought he was going to say something, but he didn't. He just walked to his seat and opened a case file.

I moved back to my seat and opened my satchel. I had run out of candies earlier that day, so I didn't have much to give to her that could make her smile. So I picked a book and handed it to her. She took it and smiled at me kindly. I knew she was fighting back the tears, and I am sure she has held back all the emotions than being with the daughter of the man who killed her aunt since she knew who Seaver was. And she managed to do the job well. I was proud of her.

- "Wanna grab something to eat when we reach DC?"- I whispered, but for the first time ever, she shook her head.

- "I'm gonna have to catch a rain check for that dinner. I think I wanna go straight to my bed today, honey."- she sipped her glass again, and I nodded.

- "Don't worry, next time."

I was waiting for the train to go back home later that night when I saw Seaver sitting at a bench at the station, staring at her hands on her lap. I didn't see her leaving the BAU, though to be honest, I was really focused on finishing my paperwork to go home. (Y/N) had left as soon as we reached DC, but I had stayed a little longer.

I hesitated for a few seconds before I took a few steps closer and waved at Seaver. She looked at me surprised, as soon as she saw me, but didn't move. I smiled, trying to look friendly, and sat next to her.

- "Hi. What are you doing here?"- I asked her, and she shrugged.

- "I was going to go home, but I think I sat here half an hour ago and haven't been able to move,"- I turned to her and shook my head.

- "Do you want to eat something?"- after what had happened at the jet, I figured Ashley wasn't feeling so good, and maybe talking with someone could help her. She looked at me and blushed; I don't know why. But at least, she smiled and nodded.

- "Great, pizza?"

- "Pizza sounds good."

We were waiting for our food and making small talk. I kept giving Ashley pizza facts to fill the silence 'cos it was weird hanging out with Ashley. I didn't know her, really. We had worked a case together, but that didn't mean I knew her. And, of course, we had the whole jet incident. I felt a little guilty about what had happened, though it wasn't my fault at all in retrospect. I just felt like it was my job cheering her up a little bit after everything she had gone through.

- "How do you do it?"- she asked me all of a sudden- "How do you deal with the pressure of this job?"

- "You get used to it, I guess. I don't know if it's a good thing to get used to, but... it comes with the job, I think,"- I didn't know if I was doing ok comforting her. Then again, I have never been particularly good at it. Not then, not now.

- "Did you always dream about doing this?"- she asked me, and her eyes locked into mine in a way that made me feel slightly uncomfortable.

- "Y... yes. Ever since I was a kid, catching the bad guys,"- Seaver nodded and sipped her coke- "You? Why did you get into the academy?"

I regretted my question right after I asked, just 'cos I realized she might have done it to understand her father's behavior. It was only apparent that had shaped her actions.

- "I guess you know that..."- Ashley answered and smiled, her eyes looking straight into mine. I know I blushed. She is a beautiful woman, though I wasn't thinking about her that way. It was an odd feeling being observed that way.

I was glad our pizza made it to the table, and we were forced to stop talking, and I could focus on anything else but her. Not that I didn't want to look at her, but... I think the right way to explain it is to call it "uneasy." That's how I felt. I wanted to be friendly with her, she had a horrible experience consulting with the team, and I was sure she wasn't really having a good day.

- "This might sound weird, but... do you think I can call you sometime?"- Ashley asked after a few minutes. We were eating and talking about nothing important. I nearly chook at her words and looked at her, nodding.

- "Sure, why?"- I didn't mean to be rude. I just didn't know why she might need to talk to me again.

- "I just think maybe you could help me with a few assignments at the academy."

- "Yeah, of course."

Ashley Seaver smiled and nodded at me, pleased. She took a sip of Sprite, and I could read her, trying to find the words to continue speaking.

- "I'm glad. I was sure you were going to say no."

- "Why?"- I furrowed my brows, confused- "I'm not a big fan of phones, but I can handle a casual phone call."

- "No, I just didn't think your girlfriend would like... I mean, I think (Y/N) hates me, and as her boyfriend, I thought you... would... I don't know."

- "I'm, we are... we,"- I was completely flustered as I tried to rearrange my thoughts. Seaver looked at me innocently and waited for my words.

- "(Y/N) isn't my girlfriend"- it bothered me to admit that simple fact. Why? 'Cos it hurt to think we looked like a couple, but we weren't. Why did Seaver think we were together?

- "Really? But..."

- "She is my best friend,"- I explained poorly. She nodded and hesitated before saying what she was thinking. It was obvious she was trying to arrange the words in her head.

- "It's just that you two... sorry, I'm overstepping,"- Ashley blushed and shook her head- "She is... strong."

- "Yes, very."

- "I think I started with the wrong foot with her."

- "Well, I don't mean to justify anything, but if your father hurt,"- I made a pause, trying to find a way to say it that wasn't so painful.

- "Killed. My father killed her aunt,"- she corrected me with a cold and monotonous tone of voice. I just nodded and sipped my water.

- "She is an amazing person,"- I don't know if I was trying to excuse (Y/N)'s earlier behavior or if I just loved her so much I needed to tell people how awesome she was.

- "I'm sure you will pass this,"- I assured her- "Once you get to know her, and she gets to know you."

- "I don't think she will give me that chance. Besides, I was just clear to assist with only one case."

- "If you want to stay, you can request your remedial training be here. And if Hotch approves it, I could talk to (Y/N). I'm sure she will like to know you better."

Why did I say all that? I had no idea.

- "Thank you, Spence. You are really sweet,"- Ashley moved closer and held my hand. I stayed very still, absolutely awkward.

- "Yeah, I don't... like... holding hands,"- I quickly moved it away and tried to smile at her. She stayed still, not understanding my reaction but trying to act normal.

- "Sorry."

- "That's ok. I'm a germaphobe, that's all."

After pizza, we left the place and said goodnight. I told Ashley I was weary (which was, in fact, the truth) and got her a cab to take her home. After that, I walked to my place. I felt like I needed to be alone for a while. My head was overwhelmed, and in the latest couple of weeks, I had severe trouble sleeping.

I had migraines that nearly blinded me. I was scared they meant I could develop the first signs of schizophrenia, like mom, 'cos they were coming more and more often. It wasn't that bad yet, the light didn't hurt my eyes, and I didn't have any sign of hallucination, but still, I knew it could be serious.

I tried to think of a reason why I might be having those severe headaches. I was eating correctly, mostly 'cos (Y/N) forced me to eat. No, she didn't force me, but she made sure I had all my meals at work, not just coffee. And usually, at the weekends, we would spend our time together, and she was a fantastic cook. So it wasn't an alimentary issue.

I wasn't sleeping well. That wasn't new, but it was getting serious. I wrote and read a lot at night 'cos I couldn't fall asleep until late. I didn't know why. I just couldn't rest. My body ached, and my brain wouldn't sleep. The only nights I could actually get some rest were the ones when (Y/N) stayed with me. It was a blessing when Hotch paired us to share rooms, 'cos I could easily fall asleep when she was around. Her presence soothed me in a way that I didn't understand. Let me put it this way, I know it might sound cheesy, but the beating of her heart set the rhythm for my own, and at night it would bring me peace.

I reached home that night and sighed. I knew I wasn't going to rest easy. (Y/N) wasn't there with me. So I made myself a cup of herbal tea, (Y/N) had a lot of those in my house, and I drank them when I missed her. The smell coming from the cup made me feel like she was close.

How pathetic I had become! But I could only share those thoughts with myself. No one knew I had feelings for her, and I was going to deny it till the end, no matter what had JJ said. I couldn't take that phone call from my mind, and on those sleepless nights, I kept overthinking and overanalyzing everything.

I got into bed with a few books and my cup of herbal tea. I took a look at my cell phone, two new messages.

- "I miss u"

(Y/N) sent, and a warm feeling spread on my chest as I imagined her whispering those words as I read them

- "Breakfast tomorrow before work?"

- "See you at seven-thirty."

I typed and sent it.

What could ever happen if I told her how much in love I am with her? I would lose her, and I'd be alone. She didn't feel that way for me. It was a fact. I was just glad she was my best friend, and I could share everything with her. Was I pathetic? Yes, very, but in a way, it felt it was just all I deserved. Not more, not less. Just being in love with a girl who didn't love me back.

At least she wasn't dating Paul anymore. I hated that guy.

(Y/N)'s point of view

Spencer was waiting for me outside our usual coffee shop, already holding two cups of coffee. His short hair looked dreamy as she smiled and took off his sunglasses. It had to be illegal being that hot. But, seriously, how didn't he get laid? He was fucking dreamy. In the four years we had been best friends, I saw Spencer in many hairstyles, and each of them made him look like a model.

Falling in love with Spencer Reid had been a process I hadn't actually been fully aware of. But I was completely conscious I needed to hide those feelings from him and from everybody at the BAU.

Ok, fine, I had somehow faced part of those feelings in front of my drunk best buddies at Penelope's house, but I never actually confirmed anything. I had just... shared some of my frustrations, I guess.

- "Good morning, honey bunny,"- I smiled and sighed as I stood in front of Spencer, watching him grin back at me and hand me one of the coffee cups.

- "Good morning, chipmunk. Did you get some rest?"

- "Yes, I fell asleep as soon as I reached my bed. I was exhausted."

- "I'm glad you are fully rested."

- "What did you do yesterday?"

- "Nothing,"- he answered quickly and turned around- "I got you a carrot muffin to go."

- "Thank you so much. I'm starving. I didn't even have dinner yesterday."

- "Really?"

- "I told you, I reached home and crawled into my bed."

We walked outside the coffee shop in silence. Spencer bit his donuts, and I ate my muffin. It was nice and calming being with him doing domestic things in life.

I hated how much in love I was with him 'cos I knew I had to shake that feeling away. He was never going to have feelings for me. I was a regular human being, and Spencer Walter Reid was a genius. He deserved better, he was actually never to think about me that way, and I refused to ruin our friendship with those feelings.

- "So, Comic-con is coming. What are we doing this year?"- I asked as I drove us to Quantico.

- "I was thinking we should do something classic,"- he looked at me, nearly beaming on his seat- "We haven't done Star Wars yet."

- "Really?"- I frowned, confused- "All these years? Are you sure?"

- "(Y/N), eidetic memory,"- he argued, and I chuckled- "So, how do you feel about Leia?"

- "Do I have to be Leia 'cos I'm a girl?"- I asked him, and he flustered right away.

- "What? No, you can be whoever you want to be. I was just, it came to my mind... I didn't,"- I giggled and looked at him for a second.

- "I'm messing with you, Batsy. I always wanted to dress as Leia. Surprisingly, I never had. Padme once, it was a mess, but never Leia. Who are you planning to be?"

- "Maybe Luke... or Obi-Wan. Morgan suggested C3PO once."

- "If I'm Leia, you should be Han,"- I don't know why I said that out loud. I thought about it, I pictured it in my head, but I knew I shouldn't have said it. Then why did those words leave my mouth? I don't know.

- "Han Solo... yes... yeah, sure. Of course! We can pick our outfits this weekend."

- "Great! What do you think would look better? Slave Leia or classic all in white Leia?"- Spencer didn't answer. He just sipped his coffee and looked outside the window.

- "You would look good in both,"- his cellphone interrupted our conversations, and I thought it might be a case. But I was so wrong, it hurt.

- "Hello? Oh, hi, Ashley,"- I nearly hit the break as soon as I heard him saying her name, but instead, I turned around and looked at him.

- "Good, yes. On my way to work with (Y/N). Oh, that's good."

I didn't care what she was saying. I just needed to know why that bitch was calling him. I was blind in jealousy, and I was having a hard time hiding it.

- "Really? Emily? That's... that's great. Sure, we'll see you around, gotta go. Bye."

- "What the fuck?"- I swear, I didn't think what I was saying. Those words just slip through my lips straight from my guts. I hated Seaver.

- "That was Ashley."

- "Figured when you said "Hi Ashley." What? Are you best friends with her now?"

- "What? No! No way! She just wanted to say hi... and... She.... asked for my number 'cos she wanted to help her with some of the academy's projects,"- Spencer was so nervous he actually stuttered as he answered my simple question.

- "Of course, she did,"- my voice was bitter and hurt, but most of all, ironic. And I don't know if Spencer didn't want to understand me or actually didn't get the hint, but he just continued talking.

- "She wanted to tell me she requested her remedial training be at the BAU."

- "What?!"- that wasn't subtle. I actually yelled- "I'm gonna have to see her again?"

- "If Hotch approves..."

- "Fuck!! That's awful!!"- I hit the wheel, frustrated.

- "She's not a bad person, (Y/N). Her dad was a murderer, but that doesn't mean..."- I turned to look at Spencer for a second, and he just shut up- "Sorry."

