#then home before getting up to do it all over again. living off caffeine and neurostims

[heartshattering]

5 AM

Just me and my overactive mind facing the nighttime again 🙃

[prvtocol]

New Year’s Resolutions

Unsurprisingly, Brianne is meticulous about work-related goal setting. 1-year, 5-year, and 10-year plans for her department are reviewed periodically including during the new year start. She will sit down during the break and review prior goals, assess what milestones were hit and reassess new directions. These plans are presented at the first dept committee meeting when work reconvenes in the new year.

Outside of financial planning, when it comes to her personal life, her goal list is left blank. 15-20 years ago, however, she used to be just as meticulous as with work. She’d have the usual small goals including more of this or that exercises, include this or that in her diet, visit this place, but it’s the big long-term goals which showed a planner mindset. Find a husband, child number one, child number two, promotions, retirement plan, etc.

It’s not that now she’s currently living day-to-day, though it begins to feel that way in 2077, and a corpo’s act of self-preservation never stops, but rather she learned 10 years ago that the best laid plans fail and only set herself up for disappointment. That she no longer acknowledges these wants is also a flaw in what evolved into a dangerous form of selflessness and work defines her/her life. “The less I needed, the better I feel” mentality (or “I’m fine as is”) and a denial of wanting as if somehow wanting caused it to go horribly wrong as it did (the miscarriages, the divorce, etc.). Not superstition as much as negation.

On a more positive note, retiring in 2078 when her 20 year contract is up remains on her professional agenda. She’s fine but she also knows she is not fine. She cannot keep going on like this. The struggle will then be discovering who is Brianne Landry when she no longer has work to define her. 

[mrchiipchrome]

Talkin' 'Bout My Girl

W.C. - 6.3 k

Warnings: throwing up ig?

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Lucy’s calling, answer me, Lucy’s answer me. 

Your phone blasts the annoying ringtone Lucy had created the latest time you’d met her, she’d insisted on having a unique one so that you’d answer all her calls. Spoiler alert: you didn’t answer all her calls.

Groaning loudly as your sleep is interrupted by the older woman calling you, she obviously didn’t think about the fact that you were in a totally different time zone and therefore calling you at 7 in the morning wasn’t a good idea.

“Fucking hell Luce, why’re you calling me at 7 in the fucking morning?” You can hear the way she laughs at your grumpy tone and how she sucks in a breath after a second or two. Well at least one of you was enjoying yourselves.

“Ou, someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed today, did the grumpy wittle baby not get her 8 hours of sleep tonight?” She teases through the phone, the rustling of your sheets as you sit up echoing through the room that’s practically empty, like a hollowed out coconut.

“Actually, since you woke me up at 7, I did in fact barely even get 4 hours since Em dragged me away to a party in Connecticut, got wasted and then made me drive us both home.” This just makes the older woman laugh even more. For some reason, you thought that she’d be a bit more responsible and tell you off for going to a party, but she didn’t.

“Well that’s good then, Em is finally making you go through college the correct way, by going to parties.” You groan loudly as you stretch out the tightness in your limbs, the headache that appears soon goes away just as quickly. The floor is cold beneath your feet as you stand up from the bed, dragging your hand over your face before slapping yourself a few times to really wake up.

“Yeah, the proper college experience or something like that.” Lucy hums at your statement, her usually thoughtless brain quickly reforming to its usual state. 

“Mhm, well I’ll call tonight then, don’t sleep too late.” You say goodbye to the defender quickly before she hangs up the phone, venturing into the kitchen to pull open the door of the fridge, substituting a warm cup of bitter coffee for an energy drink.

“You’re going to be my best friend the coming four years, aren't you?” You look at the ice cold can in your hand as you speak, smiling sarcastically as you pop the tab open and take a swig, the weird aftertaste of pure caffeine leaving a streak down your tongue.

“Fucking hell, why do I not have anything at home?” As you look into the empty pantry, you suddenly understand why you should’ve taken Em’s advice earlier in the week, ‘fill your kitchen up like you have a whole family to feed’. Apparently a whole family equaled a drunk Em.

Peeking into the living room, you immediately see Em fast asleep on the couch, half her body hanging off the small piece of furniture like she was some drunk dad in a movie. Her mouth is wide open and the snores escaping from between her lips are just brutal.

Her party clothes from the night before are still donning her body, the dress barely staying intact after a night of tossing and turning to find a comfortable fit on the uncomfortable couch. But at least she’s not throwing up in the bathroom, so that's a plus.

You sigh, the quiet patting of your bare feet hitting the floor reaching your ears, fingers wrapping around the discarded blanket laying on the floor beside her on the floor and pulling it up to cover her body. She shifts underneath it, mumbling incoherently at you.

“Thanks mom.” You giggle at her sleepy presumption and she grumbles before turning her back to you like a moody teenager.

“Not your mum Em, but no problem anyway.” Walking back to the kitchen, you quickly find your phone before going to look for your wallet in your room, the sleek black leather laying on the floor beneath your mattress.

“Okay, just got to swing by the kitchen again then I’m off.” You mumble to yourself, patting your sleep shorts to see that you had everything you needed with you. The old Arsenal shorts from your time in the academy and the brief time you’d spent in the first team were the first things you’d packed for your move to America.

The comfort of home you supposed.

The simple t-shirt you had on was a Harvard one you’d gotten practically the first day on campus, the small ‘sports’ being printed just beneath the massive lettering of Harvard across your chest. It’s still warm enough outside to not need a jacket, you think to yourself, the sun shining brightly in the sky.

Picking up your can when you pass by the kitchen, you quickly make your way towards the door, finding the keys to your car hanging on the small hook meant for jackets. The metal ring you put them on clinks as you pull your keys off the hook, pulling your shoes over your bare feet before you turn the lock with a satisfying click, unlocking the door before disappearing out of it. Your key turns in the lock as you close the door, effectively securing Em inside the apartment.

The nice old lady living in the flat beside your own walks out of her door at the same time you do yours, her kind smile immediately filling you with a comforting warmth, her grandmotherly energy enveloping you fully, almost transforming you back into that little kid who would sit and wait for your gran to read a bedtime story.

“Hello dear, what are you doing up so early?” Her southern accent makes her words almost unintelligible, but you understand them either way, nothing was worse than drunk Em trying to speak. The large Newfoundland dog wagging his tail beside her yaps excitedly as he notices you, his entire body wiggling.

 “Oh I’m off to the bakery to get some pastries, Em got really drunk at a party yesterday and I don’t have anything for breakfast, so bread and pastries it is.” She looks amusedly at you, despite only having been neighbours for about two or so weeks, it was like the older woman had seen both you and Em grow up the entirety of your lives.

“Yeah that does sound like Em, don’it.” You laugh along with her, walking closer to pet Bubba who jumped at you as soon as you were close enough for him. “Bubba, no, you know we don’t jump on people.”

Laughing at the gentle giant, your hands soon tangle in his soft fur, giving him a bunch of kisses. 

“Oh Mrs. Peters, you know it’s his fault that he gets so excited, he’s just a little baby.” She rolls her eyes fondly at you and her dog, a simple tug of his leash making the fluffy dog go back to his owner. Moving towards the stairs you quickly turn back to ask her;

“Mrs. Peters, do you want anything from the bakery?”  She smiles but shakes her head, signaling that she doesn't want anything, before she enters the elevator and disappears from your line of sight.

You hum the tune to the song playing in your headphones as you walk down the stairs quickly, arms nearly tied to your body as you make your way down to the bottom floor of the building. The last step is one you jump over, walking over to the door that opens almost automatically and exiting the building completely.

The rays of the brightly shining sun hit your face as soon as you step out into the warm weather, Frank Ocean’s soft voice floating through your headphones as you walk, the wind blowing onto your exposed arms. 

It wasn’t often that people would just walk through the neighbourhood just to appreciate the scenery, to appreciate the nature and the small things that often seemed unimportant when living in such a fast tracked life as you did.

But you couldn’t just ignore the beauty in the simple things, the beauty in the small flowers growing along the road, the beauty in the gravel crunching under your feet as you walked, the warmth of the sun against your skin and the cooling effect of the wind.

It was all so beautiful, the calm and simple beauty.

You could find beauty in everything you saw, if you knew where to look for it, the soft smile on the mother’s face as she watched her toddler climb on the structure, the bird chirping as you pass it by, the old man sitting on a park bench. 

The world wasn’t as bad as people thought it was, they just hadn’t looked at it the right way.

The chime of the bell hanging above the door takes you back to only hours before, when you’d been at the diner with the divine girl, Nika. God, she was the embodiment of beauty, Aphrodite reborn as a human. 

The local bakery is well known among students, professors and newcomers alike, everyone knows about the bakery with the best pastries in the whole of Boston. Knowing that, it’s not even close to surprising when the line to the register reaches across the room, looking up at the menu of sorts to see what you want to pass the time.

There’s music flowing out the speakers, covering the low sound of people speaking to each other with its instrumental cling. You didn’t mind it though, it made everything just feel more real in a sense, there was no telling why, you don’t even get a chance at trying to figure it out as your phone starts ringing again, though this time it wasn’t Lucy’s voice ringing out, instead it was the infamous song of Arsenal, The Angel aka North London forever.

“Lee, to what do I owe the pleasure of a call? Did Spurs win?” You were both Arsenal through and through, but you always liked to tease her about her being a Spurs fan, the arch rivals of Arsenal being one of the things the older woman hated the most.

“Thank god, they didn’t win. No, I’m just calling to check up on you, ask how you’re settling in and all that.” She tries to be nonchalant in her tone, but  having known the blonde for as long as you had, you knew that there was something more to it. Thankfully, the line’s length has barely changed since the second you walked in, so there’s plenty of time to figure out what she’s playing at.

“Leah, what do you really want? I know you as well as you know yourself.” When you hear her sigh you pump your fist in the air triumphantly, getting more than a few judgy looks and glances from the people around you.

“Well, Jordy and I are having a bit of an argument right, and as our unofficial kid we need you to settle this.” You nod before you realize that she can’t see you, quickly replying verbally.

“What’s the arguing about?” She almost cuts you off with the speed at which she responds at, the smallest giggle to her tone giving you the impression that the matter at hand wasn’t as serious as she’d first made it out to be.

“Who do you think Blu loves the most?” Giving it a second before you answer to give the illusion that you actually thought about it, you can almost imagine the smile on her face, thinking that you’re going to back her.

“Neither of you, Blu loves me the most.” Leah lets out an offended gasp at your statement, and you can hear Jordan’s laugh in the back for a second before a playful slap can be heard. On your side of the line, only a giggle can be heard with the simple murmuring of day to day life in the background.

“That’s only because you give him so many treats.” The blonde groans at you, but you just smile smugly in return, not that she could see.

“It sucks to suck doesn’t it, Lee.” The line of people in front of you gets smaller and smaller with every passing minute as people order, with there only being around five or so people in front of you now.

“Well I wouldn’t know much about sucking, right Jord?” When you finally catch on to what she’s insinuating, you gag, not even caring that there are tens of people around you who can hear.

“Ew, I don’t need to know about what you two get up to in your spare time.” The sentence is whispered, not wanting to embarrass yourself even more than you already had. “Listen, I’ve got to go, I’m about to order some pastries for me and Em so I’ll call you back later.” 

By now you’re nearly at the front of the line, about to get what you came for. But they didn’t seem to want to end the call, nor the teasing they were putting you through.

“Ooh, does your girlfriend want a sweet breakfast?” If the two could see you they’d guaranteed to be laughing their heads off, the look of pure disgust on your face simply hilarious.

“Em’s not my girlfriend, even the thought of that is just like ew.” You shudder when you think about it, the girl had quickly become one of your closest friends and to even entertain the idea of being with her romantically was just gross.

“So you’re just buying her breakfast platonically?” Rolling your eyes at the conversation, you quickly plaster a smile on your face as you reach the counter. 

“Hi, I’d like four croissants and a caramel coffee.” The cashier’s name tag reads ‘Amelie’, the girl looking at you confused as if she doesn’t understand what you’re saying. The women on the other side of the phone snicker and if you weren’t raised the way you were, you would’ve hung up by now.

“A caramel coffee? You mean a caramel macchiato?” She questions dryly, like she really doesn’t enjoy her work.

“Yeah let’s go with that.” You pull out your wallet from your pocket, fishing the card out whilst trying your very hardest to not drop the phone sitting in the space between your head and your shoulder. 

“That’ll be 14 dollars.” Blipping your card against the side of the maschine, the transaction goes through without a problem thankfully. You smile at the girl again as she tells you that your order will be ready soon, and as you walk over to sit down at a table you can hear the kissy noises they’re making.

“Did you two just collectively decide not to hear me say ‘me and Em’, the idiot got wasted last night and I don’t have anything at home, courtesy of that drunk idiot. So me being the great friend that I am, decided that it was better to get breakfast than having to deal with a hangry and hungover Em.” You can hear the way they let out sounds of realization, understanding what you mean.

“Hey, why didn’t you bring us treats when we were hungover?” Leah asks, apparently offended that you hadn’t done this for them.

“Well, you two never took me out to parties so I never knew when you were hungover.” Despite them not being able to see it, you shrug absentmindedly, it wasn’t your fault that you didn’t get to go with them.

“Fair enough.” 

“Listen, I’ll call you back later, I’ve got to carry everything home and I only have two hands, so.” The two say goodbye before hanging up, and you slip your phone back into your pocket as you walk up to the counter, taking the paper bag with you as you walk out into the warm weather again. 

The walk back home is just as peaceful as the walk to the bakery, maybe the usual Boston had decided to take a break for just a day. Well whatever it was, you were thankful for it, your sleep deprived mind couldn’t handle much more than it already had.

When the lock clicks and you open the door, you’re met with the sound of groaning coming from the kitchen. Taking off your shoes at the entrance, you hang your keys back on the designated hook before you move towards the kitchen.

Peeking around the corner and into the kitchen, you quickly find the source of the noise. Because Em was standing in the middle of the room, banging her head against the counter clearly in quite a bit of pain. 

Why she was hitting her head against the counter then, you didn’t know, it’s completely irrational. But if that’s what she wanted to do then you’d let her, it wasn’t really any of your business.

“Em? What are you doing?” She looks up at you when she hears your voice, her gaze murderous, her hands in her hair, massaging her head like it was the last thing she’d ever do.

“Oh, grumpy you’re finally home, where have you been and why did you let me drink so much last night?” She groans out from between clenched teeth, your laugh filling the room pitifully within seconds at her words. It is funny after all, it was Em herself who insisted on drinking last night and her suffering the consequences of her actions was hilarious.

“I was out being an amazing friend and getting us both some breakfast.” You place the bag on top of the counter, almost right in front of Em’s face, but when she makes the motion of grabbing the bag and consuming the contents, you snatch it from the counter.

The older girl whines at your actions, her head coming down against the marble countertops again, the repetitive thumping annoying you more than you’d like to admit.

“Listen, I didn’t spend 14 dollars just for you to throw it back up. Off you go, get ready and for god’s sake please do not throw up in my living room.” Putting your hands on the back of her shoulders, you gently lead her all the way out of the room and into your bathroom, sitting her in front of the toilet before going back to the kitchen. “Oh, I talked to Luce earlier, she wants to thank you for making me ‘experience college the right way’.”  

Emma lets out a groan that sounds like a hybrid of a hawk getting piped and the death whistle, was getting praised by THE Lucy Bronze really worth the terrible hangover? Only Em could answer that, and she was currently hanging over the seat of your toilet, puking her guts up.

You can hear Em flushing and then moving to the sink, turning the tap on and taking some into her mouth, swirling the water around. Her bare feet slap disturbingly against the wooden floor as she makes her way towards the kitchen, your back turned towards her as she comes up behind you, her arm slinging around your shoulders.

“Wait, Luce? Luce as in Lucy Bronze? Lucy Bronze, the three time Champions League winner?” You shrug at her, turning back around to face the rest of the kitchen with Em hot on your heels.

“Yeah, I mean knowing her is not impressive.” Em’s wide eyes suggest a different story, her hands coming up to lay on your shoulders as she shakes your body back and forth.

“Wait, you know THE Lucy Bronze?” Taking her hands off your shoulders, you push the coffee cup into her free hand and a croissant into her other one. She nods thankfully before she hops up and sits on the counter, the small bag being placed between your bodies as you sit beside her on the counter.

“Did I forget to tell you that? And also why would she call me if we didn’t know each other?” Your eyebrows knit together, thinking back to all the conversations you and Em had over the past two and a half weeks.

“UH yeah, how do you know the best defender in the world?” The brunette girl slaps your shoulder playfully, studying your side profile out the corner of her eye. You look back at her in the exact same way, a small almost unknown smile on your face.

“Our mums knew each other, I’ve known Lucy since I was in diapers. And besides, I wasn’t the only one out here hiding family.” Raising your eyebrows accusingly, the girl beside you gives you a look of perplexion, not understanding what you mean by the statement.

“What do you mean?” She asks, her feet swinging off the edge, nearly smacking against your cabinet doors every time.

“I mean your scary older brother that you never told me about.” You say matter of factly, pointing at her with a ‘you know who I’m talking about’ look. The ‘ahhh’ sound that escapes her lips when she realizes who you’re talking about sounds out through the kitchen, clicking her tongue against the roof of her mouth.

“Oh, Cal? Cal’s not scary, he looks like the rat from flushed away. Oh and that reminds  me, you have to come with me to this dinner he invited me to next week. No way I’m third wheeling all night long with him and his latest girlfriend.” The snort you let out is involuntary, the American girl’s description of her brother very vivid, and hopefully correct. It wasn’t like you’d seen her brother ever before, so you didn’t actually know what he looked like.

“Yeah sure I’ll help you feel less single, but no hand holding and no pretending to be together.” You look at her pointedly, making your point totally clear, no fake dating, that never turned out right. Em nods her head as she shrugs, as if to tell you ‘fair enough’.

“No way that I’d go out with you anyways, you’re far too grumpy for my liking. Maybe you can set me up with one of your mates in England.” Her hand covers her mouth so that she doesn’t laugh at your horrified expression, clearly you’re disturbed at the mere thought of Boston Tea Party part two happening if they ever broke up. 

“One Boston tea party is enough mate, we don’t need another.” The sip of coffee that Em had just taken covers  basically the entirety of your kitchen in a single second, the girl beside you spitting it out in surprise. “Em, come on. I’m not cleaning that up just so you know.”

Jumping down from the counter, you nearly slip on Em’s newly spit out coffee, only escaping the sticky mess by a millimeter. Her laughter clings out through the apartment, and Em makes sure to let you know that she’s sorry by telling you through her bouts of laughter.

“Look under the sink, you’ll find what you need under there.” The sound of the cabinet door opening can be heard from where you’re standing in the middle of the living room, picking up all the various things littered around the space. 

“Girl, why do you have everything under here except paper towels?” The brunette calls out for you, and you shake your head in amusement at her, there was no way that Em hadn’t thought about looking in any other cabinet than the one she had her head stuck in at the moment.

“Look in the compartment above, see if you’ll find them there.” You get the confirmation that she’s found it when she lets out a short ‘aha’, you can almost imagine the way her head hits the corner of the sink when she gets up, the loud ‘fuck that hurt’ being very telling.

“You okay?” Looking around the wall in the direction of the kitchen, you see Em sticking her hand out, the thumb sticking up telling you that she was fine.

It didn’t take as long as either of you had thought to clean the kitchen up, only a few minutes and even less to clean the mess in the living room. Soon enough, the television was turned on and the two of you were sitting in silence watching the looney tunes.

“Do you think the duck piped the rabbit or is it the other way ‘round?” Em questions, her tone completely serious, as if she wasn’t asking the craziest question ever.

“Uh I don’t think Bugs Bunny piped Daffy Duck.” Looking at her incredulously, she only responds with a shrug, her theory about the two cartoon animals being shot down almost immediately.

“Well they do have sexual tension that’s for sure.” She states matter of factly, pointing at you like you would agree. Spoiler alert: you didn’t agree at all.

“Mate what goes even on in your head?” You ask her, looking at her as if she belonged in a mental institution. Em scratches her head nonchalantly, stretching out her legs and placing her feet in your lap. “Do you not have anywhere to be?”

“Like where?” She asks, her words coming out mumbled as she’s biting her nails, chewing on the bits before she spits them out. When she looks at you she sees the judgemental look on your face, stopping what she’s doing with no real sense of urgency.

“I don’t know, maybe at home? Do you not have like a hundred plants that need to be watered?” She springs up from the couch, running to the entrance where she puts her shoes on before she shouts out a quick ‘bye’ and runs out the house.

“What is she on?” You laugh through the sentence, the pure hilarity and absurdity of most situations involving your newest best friend making you laugh more often than not.

With Em being in and out of your apartment practically every day, the week leading up to the dinner with her brother and his ‘newest’ girlfriend passes by extremely fast, feeling more like a day than a week.

“Em, what am I supposed to wear? Is it like a fancy restaurant or more chill?” You shout from your room, Em changing into her clothes in the living room. The clothing hangers click against each other as you look through the clothes you’d managed to put up over the past few weeks, many different button ups and a few normal t-shirts.

“You’re asking me this 10 minutes before we go?!” She shouts back, surprised that you’re not already finished dressing yourself and getting ready, seeing as you were the first one out the house normally.

“Yeah, I just realized that I never asked you what to wear.” You shrug to no one in particular, seeing as you were the only one present in your room.

“Didn’t your parents take you to a bunch of dinners with their clients?” Em’s voice carries through the walls, especially with the woman coming closer and closer to your door.

“I’ve been to a fair few, but in my defense I’ve always had stylists helping me so putting together outfits isn’t really one of my strong points.” Pulling out a few items of clothing, you hold them up so that they’re almost exclusively in your line of sight, looking to see if they’d match. 

“Fair enough, it’s not too fancy, just wear that linen shirt and some of your fancy pants.” She peeks her head into the room, looking at where you’re standing in your jeans, seemingly debating whether to wear the simple white button down or a Harvard t-shirt. 

“Trousers?” You raise your eyebrow cheekily at the brunette, a small teasing smile on your face.

“Yeah yeah, you know what I mean.” Emma rolls her eyes at you whilst you place the two articles of clothing back into your closet, the hangers clicking easily against the pole they’re hooked on.

“I do, I just like to annoy you.” Hearing the door click closed, you pull the linen shirt off its hangar and pull it over your head before you unbutton your jeans and pull the ‘fancy pants’ over your legs. Buttoning up the various buttons on the slacks, you quickly tuck your shirt in before opening the door and tapping Em on her head as you pass her.

“Shut up man.” You look back at Em when you reach the entrance, picking out your fanciest pairs of shoes to show her.

“Those look good?” She studies them for a second or two before nodding diligently, pulling on a pair of relatively fancy shoes too.

“They’re better than your beat up sneakers at least.” She shrugs at your offended look, almost telling you that it’s only fair since they are beat up.

“They still have at least two, three years left in them alright. There’s no need for new ones if they work just fine.” For the second time that day, you take your keys off the hook in the hall, letting Em walk out the open door before you so that you can lock everything up.

