#there was one spook that really got me towards the end. imagine you are sort of in a fish bowl. and people are tapping the glass. and also
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draconicace · 4 months ago
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just finished reading stagtown and i'm surprised there's not more post-canon fics. or. well. more than fifteen fics total considering how many views the comic's gotten
ah well. the comic's really good! great horror vibes. scary deer and eyes. fun characters that bounce off each other well. there was also an arg part of it at some point that readers got to participate in and affect the story which is cool. okie it's past 1am i have to go to sleep now
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amplesalty · 2 months ago
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Halloween 2024 - Day 1 - Nope (2022)
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Whole lotta horse abduction going on...
What, October already? Better break out those horror movies then, and why not a continuation of sorts from yesteryears? Following on from the past successes of Jordan Peele with his direction of Get Out and Us, as well as his involvement in the new Candyman, Nope has been something I've been looking forward to seeing over the past couple of years so I figured I'd put it on the agenda for this year's marathon.
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Daniel Kaluuya return's as the the protaganist, OJ, having starred in the aforementioned Get Out. There's also other familiar faces like Steven Yeun from The Walking Dead, Michael Wincott who was in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves and The Crow, and of course my boy Ketih David. Though, his is only a passing appearance as he is killed off early on by a falling coin that is thought to be some sort of airline malfunction. See kids, this is why your parents tell you never throw things from the top of car parks.
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It's David's untimely demise that see's OJ thrust to the forefront of the family business; horse training. Specifically for use in film and television. Unfortuately, OJ doesn't quite have the knack for this whole thing and gets dumped from an upcoming project after one of his horses get's spooked and lashes out on set. Speaking off which, in order to get some money back into the business, OJ has been selling some of the horses to a local western themed theme park called Jupiter's Claim, whose owner has a tragic background of being witness to a much more violent animal outburst on set.
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As a child actor, he featured in a sitcom called Gordy which seems to be the kind of absurd show you normally see parodied on TV or film where a family has a chimpanzee that lives with them. One day though this chimp goes completely apeshit (pun intended) and kills some of of the cast. Now, granted you're probably not expecting that and the monkey probably got the jump on you but I dunno, is it wrong to think you could take a chimpanzee in a fight? Granted, they do have those nasty fangs and pound for pound they probably are pretty strong but they're only small. I do love those kind of surveys, if only for when they get towards the end of the list and there's a handful of people who are like "Yeah, I think I could beat an elephant."
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OJ starts to notice some weird occurances around the family ranch like EMP type blackouts that even knock out cars and phones. He comes to suspect this is a UFO and hopes to document this in the hopes of becoming rich from selling the footage. Only to a completely reputable outlet that is, like Oprah. It's here that I start to have some problems with the movie. Like, it's not a bad movie and it did keep me intruiged as to where it was going. But it never seemed to really have a strong sense of dread behind it because whatever this UFO is is very vague and unseen for the bulk of the money. That's not uncommon in horror, with the old idea of what the mind imagines can often be scarier, but it felt like the characters in the movie weren't particuarly fussed most of the movie either. I think that largely comes down to Kaluuya as OJ who just seems completely stoic about everything the entire time.
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When the UFO does show up, at first I thought it was a flying Stetson hat or something, like the overall Western theme going on had somehow manipulated it's form, kinda like when Gozer appears as the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
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And even when it does start racking up a body count, it's largely off camera and you just see what appears to be shots of it's victims being ingested like Augustus Gloop going up the pipe in the chocolate factory but even they seemed hard to comprehend and a bit hoky. I'd suggest it was meant to be emulating someone from the classic 50's era sci-fi but it feels a bit out of place amongst the rest of the movie. I guess it's tying back to the whole alien theme by being un-natural and un-nerving.
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Which is echoed when the creature does reach it's final form which is something akin to a jellyfish. I think this aspect works well, getting away from the cliched humanoid forms you sometimes get in sci-fi movies, which is something they poke fun at earlier in the film. This particular shot where OJ is trying to lead the thing away from the rest of the group is particuarly mesmerising, just the sheer scale of thing. It has a bit of that 'Old Ones' vibe to it too, that it's just something so unfathmoably alien that your brain couldn't possibly begin to comprehend it and to try would send you mad.
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The part where the creature hovers over the hose, regurgitating all the stuff it's eaten and showering the house in blood is also a really cool moment, like something out of The Shining or Poltergeist. Ultimately though, this one felt like a let down to me in that I went into it with such high hopes based of Peele's previous work. Some people seem to really love it and rank it amongst some of the best sci-fi movies ever made so all power to you guys on that one, it just wasn't for me. Even the underlying messages didn't really hit me that strongly, like I've seen people talking about how it's a look at the dangers of survellience and making allusions to faith and the ascencion to Heaven but it doesn't have that raw 'holding a mirror to society' feel that Peele's earlier work does. Though, I guess you don't want to do that in every movie lest you become pidgeon holed and you get those stupid people who think you're 'bringing race into everything' when you're making a Candyman movie. I still can't get over that.
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forever-rogue · 2 years ago
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you don’t have to expand on this if you don’t want to or you could wait until closer to halloween?!? buuuuttt imagine this;
so reader and eddie are in a relationship and the stranger things clan go to a halloween haunted house for fun. reader sticks to eddie the entire time because they are terrified and it honestly seems like the house is just picking on them (grrr). afterwards someone makes a comment about how the reader was so clingy towards eddie and it makes the reader feel upset and silly. reader keeps away from eddie to lessen this ‘clinginess’ thing, but one night reader is terrified and eddie can tell that something’s been keeping them up for nights on end now and he’s had enough. reader explains why they’ve kept their distance in desperation to not spend another night alone :////
idk if this is absolute shite… but it’s been on my mind!
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AN | It’s officially spooky season, so here we are! It’s some soft Eddie! Enjoy 🥰
Warnings | None
Pairing | Eddie x Fem!Reader
Word Count | 2.6k
Masterlist | Main, Eddie
─── ・ 。゚☆: *.☽ .* :☆゚. ───
“Tell me why I agreed to this,�� you looked at the looming haunted house, surprised and intimidated by how spooky it actually managed to look. Hawkins didn’t seem to do a lot right, but for whatever reason, Halloween is when the town went all out. You sighed, tightening your grip on Eddie’s arm. His warm chuckle reached your ears and you relaxed ever so slightly, “if I have a heart attack and die, it’s on you, Munson!”
“Relax, princess,” he stopped for a moment, turning so he was facing you. He put a finger under your chin and tilted your face up to his before pressing a small kiss to your lips. He tasted like the sweet cotton candy and caramel corn you’d eaten a while ago and that made you giggle softly, “it’ll be okay. It’s all fake, remember. And besides, I’ll keep you safe.”
“My valiant knight,” your face warmed under his sweet gaze, causing your stomach to flutter with butterflies. No matter how long you’d been together, he still managed to make you feel like you were falling in love all over again, “thank you, Eddie. I love you.”
“I love you too,” he affectionately booped your nose before taking your hand in his and leading you closer to the haunted house. You groaned lightly, but followed him, finding the rest of your friends already in line, “this is going to be so much fun!”
─── ・ 。゚☆: *.☽ .* :☆゚. ──��
You and Eddie apparently had very different definitions of fun. His definition was apparently filled with all sorts of tricks and spooks, while you preferred something much more mellow. You’d snuck into the middle of your friends, letting Steve and Robin go in front and the kids trailing behind you. You figured that it couldn’t get too crazy in the middle…but that didn’t prevent you from clinging onto Eddie like he was your life line.
You were pretty sure you weren’t normally so on edge and that much of a scaredy cat but something about this particular evening had gotten to you. Might have been the shared trauma you’d been through together. Probably. But that was something to unpack another day. 
As you turned the corner into another long hallway, after a few quiet footsteps, a large zombie popped out and growled menacingly, chasing after you before you made it into the safety of the next room. Your heart was thumping around wildly in your chest, and were clinging onto Eddie like a koala; he wrapped his arm around you and held you tightly, whispering soft words of reassurances into your ear.
“We can leave, baby. We don’t have to go through the rest of it,” he insisted but you shook your head. You didn’t want him to miss out just because you were a big baby, “really, I don’t mind.”
“No way, Eds,” you reached for his hand and tightly laced your fingers together before motioning for him to keep going, “let’s just keep going.”
“If it’s too much, you promise to tell me?” his concern was touching but you just nodded in agreement, “I’ve got you princess.”
The rest of the trek through the haunted house wasn’t as bad, but it was still enough to rattle you. By the time you got to the end, your body was practically meddled into his; but you could tell he had a good time which was all that mattered to you. When you stepped back into the fresh evening air, you found the rest of the group waiting for you guys, amused little smiles on Steve and Robin’s faces.
“Oh Eddie,” Robin teased as she looked between the two of you. You knew that she held no ill will and all you could do was laugh nervously, “please keep me safe!”
“Robin,” you groaned and flipped her the bird as she just laughed, “don’t be so mean!”
“I’m just teasing babe,” she promised softly, “but seriously, you’re hanging onto him like a koala. Didn’t think you were so clingy.”
“Give the poor man a moment to breathe,” Steve winked and while it was all in jest, your face flushed with embarrassment. You didn’t think you were that bad….but apparently you were, “you’re going to squeeze the life out of him!”
You immediately dropped his hand and took a step away so there was a small distance between your bodies. Eddie gave you a surprised little look but you refused to meet his eye. Were you really that bad? Did he feel smothered, and just not want to say anything? You hoped not…but maybe it was time to give him some space. Just a little bit, for now. Maybe that would be best for you. Maybe. Probably not. But you were willing to give it a try.
─── ・ 。゚☆: *.☽ .* :☆゚. ───
 After that night, you'd started to create a little bit of separation between yourself and your boyfriend. You knew he'd never tell you that you were being clingy, even if he thought you were. He'd rather deal with something like that than hurt your feelings.
Little did you know that he absolutely did not feel like you were clingy. He adored the fact that you were so close to him. But you weren't aware of that just yet. So, after that Halloween evening spent at the haunted house, you slowly started to take small steps away from him.
At first, it was getting to and from school on your own. Normally Eddie would pick you up and you'd go home with him after school. That's how it had been for almost 2 years. It caught him off guard when you'd called him early in the morning and told him you wouldn't need a ride. It was odd, but he wasn't going to question you - not just yet. He was sure it would only be for a day or two, but that had turned into a week and then two weeks. 
The lunch periods you used to spend with him at his table turned fewer and fewer. Every day it became some sort of excuse of having to go to the library to study, or working on a project, or working to get ahead on something, or to get help on something or other. Eddie knew that was a load of bullshit; you were not only one of the smartest people in school, but one of the smartest he knew. He was sure it was thanks to you that he was finally going to graduate. You wouldn’t need help - at least not that much, if anything people would be asking you for help.
But - those were things he could deal with. He could give you your space during the school day, and he absolutely wanted to respect your boundaries. But then you stopped going to Hellfire meetings - I forgot, ‘m sorry, Eds. You bailed on Friday evening plans with the whole gang - game nights, movie nights, or just hanging out. But the worst part came when you canceled your dates with him, and stopped going to his place all together. It had become so normal for the two of you to spend a lot of your time with one another. 
It slowly managed to break Eddie’s heart, but more than anything, he was worried about you. He knew something was eating at you and just wished you’d let him in so he could make it all better.
And you missed him just as much. He’d become such an important and large part of your life - your heart - and not having them there left you feeling like there was a big hole in your chest. But this was the best thing to do, right? Give him space and not smother him so much. Then why did it feel so very wrong?
─── ・ 。゚☆: *.☽ .* :☆゚. ───
The nightmares were getting bad again. They’d dwindled and almost completely went away over the last few months, but they were slowly coming back. There were more nights than you wished to count that you’d woken up, crying or whimpering, working hard to self-soothe and remind yourself that none of it was real. Not anymore  - you were safe and sound and nothing could harm you. 
But that didn’t help you to sleep any better. Your sleep pattern had been so thoroughly disrupted that you barely got more than an hour or two at time before you were up again, cycling through that several times most nights. You were exhausted and felt worse than ever, and you missed Eddie. You felt more like a shell of yourself than anything. 
You were sitting in bed, attempting to read through the battered copy of the Hobbit that you’d stolen from none other than Eddie, when you heard a loud tapping at your window. The sudden sound startled you as you flung the book across the room in surprise. You slid out of bed and went to see what the commotion was and quietly found Eddie, looking at you from the other side of the window. Your heart swelled and then fell, but you slowly opened the window for him nonetheless, folding out a hand so he wouldn’t tumble in. 
As soon as he was on solid ground again, he turned to you, his own eyes glassy with tears as he looked you over. Without a word, you almost jumped into his arms as you flung yourself at him. You couldn’t help it; you’d missed him desperately and just wanted to be held by him.
“Baby,” he took a shuddering breath in and wrapped his arms tightly around your frame as you buried your face into his chest. You felt so good, so warm, and smelled just like your Eddie. He could feel your tears soaking into his shirt as you tried to keep your cries and whimpers quiet, “it’s okay, I’ve got you. It’s alright, princess. I’m right here and I’m not going anywhere.”
“Eddie,” you let him hold you for a few long moments until you were able to get all of your tears out. When you pulled back to look at him, he tenderly touched your face, wiping away the last of your tears, “‘m sorry. I’m so sorry. I love you so much.”
“Hey, I love you so much,” his voice was barely above a whisper as he looked at you sweetly, “what’re you apologizing for? There’s no need; it’s okay.”
“I’ve been treating you like garbage,” you sighed, letting him move you to the bed so you could sit down on the bed. He toed off his old, beat up Reeboks before sitting down in the middle, crossing his legs. You mirrored him and allowed yourself to study his handsome features. He really was beautiful, so much that it made your heart ache to touch him, “you didn’t deserve it, any of it. You deserve way better. Better than-”
“Shh,” he put his finger to your lips, gently shushing you, “I’m not even going to let you finish that. You haven’t been treating me like garbage. More like…recycling -”
“Eddie!”
“I’m kidding,” he teased softly, his messy waves bouncing wildly, “I’m not gonna lie, it has hurt a little bit to have you distance yourself so much, but I’ve been worried about you more than anything.”
“I know,” you nodded and dropped your gaze into your lap as you played with your hands, “I’m sorry to have worried you. I’m sorry for…everything. I love you so much. The worst feeling in the world is knowing I’ve hurt you. I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t want to…be with me anymore.”
“Okay,” he was almost giggling now, “dramatic much? Baby, I’ve always told you and I still mean it - you’re it for me. Whatever is going on is something we can work through. Yeah?”
“Yeah,” you nodded through a fresh wave of tears, “you’re it for me too, Eddie.”