- "I don't like her, Spencer."

- "Yes, I know."

- "Her dad killed my aunt!!"

- "I know..."

- "And on top of that, that bitch is..."

I had to bite my lips and focus on the road, actually holding my breath for a few seconds, just not to open my mouth and ruin it all.

The main reason why I hated Ashley Seaver wasn't just because of what her father had done. That itself was enough to keep her away. But on top of that, she was flirting with Spencer. She wasn't even subtle about it; she was nearly all over him. I saw her! She wanted him, and he had no idea! He was blind to her attention. Unless he liked it. Did he? Shit, I hoped not.

- "She what?"- Spencer whispered, scared of my reaction.

- "She plays the pity card the whole time. Bad things happen to all of us. You don't have to make it who you are, she does, and she expects sympathy."

I grabbed my muffin and took a big bite of it. Spencer sighed and stayed quiet for a moment, giving me space to decompress, I think.

- "Did you know the origins of carrot cake are disputed by many countries?"- I looked at Spencer, and he nodded- "Many food historians believe carrot cake originated from the English recipe of carrot puddings, eaten by Europeans in the Middle Ages when sugar and sweeteners were expensive, and many people used carrots as a substitute for sugar."

- "My mom would fight all those historians and convince them she invented it. Her carrot cake is the best."

- "And I would agree, the cake she baked for your last birthday was amazing."- I nodded and heard him chuckle as I kept my eyes on the road. I wanted to focus on the memories of my last birthday and how fun it was, but something was bugging me.

- "And why did she call you to tell you what she wanted to do?"- I parked the car outside the BAU and turned to Spencer. He opened his mouth, but no word came from it. So I asked him again.

- "Honey, why did Seaver call you to announce she would take the remedial training at the BAU?"

- "It... might... had been my idea,"- he whispered and held his satchel tight against his body. I didn't know what to say. I couldn't believe it.

- "Why on earth did you do that, Spencer?!"- I shouted as I got out of the car, grabbed my purse, my clean go bag in case we had a case, and started walking towards the building.

- "It wasn't like a suggestion. She just..."

- "I can't believe it!!"

- "It doesn't have to be that bad! It's just for a few weeks..."

- "Hopefully, Hotch won't accept."

- "(Y/N), come on,"- Spencer held my hand and stopped me- "This is not like you. Yeah, you don't like her, but you are making it a big deal, and it's not."

- "I'm starting to think you are crushed on her,"- I didn't want to say those words. They just slipped.

- "What!? Why? No!! I'm not!"- the high pitch on Spencer's voice was a clear sign of how uncomfortable he was with the conversation.

- "Then why are you defending her?"

- "I am not! I'm just saying maybe you are acting a little bit... irrational about this whole thing. She hasn't done anything bad."

- "Other than jeopardizing the whole case yesterday?"

- "Right, other than that..."

I felt Spencer's hand in mine, and I swear, I couldn't stop thinking about how it felt. It kept sending shivers all over my body. His thumb rubbed small circles on my skin, probably trying to calm me down, and it worked. I followed it with my eyes for a second as I took a few deep breaths and nodded.

- "Ok, I won't make a big deal if she stays."

- "Thank you."

- "Just... don't ask me to be her friend."

- "You don't have to be her friend."

Spencer stood in front of me and smiled. I swear all I could think of was kissing him. And a part of me felt it was getting harder and harder to resist. He put on his sunglasses and kept his hand in mine for a moment until Penelope's voice took us from our little bubble.

- "Good morning, my wonder babies!! Ready to fight crime?"

I actually didn't know what I was getting into.

Hotch had taken the day off. We were around the one-year anniversary of Haley's death, and according to what Rossi explained to us, Jack wasn't feeling so good. It was said it would be just a day or two, but I had the feeling it might be a couple of weeks. Hotch would always put himself second, but he would do whatever it took to keep him safe when it came to his son.

Morgan had been asked to take a trip to Petersburg Federal Correctional Complex to do a risk assessment on a case, so Spencer, Prentiss, and I were in the bullpen. Garcia was in her office, and Rossi was in a meeting with Strauss. I'd say it was a very calm morning, catching up with all the pending paperwork we had. Spencer had just gotten me a cup of coffee when I heard Seaver's cheerful voice.

- "Hi guys!"- she walked in with a big smile and waved- "How are you?"

Spencer looked at me as we all said our hellos. I could almost read "Please, be nice" written all over his face, and for a moment, I was willing to do as told. I didn't want him to suspect why I was so annoyed by her after all.

- "I talked to Hotch"- Emily smiled at Seaver and moved a chair for her- He signed off your remedial training, and I'll be your training agent. I'll supervise your work. I already told Rossi too, so it's official.

Ashley jumped from her chair and hugged Emily. I rolled my eyes and stared at the file on my desk. I really wasn't ready to deal with her. I wasn't prepared to deal with someone trying to steal Spencer from me.

Ok, Spencer wasn't mine to keep, but we had been inseparable for four years, and I didn't want to lose that. I didn't want to lose him.

I had never been ready to deal with Spencer dating other girls. The few times girls had hit on him had been awful. Once, Morgan took him to a club when we were on a case, 'cos the unsub was picking his victims there, and he taught him how to pick up girls. The bartender ended up giving him her number 'cos my dorky best friend was charming. Derek still remembered that moment from time to time, quoting it as "The day he turned Spencer into a man."

I loved Derek, but fuck, I hated him sometimes.

- "Welcome to the team,"- Spencer waved at Seaver from his desk and turned to me, raising an eyebrow.

- "Yeah, welcome,"- I added and cut her a short smile.

- "I'm thrilled to join you guys for a few weeks. I always dreamt of being here. I'm ready for making it up after the last case."

- "Don't be so hard on yourself,"- Prentiss interrupted her and smiled friendly- "You remained calm under pressure, and the case was solved. That's all that matters."

I had to control myself not to snort after Emily's words. Instead, I kept my eyes locked on my desk like I had done before. I was so focused on it that I could have actually developed telekinesis skills and moved the freaking file with my eyes.

- "I just wanted to say thank you to all of you,"- Seaver's voice was soft, in a mix of fear, excitement, and... something else I couldn't read.

- "Especially you, Spencer. I really enjoyed our talk last night, and I have the feeling I wouldn't be here if it weren't for you. Thank you for the pizza. I owe you dinner."

- "Don't, it was nothing,"- Spencer flustered and stood up quickly, grabbing his pile of files and walking away, arguing he needed to ask Garcia something.

I did my best not to move a muscle. I didn't want Seaver to know how much I hated the fact she had shared what seemed to be a lovely evening with Spencer. One he didn't actually mention when we talked about what we had done the previous evening. Why did he decide to keep me in the dark? I couldn't understand that. Maybe he just didn't want me to know he actually had feelings for Seaver. Maybe he had asked her out, and because he knew I hated her (though he really didn't know why), he decided not to tell me what was going on.

I had been wasting all that time in love with Spencer. I knew I would never act on those feelings, and clearly, he didn't have feelings for me. So... maybe it was time to let him go.

How could I let Spencer Reid go when I never actually had him?

–

DIWK Taglist:

@all-tings-diego @big-galaxy-chaos @muffin-cup @shilohpug @eternalharry @tvandfanfic @fandomtrash2405

Spencer taglist

@calm-and-doctor

General Taglist

@spenxerslut @ash19871962 @babebenhardy @meowiemari @archer561

–

Do you want to be on the taglist or ramble about this chapter with me? Just send me a message here.

Next update: June 16th, 2021

#spencer reid #Criminal minds #matthew gray gubler #diwk #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid x you #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds re write

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ack3rlady · 3 years ago

Text

The Universe Had His Back - Chapter 5

Sunrise

Summary: The aftermath of the breathtaking encounter between reader and Levi when true feelings are revealed

Chapters: Four | Five | Six

Master List

Warnings: Fem! Reader, Angst, Fluff, Modern AU, Reference to alcohol abuse, slight swearing.

Word Count: ~ 2.5k

Inspiration: Starry Night - Suho

Tags: @sooibian, @queenofcurse, @red-n-tall ; Anyone else who'd like to be tagged, please let me know!

You accepted Levi’s offer to drive you home, a decision you would come to regret the moment the car was in motion. The journey was quiet, with you mostly looking out of the window as he drove. Your greed for more time with him that you didn’t account for how dejected you would go on to feel once the adrenaline dried out. You hadn't exactly ended things with him on amicable terms. The ride home in his company just added salt to the unhealed wounds. Levi turned his head towards you several times like he wanted to say something, but didn't.

“How’s Luna?”, your words finally cut through the silence, voice low and shaky.

“She’s fine. Isabel stayed at home with her today.”, he responded, eyes focused on the road.

Then it was quiet again. It took all the strength to bottle up the multitude of emotions building up within you that were burning to be expressed. So, you decided to focus your attention on the row of lush green trees along the sidewalk, whirring past you.

Levi quelled his desire to lay his hand on yours more than once; intertwining your fingers snugly together while you ran soothing circles on the back of his palm - something he always did while driving with you by his side.

‘Old habits die hard’, he thought. Neither of you uttered a word again till your apartment building was around the corner. You sat glued to your seat, unmoving even after he parked.

“You know that you could just come see her, right? She asks about you every day.”, Levi’s gaze was still fixed on the car parked in front of his own, his voice barely audible.

You sighed, feeling ashamed for depriving your own baby of your presence.

“I’m not ready. What if I can't keep it together in front of her? I need to get better before she sees me.” you despaired, looking down at your feet, too afraid of the effect on Luna if she saw you like this.

“I’m going to be right there with you. And how do you expect to get any better if you deny yourself the exact person who is capable of making you feel so?”, Levi turned in his seat to face you, placing a firm hand on your shoulder.

He was right. Of course, Luna was the only one who could pull you out of this abyss. Why had you been running away from her this whole time?

“C-Can I come see her after work tomorrow?”, you squeaked.

“You don’t have to ask. We’ll both be waiting for you.”, he whispered moving his hand to rest on top of yours.

You finally mustered up the courage to look towards him. He wore the same smile on his face that you had been in love with for the last eight years; the exact one that always assured you that everything was going to be okay.

Reader’s POV

You entered your apartment and laid the shopping bags on the counter. Taking off your shoes, you placed them neatly on the rack by the door, taking a little step towards keeping the word you gave Miche this morning. It was late in the evening; the Sun having just set. You glanced around your gloomy apartment, at the dark shadows and how even the brightest colored paints and fabrics looked somber in the dusk’s dullness. The eeriness of the space was starting to eat at you when something shiny on the kitchen platform caught your eye. It was a bottle of whiskey, its amber liquid gleaming in the residual rays of light entering through the window.

The conflict in your head began as you started walking towards it absentmindedly. Was tonight going to be the same as the other wretched ones of the last two weeks? Faces of Luna, Levi, Miche and Nanaba flashed before our eyes as you inched towards the humble kitchenette. Finally at your destination, you picked up the bottle and stared at it, putting up a hard fight against the demons in your head.

You jumped when the door to your apartment suddenly slammed open, making the bottle almost slip out of your hands.

"Sweets!", A loud voice called out to you, the light from the window reflecting off the intruder’s glasses.

It was a moniker given to you by your dear friend based on "your profession and character" as they liked to call it. But the truth was, it was a part of the 'couple name' they had created for you and Levi called 'Short and Sweet', earning them a few punches from the holder of the other half of the title.

“Hange, you almost gave me a heart attack! What are you doing barging into my apartment like this?”, you grumbled.

“Well, your door was unlocked. So, how was your run in with Shorty? Tell me everyth... What the fuck is that?”, they began with excitement, but it dissipated as soon as they switched the lights on and spotted what you held in your hands.

You looked like a thief caught in the act. Guilty.

“It-It's nothing. I wasn’t drinking it.”, you stuttered, hastily putting it away.

“You mean you hadn't started drinking it yet?”

They were probably right. That’s how your evenings usually began these days. You tried your hardest to conquer the need for a drink, only to eventually give in and ending up passed out somewhere in your apartment.

Your train of thought was interrupted by a knock. Miche and Nanaba tiptoed inside through the still unlocked door with guilty smiles, as if ready to turn on their heels in case if you decided to chase after them.

“So? How did it go with Ackermann?”, they asked eagerly in unison.

“Wait. Was my day broadcasted in the news or something? How do you already know?”, your face had a giant question mark stamped on it.

“Who do you think brought it all together?”, Hange grinned, proudly wiggling their eyebrows.

You furrowed yours, and audibly gasped seconds later when it hit you. The sequence of events played before your eyes; how each person you had seen today and led to you meeting Levi. First Miche and Nanaba, then Suki. Your jaw slacked, and you gaped at each one of them in complete disbelief at what they had just pulled off.