“Are we finally taking your car?” She asks, seeing the little metal key on your keychain with hers nowhere in sight. Normally you were insistent on taking hers as your baby was almost priceless, a reminder of home that you’d come to love over the past week, seeing as you’d gotten it shortly after signing your first professional contract.

“Yeah, I need to impress your brother, right?” Smirking cheekily over your shoulder, you see Em smiling widely at you as the lock on the door clicks closed, waiting for you to follow her into the elevator.

“Can I-” She starts off, the cool air in the lift making the hair on your arms raise, the skin becoming all prickly like that of a goose.

“No.” You can see the way Em pouts almost like a petulant child through the mirror, her arms crossed over her chest as she glares at you.

“You don’t even know what I was about to ask you.” Raising a single eyebrow at her, you look down at her through the corner of your eye, like you did more often than you were willing to admit.

“No, but I do know you and that’s enough, no one other than me will ever drive my car.” The late afternoon sun glows bright orange like hot coals as the two of you step out into the humid air, the garage not too far away from the building’s entrance. Picking out the right key, you quickly unlock the door before pulling it up, revealing the gorgeous red ‘67 Mustang that Em always wanted you to drive.

The girl in question wolf whistles when she sees the car, a hand coming up to shelter her eyes from the sun beaming into them, moving towards you with slow steps. Walking into the garage, you motion for the other girl to open the door on the passenger side as you plop down into the driver’s seat. 

You don’t have to feel around for very long to find the ignition, as you push the clinking keys in, smiling satisfied as the motor revs up loudly. Applying a small amount of pressure to the gaspedal, it’s not long until you’ve navigated your way out of the garage successfully and pulled onto the main road.

Pulling the seat belt over your body as soon as you’ve made it out to the main road, you waste no time in pulling your sunglasses out of their compartment and putting them over your eyes so as to not get completely blinded by the sun.

“Okay, give me the rundown of your brother, likes and dislikes, hobbies, aspirations, all the basic knowledge apart from him looking like the rat from flushed away.” Tapping your fingers against the steering wheel, you peek down at the phone that’s currently giving you directions for the restaurant, the beautiful nature almost mesmerizing.

“His full name is Callum Adam Whitmore, he’s 23 years old and he plays basketball for UConn. He likes sports, hitting on anything that has a pulse, pretending he knows how to play the guitar and pretentiously explaining movies. He dislikes losing, being told no by our parents and me on a few occasions. Hobbies are partying and gaming, aspires to go to the NBA. That’s all.” Em lists, giving you all the information you need to adequately make the assumption that Callum Adam Whitmore is kind of an arse.

“Well he sounds…nice?” There’s no denying how questionable you sound, clearly not believing the words coming out of your own mouth. Em looks at you over the tops of her own glasses, giving you a skeptical look.

“No he doesn’t, he’s an ass and to use the correct terminology, a fuckboy.” Em pushes her glasses up higher on the bridge of her nose, turning the knobs on the inbuilt stereo for it to start playing music, ‘My Girl’ by The Temptations flowing softly out the speakers.

“Sing with me grumpy! I’ve got so much honey, the bees envy me, I’ve got a sweeter song, than the birds in the trees.” She sings loudly, her hands gesturing for you to join her in singing as you shake your head, a small smile on your face at her antics. “Come on, sing it man! I guess you’d say, what can make me feel this way?”

Finally relenting at the last second possible, you join the older girl in song happily.

“My girl, my girl, my girl, talkin’ ‘bout my girl.” Tapping along to the beat just as the last note of the song rings out, you pull into the parking lot of the restaurant, effectively ending the little karaoke session you were participating in.

“Holy shit man, that went so fast.” Em pats your shoulder as you pull into a parking space at the corner of the big parking lot, taking the keys out of the ignition before you fold your sunglasses and place them back into their compartment.

“Perks of having a really fast car.” Waiting from the brunette to step out of the car, you don’t waste a second in locking up the extremely expensive piece of machinery. You take a second to fix your hair in the rear view mirror, even though you don’t really know why, there wasn’t really anyone in that restaurant to impress now that you knew that Em’s brother was a total ass, but your instinct told you to. 

“Can you hurry up?” The girl in question asks from her place in front of the restaurant door and you send her a sarcastic smile in response, half running half walking up to her.

She doesn’t say anything as she pushes the door open, in fact she doesn’t say anything until you two reach the hostess stand where she tells the worker the name of the reservation.

As the worker leads the two of you over to the table there’s a million different thoughts running through your head, why were you nervous? Why did it feel like your stomach was about to explode? Why were there so many tables in the restaurant?

You only really tune back into the real world around you when Em pinches your side, her head turned towards a table with a man sitting alone, presumably her brother. The man stands up and walks around the table to reach your side, bringing your friend into a familial embrace, before he turns to you and sticks his hand out.

There’s no avoiding the sense of deja vu you get from the action, remembering the girl from the party almost a week ago who’d done the exact same thing, but then again it was the most common form of introducing yourself.

“Cal Whitmore.” His voice is on the deeper side, not Darth Vader deep but definitely on the deeper side of the spectrum. His calloused hand grips onto yours in a confident handshake, fingers gripping onto yours harder than needed, which fits the cocky description Em had put forth.

“Y/n Y/l/n.” You smile staley at him, the man moving back to his side of the table as you pull out the chair for the girl beside you, only sitting down when she’s settled.

“So, where’s your darling date Cal?” Em asks her older brother teasingly, looking around the restaurant like she’d appear just out of anywhere.

“Calm yourself Em, she went to wash her hands.” He leans back in his chair cockily, his eyes glued to the backside of one of the waitresses passing by like some horny teenage boy.

“You know what, he does kind of look like the rat from Flushed Away.” You lean in closer to Em as you whisper, studying the man’s face carefully and noticing increasing similarities between the stopmotion rat and the tall man.

“Em, what the fuck, have you been telling people that I look like the rat from Flushed Away again? I don’t look like the fucking rat from Flushed Away, stop telling people that.” He looks at the girl beside you in disappointment, his thin lips turning down quickly. Well that was until a sweet voice cut in, a soft hand with fingers adorned with rings placed on his shoulder, moving down to his chest softly.

“What has she done now?” That accented voice was familiar, and as your eyes trail up from the stranger's hand to her chest and then lastly to her face you soon realize why it was so damn familiar. The careful upwards tug of her lips to the slight curls of her hair and the furrow in her brow, there was no denying that the girl standing before you was someone you recognized.

Fucking hell, you’d just taken your best friend’s brother’s girlfriend out on a date a mere week before meeting him officially. You were officially fucked.

[rishiguro]

you don’t think that you have ever felt as much relief as you did when you finally stepped inside your home.

with a loud thud your bag fell to the floor, right before you somehow managed to stumble into your bedroom, falling face-first into the mattress. the weight of the day finally truly sank into your bones, making your entire body ache. all you wanted to do was close your eyes and fall asleep, forgetting the day even happened.

all had been too much today.

you barely managed to get yourself out of bed in the morning after a terrible night of (or lack of) sleep and you still don’t really know how you made it to your place of work, much less made it through the day in the first place. everything was loud and bright, you were running on caffeine only and everything seemed to go wrong today. your performance was questionable at best and you couldn’t help but overthink each one of your steps.

and if that wasn’t bad enough already, the whole day you were jittery until after a few hours you noticed just how much you were shaking and how fast your heart was actually racing.

and then all you wanted to do was cry.

SUNA meanwhile had absolutely no idea what was going on when he entered your home with the key you gave him a few months ago, mindlessly taking his shoes off and messily throwing them away.

he called out for you when he noticed your bag laying right by the door. when he didn’t hear you call back to him, he furrowed his eyebrows, making his way into various rooms of your place, trying to find you. he grew slightly worried when he didn’t see you in your kitchen, living room or in the hall, but a part of him figured you might be purposely hiding from him, trying to scare him.

with a smirk on his face he decided to play along, carrying himself with light footsteps over to your bedroom door and carefully watching for a sign that you might be waiting somewhere to jump out.

when he reached your door, his hand slowly moved to the handle, pressing it down gently. taking a peek inside, he leaned forward.

you hadn’t noticed the door opening a few centimeters, much less the head peeking through it, with your head still lying flat on your bed, pillows practically pressed against your eyes to avoid sound coming through as much as possible.

suna would find it endearing if he didn’t grow so worried seeing you like this.

pressing his lips into a thin line, he decided to carefully step inside, practically sneaking towards you.

“baby?” you jerked up startled, looking around with wide, slightly puffy eyes, before you actually noticed him sitting next to you.

“fuck,” you groaned, “don’t scare me like that” you let your head fall back into the mattress.

he chuckled as you scooted over and ultimately laid down next to you. “sorry” he opened his arms and you immediately cuddled into him, resting your head on his chest. “what happened?” he asked after a few seconds of silence.

you however only shook your head, hiding your face in the fabric of his sweatshirt. “don’t want to talk about it?” you shook your head again.

so in response, he only tightened his hold on you, bending his neck in an uncomfortable way to press a kiss on your temple. “that’s okay. we can talk later”

the two of you continued to lie there in silence, simply finding comfort in each other’s presence and warmth. you listened to his calm heartbeat with closed eyes and enjoyed how suna’s hand slid up and down your back.

“it’s alright. i got you,” he muttered softly, “i’m not letting you go”

you still felt bad. but laying in his arms, you felt a little better.

[cumikering]

F1 John Price x reader

2.7k | fluff Price raced for Mclaren. You didn’t know that (part 2)

No human body was made for this: jetting across continents and time zones for nine months out of twelve.

Even after the years, John Price hadn’t got used to it. Neither was he used to flying from Las Vegas to London for a photoshoot only to hop on another plane the day after for his next race in Qatar.

He groaned internally, his body aching as he plopped down onto the backseat of the cab before taking his black surgical mask and cap off. He didn’t get a proper rest with how turbulent his flight was.

“Oh, I’ve seen ya mate!” the middle-aged driver exclaimed, eyeing him from the rear-view mirror. “You’re famous- you’re the F1 bloke, innit?”

John gave him a polite smile.

“Could you sign something of mine?” He popped open his glovebox. “Wait, this wouldn’t sell so high…” he muttered as he rummaged through it.

The cars behind started a cacophony of honks.

“Am in the way.” He chuckled sheepishly as he pulled away. “You better not run off before I find something!"

Downtown London was packed at the hour. The driver had plenty of time to look through every nook and cranny of his car, but cursing when he could only come up with a yellowing notepad and a drying pen. John made do.

“Could you also put your name down, please?” He held the pad over his shoulder after he’d inspected it. “So we know who you are.”

And he did, with another rehearsed smile.

“Cheers, mate.” With a pleased grin, he tossed the pad onto the passenger seat, not even bothering to make eye contact amidst the traffic.

At the red light around the corner of the magazine HQ, the taxi halted in front of a coffee shop. He glanced at his watch - he was 20 minutes early and he desperately needed caffeine.

John pulled his mask and cap back on before exiting the car. The cap was still stiff, one with a French flag patch he grabbed at random at the airport with a grumble. He’d misplaced the plain one he liked.

He kept his head down as he stood in the short queue.

“Hot Americano, double shot, please.”

His phone chimed when he waved it over the payment terminal. He was going to regret this. He wasn’t a big coffee drinker.

“Can I get a name for that?” You looked up from the cup you scribbled on.

“JP.”

You smiled, glancing at his cap and wrote his name down. “Like Jean Pierre?”

He chuckled, only now making eye contact with you. It was a joke between him and his teammate, Kyle, or Gaz as the fans called him. You must be one of those well-meaning people pretending to not recognise him, giving him a slice of normalcy.

He always appreciated the gesture, especially the more years passed. As glamorous as life had been since F1, John discovered he wasn’t about all the glitz and glam.

He didn’t care about looking immaculate all the time, scripted speech in designer clothing or driving expensive cars. Have you seen the state of London’s streets? Everything was PR, PR, PR - like this wasn’t even his life he was living anymore. He wanted to be home on his racing simulator or get the neighbourhood takeaway in his thick hoodies without anyone shoving a camera in his face. He just wanted his old, quiet life.

You worked the coffee machine, your back to him, and his gaze wondered to the pastry display as he leaned on the counter. The cookies were massive, thick in the middle, probably chewy too. They would be perfect with his coffee.

He glanced at the line which had grown longer, and at you at the register now, scribbling another customer’s order onto a cup with a smile. It was odd that no one else was in sight to help you at the busy time.

A quick peek at his watch: he didn’t have the time to queue again. He’d just have to come back later after his business.

“Enjoy.” You flashed him a smile as you placed his order on the counter.

It didn’t hurt that you were easy on the eyes.

Sure enough, hours later after a photoshoot and an interview, caffeine still buzzed in John’s veins. He could only imagine how long he’d be up later that night, but it was worth it. At least he didn’t look like a zombie in the footage.

His mask didn’t hold off the gust of wind - cold against his cheeks as he stepped out of the building. His stomach rumbled. While pubs had started to fill up with people in work attire, the lights were still on in your shop. He crossed the street only for the sign to read ‘closed’, the last couple exiting the door.

His shoulders sagged, but he pushed the door open anyway.

You looked up from the tablet you fumbled with, your smile apologetic. “Hiya, we’re closed. Sorry.”

He glanced at the display, empty safe for two remaining cookies. He pointed at them. “Hi, so sorry to bother, but I just wanted those, please. I didn’t get the chance earlier.”

Recognition flashed in your eyes. “Oh, I remember you. Jean-Pierre.”

“It’s me.” He laughed.

You slid the bag of two cookies across the counter. “On the house.”

“No, no. You’re doing me a favour already. Have one with me at least?”

You hummed. “Why not.”

At the nearest table, he had taken his cap and mask off. You set down a mug of milk.

“You’re spoiling me.” He chuckled, taking a bite of the cookie. “Oh my god, it’s spot on,” he groaned.

You smiled. “I’m glad you like it. It took me a while to come up with the perfect recipe.”

“I’d thought about this for hours and it doesn’t disappoint, but I bet it tastes even better warm.” His gaze couldn’t help but fall to your untouched cookie.

You laughed, pushing the paperbag across the table.

“I’m sorry, this is so, so shameless.” He gave you a sheepish grin. “But it’s wonderful, really. I’ll be back. Definitely.”

“You’re very welcome to.”

“Can I place an order? For my team. Three dozens for tomorrow morning, or is that a bit last minute?”

“Yeah, no, I can do that.” You smiled. “If I may ask, what do you do, JP? Sounds like a big team.”

He frowned. “I thought you knew?”

You tilted your head. “Sorry, I don’t think you told me?”

“Right.” He cleared his throat. Heat crept up his neck from the presumption. “I work with cars.”

“Like a mechanic?”

“Something like that.”

“Oh, that’s impressive. You must have steady hands.”

“I do, I suppose.” He held your gaze for a moment. “Oh, sorry, you were about to close. I’ll just finish this-“

You waved your hand. “Do take you time. I hadn’t had the chance to sit down.”

“Busy day?”

“Very. One of my girls is sick so I worked alone today.”

“I can stay a bit, if you don’t mind.” He smiled. “Actually, would you like dinner? I’m famished. I can get something for us?”

“That sounds fantastic.”

“I saw a kebab shop a block away. Are they stingy with their chips?”

“Of course not. They wouldn’t be my favourite otherwise.”

He dashed out the door with a grin.

When John returned with dinner, you called out from the kitchen as you put away the cookie dough you’d just prepped for his order.

“I make the dough at least 12 hours ahead. That way the flavours have a chance to mingle.” You sat across him.

“Is that why they’re so good?”

You shrugged, smiling, as you unwrapped your dinner.

“I’ll be back for this too.” He nodded approvingly at the kebab, bursting at the seams with chips.

“They’ve got great food around here.”

“All the more reason I’ll have to be back.”

You chatted over the meal, about the area and its hidden gems. He was convinced he didn’t even know half of the city even after living there for many years.

“Thanks for dinner, Jean-Pierre. You can go now if you want.” You put away the wrappings. “I don’t want to bore you with all the cleaning I’m going to be doing.”

“It’s John, and I can do the dishes.”

“I can’t let you do that.”

“You said you were tired, and look how long I held you up.” He gestured at the dark sky outside.

You chuckled as you shook your head.

“Come on, let’s get to work,” he said over his shoulder as he sauntered to the kitchen.

You wiped down the counters and did the floor as John helped with the dishes, asking about you and your shop. While he didn’t like doing chores, doing them with you didn’t feel troublesome.

In fact, it was nice to spend some time out, not cooped up all alone in his apartment. It was refreshing to not be talking about racing or cars, to get away from it all. You laughed so heartily, so bright at his jokes. Within these four walls, maskless, he didn’t have to pretend.

He wore his mask as you locked up, but not before sliding in a few bills into the tip jar when you weren’t looking.

“So.” He turned to you, hands jammed in his pockets.

“I’m taking the bus.”

If he had his car he’d have offered to drive, but it was just as well he wasn’t driving. What if he wouldn’t want to leave?

So he walked you to the bus stop before calling a taxi for himself, back to his own reality.

While John was away for a Grand Prix weekend, between media day, qualifying and other preparations, he didn’t have the chance to be alone with his thoughts. However, as soon as he lay in his hotel bed that Sunday night, adrenaline still pumping in his blood from the race hours before, his mind drifted to you. He wondered what you were up to, if you’d thought about him since Wednesday morning when he picked up his order.

See, his problem wasn’t that he didn’t ask, but that he asked too easily and often came off too strong. He didn’t want that, especially not to you, someone the slightest bit more than an acquaintance now, a funny and pretty one at that.

But he should have asked for your number. He had so many chances to: during dinner, while walking you to the bus stop, or when he swung by the day after. You would have loved to know how everyone flocked to him when he walked into the room, oohing and aahing over your cookies.

He’d just have to wait until the next day.

Monday was his favourite day of the week because it was his day off, allowing him to not even leave his penthouse apartment if he so wished. But in the afternoon when he arrived back in London, he had somewhere else to be. On his way home from the factory, he took a detour, parking around the corner from your shop.

He wasn’t supposed to think so much about you, let alone miss you, but he did against his better judgement. He couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face when you greeted him as he approached the counter.

“Hiya, what can I get you?”

“I’d like to place another order for tomorrow. Everyone loved your cookies.”

“Sure.” You smiled. “You know, you could just give us a ring, yeah?”

“Right, about that. I was wondering if you fancy dinner with me tonight?”

“Oh, I’ll have to prep for the cookies-“

Behind you, a young lady at the coffee machine quipped over her shoulder with a stifled smile. “I can handle that.”

You turned and mouthed ‘thank you’ to her. “Where to?”

“Anywhere you want. I’m driving.”

When you sent him to wait at a table with a cup of hot chocolate, his smile faltered. He didn’t think this through. He was driving his Mclaren. Shephard, the boss, made up this silly clause in the contract for him and Gaz to drive their own McLaren to and from the factory. Good for PR, he said.

 He hurried outside as he dialled.

“Kate? Kate, I’m at that coffee shop.”

There was a beat. “Okay?”

“Would you please drive my GTI over?”

“Why, did your car break?” She chuckled. “A towed Mclaren isn’t a good look. Shephard won’t be impr-”

“No, I need my GTI in-“ he glanced at his watch. ”Exactly 52 minutes.”

“What? John, I’m your manager, not your errand boy.”

“Please! I’ve got no time to explain, just do it.”

“Or what?” she said dryly.

“I’ll tell your wife in Qatar there was a lighter in your coat pocket which smelled an awful lot like smoke.”

There was a pause followed by a huff. “Fine. Text me the address.”

Kate rolled up in his Golf GTI in time for your shop to close. You picked a place not too far from your flat, and he was thankful it wasn’t packed. You sat at the table in the corner and kept his cap on.

It was evident you were less tired that night, more playful with your jokes. He could listen to your laugh and look into your eyes all day. But before it was too late, much to his chagrin, you called it a night.

He pulled up at your flat. “I promise no more last-minute orders.”

“Just give us a call next time.”

“Rather call you.”

John Sloane, he typed into your phone.

You smiled, sliding your phone back in your pocket. “See you soon, John.”

“Tomorrow. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

You held his gaze for another moment before giving him a quick peck on the cheek. His heart soared, but before he could react, you’d shut the door behind you with a supressed smile.

He grinned to himself as he drove home.

“Gaz!” Soap bellowed at the door. “Sorry am late. My alarm didnae go off.” The engineer hurried to the table to see Kyle munching happily. “Och, did ye get more cookies, Cap? I’m starvin’.”

Everyone on the team wore a cap, but Price was the only one who couldn’t be caught without one, therefore the curious nickname. That, and he often swore up a storm on team radio, like a bossy sailor. Simon, his engineer, could only remain silent witnessing the outbursts like he wasn’t even there. He earned his moniker Ghost that way.

John chuckled. “Help yourself, mate.”

He popped open the box, groaning after a bite. “Aye, that’s the one.”

“You sure you don’t want one, Ghost?” Gaz teased as he grabbed his third cookie. “You’ve been staring.”

“Alright, just one.”

“Oh, that didn’t take a lot of convincing,” Soap quipped between bites.

Ghost gave him the side eye. “Would you rather I eat the whole box, Johnny?”

Soap pouted and took his seat next to Gaz, and the team meeting for the upcoming race commenced.

As always, the crew flew out on Thursday, but this time, he had you to text. And he did, between the press conferences and briefs, or work, as he simply told you. If he was home, he would ask you out again in a heartbeat. Texting couldn’t compare to seeing that smile in real life, but it would have to do for now.

Abu Dhabi was the last race of the season. He was very much looking forward to winter break, even more so this time, because for the first time in years, he had someone to come home to. Okay, maybe that was too generous a statement. There was someone he would very much want to see, to say the least.

John landed in London Monday evening, still thrumming from his P1 win and finishing second for the season. He went straight home to switch cars before picking you up at work for dinner with a giddy smile.

He had a few days to himself before leaving for Liverpool for Christmas, which hopefully meant one more time of seeing you, if you let him, that was. But when you gave him another peck on his cheek when he opened the car door for you, he decided it was impossible to stay away from you.

I’ve missed you too much.