“Wanna tell me what’s been going on?” he pressed a kiss to your forehead before pulling you closer so you were almost in his lap, “you don’t have to, but I want to help. I want to make it better, if you’ll let me.”
“It’s stupid,” you shrugged, feeling your face flush with warmth at his intense gaze, “so stupid and I can’t believe…I’m stupid. It’s just that…on Halloween, when we went to that haunted house…Steve and Robin were making fun of him for being too clingy and attached to you. And it made me think - what if I am too clingy? What if I’m too annoying, but you just don’t have the heart to tell me? I thought that if I gave you some space, that might be better. Ya know?”
“Oh. Oh,” he mulled over that night in his mind before pulling up that conversation. He did remember that, but he had a very different take away than you did, “Harrington and Robin were just teasing, sweetheart. You know they’d never actually say anything mean, they’re a lot of things, but they’d never be mean. They didn’t mean anything by it - I didn’t take it like that. And I do not think you’re too clingy. Fuck baby, I love spending my time with you. There’s no one else I’d rather share it with. I’d spend all of my time with you if I could. I love how close we are, princess.”
“Really?” you looked at him with wide, innocent eyes that he was sure would kill him one day, “do you mean it, Eddie?”
“Of course I do,” he reached over and touched your cheek, his fingertips grazing over the soft skin, “I would never lie to you. I’ve missed you like crazy the past couple of weeks. I thought you wanted the space and I didn’t want to push you away. But I couldn’t…I missed you too much. Had to see you.”
“I missed you too,” you hesitated for just a moment, but he could easily read your mind and pulled you into his lap. You curled up and melded into his body, “will you…Eddie, can you stay the night?”
“Of course,” he didn’t hesitate to answer as he pressed a kiss to the top of your head, “any time.”
“Thank you,” you looked at him softly, “I-I can’t sleep lately and maybe it’ll help if you’re here.”
“You haven’t been sleeping?” he sounded pained as he studied your appearance, “how long has this been going on? What’s wrong?”
“The past couple of weeks,” you admitted softly, “since like…I thought it was better to keep separate from you. It’s just…the nightmares have been back. It’s been making it hard to sleep.”
“Oh,” his heart constricted as you just gave him the lightest of shrugs, “I wish you would have come to me sooner. I’m so sorry, princess. I’ll stay, okay? I’ll stay whenever you want or need.”
“Stay forever,” you worried your bottom lip and he just chuckled lightly before tightening his grip around you, “don’t ever leave me.”
“I’ll stay forever,” he promised, “even if you don’t want me around. I’ll be here. You’re never getting rid of me.”
“I don’t want to,” you shook your head before pulling him in for a kiss, letting your lips linger against his, “forever with you is all I want.”
“Then that’s what you’ll have, princess.”
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spectaclespencer · 3 years ago
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P.H. // Part 1; Alone
Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader
A/N; Here’s the first chapter! Let me know what you think <3 this is based off of this request I got. Any and all feedback is appreciated. Please know I know this theme/part has little to nothing to do with the actual meaning of the song, but some lines work if you ignore the rest 😅
Summary; After Gideon leaves, Reader takes up chess to comfort Spencer through the difficult time.
Category; Fluff, Angst(?), Hurt/Comfort
Content Warnings; Sad Spencer otherwise none!
Word Count; 3.5k
Masterlist | Series Masterlist | Next
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It started when I found Spencer one morning. He had fallen asleep on a chair at the bau, and he explained to me that he’d been waiting for Gideon because he promised to play chess with Spencer that night.
“Is Hotch in yet?”
“No, he will be soon. We have a case, JJ is gonna brief us and we leave in 30.”
He thanked me and left the room, with his head down. He kept the same mood during the briefing, he kept drifting off as JJ was talking. Spencer was known to be stuck in his head often, but this was far more unusual behaviour. I figured maybe he slept wrong, or maybe just was simply looking forward to playing chess with Gideon. That was their usual routine, to have a game or two after cases to relax. It was understandable to see him on edge after not hearing from him all night.
As we got on the jet he didn’t sit with me on the couch right away as he usually did, instead he walked over to Hotch in the back corner. I craned my neck to try and see what he was doing and hear what he was saying. He spoke in soft whispers, seemingly asking questions I assumed were about Gideon’s presence. I saw Hotch shake his head, to which Spencer’s expression dropped. He thanked him, then made his way over to the couch beside me.
“You okay?” I asked.
He gave me a quick nod -- yet didn’t meet my eyes -- then curled up at the end of the couch to presumably take a nap before we landed.
We were all worried about Gideon, none of us had heard from him since the last case. We figured he just needed a break from the chaos; having a loved one die would take a toll on any of us. It was logical really, any one of the team would need time to recover when presented with that situation.
Spencer remained more quiet throughout the case, not engaging in conversation when it wasn’t crucial to the work. We ended up sharing rooms but even then he didn’t budge. He mostly sat in the corner and played chess against himself, often zoning out and staring at the wall. It was hard to see, and even harder to sit back and let him try to get through it. I could tell he was fighting himself in his head, probably going over scenarios on Gideon’s whereabouts. I imagine the stress was affecting him heavily -- or at least it was clear with the way his forehead had been creased all night.
Chess. Nobody on the team had a fair shot at him besides Gideon. Sitting there staring at the pieces probably wasn’t doing him too good, only making him worry more.
It wasn’t that I didn’t care because I did, but when it comes to certain things Spencer can be defensive and refuse help, so I wanted to give him a chance to get better. It wasn’t unlike him to refuse help, and I didn’t want to make the situation worse by opening my mouth. Instead, I opted to ask, “Mind if I join in for a game?”
“What? Uh- no it’s fine. I mean, okay yes. Sure,” Spencer stuttered, spooked by my sudden appearance beside him.
“Stop slouching, you’re gonna make your posture even worse,” I chuckled lightly, patting his shoulder to remind him. He shot me a small smile, watching as I rounded the table to sit across from him. I wasn’t too good of a player, but I wanted to make Spencer feel just a little less alone.
“Do you even know how to play?”
“Ouch,” I mocked offense, slapping a hand over my heart. “So cruel, Spencer.”
He raised his eyebrows in a form of asking again, to which I replied with, “Kind of. I haven’t played for years but I’ve observed you.”
“Y-you’ve observed me?” Spencer questioned, resetting the chess pieces on the board.
“Well, yeah. Kind of hard not to. You’re a pretty interesting guy.”
“Oh. Thank you.”
I smiled when he finally made eye contact with me. He looked tired -- more so than usual -- with his eyebags a deeper shade than they were normally.
The game didn’t last long. In only seven minutes, he managed to beat me. I groaned at my loss, lips pulled into a tight line. Spencer didn’t react, however.
“Okay that’s enough for me,” I said, heading over to the bathroom to brush my teeth before bed. “Goodnight Spence. Get some sleep. No offense but you look like you need it.”
He hummed at me, cleaning up the table before he climbed into his own bed.
I could tell he didn’t sleep much that night, as he kept a lamp on and littered his bed with various books. He looked cute, all swaddled up in the blanket he brings with him on every case for a sense of stability. His glasses were perched on his nose, and he was chewing his fingernails -- a habit I’ve tried to get him to kick over the past two years.
We didn’t talk during the night, but we both knew that each other were awake. I was kept up by my thoughts, trying to figure out how to get Spencer out of his slump. Re-learning how to play chess seemed like a decent enough idea -- yet one that would take some time. I was proved tonight that my skill needed to be greatly improved. It was nice in the moment, but realistically it would take a few weeks, if not more, to get the hang of.
The next day at the precinct I was stationed at the map, trying to figure out our geographical profile. I heard faint chattering coming from outside, and looked over my shoulder to see Spencer and Derek talking. I couldn’t hear much, but I did get that Spencer mumbled about calling Gideon, to which Derek answered that he might’ve just missed the call. It was possible, but likely deeper than that.
“Six times? Six calls? Something’s wrong,” Spencer sighed, rubbing his eyes.
I didn’t intervene with the conversation, instead deciding to finally speak to him about it after the case had ended.
On the last day, we all headed to our rooms after grabbing some dinner, to get a good rest before we took off early the next morning.
“Hey Spence, you awake?”
He hummed in response, and I could hear the rustle of the sheets as he rolled over in his bed to face me.
“I know you’re worried about Gideon. How about when we get back tomorrow I’ll drive you down to his cabin? We can go check on him.
“Would you really?” he asked softly. I couldn’t see him fully in the darkness, but I could sense he was looking at me with pleading eyes.
“Of course. I don’t like seeing you this stressed and down. I want to help.”
“Thanks ____, goodnight.”
“Goodnight, Spencer.”
After our conversation it was like a blanket of grey was lifted over his head. He settled in more, drifting off to sleep within minutes. I hated seeing him sad, and I did my best to try and fix his mood whenever I could. Spencer didn’t like change, I knew that, and the team knows that. A part of me had a sneaking suspicion that Gideon wasn’t coming back, and I had fear for what that would mean for Spencer.
-----
“Do you want me to come in with you?” I asked, pulling up in front of the cabin and turning off the engine. The only sounds were the faint hum of rain outside, splattering against the windows.
Spencer shook his head and took a deep breath, before unbuckling himself and opening his door. He mumbled something about being right back, as he headed off towards the building. It wasn’t dark yet -- only being four pm -- but it wasn’t too light either.
It looked as if the lights inside the cabin were off, and I could just hardly see Spencer as he knocked on the door. He waited on the porch for a moment, waiting to see if anyone would come to the door.
Nobody did.
It was hard to just sit there and watch, as his desperation grew stronger by the millisecond.
-----
I took deep breaths, trying to even out my intake of air and remain calm. When nobody answered the fifth time that I knocked, I reluctantly grabbed a hold of the knob and turned it. Much to my surprise the door opened, creaking inch by inch as I stood there unmoving.
“Gideon?” I called into the home, taking one step inside. “Jason?”
I wasn’t greeted with an answer, he didn’t come to the door and thank me for coming to visit. It was eerily quiet -- so quiet I took a few more steps inside to create some sort of volume.
“Hello?” I spoke again, louder this time. Shutting the door behind me I took off my jacket and hung it on the coat rack next to the entrance.
The place had been mainly cleared out, there weren’t many personal items behind. I stalked over to the kitchen, to see if there was any trace of someone within the last few days. It’s been officially a week and a half since anyone had last heard from him that I was aware of. I thought someone must have eaten, or at least left a bit of a mess behind them that would signal a presence.
As I turned the corner to enter the new room I noticed something on the table. I stopped in my tracks, leaning down to take a closer look.
Gideon’s badge, gun, and an envelope.
I swallowed thickly, walking around the table and took a seat in front of the items. When I saw the envelope had my name on it, my heart dropped. With shaky hands I picked up the paper and opened it, seeing there was a letter inside.
Spencer,
I knew it would be you who came to the cabin to check on me.
You must be frightened, I apologize for that. I never meant to cause you any pain. But then I also never envisioned writing this letter. I’ve searched for a satisfactory explanation for what I’m doing, all I’ve come up with is: a profiler needs to have solid footing. I- I don’t think I do anymore. The world confuses me. The cruelty, indifference, tragedy.
I stopped there, my eyesight becoming blurry from tears. I shoved the letter in my pocket, not caring at the moment if it got crumpled or not.
I was out of the cabin in no time -- choosing not to stay there and sulk in a deeper sadness.
-----
Waiting in the car for Spencer felt like torture. It was difficult, letting him go in there alone to be met with possibly no answers. I was thrown out of my thoughts by the sound of the cabin door slamming shut, Spencer jogging over to the car.
“Hey. Hey, what’s wrong?” I asked, red flags hanging immediately as he climbed in the car, tear soaked face pointed down towards his lap. It took me a moment to realize he was crying -- the rain had completely soaked through his top layer of clothes. He didn’t reply with words, instead reaching into his pants pocket to retrieve a piece of paper. He handed it over to me, still not meeting my eyes.
I unfolded it and began to read -- it was hard, through the tear stains smudging the ink across the page.
“Oh, Spence…” I whispered and stopped after the first few sentences, leaving the rest for him. I didn’t know what to say, how to comfort him.
“He’s gone,” Spencer sniffled, wiping his eyes on the sleeves of his nearly drenched jacket. “He just left. He didn’t say goodbye. He left me a note,” he froze, taking a few deep breaths. “Just like my dad did when I was a kid.”
“It’ll be okay. Wherever he is, I’m sure he’s okay,” I assured him. “You know he cares about you, right?”
“I know he is. It’s just-” he started, trying to find the right words between his gasping for more air. “Can you just take me home, please.”
I nodded, while turning the car back on to drive away. Spencer kept his gaze towards the window, refusing to let me see his face. I’m selfishly almost glad for it, because I don’t know if seeing his heartbreak is something I could handle.
It was a long, quiet drive, taking around an hour and a half to finally reach his apartment. He scrambled out of the car fast, but I still walked him up as I usually did. He got to the door before me, thanking me for driving him home. He shut the door just as I got fully up the stairs, leaving me standing with my mouth open.
‘Baby, when you fought me at the door
Kinda hard to force what's natural
Maybe you don't want what you need most’
-----
The next day when he came over after work he was almost back to normal. It was weird to see, to see such a shift in his behaviour after less than twenty-four hours. As much as he tried to hide it, I could tell just how hard it was for him. The sudden change didn’t go well with anyone, we’d all been informed that Gideon wouldn’t be returning and that he’d moved on from the BAU. It was especially hard on Spencer too, since Elle had just left not too long ago, and then Emily joined the team. First he loses a friend, someone who truly understood him as I did, and then someone he considered a father figure.
And neither of them had said goodbye to his face. It was scary, knowing a member of your team could walk out and never return before you know it.
We were seated on the couch, a game of chess displayed on the middle cushion between us.
It wasn’t anywhere near a fair game -- Spencer’s skills were still far ahead of mine. However I noticed it made him smile, and that’s all I wanted. For him to feel loved, and secured. It was a sense of grounding, a routine that was regular in his life. I still wasn’t very good -- not having played since high school and that night on the last case. But I downloaded an audiobook and several player’s guides for the plane ride home to study, because I wanted to learn for Spencer’s sake. However I soon realized it was easier to watch Spencer and how he plays, and to ask him questions. He seemed to enjoy it, having someone else in his life to play with.. And he loved to teach, to help people learn. He was so good at it too, his big brain being used to help people no matter the context.
Eventually he won the game as usual, causing me to groan in frustration..
“You bastard.”
“Not my fault you kinda suck,” he laughed bashfully, lips curling up into a small smile. It was nice to see a bit of happiness on his face, no matter how temporary.