Miche quietly slithered to position himself closely beside you and wrapped his arm around your shoulders – a little too tight. Well, you were contemplating introducing their jaws to your fist, so you guessed he was just being cautious.

“Who else knew of this?”, you hissed.

“Not Shorty, if that’s what you’re asking. I cooked up the idea. But it was Erwin who played commander and assigned roles! Everything from you and Levi having the same day off work, Suki and Furlan pestering you two into going with them, Nanaba and Miche forcing you out of here, Isabel staying home with Luna so that Levi could leave, and now us being here to witness the success of our little project, it was brought together by him. In fact, Erwin is checking in on Levi as we speak!”, Hange exclaimed triumphantly.

You felt stupid after finding out that you and Levi got played by practically everyone you knew. How were they this good at keeping it under wraps?

“Why did you do this?” You asked.

“Because you are both too stupid realize how crazy you are about each other and how this estrangement is paining you. So, we just decided to nudge you in the right direction. You’re welcome, by the way!”, Nanaba grinned.

“What are you even talking about? He’s the one who willingly ended what we had.”, you despaired.

The memories of the months preceding the divorce were fresh in your mind. Levi couldn’t stand being in the same room as you for more than a few minutes at a time, constantly falling out with you over something or the other. You remembered how much it hurt when he always seemed irritated by your sheer presence.

“Rubbish! You should know by now that Shorty is a complete moron with his feelings. Don’t you remember how long he stalled asking you out on a date all those years ago? And also, how I finally had to ask you for him? This is history repeating itself, silly!”, Hange chuckled, gently flicking your forehead

“Erwin and I see him every day, Sweets. We know how much he regrets letting you go. But he’s too much of a chicken to do anything about it. We’ve been badgering him to reconnect with you for a while now. But he was terrified of making a move. The dumbass is utterly in love with you. Precisely why Erwin and I decided to take matters in our own hands.”, they stated matter of factly.

The barrage of information caught you completely off guard. But you couldn’t help but dwell on one detail in particular -

“He’s still in love with me?”

Levi’s POV

Levi felt restless on the drive back home, aimlessly fidgeting with his seatbelt and rapidly tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. He was worried about you. Well, he always was, but more so because of what happened today. He suppressed the constant urges to turn his car around and return to you because he needed to get home to Luna and relieve Isabel of her baby-sitting duties.

He parked the car in the driveway and walked through the front door, momentarily freezing upon seeing a tall blonde man seated on the couch with Luna half asleep on his lap, immediately relaxing after recognizing who it was. He was reading her a story from one of the many books you had bought while Isabel was lounging on the loveseat beside them, her face glowing under the light from her phone screen. All three turned to Levi upon hearing the jingling of his keys.

“Papa!”, the little one was refreshed by the sight. She ran to greet her father by wiggling her way off the man’s lap and on to the floor and hugged is leg.

“Hi, moon beam! Erwin, what are you doing here?”, he asked as he gave Luna a kiss and then looked up at the man.

“I’m here to check in on you. How was your meeting with uh... ahem?”, Erwin cleared his throat instead of mentioning your name in the toddler’s presence.

“Check in on me? How do you know about that? What did you do?”, Levi’s temper audibly rose with each question.

“I’m going to tuck Luna into bed, and you are going to wait right here for my return. We need to have a little chat.” he glowered at the taller blonde before he could answer, ignoring the sheepish smile slapped across his little sister’s face.

Luna was out cold the moment her head rested on the pillow given how worn out she was after horsing around with Isabel all day. Additionally, story time with Erwin already had her feeling drowsy by the time Levi had returned home. Ten minutes and a few goodnight kisses later, he was sitting at the dining table with the two adults, sipping tea that Erwin had just brewed.

“When do you plan to start telling me what is going on? I could have had dinner during the wait.”, he jibed.

“I take it that Suki and Furlan were successful in bringing you two face-to-face?”, Erwin’s tone was casual, maintaining steady eye contact with his old friend.

He proceeded to explain in great detail, how he and Hange worked with both your close friends to hatch this plan.

“Can’t you two keep your eyebrows and shitty glasses out of my fucking business?”, Levi growled.

“Since you both can’t communicate like mature adults and figure things out for yourselves, we had to step in as catalysts. Hange is at her apartment right now, making sure she’s okay.”, Erwin kept his defense short.

Levi was at a loss of words. Sometimes he felt like he wasn’t worthy of his two friends. Hange and Erwin always went out of their way for him when he was hit with a challenging situation, and all he ever did was snivel about it.

“Fine. I’ll give you both credit where you deserve it. I had been wanting to see her myself. But I didn’t know what to say. She is coming over tomorrow to see Luna. So, thanks, I guess.”

Erwin knew that this was the closest thing to an apology and appreciation that he was going to get from Levi. So, he took it with a smile.

“Awesome!”, Isabel's scream cut through the calmness.

“And you.”, his fiery gaze landed on her at the far end of the table where she strategically seated herself away from the reach of her older brother in case if he was particularly irked. “I’m going to take care of Furlan later. But you too are hiding things from me now?”,

“Hey! I was just following Erwin's orders! And how could I say no to having my favorite person all to myself for an entire day?”, she reasoned, her face resembling a cartoon cat that Luna was fond of; Puss in Boots, was it?

“So, how did it go?”, Erwin intervened before Levi could scold her further.

Levi took a minute to gather his thoughts. Images of your face flashed before his eyes, making his tense posture relax significantly.

“I - I don’t even know how to describe it. I feel like for the first time in forever, I might sleep well tonight just because I met her. She looked so beautiful.”, his lips showed signs of the smallest smile as he ran his fingers along the rim of his teacup, gazing at the dark liquid contained within.

He quickly composed himself after realizing that he had in fact just said these words out loud and they were not just in his head, but it was too late. Isabel oohed with amusement and yelped after receiving a flying spoon to the head from him.

“It was also... a stark reminder of what an absolute piece of shit I have been to throw away everything we had. She’s in so much pain.”, his softened expression clearly revealed the despair behind his words.

“As are you, Levi. You made a grave mistake. Unfortunately, you're not the only one who is paying for it. But there is no use lamenting over the past, is there? What counts is what you plan to do now. Have you decided what you will say to her when she visits?”

Levi let out a long, suffering sigh. “I regretted what I did the moment I came back to an empty home from the court that day, Erwin. Seeing her today only reaffirmed how shitty my life is without her. I need to win her back. I’m afraid she’ll reject me after what I did to her. But - But she still needs to know that I -

I’m still in love with her.”

Chapters: Four | Five | Six

#levi x reader #levi ackerman x reader #levi ackerman #attack on titan #snk #shingeki no kyojin #levi ackerman x fem!reader #levi ackerman fluff #levi ackerman angst #levi ackerman fic #levi ackerman imagine #levi ackerman headcanons #domestic levi #dad!levi #aot fic #aot x reader

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emeraldvagabond · 3 years ago

Note

If Rhysand was portrayed as a misogynistic and abusive bastard who later learns from his mistakes and his position in the narrative more ambiguous, I would've loved him as a character. I'd still find his actions abhorrent. But at least it his character wouldn't be the mess we're dealing with. In other words, more like how Tamlin's arc went lmao.

As it is, my reaction to finishing the series was "this woman has a hell lot of issues she needs to get checked out ASAP"

I just have nothing to add to this😭😭sorry, you're just right. There's nothing else. You've said it all. I could just...I could like Rhysand's character if he stayed in the bad guy role he was supposed to play, but he didn't lmao. Now he's just like...I dont know what he is he's still a shit person🤢sorry, male🤢 but for some reason everyone around him, even the people he uses and abuses for no reason other than he felt like it, think he's the greatest thing to walk the earth bcause....reasons....and the plot just couldn't go on if he faced consequences.

Tamlin's arc was a fucking mess too, but he's...just everything she was trying to make Rhysand LMAO I'll say it. If the series hadn't done a 180 to make Rhys the good guy and retconned everything in the first book he would just....be straight up good. I stand on that, it is a hill I am willing to die on. He is not portrayed as abusive in the first book. But even throughout the others...we get this morally grey character....his actions are actually backed by what he thinks are good ideas. i.e. working for hybern but like...not actually. and we get to see the kind of idea sjm had for Rhys but executed very poorly.

His magic exploding and shit...being directly tied to his emotions...could have been something he worked on. That could have been part of his arc, to be fair, maybe he was in control before Amarantha but he's been all but drained of his power for 50 years....it's got to be a readjustment. Locking her in the house, not teaching her about her magic....being emotionally negligent?? These are all things we see that he already regrets and would like to fix, even as the "bad guy". That is kind of...the idea of a morally grey character, Rhys kind of just does things and doesnt care what it does to anyone else, and also doesnt care if it isnt good...because he has like a total of 6 people he likes and actually gives a fuck about, and they don't care, and even when they do care(Mor when her abusers were given permission to come to Velaris)they...just dont matter. Because hes the greatest most bestest most...whatever that pizza commercial says because thats a what I think of every time I read those fucking sentences he used to "teach feyre how to read and write" like...babe??? how did THAT work???

Anyway sorry for making everything about Tamlin, I do in fact love him, even though he has dumb bitch disease to the max and also an inability to read people(Ianthe....bitch) and also makes horrible awful decisions occasionally. And I hate Rhys bc he makes horrible awful decisions nearly all the time but their hailed as the best things ever bc.....everyone kisses his fucking feet for some reason...the ground he walks on is blessed.....for some reason.

Idk I'm rambling and not making sense. I'm on mobile cause I'm waiting for my game to load so I can put Timtam in Henford-on-Bagley with my totally-not-a-self-insert sim. Feel free to laugh now. I feel like I can pack it up because like I said you're just...right.

feel like I started this with I have nothing to add and then proceeded to add a lot. Humm. Same energy as "I'm just at a loss for words" b4 your mom cusses you out.

Get Feyre therapy 2k21, might as well throw everyone else in there too. Get Acotar therapy, 2k21.

#tamlin #anti rhysand #anti sjm #sorry im talking about the sims so much it is in fact my favorite game #asks

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msmarvelouswinchester · 4 years ago

Text

Lost Years

Summary - After spending five years in LA, Dean comes back to Lawrence and meets up with his bestfriend or rather his then bestfriend. Y/N isn't exactly happy on seeing Dean either. Will he be able to fix his strained relationship with her?

Pairing - Rockstar!Dean Winchester x Y/N

Warning - Cheesy fluff, angst, mentions of unrequited love, mentions of divorce, parents separation, drinking, bad dates, kissing, unprotected sex 18+ (wrap it before you tap it), p in v smut, oral sex (fem receiving), sex in the Impala.

WC - 5.3k+ (....oops)

Square filled - Angst ( @girl-next-door-writes ) and “Why the fuck would you laugh at that?” ( @anyfandomgoesbingo )

A/N - This is my submission to @downanddirtydean's 500 followers writing challenge (Congratulations again, Lyd). Prompt is in bold.

This is an AU. Flashbacks are in Italics.

Beta'd by @miss-nerd95 (Thank you so much, hon) and thank you to @whatareyousearchingfordean for giving this a read and leaving some valuable comments❤️

Dividers by @firefly-graphics

“Fuckin’ brilliant!” A weary exclamation left the woman's mouth as she read the text displayed on the device's screen in her hand.

There was a very significant reason why she didn't believe in blind dates, but Jo had been stubborn and insistent. And with Valentine's Day approaching, Y/N didn't want to spend the day in her pjs, crying over The Notebook again. So she had agreed to give a chance to Jo’s friend, or to be more precise, her friend's cousin. His name was Gabriel, and from what she had heard from her mutual friend circle, he seemed to be a decent guy.

But now all she wanted was to go back in time and change her decision to give into Jo’s request, because looking at the empty chair in front of her, she regretted allowing her friend to even try to interfere in her love life.

She signaled the waiter to bring over her check after downing the entire glass of wine. The restaurant was quite busy tonight. It was packed with people on this fine Saturday evening - from lovestruck couples to families with crying kids, Y/N found herself feeling quite lonely as she had stupidly waited on her date to show up for such a long time. Heat crept up her neck in embarrassment when the waiter showed up, the latter’s eyes filled with sympathy as Y/N paid the price of her drink.

Within no time, she was out of the restaurant.

Glancing down at her green dress, she swore under her breath. She tried to book a cab to return to the comfort of her home when her eyes caught the glowing signboard of The Roadhouse right around the corner of the street. The only thing she could think of was to get black-out drunk now. Y/N, still in her high heels, trudged down the path to Ellen’s bar.