Ex boyfriend Price Masterlist

@tiredmetalenthusiast @le16erc @keegansshark @kyletogaz @footyandformula

[mixtape-racha]

enough for you | poly!ot8 (9th member reader)

dating the members of your band was both a blessing and a curse... especially when you had to hide your changes in behaviour from them

words: 3.21k // warnings: established relationship, poly!skz x reader, reader is put on a diet and workout plan, lack of eating, reader takens caffeine pills, overworking, overexercising, reader passes out, the boys get angry (not at reader)

a/n: i am NOT trying to glorify undereating and/or overworking yourself in ANY way, but if you struggle with food-related topics or suffer from an ED please do not read this fic as i don't want to trigger you in any way // based on this request

you bowed your head with a small - and extremely undeserving - smile as you said your goodbyes to the staff and left your meeting. solo meetings with the staff at jype were always worrying, but this time you wished you had forced one of the boys to come with you.

you had a huge year ahead of you; your comeback being one of the most anticipated of the year on twitter, before your japanese comeback, and then further embarking on a tour. really, you and the boys were enjoying all the free time you had before the workload became overbearing - which none of you could deny it was, despite how much you loved your jobs.

but to then be sat down and given a whole new diet and gym plan? on top of everything else, it was…. hurtful. you were always a little self-conscious of your weight - being the only girl in a group with 8 boys, anything you did or changed stuck out like a sore thumb. but as far as you knew, you were fine. your weight had sat steady since the last comeback, and you were always careful with what you ate and how you worked out.

shaking it off as your manager put a comforting hand on your arm and helped you out of the building to your awaiting car, you assumed that something had changed if the company felt they had to step in. you just hoped the boys hadn’t noticed, and if they had they weren’t talking about it behind your back. 

it was a silly thing to worry about, obviously. your boys only ever wanted what was best for you, and you knew that. merely 2 years after your debut, you had all begun understanding each other on a deeper level, and - under chan’s demand - very, very slowly it led to romantic connections establishing between you all. and now here you are, in one of the biggest kpop groups in the world, working and living and thriving with your 8 boyfriends in one harmonious polycule.

during the drive back to the dorm, your manager was kind enough to let you brood in your silence - he understood all too well that you were bombarded with a lot of information to process during the meeting, especially when your small hands started flicking through the folder you were given. a strict meal plan - every meal and snack planned out to the last gram with no room to move. an exact workout guide - how on earth you were going to do this without changbin noticing something was up in the gym, you had no clue. you just prayed that their busy schedules leading up to comeback season were enough for you to keep this from them - the last thing they needed right now was to worry about you too.

when you finally arrived back at the dorm, you were instantly wrapped into a tight hug by a pouting jisung. you giggled softly as he complained about losing mario kart to felix - again - and how he owed jeongin $100 because felix beat seungmin too. he kept mumbling his complaints into your neck as you waddled to the living room, the sight of the maknae line bickering and throwing popcorn at each other being a wholesome and beautiful sight to come home to.

jisung finally released you from his hold, allowing you to squeeze yourself onto the couch between seungmin and jeongin, the latter instantly throwing an arm around your shoulders as seungmin looked over at you, a smile painted on his lips.

“how did the meeting go? we were trying to figure out why they’d call a solo meeting with you, but none of us worked it out.” he asked softly, planting a chaste kiss on your cheek before handing his controller back over to jisung. you weren’t entirely sure how to respond, thinking of an excuse on the spot.

“oh, yeah it went fine. they were just checking what parts of the comeback schedules lined up with my period - after last comeback, they want to try and make that week as easy as possible for me.” you shrugged, knowing the boys wouldn’t ask more questions when it came to that time of the month.

its not like they were disgusted or anything. in fact, they were the most helpful and understanding boyfriends you could ask for. they just never pried, never dug for more information than you seemed comfortable with sharing, and you were grateful for that. especially as you lied. if they asked questions, you were sure you would crumble and tell them the truth. for now, it was just easier to ignore it and join them playing video games.

dinner time that night was your first exceptional challenge. after studying your diet plan in your bedroom, it was suggested that you have a vegetable salad with plain chicken breast and a small portion of sweet potato. it seemed boring and bland, especially with the other meals you were expected to follow. usually, you would follow the boys around the kitchen and see what they were having for dinner - then helping one of them make a larger portion so you could share and eat together. it was so normalized at this point, you’d typically get asked teasingly which member’s meal you’d be planning to hijack that night.

so, of course, when you headed to the kitchen silently and began preparing a completely different meal, a few eyebrows were raised, although thankfully no one asked any questions. they just simply assumed you had a specific craving that night that you wanted to indulge in. truthfully, as much as you wanted to eat your meal in the company of your boyfriends, discussing your days and giggling together, you were deeply embarrassed by the fact the company had put you on your diet plan. so regretfully, you skulked back into your bedroom with your dismal meal and ate in the comfort of your bed with a disney movie playing in the background.

the next morning, you woke yourself up at what felt like the ass-crack of dawn to head down to the company gym. you stuffed everything you’d need for the day into a backpack, silently leaving the door and enjoying the quiet of the early morning during your walk to the company building. the lack of noise and movement in the world was nice, feeling like it had washed away all of your worries almost instantly. every time you saw a stray cat, or a funny street sign, you’d snap a picture to send to your group chat with the boys.

you allowed yourself to send a couple of animal pictures to the chat, assuming the boys would be asleep, and when they woke, wouldn’t notice or question the times that you had sent the pictures. of course, that was a misjudgement on your part, because when the hell did chan ever sleep? as you approached the gym doors, your phone dinged and your heart squeezed at his message.

lying to your boyfriends in any way made you feel sick to your stomach, but deep down you just didn’t want them worrying about you. luckily, your workout went relatively easily - you were quite active and partook in gym activity frequently so it was simply like a higher intensity session for you.

after you had showered and left the gym, you headed down to the company cafeteria for breakfast. your meal plan stated that your breakfast for the day should be a small portion of mandu dumplings and a pineapple and kale smoothie. you savored the food as much as you could with each bite, knowing you wouldn’t be able to get a chance to eat again until the later evening. your schedule was packed, practices upon practices before your evening workout, and as much as you loved your job, you knew wholeheartedly how much the company liked to overwork you leading up to comeback season.

practice seemed to drag that day, your vocal teacher questioning if you were feeling unwell because your energy just seemed completely off during your session together. you shrugged her off, insisting you were just tired, but in reality you were overthinking every single moment of the day. between the lack of food, and ache from overworking yourself in the gym that morning, you just felt exhausted - both physically and mentally.

after you finished all your scheduled plans for the day, you decided to head to the company cafeteria for dinner - it was easier than going home and then heading back out to the gym, in all honesty. you tried your hardest not to finish your allocated meal, thinking if you left food on your plate that you’d feel more accomplished. however, as soon as you got to the gym and began your evening workout, you knew leaving food was a bad idea. nonetheless, you pushed through the achy joints and growling stomach, even beating your current personal best on the stairmaster before you ended your session.

the stress of needing to be a certain weight before your next solo meeting before the comeback had you stressed and pushing yourself harder than you should, so you opted to walk back to the dorms that night rather than calling a car. the next few days were similar - the ache, and fatigue, and sick feeling in the pit of your stomach as you forced yourself into work. staying at the company later, working out at any free time you had, sleeping as soon as you got home without even acknowledging the boys you shared a dorm with. they had slowly started noticing, of course, but it wasn’t until exactly a week after your meeting that things all came to a head.

you had finally noticed in the mirror that morning that you had lost weight - your clothes weren’t fitting how they usually did, and you weren’t even hungry most of the day. the gym had become your best friend, and working out had become so much easier. sure, the fatigue and lightheadedness was slightly concerning, but in your opinion it was worth it to keep your job.

that day, you were scheduled to have a whole-group dance practice in the evening before you all headed home, which the boys were excited for because it meant they could travel home with you for the first time in a week straight. you, on the other hand, were slightly annoyed you couldn’t just sneak off to the gym or make an excuse to stay at the company longer. that day you’d opted to skip breakfast - the idea of eating before a day of work making you nauseous - and instead had chugged an energy drink and some caffeine pills along with your morning vitamins. work was boring, and all day you were itching to just up and head to the gym, or just go on a long walk, but you couldn’t. you were stuck between rooms in the company, and it was honestly stressing you out.

by the time it got to the evening, and you and the boys all met up for dance practice, you were instantly scooped into a hug by hyunjin, giggling as his hair tickled your skin.

“finally! missed you so much, pretty girl. feels like i haven’t seen you for more than 30 seconds lately.” he mumbled against the skin of your neck, the sensation making you shiver.

“don’t be silly, hyun,” you grinned as you pulled away to help him tie his hair into a ponytail. “i’m right here now, not going anywhere.”

practice started pretty quickly after that, considering jisung was running late after vocal lessons, and you quickly realized that not eating that day may not have been your best idea. the haste of your movements had your head spinning more than usual, and you felt like you were tripping over your own feet every two seconds. you couldn’t sworn you were moving in slow motion with everything around you sped up, and no matter how much you tried to shake the feelings off, it wouldn’t leave.

you stepped forward through a wave of your boyfriends, fighting to keep your eyes ahead and complete your center dance for the bridge in the song, but it was to no avail. your heart thudded and you internally cried as you felt your body collapse to the ground, black dots circling your vision and your ears ringing loudly.

the thud your body hit the ground with was sickening to the boys who looked on, minho rushing over to try and catch you since he was the closest. they were fast to carry you to the couch in the corner on the practice room, seungmin practically sprinting out of the room to get you cold water and ice from the cooler in the hallway. of course, they knew you had been acting strange, but they never realized it was something so big or detrimental to your health - both physical and mental.

“she feels lighter… god, how did we not notice she’s lost so much weight?” felix practically wailed, his eyes brimming with tears at the sight of you sickly pale and unconscious in his arms.

“when was the last time someone saw her eat?” changbin quizzed, his frown only growing as jeongin piped up.

“forget that for now, when was the last time she had a drink?”

seungmin had reentered the room by that point, a cup of ice and a separate cup of water in each hand. felix had his hands in your hair, fingers tangled between the locks as he stroked your head soothingly. chan had crouched in front of you, cupping your cheek and softly rubbing the skin with his thumb in an effort to gently wake you up.

when consciousness did finally grace you again, you groaned. your head was pounding and you felt gross, and sticky. you tried to sit up, surprised when felix pulled you back down to lean on him from behind you. it was only then that you looked around and took in the worried faces of your boyfriends and bandmates, instantly flushing red in shame that you disrupted practice.

“i’m so sorry–” was all that managed to escape your lips before seungmin held out the cup of water in front of you, swiftly cutting you off.

“drink. we’ve got ice, too, and jisung has a protein bar in his bag that you’re eating, okay?”

you blanched at his words, sipping the water while carefully trying to decide your next words.

“i appreciate it, but i’m fine. i don’t need to wait, i just need some water and i’ll be fine.”

yeah, that sounded good in your head. not too many details, but enough for them to hopefully drop it - at least, you hoped. but unfortunately, the universe didn’t want to work in your favor that day, as you eyes fell on chan and his worried - but stern - face.

“(y/n)...” he started, and your heart dropped at how exhausted and scared he sounded. “what’s going on? when’s the last time you ate? and don’t lie to me, please.”

you sighed, looking around the room and accepting that the game was up. you just hoped they would understand, and they wouldn’t be mad at you. it was bad enough that disrupted practice, you couldn’t handle your boys being disappointed with you too.

“i…” even just looking around the room at the scared faces of your boyfriends, all ideas of lying slipped away from you. “yesterday lunch time. i had a chicken salad…”

you looked at the floor, too scared to face their disappointed stares as you felt felix’s hand shift from your hair to your shoulder. tears were welling under your eyelids no matter how hard you tried to blink them away, and you knew you couldn’t keep it a secret anymore.

“love,” changbin asked softly for his position on the floor next to chan. “is this why you’ve been going to the gym so much? why are you doing this to yourself?”

you shook your head unable to reply, as you felt chan’s hand on your knee.

“we’re just worried, pretty girl. ther’s no need for you to be doing this to yourself, you know that, right?”

you couldn’t help the way you groaned loudly, all your recent frustration pouring out in that moment. it was like a dam had broken, and you couldn’t stop yourself.

“it’s not me! i don’t want this. it hurts and it sucks. it’s– it’s not me.”

“can you elaborate, angel?” felix asked softly, his breath tickling your ear from his proximity to you.

“it’s…” you sighed, knowing that if you didn’t tell them now, then you never would. “it’s the company. that meeting, last week i– they gave me a diet plan. told me i needed to lose weight before the comeback. i just didn’t want to let anyone down…”

your voice slowly trailed off as you gained the confidence to look up, meeting the distraught expressions of your boyfriends. shock, disgust… anger…. you weren’t sure what scared you more in that moment. really, you tuned out everything that was going on around you, sipping your water in hopes of combatting the thudding in your head.

it was only when jeongin crouched in front of you with his signature smile plastered on his lips that you came back to reality. he hed out his hands to you, helping you stand, as everyone packed their belongings up.

“we’re gonna head home, okay? order in some food and have a movie night, if you want that?”

your eyes leaked again at their concern, the group of you leaving the practice room and headed down to the company lobby. “i’d love that, innie… but where are chan and minho going? aren’t they coming home with us?”

he shook his head as the rest of the members, along with yourself, headed out to the cars waiting for you outside the building.

“they’ll be right home - they’re just going to talk to the staff… make some ‘arrangements’, as channie-hyung worded it.”

you were too tired and mentally exhausted to ask any further questions, allowing the boys to bundle you into the car without a fight. when you finally got back to the dorm, felix and jeongin helped you shower, before you met changbin in the bedroom to help you get dried and dressed for bed.

by the time you got back into the living room, chan and minho had arrived home, but they wouldn’t answer any of your questions - opting to give you the television remote instead as they placed bags of takeout food onto the coffee table.

and thats how you spent the night; curled up on the couch with your favourite boys, enjoying takeout and watching movies. it was perfect, and you couldn’t believe you allowed the words of staff members to take this feeling away from you.

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

oh, and you later found out chan and minho had gone into a meeting room all guns blazing, threatening to sue if the company risked your health the way they did ever again. you were never put on another diet plan after that, and used your experience to speak out about the mistreatment of idols due to unobtainable beauty standards. life was good.

taglist: join taglists here @pretty-racha @chubbyanarkiss @taeriffic @mits-vi @chanssmiles @5kayzee @torixx80 @fawnpeaks @bangtanmix73 @savluvsmingi @boi-bi-ahaha @4evrglow @skz-streamer @crybabyychu @demetrisscarf

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

The Man 4

Warnings: non/dubcon, and other dark elements. My username actually says you never asked for any of this.

My warnings are not exhaustive but be aware this is a dark fic and may include potentially triggering topics. Please use your common sense when consuming content. I am not responsible for your decisions.

Character: mob!Lloyd Hansen

Summary: a demanding customer complicates more than your work life.

As usual, I would appreciate any and all feedback. I’m happy to once more go on this adventure with all of you! Thank you in advance for your comments and for reblogging.

You lift your head and stare at the man. Floyd or Lloyd or whatever his name is. You grimace and stand straight. You know better than to say anything but you have no idea what to do. 

“You know, this ain’t half bad,” he holds up the cup, turning it slowly between his thick fingers, “at least you got that going for ya.” 

You blink. You look down and unfold your jacket. You pull it on over your still damp uniform, the bitter scent of espresso wafting up. You untangle your purse strap and slide out your phone. You’re going to have to do something; start job hunting or call your mother and tell her you messed up again. 

As soon as you have a grip on your phone, it’s out of your hand. That man has it in his free hand, thumbing through it as the face recognition caught your image just enough to unlock before being accosted. You take a step forward and stop yourself, as deterred by the steaming coffee as by Bre’s warnings. 

You watch him scroll and flick and tap. You are at a loss. In more way to one.  

He pokes his tongue out, feeling the hairs of his mustache before his mouth seals. His cheek dimples as his blue eyes reflect the screen. He hums dully and curls his lip. 

“Boring,” he shoves the phone back you. 

You take it, barely catching it before it falls out of his hand. Just as quickly, he latches onto your wrist. You squeak and tug back in shock. He keeps a hold on you and bring the cup to his mouth. He uses his teeth to pop the lid off and let’s it drop to the ground. He raises the cup above you. 

“No, please!” You beg as you look up. 

He guffaws and tips it slightly then pulls it back as you whimper. He keeps it over you as he squeezes your arm until it hurts. Your eyes are almost crossed as you stare up at another caffeine deluge. 

“You gonna cry for me? Come on. I want more, baby cakes. Let me see those tears.” 

“Please, sir--” 

He chuckles, “there it is,” he purrs and retracts his arm, swigging from the cup with a loud sigh to cap it off, “you know, that’s all I wanted. Respect.” 

He lets you go and you bend your arm to your chest, rubbing your wrist. He swirls the cup and takes one last gulp, draining it and tossing it onto the cracked pavement. You watch the cup bounce around as the wall of his body keeps you penned in the alley. 

You look up at him dolefully. You just want to slink home in shame. He got his victory. You wipe your wet cheeks and sniff back the last of your grief. You’ll find another coffee shop, hopefully far from this man. 

“You know, that was so delicious, I’m feeling nice. Why don’t I give you a ride?” He offers, “you in a hurry? Got somewhere to be?”  

He's mocking you. Your cheeks pinch and you webbed lashes flutter. You shake your head, “no thank you, sir.” 

You take a step to the side and he mirrors you. You stop and peer up at him. You frown. There’s no getting past him. He’s tall and surely stronger than you. Not to mention the obvious disparities between you. 

“Pardon me, sir,” you gesture past him, “may I get through?” 

“I didn’t dismiss you,” he tilts his head, “get in the car.” 

Your eyes skitter back and forth. You see a car by the curb. It’s flashy enough that you can match it to the man before you. His command makes your stomach mulch. It’s not a good idea. 

“That’s really nice of you but uh... I don’t live very far.” 

“Not asking,” he crosses his arms and widens his stance, “you got a thick head, don’t ya?” 

You wince. Why does he have to be so rude? Your lip pokes out and your brows furrow. 

“You don’t have to be such a meanie,” you murmur. 

He scoffs and raises a hand to cup his ear, “what was that, sweet lips? Gonna have to speak up.” 

“You’re a meanie,” you say loud and grip the strap of your bag, “and I don’t want a ride from a meanie.” 

You stamp your foot and turn. You march away, heart-racing, mind too. You don’t know what you’re doing but you know you should be doing it. Still, you can’t stop yourself. If you don’t get away from him, you’re going to do something even worse. 

You’re not sure what’s at the other end of the alley. You’re still learning the city. You refuse to look back as you pass the dumpster. A cackle follows you, echoing along the brick walls. 

“Oh, cupcake,” he calls after you with delightful spite, “big fucking mistake.” 

Your feet hammer faster on the ground. You’re dizzy with fear and dread. As you get to the far end of the alley and come out onto the street, you dare to glance behind you. You see him standing there, glaring at you. He stays like that for a moment longer before he turns on his heel. 

He disappears and the distant hum of an engine sees him away. You frown and turn to face the unfamiliar street. He’s gone now but you know you haven’t seen the last of him. 

[toomuchracket]

promises to keep (flatmate!matty x reader fluff)

matty made a promise to do something for you before you dated, and this is what happens when an opportunity to fulfil it arises once you're together - kinda sorta a sequel to this, but can be read standalone. day 4 of valentine's week. enjoy <3

“matthew? have you got a minute?”

shit. the full name. 

gritting his teeth in a grimace, matty puts down his guitar and follows your voice. “coming now, sweetheart.”

“much appreciated,” comes your tetchy reply. matty winces, wracking his brain in an attempt to figure out why you're not best pleased with him right now, but he comes up short.

he gets it as soon as he enters the kitchen, though; the french press in your hand - and the grumpiness on your pretty, sleepy face - reminds him of everything he needs to know. it also almost manages to stop matty from missing the fact you’re wearing his glassjaw hoodie, a pair of fluffy socks, and very little else. almost. “ah, fuck.”

“indeed,” you say, putting the cafetiere on the counter and frowning (quite adorably, to be honest) at your boyfriend. “actually, that was my exact phrasing when i came in here for a coffee, only to find that the grounds from the last cup hadn't been emptied.”

“m'sorry, baby,” matty moves to hug you.

you, however, have other ideas, and put your arm out to keep him back. “nope! no chance! absolutely not! you can't boyfriend your way out of this one, healy, this is a flatmate issue.”

matty sighs, but he can't exactly argue - the rules on emptying the coffee grounds have been finite since you moved in, the only way to ensure two caffeine-dependent people could cohabit in relative peace. “you're right. i really am sorry, darlin - let me clean it out now, and i'll make you a coffee, yeah?”

“thank you,” your face softens, into the cheeky smirk that never fails to make matty's heart feel funny. “would you make me a bit of toast, too, while you're at it?”

“it'll cost you a kiss, that one.”

“s'pose i could fork out for that,” you wrap your arms around matty's neck, hands sliding home into his hair to pull him down for a kiss. he dips you as you make out, like the two of you are lovers in an old hollywood romance film, and you giggle against his lips as he gently pulls you back to stand. “that was fun!”

“i was kinda scared i'd drop you, i won't lie.”

you laugh, ruffling matty's hair before taking a seat at the breakfast bar. “i would've dragged you with me if you had.”

“i'd expect nothing less,” he smiles, rinsing the coffee grounds from the press and holding it up to the light to check its cleanliness, before popping two slices of bread in the toaster. “what d'you want on your toast, by the way, babe?”

“hmm,” you tilt your head. “do we still have nutella?”

matty squints as he wracks his brain, then rummages around in one of the cupboards. “aha!” he emerges triumphant, almost-empty jar in hand. “enough for toast. but i'll need to get more before the weekend.”

“why? you don't even like it that much.”

“well, what else am i going to put on your valentine’s breakfast pancakes?”

you beam. “am i getting breakfast in bed?”

“course you are,” matty runs over to kiss your nose. “you're getting spoiled, sweetheart.”

“so are you. i was gonna keep it a surprise, but…” you pause dramatically. “i bought new lingerie.”

he drops the butter knife in shock. it hits the countertop with a clatter, and his head almost follows suit. “fuck,” he croaks out. “what colour?”

“dark red. your favourite,” you smile. “i look really sexy in it.”

“i bet you do, baby,” matty sighs happily, pouring coffee into your favourite mug. “can't wait to get into that hotel room and take it off you.”

“me either. and thank you for organising all that, my love. m’excited,” you smile, leaning up to kiss matty as he brings your breakfast over. “thank you for this, too. love you.”

“love you,” he kisses you again. “bring it to the living room? wanna cuddle.”

you nod, picking up your mug and plate and following matty through. he settles on the sofa first, arranging the blankets draped over it and taking your plate from you as you snuggle into his arms. with a kiss to your head, he flicks the tv on, and the two of you sit in contented silence for a little while - with the exception of you crunching your toast - watching animal park. 

matty nudges you when the camera zooms in on a pair of lions curled up together on a rock. “us.”

“really?” you snort, putting your plate on the coffee table. “you think we're lions?”

“yeah. you're the brains behind everything, and i just chill out and have really cool hair.”

you laugh, bringing his hand to your lips and kissing it. “you're an idiot, healy.”

“but i'm your idiot. and i'm right,” matty looks down at you, grinning. “and you've got a little bit of nutella on your lip. here, let me,” he leans down and kisses it away. “there.”

“thanks, lover,” you stretch, snuggling back into your boyfriend with a sigh. “the lions are boring me a bit now, though. what else is on?”

“hmm, let's see,” matty clicks through channels, watching each for a couple of seconds before continuing to search - only when a familiar shot of a girl curled up in a chair reading the bell jar appears does he stop. “oh! babe, look! 10 things!”