“You’re so rude to me,” I joked, moving the board to the coffee table. “I thought we were friends.”
It was silent for a few moments, with me figuring out what I was going to say next.
“Spencer I know you haven’t wanted my help, but please tell me what I can do for you. Tell me how you feel, at least?”
‘Maybe you don't want what you need most’
“It’s nothing, ____,” he breathed, looking away from me and instead at the wall the couch was facing. He could see our reflection on the blank tv, and instead opted to just look down at his lap. “I’m better now.”
‘You ain't even there for me
Now you're scared to be alone’
“Respectfully, that’s bullshit.”
“Excuse me?”
“Oh come on. I know you don’t want to talk about this but at least give me something. Don’t keep it all in. It’s not healthy.”
His face screwed up at my words, eyebrows furrowed and lips twitching. I could tell he knew I was right, as much as he hated it.
“I’m just- I’m scared.”
“Of what?”
“I don’t want you to leave,” Spencer whispered, barely loud enough for me to hear.
‘Got me thinkin' that you scared of yourself, not me’
It all made sense -- the way he’d been distancing himself lately. It took me promising candy and Star Trek for him to come over tonight, and even then he almost declined. Too many blows to the heart made him afraid to get attached. He didn’t want anyone else from his life to disappear in a flash.
“Look at me,” I said, and he snapped his head to face me. “I’m not going anywhere. I can’t claim to be far in the future, but right now? I’m here. You’re stuck with me for a while, Spencer.”
He smiled, closing his eyes as a stray tear graced across his cheek. I used my thumb to wipe it away, and pulled him into a tight hug. He relaxed against me, I felt the tensions in his shoulders deflate as I held him.
“I’ve got you,” I whispered, pressing a kiss to the side of his head. His breath shuddered, and he wrapped his arms around my middle tighter, pushing his face into my shoulder to muffle his crying.
We sat for a while, my hands tracing patterns along his back. It took a few minutes for his cries to calm down, but eventually his breathing evened out with only a few hiccups here and there. He was practically sitting in my lap with his legs flung over mine, suddenly not caring about his personal space. I couldn’t blame him -- the boy was so touch starved he so clearly craved all contact he consented to.
“Do you want to spend the night?” I asked, quietly so I didn’t scare him with the sudden sound.
“Could I please?”
“Of course,” I smiled, pulling away. He still held on tight, not wanting to let go.
We made our way to my bedroom, repeating our usual routine. This wasn’t the first time we’d had a sleepover, and it won’t be the last I’m sure. Sometimes after particularly harder cases he would spend the night, just to be close to someone.
I went into the bathroom to change, giving him the opportunity to do the same. When I returned, he was dressed in a t-shirt and flannel pants he left at my place for sleepovers like this. He was already in bed, and when he saw that I was done in the bathroom he lifted the side of the blanket to welcome me in.
I joined him, grinning as he scooted over and pressed his back to my chest. I felt him breathing softly, my right arm slung over his torso to bring him in closer. He held onto my hand, and didn’t let me drift away. I was happy to comply, happy to feel his body warmth radiate through me.
“Thank you, ____. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight Spence.”
From that day on for the foreseeable future, I swore to myself to have check-ins with Spencer whenever it seemed necessary. Whether it was in the form of words, sleepovers, movie nights, or chess.
His smile got brighter everyday, and eventually he no longer felt as much weight on himself a few weeks down the road. He still cried to me about how he missed Gideon, but it had gotten less frequent. And I was always there for him, offering my shoulder and the promise of my embrace. I knew he appreciated it too.
After a few months since our first game, I beat him in a game of chess. We were on the jet on the way to Montana for a case, and Derek was sitting beside Spencer. He kept annoying him, doing little things like twisting his hair and fanning him with files. Spencer kept shrieking quietly -- trying not to alert Hotch of the bickering.
“Checkmate,” I said, biting back a smile.
“What?!” Spencer froze, arm raised in what looked like to be a poor attempt of whacking Derek’s head.
“Awe, pretty boy. You’ll get her next time,” Derek threw his head back in laughter.
“What?” Spencer repeated quieter, eyes darting across the board, likely running calculations in his head.
“Better luck next time,” I smirked, tilting my head to the side. I wiggled my eyebrows, my small victory boosting my ego.
Spencer tried to keep a neutral face, but I could see by the tension in his cheekbones that he was happy. He was enjoying it.
-----
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imagineyouandharry · 3 years ago
Text
Gypsophila (H.S)
Summary: Prince Harry has been under great pressure to find a wife, and he finds his Queen in a way far more unconventional than he could’ve imagined. 
Words: 5,730
Warnings: It’s a bit strange I guess? Idk lol.
A/N: Someone requested a Prince!Harry au forever ago, and then I didn’t really have an opportunity to write for a while, and then this idea sprung up on me and I’ve been lost in this little au for the past few days. It’s like a little twisted fairytale, taking inspiration from Snow White and Sleeping Beauty mostly. Part two is already a work in progress. If people are interested I’ll even put out a little sort of world building lore post with a map of the kingdom etc (I’ve been in DEEP). This part is a bit choppy and barely edited because I was just so eager to write it and get something out, but I would really appreciate any constructive criticism and editing notes! TYSM!! Long story short, enjoy!!!
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Harry Edward Styles did not believe in true love, in fact, he thought it was the most ridiculous idea ever. Harry’s certain he’s laid eyes upon every eligible young lady, from his kingdom and the ones surrounding, and he hadn’t felt a single thing when looking at any of them. He prayed every night that he would find his love the next day, and finally be able to put his parents out of their misery and ascend to the throne. At the age of 27, Harry’s the oldest person in his family to not be married, no one every waited this long in the royal family. He would’ve had an arranged marriage at 21, though when his parents suggested that he ran away on a sailing ship for two months. One thing was clear to him: though he may not have experienced love yet, he wasn’t going to ruin his chances at true by being forced into a loveless marriage. It wasn’t only Harry’s parents, but the entire kingdom that woke each day hoping to hear that their Prince had found his Queen. They referred to Harry as the Good Prince, his subjects adored him, and lived for his acts of charity and selflessness, and they only hoped he would find a Queen that would treat them the same.
Harry’s outlook on love changed however, after his most recent hunting trip. Sundays are for family and hunting, that’s what Harry was always told. No day was for Harry, he’d come to learn that. Living under a microscope meant for very little alone time, and almost no guilt-free alone time. He and his hunting party rode across the fields and out to the dense forest surrounding the kingdom, and over the two hour journey Harry found himself agitated with the topics of conversation going on around him. He wanted a break, tired of everyone only ever speaking about royal duties or politics. Harry had discovered a fresh water lake if he went off the trail, and when he realised they were edging closer to his favourite place he decided to excuse himself with the excuse of needing to fill his canteen.
The natural spring was a hidden treasure indeed. Harry’s entire kingdom was cut off from the rest of the world due to the thick forestland surrounding it. There was only one trail in, and one trail out, and even then only experienced riders were able to make the journey. The end of the trail, in the deep of the forest, was also often lined with thieves and outcasts making it not the safest journey. This spring wasn’t necessarily hard to find, however thick trees that lined the main trail hid the spring, the gorgeous wild flowers, and clearing of soft grass either side. Harry tied his horse to his usual tree, softly parting the bushes careful to not cause any permanent damage, and stepped his way through. His kingdom was full of hidden treasures like this, tucked away in places only to be found by those adventurous enough.
The sound of the running water was most prominent, however the closer he walked to the spring, the more he could hear a faint, delicate singing voice. Harry couldn’t recognise the song, but it was one he’d never forget now. It felt as though his heart dropped in his stomach, and he had to lightly scratch his arm on a branch to double check he hasn’t died and was hearing an angel of heaven sing to him. He walked closer, with quiet footsteps so not to disturb the singing. He knelt down to the edge of the spring and began to fill his canteen, looking around his eyes eventually focused on the source of his siren, standing in the clearing over the other side of the spring as she picked a bouquet of dainty flowers. Lavender, daisies, bellflowers, poppies. Her body was dressed in sage green, the simple dress showed she definitely was not from a wealthy family, but it was simple and beautiful in its own way. Perhaps she sewed it herself, it did look as if it were made for her. He could see her hair shine from here, and the features of her side profile were striking him even from a distance. She didn’t look real. The strange girl across the spring looked ethereal, like her beauty was too surreal for this planet. Had he hit his head? Was he seeing a forest fairy? He hadn’t even realised the staggering increase in his heart rate as he watched the girl, and listened.
He lost track of how long he had been watching her for, snapped out of his daydream when he heard a “Your Royal Highness! We must be getting on!” Harry heard shouting at him from a distance, most likely back where he had tied his horse. The girl had heard the faint noise and her eyes shot in Harry’s direction. His cheeks flushed with heat as their eyes met only for a brief second, before she ran away. The eye contact brought a slight curve to his lips, although she was leaving, at least he got another good look at her.
“Wait!” He called as he stood up, his hand and canteen dripping wet. His eyes softened as she simply left, looking back briefly in her stride, but he’d blown it. “God fucking damn it.” He cursed under his breath as he began to trudge back to his horse, his feet weighing heavy on the ground.
That was the most he’d ever felt, looking at the stranger across the lake singing as if it were for him, and he couldn’t help but feel like he’d just lost his future Queen. Half of him wanted to wade through the water and run after her, but Harry wasn’t a often disobedient Prince, when one of his parents or advisors told him to jump, his usual response would be “how high?” It’s ironic how for someone who’s whole life depends on finding his future Queen is given so little time to actually explore a social life, or love life himself. He was always set up with suitors who his parents found best. In the rare times he’s able to sneak away he’d gotten around, and most definitely wasn’t a virgin, but he’d never found a girl who had made him feel the way he wanted to feel about his future queen. He only wanted to please his family, and his realm, but this was the one thing where he refused to compromise.
Y/N was as far away from a future queen as it could come, or at least that’s what her step-mother wanted everyone to think. The entire town hoped to marry their daughters off to the elusive Good Prince Harry, however her step-mother only wanted her biological daughters to have that chance. When Y/N’s father passed away her step-mother sent her out to live as a recluse in a tiny cottage in the woods, she had always feared that her beauty would distract future husbands away from her actual daughters, and didn’t want to ruin their chance of being married. Each Sunday she drops Y/N off the supplies she needs, but that was the only human contact she was given. It wasn’t too bad, she managed to keep herself busy with sewing, baking, or whatever other art or craft she could think of and had the materials for. It was lonely though, and she was ultimately alone.
Well, if you don’t count forest fairies. Y/N hated being outcast into the forest, and spent most of her early months in the cottage crying to whatever wild animal she could find that day that would stick around long enough. Eventually, these wild animals started bringing their fairy friends along with them. They would spend their days with Y/N tending to fruit and vegetable gardens, watering plants, having picnics, and making daisy chains. Her life was simple, and although not one she asked, it was one she was growing fond of. Male company was something she could only imagine and long for, or read about in story books. There were dozens of fairies living in the forest, but she’d become particularly close to a group of some of the female fairies.
Each Sunday before her step mother visits, Y/N will pick her step mother a bouquet of flowers in attempt to win her over, in hopes maybe one day her sweetness will earn her way back into town. Y/N had total obliviousness towards her step mother’s plan, and towards what was going on in the city. This year, any woman over the age of 21 was to present herself to the Prince. Y/N’s 21st birthday fell on the day she was scheduled to be presented to the Prince. The letter had been delivered shortly before she was sent away to the forest, Y/N never laid her eyes upon it though. The letter outlined the royal guard would be coming to collect anyone who failed to present themselves on the day, and to Y/N’s step mother that meant the only option was to make it so Y/N never turned 21, or made it to her birthday for that matter.
Seeing the Prince most definitely did spook Y/N during that day in the field, if her step mother ever found out she’d had contact with a male there was no chance she’d ever be allowed to move back home. She did all she could think to do. She ran. She ran so fast that the petals of the flowers she had picked were ruined in her haste, quickly shutting herself inside the cottage to gather herself before her routine afternoon visit from her step mother. Sure she knew of men to be dangerous and terrible, but she feared her step-mother’s wrath more than anything any man could put her through.
Like any other Sunday, she scrubbed the house and dressed herself in whatever new garment she had stitched herself this week. The fairies had been busy this week and she’d had a great deal of time to herself, embroidering colourful flowers into the soft white linen of the new dress she had made. Her step-mother would bring her fabric and thread to sew dresses for her step sisters. It was something to be proud of, but most likely would be over looked. Little was said upon her step-mother’s arrival, but her character seemed off. Her step-mother’s eyes darted around, checking windows as she insisted on making the two of them tea. Y/N sat down at the small dining table, recounting tales of her week, ensuring to leave out anything about fairies or a boy. She watched a small bunny outside the window, forgetting to speak as awe overwhelmed her whilst she watched its tiny nose twitch. Her daydream came to an end when the sound of the ceramic mug hit the hard wood of the coffee table. “Drink while it’s warm, my love.” Her step-mother told her, sitting down in the seat at the head of the table beside Y/N. It wasn’t long after that that Y/N hit the floor, and her step-mother was shrouding herself in a hooded coat and sneaking out of the tiny cabin.
Elsie, a fairy most close to Y/N, who specialises in healing, came to the conclusion that she was only out for about six hours before the fairies found her. They did all they could over the following weeks to bring her back to life, trying as many possible rituals, potions, and spells to give life to her body once more. Nothing was of use though, and instead they decided to preserve her in a glass case in the clearing amongst the wildflowers. She had professed to them that the clearing by the spring had been her favourite place, so they saw this fit. Preserving her in the glass case was simply because the idea of her beauty decaying away made any of the fairies shriek. Fairies never communicated with humans, however Y/N was different. Elsie had always theorised that Y/N had magic in her blood. Amongst the many spells and rituals they tried to bring Y/N back, they threw in a spell that would hopefully bring her back with true love’s kiss. It was like a safety net, or a ‘what if?’ But they eventually tired and wore out, preserving her was well enough for now. They kept her dressed in the new dress she had crafted for herself, it was so beautiful after all. They had placed tiny baby’s breath flowers throughout her hair, and made sure everything was perfect. They even went as far to adorn her in delicate gold jewellery, with beautiful crystals of all colours. Her body rested upon a large rectangular slab of rose quartz.