Dressed up all for nothing. Rolling her eyes at herself, she went inside the establishment, heading straight towards the counter and taking a seat there. Like any other weekend nights, the place was stuffed. Y/N let her eyes trail over the many patrons of the dingy bar, landing finally on the middle-aged brunette who ran the place

“Ellen!” She called out to the woman.

“Hey, honey,” she approached Y/N, all the while glaring daggers at the drunk she had just previously been arguing with, “A bit overdressed for this place, don't ya think?”

“Your daughter is officially fired from matchmaking services,” Y/N sighed.

“Boy troubles, huh? What can I get ya, hon?” Sympathy was evident in Ellen’s eyes as she spoke. Y/N was as much of a daughter to her as Jo was. The girl had been through so much heartbreak, all Ellen wanted was to see a smile on her face.

“The usual,” Y/N gave a sad smile.

“Rough night indeed, huh?” She raised an eyebrow. The woman in question shrugged defeatedly. Ellen patted her arm in comfort before she left her to arrange for her drink, leaving Y/N to wallow in self-pity.

She thought back to when her life had taken such a traumatic turn. All her friends were either getting engaged, married, or popping out kids. But not Y/n... she was in her late twenties now, and she couldn't even find herself an eligible man.

Ellen pushed the glass towards her. Sighing, she picked it up as she admired the liquid in it. She drank slowly, every sip creating a burning sensation at the back of her throat. Fingers still wrapped around the glassware, she set it down, looking around the bar. The place was filled with mad chatters and howling laughs along with the music blasting from the stereo placed on the deck inside the room, a stark contrast to how lonely she felt. She signaled Ellen for another round, who nodded before giving her that sad understanding smile Y/N was now starting to hate. Frowning, she dropped her head and exhaled.

“Sweetheart, where did that pretty smile for yours go?” Y/N was quickly pulled out from her daze by a very familiar voice; a voice she hadn't heard in a few years. It couldn't be him, he was supposed to be in LA!

“Ella?” The term of endearment brought back dozens of memories, some good and some bad, but all were about him - the freckled face teenage boy with dirty blonde hair and eyes as green as the forest in the summertime she had once fallen for. It brought up the painful memory of their first meet which she had tried to forget so hard.

She remembered the day of their first drama practice when Dean had grudgingly walked into the room. He had reluctantly agreed to play the Prince in the Cinderella act after Cas who was supposed to be the Prince had accidentally ended up with a broken leg. He didn’t know her name, so he had called her ‘Ella’ to get her attention which was the start of their epic friendship.

Y/N didn't dare to turn around to look at him, after all, he wasn't the scrawny teenager from Lawrence anymore. He was now the lead singer and guitarist of a popular rock band with a fancy name and songs that were in the top ten of Billboard music charts. Yes, she did keep up with his rising fame, sometimes even listening to one of his songs before she was once again reminded of the heartbreak he had caused.

“You can't even look at me.” His voice was barely a whisper but loud enough for her to hear as he slid into the stool beside her.

Gathering enough courage, she raised her head. “Dean.” His name rolled off her tongue so easily, but her heart ached for the past. Dean cracked a smile at her as his emerald eyes did not leave hers once. It was as if he was memorizing every tiny detail of her face and if anyone would've asked him, he would've replied that he was.

Y/N hadn't changed much over the years he had spent in LA. She was still the same girl he had first met in school and the last time he had seen her at their graduation. She was a shy girl but they had clicked instantly. Growing up, she was his best friend, his person, his escape.

“Dean Winchester has walked into my bar. Must be my lucky day!” Ellen’s voice thundered across the room, grabbing the attention of a few intoxicated people. “How's LA treating you, boy?”

“Ellen! It's awesome to see you again.” A grin broke out on Dean's face as he jumped out of his seat and pulled the lady into a bear hug. “LA’s pretty okay. It is as good as the industry can be.”

“Heard some of your songs, I knew you had the talent,” Ellen said, jabbing her finger into his chest to prove her point. “Now what can I get ya? On the house.”

“A beer will be just fine. Don't want to show up to the Winchester house drunk!” He chuckled.

“Alright, coming right up. Y/N, honey, you want another round or a glass of water?” The lady asked.

“I'll be leaving in a few. Glass of water it is, El.” She replied but was then interrupted by Dean.

“One drink, with me. It's on me, Ella.” There it was again, that fucking name. A few years ago, that name would have made her cheeks heat up but now, it just made her blood boil. She clenched her hand into fists, tears pricking at her eyes as she swallowed the lump in her throat.

“Do not call me that.” She hissed, surprising Dean. Y/N turned towards the man, finally taking a good look at him. He had changed a lot, had become more handsome but LA had not modified his clothing style because he was still wearing his signature flannel and jeans accompanied by a jacket. She wondered how many girls had stopped him for a picture or an autograph on his way back to Lawrence, jealousy seeping into her. She hated the way he still had that effect on her.

“Y/N-” She knew what he was going to say. ‘I am sorry’, but she wasn't ready to forgive him now, if ever.

“No. Don't.” She stopped him mid-sentence, hands digging into her purse as she pulled out the money for her drinks, dropping them on the counter.

“El, I am going home.” Ellen, who was silently watching their whole exchange, nodded her head before asking, “Want me to call a cab for you?”

“No. I'm going to crash at your place. I need to have a word with Jo.” Y/N said since it was near impossible for her to walk back to her house, considering she was quite tipsy and still in heels, but she also didn't want to wait until the woman called a cab with Dean Winchester anywhere nearby. After getting her belongings, she got out of the barstool and left the place on wobbly legs. Her feet would no doubt be screaming in pain the next day.

Stepping out, she inhaled deeply, letting a few tears fall as the cool air hit her face. After their graduation, Y/N had sworn she would try her best to forget the older Winchester. She wasn't quite successful in her aim, because many times she would come across his gorgeous face on the cover of a magazine or his song would be playing on the radio, striking up old memories of their time spent together in high school.

Still lost in her thoughts, she took a step forward, only to misjudge the cobblestone path and end up losing her balance. She braced herself for the impending fall but was saved by a pair of strong hands wrapped around her waist.

“Watch your step, sweetheart,” Dean said, letting her down gently. “Lemme see, did you hurt your ankle?” He went down on his knees in front of her, pulling a low gasp out of her as he examined her feet.

“Were you following me?” Y/N gritted out those words.

“No.” He shook his head but she clearly saw through the lie.

“I’m fine. You can go now.” She said, her eyes looking everywhere but the man.

“Come on, don't be so stubborn. Get in the car, I'll drop you off at your house or Jo’s place if you want.” He said looking up, trying to catch her eyes but she was adamant about not giving him that satisfaction. Y/N squeezed her eyes shut, lips quivering before she answered.

“Leave me alone.” She muttered, a tear running down her cheek. All that preparation for not breaking down in front of Dean and her body still betrayed her. The man got up. Y/N noticed that he was now wearing a cap, probably to hide from any bystander who might recognize him.

“Y/N/N, I-” Dean was at a loss of words. He hated seeing her so heartbroken and he loathed himself for being the cause of it. He tried to reach out and hold her hand but she recoiled back, making him wince. “Please, Ella.”

“Stop calling me that, Winchester. How many times do I have to repeat that?” Her voice came out as a little whine, making Dean chuckle. He missed it - her tone, the timbre, the intensity in her pitch, and the words it said, which used to be his voice of reason; he missed his best friend. “Why the fuck would you laugh at that? I am not doing stand up comedy out here.” Y/N was still the strong-headed girl he adored.

“You'll probably hurt yourself if you walk in those heels again with how tipsy you are right now. Get in the car, I know you missed cruising around the town in Baby because she missed you for sure.” And that thankfully got the exact reaction out of her that he had anticipated. She finally looked right at him, her face lit up at the pretense of seeing the beloved black car again.

“I thought she was in LA with you.” Y/N said and then it dawned on her, “Did you drive across the States?”

“Damn right I did!” He beamed in reply like he had won a trophy, his heart swelling with happiness when he saw the smile forming on her face mixed with awe and surprise. He still had to go a long way to get her back, but he had to take baby steps. At least he managed to make her smile. “So? Want to go out, just like the old times?”

The smile instantly disappeared from Y/N’s lips and Dean knew he fucked up right then. Maybe he shouldn't have mentioned the good ol’ days. “Sweetheart, I'm sorry-”

“Just drop me off at Jo’s. That's it.” She said, lowering her gaze. He waved her over to the direction where his car was parked. Y/N started to walk along as Dean wordlessly followed her.

Y/N felt a wave of nausea hit her. She didn't do well in social gatherings and this was her graduation ceremony. One wrong step, one wrong word, or a wardrobe malfunction, and the day could turn into a disaster in an instant.

“Honey, you're gonna be excellent out there! We're all very proud of you.” Mary said while hugging Y/N tightly as they both waited on the former's older son to come downstairs who was running late, as usual. She had grown incredibly close to the Winchester family over the years. They were her rock, especially Dean who was there with her at every step as she went through the separation of her parents.

“Are you and John going to join my parents at the ceremony? Someone needs to stop them before they end up killing each other.” She grimaced.

“Isn't this going to be the first time they are together in one single room, since their….you know-” Sam asked as he came out of the kitchen, a green smoothie in his hands. Dean might have been her best friend, her confidante, but Sam was the little brother she never thought she needed.

“First get that green drink outta my sight, I already feel like I'm gonna throw up. Second, you can speak about the divorce. It's not taboo and it was a long time coming. Everyone knew that.” Y/N reluctantly said. The separation of her parents might have been foreseeable but, nevertheless, it still hurt her to see her parents walkout in two separate ways once the divorce was finalized. The house had become much quieter these days which she was thankful for but she also felt the evident absence of her father.

“Mom and Dad will definitely be there!” Dean announced loudly as he came down the stairs. “Come on let's go. Don't wanna be late for our own graduation ceremony!” She could always count on him to make her day better.

“I should have told you.”

“W-what?” Y/N asked dumbfoundedly as Dean’s gruff voice broke her out of the reverie and pulled her back to reality. A minute passed when she noticed even if his hands were on the steering, he wasn't driving anymore.

“This-” she looked out of the window, “this isn't Jo’s place.”

“No, this is our place,” Dean said.

“Dean.” This was the last place she wanted to be at, let alone be here with Dean. It had taken every ounce of her strength to not run back to this place over the past few years whenever she missed her best friend, only to realize that he had left her in the dust on his path to fame and didn't care about her as much as she used to think. Too many memories were attached to this particular place.

“I missed this, Y/N.” He said, killing the engine and slowly opening the door on his side. Y/N understood what he was trying to do and her mind screamed at her in protest to not follow him but her heart told her to follow the man it belonged to.

Dean finally stepped out of the car and walked over to the closed door on her side. She opened the door herself before he could and stepped out as well with a huff. The place was the same as it ever was. “I haven't been here since graduation.” She blurted out.

“I should have told you,” Dean said as they started to walk to their spot. Y/N chose to remain quiet. “Ella, please say somethin’.”

“I am not your Ella anymore, Dean. Stop calling me that.” She said but this time it wasn't a whine, instead, she yelled it out. She was sick and tired of yearning for the man who had broken her heart several years ago and now she was scared that he was gonna leave her once again.

“You'll always be my Ella.” He said.

“The Prince didn't lie to Cinderella and leave her behind but you- it hurts me to remember how close we were then. You left me without even a simple goodbye, so no, I am not your Ella anymore.” She flinched when he reached out for her.

He had stopped walking now and so had she. Dean moved closer to her before standing exactly in front of her. His hands lightly traced her jaw as she looked up at him. She looked just as enchanting under the moonlight as he remembered. He cupped her face in his hands, thumbs gently caressed her cheeks. She had given up fighting herself now, driven only by instinct. All the walls that she had put up came crumbling down with one touch of his.

“Why do you think I didn't say goodbye to you?” Dean whispered.

“Maybe all the years that we spent together meant nothing to you.” Her voice was like a melody to his ears but the words broke his heart even further.

“Because it was too damn hard. When RC Records called me up three days before graduation, you were the first person I wanted to tell, but I couldn't, ‘cause if I did, I wouldn't have made it to where I am right now.” He said, not a trace of mirth on his face.

“I wouldn't have held you back.” It was simple. Y/N always wanted to stay in Lawrence and look over her mother's bakery shop, and that's what she ended up doing. She now owned the shop and her business was thriving. Dean had wanted to become a singer ever since he was ten when he was forced to play the Prince, opposite to Y/N’s lead. He had found his passion and she had always encouraged it, even when John had strongly protested against him choosing music as his major. “You know I always supported you.”

“I know that, but thinking about not seeing you every day made me not want to go. I kept imagining you upset and that's why I didn't have it in me to tell you about my break.” He said. Y/N grabbed his hands pushing them away from her face.

“You ended up making me sad anyway. So why the fuck are you back?” She was enraged.