“aww, i love this film,” you curl up even further into him, playing with the neck of his t-shirt. “remember when we watched this together in my room?”

matty's voice is quiet when he answers, but you can hear him smile. “thought about it every day since we did, darlin.”

he grins bashfully when you turn to look at him, open-mouthed. you smile, too, so sweetly that it hurts his heart. “same. it was all i ever wanted, to be so intimate like that with you,” you reach up to stroke his face. “best feeling in the world, knowing i get to do it for real now.”

all matty can do is softly hold your face and kiss you, until he runs out of breath and has to pull away from your chocolate-flavoured lips; even then, though, he keeps his hands on your jaw, and murmurs against your lips. “my dream girl. m'so in love with you.”

“i love you so much,” you whisper. “d'you wanna keep watching this, then?”

“course. rite of passage, innit?” your boyfriend grins, tugging you onto his lap and wrapping his arms around you. you turn to kiss him softly once more, then rest your head against his chest and look at the screen. 

the time passes a lot like it did the last time you and matty did this, but instead of mutual pining and an undercurrent of sadness knowing you weren't really together, it's just completely… lovely. you press kisses to each other's heads and hands and lips, and just bask uninterrupted in the love evident between the two of you in the room. aside from the kisses, you don't even move.

that is, until the scene matty knows is your favourite begins. he grins, shifting you slightly further up on his lap so he can look at you properly, and begins to sing into your ear along with heath ledger onscreen. “you're just too good to be true, can't take my eyes off of you…”

your cheeks lift into a smile, and matty can practically feel the heat radiating off them. but still, you keep your eyes on the tv, the only proper acknowledgement of matty's singing being the way you softly squeeze his thigh.

“... you'd be like heaven to touch, i wanna hold you so much,” he continues, resting his head against yours and smiling when you giggle, then taking your hand. “at long last love has arrived, and i thank god i'm alive,” he moves his hand up to gently turn your head, singing the last bit to your adorably flustered smiling face. “you're just too good to be true, can't take my eyes off of you.”

you laugh joyously when he stops singing - the best sound matty thinks he's ever heard - and pull him into a kiss. “you're serenading me?!”

“you asked me to, first time we watched this,” matty smiles warmly, tucking a stray strand of hair behind your ear. “and i promised you i would.”

“i did?” your brow furrows so cutely. “you did?”

“just as you fell asleep. therefore,” he grins, taking a deep breath before literally belting. “i love you, baby, and if it's quite alright i need you, baby, to warm the lonely nights. i love you, baby - trust in me when i say…”

you beam, wrapping your arms around his neck and swaying as you join in the song. “oh, pretty baby, don’t bring me down, i pray,” the two of you giggle as you sing, and matty's never been so in love in his life. “oh, pretty baby, now that i've found you, stay, and let me love you, baby, let me love you.”

as your voices fade out, matty leans forward and kisses you chastely; he beams and caresses your cheek when he pulls back. “thank you for letting me keep my promise. and for singing with me - that was lovely. should get you on the next album.”

“no, i think i'm content with just singing to you at home,” you smile, playing with the curls at the nape of his neck. “thank you for doing that for me. always found it really romantic, that scene and that song. but you know how i am about pda, so what you just did was really perfect,” you kiss him again. “i honestly can't remember you making that promise, though.”

“i think you had already fallen asleep on me, darlin,” matty giggles. “but i wanted to keep it, anyway. and speaking of promises to keep,” his face goes a bit more serious, but still tender, as he picks up your left hand and kisses your ring finger - your breath catches in your throat, eyes widening and welling up. “gonna marry you someday. i mean it.”

you nod, a teary smile on your beautiful face, and pull him into a hug. “i can't wait.”

[annie-creates]

Life without you

Pairing: Abby Anderson x reader

Genre: fluff

Words: 1000

Note: This is a cute little comfort fluffy fic.

With a heavy sigh you close the door of your small apartment in the Firefly base, shrugging your jacket off and placing your shoes by the door. The living room is quiet and dark, not even the kitchenette light left on. No wonder the place is vacant, it must be long past midnight at this point. Not having the energy to even eat you quickly brush your teeth changing into the pajamas you left in the bathroom this morning. You’re trying to keep quiet, not wanting to disturb the night peace of the place. Carefully you open the bedroom door, your girlfriends form steadily breathing on her side of bed.

You whine in pain as you sit on your side of the bed trying to relieve your tensed up muscles, the mattress dipping under your weight. With the many people who kept arriving at your camp, a lot of them needed your help as a doctor. Count in your regular patients and those who got hurt during patrols and hunting and you were overwhelmed with work. Sleep was a foreign concept to you at this point, your body running solely on caffeine and cold showers. The rare nights when you could take the time to actually go home and sleep you returned deep into the night and left before sunrise, hardy even having the time for a conversation with your girlfriend.

“Hi.” Comes from behind you and you feel the duvets shifting.

“Sorry, I didn’t want to wake you up.” You apologize in a tender voice.

“You didn’t.” But it’s clearly not true. “A lot of work?”

“A crazy lot of work.” You admit crawling into bed, Abby offering her strong embrace to you. “I wouldn’t even wish upon anyone to see it.”

“That bad?” She chuckles amused.

“Nah, even worse.” Is all you say because the last thing you want to talk about when finally coming home is your never-ending work again.

Your mind goes back to a year ago when Abby joined the fireflies, needing your medical help herself. She was a much different person back then, hurt and skinny, but also guarded and insecure. She came out of her shell a lot over the time, being an amazing companion, endlessly supportive and caring. She always understood when you had too much work or needed her to reassure you in your skills. Her hair had grown out to a shot bob now and she built her muscles into a strong frame.

“When was the last time you slept?” She asks watching the dark bags under your beautiful eyes.

“Um, Monday? What day is it?” You answer unsure, your mind and eyes already too heavy to hold a meaningful conversation.

“Thursday.” From her vice it’s clear Abby doesn’t approve of this, but all she does is tighten her hold on you.

She carefully caresses your back and you play with her short hair. You told her how beautiful she’d look with it longer, but she’s adamant on not letting it grow longer than her collar bones. It’s practical, won’t get in her way in a fight, she always says, but you can see she has deeper reasons not to want long hair she’s not yet ready to share with you. As you’re falling into slumber, a harsh knock on the front door startles you awake.

“Really?” You complain under your breath getting up to open the door before your girlfriend can stop you.

You open the door to find the west group’s captain on the other side, tapping his foot impatiently. You can already guess where this is going, waving your sleep a goodbye in your head for another night. Sometimes it felt like the planet would stop turning and freeze over if you took just thirty minutes to have a break. You contemplate shutting the door in his face but you’re just not that kind of person, besides there could be an actual emergency needing your attention.

“What can I do for you?” You offer instead.

“I need you to come look at one of our guys, he got an arrow to his knee and…” He keeps rumbling.

“Do you know what time it is!?” shutting him up your girlfriend inserts herself into the door frame, her arms already folded over her broad chest in anger. “You have like ten other doctors to look after him, let this one have a night of sleep, Jesus Christ.”

“But he’s…” He tries to argue with her, not knowing it’s equivalent to signing your own death certificate.

“He’s not going to die till morning. For fucks sake.” Not letting him continue she shuts the door with a harsh swing. “You really need to learn how to say no sometimes.” She admonishes you being in a rage.

“Thank you, my knight in a shining armor.” It’s only half joke because you know deep down she’s right and people need to stop using you so much. “What would I do without you.”

“Die of sleep deprivation.” The look on her face is serious but you see it in her eyes she’s not actually mad at you.

Hugging her neck you give her a loving kiss, content you might actually get some sleep in tonight now. She picks you up forcing you to hang your lets around her waist and carries you back to bed, wrapping herself around you like a snake to stop you from getting up again and also because she loves your affection and scent. It wasn’t hard to get sleepy again in her warm embrace full of love and care.

“Now sleep.” She commands you and you have no intention to disobey her.

Sometimes you really didn’t know what you’d do without her, but she felt equally lost in the world without you. She couldn’t let you get yourself hurt one way or another, partly because she wouldn’t know what to do with herself if you weren’t by her side. At this point she couldn’t imagine her life without you.

[itsnotgray]

We're living different lives

Heaven only knows

If we'll make it back with all our fingers and our toes

Five years, twenty years, come back

It will always be the same

For the first time since the end of August, all of the Fantilli siblings would be under one roof. Albeit, only for three days, but it was three days that they were determined to make count.

Luca was the first to fly home, following the conclusion of the first semester. About a week later, came the twins. First was Gianna, who left straight from the rink in Nashville (as Luca could tell by the wet hair she was sporting), nearly forgetting to even tell her teammates she was leaving, eager for whatever scraps of time she could get with her family.

The minute his baby sister stepped off that plane, it was as if someone had lifted the weight of the world off his shoulders. He threw his arms around her, smothering his face in her hair as he inhaled the scent of the shampoo she’d been using since she was 14. Gianna returned the sentiment, clinging onto her older brother as if he was the only thing keeping her afloat. “Lu,” she cried into his shoulder, the relief of being reunited with one of her brothers, one of the people whose presence had been so distinctly woven into her life force, that the past few months of separation has been akin to torture, making it’s way to the surface. “Gi,” he said soothingly, tilting her head back so he could wipe her tears, the same way he used to when she was learning to skate all those years ago. A watery smile made its way onto his face as he uttered the words he’d been rehearsing for the past week, “Welcome back sorella.”

At the familiar term of endearment only her family was privy to, she launched herself at Luca, her arms encircling his neck as she began crying again. At last, her tears dried up, and she unpried herself from her Luca, mostly at the insistence of her stomach. “Now, can I go grab a snack before Mo gets here? I’d wait, but I haven’t eaten since before the game yesterday,” Gianna questioned while quickly taking out her phone to make sure her face wasn’t too terribly swollen from the tears she’d just shed. “Sure Gi, go ahead,” he responded while glancing down at his phone to check for any updates from Adam. A few beats of silence passed, before Luca glanced up, confused as to why she hadn’t walked away. He locked eyes with Gianna, who stood there awkwardly, rocking back and forth on her heels. “Do you want anything?” She questioned, voice as earnest as it always had been. He shook his head softly, and she quickly pivoted on her feet and made her way to the nearest coffee shop. Luca stared after her, a small smile on his face- it was like the old days. As long as he ignored the looming feeling of dread, dread at the fact that their time was limited, that she and Adam (who wasn’t even here yet) both left in two (technically three) days, he could pretend it was just like the old days.

Around an hour later, the third piece of their puzzle was getting off of his flight. Luca shook Gianna awake, who had fallen asleep on his shoulder shortly after returning with her snack, and barely got out the words, “Mo’s flight just landed,” before she shot up out of her seat, as if pure caffeine had just been injected into her veins. Without haste, Gianna threw herself to her feet, before quickly turning around and yanking Luca to his. “C’mon Lu, be ready- wait, which direction will he be coming from?” She spoke, the words rolling off of her tongue, too fast for her brain to comprehend, excitement taking over her body at the prospect of finally being in the same place as both of her brothers. “Should come from the left, if I scoped out the place correctly,” he said while wrapping an arm around her shoulders, as if to hold the girl back from sprinting to Adam the second she saw him.

About twenty minutes pass, before finally, Gianna catches a glimpse of the “stupid and entirely unnecessary” beanie she forced Adam to wear, so they’d be able to spot the boy from a distance. “Lu I think see him,” Gianna expressed excitedly, the girl beginning to bounce up and down on her heels, Once Adam got within a few feet of the pair, both siblings took off towards Adam, wrapping him in what their parents (who had elected to stay home, both to give the siblings time to reunite, but also to get some sleep- which they knew would be hard to do having all of their babies under one roof again) would call a “Fantilli take-down,” mostly because, had Adam not planted his feet on the ground in preparation, he easily would've fallen straight to the airport ground, which he was not about to do. The moment he felt the arms of his siblings encase him, he dropped his bags to the floor and wove his arms around someone, though he wasn't sure who, because their three bodies were so intricately woven together in this moment, it was impossible to tell where Luca ended and Gianna began. He tried to force a few words out of his mouth, but the emotional shell shock at finally reuniting with his best friends had seemingly made his brain short circuit. Yet, there was no doubt that the silent sobs that wracked his shoulders, and the tears on his cheeks said all of the words he couldn’t.

For this one brief moment, it was like the world stopped. For the first time in about four months, the pieces of the tattered, kindred spirits that resided in the each of three siblings, were at peace. At that moment, they were one soul, split into three hearts.

[bingo6776]

Amber Freeman x Reader

disgustingly unedited, ive never written for Amber freeman before but shes bae and hot so yk heyo. if theres any feedback or ideas, my asks or dm are open

probs ooc? again idek im just sleep deprived 

1.6k

You were tired.

You were completely and totally exhausted.

 You had barely slept last night after you had heard about the murders, another fuck face trying to make a name for themselves whilst hiding under the Ghostface mask. Why did you still live in Woodsboro? Fuck knows.

 You were scared shitless, who knew who the next victim was going to be? Whilst as far as you knew, you had no ties to the original Woodsboro murderers or actual reason to be targeted, that didn’t prevent the anxiety that consumed your entire being, feeling like you were edging closer and closer to a break down as said anxiety played ‘keep aways’ with your sleep.

 So yeah, its suffice to say that 8 hours of the barbaric education system was not good for your health, mental or physical.

 Hence, why you were more so dragging your feet than actually walking through the hallways. You didn’t even have the energy to dodge most of the students that were too caught up in their own worlds to pay attention to the fact that other people actually existed and wouldn’t just part like the red sea for them. Instead, you made a mental list of the all the people that slammed into your shoulder, swearing that one day you’d smite them down – the kind of thoughts only a sleep deprived, and still overly caffeinated person would have.

 All you wanted to do was go home, get into the baggiest, most homeless looking outfit you had and watch movies.

 And at some point spam Amber until she ‘caved’ (jumped in her car the first chance she got) and came over to indulge in your lazy evening.

 Which is why, when your eyes finally laned on your girlfriend, you felt some of your tension leave your body, a warmth filling its place.

 She was leaning up against one of the wall lockers, a scowl on her face as she watched Wes and Mindy argue you with one another, rolling her eyes occasionally as if they were something much more important she should be doing than listen to the childish bickering her friends had daily.

 As you shuffled closer to the group, you let a small smile tug at your tired features as Amber’s gaze landed on you, her bored, aggravated expression softening slightly at the edges as her face relaxed, her lips titling up slightly in a smirk instead of an actual smile.

 Amber Freeman may be soft as fuck for you, but she was very much still the dark, brooding Amber everyone else knew. Just with you, she was slightly warmer, less sharp edged.

 Once you had gotten close enough to the group, she wrapped an arm around your shoulder, the other hand simultaneously pulling your bag from you as she flung the backpack across her own shoulder, ignoring the teasing look from Mindy and the eye roll from Wes as he tried to reegange Mindy in their conversation.

 At seeing the way your body seemingly slumped in on itself, every movement taking more energy than it plausibly should, she placed a gentle kiss on your forehead.

 “Is everything okay, my love?” she uttered lowly, looking at you with such an openly worried expression you almost melted on the spot.

 You simply hummed in response as you leant into her body, your face landing in the crook of her neck as your arms encircled her waist, “just tired.”

 “Aww, would you just look at these adorable little love birds we’ve got here?” you heard Mindy tease, no doubt a cocky grin on her face. If you actually cared, you’d pull yourself away from Amber’s grounding embrace to flip her off, but did you care? Honestly, not a single fuck was given.

 You were far too sleepy, and much more comfortable with the warmth Amber exuded to give a fuck about anything, actually.

 One of Ambers arms left you shoulders, probably doing the flipping off for you. “If you don’t shut the fuck up, and fuck off right now, I’m going to kill you,” the sweet voice Amber forced on made the threat seem even more haunting. “Very slowly.”

 You lightly poked at her side, you knew she’d never actually hurt one of her friends, but you’d spoken about the right time and place to threaten people with death. School after an attempted murder was most definitely not one of them.

 “C’mon, Amber, you know I could take your ass,” Mindy quipped, knowing full well that whilst you had wrapped yourself around the taller girl, Amber wouldn’t move a muscle until you let her go.

 “You fucking wish,” you girlfriend practically growled out. “You wouldn’t even last two minutes.”

 “Oh, yeah, wanna bet? Come at me right now then, if you’re so big and bad.”

 Sighing heavily, you placed a soft kiss on Amber’s neck. “I swear to all that is good and holy, if you even think about moving right now, I’m going to be the one killing you, do not test me.”

 Mindy could barely hold back the laugh that overtook her body at the murderous glare Amber shot her way instead of, well, actually shooting her – unbeknownst to Mindy it was a very real, and a rapidly growing, possibility.

 It was honestly comical to see the sarcastic and at times outright scary, Amber Freeman trying to intimidate the other girl, whilst you were clinging to her body like Amber was your saving grace, the only source of warmth in the middle of the Antarctic.

 Yet, as amusing as it was, even Mindy eventually got bored of the banter which eventually simmered to one sided taunts as you silently soothed Amber’s simmering anger. So, being the mature person Mindy believed she was, she wandered away to go see how riled up she could get her twin instead.

 Once you heard Mindy’s steps retreat in the emptying hallway, you pulled away slightly from Ambers body, keeping your arms around her waist.

 “You know, if you keep wishing death on your friends, people might start to think you’re the new Ghostface,” you looked up at her, eyes trailing how her lips drew up in a lazy smile, your eyes eventually locking onto her own, and the all too familiar feeling of falling into the dark orbs encompassed your body.

 “Please. Little old me? I wouldn’t hurt a fly,” her voice was gentle, her gaze soft as she slowly leant down, her lips grazing yours as she whispered the last of her sentence before she finally planted a soft kiss onto your waiting lips.

 it only lasted a few seconds before Amber pulled away, one of her hands running through your hair before landing at your neck. For a few seconds you just stood like that, arms around each other, letting the rare instance of quiet fall over you.

 You knew for sure that if you had walked in on such a seemingly intimate moment between another couple at school, you’d gag and cringe as you poured bleach into your eyes.

 But with Amber it was different, everything was just so overwhelmingly perfect that at times you found yourself wondering when it was all going to go shattering to the ground, leaving you heartbroken. As soon as those thoughts would take hold, Amber would be there. Whispering sweet nothings to you as she held you close.

 Before you fell too deeply into your thoughts, you felt Ambers arms leave your body, her hand clasping onto one of your own as your arms fell to your sides.

 “So, go ahead. Spill, what’s got you so tired today, hm?” she gently ran her thumb up and down your hand as you began walking towards the parking lot, where your friends where waiting before the group eft for the lunch period.

 “After everything that happened with Tara, its been hard to do anything, let alone sleep,” for a second you saw something flash across Amber’s face, but it was gone as quick as it had come, the only sign that anything had changed at all was in the way she pulled you close as she stopped walking.

 Placing a delicate kiss to the back of your hand, Amber tried to keep her voice steady, “as long as you’re with me, I promise you with every ounce of blood in my body that you’ll be safe,” she looked deeply into your eyes, trying to convey that she’d lay her own life down if it meant you could keep yours, “I’ll protect you.”

 Shocked by the sudden deepness to her words, a deepness you didn’t completely grasp, you only blinked up at her.

 After a beat of silence, you smiled up at her. “I know, I know. I trust you,” not liking the heavy silence that weighed on your shoulders, a far cry from the way you could both usually spend hours in a comfortable silence, just enjoying each other’s presence, you smirked up at her, “plus, you know I’d have Ghostface on his ass before the bitch could blink.”

 A mischievous smile crept onto Amber’s face, “oh, really?” she jokingly leant back slight, as if she was assessing how likely that would be – you both knew it was complete bullshit, but hey, you never know right?

 “You best bet, bitch,” you resumed the walk to your friends, tugging your girlfriend behind you as she let out a loud laugh, the sound you rarely ever heard outside of the confines of one of your bedrooms leading you to laugh alongside her as people around you both gave you concerned look as the ever so stoic girl laughed in a way that sounded… free of sadistic intent?

 Yeah, Amber was most definitely a simp.

[allthesmutl0vers]

Entirely Forbidden and Completely Fucked. Wincest fanfic- Chapter Two

MDNI, 18+, NSFW

Pairing: Sam x Dean, Sam x Reader x Dean, Reader x John

Trigger Warnings: Graphic Wincest sex scene, implied feelings for John by the reader (no sex...yet)

Thank you so much for every like🫶 Reblogs and comments are always appreciated, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Chapter Two

Y/n

“Come on guys, up at ‘em,” John says, ripping open the curtains. I cover my eyes with my arm to block out the sudden intrusion of light. 

Was this guy raised in a fucking barn? Who wakes people up like that?

Sam groans in the next bed but gets up, and Dean gets up without a word. I sigh, rub the sleep from my eyes, and stretch my arms out in front of me. “I’m going to get coffee, and I expect everyone to be ready to go when I get back,” John says, grabbing his keys. “Don’t be a dick,” he says to Dean, pointing a finger at him before walking out the door. 

I stand up, pull my hair back into a messy ponytail, and put on my black, square-lens glasses. My eye contacts dried out, and I don’t have another pair, which reminds me that I need to get my prescription transferred to wherever John and them live. 

I grab the backpack that I grabbed from the car last night and pull out another pair of shorts, a T-shirt, socks and underwear. 

“Going somewhere?” Dean asks, finally acknowledging my existence. 

“Considering I’m holding clothes, I’m going to say ‘to shower,’” I quip. I’m not a morning person, and Dean doesn’t get to be a fucking asshole and expect me to be nice before I’ve had caffeine. 

Dean rolls his eyes and scoffs. “Sorry, princess. You’re going to have to wait. I always go first.” He says, walking past me to the bathroom. 

I clench my jaw and take a deep breath. I’m too tired for this shit right now.  “Whatever, go,” I wave my hand and set my clothes on the bed. 

“Don’t mind if I do,” Dean says with a mocking laugh and closes the door. 

I exhale deeply and rub my eyes under my glasses. I try to imagine what it must be like for him, going from not having or maybe even not knowing you have a half-sister to having her thrown at you. But at the same time, my Mom just fucking died. I don’t want to be here anymore than they don’t want me here. The only reason I am here is because I don’t turn eighteen for two months. But after that, I’m out of here.

“He’ll warm up. He just needs some time.” Sam says, putting a hand on my shoulder. 

I shrug. “It’s whatever. I’m going to smoke,” I respond, pulling my vape and dab pens from my bag and slipping on my Vans.

“Smoke like cigarettes?” Sam asks curiously. 

I stand up and face him, holding up my vape and dab pen. “No, smoke like a vape and some weed,” I flick them around in my finger and walk by him, opening the door. I turn around and look at him. “Wanna join?” I ask. 

Sam shakes his head, and the corner of his mouth lifts into a smile. “I’m good, maybe next time,” 

“Suit yourself,” I shrug and walk out of the hotel room and into the morning sun, closing the door behind me. I sit down on the steps and let out a sigh. 