****
Harry was dreading sitting in the throne room, while all the eligible females from the town were presented to him like livestock. It made him sick, and left a terrible taste in his mouth. All he could think of was the girl from the clearing. Is she a sign? Is he his ticket out of here? Was seeing her fate? Questions like that simmered over his mind and kept him awake at night, he had been sleeping little and finding it hard to focus on his duties. His best friend Niall was he closest confidant, the only one he had told about the beautiful girl in the clearing that day. Niall cared more for Harry than anyone, really. He didn’t just care about his fame or power or wealth, Harry was his best friend and he hated seeing his best mate so down about his love life and the pressure to marry a woman he doesn’t love. He made it his mission to find the woman, and his detective work lead him down a path he didn’t expect at all. First he went to the clearing where Harry filled his water in the spring, that was where he first noticed something over the other side of the spring that he couldn’t quite make out. He followed the spring and found an area narrow enough to cross, making his way to the structure he’d seen earlier. He didn’t know what to make of this discover, a dead girl in a glass coffin. ‘Forever at rest, only to be woken by true love’s kiss’ read an inscription on a gold plaque. He really didn’t know what to make of this. He didn’t know what to tell Harry.
Sweat lingered Niall’s brow as he made his way back to the castle to find Harry, to tell him of his discovery. “Look… I just need you to come with me and tell me what you think when we’re there.” Niall tells him, his voice somewhat breathless. Niall himself was still in disbelief, shock, his eyes wide as he shook his head. “I just- I don’t know what to tell you. You need to see it for yourself.” He adds.
Harry nods. “I’ll come immediately.” Harry tells him, his trust for Niall outweighing anything else going on in his head. Together they rode to the forest, crossed the narrow part of the spring, and towards where Niall had discovered Y/N.
“Is this the girl you were talking about?” Niall asks, however when he looks from the girl to Harry, he knows the answer. Harry couldn’t help but fall to his knees, pressing his palms against the glass as he looked inside. He noticed how long her eyelashes looked, and the freckles on her nose. His nose was almost touching the glass as he leant here on his knees at the side of her, taking her in up close.
“What happened to you?” He whispers, his eyebrows knitting together. Niall gives him a moment before he decides to mention the plaque at the foot of the structure.
“It uh, says something weird about being awoken by true love’s kiss. I don’t know if it’s true, and it’s revolting to think you would kiss a dead body for nothing, but someone has put her here. Someone made this. My grandmother in her old age would mutter stories about forest fairies and their magic… It just makes you wonder, you know?” He ponders, his eyes wandering away. It felt silly to bring up magic, it was something very commonly dismissed.
“Help me get this off.” Harry said as he brought himself from the ground, the soft grass had left green stains on his tan riding pants. He pushed the sleeves of his white linen button down up past his elbows, and the two men carefully lift the heavy glass case up off of the rose quartz Y/N had been resting on. It wasn’t easy, and the glass at the bottom dug into Harry’s fingers before they set the glass piece of the structure down on to the grass. “Alright. Here we go.” Harry said, in attempt to psych himself up for kissing a dead girl. She didn’t look dead though, just sleeping, you could only tell she was dead due to the missing rising and fall in her chest with her breath. “I might start walking back to the horses, give you some privacy.” Niall said, giving him a slight smile. He also didn’t really want to witness someone kiss a dead person, if she didn’t end up waking up.
“Good luck. Take your time.” He adds, part of him had no doubt it was going to work though. The stories his grandmother would tell him of the forest fairies were something he’d always held on to, those stories were amongst his most treasured memories. He’d always had some hope.
Harry waited until he could no longer hear Niall’s footsteps before he leant down close to Y/N, brushing a strand of hair back behind her ear. He took a moment, if this never worked it was going to be the last time he’d ever see her. He couldn’t fathom coming back to this spot if this didn’t work. His heart began to ache at the thought, it made his chest feel tight, and gave him the urge to rub at the spot.
“I really hope you’re who I think you are.” He whispers as he looks down at her. “This might seem like absolute madness. I don’t even know your name, but if you wake up for me, I swear to you I will be yours forever.” He began, to Harry this almost did feel like a ritual, it felt special, and the words he was speaking were amongst the most genuine he’d ever given life to. “I promise, I will protect you. I will provide for you. I will love you. I will never, ever harm you. I will love you until my very last breath, I just need you to do this one thing for me.” His voice was barely a whisper now, and breaking as hot tears welled in his eyes. He very carefully leant down, pressing his warm, puffy lips against her cold, smooth ones. He didn’t know how long to wait, but it didn’t feel wrong. It was a sweet, tender kiss. His eyes closed, and he felt at peace. It felt more than at peace. The long grass, wildflowers, and tree branches that surrounded them began to stir with wind, petals floating up into the gusts that took them. This girl had a tendency to make him feel like he’s dead and in heaven. Her lips slowly began to warm, and skin began to glow with heat. It felt like they were floating, as if the universe was made up of just the two of them. The flowers beneath him began to grow taller and more dense, and it began to feel like his heart was pulling towards hers. It felt like a tether had been formed, connecting their energy, he could feel as her heart began to pump blood again, and her energy radiate from her skin. It felt too surreal.
Slowly, Harry removed his lips to allow Y/N to breathe. He let a hand lay gently resting on her cheek as he watched her gasp for her first new breath, eyes shooting open as she looked up at him. It wasn’t shock she was met with when her eyes met Harry’s, but peace. The luminous green eyes that were gazing down upon her were like lighthouses, guiding her towards safety. So many questions began to race her mind as she came to reality, unable to decide which one to ask first. As if based on intuition, Harry decided to speak. “I uh- I’m not too sure what happened to you but my friend found you here today and brought me to you. I believe I saw you a few weeks ago, in the same spot. I’m not sure how long you’ve been out here, but there was this little plaque at the end of this thing here, that said something about a kiss to wake you up… I’m sorry for kissing you without your consent, but I couldn’t risk not taking this chance.” He didn’t mean to ramble or to overwhelm her with his spiel, but he was overwhelmed himself with everything that had just gone on. True love’s kiss. His queen. His true love. The other half of his soul, in human form. Y/N’s lips parted as if to speak, but nothing came out. She closed them once more as she sat up and looked around, swinging her legs off the side of the marble before looking back up to Harry. Her movement had disconnected his hand from her face, and they both longed for each other’s touch once more already. Her eyes began to well with tears as she began to think about how she got here, her last memories.
“I can only assume how overwhelming this must all be for you… We can stay here as long as you need, it’s just us. When you feel ready for it, I can take you back to my home and we can get you showered and fed. I don’t mean you any harm.” Harry doesn’t even need to add that last sentence though, because she can feel it. She can feel his love for her, she could almost hear it if she listened closely enough, as if his heart was now beating a song for her.
Harry stood back, as if to give the doe eyed girl some space. She looked at him as if he was the most precious treasure on Earth, he’d never felt so overwhelmed with love. This was followed by her delicate hands reaching out, taking ahold of his as she brought herself to stand in front of him. “Is it alright if you hold me for a second?” She asked softly, needing time to process things.
It had been so long since she had been touched affectionately, she couldn’t really remember it. Her father was never affectionate, nor her step mother or step sisters or anyone else she’d met. She felt comfortable with the stranger in front of her though, and didn’t have the energy to resist the magnet like force pulling her towards him.
“Of course.” He responds, his voice soft as he wraps his arms gently around her frame, pulling her into his warm figure. Harry was like the perfect, giant teddy bear… but he wasn’t really that soft. Pressed against him she could feel how chiseled his features are. Her arms wrapped around his waist as she relaxed into him, cheek against the skin of his chest kindly revealed by the first few buttons of his shirt being undone. “What’s your name?” He asks, tangling his fingers in her hair to lightly rub his fingertips against the tender skin at the back of her neck.
“Y/N Y/L/N. Yours?” She asks, looking up to the tall, broad man.
“Harry.” He decides on leaving out his royal title or last name.
“Just Harry?” She asks, her eyebrows raising.
“For now. We have plenty of time to talk about me later.” He notes, removing the same rogue strand of hair as before from her cheek, tucking it behind her ear. It was almost as if her hair had a life of its own, breathing, like the other flora growing in the forest. He had noticed the baby’s breath in her hair, though her hair moved, they remained in the same places, as if growing out of their place on the strand of hair. “What do you last remember?” He asks, needing to know if whatever put her in eternal sleep had been by accident, or as an act of malice. She looks back away from his face, resting her cheek once more against his chest.
“My step-mother, Styephania came over, she made me tea. That’s all I can really remember.” She said, unable to stop the disappointed sigh from escaping her lips. Maybe she’d had a freak health accident, like a stroke. Just because she’d been mistreated by her step mother her whole life, didn’t mean she was capable of murder. She knew her step mother didn’t put her out here though, this was the work of fairies. They were looking on, hiding in the bushes as they stood witness to young love blossom in front of them, not wanting to disturb the two of them. “I look crazy, and it sounds crazier saying this, but I’m certain the forest fairies are responsible for looking after me and putting me here. The day she came over was the day I think you saw me here, and I’m not sure how I’m meant to feel but I don’t feel like I’ve been a dead body since then. I feel like no time has passed at all.” Harry avidly listened to her speak, her voice like caramel, seeping in his ears and warming his whole body. Harry wasn’t phased by her mentioning fairies, Niall had suspecting this being their work earlier. It was the only explanation Harry could think of. He couldn’t understand why her step mother would leave her here, why she wouldn’t find her help.
He didn’t want to worry his sweet girl now, he wanted to make sure she felt alright, safe, and cared for. His grip on her wasn’t too tight, but firm in a comforting way. “The plaque… It mentioned how you’d only be woken by true love’s kiss.” He figured the longer he waited to tell her the stranger it would be. His cheeks were red, as if embarrassed or ashamed to tell her about the plaque, how strange it all was. Her eyes met his, and the connection gave him whiplash. He couldn’t peel his eyes away, getting lost in the little pools. He wanted to know everything about her, what she liked, disliked, what she ate for breakfast, her favourite songs, flowers, secrets. Everything.
“I don’t know if I know what love feels like. The only men I’ve spoken to are all twice my age. I wasn’t really allowed to see boys. You’re definitely much, much more beautiful than I would’ve imagined a man to be, and I’m certain that my heart is literally beating for you now, since you woke me.” She tells him, the descriptions of heroes in stories she would read, or how she would imagine the older men to look when they were younger, were incomparable to Harry. The compliment made his cheeks flush. With each beat of her heart, it was as if it was pulling her closer to Harry, calling out for him, begging for him to love on her and soothe the ache in her chest.
“How has God made something so sweet?” He mumbles, he hadn’t even realised he’d said it out loud at first. “You’re breath taking. The most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid my eyes upon, and trust me when I say I’ve seen a lot of them. Even from far away, the first time I saw you… You make me nervous. You make my heart race, and my palms sweat, and I get butterflies in my stomach and nervous when I think about saying the wrong thing or not having you like me. It’s as if you’ve been carved by God himself, like he was showing off when he made you so beautiful. I wish I’d met you sooner.” Those last words burn his throat, how easier the last few years would have been if he had just been able to find her sooner.
*****
Harry sent Niall back to the castle first, having him instruct everyone to clear out the path that the Prince and his soon to be queen would take to his suite, he didn’t want to spook her with people around. The guards had to stay though, non-negotiable. He also had Niall ensure the doctor was on standby, just to check on Y/N and stay in the castle over the upcoming weeks in case anything else happened. Security was going to be increased, and tightened, and a warrant put out for her step mother.
The two hour horseback ride to the castle would give them well enough time to get to know each other, Harry and Niall had also switched horses, Niall’s being the slower of the two. “I don’t want to startle you when we get there. I also don’t know how to really tell you this. I’m in the royal family, so the guards and whatnot are something to just be ignored. They’re for your protection. I don’t know if you heard much of what I was telling Niall earlier, but you’re going to be very safe here, and we’ll find out what happened. I’ll look after you, I promise.” His eyes are ahead as he speaks, looking over the vast green fields ahead of them once they eventually emerged from the forest.
“Still just Harry, to me.” She reassured, sensing his nerves about revealing this information to her. His shoulders relaxed at her reaction, and a smile formed on his lips when his mind began to wander into what their future may be like. His queen.
“Hey, one day that’ll be King Harry to you.” He joked, thankful that it was received with a laugh. Her laughter was almost as sweet as her songs, and for the rest of the journey he made it his mission to mine as many possible laughs out of her as he could, like little nuggets of treasure. After making their way through the fields that lined the forest, they went down a long road that served as a divide between two of the castle’s towns, and at the end of that road just past a small valley of mountains was a sight far more glorious than Y/N had imagined. Her village was a small village that contained mostly candlemakers and dressmakers, and it sat further to the east, people only ever going out there to purchase fine candles and clothing. It was niche though, and not many could afford the fineries the master crafters in her village would create. Y/N hadn’t even really seen a home larger than a cottage, Harry’s castle looked large enough as if it could contain its own little world, a complete wilderness of towers surrounded by fine gardens, protected by a large moat with a standalone drawbridge. Harry didn’t even need to announce himself, the drawbridge was already in the process of being lowered for him.
“I had Niall clear our path, I don’t want to overwhelm you. I’ll introduce you to everyone when you’re ready.” Harry reassures her, she hadn’t even thought of anyone else though, too in awe of the sights around her. Flowers she’d never seen before laced these gardens, with fine marble sculptures and fountains protruding from them.
“I can’t believe this is your home.” Y/N whispers, unable to think of anything else to say.
“Your home too, if you’d like.” Harry replies, though his words immediately shrouded him with nerves about rushing Y/N into anything. It was stupid, they were each other’s true love’s, but it felt wrong being strangers, so Harry tried his best to conceal things. He’d never been in a conventional relationship before, never mind whatever this arrangement is or was going to be. He just knew he wasn’t meant to rush things, so he tried to refrain from expressing his feelings as best as he could. Her arms around his waist tightened, Y/N needing to feel as close to Harry as possible. He held the reins in one hand, the other arm resting over hers around his stomach, holding on to her arm to make sure she couldn’t let go.
“I’d like that.” Y/N reassures, gently rubbing his side to soothe him. Harry was too caught up in his own feelings to pay attention to how calm Y/N was. She could feel his anxiety though, and continued to try to soothe him as best she could. Y/N knew very little about Harry so far, but what she did know was that he was kind, caring, and had a lot of worries. She’d never been a worrisome person, and if anything would even refer to herself as naive, it was something she’d always been almost ashamed of but in this moment felt like maybe she’d been made to be by Harry’s side. Y/N liked the idea of spending her days being Harry’s rock, a voice of reason. She’d rather a man like this than one who had no emotions, that was for sure. It could’ve been whatever was now eternally bonding them, but she swears she was feeling his emotions, able to see his aura if she really studied hard enough. She sunk into him some more, her arms around his waist, cheek resting against his back. Harry made sure to take it extra slow, giving his love enough time to appreciate the flowers. She seemed to like flowers, and his mother took pride in this being the most beautiful garden amongst all of the kingdoms. He couldn’t wait to show her all the fineries that came with his life.