“Ella-” Dean tried to come closer but she stepped back, “I came to see my family.”

“Then why are you wasting your time here with me?”

“Because you're the most important person in my life and every day I spent away from you, you were the only person on my mind.” Dean smiled.

“What?”

“You were the first thought when I woke up and the last thought when I went to sleep.” He said and pulled her close when she finally stopped fighting. “I love you, Y/N Y/L/N. I know I am late and probably missed my chance, but five years in LA have taught me to take the risks. I love you, Ella.”

“I can't-” Dean’s smile felt but he quickly recovered.

“I-I understand.” He let out a dry chuckle, “You got a man back at home waiting for you. He sure is one lucky bastard.”

“No. You do not fucking understand! You are just so in your head, it's just-” She flailed her arms around in utter frustration. “Do you have any idea how long it took me to move on? I have been on so many dates but no man was ever enough for me, all because of your sorry ass! The Graduation Day - I knew you always thought of me as your best friend, so I had decided to ask you out myself,”

“Y/N-”

“No, let me finish. You have to fucking listen about how much pain you put me through these five years! The next day, I went to your house only to hear from your parents that you were on your way to LA. I fucking hate you!” Tears rolled down her cheeks. “I fucking hate how much I still love you, Dean!”

His eyes widened in surprise as he kept opening and closing his mouth like a damn fish. He was unable to form a coherent sentence and so he cupped Y/N’s cheeks in his big, warm hands once more, but now he dipped down, tilting his face and pulling her in for a kiss. His teeth grazed her bottom lips, making her moan into his mouth. She could feel the blood rush to her cheeks as she found herself completely enamored by him. Her hands snuck to the back of his neck as she steadied herself. Her knees buckled under his hypnotic touch as he slipped his tongue into her mouth, her whole body tingled and toes curled up as his tongue explored every inch of her mouth.

“De,” Y/N tried to catch her breath when Dean finally let go of her lips, already missing the feel of her on him.

His hands traveled down her body, making her gasp aloud at the feel. He lowered his mouth as he started to leave a trail of kisses along her jaw and down her neck. “Dean, please. Don't.” Her three short words made him stop.

“Alright.” He gulped.

“I don't want to get my heart broken again, Winchester, I don't think I can survive it again.” Y/N knew he would return to LA within a week, and so she didn't want to take this any further. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me, right?”

“I won't. I am not going back.” Y/N looked at him, surprise evident in her eyes, “I don't care about my career anymore. Five years without you was like living in hell and my bandmates are probably so tired of hearing how much I missed you. I will write my songs from here in Lawrence if it means that I'll be closer to you.”

“You would do that for me?” She asked sincerely.

“I would. I was a stupid kid back then but now I have realized that nothing's more important to me than you. I don't want to lose my Ella ever again.” He said, “I'm sorry for taking so long to understand that. There is no way-” His words were cut off as Y/N captured his lips with her own. The sudden kiss caught him off guard but he quickly pulled himself together to kiss her back. “Shit, Y/N-” he gasped when he felt his dick twitch. He picked her up in quick motion and went towards the car. Y/N giggled when her back lightly collided with Baby’s door. Dean dropped his head, nipping at the pulse point on her neck.

“Dean-” She moaned, which was better than any music he had ever made as his hands slipped under her dress, his fingers hovering over her soaked panties. Her thighs clenched in anticipation.

“You have no idea how long I dreamt of having you. You're soaked, sweetheart. ” He huskily said, his fingers hooking on the waistband of her cotton panties. “Tell me to stop and I will, in a heartbeat. No questions.”

“N-no. Don't stop.” Y/N cooed. Dean dragged down her panties which pooled at her feet. He picked it up and stuffed it into his pocket. Thankfully, there was no one around but the thrill of being out in the open with Dean got her even more hot and bothered. Her hands grasped onto his biceps tightly so that she wouldn't topple over when Dean slipped a finger into her tight pussy. Her mouth fell open, her head dropping on his shoulder as he started pumping slowly, every drag of his finger pushing her closer to the edge.

Dean felt his pants tighten as he heard the sweet moan of his name leave her lips. Her raspy voice was one he could hear all day long, her heavy pants tickling his skin. With one hand he unbuckled his belt, trying to relieve himself a little, but when a cry of pleasure left her lips as he slipped in another finger, he hoped that he wouldn't cream his pants like a freaking teenage boy.

Y/N felt the coil in her stomach tighten as she inched towards her climax. Dean quickened his pace, curling his fingers inside her and brushing her g-spot, each time eliciting a low moan out of her. “Dean….” She couldn't form any coherent words other than chanting his name over and over again and a moment later, the coil snapped as she felt herself coming undone. He delicately pulled his fingers out of her, which were covered in her juice. Dean reached behind her, yanking the door open as he nudged her to go in. She readily obliged and slid into the seat with shaky legs. He climbed into the backseat after her, closing the door behind him.

Her dress had ridden up her thigh, exposing her glistening pussy. Dean’s eyes darkened at the sight before him as he swiftly pulled his shirt over his head, discarding it somewhere in the front. He pushed her dress further up. She raised her hands as he successfully got her out of the garment and unhooked her bra. Y/N moved further back into the seat, her back resting against the door on the other side as Dean started to leave kisses down her body.

“Have you ever thought about this? ‘Cause I did, every freaking day.” Dean asked, kissing the valley between her breasts, the rumble of his voice sending shivers down her spine.

“E-every time I touched myself, I thought of you.” She said, gasping out loud at every word when his mouth found her breasts and started to suck on the soft skin, flicking a nipple with his tongue and twirling the other within his fingers.

“Oh-” Dean raised his head to look at her before he moved south, “Did you think about me between your legs just like this-” He said as he left kisses along her thigh, his stubble creating soft burns on her skin in its wake that she would definitely remember. He finally stopped at her nether regions, his hot breath fanning against her throbbing pussy. “Did you think about me tasting you like this?”

Y/N threw her head back in pleasure when his mouth latched onto her sensitive bundle of nerves, his tongue flicking at her aching nub. Her hands traveled down to his head, her fingers getting tangled up in his soft hair and pulled at the strands, making him groan.

“Fuck-” She exclaimed as Dean hungrily devoured her, his tongue repeatedly assaulting her sensitive pussy, sucking needily on her bundle of nerves. Y/N threw her head back in pleasure as she felt the coil in your stomach tighten before a wave of pleasure washed over her. “Shit!” She gasped as Dean’s tongue lapped her juices hungrily.

“Fuck, sweetheart, you taste so good.” He panted before he unbuttoned his pants pushing them down along with his boxers, freeing his erection sprung from his confines. “Son of a bitch, I don’t have-” Y/N sensed his uneasiness.

“I’m on the pill.” She smirked as she stared at his toned body.

“Well, I’m clean.” She reached out to touch his stomach, hands then traveling down to his length. Dean dropped his head, biting down on his lips, “Y/N-” He pushed her hands away, smirking as he ran his hand along his hardened cock, giving it a few strokes, the tip beaded with precum. He looked at Y/N once and lined himself with her dripping entrance when she gave him a nod to go ahead.

His swollen tip teasingly nudged at her opening before he pushed himself into her.

“Shit Y/N-” Dean grunted, simultaneously as Y/N hissed out at the painful sensation at the beginning as he pushed himself into her, letting her adjust around his size before she told him to move. He circled his hips as he slowly pulled out, leaving only the tip of his engorged cock inside her, before pushing back in again, deeper than before.

“Holy fuck-” Y/N moaned out when he quickened his pace, hitting her g-spot repeatedly with every thrust as they both inched towards their release. Dean kissed her as he continued to thrust deep into her, their breathing growing erratic, the windows of the chevy fogged up and the car filled with their groans and moans as they both chased their release. She hooked her arms at the small of his back as he started to nibble at her sweet spot. His hand moved south, his thumb rubbing circles on her clit which further edged her.

“Shit De!” Y/N cried out loud as her walls fluttered around his pulsating length when she felt herself coming undone. Dean’s thrusts became sloppy as he grunted into the crook of her neck before he spilled into her with one cry of her name, painting her walls with his seed. He dropped his head, trying to catch his breath before he gently pulled out.

“Fuck sweetheart.” Dean panted, beads of sweat lining his forehead as they both laid in each other’s arms, basking in the post-coital bliss. “Was this better than your fantasies? ‘Cause, ‘twas surely better than mine.” Dean smirked, reaching out to grab a piece of cloth to clean themselves up. “We should have done this sooner.”

“If only you hadn't been such a coward.” Y/n teased with a giggle.

“Your dumbass could have called me up. I wasted five years being one, terrified to hear how much you hate me.” He grumbled, cleaning up the mess on the seat. Honestly, she could have but she didn't ‘cause she was scared to hear the truth as well; that Dean had truly left her.

“So, you’re sayin’ we’re both a couple of dumbasses.” Y/N chuckled, putting on her bra.

“Your words, not mine.” Dean gave her a sly smirk. “The Winchester household will be so delighted, once they know I finally got my head out of my ass and looked at the beautiful woman right in front of me.” He was right in every sense. The Winchesters, all of them had always believed that those two would end up together. Everyone saw how in love they were except Y/N and Dean.

“Isn't it too early for the introduce-the-girlfriend-to-the-family thing?” She asked which got an eye roll out of the man. “Panties?”

“I don't have them.” Dean sneakily raised his hands.

“I saw you stuff them into your pocket.” He grabbed her dress from the front seat, throwing it at her.

“Put this on, or preferably, just don't.” He gave her a boyish smile, getting a raised eyebrow in reply, “Oh I'm not done with you. Gotta make up for the lost years, sweetheart.” Dean's eyes darkened at the thought as Y/N gulped, knowing she wouldn't be able to walk properly for weeks.

Feedback is highly appreciated!

#downanddirtydeans500followerschallenge #make me feel bingo #dean winchester fic #dean x reader #dean winchester x reader #au dean x reader #au dean winchester x reader #dean x y/n #dean winchester x y/n #au dean fic #au dean x y/n #au dean winchester x y/n #spn fic

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monsoonblooms12 · 3 years ago

Text

The Butterfly Effect (Ethan Ramsey x f!MC)

Summary: The Journey from where it all began to where they are now. From a 2-minute power nap to a Miami kiss, Pooja and Ethan have come a long way. From Pooja's POV (Set in OH Bk 1 Ch 10 and contains flashbacks from OH Bk 1 Ch 1, Ch 4 and Ch 5)❤

The Butterfly Effect: Discovered by Edward Lorenz, this theory suggests that something small and insignificant, can alter situations in such a way that leads to utterly drastic changes. For example, a butterfly flaps its wings at an Amazonian Jungle and subsequently a storm ravages half of Europe. (This has to be one of my favorite theories ever��)

A/N: I got inspired from a dark Academia quote and here we are with 2.4K of mess. But I enjoyed providing all the fbs from Poo's POV and filling in the gaps of the unknown. And all the DbC peeps, I am trying to finish ch 8 believe me😭

Thank you so much to @jamespotterthefirst for Pre-reading! Love you🧡

If you enjoyed the story, please like it, leave a comment or reblog. Your feedback keeps me going🦋

Pairing: Ethan Ramsey X f!MC (Pooja Sharma)

Word Count: around 2.4K

Rating: General

Category: A messy mix of Fluff and Angst

Warnings: None that I found

A grain of sand, almost imperceptible to the human eye, 2 millimetres in diameter. Just a tiny little grain of sand, a single one. One would wonder how great of an effect that could produce?

A single grain of sand, eliminated from the base of a sand sculpture, can set on fire a cascade of events that result in something as drastic as the demolition of the entire sculpture. Just a trifling 2 mm sized grain of sand.

Tufts of hair gently swayed with the swooshing ocean breeze, the very grains of sand of which her mind was thinking about slip through gaps of her toes. It's a calming atmosphere, having a Zen-like effect on her racing heart and confused reasoning.

The echoing crash of ocean tides, the hushed ruffle of her shimmering purple dress, and the pattern of her footsteps of the white sand, now silver under the enchanting moonbeams.

She could not think about bad ideas and good ideas anymore. Nor could she obliterate the delicate touch of peach lips ingrained in her mind. Everything was a lock of tangled hair, a chaotic mess in her mind.

And when you can't disentangle a mess, you just tear it off.

That was what she was doing, tearing herself away before her mind got engulfed by a cocoon of ambiguity and concealed probabilities, restricting her to get out without getting transformed into someone else.

Legs exhausted after strolling for who knows how long, Pooja sits down, not bothering about the sheet of sand fragments that adhered begrudgingly to the purple satin.

A simple motion ensues, the florid hair tie holding her brown hair strands in a ponytail, now lay in her hand, giving them the liberty to enjoy the tranquillity of the idyllic scene they found themselves in.