Maybe I should just leave. I could say I’m going to the corner store for a vape and just take my shit with me. I have enough cash for a bus ticket wherever I want, and my inheritance will be mine once I turn eighteen. 

I think it over as I hit my vape and take a couple of hits off my dab pen. I have around two grand saved up from the job I had since mom never wanted me to spend my own money but to save it instead. I could definitely make it for two months if I stay in a cheap hotel and don’t go book or clothes shopping. I scoff to myself. 

Maybe just buy a couple of books to kill the time.

I sigh and decide that just leaving is my best option. Maybe I can’t go home, but I can stay in Washington, and that’s all I really want right now. I go to hit my vape again, and it’s dead. “Shit,” I mutter to myself and stand up. I groan in frustration.

I really don’t want to go back in there.

I weigh my options: either go to buy a new one or go back in to grab my backup. I don’t have my bags yet, so backup it is. I walk back to the hotel room and open the door, only to be staring right at an ass-naked Dean and a shirtless Sam. 

“Fuck!” Dean exclaims, covering himself up. “Would it kill you to fucking knock?” He asks me angrily. 

I look over at Sam, who is beet fucking red and throwing on a shirt. “Uh, I didn’t know I needed to,” I respond. 

“Well, get the fuck out,” Dean says as he marches over to me. He towers over me, not as much as Sam, but pretty damn close. 

“Last time I checked, I’m staying here too, asshole,” I push past him and grab my clothes and walk to the bathroom. I close the door and lean against it, the steam in the air warming up my skin. 

I thought Dean was showering. So why is Sam’s hair wet, too? What the actual fuck did I just walk into? Or, almost walk into? Were they…no. No, no fucking way. I’m just tired, that’s all. 

I’m not thinking straight. 

No fucking kidding. 

I hurry up and take my shower, being as quick as I can. Just as I turn the water off and step out I hear John’s voice. “Where’s y/n?” He asks. 

“Shower,” that’s Sam’s voice. 

I quickly get dressed so I don’t keep them waiting. I need enough time to give them my excuse and grab my bags before they realize I’m gone. I curse myself for spending precious seconds wondering why Dean and Sam’s hair was wet at the same time, which was fucking stupid. Men shower faster than women, and I was outside for at least fifteen minutes. They probably showered one after the other. They must have. 

A knock sounds on the door. “Chop, chop, kid. Time to get a move on,” John says from the other side. 

“Coming,” I respond, opening the door and putting my glasses back on. “I need to run to the corner store. What time were you planning on heading out?” I ask John as I grab my bag.

“Right now. We can stop on the way out of town,” he says, handing me a coffee and pulling his keys back out of his pocket. 

Goddamnit. There goes my shot to do it now.

“Oh, so you’ll stop for her but not us?” Dean remarks, slinging his bag over his shoulder. 

“Shut up and load the damn car, Dean,” John says, tossing Dean his keys. “We have a long drive back to Kansas, and there will be other opportunities to stop. So quit your bitching.”

Hold up, did he just say Kansas?

“Need me to carry your bag?” Sam asks me, pulling me from my thoughts on improvising another way away from them. 

“Huh? Oh, no, I’m good. Thank though,” I smile softly and walk past him and John and out the door. 

I throw my backpack in the back seat, pull out my dab pen, take another big hit, and bend over, coughing hard. I don’t know when we’ll be stopping next and I don’t think John would want me smoking in the car, so I want to make it count. 

“You good?” Dean asks, standing next to me by the passenger front door. 

“I,” I cough again. “I’m fine. What do you care?” I ask, blinking away the tears from coughing so hard. 

“I don’t,” Dean shrugs. “Just don’t feel like burying a body today.” He says cooly.

What the fuck?

“Very funny, Dean,” I roll my eyes and take another hit, my head already feeling lighter. 

“I wasn’t joking. I’m not in the mood for it today. What are you even smoking anyway?” He asks, pointing to my dab pen in my hand.

I blow the smoke in his face. “You tell me,” I quip with a smirk before coughing again, this time not as bad. 

“Smells like weed, but not?” Dean guesses. 

“Wow, really perspective,” I say sarcastically. “It’s a dab pen.”

“Dab pen?” Dean asks curiously, sipping his coffee. “What is that? Some kind of new weed or something?”

“It’s weed; it's just processed into an oil, which is what’s in here,” I explain, pointing to the oil in the tank. “It makes it more discrete, the smell isn’t as strong, and I don’t have to whip out a bong and spend twenty minutes finding a lighter. Plus, it’s more potent.” I explain. 

Dean pokes out his bottom lip and nods in interest. “Hm, alright then.”I nod, pull out my backup vape, and take a hit off of that as well. “And what’s that?” he asks.

“It’s a nicotine vape. I hate the smell and taste of cigarettes.” 

Dean actually laughs. “Same here,” he says, looking over his shoulder back at the hotel room. “Look,” he says, facing me again. “I’m sorry about yesterday, I shouldn’t have been such a dick.”

“I get it,” I shrug. “John said you’re a little standoffish.”

“You say John a lot,” he says curiously. “He’s your dad too, isn’t he?”

“Depends on your definition of ‘dad,’” I tell him as I lean against the Impala. “Biologically, yeah, he is. But other than that, he’s just a guy who randomly came around once or twice a year when he had ‘business in town,’” I air quote with my fingers. 

Dean nods, and his jaw ticks again. “Do you know what that business was?” he asks. 

I shake my head. “Didn’t bother to ask, and he didn’t bother to explain.” 

Dean nods again. “Well, look,” he sighs and scratches his head. “I’ve never had a sister before. It’s only ever been me and Sammy, so…” 

“Don’t worry, I won’t be around that long,” I look over the car into the distance. 

“Oh, um, okay,” Dean says with a hint of surprise in his voice. 

“Alright, let's roll,” John says as he and Sam approach the car.

We all climb in, me and Sam in the back and Dean up front with John. 

I wonder if I can get a map of bus routes along the way.

Sam

This morning was too close a call. Me and Dean know how long Dad takes to get coffee, but I got so caught up in the heat of the moment, that I completely forgot she was there when I went to shower with Dean. It was worth every second of it, though, and I can’t bring myself to regret it. 

Having her here has brought up feelings that I wasn’t prepared for. When she walked through the door with Dad… Fuck, I haven’t looked at anyone like that besides Dean in so long. My dick was entirely confused. And I can’t help then whenever Dad mentions that she’s our sister, half or full, it doesn’t matter. My dick swells in my jeans. 

I shouldn’t want her this way. 

To be fair, I shouldn’t want Dean this way, either, but I do. I can still remember the day the dam finally broke between us. We were at Bobby’s two years ago, and Dad had dropped us up for a week. 

“Hey,” I greet Dean, opening the door to the garage. He’s pissed that Dad left us here. He said he had business to take of in Washington and that we had to stay here.

Dean looks up from the car he’s taking apart. “Hey, Sammy,” he says, leaning back over the open hood. His shirt is tucked into his back pocket, and sweat drips down his chiseled chest. I’ve never been so nervous in my life, but this is Dean. If I can tell anyone anything, it’s Dean.

It’s always been Dean.

I clear my throat and step closer, tucking my hands into the front pockets of my jeans. “So, um, I want to talk to you about something,” I start to say, but when he looks up at me with that smoldering gaze, the words escape my mind. 

Dean looks me up and down, wiping his hands on the shirt in his back pocket, and stands up straight. “What?” he asks.

It shouldn’t be this hard, but my hands shake, and the cut on my abdomen stings. I bite the corner of my lower lip. Should I just come out and say it? 

Dean walks closer, noticing my nervousness. “How’s your cut?” he asks, reaching for the end of my shirt. 

“It’s,” I clear my throat. “It’s okay,” I lie. It hurts like a bitch, but I won’t admit it.

Dean lifts my shirt, revealing the cut that he mended last night. “I thought we agreed to never lie to each other Sammy,” he says without looking at me. His fingers graze the gauze taped over the wound.

My skin heats at his touch, taking my mind off of the sting. “We did,” I agree, watching as his gaze moves from my wound and up to my eyes and his eyebrows furrow. I take a deep breath, and Dean watches as my jaw ticks. “But we’ve both been lying for a long time,” I tell him, hoping he’ll know what I mean. 

Dean sucks in a breath, and I know he gets what I mean. Of course he does, he always knows what I’m thinking, as do I for him. Dean backs up and shakes his head slightly. “We can’t go there, Sammy. Once we do, there’s no going back.” He says with a disappointed sigh. 

“Who said anything about going back?” I ask. My heart races in my chest, and my hands shake when I pull them out of my pockets. 

“Sammy,” Dean says like a warning. I watch his chest rise and fall heavily. I know he wants this too, if only he’d just admit it. 

“I’m tired of denying it, Dean. I want you. Only you, all the time,” I admit. “In bed, in the shower, any and everywhere. Stop being so stubborn it’s-”

Dean cuts me off, grabbing my face with his hands and pressing his lips to mine. My lips melt into his, and everything we’ve never said aloud is poured into the kiss. My hands grip the waistband of Dean’s pants and pull him closer. 

Dean’s tongue dips out, licking between my lips and begging for access. I open my mouth and allow him inside, and his tongue licks the roof of my mouth and my tongue making my cock strain against the inside of my jeans. I suck on his tongue and bite it softly, dragging it between my teeth and making Dean groan. 

 Dean pulls back, and we each suck in a desperately needed breath. Our foreheads are pressed together as we share breaths back and forth. “We should stop,” Dean says softly. 

“We definitely should,” I respond, but neither of us steps back. 

“Fuck, Sammy,” Dean mutters, his hands slide from my face to my neck, slide up the back and into my hair, gripping it in his fingers. “You have no idea what you do to me.”

“Show me,” I lean down and kiss his neck right behind the shell of his ear. 

Dean groans and tilts his head to give me more access. I bite the sensitive skin behind his ear before sucking. Dean’s fingers grip my hair, making me hiss in pleasure. “Fuck it,” he groans and pulls back out of my grasp. 

Dean rips down his pants and boxers, and my mouth waters at the sight, just like it always has. We’ve showered and slept in the bed together. I’ve seen his cock before, but knowing I get it this time makes pre-cum drip from my tip as I pull my pants down. 

Dean kicks his pants to the side and stalks toward me. He grabs my cock in his hand and kisses me in one fluid motion. I moan into the kiss and pump his cock in time as he pumps mine, rubbing his thumb over my tip, coating my cock with my pre-cum. 

Dean pulls back and spins me around, pushing my chest against the side of the car he was working on. “Pass me that jar, Sammy,” he demands gruffly. 

I pass him the jar of coconut oil and rub my cock as I feel Dean’s lubed fingers rub my ass, pushing in and scissoring his fingers to open me up. “Fuck, Dean,” I groan, my balls tightening and threatening to burst. 

“You like that?” He asks, biting my shoulder harshly and making me hiss as his teeth pierce the skin.

“Fuck, yes,” I moan, my eyes hooding. His fingers leave my ass, and I feel the head of his cock  press up against my tight ass. My fingers grasp for hold on the top of the car, and my head falls back as Dean pushes himself inside deeper. “God,” I moan.

Dean grips my hips and thrusts in fully. “Don’t pray to him, little brother. He’s nowhere near here,” Dean groans, pulling back and thrusting in hard with a moan. “Pray to me, I’m the one fucking you.”

I moan as Dean pulls back and thrusts in again faster. Dean grips my hair and pulls, making my eyes roll into the back of my head. “Fuck, yes, Dean,” I moan between heavy breaths. 

Dean continues to fuck me like a man possessed, his cock hitting a g-spot I didn’t know I had inside of my ass. “Damn, Sammy, Fuck… I’m gonna cum.” Dean moans as I feel his cock swell inside of my ass. 

“Fuck, me too, Dean,” I moan, my balls tightening impossibly tight. I wrap my hand around my cock and pump it with my hand, matching Dean’s harsh thrusts. After a few more thrusts, I feel Dean’s cum fill me as mine paints my hand and the side of the car, our breathing heavy and staggered as he pulls out and spins me around, kissing me again. This kiss isn’t heated. It’s soft and gentle. 

“No going back,” Dean says like a promise, holding my gaze with hooded eyes. 

“No going back,” I agree with a smile. 

I adjust myself and clear my throat. The memory makes my cock swell in my jeans. Y/n looks over at me, one eyebrow raised in curiosity. I smile at her with pursed lips, and she rolls her eyes and looks back out of the window. 

I take a moment to take her in. Her bare legs under her short ripped denim shorts, the black band T-shirt with ‘A Day To Remember’ written across the front. Fuck, she looks so good with glasses too. The black-rimmed ‘nerd glasses’ really do something to me, along with her long, almost black hair that reaches her waist. The perfect length to grab and hold tight as you plow into her. 

God, now I’m hard again. 

My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I pull it out and see a text from Dean.

Dean: What are you looking at?

Me: Nothing.

Dean: Bullshit. Why are you staring at her?

Jealous much?

I chuckle silently and text back.

Me: Who do you think?

Dean: Not me, and that pisses me off. Stop it.

Me: Jealous?

Dean: Hardly. 

Me: Don’t act like she’s not hot. She’s exactly your type.

Dean: She’s our sister.

Me: Half-sister. And you’re my brother. That didn’t stop you this morning. 

Dean lets out an annoyed sigh in the seat in front of me. 

Dean: Point made. So, what? Do you wanna bring her into this? That’ll go over well. 

Me: I’m just saying it’s an option. 

Dean: She’s leaving soon anyway. Don’t bother.

I stare at my phone, confused. What does he mean? She’s ours now, that’s why Dad went to get her.

Me: What are you talking about? She just got here.

Dean: And she doesn’t want to stay. She told me this morning, so leave her out of it. 

Me: She can’t. She’s not even eighteen yet.

Dean: She will be in 2 months, that’s when she’s leaving. 

Me: That’ll go over well with Dad. 

Dean: What does? Stop texting me. Dad keeps looking at us. We’ll talk about it later.

I look up and see Dad looking at me in the rearview mirror with narrowed eyes. He doesn’t know about me and Dean, obviously, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t suspect anything. Especially when Dean fought going with him to pick up y/n because he ‘needed to stay and protect me.’ I look away from the rearview mirror and look out the window. I don’t want y/n to leave, but I don’t know if I can trust her yet, either. 

What a fucking mess.

Y/n

We finally pull into another hotel somewhere on the boarder of Wyoming and Colorado. I get out and stretch while John goes to get a room. I grab my backpack from the backseat and close the door. 

“So,” Sam clears his throat, talking to me. “Long car ride,” he says awkwardly. 

I purse my lips into a smile and nod. “Yeah, he doesn’t like to stop, does he?” I ask jokingly. 

Sam laughs as Dean gets out of the car, too. “No, not really.”

“He would’ve just kept going if you weren’t here,” Dean says, stretching his arms over his head. 

“Oh,” I respond, trying to ignore the dig at my presence. “Sorry.”

Dean shrugs. “Don’t worry about it. He’s just trying to make sure you’re comfortable. I don’t mind stopping,” Dean smirks. 

I nod and pull out my vape, taking a drag off of it and blowing the vapor into the air above me. “Think he’ll be able to get one with three beds this time?” I ask Sam and Dean. 

They both laugh and shake their heads. “Not likely. But he’ll probably take the couch again,” Sam responds. 

John comes back with the key, and we all carry our bags to the room. I put my bags by the bed furthest from the door and sit down on the edge. Sam and Dean put their bags on either side of the other bed in the room. 

“I’m going to get burgers,” John announces as he sets his bag on the other side of my bed. “Do you want to come with me?” he asks me as he hands Sam and Dean a second copy of the hotel key. 

I’m not sure if I want to leave or not, and I don’t know how to tell him. 

“She can stay here,” Dean says flatly. “We should probably have the talk with her anyway,” Dean says to John with a serious and mysterious tone of voice. 

John narrows his eyes at Dean and nods before turning back to me. “Stay in the room unless one of them goes with you. I’ll be back,” is all he says before walking out of the hotel room and closing the door behind him. 

“What talk?” I ask, looking over at Sam and Dean. 

They look at each other and then back to me. “You said you don’t know what business Dad is in, right?” Sam asks. 

“Yeah, no clue. Is he in like the mob or something?” I ask jokingly. 

“No, he’s a hunter,” Dean responds, clearing his throat. “All of those things you read about in fairy tales growing up are real,” Dean explains. 

I blink a few times, wondering if he’s fucking with me. He has to be. “Right,” I drawl out. “Next, you’re going to tell me you just live in a dragon-guarded castle,” I joke back with a small laugh.

“Not a castle, a bunker,” Sam corrects.

“And it’s not guarded by a dragon, but it is warded,” Dean adds. 

I can’t help but laugh at their serious faces. The first I’ve laughed since I lost Mom. Sam and Dean look at me like I’m crazy, and Dean rolls his eyes. “I’m sorry,” I laugh. “I’m sorry, it’s just,” I chuckle, my laugh dying down. “You can’t be serious.”

Dean stands up and grabs something from John’s bag and sits down next to me. “See for yourself,” he says, handing me a leather-back journal. I look at him with a raised eyebrow, and he nods to the journal in my hands. “Open it, it’s dad’s, you can look at it,” he says seriously. 

I open the journal, and I can’t believe my eyes as I turn the pages. There are what look like entries with names, dates, places, and all different kinds of creatures. “All of this is real?” I ask as I skim the pages.

Sam sits down on my other side. “Yeah. This is what we do. We travel around the country and hunt these things,” Sam explains. 

I look up at Sam, the journal resting open on my lap. “How do you know where they are or what they are?” I ask curiously.

Dean takes the journal from my hands and flips through it before finding the page he wants and shows me. “This is the newspaper article,” he says, pointing to a clipping that’s paperclipped to the side of the page. “It talks about people going on a killing spree, in this case, killing their entire family. Only to disappear and never be seen again,” Dean explains the article to me. 

“But that happens sometimes, doesn’t it? I mean, there’s serial killers and family annihilators in prison for the same thing,” I mention as he flips the article to show the entry underneath.

Dean nods. “Yes, there are. But in this town, it happened to three separate families. That’s what makes it our kind of case,” Dean explains. 

“So, what kind of monster is that then? A vampire?” I ask.

“Shape-shifter,” Sam corrects on my other side. “Vampires can’t come out in the daytime; they’ll burn.”

I nod and look back at the journal. “And that’s a shape-shifter?” I ask, pointing to a still photo of a man, his eyes glowing. 

“Yes,” Dean answers. “See how his eyes glow in the picture? That’s how you can tell.”

“So, what does it look like? Like, not in a human?” I ask.

“Nobody knows. Nobody has seen one in its own skin and lived to talk about it,” Dean responds.

“This is freaky,” I murmur, shaking my head. “So you guys kill these things?” I ask them both.

“Sometimes, but they’re pretty rare, actually. Our biggest problems are usually vampires, werewolves, and demons. And a few ghosts,” Sam explains calmly. 

“Did you say…demons?” I ask, confused. “Like wings and shit like that?” 

Sam and Dean chuckle and shake their heads. “No, they look like regular people because they possess their bodies,” Sam explains. 

“I’m sorry, did you just say they possess people?” I ask, shocked. “Like, they just walk around and act like regular people?” 

“Not exactly. There are different kinds. Some are relatively harmless, just happy to be out of Hell. Some make deals with people, and those are called crossroads demons. Stay away from them,” Dean explains. 

I shake my head as I try to wrap my mind around what they’re telling me. “So you mean to tell me that vampires, werewolves, shape-shifters, demons, all of those are real?” I ask, looking down at the floor. 

“There’s more-”

I cut Dean off. “There’s MORE?!” I practically scream. 

“Calm down, you’re safe with us. Yes, there are more things out there, and you’ll learn about all of them and how to keep yourself safe. We’ll teach you, and Dad will too,” Sam assures me, placing a hand gently on my back and rubbing small circles. 

“This is crazy,” I shake my head. The room suddenly feels too small, and I need to get out. I stand up and grab my vape.

“Where are you going?” Dean asks, standing up too. 

“I need some air,” I shake my head. As I walk toward the door, it opens, and I jump nearly out of my skin. 

“Looks like someone took it well,” John says, walking in and placing the food down on the table. “Knew that  I should’ve done it myself,” he shakes his head and walks over to me. “You alright?” he asks, placing his hands on my shoulders. 

I nod once. “I’m fine. I just need some air,” I mutter. 

“I’ll come with you. It’s dark out,” John says, looking over my shoulder at Sam and Dean. “Food’s on the table; we’ll be back,” he says to them. He puts an arm over my shoulders and walks outside with me. We take a seat on the steps, looking out over the empty parking lot. “It’s a lot to take in when you first learn about it,” John says softly as I hit my vape. 

“How did you find out about it?” I ask, not looking at him. I can tell I struck a cord asking when he sucks in a deep breath and lets it out in a huff. 

“After my wife died,” he says softly. I turn to look up at him, feeling sorry for him. I can’t imagine what that’s like. “She died when Sammy was just a baby, and Dean was about four. A demon killed her,” John explains sadly. 

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, wishing I hadn’t asked. 

John takes a breath and sighs. “Thank you, y/n. I loved your mom, too. Sheila was…” he looks out over the parking lot. “Special.”

“Yeah, she was,” I agree, fighting back the tears at the fact I’ll never get to talk to her again. I sniffle, and John wraps an arm around me and hugs me to his side. 

“Cry if you need to, honey, it’s okay,” he assures me, and that itself breaks the dam. The tears fall down my cheeks, and I lean into him for support. John hugs me and shushes me gently. He doesn’t tell me it’s going to be okay, and he doesn’t tell me it’s going to get better or easier; he’s just there. And for the first time in my life, I’m thankful he is. 

After I’m finished crying, John stands up and gives me a big bear hug. We go inside and eat dinner, and for the first time everyone is civil and even joking around. When it comes time to go to bed, I change into my pajamas and climb into the hotel bed. John offers to sleep on the couch, but I tell him that he can share the bed with me. He’s my dad, after all and I feel bad that he slept on a too-small couch last night. John gets under the covers with me, and as soon as my head hits the pillow, I’m out. Who knew crying could make a person so tired?

Chapter Three

[montammil]

June of Doom Day 2 - "It didn't have to be this way"

| Scream | Double Cross | Made to Watch |

Everyone's favorite wholesome couple is back!! /j I didn't proofread (then again when do I ever), so sorry in case its kind of messy lol.

CW: Yandere/intimate whumper, torture, blood, implied noncon, kidnapping, murder (not Rowan or Sawyer)

...

Rowan couldn't go a single second without Sawyer mentioning his past life. It seemed that no matter how much time passed, Sawyer refused to accept the new life they lived together. That really hurt his feelings.

Why couldn't Sawyer see that he only did these things because he loved him? He did everything he did out of love, and Sawyer needed to appreciate him for that.

He set down a cup of tea for him and sat across from him at their small dining room table. Sawyer eyed the cup and saucer but didn't touch it. He did that sometimes, tried to pretend he wasn't hungry or thirsty.