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whosjunglejim4322 · 4 years ago
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SMUT, collegecrush!au, tattooed Johnny agenda, bff Jaehyun! And brief mentions of him being drunk, all the yearning, Johnny is whipped for you but you didn't hear that from me, he's got a big dick, brief dry humping, finger fucking and pussy eating bc....I'm a whore, sensual fucking cause he thinks ur precious teehee ngl I have a crush on this Johnny
A month ago, if someone would have told you that Johnny Seo would be watching The Matrix trilogy with you while sitting on your living room floor under a blanket that he'd brought to the routine occasion - you would have thought them to be crazy. Insane, even.
And not because Johnny is unpleasant to be around, quite the contrary. Despite his popularity he's one of the most levelheaded, endearing frat boys - for lack of better term - you've ever met, and you also happen to think of him as a superhero of sorts, always there the moment you need him.
It had been a party, where the two of you met - sort of. Not shocking, in the least bit, but also not the first place you would have planned to be on a Saturday night. Jaehyun, being the stubborn and puppy dog eyed best friend that he is, insisted that you come along with him - that he'd keep you glued to his side all night long.
Of course, in proper Jaehyun fashion, three tequila shots in and a game of beer pong had him barely cognitive and passed out on some ones bathroom floor within two hours. The house was big, but filled with people and between trying to lift him up while he giggled about your hair smelling so good and sweet - you also feared anyone seeing him like this. Even if it weren't the first time.
His presence spooked you, at first, a light tap on your shoulder from somewhere behind you just as you attempted to lift your aforementioned best friend for what felt like the hundredth time that night. You nearly dropped him back on his head, if it weren't for quick hands and a sturdy grip on the drunk boys slumped shoulders.
He looked like sunshine, honey skin and dyed blonde hair with the dark roots growing out - a soft, comforting smile across the smooth planes of his face. Dark ink peaked out from where the collar of his shirt had drooped, appearing to be spilling from his shoulder. Your arms felt weaker than before, and embarrassment regarding the situation began to make your skin hot.
"I got him, don't worry," he'd assured with a gentle grin, lifting your bestfriend with an ease you almost wanted to scowl at. His height had been startling too, and not just because you were sitting on someone's bathroom floor. "did you guys drive here?"
You shook your head, a sigh of frustration leaving your lips and slumping your posture as you remembered that you both had walked here. Johnny slung Jaehyuns arm over his broad pair of shoulders, and jerked his chin towards the door, which you opened warily.
"I'll drive you home, it's no problem," his voice was soft, reassuring and you were taken aback. He obviously knew Jaehyun, and you'd never met any of his friends that were so...pleasant. "let's get him to my car first."
It wasn't nearly as painful and humiliating to push past crowds of intoxicated people with Johnny leading the way, as it would have been if it were just you. No one even batted an eye at the way he was dragging Jaehyun like a ragdoll, while the boy grumbled under his breath like a child.
People looked at him, of course. Oh, they looked at him. But not because of his human luggage, and it felt odd to see so many eyes on one person, to realize that his presence has the same effect on everyone else as it did you.
He kept looking back, making sure you were still close behind him, and it wasn't until you were outside in the open that you realized he'd been clinging on to the fabric of your jacket, making sure you didn't stray. Your heart felt like it was bursting open. Focus. You'd thought to yourself.
"That's my car over there, can you open the door for me?"
You jogged towards the sleek, onyx colored SUV that looked like a shadow against the dark bushes, and in just a split second Johnny was behind you, maneuvering Jaehyun into the backseat.
"Mmm...leather." Your best friend's giggle made you all the more grateful for the fact that you hadn't had to do this alone, his cheeks bright red and eyes crescent moons from the way he gleefully grinned. Still, you love him nonetheless.
You pulled your jacket off and prepared to drape it over his body before Johnny stopped you with a gentle hand, shaking his head. "I've got two on, let me."
His jacket probably sufficed more anyways, a heavy denim that would actually cover most of Jaehyuns body. You thanked him with a shy smile while he closed the door, and headed towards the passengers seat.
This experience had been the beginning, the car ride home that night being one full of conversations - genuine conversations, and he didn't leave once you both arrived at your apartments. Jaehyun snored in the background while the two of you talked, laughed. It was hard to look him in the eyes, to not make it so obvious - it's hard now, too.
Neo and Trinity kiss on the screen in front of you, and you wonder how Johnny sees you. Sure, he's flirty, overtly sometimes, but there's never been a definitive line to mark where the both of you really are on the friendship spectrum. If you even want to call it that.
Every time he touches your cheek or catches you staring, even when you're walking to your classes and his hand graces the small of your waist just before he waves you goodbye - you have to assume that he knows what he's doing - that the tension hasn't ever just been one sided.
His hair is a light chestnut brown now, longer than usual and flopping into his eyes from the sides. It's unfair, how he doesn't even have to try. The sharp slope of his nose, the bow of his lips, even the elegance of his neck and jaw. That awe from when you first saw him, has never left.
Not to mention that you often times forget he has so many tattoos whenever he decides to wear short sleeves, the art inky and stark against his olive skin - riveting down from his biceps like silk, cascading over his thick forearms and ending at his knuckles.
You turn your attention back to the laptop upon realizing that you've gotten caught up, heart still rattling underneath your ribcage. It makes it worse, the fact that the heat of his body is so close, that you can smell the scent of dryer sheets clinging onto the fabric of his shirt along with the natural allure of his skin.
"Why were you staring at me?" His breath is warm against the shell of your ear and you shudder, surprised by his sudden closeness and the timbre of his voice. You turn to face him with an incredulous expression, feigning innocence - but he makes it damn near impossible with the way he's looking at you - a dark eyebrow raised and a sly smile playing on his heart shaped lips.
"I was looking at your tattoos, cause - uhm, I forget they're underneath your clothes sometimes." You confess, and his knee knocks against yours underneath the blanket.
"Mmhm, so you think about what's under my clothes?" He teases, and takes pride in the way your eyes glower at him, a scoff leaving your mouth. It's hard to be annoyed when he's so vibrant, right here in front of you.
"Just the art, this one's my favorite." Eager to not have the pressure on you anymore, you reach out to grasp his wrist - not realizing how deeply of a need you've had all this time to do so, until you're tracing the flower that's decorating the top of his hand.
In hindsight, it's a bold move - but you can't go back now, not when he's staring down at you so fondly, scooting closer and placing his hand in your lap while you admire his body art.
"Yeah? Why's it your favorite?" He asks, genuinely curious. He nudges your shoulder with his when he sees the shy smile spreading across your lips, your skin hot to the touch. His comfort level has you less nervous than you were before, and the whole thing feels oddly natural, being so close together.
"I don't know, it just suits you. Your hands are so big, and the little vines looping around your knuckles really makes them look...delicate."
You don't dare look up, not when you realize his chest is rising and falling faster than it was before, just like yours is as you spread his fingers out and play with the digits, his face just inches above yours, voice warm in your ear.
"Second favorite." It's not a demand but it's not exactly a request either, and there's a safety in the energy pulsating around you both - mutual, rippling like a current through your bones.
Your eyes deliberately trail up the length of his long arm, scanning, and your fingertips press against the belly of the dragon that wraps around his bicep, sinewy tail tapering off just below his elbow. You've secretly admired this one for a long time, sneaking glances whenever you can. He turns more towards you just the slightest bit, and the closeness begins to make you feel dizzy.
"Your hands are soft."
This time, you can't not look at him, belly filled with a need to see his face, to save the memory of his features so up close in the back of your mind. However, once you do, look up at him - you almost wonder how you'll be able to handle it at all, his amber eyes boring into you as if he's trying to read your thoughts.
"So is your skin." Is what you manage to reply, willing yourself not to look at his soft, inviting mouth - afraid you'll give yourself away. You feel something stroke the side of your cheek and it takes you a second before realizing he's touching you, apparently giving yourself away isn't an issue. You feel like you're being set ablaze.
"Is it really just the tattoos, you think of?" You're not imagining things, he's definitely moving closer - you can smell the starbursts that he ate earlier still sweet on his breath, the wrappers crumpled on the coffee table next to the laptop.
It's all settling in, the realization that this hasn't been just you, fantasizing and daydreaming about someone who hasn't even realized how his natural charm has made you feel.
You're afraid to speak, so you shake your head as a response to his question, the atmosphere thickening impossibly now that he's cupping your chin between his fingers, the tips of your noses almost touching. You've placed your palm against his knee without even realizing it, steadying yourself.
"I've wanted to kiss you since the day we met," he confesses, dark eyebrows furrowed as if he's restraining himself, waiting. "is this...is this okay?" Your lower belly flutters, and you're almost afraid to move, to change anything about this moment and the way it is right now.
"Me too. I've wanted to kiss you, I mean." You breathe out, and now your lips are ghosting against each other, a moment of hesitation that feels both infinitesimal and fleeting. "It's more than okay." A heartbeat passes and he presses his mouth against yours, so pillowy soft that you gasp, surprised.
It's just a second, that he pulls away to look down at you, and your expression is so heavenly - so hazy and delicate. He kisses you again and this time your lips begin to overlap, from top to bottom, suckling and getting used to the feel of each other. He's still holding your face, but with both hands now, thumbs on your cheeks and fingers wrapping around to the nape of your neck.
You cling onto him like you've no other choice, desperate to have him underneath your fingertips, reminding you that this is really happening and that your mind isn't just creating very vivid daydreams. He pulls you closer and you grip onto his broad shoulders.
"Mm, you're so sweet," he lilts between his kisses, tone somewhere between bliss and desire. You're not expecting to be so worked up already. "even better than I imagined." His tongue slips past yours, wet and warm and it's like your body is being put on vibrate.
He senses this too, with the way you're almost in his lap, breath unsteady. His arms are around your waist before you can move any further, pulling you on top of him and locking you to his torso.
"Johnny." You strain, as the feeling within you becomes overwhelming, craving his touch, his mouth. It doesn't help that he's being so vocal, as well - the sounds sweeter, and more desperate than you'd expect from him. It has something feral igniting within you.
What shocks you the most is that he's already hard underneath you, and the thought alone is enough to have you keening further against his chest, tightening your thighs' grip around his trim waist- not to mention you can feel him snug against your ass, material of your shorts so thin it's palpable when he twitches.
So, naturally, your whine is petulant when his mouth departs from yours, his plush lips a deep blush, matching his cheeks in their hue. He's just as worked up as you if his erratic breathing and the way that he grasps onto your sides is anything to go by, and you shouldn't be as surprised as you are about it.
"You...have no idea," he pants, smoothing his thumb over your bottom lip. "how badly I've wanted you. In so many ways."
Your heart feels like it's attempting to burst through your chest in an effort to be closer to him, his sharp eyes lowly lidded but fierce in their honesty. You take this brief moment to touch his face, his soft cheeks and the smooth, taut ridge of his jaw. It all feels too real to be a dream. This must be reality.
"I'm only stopping because, well I like you," it's hard to pinpoint if the trembling of his hands is fueled from his desire or his nerves, but either way he's got your rapt attention. You doubt anyone could look away from those eyes.
"I like you a lot and...fuck, I don't want to do anything you aren't comfortable with or...sure about. Because I'm sure about you." He finishes, sincere and stoic while holding you against him. You feel like you're floating.
"I have a really big crush on you, Johnny," you kiss his mouth and he smiles against it, humming in contentment. Suddenly, your nerves are replaced by pure adrenaline. "and I like you a lot, too." When you pull back from his lips with a soft smack, his expression causes your skin to burn hot.
"So it'd be okay if I did..." he tilts your head to the side, and a flurry of goosebumps descend across your skin, his breath warm against your throat. "this?" A kiss, soft but purposeful, is placed there, and you shudder.
All you can do is nod in affirmation, heartbeat in your ears among other places. Your fingers run through the hair at the nape of his neck while his mouth begins placing warm, wet pecks against yours, and his body lurches when your thighs tighten around his torso.
It only manages to work you up further, of course, brain already high off of the fact that Johnny likes you back...in fact...he truly is as good as you've always thought, sweet and kind and nasty, groaning when you rut your hips against him.
"Baby, you're shaking." He mouths against your jaw, wondrously and laced with an undertone of hunger. His strong arms hold you tight, eyes softening when he looks down at you and realizes just how worked up you really are.
"I just want you really bad, Johnny." Your body emphasizes your point, chest pressed against the firmness of his, nipples hard behind your shirt. He can practically feel you throbbing.
It's a little fucked up, honestly.
No ones ever had him this head over heels, he feels himself melting against you, your voice sweet and syrupy, dripping with this ache just for him and he's losing it.
"Yeah?" He muses, the wide palm of his hands sliding down the curve of your back, and over the swell of your ass where it's planted so firmly atop of him - massaging you there. "Where do you want me, honey?"
The pet names have you too worked up, you really could get off of anything right now and he's tracing the back of your thighs now, swirling his soft fingertips around, leaving a wake of searing heat in their path.
"Want you everywhere, just - mmph." This kiss interrupts you, bruising in it's intensity and he cups your face softly as a silent apology despite the fact that you're letting out small coos of satisfaction, tugging at the ends of his messy hair.
For a second you feel like you're being lifted, not realizing he's just moved you both to the couch until your head is resting against the cushions, inky arms caging your body against the length of his. He groans when you palm at his stomach, touching and rubbing his sides and then the broad of his back.
All the while his free hand, the one that's not attached to the arm holding himself up, does some exploring of its own, palming your breasts through your shirt and squeezing with just enough pressure to have you arching into his touch.
Automatically, your legs wrap around his middle and your heels dig into the dimples of his back, and his hips pivot downwards to nestle right in between yours. You're both instantaneously struck by the sensation of your centers meeting, his length jerking inside of his pants, your clit throbbing in yours.
"Gonna touch you..." nimble fingertips dance over the skin of your inner thighs. "...here, is that okay?" The warmth of his hand cups your sex and now you're positive that wetness has begun to soak through your underwear, senses gone haywire from the way he's rubbing you, up and down.
"Mhm that's - yes, that's okay." You pant, desperate to feel him as well and reaching in between your bodies in an attempt to grasp at him - his height doesn't make this as easy as you thought and your pliant hands meet just his navel, the faintest of happy trails soft against the skin here.
He switches to his thumb now, instead of the heel of his palm to rub you through your shorts. He searches, for a short moment, finding what he's looking for and pressing the pad of his finger against your bud.
He kisses your whimper, shifting his hips and shuffling upwards just a smidge so that your hands can reach his hard cock. You have to maneuver your arm underneath his but it's working out fine so far, your eyes widening once you feel the twitch of his length.