Relaxation. That was what she anticipated. The soothing of her racing heart, the clearing of her muddled head, the easing of her bothering thoughts.

But it never came, the relaxation she desired.

Instead, her fingers, for a reason mysterious even to her, fidgeted the diamond imitation bracelet that embellished her left wrist. A twitch unveiled a vague scar, a remembrance of an old episode entirely cleared off from her mind.

Flashback

Pooja was a Potterhead. An extreme one indeed. Sometimes the thought made her chuckle. How she despised the books once, presuming they were overrated. And then, as if a magic trick had been performed on her, she became the Maven of the Harry Potter club.

But being a Potterhead and having to live in a niche under the stairs did not go hand in hand. The room under a staircase was still a room under a staircase. And every day, her mind replayed the poem of curses to her, as if to warn her to never search for an apartment on a Facebook Group ever again.

And now she stood, waiting for the century-old toaster's ping, as sleep struck like pin-pricks on her eyelids, threatening to close them off. It was a bad day today, the phone battery drained, and she, coffee drained. And the cherry on the top? Today was the first day of her residence at the most prestigious hospital in the entire States.

Uff!

She yawned the hundredth time, sleep playing a tiring game of chess with her mind, and giving it a Check! every now and then.

I don't even know a goddamn coffee shop around in here!

Displeased grunts accompanied the thought as she took the knife and began slicing the apple she had been floundering around for quite some time.

One Slice, and Another, and Ano-

Snorr!

What an ability it was to fall asleep anywhere, in any position! What harm would a "Power Nap" of a minute or two do? Right?

AAHHH!

The scream came out in bits, first when her eyes fluttered open with the sudden pain. A pause followed when she actually looked at the source of it and after her eyes and mind registered what was happening, came the second scream.

She was getting the taste of just how profitable the power nap was.

Hurrying away, she rummaged around for a first aid box, failed to find it, trotted to her Harry Potter adobe and took out the medical goodies she had brought with her. After ransacking through it, she found the antiseptic and the swabs she was looking for. Then a faint sound came from the blinking cellular and she picked it up, not waiting for breakfast. Just as she clicked the unlock button...

HOLY SHIT!

What? How? Her mind could not register. The only thing she understood was that she was notoriously late for her first day, and now she would have to do all the running that she had avoided for all the preceding years.

Letting out another pained groan, she kicked two flowerpots on her way to the kitchen, took the toasted slices of bread, switched off the stupid piece of machinery and ran.

She was sure she would have come first in any marathon if she had run in them with the speed she was racing right now.————————————————————————

Did she know about Dolores Hudson? No, she didn't. Had she planned on telling about her to Dr Ramsey? No, she hadn't.

The two words had inadvertently slipped off her tongue, not envisioning it as an indication. But as soon as they reached his ears, it felt as if a domino had been pushed. One pushed on to the other, leading to a chain of events that had given no hints, no warnings at all.

And now she was in the NICU, chatting with the man whom she considered an idol, a role model as if they were old companions. It was an enchanting experience to see the intern-terrorizing gentleman, so ... normal.

She questioned her mind's choice of word, but she did not completely disagree. To see Dr Ramsey, sitting here with an intern, talking with her, for no particular purpose other than the fact that she decided to stay back here in contrast to any other person, who would have valued their sleep than watching over a premature baby with whom she had no connection.

When sleep muddled her thoughts, she didn't realize what she was doing. Head lowered into his shoulder in a motion that felt like a reflex embedded in the nerve cords of her spine. She missed the gentle smile, decorating the handsome face of his, as he watched her from the corner of his eye, his eyes holding an emotion unrecognizable.

Was it affection? Pride? Adoration? Or something completely different? Who knew.

But if there was something she did know after that day, it was that she felt lucky, damn lucky, for that slip of the tongue.————————————————————————

How idiotic of her the decision was, she didn't want to talk about it.

Pooja had only found herself running the way she was running now on the first day of her residence, and she had only herself, and no one else to blame.

Why did she think that giving up on the most wanted position for every medicine intern in Edenbrook for friends when every one of them participated in it was a good idea?

If only her brain comprehended her priorities appropriately, she wouldn't have to rush through roads like a person who was missing their train.

Panting, grunting, and completely tensed, she arrives at Edenbrook. Steps don't slow down until she arrives before the light beige door, huffs and puffs, not pausing for a split second. She doubted if her legs still had the power to walk or if she would have to crawl into the office.

Nah, no more embarrassment, she would not be able to bear it. With the power that remained in overworked limbs, she knocked, entered and gave her reasons for the delay. And then, by a margin of a minute, she signed the sheet, absolutely normal but still holding the power to twist her entire life in an unforeseen way.

But did she regret it? She couldn't, and she wouldn't.————————————————————————

Miami. The city of gorgeous beaches, giving the aesthetic of peach and teal life. The expensive marble-floored hotel rooms in which she found herself was unreal. Definitely not made for some random intern.

Gorgeous decorated interior, delicately manicured lawns, elegantly made fountains, all standing majestically, giving a fight to each other. She glided through the vast space, joy overcoming job as she breathed the calming salty air coming from the oceanfront, which appeared like a picture frame in front of her. She had never seen anything so perfect in her life.

It was like Ataraxia.

She preferred Mountains over Beaches. She always had, and without a doubt, she always will. But when something looks so heavenly, it would be absolute stupidity to forego the chance of visiting it, even if it contrasted her preferences.

Forgetting the not-so-pleasant interaction with Declan Nash, which appeared like a stone in her perfect day, she let her sensations delve into the delicious culinary masterpieces that melted in her mouth like wax.

All the merrymaking and socializing drained her. But the gentle talks, soft giggles that she shared with him, an extraordinary, priceless moment, seemed to charge her, rejuvenate her. A corner of her heart did hope for something to happen. But she hushed it, not wanting to spoil the casualness, the beauty of the simplicity that blew in the air between them.

It felt like existing in the setting of one of those Michael Faudet quotes, one of them particularly being emphasized by her mind.

"As our eyes meet, all-time seizes to exist. The dying second frozen like petals of red roses kissed by autumn frost."

Pooja's mind still reeled, falling freely into the void as passion and some unnamed emotion overtook them. His heart steady under the touch of her palm and hers racing under the touch of his. She would not be able to remove the unreal image from her idiot of a heart, even if she wanted to.

Sleep refused to come to her, even after calling it repeatedly. She sat up, relieving the memory, playing in front of her like a sepia movie on the silver screen. Eyes travelling around, only to fall on a bouquet kept neatly at one of the antique corner tables.

It was white lilies and purple orchids.

Pooja Sharma didn't know the language of flowers when she received them, with a tag casually signed as E. A vague tag like that did not help to know the actual sender. The man whom she kissed had a name beginning with E, the hotel she was staying in had a name beginning with E.

Hell, even the hospital she worked in had a name with the letter E.

But if she had known the language of flowers, she would have pinpointed the symbolism hidden in it.

The White Lily carrying the meaning of Purity, Sweetness while Purple Orchids a clear cut indicator of admiration and elegance.

She would have been able to tell which E had sent the delicately wrapped piece that now lay uncared for in the corner of her room.

Feelings overcrowded reason, and she found herself suffocated in the very room that seemed heavenly to her in the morning.

Slowly and silently, she walked away to find the solace which he or she could not give her, in nature.

Flashback ends

As the amaranthine ocean glistens, waves crash and the foamy water rushes to engulf her feet as she stood, hands wrapped around herself, she felt she had truly found solace. There was a spiral, an unending coil of memories, a string which, when pulled, tugged in emotions hidden in darkest corners, forgotten but related, all tied together.

It was surprising, enigmatic, how much the little brain of hers, the soft heart of hers, holds in them. A constant battle of reason and emotions ravage the tired battlefields of her body. How casually, reminiscences of a bygone day appears, flicker like the reflection in the mirror of the calm pond water, but remain clear through the ripples that spread on the surface from time to time. That's how memories work, still clear, still dear, even after passing through chaotic ripples of time.

As she reaches the end of the spiral, the helix of her thoughts, she finds herself even more astonished than she was when she reverted to the first pages of the memoirs of her stay in Boston.

It was just a minute, or a word or two. Always so insignificant.

Every ignored act added one upon another and resulted in the catastrophic mess of heartbreak and affection she found herself today.

The 2-minute Power Nap of her first day? It led to the 2-degree shift of the knife and the scar that her finger was tracing now.

That 2-degree shift led to the delay in her reaching the hospital?

It resulted in her meeting her mentor, which gave her the chance to do the thoracotomy with him, to experience how it felt when his hand enveloped hers.

Those two words that slipped as a nonchalant thought off her tongue? It was why she could know how Ethan Ramsey was, behind the tough exteriors, the short-tempered demeanour, how it felt to place her head gently on his shoulder, to wake up to his glowing face.

And that one minute past midnight, when she signed up for the challenge that would change her life? That is why she is here, hair ruffling and eyes glistening, the Leucos Moon reflecting on the glistening water, the crepuscule spread mystically around her. That is why she knew how it felt to be touched by him, kissed by him, to get lost in him.

When Edward Lorenz discovered the butterfly event, he had correlated mathematics and meteorology. Had he thought that the same butterfly effect had turned an unassuming intern's life upside down, pushed her so back in the void of circumstances that it was impossible to come back?

Just a 2-degree shift of a knife, and now she was here in Miami. Just like the unassuming butterfly's flap of wing, which now ravaged a storm through her life.

Glassy droplets make a slow trail down the curve of her cheeks and drop on the scar as if trying to meet the origin which has brought her to the coordinates of the present.

And even though she did not know what would happen in the days to come, she was happy, truly happy, for that shift of her knife and for the 2 minutes of the power nap.

For the butterfly effect of love.

PS: Thank you so much for reading and I hope you have a great day ahead! Love, Manamee🧡.

Tags (Please let me know if you want to be added or removed or if I forgot you):

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@choicesficwriterscreations @openheartfanfics @choicesbookclub

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lem-20 · 4 years ago

Text

Frustrations

Summary: Frustrated that Ethan won't let their relationship develop, will MC find some time alone with Bryce too much of a temptation? Rewrite of Bk 1 Ch 11 Bryce scene.

Book/Pairing: Open Heart/Bryce x MC / Ethan x MC (Cecilia Gibson)

Category/Rating: Smut/Explicit

Word Count: 1.7k

Authors notes: I thought I'd try something a bit different for this fic. I had an idea in mind, but I'm not sure if it has come out as I'd hoped 🤣

I have included this weeks @wackydrabbles prompt Hold still

Also inspired by @choicesmonthlychallenge prompt Day 18: Waiting

Characters and some dialogue owned by pixelberry

Cecilia never meant to fall for Ethan Ramsey.

She had always admired his work and had been hugely inspired by him, but a romantic relationship wasn't something that had ever crossed her mind - she hadn't even known what he looked like before her first day at Edenbrook.

When she first met him his condescending behaviour had actually led her to think that he was a bit of an asshole - admittedly she didn't realise it was him at that point, but he definitely hadn't left a good first impression.

It didn't take long for her opinion of him to change though. Working together when Dolores came in and then trying to help Naveen had brought them much closer together than either of them could have imagined. What was blossoming between them certainly wasn't a normal attending/intern relationship.

When they finally kissed in Miami, she'd hoped that it would be the start of something between them. They had got so close to ending up in bed together—something she had been fantasising about for some time—but Ethan had stopped things going any further and she had been feeling frustrated ever since.

A few days after returning from Miami, she had questioned Ethan about what was happening between them.

"Be honest...about us," she said.

"I'm...not sure what you mean," he replied, avoiding her eyes.

"I think you know exactly what I mean."

He turned his back to her and she walked up close behind him, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Please Cecilia, this is hard enough already."

"Then why keep fighting it? We both want this. We both feel this. It almost seems inevitable..."

He turned to her, his eyes filled with longing...and pain.

Reaching up, he gently stroked her cheek. "We're doctors, Cecilia. Fighting the inevitable is our job description."

Without another word he walked past her and out of the lab. She hung her head—her heart sinking—as the sound of his footsteps faded away.

She couldn't deny the hurt she felt. Even though part of her understood his reasoning, she couldn't just pretend there wasn't a connection between them.

---

Several nights later Cecilia was at home in her apartment researching Rhodes disease for Mrs Martinez. Her friends had volunteered to help and several hours had passed when her reading was interrupted by snoring. She looked up to see that everyone had fallen asleep, except for Bryce.

"And then there were two," he smiled before looking back down at his research. "Wait a second...Cecilia, come look at this."

"What'd you find?" she asked, taking a seat next to him.