"Come on, drink up. It's herbal and it's good for you." Rowan took a sip from his own teacup, his eyes never leaving Sawyer's face.

"It sucks. I want coffee," Sawyer bitterly said. He crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at the dark wood of the table.

Rowan dragged out a sigh. "I think you've had enough caffeine in your lifetime. Besides, this has chamomile in it, and that helps you sleep. That's what you want, right?"

He hated the fact that Sawyer still couldn't sleep in their bed, and preferred the guest bedroom's old, worn mattress. Sometimes Rowan would allow him a slight bit of space, but only sparingly.

"I want to go home." Sawyer's voice cracked. "I miss my friends, I miss the club, and... I want to be with people again, Rowan."

"You have me." Rowan scowled at him. "That should be enough. What's so wrong with that?" Sawyer shook his head, but kept his mouth shut. To Rowan, it just proved he was right. "Besides, why sing in front of a bunch of perverted drunks when you can sing here? In front of someone who actually cares about you?"

Sawyer clenched his jaw. "People who love others usually don't go out of their way to torture them."

Of all things, Sawyer had to bring that up.

Rowan sighed heavily. He really thought that they were making progress, but apparently that wasn't the case. Sawyer was just getting more defiant by the day. Rowan needed to do something about it, but it seemed like Sawyer became immune to his typical punishments. If only he could just bash in the brains of one of those friends Sawyer talked nonstop about.

The more he thought about it, the more appealing it sounded. If he killed one of Sawyer's friends, maybe he could learn a lesson about gratitude.

Then maybe he could finally forget all about that life and live in the one where he belonged with him.

That bartender--Lucien, he think his name was--was definitely a suitable option. He knew him and Sawyer were close, they always shot witty quips back at each other at Indigo. It filled Rowan with rage every time he watched their interactions.

He always had a feeling that bastard wanted Sawyer in more than just a friendly way. He didn't miss the way those dark eyes swept over his beloved every time he was on stage.

The more he thought about Lucien, the angrier he got. His hands tightened around the handle of his cup so hard it almost broke.

Rowan downed the rest of the tea like a shot. "If you keep this behavior up, Sawyer, I think we're both gonna regret it," he warned. Sawyer simply rolled his eyes in response. He didn't take Rowan seriously, and that pissed him off.

Part of Rowan was bluffing. He didn't like the thought of killing someone unless absolutely necessary, but... maybe this was necessary.

It wouldn't take too much effort to get to him. The bartender was not only scrawny, but even shorter than Sawyer. That made him the perfect victim.

He didn't try to hide his malicious smile. "Have it your way."

...

The next two weeks were somehow even more of a struggle than before. Rowan really thought Sawyer would have time to think over his vague threat, but it seemed like nothing affected him anymore. Sawyer had given up completely, and it hurt Rowan to see him that way. But what made it worse was the fact that Sawyer hadn't eaten in a week, and it didn't look like he planned on doing it any time soon.

Rowan was considering going back on his idea to murder Sawyer's friend, but the last straw happened just a few hours ago.

"You need to eat," Rowan insisted. He pushed Sawyer's plate in front of him. "I made your favorite."

Sawyer blinked at him tiredly. "I don't wanna."

Rowan ground his teeth. He tried so hard to remain patient for him, but all of that was quickly wearing off. He always considered himself a patient man, but it seemed as though Sawyer made him snap in more ways than one.

"Please, sweetheart. Just a few bites?" Sawyer remained silent, even having the gall to scoff at him. "This is for your own good, love. If you don't eat--"

"What? You're gonna beat me again?" Sawyer cut him off with a sharp tone. He couldn't hold back a dry, sarcastic laugh. "I'm over it, so go ahead." He propped his chin in his hand, his expression so cold it sent shivers down Rowan's spine.

"I was going to say you'll need to be put on a feeding tube." Rowan's voice was even, but Sawyer could sense anger bordering in his words. "Do you really want that?"

Sawyer huffed. "No, but I'm sure you'd be into that, right?" He saw a twitch of rage in his face and he smiled triumphantly. "Go on. Tell me about how it's for my own good. You love to hear yourself talk, right?" Rowan glared at him. "You spout the same shit every day, I have it all memorized! I can't tell if you're delusional or in denial, so I don't even know what it'll take to get it through your head that I hate you!"

He slammed his fist down on the table, hitting the edge of the plate and sending the contents flying off it.

After the shatter of the glass resounded the kitchen, the room became silent. Sawyer stared at the mess he made, then to the stunned Rowan across the table.

He swallowed hard, his stomach churning at the realization he may have gone a little far this time.

Sawyer always knew when to toe the line, when to push Rowan just enough to where he felt justified in his actions. But he'd never outright provoked him like that.

"Well," Rowan started. Sawyer couldn't see his face, but he heard the venom dripping in his words. "You've done it now."

And now, with Sawyer tied up and gagged back in the shed, Rowan decided he was done stalling.

It took almost three hours just to get into the city again, but it was worth it when he recognized the familiar street that led to Indigo. He pulled over by an alley, parking so his car was out of view. His timing was great, since he subconsciously memorized Lucien's schedule after memorizing Sawyer's, given he used to visit Indigo practically every day.

Lucien was smoking out back. Perfect. He went to the trunk and took out his gun, along with a few other supplies that he brought just in case.

The alley was deserted, but Rowan needed to work fast just in case some other staff member decided to join him.

"Hey," he called out as he approached. Lucien jumped and turned around.

The man looked up at him after brushing some of his own dirty blond hair out from his face. His brow furrowed, looking Rowan up and down. He didn't recognize him, clearly. Good.

"Hi?" Lucien paused. "Can I help you?"

Rowan smiled. "Yes, as a matter of fact." He leaned in close and used the little space between them to shove the muzzle of his gun into his stomach. "You're going to follow me and not say a word. Right?" Lucien stuttered in surprise, but managed to nod. "Good, now let's go." He nudged him with the weapon to show him where to go, which was back to his car.

Once they got there, Rowan unlocked the trunk and gestured to it. "Get in." He didn't expect the smaller man to climb in with no issues, but he didn't complain about it either.

It almost made Rowan feel sympathy for the guy, seeing him squished into the trunk. But that went away once he remembered who he was.

He was quick to tie him up and then slammed the trunk closed. He glanced around to make sure no one saw him, then climbed into the driver's seat. He wasted no time peeling out of the alley and speeding back to his lakehouse, where he was happy to dispose of him.

Rowan wasn't a sadistic man (at least that's what he convinced himself of) but he had no problem making sure Sawyer knew what he was capable of.

Sawyer was already devastated when he killed that random guy who tried to help him out. Even though it broke his heart terrifying his darling so much, he was still hoping this would teach him a lesson.

Maybe that time it didn't, but this one would surely be the nail in the coffin.

Rowan pulled in the driveway and cut off the engine. He stepped out, opened the trunk, and hauled the screaming bartender onto his shoulder. The bastard thrashed and kicked, but Rowan just held him tighter. He managed to slam the trunk closed while still holding his writhing captive. He stormed into the house, slamming the door behind him with his foot.

"I don't know what I did to you, but I'm sorry," he pathetically shrieked. Tears poured from his eyes. "You- you don't have to do this. We can talk about this!"

It was amusing how quickly his tough guy persona was dropped. Every time Rowan had seen him, he was always flexing his nonexistent muscles and acting all confident.

Now he was a sniveling mess, begging for his life.

Rowan opened the door to the basement, where he would've put Sawyer if not for what he was about to do. He threw the man down the stairs and left the room to retrieve Sawyer.

Sawyer was asleep when he opened the shed with a loud creak. He looked so beautiful when he was sleeping, he always had.

His eyes slowly fluttered open, then widened when he noticed Rowan standing over him. He tried to say something through the gag, but Rowan made no attempt to try to understand him. Right now, he didn't care what he was saying.

He picked up Sawyer and carried him inside, and to the basement. The man at the bottom of the stairs started crying harder as soon as he spotted Sawyer, and Sawyer returned the gesture.

Rowan sat Sawyer on the floor, much more gently than he did with Lucien. He removed the gag from his mouth.

"Lucien!" Sawyer wailed. He tried crawling over to him, but he didn't get very far. "Fuck... fuck..." He fell forward on his face, squirming in an attempt to escape his binds. "You motherfucker! What is wrong with you?!" This was the angriest he had ever sounded. But Rowan, who knew Sawyer better than anyone, knew he was more scared than anything.

But sometimes things like this needed to be done. Just a bit of tough love.

"Sawyer?" Lucien's voice broke. "Are you okay? What did he do to you?" His gaze flickered to the bruises littering his skin. Sawyer didn't answer. His shoulders shook violently.

Rowan stood by and watched with a blank face. "I thought you already learnt what I'm capable of, but I guess you need a reminder. Do you still hate me, my love?"

He didn't respond. Sawyer's breathing was harsh, tears streaming down his cheeks. He curled into a ball as much as possible with his hands bound behind him.

"Sawyer--" Lucien started.

"Shut the fuck up!" Rowan snapped at Lucien, silencing him. He grasped his gun out of his coat and pointed it at him.

He paused when he felt something on his shoe. Rowan glanced down to see Sawyer had crawled over to him, his body pressed against his legs. He was shaking like a leaf and giving him a teary-eyed expression, one Rowan was admittedly weak to.

"Please," he choked out. "Please don't kill him... please... I don't hate you, I love you, just let him go..."

Rowan adjusted his grip on the gun. He wanted to believe him, but he wasn't that stupid, especially after being fooled by him once. "You're a good actor, darling, but my heart can't take being deceived again. You've played with it enough. It didn't have to be this way."

Despite his words, Sawyer sobbed in relief when Rowan tucked the gun away. It didn't end there. He pulled something else out of his coat. It was a small but undoubtedly sharp switchblade. He grasped Lucien by the collar of his dress shirt, pulling him up so he could plunge the knife into his stomach, all the way down to the hilt. The action was met with an agonized cry from both of them.

Sawyer's eyes were so wide, so full of terror. Rowan could hear him begging, but couldn't care less in the moment.

He twisted the knife in his gut, watching blood seep past his fingers and soak through his clothes. Lucien's cries echoed around the room, incoherent and garbled. Rowan threw him to the ground.

"No more!" Sawyer blubbered, "please, no more, please! I'll do whatever you want! I'll never complain again, I'll never fight you again! Please!" He shrieked loudly, a scream so strong that his voice broke, turning into nothing but a raspy squeal.

At first, Rowan was about to say 'fuck no' and finish gutting him like a fish. He then thought over his words. He was still going to kill Lucien, no doubt about that, but...

"Whatever I want," he mused. "You'll say yes if I propose? Sleep with me? Let me touch you without complaint?" Sawyer nodded so furiously his head nearly flew off. That was a reaction that satisfied him. "And if you go back on your promise, I'll bring you his head. Do you understand that?" Another rapid nod. "Okay. I want you to remember your deal with me. I'd hate for you to think I'm bluffing."

Sawyer cried into the cold ground as Rowan dragged Lucien off, with the promise of taking him to a hospital.

Little did Sawyer know, Rowan buried him in the backyard.

[darkomoth]

Insomniacs

Chapter 1: Violets

Aaron Hotchner x reader

Summary: You and Hotch are both workaholics, but when you start showing up earlier and staying later, he starts getting concerned. A case will give you something to preoccupy yourself with, but something goes severely wrong.

Cause when doesn't it?

Notes: I recommend getting the InteractiveFics extension for chrome! It's really good and will replace the y/n and l/n with your name :)

Also uploaded on Ao3 under the same title

Word count: 9.7K

Ch. 2 Ch.3

It was another night of not being able to sleep at all. Not that you hadn’t tried. After the plane touched back down in Quantico, you should’ve felt relief at the thought of home and a comfortable bed to lie your head, but you felt nothing other than anxiety at the thought of nothing to do. 

You got to your apartment, dumped your used go-bag clothes into the washing machine, showered, cleaned up the dishes that cluttered in your kitchen, even vacuumed up a bit in the living room. You looked over at the clock on the end table by your couch, it read 3:33 am. With a sigh, you decided to give rest a shot. 

Your bed was made perfectly already, not wanting to mess it up, you decided the couch was good. You grabbed a blanket and pillow and turned on the TV, volume all the way down. The time passed achingly slowly. Seconds crawled by and the silence was unbelievably deafening. You looked at the clock once again, 3:39 am. Another attempt to close your eyes and you were met with 20 minutes of tossing and turning. 

“That’s enough.” You mumbled to yourself before throwing the warm blanket off your body and getting up. You made a pot of coffee, moved your clothes to the dryer, and packed a new go-bag. 4:05 am. It was agonizing, every second you waited for your phone to ring. You watched it, the dark screen with no new notifications taunting you. You sat on your couch, watching the characters on your screen move and laugh silently, your eyes drifted closed once or twice, but never long enough for it to be called sleep. 

You sipped your coffee, hot and caffeinated and perfect. 4:17 am. When the drink went cold you decided it would be a good time to get ready for the day. You got dressed, black slacks and a dark blue long-sleeved button-down. You brushed your hair and did your makeup. 4:29 am. You considered whether to just go straight to the office, ultimately deciding it best to grab some food first. 

You arrived at the building at 5:02 am. It wasn’t too early, you decided. After all, there have been nights that you’ve seen your boss not leave until past 5:00 in the morning. Hotch’s car wasn’t in the parking lot this morning, however. That was good, it meant he was getting sleep and time with his son. 

The bullpen was dark, you decided to only turn on one light, enough for you to see. The case report on your desk was already finished since you worked on it during your team's flight back home, but there would be no harm in going over it. You wouldn’t classify yourself as a perfectionist or even a workaholic, though you presented that way to others. You just didn’t enjoy doing nothing like other people. 

Footsteps coming from your left made you pause what you were doing and look up. 

“Good morning.” You said as Hotch came walking into the bullpen with that perfectly pressed suit of his. The time on your watch read 5:30 am, he was very punctual. 

“Good morning.” He said, with that usual furrow of his brow and the tight-lipped look that meant a question was coming. “You’re here early.”  

Okay, not really a question. 

“So are you.” You say, too tired to engage in your typical banter. 

Hotch only nodded once in response, then took a few steps towards his office before stopping in his tracks and turning back around. “Did you actually go home last night?” 

“Yes.” You said, fidgeting with your fingers beneath your desk. “I couldn’t sleep.” 

“Mm.” He hummed in response. “Don’t burn yourself out, we need you alert.” 

“Do we have a case?” You asked, maybe a little too quickly. 

“Not until the rest of the team gets here... but yes.” 

You nodded and any trace of tiredness from the night dissipated. Blood pumped in your veins and your anxiety disappeared, anticipation for the new work ahead of you completely replacing it. 

“Okay, would you mind if I got the case file now? I have nothing else to do.” You asked. 

Hotch studied you for a moment with that serious frown of his, “I’ll make copies now.” 

“Thank you.” 

Sometimes you felt like Hotch was the only one that understood you. Maybe it was because he was the resident workaholic in the department before you showed up, and he still is, but it feels deeper than that. Most days you come in at the same time, leave at the same time... honestly the only time you don’t see your Unit Chief is when you’re home. You hated being home. 

In the very late hours when the whole building was quiet and not a soul lingered, you would see that one light from Hotch’s office and feel comfort. His blinds would be open, and you could see him reading and writing, looking like the weight of the world is on his shoulders. Since the death of his ex-wife, Haley, he’s stayed later and later, coming in earlier, only departing when he knows Jack needs him. It’s a heartbreaking thing to watch. 

But often you would be sitting at your desk, getting lost in the paperwork as your eyes strained to read every bit of information in the dim lighting, when a warm hand would land on your shoulder. Hotch’s soft, tired voice telling you to take a break, rest your eyes. It made your chest warm, and body relax if only for a few minutes. He knew better than to try to get you to go home, it never works out. Unless of course, he leaves at the same time. It was a very rare occurrence, to say the least. 

Right now, Hotch is in his office making enough copies of the case files to be passed around to the team when they get in. You tap impatiently on your desk, drumming your fingers along to a song that only exists in your head. When you can’t stand it anymore, you get up and make your way over to him. 

You knock once on the open door, “What is it?” 

Hotch turns to you with a serious look. “You’re very impatient this morning.” 

“I know. So?” 

With a sigh, he hands over a manila folder with the FBI logo. 

“Three women in three weeks, all were strangled and beaten to death, abducted from their homes. Last victim was found 4 days ago.” 

“That’s a strict timeline... and they’re just calling us in now?” You ask. 

“Local sheriff thinks it could be even more and I’m inclined to agree. So far, this presents as organized. No one starts out like this, there are no hesitation marks on the bodies and no DNA was left behind on the scenes.” 

You nodded along as he spoke, already going over the possibilities of this unsub in your mind. Organized means older, that rules out teenagers and younger. No hesitation could mean psychopathy, lack of remorse, etc. Most likely white given the victims were, possibly sexually frustrated. 

“Any sign of sexual assault?” 

“We’ll go over everything when the team arrives.” Hotch states firmly. 

“When were they called in?” You asked. 

“If you check your voice mail, you’ll see.” He says with a small smile. “Look, go to the conference room and read over the files some more, I’ll make some more coffee.”  

You want to argue, but you know he’s right. You were definitely getting ahead of yourself here. With a grateful nod, you head to the conference room. 

The pictures were gruesome, but when aren’t they? The girls were pretty when they were alive, their faces were mutilated during the attacks. Could have something to do with the unsub’s view of women. You turned over theory after theory in your head and before you knew it, Hotch was back and sliding over a mug filled to the brim with coffee, just the way you like it.  

“Thank you, Hotch.” You say, taking a sip. He nods and sips his own cup. 

“How long were you here before I came in?” He asks you, glancing up from the file in his hands. 

You shrug and say, “Not long... half an hour?” 

“You need to rest.” He says, in his usual commanding tone. It makes you smile a bit, though you try to suppress it. 

“I know, and I will.” You look him in the eyes to try and convince him, but he looks doubtful. “Promise.” 

Hotch nods, seemingly satisfied for the time being. You knew he was just checking in on you out of concern for a team member, but you hoped it was just a little more than that. Anytime he looked at you, it made your heart rate pick up a little. You weren’t as sure of yourself as usual when you were around him. 

Five minutes later the team starts filtering in, first is JJ, then Morgan, Prentiss, and Reid. Then it’s Garcia, who did not seem very happy to be awake at 6:30 am, followed by Rossi. When everyone finally gathered into the conference room, you could feel your body relax. Your work could finally start for real. 

After the initial ‘good mornings’ and bantering, Hotch started to present the case to everyone. You suggested the same preliminary profile traits from earlier and most everyone agreed. 

“Well, if this unsub has killed before, it will most likely not be in the exact same spot.” Reid says. “We should widen the range to a fifty-mile radius to see if there were any similar murders in the past couple years or so.” 

“I’m so on it.” Penelope says.  

“What else did the unsub do?” Prentiss asks, looking at the photos of the victims’ neck wounds. 

“A call was placed to each of the victim’s significant others, a voice modifier was used but the message remained the same. ‘Don’t bother looking, you will never see her again.’” Hotch says. “He keeps them for at least a day, given the various stages of healing with the victims bruises.” 

“Well, that’s definitely sadistic, torturing not only the victims but those close to them as well.” You add. 

“Was the call placed before or after their deaths?” Rossi asks. 

Hotch’s eyebrows knit further together, “Before, according to the coroner's report.”  

“Which gives the victim’s family hope only for that to be snuffed out almost immediately.” Reid says. 

“If this guy’s seasoned in his kills, why risk dumping the bodies in such a public way?” Morgan asks. “All of the victims, Susanne Yearly, Brenda James and Larissa Buckly were all found in public parks, somewhere he could’ve easily been seen even at night while disposing of them.” 

“Maybe there’s a part of him that wants to get caught? Wants people to know that this was his work.” You say. 

“If that’s the case, we’re dealing with a narcissist.” Rossi adds. 

Prentiss jumps in again, “Yeah, but this level of body mutilation feels personal. Their faces were left nearly unrecognizable, I’m willing to bet his stressor involves a woman that has similar features.” 

“The families are distraught.” JJ says. “They confirmed in the police reports that all the girls lived alone, having just moved into new places weeks or even days before their abductions took place.” 

“Well, that’s certainly a connection.” Hotch states. “Chicago PD will be expecting us when we arrive, wheels up in 30.” 

- 

Arriving less than three hours later, Hotch orders you and Reid to establish a timeline in the precinct while Morgan and Rossi take the newest crime scene where Larissa’s body was found. Hotch has JJ speaking to family members and Prentiss goes with him to the morgue. 

Garcia’s on the speaker with Reid, “I did what you asked and widened the range for possible attacks fitting this creeps M.O., however absolutely nothing came up. Soooo, I changed the parameters. Hotch and L/N mentioned that most likely this guy wouldn’t have been as confident as he is now, meaning the kills may not have been as brutal. I included any and all deaths as a result of suffocation from the last ten years surrounding the Chicago area and wouldn’t-ya-know-it I got a hit. Well, hits.” 

Garcia explains that there were at least 5 possible victims, all of them died of various forms of suffocation. You and Reid went through the past reports of the deceased women and ruled out two of them since they both drowned, which didn’t fit this unsub’s specific fantasy. That left you with three girls, one found in an alley behind her work with a bag around her head, no other injuries except a hit on the head with a blunt object. The other two were covered in bruises and strangled with rope. Since then, the unsub’s gotten smarter, switched from rope to wire making it less bulky and conspicuous. He’s also leveled up his damage to their face and body, becoming more intense with each kill. 

You and Reid explain your findings to Hotch and Prentiss when they return from the morgue. They corroborate the theory with their own findings, since each body was more disfigured than the last. The thin lines on the necks of the victims were so deep, you wondered if that’s what the unsub focused on the most. 

“There was no sexual assault present on the bodies.” Prentiss states. “But there were marks on their wrists and ankles, they were most likely tied to something while the unsub beat them.” 

“Which means the act of killing is more than enough for him,” Hotch adds. “He derives all of his pleasure from brutalizing the women, then watching them die in front of him.” 

“The bag around the head on the very first victim, Miranda Jall, along with the hit on her head suggests a sort of de-personalization.” Reid says. “He didn’t make a call to her fiancé and there was no abduction. He hit her over the head as she walked out of her workplace, and the bag obscured his view of her face, he couldn’t have gotten off on it.” He says. 

“It was practice. He was figuring out how he was going to incapacitate his victims.” You say. “He probably felt a rush after the initial hit, and realized he wanted more of that aspect.” 

“So, he amps up the beatings.” Hotch adds. “He isn’t satisfied with just the kill, he wants more time.” 

“And then he switches to rope so he can see their faces.” Prentiss says. 

“The two victims that were strangled with rope still have yet to be identified. He started out by blitz-attacking his victims in isolated areas, where-as now he targets newly independent women inside their homes.” Reid says. 

JJ walks up with a look on her face that you all know means bad news, “The victims' families have no idea who the caller could be, all the young women appeared to be well-liked, in stable relationships. They can’t think of a single person that would want to do this to their daughters.” 