"Oh." You gasp, expecting to have felt it all while you were on his lap, but missing by a longshot. He's big, bigger than anticipated and you're a bit too flustered as you follow it's bulge through his sweats. He groans your name, and you might be short circuiting.
"You're so hard...and b-big, Johnny you're really big." The incredulity of your voice only has his hunger growing, threatening to swallow him whole. In one breath your hands are pulled from him, pinned above your head with his gentle fingers barring your wrists.
"You're so fuckin' cute," he professes with an awed lilt, moving his hips in circles between yours - his shaft, heavy and thick, nudged against your lips. "wanna make you feel good...mm, wanna make you cum."
Butterflies threaten to flutter into your throat and suffocate you, his breath warm and sweet against your cheek before he's nipping at your earlobe. You feel like you're high, spinning yet completely grounded by his weight above you, against you.
"I want you Johnny, want you to fuck me." You try to turn your head, bashful of the way you're being so shameless but he's not having it, keeping his gaze on your every expression, trying not to lose his sanity when you grind yourself against him. Your voice, petulant and needy, is enough to have him at his wits end alone.
"I will baby, I will," he promises sweetly, accentuating his point by letting go of your wrists, and using one of his hands to pry your thighs open. He rolls his agile hips against you and the friction has you reaching out to grasp at his waist - trim and firm underneath your fingertips. "just gotta get you ready first."
He sits back on his haunches and you pout about the lack of content, his pleased grin a beacon as he hooks his fingers into your waistband, pulling your shorts off your hips and past your thighs - till they're at your ankles, and it feels surreal when he throws them somewhere behind the couch, too eager for his own good.
You're brought back to current reality when his big hands caress the tops of your thighs, before creeping down into the soft crease where they're shut closed in embarrassment, and pulling them apart.
He outwardly marvels and you wonder if he can see you clench, the moment overwhelmingly intimate with the way he's staring directly at the wet spot that’s soaked through the crotch of your panties. He takes only a moment to reach out and press his thumb against the dampness, balls tightening with the need to release each time you whimper or gasp.
With his cock leaking in his pants, he wastes no time, taking the flimsy piece of fabric off so fast you don't even have time to by shy about him seeing you naked and glistening in front of him. Furthermore, you don't think anyone could feel even the least but bad about themselves if he looked at them like this - slack jawed, and starved.
"Fuck...you're so beautiful," two long, inky fingers formed into the shape of a V, spread your lips open and then he's moving further away - no, scooting down onto his stomach, and suddenly his breath is a warm puff against your most sensitive parts. "so wet for me, hmm?"
You're not sure you can look away, too enraptured by the visual stimuli that's correlating with the circling of your swollen clit. You want to cry, a little bit. Scream, maybe. He's so beautiful you can't help but to reach out, running your fingers through the front of his chestnut hair and then his eyes are piercing through you like the shock of ice water.
Your body seems to register the feeling before you can process the sight by itself, back bowing off the couch, hips bucking. His hot, wet tongue licks at the hood of your clit, starting slow and picking up pace when you start to squirm. The blossoms painted across his skin decorate the arms that hold you down while his pillowy lips envelop the bud, suckling lewdly.
"O-oh, oh fu-mmm." You're already blubbering, lost and falling into the sensation of everything all at once. You've no doubt that he's had years of experience but this, you're not sure you've felt pleasure like this before.
"Feels good?" He mumbles between the flick of his tongue, hands traveling up the length of your body to grip your waist, kneading your skin. You almost laugh at the question, assuming your trembling body and the way you're involuntarily bucking against his mouth would suffice as an answer. Still, you humour him.
"Mmhm, feels- ohh, mhm feels good." Your voice is barely there, strained and whiny but he feeds off of your every utterance as if it's something he so desperately needs. The smacking between your legs becomes louder and like a magnet, you're drawn to the sight again, coil in your belly tightening impossibly.
He's a muss of hair, the dark strands tickling your thighs when his head moves from side to side. Your thighs attempt to clamp shut but then he's looking up at you again - purposeful in the way he maintains eye contact while he dives down and licks a stripe over your entrance.
You're not going to last long, and he knows this, from every twitch and squirm and whimper - he's preparing for your demise, humming in contentment while the lewd sounds of slickness continue.
He slips a finger inside of you, and then another once he realizes how soaked you are, and this proves to be the beginning of the end. You grip onto his forearms, needing to be grounded to something while he buries the digits inside of you, curling in a come hither motion.
It's all beyond what you thought pleasure could be, it's violet and red and all things euphoric behind your eyelids and the sound of his pleased groans are what finally have you giving out, melting against the couch cushions.
You're not sure if you're making any sound at all, honestly. It comes so quick, violent in it's force and you're hazy headed - tears welling in your eyes from the way he's still massaging you, licking you while your walls squeeze and contract around his fingers.
"That's it baby, mmm, let go."
The velvet voice is warm against your sensitive sex and you're still twitching as you peel your eyes open to peer down between your legs and see him there, staring up at you like you're the sun, slowing his movements while the aftershock of your orgasm seeps through you.
His knuckles are buried to the hilt inside of you and he pulls them out slowly, petal pink lips kissing your clit gently, adoringly. With your brain still foggy and embarrassment no longer present, you grab his wrist, bringing his slick soaked fingers to your mouth and wrapping your lips around them.
He moans an expletive and then he's hovering over you again, watching with a soaring heart as you suckle your juices clean from his digits, lashes fluttering when you open your eyes.
For once in his life, he's speechless. You have to pull him down to kiss you in order to breaks him from his reverie and it's now that he's realizing how excruciatingly hard he is. He doesn't remember the last time he's ever been this worked up without his dick even being touched for more than five minutes.
It's safe to say he's taken by surprise when your hand slips into his bottoms and briefs to palm him this time, and his body lurches against you while a desperate sound bellows in his throat.
"Baby." he coos, relishing in the softness of your palm, the difference in size of his own. He wants to protest when the intense bliss of it is gone, momentarily, only to feel your fingers attempting to pull his sweats down.
You're still buzzing from your orgasm but you've never been more positive about something; about someone. Your whole body feels as though it can't be satiated, not until you have all of him after having such a sweet taste.
"Please, now, want you now." You nibble on his bottom lip and he has to pull himself away or else he'll get too caught up in your mouth by itself, but he's on a mission - searching for his wallet and scrambling for it when he sees the leather square sitting on the floor.
The tips of your fingers and toes tingle with a mixture of unbearable anticipation, and nerves for what's about to come when he pulls the condom from his wallet and tears the corner of the foil.
It's just a second but it's enough to admire him silently, the twitch of his mouth, the elegance of his fingers even when they're eager and uncoordinated. A part of you feels overcome by the need to be encapsulated by his presence, for his skin to be a permanent silkiness against your lips.
He catches you in the midst of staring and it's like he's glowing from the inside out, pulling his pants down his thick thighs along with his black briefs, kicking them to the floor.
Without thinking your arms are reaching forward, gripping the small of his waist as if to still him, and he pauses at your will. He's cupping your chin with one hand while your fingertips explore underneath the hem of his shirt, and you're grateful that he's allowing you to soak this in, that he's not rushing despite the fact that both of you are like exposed lit wires.
"Here, let me take it off." His arms are reaching behind him before you can blink, biceps curling as he pulls his shirt off of his broad shoulders before discarding it with the rest of his clothing.
Your breath is audible, pupils blown wide while you examine the length of his torso and the permanent shapes that are marked there. Only patches of his honey skin peek through the array of tattoos he's got climbing his sides, over his chest, and you swear you've never seen someone so beautiful.
"Take mine off too." You barely manage to get out, and he's kissing your lips again with a soft sort of fondness, while his knuckles graze your skin and your shirt is being stripped from your body. He's back to kissing you and your naked chests meet for the first time, a fierceness gripping you by the throat when when when the shaft of his cock nudges your clit.
"You're sure about this?" He asks, gentle in the way he strokes your cheek with the back of his hand, pecking your mouth between glances at your nipples where they rub against him. His touch travels to your jaw and down your neck, before he's tweaking the buds between his fingers, and your legs wrap around his middle in an effort to solidify your answer.
"Yes, I'm sure," you run your fingers through his hair. "very sure."
Lips press against your cheek and then you're presented with the sight of him again, bare in front of you, just a few inches away. It's now that you really find the courage to look at him, not expecting to be out of breath and shock stricken once you lay your eyes upon his dick.
It's pretty, as pretty as you knew it had to be; curved just slightly, the tip swollen with arousal and a shade deeper than that of his lips that you've come to have photographically memorized.
You watch with probably more fascination than most while his slim fingers roll the condom onto his length, down the shaft that protrudes with a small vein right in the middle, until it's snug and securing the fact that you and Johnny Seo are about to have sex.
As always, here there right when you need him most, aiding you in forgetting about anything that isn't crucial to right now. His arms are wrapping around your thighs and pulling you closer - your small gasp doesn't go unnoticed.
And then, there's also the way he's looking at you, again. It's like he's compacted every emotion you could feel in a moment like this, and somehow managed to reflect it's opacity back at you through the glimmer of his irises.
You jerk your hips against him and he grins at your urgency, diverting his attention to the space between your legs and holding you steady by the hips with one hand while the other goes to grip his cock.
He levels his pelvis with yours and brings the pink head down to your entrance where it leaks for him, gathering the slickness and smearing it through your folds, around your clit.
His fingers search for yours and suddenly he's interlocking them while you feel the initial stretch of his dick finally entering you, a soft expletive leaving his mouth while he pushes himself into you halfway, peering down with half lidded eyes as a silent affirmation.
Your expression must be as expressive as the soft mewls that involuntarily fall from your lips, and he bottoms out while leaning down to kiss you as he's come to realize that this action is single handedly way more addictive than it should be.
You feel so full it's impossible not whine, and within seconds he's pulling himself out of you nearly all the way - mouth hovering over yours so he can watch your features contort when he sheathes himself back in with a snap of his hips.
With the need to hold on to something becoming incessant, he allows you to throw your arms around his neck while your thighs tremble around him, his hips creating a slow but steady pace that draws lewd sounds from between your bodies with every slow drag of his thick cock.
It's strange, how you provoke such tenderness within him when you shudder and pant beneath him despite the fact that he's barely done anything yet- a juxtaposition to the feral, nagging type of ache that brews in the center of his belly to have you even more a mess.
It's not that he's fairing any better, though. Even you can see that, feel it in the way he keeps his lips on your skin, trying and failing miserably to hold back his groans while your nails create crescent moons on the broad of his back.
"You - f-fuck you feel s-so good." He stutters, and if you could find your words maybe you'd even have the confidence to tease him, but right now all you can comprehend is the feeling in which he's providing, the nudge of his tip so deep inside of you.
"Faster, can you - oh yes, yes." It's like he knows what you want before you get it out all the way, and his tongue is warm against your throat while he obliges your request, furthering your haziness.
You're quick to realize that Johnny is a generous lover. Despite the fact that he's holding himself together on the edge of his coherency, he's already atuned to each tense of your muscles, the strain of sweet sounds you coo in his ear. He uses this as a guide, working his hips skillfully, circling when he pushes himself back in.
The fact that you're sopping wet helps as well, audibly soaked and your walls are taking him in so generously he doesn't know what to do with himself. Your hands are in his hair and tug at the dark strands without thinking, drawing a sweet, serene moan from the back of his throat.
"Mm, feels good?" He asks despite knowing the answer, your countenance painted with the colors of bliss. He peers down in between your bodies and almost regrets it due to the pulse it sends through his groin - threatening to send him over the edge too soon.
But it's a sight too mesmerizing, his entire length disappearing inside of you with an easy glide, his hips colliding with the back of your thighs and your clit waiting to be played with. You're just as taken by the sight, surrounded by only him, inside of you and around you like a life force. Your hands travel over anywhere and everywhere, down to his belly where the muscles flex underneath the painted skin with every thrust.
"So good, you feel s-so good Johnny." You're becoming even more petulant but he doesn't mind, not when you're clinging onto his biceps and mewling his name. He slips his tongue into your mouth while his hands cup the back of your knees, hiking your thighs up higher around his middle.
Your skin burns where he touches, his pace increasing and now you wouldn't be surprised if the neighbors knew exactly what it is that the two of you are doing, skin against skin and coos of pleasure echoing through your small apartment. You have a hard time forming thoughts that make sense.
"M' all the way up there baby," his voice is deceivingly sweet, hips dangerous and borderline ruthless now that you two are drenched in the essence of lust and desire, driven by your need to come undone. "such a sweet pussy."
He means it, too. Maybe that's what makes this all so much more enthralling. From the clench of his taut jaw, to the way his dark eyebrows are furrowed, even the crimson of his lips from the way he's been biting down on them - Johnny is nothing but honest. It's somehow stripped you of the shyness you'd normally be harboring, compelling your mouth to speak without a filter.
"It's all yours, I'm yours."
This seems to spur him on, more than you thought because now he's all but cradling you in his arms, mouthing his words against your lips, not allowing even a centimeter of space to reside between the two of your bodies. It feels whole, complete.
"Mm, yeah sweetheart? Mine. Fuck, you're all mine."
It's a growled statement and you quiver against his solid form, warmed from the inside out like a furnace and set ablaze. You're still sensitive from his mouth but that doesn't change the orb of pressure within your belly, or the waves of pleasure that spread through your thighs and up your spine from the way your clit is rubbing against his pelvis while his cock reaches new depths.
You should've known his mouth would be filthy, and it's really ticking every box you've literally ever needed to be ticked and you're sort of embarrassed by how far gone you are already, properly mewling with your fingers gripping onto his bulged biceps where he uses them to hold himself up.
His face is a sight to behold in itself, as well - plush lips parted, cheeks hot and a shade of deep, ravishing plum. If he weren't steadily hitting that sweet spot inside of you maybe you'd actually be able to keep your eyes open long enough to admire it more - but it's obvious it won't be long until you're unraveling.
He's thankful, in a way. Because you're sighing out sweet words that profess how good he's doing, and he swears that he's never felt anything as good as this. Through and through. You're made for him, wrapped around his being, tight like cellophane and it's silly but this is all he's dreamed of for months.
"Open your eyes sweetheart," his hips stutter at the same time you involuntarily squeeze around the tip of his cock as he goes to seep back into you and you're drawn to the plead of his voice. "let me - fuck, let me be yours, please?"
His voice is honey, coating you in it's sweetness and you're teetering on the edge of your release. It beckons you soothingly, like a siren in the wake of a wave and it doesn't calm when you pull him down to your mouth by the nape of his neck, your shared groans being swallowed by the other. Your thighs are a vice around his waist, keeping him locked against you as he grinds his cock into you.