"Wound up on a message board. Looks like a pissed off employee leaked some old R&D memos from Panacea Labs...Check it out. It says a drug used for Huntington's cured some test subjects of Rhodes disease."

"If they've found a cure...why isn't it on the market?"

"This is pretty recent...Human trails can take years before a new drug gets F.D.A approval."

"Bryce, you found the answer!" Overwhelmed with excitement, she threw her arms around him and he hugged her back tightly.

The hug lingered and she feel reluctant to let go of him...

"I dunno about you, but I feel like celebrating," he whispered.

She looked into his eager eyes, knowing exactly how he wanted to celebrate.

If she went along with this she knew she may end up regretting it. Her feelings for Ethan were undeniable and there was definitely more to it than just a sexual attraction. But their interactions over the past few weeks had left her so confused and sexually frustrated that she was seriously considering taking Bryce up on his offer. She didn't know if Ethan would even allow anything to happen between them in the future and she couldn't wait around for him forever.

It wasn't as though Bryce was a random stranger. He was a good guy...kind...sexy. They had already been physical with each other before—after her housewarming party—so she knew he could definitely help release some of her frustrations there and then.

She gave him a smirk as she made her decision.

She grabbed Bryce's hand and led him to the bathroom. They bumped hard into the door as she pulled him in for a passionate kiss.

"Shh, don't wake the others up."

"I'm not the one you're gonna have to worry about," he teased.

He pinned her against the closed bathroom door and kissed her, while she pulled off his shirt.

His strong hands roamed her body, gliding under her clothes, trying to feel every part of her.

"Pent up much?"

"I'm always pent up when I see you," he replied.

She could feel the blush reaching her cheeks.

"Before we go any further, you should know...we have to keep this casual."

She knew this probably didn't need to be said, Bryce was a casual sort of guy, but she didn't need any extra drama in her life right now.

"No strings...fine by me," he grinned, pulling her clothes over her head.

She kissed up his neck and across his smooth jawline as she undid his trousers and pushed them to the ground.

She snapped the band of his underwear with a cheeky smile before sliding her hands beneath the fabric.

"I really don't need to keep those on," he whispered.

She kissed his chest as she slid his underpants down, her fingers brushing against him.

"Agreed..."

The sight of him standing to attention for her was a massive turn on.

She kissed him again as she took hold of him, enjoying the way his breath stopped and started as she pumped his length.

"Who has magic hands now?"

"You're giving me a run for my money," he replied before pulling her bra down and kissing and licking his way across her breasts.

A moan was the only sound she could make as a shiver ran throughout her entire body.

"How 'bout we have some good clean fun," he said pushing her backwards, guiding her toward the shower.

She turned to step in.

"Wait, hold still, "he grabbed her hand to stop her. "Before we get in, I want to get a proper look at you."

He spun her back to face him, before looking her up and down—eyes filled with lust.

"You're gorgeous," he stated while flashing her a grin.

She couldn't help but giggle. "You're quite the charmer Lahela."

Continuing into the shower, Bryce gently pushed her against the shower wall, turning on the tap. Warm water poured down on them as he kissed her, his hands exploring her body.

She returned the favour, running her hands over his slippery muscles.

Bryce reached between her legs and began to move his fingers, slowly but surely. She let out a moan.

"I told you I wasn't the one you had to worry about making noise..."

"I don't think I care anymore..."

She leaned her head against the shower wall and sighed as Bryce's hands worked their magic, circling round her most sensitive part. His lips traced across her collarbone as he dipped a finger inside her.

Her breathing grew heavier as he added another finger.

"Bryce...I need more..."

He gripped her by the back of the thighs and lifted her, pinning her high against the cold tiles.

She sighed with pleasure as she wrapped her legs around his waist and he slid himself inside her.

A whisper of guilt flickered across her mind, but it was too late to take it back now, this was happening and she wanted to enjoy it. It felt too good not to.

She squeezed her eyes shut, forcing any doubts out of her head. Instead concentrating on the sensations, the pleasure.

Bryce moved his lips down her neck, softly sucking and kissing as he went.

For a brief moment her mind took her back to Miami where it was Ethan's lips on her neck, his stubble gently scratching her sensitive skin. She remembered the taste of wine on his tongue as his mouth crashed into hers.

She lifted a hand up and ran it through Bryce's hair, gripping tightly as her pleasure started to build.

He plunged himself deep inside her over and over again and she moved her hand down to his chest, feeling his heart thundering as she neared her climax. Her fingernails clawed into his back as she lost control.

"Yes Eth—, Bryce."

Fuck.

She clung on to him, breathing heavily as he thrust a few more times, until he got his own release.

As she came down from her high she cringed as she recalled the fact she had started calling out Ethan's name while having sex with someone else.

She slowly opened her eyes and looked at Bryce. He smiled at her and kissed her on the lips.

"That was amazing," he said.

"Yeah, it was," she replied through her heavy breathing.

Somehow she seemed to have got away with her slip up. Either he was too wrapped up in the moment to notice or he had decided not to mention it. Either way, she was extremely relieved.

He lowered her back down to the ground and they held each other close for a moment before getting dressed.

Bryce looked at the time, it was 2am.

"I'd better head home if I'm going to get any sleep before work tomorrow."

She grabbed his arm.

"You don't have to go, you could sleep here tonight."

He gave her a little smirk. "I think if I stayed here, you would prove to be way too distracting for either of us to get any sleep."

They both laughed.

"Okay, I'll walk you to the door."

They threw their clothes back on before stepping out into the corridor, where they could talk without waking the others.

"Thank you for tonight Bryce. For the help with the research and the...other thing. I really needed that."

He smiled broadly at her.

"Anytime, Gibson. And I mean it. Any time you need a special release, I'm there. Supply closet, on call room, gym, shower, locker room, your place, my place..."

"Yeah, okay Bryce," she chuckled, playfully pushing him away. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight Sien—, I mean Cecilia."

She tilted her head quizzically and he winked at her before turning to leave. Her eyes widened suddenly with realisation that she hadn't got away with her slip up after all.

Although she felt her face burn with embarrassment, she couldn't help but giggle to herself as she watched him walk down the corridor, before disappearing out of sight.

***

Next part (What is this?)

***

Thank you so much for reading, I really appreciate everyone who takes the time to like, comment and reblog 🥰

***

I only tag those who ask, so please feel free to let me know if you would like to be added to my list 😃

#open heart fanfiction #ethan x mc #bryce lahela #bryce x mc #wacky drabbles #choices fic writers creations #fics of the week #ethan ramsey #choices monthly challenge #cecilia gibson

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charlthotte · 4 years ago

Text

Breaking Through The Iron Wall - Aone Takanobu x Reader

Chapter 4

The squeak of trainers stubbing themselves on the gym floor echoed throughout the massive establishment. Around a dozen boys in volleyball uniforms were scattered around the court, spiking and blocking balls with ungodly strength. It was truly mesmerising seeing a spherical piece of foam being smashed around the court at an immense velocity, even when their hands met with the ball - the force didn't phase them one bit. That was truly amazing.

Futakuchi must have noticed myself and Aone entering the gym through the corner of his eye, he immediately dropped the ball he held in his hands. Soon, his annoying smirk regained its composure upon his face. "What is their highness doing here? We are but a simple sports club, after all." That boy seemed to poke bucket loads of fun out of messing with people. Tired of his jests, I folded my arms and sighed, feeling rather ticked off my his words. At that moment, Aone must have sent him a look, as Futakuchi soon came to his senses and asked me a question. A question that was certainly very out of the blue. "So... Your highness, it seems that our team is in need of a manager; seeing as though our last manager - Nametsu - is in Greece because of a foreign exchange program."

"And what am I meant to do about that?" I replied curtly.

"Well, pretty, pretty please could you be our new manager?" He spoke in the voice of a little girl, furiously batting his eyelashes whilst swaying from side to side, with his hands cupping his face.

"I'm sorry but I don't know much about volleyball. Wouldn't someone else be better at the job other than me?" I inquired, seriously confused.

"However, I do see that Aone was the one to bring you here, and you wouldn't want to disappoint him, would you? Futakuchi's face switched from that of a child to his devilish smirk, knowing the right buttons to press in order for me to accept his offer.

"Wouldn't you need the captain's approval first?" I asked, trying to worm my way out of being the manager in any way possible. "Or the coach?"

He snickered, "I see what you're doing. Moniwa! Coach Oiwake! Come here!" He belted across the gym, beckoning his hands towards himself. A boy with choppy, black hair wearing the number 2 and a man with his hair slicked back with a stern disposition made their ways towards Futakuchi. There weren't going to be any chances for escape after that.

The captain seemed as if he didn't want to entertain Futakuchi and what he was going to say. Everyone was probably thinking that too.

"Captain..." Futakuchi cooed, falling into his childlike state again, "Don't you think it'd be great if this person here became our manager, they've already met Aone and myself?"

"Don't ask me leading questions, Futakuchi. It is their choice to join anyway." The captain turned towards me, shooting me a look of compassion. I did need to join a club, but none I had came across interested me. If I did want to join, I would have already known people, which was obviously a bonus. Pondering for a little longer, I wondered what clubs Hiroko and Rea did? Surely they'd be less demanding than being a manager. Futakuchi also wouldn't be a part of their clubs. Seeing his grimace each day, would have surely drained me.

I nodded in appreciation towards the captain. "Thank you. I'm not acquainted with the rules of volleyball, so I don't think I'd be the best fit."

Once again, Futakuchi started to open his mouth, "But Moniwa! There hasn't been a single other applicant for the position, and we could teach them over time." I could tell he wasn't going to give up anytime soon, the thought of that and how draining his consistent begging would be, I began to cave.

"Maybe you could give me until tomorrow to think about it? I think I'd make the better decision if I think it over properly" However, I knew all too well that no would probably still had been the answer.

"Yeah, that's completely fine. I'm Moniwa Kaname by the way." He held out his hand before me.

"Thanks, (L/N) (F/N)." I then took his hand in mine and shook it, and his grip was certainly more intense than any I had felt before. "Goodbye, I'll see you tomorrow." I swiftly turned around and headed for the outside, wanting to be out of that situation.

And of course, Futakuchi had one more thing to say, "You better say yes, your highness!" Turning around again, my face met his and glared at him, and I ushered him away with a curt wave of my hand. That thing was infuriating. I tried to keep my walking at its fastest pace possible so I wouldn't be in view of the gym anymore. From checking my watch I noticed I had a decent amount of time before my train came, so maybe I'd do a bit more reading when I arrived at the station.

Walking down, my velocity was set at a mere saunter compared to the jog this morning, the afternoon air hitting my face making me feel somewhat refreshed. My head remained empty for the rest of my stroll, there was no need to think, I was walking down the path solitaire - just admiring whatever new things came into my view. Seeing as though, I didn't really get the chance to that morning. This place was just a completely different world compared to my last hometown.

After arriving at the station, I set my bag down beside me and fumbled around inside it for my book. I had read quite a large portion of its contents earlier, the new page about the oak-leaved geranium. Giving it to someone would mean that you believe that your friendship with the recipient was true, so true that your bond could never be broken. It could also mean that you believe that your friendship outshines every other one in existence. Once again, I thought how beautiful it was that something so powerful could be expressed with something so delicate, something that could easily die if not taken care of. Maybe that was the whole concept behind the language, if you let the flower die - the meaning of the flower would die with it. I sat in thought for minutes more, contemplating the meaning of things we can and could say.

Not so long into the future, the train pulled up. Sparsely packed and there didn't seem to be anything wrong with the vehicle's integrity, quite a pleasant situation - given the shenanigans of the earlier hours of the day. I plonked my body down onto a seat by myself, gazing out the window, this time my thoughts interrupted by the choice I had to make. 'Should I join? But what if there's a person better fitted to the job and they don't get the chance. After all, their original manager was still joined onto the club, she could still come back. But that meant my job wouldn't last that long." I thought to myself, waffling on and on inside my head - almost panicking in a place where nobody could hear. I just couldn't seem to calm my subconscious down by even one peg. I regret to say that the rest of the journey, my mind stayed locked in the state of internal pandaemonium.

I hopped off the train, my head still stirring inside of me. I didn't even acknowledge my parents when I came through the door, I simply clambered up the stairs and flopped straight onto my bed, my head drowned into my pillow. Only coming out for air when I realised what I had said to myself earlier. I'd simply ask Hiroko what clubs her and Rea were in. Propping myself upon my headboard, I typed the digits I had been given by Hiroko.

"Hey Hiroko. It's (Y/N), just a quick question. What clubs are you and Rea in?"

It barely took her thirty seconds to reply.

"Hey!!!!!! I'm with Rea right now! She is in the computing club but she ditches everyday :( I'm in the rowing club but we can't take anymore members. Why'd you ask?