Just then, a call comes through to Hotch’s phone. “Hotchner.” He listens for a moment and then nods, “Okay.” He hangs up. “Morgan and Rossi found violets at the crime scene.”  

“The flower?” Prentiss asks. 

“Yes.” 

“Was that present at the other dump sites?” You ask. 

“If it was, it wasn’t mentioned in the files.” Hotch answers. 

“If he’s leaving flowers for his victims, it could potentially be a sign of remorse.” Reid says. 

“This guy isn’t capable, he’s narcissistic and psychopathic, the flowers have to mean something else.” You say, frustrated now. 

So far all you’ve really gotten is the confirmation that this guy has killed at least six women, and not a whole lot else. You decide to call Garcia. 

“Speak and be heard by residing genius PG.” 

“Hey Garcia, can you get me everything on the early victims? I think the unsub knew one of them personally.” You say. 

“What makes you think that?” Prentiss asks. 

“Well, if the first kill was a trial, maybe he was practicing for a specific target. He could have already gotten who he wanted and now he’s chasing the same high.” You reply. “While you’re at it Garcia, see if you can find any mention of violets being present at the crime scenes.” 

- 

Everyone had converged back to the precinct nearly an hour ago. The last victim, Larissa Buckly, was found 4 days ago. If the unsub is continuing at a consistent rate with no sign of slowing down, the police will be finding a new body in 3 days.  

You all knew this, the stakes were high and given the profile of the unsub, he wasn’t someone that was going to stop unless he was behind bars. Still, the team needed sleep. 

“Alright, we’ve done all that we can for the night. The profile is out there, the press conference warned women of Chicago to remain vigilant, you all can head to the hotel.” Hotch says. 

Hotch could tell that the team wasn’t in high spirits and exhaustion wasn’t going to make it any better. It’s usually a good idea to take a step back, take a break, and come back with fresh eyes. And yet, as the profilers filed out of the precinct, still talking back and forth about victimology and M.O., he noticed not all of them were leaving. 

Y/N stayed planted where she was at the round table, eyebrows knit together in frustration or confusion. She tapped her fingers the way that she does when she's nervous or focused, or both. Hotch takes a step towards her, his arms crossed, and a frown set on his face. 

“I said you all can head to the hotel.” He says pointedly. 

“Yes, I heard you. I’m not tired.” Y/N says, still not meeting his eyes. 

Hotch’s jaw tenses a bit. She can be incredibly stubborn and, in some cases, it was an asset. Not right now, though. 

“It wasn’t a suggestion, L/N. Go get some sleep, come back tomorrow morning with everyone else.” 

“Are you going to sleep?” She asks, finally snapping her head up and meeting his stoic gaze with her own. 

“Yes. I have to do a few more things here, and then I will be heading back to the hotel.” 

“I’ll leave when you do.” She says. It was a challenge, he knew. He was used to it. It was also extremely frustrating.  

Hotch swipes a hand across his face tiredly, “Y/N. You haven't slept since our last case. It’s been over 48 hours, and our judgement is severely impaired after 24 hours without sleep. You can become drowsy and irritable, your memory is affected, your coordination will be off-” 

“You think my judgement is impaired?” She asks, sounding offended. That would be the part that she focuses on, Hotch thinks. “Hotch, I have been trying to put all of these puzzle pieces together for over 12 hours now and nothing is going to get done if I’m knocked out.” 

Hotch understands where she’s coming from, truly, but right now, he doesn’t care. “L/N I am giving you a direct order, leave the precinct. Go to the hotel. Do not come back until at least 6:00.” 

She huffs out a frustrated breath, and it’s hard to not find that a little bit cute. The thought makes Hotch feel guilty, that’s definitely not what he should be thinking about right now. Before he can dwell on it though, Y/N is gathering up all of the papers that were scattered around the table. 

“No- leave it.” Hotch commands with his hand coming down on top of the file so she can’t take it, brushing her hand in the process. It spreads a warmth through him, but he thinks he does a good job at not showing it. “I know you won’t sleep if you take these with you.” 

Y/N’s angry, he knows by the way she doesn’t even respond, just shoots him a look and grabs her bag to leave. It’s fine though, if that’s what it takes to get her to finally rest. Hotch lets out a long sigh once she’s out of sight, taking a seat at the table and finishing collecting all of the papers on the table. That’s when he notices an image of one of the Jane Doe victims, she’s wearing a necklace, gold and dainty around her slim, pale neck. It was blurry, hard to make out, but certainly a cursive “V” pendant hung in the middle. 

“Violet?” 

-  

Hotch ordered you to leave the precinct, so you did. But he didn’t say you couldn’t make a detour on your way to the hotel. A yawn overcame you as you drove towards Grant Park, where Larissa’s body was found. You knew that if Hotch found out about this you would be in a lot of trouble, but the thought didn’t really faze you when faced with the alternative. How could you sleep when there was a serial killer out there hunting for his newest victim? A young woman was going to be dead in less than 72 hours, who were you to sleep at a time like this? 

At the same time, you can’t condemn your friends for needing that sleep. You wished you functioned like they did. You wished you could take a step back and rest and come back refreshed with a whole new outlook. But the truth was that you just couldn’t handle the nightmares. 

They started not long after joining the BAU. It was only natural; you were assured by Morgan as he noticed how off you’d been after a few months with the team. He also suffered from nightmares. They were fewer and further between now, which was good. You weren’t so lucky. For some reason they came in waves. Each case you worked on added to your memory storage of gruesome death and horrific imagery that was reflected back at you anytime you closed your eyes.  

It’s true that you hated the nothingness of your home life, the boredom of being alone with nothing but your thoughts, but that was only part of it. You figured, the longer you could stay awake, the less you’d have to worry about the nightmares bleeding into your reality. 

When you arrived at the spot where Larissa was found, you saw yellow crime scene tape wrapped around trees and some blood on the floor where the body had laid in the center of it. She was positioned laying face up, arms at her sides, clothes intact. No overtly sexual displays, no attempt to cover her up, just a corpse. 

Without the files to work off of, you only had your memory of the crime scene photos. You closed your eyes and imagined you were the one dumping Larissa’s body.  

“I would scope out the area first, without the body.” You say to yourself. “Take note of how many people were here during the day, how many at night... but I’d have to seem inconspicuous. Can’t be in a black hoodie standing still and staring at people. Someone would notice.” 

“So, I don’t cover my face... people saw me, interacted even. I’m not standing out, I’m moving. Maybe running?” You sigh and open your eyes. All that means is that this guy will be harder to catch than most. “What was with the violets...” You walk in circles around the scene, looking from every angle possible. You take note of the shrubbery, all green grass and occasional daffodils, nothing even resembling violets in the area, so the unsub definitely brought it with him. 

Before you had a chance to continue, you heard some movement from behind you. You quickly spun around but saw no one. 

You moved carefully from where you stood, a hand resting on your hip where your gun was. Taking careful steps towards the parking lot, you glance at your watch. 1:34 am. Anyone out here at this time is either a stoner or a serial killer, you found yourself almost hoping for the latter. 

Once you reached your car, you still saw nothing. “FBI, if someone is there come out now and show me your hands.” You said as loud and clear as possible. 

Nothing, only crickets sounded in the night. With a sigh, you thought maybe Hotch was right, your judgement was seriously impaired, and you needed some sleep. 

As you reached for the handle of the driver's side door, you felt a sharp pain at the back of your head, and everything went black. 

-  

Hotch felt confident in his theory that the third victim, Jane Doe #2, was the unsub’s intended target from the beginning. The first kill was fast and sloppy, he didn’t move the body and her face was practically untouched. The second, Jane Doe #1, was also blitz-attacked, but it was in a grocery store parking lot at night, somewhere higher-risk where he could have been caught. So he was getting bolder, he hit her more, but still didn’t take her anywhere new. Just left her body where she was strangled. The third though, that’s when things shifted. 

Jane Doe #2 who wore the ‘V’ necklace, was found in a public park, but that isn’t where she died. Hotch has been referring to her as violet for the time-being, since he didn’t know her actual name. No “Violet” was ever reported missing in the area, which means it could most likely be a nickname. Her real name would potentially still start with a V, he thought.  

On the phone with Garcia, he relayed all of this information and was waiting for something to turn up on her end. “I did what L/N asked and tried to find everything I could on the first three victims. Miranda Jall, like you said, was a victim of opportunity and a trial-run. Jane Doe #1 though, while similar to the first, was beaten more and found more quickly. Jane Doe #2 was unrecognizable, I mean like, her face was so swollen from being beaten it’s surprising she was found in one piece.” Her voice was tight and rushed, like the words in her mouth made her feel physically sick. 

“I know,” Hotch says. “Which is why I need everything you can find on her, search for missing persons from the past few years again, but narrow it down to only women whose first name started with a V. She would’ve been in a relationship, either long-term boyfriend, fiancé, or new husband.” 

“Okay, stay on the line aaaandd.... there are four women, Venessa Traer, Veronica May, Victoria Jennings, and Valerie Hill. None of them look like the other victims.” Garcia says, clearly frustrated. “Traer was an elementary school teacher in her late forties, May had gone missing during a boating trip out-of-state and presumed dead, Jennings was reported missing but turned up a few weeks later, apparently on a spontaneous vacation with her friends, and Hill was an elderly woman who was suspected to have left her care-facility of her own free will.” 

Hotch sighed and closed his eyes for a moment, until a thought struck him. “What about middle-names that start with V?” It was a long shot, he knew it, but he would try anything at this point. 

A few seconds passed as he heard Garcia’s furious typing on the other end, “Aha! Sir, you are in fact a genius. Samantha Vivienne Garner, reported missing only eight weeks ago. She’s a spitting image of the other women, her name shows up on a lease for a newly remodeled home with one Riley Perkins, her soon-to-be husband.” 

“Garcia, I’ll need an address for Perkins.” 

“Already being sent.” 

“Oh...” She said, sadly. 

Hotch’s frown deepened, “What is it?” 

“Perkins had posted an image of Samantha saying yes to his proposal, it was in the middle of Millenium Park.” 

“Where Jane Doe #2’s body was found.” Hotch said, now 100% convinced that his theory was correct. 

Hotch knew that he would be at the precinct all night, the irony of his situation with Y/N not lost on him. She was dedicated, maybe too dedicated, but the same could be said of him. 

“Good work, Garcia. We’ll call you when there’s another update.”  

“Oh, just one more thing, sir.” 

“What is it?” 

“L/N had asked me to look into whether there were violets at the other crime scenes and the answer is yes and no. It wasn’t reported or even see as a connection because the first Jane Doe had bought a bouquet of violets from the grocery store, which seems like a coincidence, but Susanne, Brenda, and Larissa all had violets show up on their doorsteps after they were found dead. They were presumed to be condolence gifts from friends, but now...” 

“Alright, we’ll look into this further, thank you.” 

Hotch ended the call and checked the time. 3:00 am. Three more hours before the rest of the team would show up. He was already setting up in his mind where everyone would be assigned once they got here. Hotch wanted JJ to get in contact with Samantha Garner’s parents, Morgan and Reid would pull the missing person's report and find out the details of that. He would keep Rossi and Prentiss in the precinct to dig into Garner and Perkin’s lives with Garcia. He wanted L/N with him to interview Perkins himself, if he had gotten the very first phone call from the unsub about Samantha, why didn’t he identify her? 

5:58 am, Hotch read his watch as everyone started walking in. They were tired, but still looking better than they did the previous night. There were only two days before the next body would be found, and if he’s keeping them for one day, he may have already taken someone. 

Hotch was half-expecting (half-hoping) that Y/N would show up early. She usually did, even when it was against orders. Still, he was glad that this meant she may have actually gotten a few hours of rest. 6:00 am and no Y/N, Hotch shrugged off the pit-like feeling in his stomach. 

“Good morning.” He says to the other members, who’ve taken their spots at the table. Hotch speed-dials Garcia and puts her on speaker so that the two of them can go over what they discovered last night. 

“Well, then if this Samantha girl was the real target and he’s still going, there’s no telling when or if he’ll stop.” Rossi says once they’re finished. 

“Exactly,” Hotch replies. He assigns them to their designated tasks and just before he can dismiss everyone, Prentiss speaks up. 

“Has anyone seen L/N?” She asks. 

“I called her when we got here but didn’t get an answer.” JJ says. 

The group of FBI agents share some looks but no one says anything. That feeling in Hotch’s stomach has doubled. 

“She wasn’t at the hotel this morning?” He asks. His eyebrows furrow together and jaw tenses when no one answers immediately. 

“I didn’t see her.” Morgan speaks up. 

“Me neither.” Reid says. 

Everyone else only shakes their head in agreement. 

“I sent her back with all of you, she tried to stay late but I wouldn’t let her.” Hotch says, fists clenched in the position at his sides. “She didn’t take the files with her so she wouldn’t have had anything to work on.” 

“Well...” JJ starts. 

“What?” Hotch asks. 

“If she couldn’t be at the precinct and she didn’t want to sleep, she could’ve gone to one of the dump sites.” She replies. 

Hotch’s chest feels tight, his breathing is shallow and can’t think straight at the moment. If that is what she did, it was very, very stupid. They had profiled this unsub as a psychotic narcissist with sadistic tendencies, there’s a good chance he would visit the crime scenes afterwards. Of course she would go straight there, he thought, what else would she do? 

“Alright, the plan hasn’t changed. All of you know your assignments, go.” Hotch says, before he turns to stride away. 

“Wait a second, if Y/N’s in danger, we need to find her.” Prentiss says, clearly upset and standing up from her chair. 

“That’s exactly what we’re doing.” Hotch shoots back, unable to keep the anger and worry from showing in his voice. 

He didn’t give anyone else a chance to argue as he stormed out of the precinct, heading towards the car. One of the cars was gone, which means Y/N definitely left here last night, it was just a matter of which scene she ended up at. 

With Garcia still on the phone, Hotch has a thought, “Garcia, send me the last location registered on the GPS of the rental car that Y/N used last night.” 

“Y-yes sir.” Penelope typed quickly and Hotch’s anxieties grew with each passing second. “Uh, the-the last pinned location was Grant Park, which was where-” 

“The last victim was found. Thank you, Garcia.” Hotch hung up the phone and pulled quickly out of the parking lot, heart beating out of his chest. 

- 

You were pretty sure you could feel your heart beating in your head. The back of your skull hurt very badly, but when you tried to feel for an injury you found that you couldn’t. Both your wrists and ankles were tied to a chair, which was bolted to the floor. 

Your mouth felt dry, all you could think about was water. That was, before someone came walking towards you from the corner of the room. 

“How are you feeling?” The man’s rough voice was too close to your ear, making you jerk back. The sudden movement didn’t help your head injury at all. “Ah ah ah...” He said, gripping your face with one large hand. “Stay still.” 

He was ugly. That was honestly your first thought while looking at him. Maybe he hated women cause he couldn’t get a date. 

His face was scruffy with a patchy beard, his brunette wavy hair receded away from his face revealing forehead wrinkles. He must’ve only been in his late 30’s early 40’s, but his strung-out appearance aged him. 

“Where am I?” You ask as levelly as you could in your state. Looking around, the only thing you noticed was a concrete floor and barren white walls, which hung some wire. A house? Maybe a basement, given the musty smell of the air in the cramped space. It was dark, the only light source coming from a small lamp to your right. 

“I thought you were the profiler.” 

So, this guy knows exactly who he took. You weren’t just a victim of opportunity, but a target. “You’re right, I am. Which is why I know that you are an extremely...” You take a steadying breath in preparation, “weak individual with no genuine real-world skills who overcompensates for his lack of personality with a massive ego.” You say, staring him in the eyes. “Am I getting warm?” 

The unsub pulls his fist back before it lands across your left cheek. You knew this would be the response, though. It’s why you did it. The punch snapped your head all the way to the right, where you spit out the small amount of blood that formed in your mouth. You can’t pretend it didn’t hurt; your eyes squeezed shut against the pain. 

Challenging a narcissist usually incurs some type of violence or retribution, but that makes them emotional which can make them sloppy and prone to mistakes. Maybe those mistakes would reveal to you where you were, or even lead your team right to you. You hoped you were right. 

The stranger in front of you takes in a rattling breath and exhales in your face, making you recoil. He grips you by the chin once more, putting some extra pressure on the bruise that was sure to form soon. “You are going to die here. But first, I have to make a call.” 

The man reaches into your front pocket, digging around until he finds what he’s looking for and pulls it out. Your phone isn’t locked, it never is since you never leave it behind, ever. That of course means the unsub has full access to each number in your contact list. Your heart rate picks up at the thought of who he was about to call. 

You didn’t have a significant other, maybe that meant he wouldn’t call anyone? No such luck, though. The man scrolled through your most recent calls and only one name showed up the most consistently. 

SSA Aaron Hotchner. 

His name made your head light and your stomach churn. This really was a waking nightmare. You pulled yourself roughly against your restraints, feeling the thick rope cut deep into your bare skin. It burned and you kept going until you received a punch to the stomach for your efforts. 

“Shut the fuck up.” The ugly man said. Then with a finger raised to his lips as if to demonstrate to you that you need to keep quiet, he presses the call button and raises the phone to his ear. You scream at him and that irritates him enough to punch you once more in the face, harder than the last time. 

You groan at the sensation, the pain from your skull and your cheek and your stomach combining to make you feel ill. 

“Y/N?” You could hear Hotch’s voice faintly from your phone that the unsub still had in his hand. 

“Don’t bother looking, you will never see her again.” Is all that the unsub said, before ending the call and tossing the phone away. It lands several feet behind him on the floor, and you know there’s no chance of you getting it. Not when you’re still bound to the chair. 

Your eyes remain fixed on the unsub, watching as he stares you down. He was predictably irrational, moving around you like a wild animal, as if trying to decide what to do with you first. 

You may not know where you are exactly, but you know that this unsub likes to keep his victims alive for at least 24 hours after kidnapping them. If he does stick to that pattern, that leaves you with about 20ish hours for your team to come find you. And while you did have complete faith in them, it didn’t stop your heart from pounding faster the closer he came. 

-  

Hotch saw the call with your caller ID, and he felt like he could breathe again. He had just stopped in the lot of Grant Park and was walking towards the yellow taped scene when he paused and answered. 

“Y/N?” He asked as soon as he hit accept. 

“Don’t bother looking, you will never see her again.”  

Hotch felt ice in his veins as the line went dead immediately after. The worst thing that could have happened, did. And Hotch felt helpless. His jaw was tense, and his hand curled into a white-knuckled fist around the cell phone. He dropped it to his side, not able to think for a moment. 

Then he took a deep breath and dialed Garcia. 

“Sir?” 

“Can you track L/N’s phone right now?” Hotch asks, feeling the weight of what was happening in his throat as it closed around his words. 

“Um, yeah, yes if it’s turned on and if it’s near cell phone towers I should-I should be able to triangulate its location...” While she spoke, she typed. Another few seconds passed without words. 

“Garcia?” Hotch said as firmly as he could. 

“I’m sorry sir, I can’t- if the phone was turned off or destroyed, I won’t be able to get even an approximation, nothing is coming up at all-” 

“Get into contact with the rest of the team, tell them Y/N’s been taken by the unsub.” 

“Oh, God. Oh my God, okay.” 

Hotch hung up and pocketed his phone. He wipes his hands down his face, frustrated and so fucking angry. With himself, with this case... he doesn’t know what he’ll do if he doesn’t get you back. Now was the worst time to dwell on it, though. You needed the team's help, and he was going to find you. 

Looking around at the scene, he noticed that the rental car wasn’t here either. That means the unsub took it with you inside. He must’ve disabled the GPS, either broke it or threw it away before leaving. Hotch immediately contacted the local Police Department’s office to put out an APB on the black SUV. 

Think, think... “Okay, he had a personal connection to Samantha. Not only knew her, he loved her or thought he did. He was angry that she was getting married.” 

Hotch drives as fast as he can back to the precinct where he finds everyone else, back from their assignments and looking at him for answers.  

“When was she taken?” Prentiss asks first. 

“And from where?” Reid adds. 

“Between 1:00 and 4:00 am, from the park where Larissa’s body was found.” Hotch says, trying to remain in his usual stoic façade. “He wouldn’t have risked taking her while it was light out. This unsub is bold but he’s still a coward like the rest of them.” 

“Did you find anything at the scene?” Morgan asks. 

“The car was missing, the unsub had to have taken L/N in it.” Hotch took a deep breath. “He called me from her phone.” 

That made everyone stiffen. 

Rossi speaks now, “Same message?” 

Hotch nods once, which is all he can manage. The team speaks in hushed tones as anxiety takes over. “Right now, we have to assume that she’s alive. This unsub keeps his victims so that he can... torture them so let’s get to work.” 

“Yeah, but Hotch... if he knows that L/N’s an FBI agent, there’s no telling if he’ll remain on schedule.” Morgan says, obviously troubled by the thought himself if his face is any indication. 

Hotch had considered it, of course. But he refused to accept it. Until there was a body, Y/N was not dead. She couldn’t be. 

“What did you find out about Samantha Garner from the missing person's report?” Hotch asks, ignoring the implication of Morgan’s words. 

“It was called in by her Fiancé, Riley Perkins.” He replies. “He called the police once he noticed she didn’t come home from work.” 

Hotch nods, thinking that the unsub wouldn’t be stupid enough to call in the missing person’s report himself. As much of a narcissist as he is, he wanted to keep pursuing his fantasies. 

“And JJ, what’d you get from her parents?” Hotch asks, fingers curled into fists as his arms cross in front of his chest. 

“It’s the same story as the other parents, everybody loved her, there was no one who held any grudges.” JJ says. “Her mother did mention an admirer, though.” 

“An admirer?” Prentiss repeats. 

“Yeah, I guess Sam was getting love letters. Innocuous enough to not raise alarm, but still out of the ordinary.” 

“Did she say who they were from?” Hotch says hurriedly. 

 JJ shakes her head, “No, she had no idea.” 

“Prentiss and I got Garcia to dig into Sam and Riley’s relationship,” Rossi says. “They were together only one year before deciding to tie the knot.” 

“They seemed to love each other.” Prentiss adds. 

“Well looks can be deceiving.” Hotch says. “Garcia got his address, Morgan and Prentiss, with me. The rest of you stay and find out absolutely everything you can about this secret admirer, he’s our unsub.” 

- 

When Hotch, Morgan and Prentiss arrived at the suburban home at the end of a cul-de-sac, all three stepped out and quickly made their way to the front door. 

Three loud knocks on the front door from Morgan and a few seconds later Riley came out. 

“Yes?” 

“Are you Riley Perkins?” Hotch asked, though he knew the answer. 

“Yes, I am. What is this about?” 

“I’m SSA Aaron Hotchner, these are special agents Morgan and Prentiss, may we come in?” He didn’t leave room for Perkins to answer, as he was already stepping inside. 

“Um, what-what is this about?” He asks again nervously, stepping aside to let the three of them into his living room. 