"You're mine, J-John- oh, oh please." His fingers have reached down in the limited space between your shared skin to rub your clit in circles and you know this is it - mind and body completely encircled by everything he's made of, the scent of his skin and the heat of his body and even the way he says your name.
"Want you to cum for me, please, please cum for me baby." His breath is warm against your ear, a vibration that wracks through all of your senses and your body knows it's coming before you do - instantly under the influence of his begs and pleas.
You're descending, voice nothing but a gasp and an echo of an expletive when the dam inside of you finally bursts - leaving you to tremble like a leaf beneath him while the feeling threatens to consume you inch by inch, nerve by nerve. 
You've all but gone limp, bright dots of light flitting through your vision and you feel his mouth everywhere, like a soft, warm reassurance that he's not going anywhere while you spasm around him.
"Just like that, oh fuck, yeah just like that."
In this place of completeness, you bask in the rise in octave of his usually low timbred voice, in the way he's holding you so firmly in his arms, as if scared to let go and put even an inch of separation between the two of you.
You're still twitching when you feel him throb inside of you, your name a warm whisper against the side of your neck while he pumps himself into you with no real rhythm; filling the condom with spurts of his cum while your fingers gently scratch the back of his scalp, through his hair.
Your breaths are ragged and have only that in common, his weight comforting despite the fact that both of you are in such a fragile state. It all feels surreal, like maybe you’ll wake up soon even with his cock still buried inside of you, half hard. More than anything, it feels right. Apprehension nor guilt nor worry brews underneath your skin, instead overshadowed by pure elation.
Wet pecks travel across your throat like marks of gratitude and your smile is automatic, involuntary.
"I meant it, you know," he's out of breath but concise, palm cupping the side of your face as he makes his way to your mouth and kisses you there, afraid to look you in the eyes. "about...about what I want. About wanting you."
You actually do laugh this time, suddenly outrageously giddy at the words leaving his pretty mouth, mildly entertained by the fact that someone could be almost as oblivious as you are. Almost.
He looks worried for only a split second until you're kissing his face, over his nose and fuchsia cheeks, a feather against the soft autumn ground.
"I meant it too," your voice is light, airy and he swears he'd believe anything you told him, even if it weren't as absolutely resolute as it is right now; your smile against his lips like a seal of promise. He meets your gaze, and everything within him calms, settles.
"I'm yours. And you're mine."
This, he thinks to himself, is all he's wanted to hear since the day you looked up at him with all the stars in your eyes.
Completely worth Jaehyun stealing his Armani denim jacket, honestly.
732 notes · View notes
roger-that-cap · 4 years ago
Text
cardigan
natasha romanoff x f!reader
word count: 8.9k (haha)
warnings: swearing, cheating!natasha, sad!reader, uhm this is angsty for me, asshole!natasha, sort of asshole!team, more angst, sort of happy ending sort of, secrets™️
this is inspired by taylor swift’s cardigan. folklore and evermore are really getting me through this i swear
obviously i do not own this song, picture, or any of the warped lyrics that i attempted to slide in as creatively possible :) this is also my first one shot and my first reader insert ever- i tried to not go into any physical details about miss y/n but i hope y’all like it!
No editor. All mistakes are 100% mine!
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You couldn’t have been any more excited to see Natasha. She had been gone for what felt like forever on a mission with Steve, Bucky, and some agent that was on her first big mission, a girl that you recalled to be named Abigail. Regardless of what her name was, they were all heading home today after so long, nearly two months.
There was no telling how much you were ready for the return of your fiancée. The two of you had promised to get married nine months ago, and you were already deep into planning. You were going to your dress appointment at Kleinfeld’s (your literal childhood wish) in two days. You had the venue picked, the table accessories done, the seating chart already filled out and sitting pretty in laminated sheets in a binder. The day was going to be perfect, and it was what you and Natasha deserved after so long. Especially Natasha, after every single thing that she had been through just to save the world and to help those who weren’t able to help themselves.
Natasha was your angel.
Your heart was racing in your chest as you waited for the quinjet to land, the ring feeling light on your left finger as you rolled back and forth on your feet. You couldn’t hold back a toothy grin as you waited for them to fly back in, and to hug Natasha again. That was the most important part. To have her back in your arms so that you could do things like stay in together for the weekend and stay holed up in their room just doing innocent things, like counting each other’s heartbeats.
You stood with your hands clasped in front of your body as they landed, a dopey grin on your face and the same nervous glint in your eye that was there every time that you waited for your fiancée to come back home. You knew that Natasha would always find her way back to you, but there was no telling what condition she would be in.
The moment the doors opened, Abigail ran through them, and down the ramps nearly knocking you over. You reached your arms out to steady the other girl, who looked like she was about to burst into tears at any second. As much as you wanted to just hug Natasha and go home after you ate and sleep in bed with her, you couldn’t leave a girl in tears like that without checking on her. “Woah, are you okay, sweetie?”
The girl’s bottom lip jutted out, like she was about to cry just because of you asking the question. She didn’t say anything, but she was obviously falling apart from the inside, and it made you more than mildly concerned. You didn’t like to see anyone cry, let alone a girl who had just come back from her first big mission. “I’m fine.” Her voice cracked.
“Are you sure?” You were no medic or super soldier or even assassin-spy, but you were nothing if not rational and sympathetic. You were so in tune to the poor girl that you didn’t feel the palpable awkwardness of everyone else who walked off of the quinjet, almost all of them cringing. “Do you need to talk to someone?”
“I- I’m sorry,” Abigail said, and she was running away from you faster than you had ever seen anyone run before.
You frowned as you watched her run. “I hope she’s alright, poor thing. I can’t imagine how a first mission feels,” you murmured, turning around and seeing the slightly spooked eyes of the rest of the team. You smiled at them cautiously and walked over to Natasha, arms already raised as you went to embrace her tightly. You breathed in and put your face in her neck, nearly crying tears of joy as you smelled her shampoo, a rich scent that meant the safety and comfort of them both. “I’m so glad you’re alright.”
You were so happy to hold your fiancée again that you almost didn’t notice how standoffish she was being, and her lack of enthusiasm. She had never been not enthusiastic to see you, especially after going so long without seeing each other. After too long of her not reacting to your warm embrace by kissing your hair or murmuring her usual missed you, princessa, you pulled away and looked at her, a questioning look on your face. “Are you okay, my love?”
Natasha stepped back, not looking you in the eyes and choosing to just smooth out the sleeves of her combat attire, eyes on the floor. That was very unlike her. Something must have gone terribly wrong. “I just want to get home.”
Your vibe visibly deteriorated. It was obvious that Natasha had just popped your bubble and left it as an empty shell, but you were still smiling anyway. Like you always did. “Okay, Nat. We can do that.” You reached out for Natasha’s hand and grabbed it after waving goodbye to the other team members, who all looked either extremely displeased or like they had been caught doing something very awkward.
You walked back to your part of the tower together in silence that wasn’t characteristic of the two of you. You were a known chatterbox, happy and always starting meaningful conversations, but also one of the best listeners to ever grace the earth. Natasha liked to listen, too, and she had the best words and the best voice to listen to. One of them was always talking. The silence between them was almost haunting.
Natasha went straight into the shower. She didn’t offer for you to go in with her, which was what the two of you always did after a mission. You got to see Natasha at her most vulnerable, and Natasha was finally allowed to let down the shroud of strength that only lasted for so long without being damaging. It was the thing that kept you close and often the action that got Natasha to open up about what happened and how she truly felt. Natasha skipping out on that time hurt you and made you expect the worst. 
She turned the lights off the minute that she was out of the shower, not speaking to you or even offering any physical assurance, which was something that Natasha knew that you needed after she came home.
You just prayed that she would be ready to talk in the morning.
§§§
Natasha wasn’t there when you woke up. You frowned and patted the empty spot in the bed beside you even though you knew that she was probably at the gym or running around doing errands. You sighed and crawled out of bed, doing the daily routine that you usually did with Natasha, and leaving the room to go make some breakfast.
There were whispers that hissed like snakes when you came around the corner, and they came to a screeching halt when you bounced into the room. You grinned at everyone sitting or standing in the kitchen, ignoring their deer-in-headlights looks and searching for the woman you were set to get married to. You frowned a bit when there was no sign of her.
“Good morning!” You hummed out anyways, going towards the pantry once you saw that no one had made food yet. Because you were staying there and you had no other skills, you had been the one to take up personal chef for the entire team just to pull some weight, even though they insisted that you didn’t need to do a thing. As long as you “kept Nat happy”, they said. 
It took a second for any of them to respond. “Good morning,” Steve said, his voice oddly clinical for the way he usual greeted you. He was the morning person of the bunch, and probably your closest friend other than Wanda. 
You took the supplies out of the pantry with a thoughtful look on your face. “I’m not trying to pry,” you started softly, back still towards them as you started with the pancake mix. “But, was the mission bad?” No one spoke for a few heavy moments. 
“We succeeded,” Bucky finally stated vaguely, his voice floating through the room.
You never the type to spill all of your personal business to people, but these people weren’t just anyone. These were your closest friends, the people who were going to be in the wedding, either in one bridal party or the other’s. “Nat’s not talking to me,” you sighed out, and turned around to see all of them stiff as boards. “Was it hard for her?”
No one said anything.
You pursed your lips and turned your back to them again, looking away from them to gathered your thoughts for a second. You took in a deep breath and told yourself not to pry, not to think about what Natasha would surely tell you when she was ready. You turned your head and gave them your trademark grin. “Who wants blueberries in their pancakes?”
§§§
You sat in your shared room after a full day of Natasha blatantly ignoring and avoiding you. You were patient, because that was what you had to be to date an Avenger, but Natasha had never straight up ignored you before. You learned very quickly that it called for a different type of patience than the one you were used to.
   In the kitchen when she was forced to be present after you cooked a huge welcome home meal, she didn’t hug on you or kiss your cheek or even look you in the eyes. It wasn’t like her. You came to the tough conclusion that it wasn’t because of the mission, because she had never done that before, not even after the one where the children were caught in the crossfire. You were always the one that she talked to, no matter what.
The lamp light was the only light on in the room, because you knew that Natasha liked it better that way. Maybe less light would make her open up a bit, and the two of you would finally see eye to eye after the annoying stalemate that felt eternal.
You didn’t know how long Natasha would take come back and speak, but you knew that it wouldn’t be too long. Natasha liked to talk, and she had said multiple times that she liked to talk to you the most. It would be any time, right? That’s what you thought until the hours crept by, and you saw and heard no sign of anything. Not even the ding of an elevator or the shutting of a door, or her soft footsteps that she made on purpose because her natural steps were so quiet that she scared you when she appeared. 
When Natasha finally came in, it was late in the night, morning time. Three in the morning, to be exact. You shook off your nerves and smiled at her, and the smile wasn’t returned as much as it should have been. “Hi,” you said, almost a little star struck by finally seeing her. It brought you back to the time you didn’t truly know her. 
You had always admired Natasha. Not even because of her being Black Widow, but because she was Natasha Romanoff, an enemy spy and assassin turned good. And it brought you pure joy knowing that you would soon be taking on her last name, which you secretly thought of as your greatest achievement. Natasha was the one you wanted with for life, and you were steps closer. 
You waited to hear Natasha’s voice. You waited in anticipation for her to run to you and start to spill immediately. You were waiting to wipe her tears and assure her that it wasn’t her fault, and that she couldn’t have done anything differently. “Hi.”
You frowned. Confusion flooded your senses at the short greeting. “Huh?”
“Why are you up?” Her tone sounded almost accusatory, like she had caught you doing something that you weren’t supposed to do, like you were intruding on her time. The frown on your face turned into a slight scowl, and then you reminded yourself that patience was key with Natasha.
“I’m allowed to wait up for my future wife,” you teased, but the look in your eye was serious. You could see how the red head lingered at the doorway, like she was trying to decide whether to bolt or leave with grace. You weren’t going to give her enough time to make the decision. Come sit, please.” When Natasha didn’t move an inch, your facial expression fell. “Please.”
Natasha walked over to the bed slowly, like she was being forced to move or die. You shook your head side to side, eyeing her up and down like the answer to the problem that you didn’t know yet was written on her body somewhere. “I’m here,” she said quietly, like a distant whisper.
“Are you really?” You asked quietly, and it felt like your voice echoed like the beating of drums in the nearly silent room. “Can you please tell me what’s going on?”
“Nothing happened.”
You knew that you shouldn’t pry. You both hated prying, but you were also both naturally transparent. You two had never truly had to pry with each other before. The truth was, you didn’t know how far you could push until she snapped on you. “Are you sure?”
Like someone had flipped a switch, a small smile lit up on Natasha’s face. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to sate you for a while. “Yes, princessa. I’m very sure. I’m tired.”
That was all it took. All it took was Natasha muttering the sweet nickname to you, and it was all as good as talked about. You could rest for a moment.
“Then we can go to bed, my love.” You reached out to touch Natasha’s face, loving the familiar feeling of her soft skin. “You know, you don’t ever have to be afraid to tell me anything, Nattie.”
You stared at Natasha for a while, just admiring her face and everything about it, almost missing the way that she didn’t do it back. This was something that you two did nearly every night before going to sleep- you just watched each other. A slow, dopey grin slid onto your face, and then you leaned forward and pressed a kiss to her nose, then her cheek, and then to her pink lips in a soft yet passionate kiss, as soft as rose petals.
You pulled away and smiled at her with your eyes closed, nuzzling your face into her neck. You took in a deep breath, inhaling her sweet smell and feeling the comfort was over you like waves in the ocean. You could have told her a thousand things in that instant, but they all revolves around one master idea. “I love you so much, Natasha.”
You brushed a red strand of hair out of her face before reaching up to kiss her forehead, and then you were back in her neck, trying to sleep.
There was no response, just Natasha’s arm’s getting tighter around you and squeezing three times, each harder and shakier than the last. That was all it took for you to fall asleep.
When you woke up the next morning, you recalled having a dream that featured a woman crying, the sound distant yet close.
§§§
You had a feeling that Natasha was going to do the exact same thing that she did the first time, and you assumed correctly. You took it in stride this time and went to the flower store to pick out your bouquet that you would walk with, and probably throw. It was something that you wanted to do on your own, anyway. Like most brides, you didn’t want your future spouse seeing anything that you were going to be wearing until the big day. Not even the veil or the flowers that you would be carrying.
“That’s gorgeous!” You grinned at the employee, who mirrored your excited look. “That’s perfect, she’ll love it.”
While you gushed about your flowers, you also wondered if Natasha was doing a bouquet, too. You hoped that she had someone that would help her out with it, maybe Sharon or Wanda. Natasha wasn’t really big on the planning of the wedding. In fact, she wanted it much smaller than it was going to be, but you had convinced her to do it your way. Maybe it was your natural charm that helped you swindle the spy, or perhaps it was because she just secretely wanted the same thing.