"I've been asked to manage the boys' volleyball team, but I don't really want to."

"OMG!!! That's so cool! Imagine managing a team that's practically famous!"

Famous? Why would a public school like Date Tech be famous? I thought that was a little weird, so I questioned Hiroko about it.

"Famous?"

"Didn't you know?!?! They're basically famous in Miyagi for their iron wall of blocks!!"

"Oh, that's pretty cool I guess. Sorry for troubling you."

"No problem! See you later!"

I thought that it may be cool to manage a 'famous' team, and I wouldn't be the one playing the sport everyday. All I'd have to do was put little things together and keep players like Futakuchi in check. After all, my plan of joining a club with Rea and Hiroko wasn't going to work at all, maybe I'd even get to miss school to go to their matches. I did have to join a club at some point, and there weren't any that caught my attention. Even if I didn't like it - I'd only have to stay until their actual manager got back from Greece.

Didn't Futakuchi say something about disappointing Aone?

"However, I do see that Aone was the one to bring you here, and you wouldn't want to disappoint him would you?"

Did he really mean that? I hadn't even known Aone for 24 hours - wouldn't disappointing him in that way seem strange? But, from what I'd seen Futakuchi do; he was probably just trying to pull my strings for himself. But why was he even trying to do that in the first place? Was he really that desperate for a manager?

I took one deep breath in, attempting to not let the questions drown me again. But other than the grimace, were there really any negatives that came with being their manager? Maybe being their manager would be a good thing to me...

And that's exactly what I was going to do.

#aone #aone takanobu #aone x reader #aone x gn!reader #aone takanobu x reader #haikyuu!!#haikyuu #haikyuu x reader

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lovelystarlings · 4 years ago

Text

Chapter Two - Hermione Granger

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When Camille was a little girl, her mother and father used to tell her the tale of Lily Potter; the woman who saved her son with love, the same son who defeated the Dark Lord and survived the killing curse. Camille never realised that Harry Potter was the same age as her, nor did she realise how young he was when he defeated the Dark Lord. So as she sat opposite him, she gained an insane amount of respect for him.

"I thought Fred and George were just joking around but, god you're him?" Ron spoke, his eyes wide in anticipation as he leant forward at the same time as Camille slammed her book shut and got up, squashing next to the two boys; much to the embarrassment of Ron who was heavily blushing once again.

"Have you got the, um, you know?" He pointed to Harry's forehead.

Harry nodded and pulled his bangs back to show the lightning scar that sat right in the middle of his forehead.

"Is that where the Dark Lord, you know?" Camile uttered out quietly, not wanting to offend the boy in anyway but curious, as any person would be, as to how he survived the ultimate curse.

"Yes," Harry replied, "But I don't remember it very much. Some green light but nothing else."

"Wow," said Ron. He sat and stared at harry for a few minutes than snapped his head back to the window, realising what he was doing.

"So you two must know loads about magic already." Harry spoke, looking at Camille, who hadn't really spoken to much.

"Oh yes," Camille spoke, her hands falling into her lap to fiddle with her cardigan ends, she hated small talk. "In France I was lucky to be tutored by the headmistress of my older sister's school, Beauxbaton's. My mother insisted I wasn't behind with my education, so she had me start reading and learning a year early." She explained, both boys leaning forward, her French accent making it impossible not to listen.

"Though I heard you had to live with muggles, how was it?" She spoke, instantly regretting her question when a look of despair flashed across the boy's face before he covered it with a mask of tranquillity. "Yeah that must have been terrible. My mums got a second cousin who's an accountant, but we never talk about him." Ron began, Camille suspected that the Weasley's were one of the Sacred Twenty Eight, the twenty eight pure-blooded wizarding families, unfortunately the Delacour's were not a part of that twenty eight due to her grandmother being veela and her grandfather being a pureblood therefore leading to her mother being a half blood, breaking the Sacred Twenty Eight rules.

"Muggles are horrible -well, not all of them. My aunt and uncle and cousin are, though. Wish I'd had three wizard brothers or a wizard sister."

"Witch sister actually Harry, if you're gonna be a wizard you have to get the pronouns right."

"Five, actually" said Ron. For some reason, he was looking gloomy, but Camille supposed so would she if she had five versions of Fleur, one was quite enough. "I'm the sixth in our family to go to Hogwarts. You could say I've got a lot to live up to. Bill and Charlie have already left -- Bill was head boy and Charlie was captain of Quidditch. Now Percy's a prefect. Fred and George mess around a lot, but they still get really good mark's and everyone thinks they're really funny. Everyone expects me to do as well as the others, but if I do, it's no big deal, because they did it first. You never get anything new, either, with five brothers. I've got Bill's old robes, Charlie's old wand, and Percy's old rat."

He gently took the rat that had previously been asleep off of his lap to display to the group. "His name's Scabbers and he's useless, he hardly ever wakes up. Percy got an owl from my dad for being made a prefect, but they couldn't aff - I mean, I got stupid old Scabbers instead." Ron's ears went pink. He seemed to think he'd said too much, because he went back to staring out of the window.

Harry began to speak about his experience with muggles, how he had hand me down everything, and how he lived in a cupboard under the stairs, and how his aunt and uncle practically treated him like slave, or rather a house elf, Camille thought. Ron seemed to cheer up at the news that he wasn't the only unfortunate one in the carriage, and when both boys looked at Camille, as it were her turn to share the pity party, she froze. Despite having the perfect life to others, she had suffered from anxiety since she was a child due to an event that she wasn't quite ready to share just yet.

"My parents have always favoured my older sister over me, and it hurts you know. It's always about her, and her feelings, and how she succeeds, and sometimes I feel like I shouldn't be here you know? Like if my parents don't truly love me than who will. I mean they do all these things for me so they look good and fair enough but sometimes I wish they treated me like Fleur, and not some random that lives with them. Even when Fleur's boyfriend rap-" She cut herself off, her eyes beginning to water as she remembered how her parents had treated her after that. Her sister was just a loving as always, but naïve to the hardships that some faced, as she had never faced them herself.

Looking up at the two she felt a hand on her knee, Harry's hand to be specific.

"You don't have to carry on, it's okay." He spoke, Ron nodding in agreement, trying to find something to distract the poor girl.

"Hey look! We're out of London!" The redheaded boy pointed out the window as the trio smiled at the endless evergreen that surrounded them. They were finally on their way to Hogwarts.

Timed past quickly, and at half past twelve a faint knock was heard on the door of the compartment, waking Camille suddenly from her sleep, the book that had been rested on her face banging loudly as it fell to the floor, Camille bending down to pick it up awkwardly.

A smiling elderly woman poked her head around the sliding door gently, Harry and Ron already starting to thorough through their pockets for change. Camille assumed this was the trolley lady.

"Anything off the trolley, dears?"

Ron made the decision to stay sat down and pulled out a bag of sandwiches that Mrs Weasley had obviously made, the French girl melting inside at the sweetness of his mother. He stared at the girl strangely, as if he expected her to get up like Harry.

"I left my money in the trunk," she shrugged, before going back to her book. She didn't need to eat anyway, as her mother had told her countless times.

Hearing a gasp from Ron, she lifted her head to see Harry return, arms filled with everything you could think off; chocolate frogs, every flavoured beans, blowing gum, pumpkin pasties (Camille's personal favourite) and cauldron cakes. He had basically bought out the whole trolley, making Ron's sandwiches look inferior compared to his full course meal or rather dessert.

"Bloody hell Harry. Hungry, are you?" Camille spoke, but was silent soon after as her stomach chose the wrong to rumble loudly, most likely the result of skipping breakfast and lunch.

"Bloody hell Camille. Hungry, are you?" Harry spoke mockingly, after taking a huge bite of his pasty and causing crumbs to spray everywhere.

"Harry!" Camille scolded, whipping her napkin out of her pocket to wipe off the crumps that had landed in her lap. "You never talk with your mouthful, it's vulgar!" She muttered to herself, Harry and Ron began to laugh at her antics as she furiously wiped her dress down, and threw the napkin onto the seat beside her, stomach rumbling once again.

"Camille?"

"Yes." The girl said frustratingly, blowing a stray hair that had fallen on to her forehead away, looking at the boy who lived in annoyance. She despised bad etiquette. "Would you like a pastry, in return for forgiveness for my devastatingly terrible manners in front of a lovely lady like you?" An annoying tone of confidence dripped from his words as Harry held out his hand, in it a pumpkin pastry.

"Well," Camille spoke slowly, hand reaching over to Harry's, "They are my favourite."

"You too, Ron. I'm not just gonna leave you with a beef sandwich." The boy who lived spoke, pushing a pasty over to the ginger boy. It was nice feeling, Camille thought as the three sat there munching their way through the endless pile of sweets, Mrs Weasley's homemade sandwiches far forgotten.

The countryside now flying past the window was becoming wilder. The neat fields had gone. Now there were woods, twisting rivers, and dark green hills. Excitement built in Camille, making her rather giddy as she thought of their arrival at Hogwarts.

There was a knock on the door of their compartment and a round-faced boy with shaking hand entered. He looked tearful, and Camille felt the need to give him a hug.

"Sorry," he said, "but have you seen a toad at all?"

When they shook their heads, he wailed, surprisingly loud considering they were on a train full of people, "I've lost him! He keeps getting away from me!"

"Well I'm sure he'll come back soon," spoke Camille in a matter of fact way, "We're on a train it's not like he can get far!"

"Yes, I suppose he will." The boy spoke miserably, before leaving their cabin in a hushed manner, heading straight to the opposite compartment, asking them the exact same question he had asked them.

"Don't know why he's so bothered," said Ron, patting the rat on his lap aggressively. "If I'd brought a toad, I'd lose it as quick as I could. Mind you, I brought useless old Scabbers, so I can't really talk."

"He might have died and you wouldn't know the difference," said Ron in disgust. "I tried to turn him yellow yesterday to make him more interesting, but the spell didn't work. I'll show you, look..." He rummaged around in his trunk and pulled out a very battered-looking wand. It was chipped in places and something white was glinting at the end.

"Unicorn hair's nearly poking out. Anyway."

He had just raised his wand when the compartment door slid open again. The toad less boy had returned, but this time he had a girl with him. She was already wearing her new Hogwarts robes, her puffy brown hair and front crooked teeth noticeable. But Camille thought that she was quite pretty.

"Has anyone seen a toad? Neville's lost one," she said. Ah, thought Camille, so Neville's his name.

"We already told him we haven't seen it but we'll let him know if we do." Camille spoke softly, pitying the poor boy, Neville, she corrected herself, who still had tears pouring down his cheeks.

The girl however seemed distracted at the sight of a wand, a smile appearing on her face as she began to step further into the compartment, sitting herself down next to Camille. "Are you doing magic? Show us then." Ron seemed taken aback at forwardness of the brunette girl, who had made herself comfortable nest to Camille, even going as far to rest gently on her shoulder; Camille had found her new best friend.

"Uh-ok?" He cleared his throat. "Sunshine, daisies, butter mellow, Turn this stupid, fat rat yellow."

Nothing happened, and Camille just had to let out a tiny giggle, not noticing the looks she gained from Harry and the girl beside her.

"Are you sure that's a real spell?" said the girl. "Well, it's not very good, is it? I've tried a few simple spells just for practice and it's all worked for me. Nobody in my family's magic at all, it was ever such a surprise when I got my letter, but I was ever so pleased, of course, I mean, it's the very best school of witchcraft there is, I've heard - I've learned all our course books by heart, of course, I just hope it will be enough - I'm Hermione Granger, by the way, who are you." She spoke extremely fast, Camille having issues simply catching her name.

Hermione. Camille thought. That's pretty.

"Oh, w-well thank you I guess." Camille was just about as red as Ron's hair. She hadn't meant to say that out loud.

"Um you're welcome. I'm Camille." She locked eyes with the bushy haired girl, immediately looking away when she saw Hermione was as red as she was.

"I'm Ron Weasley," Ron muttered, his mouth once again stuffed with food.

"Harry Potter," said Harry.

"Are you really?" said Hermione. "I know all about you, of course - I got a few extra books. for background reading, and you're in Modern Magical History and The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts and Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century."

"Am I?" said Harry, feeling dazed.

"Goodness, didn't you know, I'd have found out everything I could if it was me," said Hermione. "Do either of you know what house you'll be in? I've been asking around, and I hope I'm in Gryffindor, it sounds by far the best; I hear Dumbledore himself was in it, but I suppose Ravenclaw wouldn't be too bad. Anyway, we'd better go and look for Neville's toad. You three had better change, you know, I expect we'll be there soon."

#harry potter #harry potter x reader #hermione granger #hermione granger x reader #hogwarts #hermione #harry #veela #fleur delacour #fluff

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