The house was a mess, laundry and trash littered most of the surfaces. The man himself didn’t look too good, like he hasn’t slept in a week. 

“We’re here about your fiancé, Samantha Garner.” Morgan says. 

Perkins shifts his weight from one foot to another uncomfortably, not making eye contact. “Did you, um, did you find her?” 

“Yes, sir we did.” Morgan responds. 

The man's nodding, fidgeting where he stands. “And?” 

“Sir, I’m afraid she’s dead.” Morgan explains as calmly as he can. 

Hotch notices the way Perkins handles the news, the tenseness of his shoulders dissipating. Not necessarily relieved by the news but accepting. Like he already knew that she was dead. 

“Oh my God...” He lifts a palm up to his face and sobs for a moment. 

“Mr. Perkins, I’m going to ask you once and if you’re not honest with me, trust that I will know.” Hotch states after he finally stops. The man looks him up and down and nods. “Did you receive a phone call the day your fiancé went missing?” 

“I uh- I don’t remember...” Perkins says, again breaking eye contact. 

“Yes, you do.” Hotch says, now invading his personal space. “It was the day your fiancé went missing, you knew something was wrong when she didn’t come home from work, you called the police. And then someone called you, didn’t they?” 

“I- I mean no I don’t...” Perkins finally looks up and then sighs. “I don’t know who it was, I really, really don’t.” 

“What did he say, exactly.” Prentiss asks. 

Perkins looks at her and shakes his head a little, “He said... that I shouldn’t look for her, that I- I'll never see her again.” He starts crying again after that. 

“Anything else at all? Was he calm, erratic?” Morgan asks. 

“He was like, mumbling, I don’t know.” 

“There’s something you’re not telling us, if you’re withholding essential information to interfere with a federal investigation, I will see to it that you are charged with obstruction of justice.” Hotch says, angrier by the second. 

Perkins looks like he’s going to throw up and his legs give out. He slumps down onto the couch before he can speak. “He said... he said that he would kill me too if I spoke to the police again.” His head is in his hands as he talks. “I knew, I knew the second the news said they discovered a body in Millenium Park.” He was almost incomprehensible through his sobs. “They couldn’t identify her, but I knew.” 

“Mr. Perkins... Riley.” Prentiss takes a seat next to him and speaks softly, trying to establish trust. “This man has killed at least five other women.” His cries stopped for a moment when he turned to look at her, a shocked expression on his face. “We need your help in order to stop him.” 

“I told you, I swear, I don’t know who it is.” 

“We think that you do, you just don’t know it.” Morgan says. 

Hotch jumps in, “Samantha was his target from the beginning, he knew her. He may have even known you. Think, was there anyone new in your lives? Someone who seemed a little too friendly too quickly? He would have made you uncomfortable, he was domineering and egotistical.” 

“Well, um I didn’t know him, I mean, I never met him,” Perkins says, “but there was a guy. Sam would complain about how annoying he was at work, a new hire. She said he talked her ear off about his life, asked too many personal questions...” He trails off for a minute looking between the three agents. “Do you think this man killed my fiancé?” 

“Possibly.” Hotch replies. “I have one more question and then we’ll leave.” Perkins nods, tight-lipped. “Did she mention that this man called her by a different name, maybe her middle name?” 

His face changed completely, mouth dropping open and blinking, “Yes! Yeah, she mentioned that he would call her ‘my Violet’ like every day, it bugged her.” 

“Thank you for your time.” 

- 

Hours had gone by while you stayed strapped to this god damned chair. The torture felt never-ending. The unsub landed blow after blow to your face and stomach, only offering a reprieve when you had temporarily passed out from the pain. You couldn’t see very well out of your left eye and your fingers were involuntarily twitching. The blood in your mouth was metallic and awful, adding to your nausea.  

“You know,” The man said, pushing a strand of hair behind your ear. “I appreciate the way you’re hanging on. It will make the ending a lot more fun.” 

If you had the energy, you would recoil from his closeness to your face. His breath repulsed you, but you stayed completely still, barely blinking, shallow breaths lifting and lowering your chest. 

“Mm, you really need to wake up.” He pushes your head back so that you’re forced to look at him. With his grip in your hair, he strikes you in the face with the back of his hand. “Nothin.” 

You couldn’t say with any real accuracy how much time had actually gone by since you were first taken, but you had a feeling that your time was running out. Your thoughts wandered to your team.  

You missed talking and joking with Prentiss and JJ, you missed Garcia’s cheery voice over the speaker phone. You wanted to hear Morgan’s stories about picking up women and Rossi’s input that made everyone laugh. You wanted to hear Reid ramble about nothing and everything. Mostly, you find yourself thinking about Hotch.  

You missed walking into the BAU and knowing you would find him in his office. You thought about his stern face and wanted to know what it would be like to reach your hands out and touch him, wipe away his anger and guilt. You wanted another silent morning where the two of you would sit in the conference room and drink your coffees, enjoying the comfortable silence of the early hours. 

You wanted to see his rare, but beautiful smile. The kind of thing that had to be earned; it was the best. As you thought more about him, the sadder you got. You should’ve told him, even just once, how much you liked his company... how much you liked him. 

- 

When Hotch, Morgan, and Prentiss get back to the precinct, Reid’s discovered something. He and the rest of the team have been working the secret admirer angle, which they now knew was a coworker at Samantha’s law office. 

“All of the bouquets of violets left at the victim’s families homes came with a note, they all said the same thing. ‘My condolences, -K.M.’” Reid explains quickly. 

Hotch knows they’re running out of time, it was already past noon, and the team was restless, but this gave him a spur of hope that they were getting close. He pulled out his phone and dialed Garcia’s number. 

“Ready and waiting.” She said. 

“Garcia,” Hotch’s voice was stern if not a little shaky with anxiety, “was there anyone in Samantha Garner’s workplace with the initials K.M.?” 

“Uhhhh, nine.” 

“Cross-check those names with anyone arrested for minor charges, assault or something similar, he would be in his 30’s or 40’s now, white.” 

“Only one, a Kyle Mazdin, arrested four years ago for breaking into an ex-girlfriend's home and burglarizing it, then arrested again for a bar fight where he nearly killed a man.” 

“We’ll need his address immediately.” 

“You’ve got it.” 

20 minutes later Rossi and JJ were at Mazdin’s office, and the rest of the team was at Mazdin’s home. 

Hotch screeched to a stop in the front of the seemingly normal house, “Prentiss with me, Morgan, take the back of the house, Reid through the garage.” 

All of them nodded in silent acknowledgment. Morgan and Reid broke off, headed to the side gate, while Hotch and Prentiss entered through the front. 

“FBI! Kyle Mazdin, open up!” Hotch yelled. They only waited a few seconds before bursting inside. 

The door was unlocked, and they quickly moved from room to room on the first floor with their guns out and ready, yelling “Clear!” before heading upstairs. There was nothing on the second floor either, making Hotch exhale a frustrated breath.  

“Hold on.” Prentiss said, stopping Hotch. “You hear that?” 

Hotch furrowed his brows and listened. “No, I don’t-” 

Just then, a creaking noise from below. Like light footsteps, moving carefully.  

Prentiss and Hotch shared a look before running back down the stairs, but there was still nothing. Morgan and Reid were inside, also trying to find the source of the noise.  

“The rental car is in the garage.” Reid said quickly and quietly. 

“Anything out back?” Prentiss asked Morgan, who shook his head. 

Another noise came from behind the team as they stood in the living space, next to the staircase. Hotch moves silently over to the cabinet door that’s connected to the wall under the stairs. It swings open and his gun and flashlight point at nothing. It’s empty save for a few coats hanging on a rack. But looking down, he sees a square-shaped covering with a latch. 

Hotch motions for Morgan, who stands ready to open it. As soon as he does, Hotch points his flashlight and gun down, where he sees another set of stairs leading to a hidden basement. Hotch’s jaw tenses and his grip of the glock tightens as he makes his way down, hearing the footsteps of his team behind him. 

As he gets halfway down, he sees a lamp illuminating your figure which is tied to a chair in the center of the room. Mazdin is behind you, the metal wire already wrapped around your neck, not tight enough to kill you, but forceful enough to threaten. 

“Let her go now.” Hotch’s voice is strained, his anger making it hard to remain still. He can hear the rest of the team coming down the stairs and stopping by his side, also training their guns on the man. “You have nowhere to go, it ends here.” 

“Yes, it does.” Mazdin says, pulling the wire tighter against your throat, making you jerk back a little in your chair. 

Hotch dared to look at your face, bloody and bruised, and it made his stomach churn. You were conscious, making eye contact with him and taking shallow breaths. Hotch’s heart was beating out of his chest, unable to stop when he took a step closer to you. 

“Another step and she’s dead.” The man said, keeping his grip on the wire. 

Hotch’s gun was burning in his hand as it was aimed at the unsub’s head, finger twitching on the trigger. “Drop your weapon and no one else dies today.” Mazdin was taking deep, shaking breaths, debating his next move. Hotch knew the man didn’t want to die, but he most certainly didn’t want to go to jail either. “Everyone will know what you did, and why. How the love of your life betrayed you, how you got your payback... even how you managed to abduct a Federal Agent. But only if you let her go.” 

Hotch could tell the words were at least getting through to him. His grip slackened, his back straightening a bit. Morgan and Prentiss took the opportunity and rushed him, immediately tacking Mazdin to the floor. He struggled and yelled, but Morgan kept him still enough for Prentiss to cuff him. At the same time, Hotch rushed to Y/N, holstering his gun. 

“Get him out of here.” Hotch told Morgan, who roughly dragged Mazdin up to his feet and forced him up the staircase and out of the house where the local police had finally shown up. Reid and Prentiss followed, holstering their guns as well, only after Hotch informed them to grab paramedics for you. 

“It’s okay.” Hotch was saying as he knelt down to your level, all anger dissipating and worry replacing it. “It’s okay, I’m here.” He holds Y/N’s head in his hands gently, trying to gauge the damage to her face and body. The blood coming from her nose was extensive, and the blood on his hand indicated a serious head injury. He couldn’t tell if anything was broken just yet. 

“Okay, I’m going to get these off of you, alright?” Hotch asks you while tugging on the ropes, but your eyes were drifting closed. “No, Y/N, no you have to stay awake for me, you may have a concussion, the paramedics are on their way, okay?” She met his eyes finally and then smiled a little bit. It made his chest tighten in response. 

“Okay.” Her voice was uneven, probably because of lack of hydration and near strangulation. It made his frown deepen, but he made sure to work quickly at untying the restraints. “Aaron.” 

He stopped at the sound of his first name on your lips. It was very rare that you called him Aaron, it made his breath catch for a moment as he removed the last bit of rope from her ankles and looked up at her. Y/N was staring at him with an indescribable look on her face, exhaustion and relief but also pain. “Thank you for finding me... I knew that you would.” 

Hotch didn’t know what to say. He had sent her away- their last interaction wasn’t a very good one, but she was here, alive and thanking him. It made that warmth from the other night in the precinct return. “Let's get you out of here.” Hotch gently slipped his arms up underneath Y/N so that he could lift her to her feet as the paramedics came down. Her groan of pain made his jaw tense, but he didn’t stop. 

The EMT’s asked if she could walk and Y/N nodded, though she leaned most of her weight onto Hotch. He didn’t mind, keeping his arm wrapped around her waist and helping her up the stairs, into the living room. Once the two of you had made it outside, Hotch allowed the EMT’s to take her. She lay on the cot in the ambulance, and Hotch kept his hand in hers the whole ride to the hospital. 

He watched as you drifted off, thinking just how much trouble they had gone through just to get you to sleep. 

[humanitys-strongest-bamf]

hi. it's almost midnight. i reblogged this post earlier and i couldn't stop thinking about it. here's another oneshot.

Come to Bed | Levi Fluff Oneshot

✧ word count ➼ 1.6k ✧ notes ➼ modern!au, fluff, some fighting at the beginning, idk its late and im tired

The door to your office in your 1-bedroom apartment swung open.

Levi was currently in the living room, sipping on a cup of freshly made tea, ready to settle in for the night.

You, however, were not so relaxed.

Having had double the amount of work dumped onto you due to being short-handed in office, you found yourself getting buried deeper and deeper beneath piles of unreviewed documents and manuscripts. You had rushed home after your office closed and had been hermitting in your office to try to crank everything out before morning, only coming out occasionally to refill your coffee mug.

At this point, you've had so much coffee that it wasn't doing anything to help with the exhaustion you were feeling, so you just found yourself pacing around the apartment every 20 minutes or so in an attempt to shake off the anxiety that resulted from both the caffeine and the never-ending pile of work that was waiting for you at your desk.

It was currently 11:30pm. It was way past your bedtime, and especially Levi's bedtime. You were surprised that he was still in the living room. You knew he couldn't sleep well, but it wasn't like him to just hang out in the living room all night, either.

The few times you looked over at him, you saw that he had an irritated look on his face that grew more intense throughout the course of the night. You wondered if he might have also had troubles at work.

Groaning to yourself in frustration, you left your office again, taking your now long-empty coffee mug with you. You rushed to the sink and placed your coffee-stained mug inside before turning around and grabbing a snack out of the pantry.

As you entered the kitchen, your other half followed you, placing his own empty mug of tea into the sink. You slightly bumped into each other and you looked at him as you carried a few bags of chips in your hands.

He avoided eye contact with you and didn't even mutter a word after brushing up against you. He simply placed his mug in the sink and then turned around to walk towards your bedroom.

Levi wasn't a particularly talkative person, but even this was out of character for him.

"Goodnight, I guess?" you said towards him as he walked away, tilting your head in confusion at his behavior.

"Night."

His response was cold and short. There wasn't a hint of the sentiment that's usually shared when couples wish each other a good night. While you knew that Levi hated any type of superficial gestures, this could hardly be called that. He wasn't the "goodnight, my love" type of person, but even he was never this cold unless he was actively upset about something.

You stood there for a second, your thoughts racing in your head as to what he might be upset about.

Is he mad about the dirty dishes in the sink? Does he not like me making coffee this late into the night? Is he mad because the office is a mess? Am I being too noisy?

"Hey!" you yelled to him, waving at him in an attempt to get his actual attention. "What the hell is up with you?"

Levi quietly grumbled to himself and continued walking without acknowledging you.

You sighed in exasperation and put your snacks down on the counter and followed him into your bedroom.

"You didn’t answer my question. What the hell is going on? Did I do something?"

"No," he said without offering an explanation as he walked past you to the bathroom.

You rolled your eyes, deciding you didn't have time to be dealing with any ambiguous mood swings with the amount of work that was piling on your desk.

"Well, I'll be in my office if you ever decide to tell me what the hell is going on," you said, preparing to walk out the door again and leave your grumpy significant other be. "I'm not a mind reader."

Levi slightly turned and glanced at you as you walked out the door.

"What else is new?" he grumbled to himself.

You couldn't tell if he had intended for you to hear that or not.

Your head immediately popped back in through the door.

"What?" you asked, noting that your tone came out incredibly defensive. The frustration that you were feeling was beginning to compound within yourself too.

He turned to you, his eyebrows scrunched together in irritation.

"I said, what else is new?"

You squinted your eyes at him, really trying to understand what he was trying to say.

"Me being in my office?" you said in a confused tone, unable to make the connection as to how that was relevant. "I mean, I'm sorry that it's probably going to be a late night, but with Hange and Armin having to deal with the employee shortage bullshit, I'm the only one that can-"

"Fuck, _____, I know all that!"

"Then what the hell is your problem?!" you raised your voice to match his as he yelled out in frustration.

He averted eye contact and glared angrily at the foot of the bed.

After it was clear he did not intend to respond, you spoke again.

"I can’t help you if you won’t talk to me, Levi," you said in a lower volume in an attempt to deescalate the situation.

You felt your own frustration grow as Levi continued to remain silent.

"Whatever," you muttered, deciding you could no longer afford to waste time on a one-sided conversation. "Just grab me whenever you decide to actually pull yourself out of your head."

You opened up the door to the bedroom, shaking your head.

Before you fully stepped out the door, you heard shuffling behind you and noticed that Levi was approaching you. You turned towards him, intending to ask him one last time what was going on.

However, before you could mutter a word, Levi had pulled you into a deep kiss, placing his hands on the back of your neck to pull you in.

The gesture came as a surprise to you, as you did not expect such an intimate gesture to result from an argument—but it was a welcome gesture. You felt yourself relax and return the kiss, bringing up one of your hands to rest onto his.

When he finally pulled away, you looked deeply into his eyes.

"What the hell is up with you?" you whispered to him, worry entering your eyes.

"Just come to bed," he responded quietly.

You blinked at him for a few seconds, confused by his simple request.

"I’ll make some excuse up to four-eyes, tomorrow," he continued. "Just come to bed."

You felt his hands drop from you as he repeated his request. You nodded and mouthed "okay" to him silently, seeing his tense shoulders relax ever so slightly afterwards.

Once you set your stuff down in your office and shut off the lights, you crawled into bed with him, resting your head on his chest as he pulled you in tightly.

You were able to hear his heart rate slow down and his breathing relax the longer you laid there with him. The both of you laid there in silence for a while—too long for you to count—as he ran his fingers through your hair out of habit.

A small smile grew on your face as you enjoyed his presence and how he felt pressed up against you. You relished in his scent and the way that he held you as always, firm but gentle.

As you were about to get lulled into the depth of sleep, your eyes shot open again as you made a connection in your head.

"Hey Levi…" you said slowly, knowing that he was still awake.

"Hmm?"

"Were you all upset because I haven’t been able to pay attention to you all day because of work?"

You smirked as you felt his breath slightly hitch at your question.

"No idea what you’re talking about," he said coldly.

Your half-smirk turned into a full grin and you had to stifle a chuckle to avoid teasing him too much.

"You sure?"

He answered your question with a grunt, which confirmed your suspicions.

Even after how long the two of you had been together, you were still astonished at how difficult it was for him to communicate about his more intimate needs. Generally, you were able to easily pick up on it, but being scatter-brained put you in a position in which you were missing all of the usual signs: him staying up late for you, regularly checking on you in your office, and even preparing the coffee for you that he knew you were drinking much too late into the night. The small acts of service that he usually did for you ran unnoticed and you sighed to yourself as you pressed yourself tighter against him.

As difficult as he was and as annoying as he could get sometimes, he was there with you, showing affection for you in all of the little ways that was characteristic of the type of boyfriend he was. You smiled to yourself, appreciating his presence as you gently fell asleep, with your stress regarding your work nowhere to be found.

A/N: i'm trying to edit this but i literally cant see because i'm so tired so hope you enjoyed this last minute late-night drabble!!!

[intermittent-showers]

Part 2: Random Facts & Sweet Gestures

Cute little fic about how Tommy tries to cheer up Buck during his shifts with Gerrard.

Read here or on AO3

"Buckley! Diaz! I want this rig scrubbed from top to bottom!"

"Sure... Cap." Buck said, this time without gritting his teeth and rolling his eyes.

Gerrard kept walking, though, shouting commands out like he'd been doing for the last six weeks. "Wilson! Start dinner! Han!"

"Cap?" Chim popped his head out from behind the ambulance he had been using to seek refuge.

"Mop the floors!" Gerrard practically growled before turning his attention on Ravi, who was now being assigned bathroom duty.

Eddie sighed, grabbing a few rags before handing one to Buck. "Better get started. You know he'll never shut up if it's not clean by the time we eat."

"Yeah. I know." Buck replied before walking yo the front of the ladder truck and started to assess where to begin.

They had just come back from a four alarm fire. They themselves were filthy, covered in ash and mud, and god knows what else. Yet, as exhausting as that call was, working under Gerrard was far worse. There was never any time to just be. Always something to be done and all the while Gerrard would make little comments here and there. About how Bobby had run the 118 into the ground. About how everyone here was weak and undisciplined.

After three weeks of all that, Buck was struggling. He couldn't believe someone so hateful and spiteful could ever be allowed to captain any firehouse, let alone their's.

One night, he said as much to Tommy over dinner at his home. The man had simply asked about Buck's shift, to which he received a full-on rant about how much he hated being there. The job Buck once loved was now the thing he hated most. All because of one obnoxious man.

Buck felt his phone buzz in his pants pocket, quickly putting a smile on his face. Pulling his phone out, he checked the message.

𝗧𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘆: Did you know that around 700 grapes go into one bottle of wine?

Buck responded as quickly as he could, hoping Gerrard was off harassing someone new, not currently in the bay.

𝗕𝘂𝗰𝗸: I didn't know that actually!

And then.

𝗕𝘂𝗰𝗸: miss you

He shoved his phone back into his pocket and continued to clean the rig.

This was something that had been Tommy's idea. To try and have Buck think about things throughout his shift that would interest him and get his mind off of Gerrard. It wasn't terrible advice, especially from someone who understood how horrible shifts could get with that tyrant as your Captain, but Buck didn't really believe something as simple as that would work.

But it had... and it was.

The random facts started out as handwritten notes placed inside Buck's duffle. That first day, he had unzipped the bag to find a single blue post-it note stuck to his extra change of clothes.

It read: 'Human teeth are the only part of the body that can't heal themselves. -T'

And for the first time since Gerrard had taken over, Buck felt happiness within the walls of his firehouse once again.

After a week, one note turned into two notes, and now Buck started just about every shift with a handwritten note in his duffle, followed by random facts sent to his phone every few hours.

"Buck?"

Thoughts being interrupted, he looked over at Eddie, who was staring at him amused. "What?"

"You've cleaned that door six times."

"Oh, sorry." He said before moving to another section of the rig, already looking forward to his next random facts of the day.

---

𝗧𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘆: Bees sometimes sting other bees.

𝗧𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘆: Giraffes are 30 times more likely to get hit by lightning than people.

𝗧𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘆: A chicken once lived for 18 months without a head.

---

As the shift finally came to an end, Buck took his time changing into his civvies. He needed to grab some coffee or something with caffeine to help wake him up so he could make it safely to Tommy's.

Opening his locker, he smiled at the blue post-it note secured to the inside of the door. His first random fact, chosen exclusively by Tommy, to try and cheer him up. It was special to him. Knowing that he had someone in his life who wanted to cheer him up, wanted to help in any way they could, even if it was just a few tiny words.

A soft knock on the locker room door had him turning on the spot. "Tommy?"

"Hey." Tommy grinned, making his way towards him. "You all ready to go?"

Buck was confused. "My jeep's here. I can drive."

"After the shift you just had? No way."

"But I-"

"Evan." Tommy took his duffle from him, slinging it over his own shoulder. "You're in no state to drive. We can pick it up tomorrow. It's not going anywhere."

Buck shut his locker door and nodded. "Okay, you win." Halfway to the parking lot, he poked Tommy in the side. "Can we pickup dinner on the way? I'm starving."

Tommy reached down, slotting their hands together. "I ordered your favorite on the way over here. Should be ready in ten."

"Fun fact: you're the best."

With a laugh and a kiss to Buck's temple, Tommy opened the passenger side door for him. "Fun fact: I know."