As you walked away from the flower shop after placing the order, you walked by the busy donut shop that Natasha loved going to. Usually, it would be Natasha that stopped by and brought you some donuts, but maybe the other way around would be enough to make the red headed woman smile a bit. You stopped for a second and then didn’t hesitate to go in, pulling out a couple dollars for a tip, too.
Natasha loved chocolate donuts, even though she tried to resist eating them. You liked glazed better, but it was alright. You’d buy chocolate for her. You had hope that they would get Natasha to open up just a little, as dumb as it sounded. But a bribe never went wrong, and what was the harm in donuts?
“Thank you, Sarah,” you said after you got the box of donuts, walking out of the sweet smelling shop and down the street towards the tower.
When you got back, it was loud. It usually was pretty loud, with everyone and everything going on, but this was a different type of loud. It wasn’t the tinkering of metal in the lab or the sounds of sparring or elevators going up and down. It was shouting. A full on shouting match that was loud enough to be heard from floors down was happening. You nearly dropped the box of donuts as you hurriedly pressed the level that you and Natasha stayed on, hoping to find her in the room and out of the fight. The ride up the elevator was almost too full of anticipation as you waited in what would have been silence, if not for the yelling.
“No, because you can’t control yourself!” The voice was now obviously Steve’s. You were shocked. You had never heard Steve so riled up, ever. It was out of character for him to be so angry at someone, even if that particular someone fucked up royally. “You did something stupid, and now you’ll own up to it. Simple.”
“I fucking can’t!” You frowned. That was without a doubt Natasha. “I can’t, not right now. So fuck off.”
“I can’t fuck off after you’ve done something like this, Romanoff.” You winced as the elevator doors opened. Steve didn’t use Natasha’s last name anymore, not since they got close. And he certainly didn’t use the f-bomb much. “This is… it’s beyond-”
“What happened?” You shoved the donuts into Sam’s waiting hands, which were open for business when he saw you coming out of the elevator. “What’s all the yelling for?”
Everyone was staring at you like you were a ghost that wasn’t supposed to show up even though they had called on you. No one had an immediate answer, and so you put your hands on your hips. “Is everything okay?”
Tony looked at Natasha with sharp eyes and took a step back, raising his palms. “On you.”
It took a second for Natasha to say anything to you, and it was clear that everyone was waiting for something. It was even more clear that everyone was equally pissed at Natasha, for whatever reason.
“Everything is just fine, princessa.” Natasha’s voice carried over to your ears, smooth as honey, even though she wasn’t looking up into your eyes. “Don’t worry.”
You didn’t really believe it. How could you? She wasn’t talking to you, she wasn’t lying with you, she wasn’t counting your heartbeats like you did with her. There was something wrong, something had to be for Steve to be yelling like that, in front of everyone else. You eyed Natasha for a few extra seconds and then took the donuts back, muttering a thanks to Sam.
“Alright.” As if seeing the box made you remember why you went out in the first place, your trademark grin was back. “I ordered my bouquet today,” you hummed, walking up to Natasha and planting a kiss on her lips. When you pulled away, you murmured the customary I love you under your breath, like you two did every time you kissed. The one who initiated the kiss would say it first, and it would be answered by a quick “always”.
“A-always. Oh?” You realized that Natasha’s voice fluttered when she said it.
“Yeah, you can’t see which one, though.” You winked at her playfully, trying to ignore the way that the others looked mildly uncomfortable. You were used to uncomfortable looks, but never from them. You knew that it wasn’t homophobia, because they were never that way. So their behavior ran deeper than that. What the fuck happened? “My dress appointment is tomorrow.”
“Yeah.”
You were too busy getting a donut from the box to see the looks that everyone else shared when you spoke again. “How’s the girl who went on the mission with you? She seemed a little upset when you guys came back.”
Natasha’s hair nearly bounced with how high she shot up, her body going straight at the mention of the other girl. She looked away from your eyes for a split second, and then back. “Fine.”
You wiped your mouth with the back of your hand, eyes on Natasha. “Is she good with fashion? Maybe seeing dresses and all that would make her feel a little better.”
Natasha looked horrified as she realized what you were insinuating. “No. No, she’s fine. She doesn’t need to be invited anywhere.”
“It’s just to sit and watch me try on dresses. Wanda, Sharon, and Pepper are going, right?” You looked towards Tony to confirm, and he nodded his head firmly before looking at Natasha again, a serious look in his eyes. “Maybe Abigail can go.”
“No. She’s not going.” There was something in Natasha’s tone that sounded so final, so adamant, that you knew in your heart to just drop it. It saved you both in that moment.
That didn’t mean that you weren’t allowed to make a face of disapproval. “That’s not nice at all, Nattie. I hope you weren’t the reason she was crying. You’re known to be a little mean.”
Natasha looked away from you, taking a step back. Her eyebrow was twitching, a sign of stress that you picked up on like it was your own. “I have to go.”
“Wait, I got these for-” Natasha left in a hurry, so fast that you barely even registered that she had left. She left awkwardness in her absence. “Well, she can eat them later. Feel free to have some, guys, just save one or two for her, okay?”
They were all quiet for a few seconds, like they were in the midst of a special moment where they were all feeling the same thing, everyone in the room except for you. Finally, Wanda spoke. “Okay, Y/N.” You smiled at them, gave them all sweet hugs, and left.
§§§
You were bursting at the seams at being seen for a dress appointment at Kleinfeld’s. Wanda was with you, and so were Sharon and Pepper. They were excited for you, but no one matched your energy.
You were a girl finally getting what she had been dreaming of her whole life; to get married in a beautiful dress to the person she loved. You would soon be walking down the isle to see Natasha waiting for you, flanked by everyone else that was ever important to them.
You must have been the luckiest woman in the world.
“You’re really excited,” Sharon mused, but it was more of an observation than a statement.
“I’m so excited,” you confirmed. “I’m marrying the love of my life in what’s going to be my dream dress, I know it.” You grinned as the four of you watched people bustling around the shop. There was a bride near tears, just like on the TV episodes, and you watched fondly. Seeing people get what they wanted made you happy.
The search for the perfect dress went nothing less than perfectly. Within the first two sweeps, you managed to get into a dress that everyone thought was perfect for you, and you loved it, too. It even brought the three out of the haze that they were in, out of focus and minds so far gone that your excited squeals were all that broke them out of their thoughts.
“It’s gorgeous, Y/N.” Pepper said, her voice soft and cautious as they walked up to pay. It was silent as you waited for an attendant to come to the counter and check you out.
“I- I think there’s something you should know.” The other girls’ head whipped Pepper’s way, and she gave them a look that told them that she wasn’t going to back down from whatever she had to say.
You had what felt like a permanent grin on your face as you thought about the dress. It was a dramatic ball gown, blush pink and flowy. You were almost as in love with it as you were with Natasha, and the matching heels that you got and the gorgeous veil that matched topped it all off. You and your soon to be bridal party walked out into the crisp air, and you turned your head towards Pepper. “Sure, what is it?”
There were a few beats of silence. “Let’s go sit in the car,” Pepper insisted, and so they walked back to the car that Happy was driving for them, where he was sitting with the partition rolled down. He gave them a half assed greeting before they all piled in. “Can I start off with saying that… I’m sorry if you feel like any of us betrayed you.”
You trusted them all with your life, but that didn’t stop your heart from starting to race at the words Pepper said. Whatever this announcement was, it wasn’t good at all. “What?” When no one said anything, you laughed a little. “What, is the dress actually ugly and you didn’t say anything while we were in there? Do I need to go back?”
“No, the dress is beautiful.” The other girls nodded, and then you were sure of yourself and your taste again. “It’s just… Abigail.”
You frowned a bit, immediately thinking of the tragic scene where the girl rushed out of the quintet, breaking down by the second. “Oh, poor thing. Is she not doing as well as they say she is? I know a first big mission can be tough.”
There was a thick silence before Sharon blurted it out. “I am so, so sorry.” You leaned forward, heart skipping a few beats while Sharon took in a deep breath. You knew that some kind of blow was coming just by her apology, and you were bracing for it. “Natasha and Abigail had an affair on the mission.”
In the movies, it was like an instant shattering of the heart when news was broken like that. Immediate tears, automatic screaming and cursing and wanting to call up the other person to threaten them. There was lashing out, the breaking of glass, all the cinematic things that made actors on screen look better and less awkward when they broke down. You always thought that they were overreacting.
Now you knew that they weren’t. You felt that way on the inside. Your mind was raging like a hurricane and a tornado all at once, one disaster coming from the east and the other from the west. Your anger was the tornado, whipping around and threatening to destroy everything in your path and lash out at every single damn person in that car. But just like a tornado, you wore out and disbanded, all in your head. All that was left was the hurricane. The sadness. The disappointment. The heartbreak.
You had never even entertained the thought of how you would be after getting betrayed by her, but if you had, you probably would have imagined that the tornado would have acted first. But it didn’t. Unlike in the movies, all you did was tilt your head to the side and ask for the words to be repeated, even though you didn’t even listen for a second. You couldn’t believe it. Not Natasha. Not your Natasha. Not your angel.
“Natasha and Abigail slept with each other on multiple occasions on the mission, by word of Steve,” Sharon pointed out, her voice similar to the way a doctor sounded while delivering bad news, only a little shakier. “Abigail ran out crying because she fell in love with Natasha and knew that it would never really happen, not because she ruined the mission.”
Not only had Natasha slept with another person, but she had somehow convinced the girl that they were going to be together. Natasha didn’t have a ring, and the girl was new. There was no way she would have known that you two were together unless someone explicitly told her, and there were better things to do on a mission. It wasn’t her fault. Even if she had known, it wasn’t Abigail’s fault. Natasha Romanoff knew better. She knew a thousand times better.
“I don’t think either of them meant for it to happen,” Pepper said, immediately trying to calm you down, even though you hadn’t even spoken an angry word yet, and you looked like you weren’t even close to shouting.
The distinct sound of the partition rolling up was what brought you back to the present.
“But it did happen,” you said slowly, not even realizing that your teeth were gritted. “It happened.”
You couldn’t believe it. You didn’t want to, you wanted to believe it was a lie and calmly confront Natasha, but Steve was the one who had said it, and Steve didn’t lie. Why hadn’t he told you before?
Now that you knew what went on during the mission, you could see that everyone was acting weird. Everyone knew, there was no question about it. Which meant that everyone knew, and no one told you. They didn’t even hint toward anything, and they knew that you were supposed to be marrying the woman who went behind your back and did the unforgivable multiple times.
“We- we’re supposed to be getting married.” The pitiful sentence was all that you could string together in a thought as you looked out of the window at the traffic. You wished that the cars would just go, fly around so that you could cry by yourself. “I don’t even know what to say.” There were a million things happening in your mind at once, and trying not to cry in front of everyone was the biggest effort.
“I’m sorry,” Sharon’s voice said, and she really did sound apologetic. But it wasn’t enough in the moment. You wanted to hear Natasha say it, if all was true. But you knew it was. “We’re all sorry. We were waiting for Romanoff to own up to what she did.” Sharon said, obviously trying not to feel the wrath of you that was surely bubbling beneath the surface.
You could have been angry towards them. You knew that you felt betrayed, by everyone that knew and chose not to speak, that was a no-brainer. You could have been a lot of things at the moment, but there were bigger fish to fry. You clenched your fists and looked at the window, blinking rapidly as you grappled for composure. “Don’t apologize, you didn’t do anything.”
“I don’t think you-”
“I get it. It’s alright. I just prefer not to speak right now, ‘s all.” And conversation ended. But that was when the turmoil in your head and heart started to crank up the energy.
Your first instinct was to bust in there and look for the Black Widow herself, to yell until you lost your voice. Your first instinct was to cause a scene and embarrass her as much as Natasha did to you. You couldn’t believe she had gotten everyone to lie for her. You couldn’t believe that she had an obvious affair with a new agent. You couldn’t believe that you walked around thinking that nothing was wrong while everyone else pitied you behind your back.
Unfortunately, you were quite used to not being enough. Not enough to make it into ivy leagues, not enough to make the track team, not having enough to afford to buy all of your clothes without cringing and thinking about putting some items back. But you were never going to be used to not being enough for Natasha Romanov.
The drive back was the most awkward drive that the four of them had ever been on, without question. You had tears streaming down your face but you were still as silent as the night, just like everyone else. You hardly ever cried. You were always the ray of sunshine and rationality in the tower, and now everything positive had been blown out by the darkness that Natasha created.
When everyone got out of the car, it was sluggishly. Everyone knew what was bound to happen, but it was questionable whether or not the end of the blow out was going to result in settlement or people storming and and leaving. You already knew how it would end.
The second that the elevator landed on you and Natasha’s floor, you shakily thanked the girls for their honesty and walked right out, knowing that it was probably the last time that you would ever be going up in Stark Tower. In your angry fantasy about confronting your fiancée, you imagined storming in and shouting her name, getting her attention and then breaking her down into pieces like the words did to you in the car.
But once you were in your room, you found that the fantasies were just that, and you couldn’t say a word or do a thing but find your suitcase and pack, all the fire leaving your body the second that you saw your room.
You were halfway through gathering everything that was yours in the room that you and Natasha shared, tears streaming down steadily, when you registered that it was real. Natasha had really done the unimaginable, and there was no turning back. A small sob escaped your throat when you saw the sweater you had gotten Natasha hanging up in the closet, the same one that she wore when she got down on one knee for you. Did that mean nothing, too? Was the meaning and emotion of that and everything that led up to it blown to smithereens by something as trivial as two months?
The door flung open. “What are you doing?”
“Don’t talk to me.” You blurted, turning your head to not look at Natasha, trying to avoid her blue gaze. If you looked, you had no doubts that you would turn to stone, and that you would never find the strength to leave the woman who you loved the most and hurt you the most, all within three minutes.
Natasha looked bewildered by the suitcase on the bed. “Are you- are you leaving?”
“What the hell else am I supposed to do?” The temper that was kept just below simmering in the car was finally starting to boil over. “I can’t believe you, Natasha!”
“I-” She sputtered, and you gave her a pointed look in response. “Who told you?”
The question brought fire into your veins. She knew that you knew, because she knew that it was the one secret that had the power to make you so emotional. You two kept no secrets, and for this to be the first? That was painful.
You knew that Natasha would sense your lie about who told you and who didn’t, but you told it anyway. There was no use in causing a riff between the team because they wanted to help you. “I figured it out myself. Why didn’t you tell me?”
Natasha held her hands out in front of her body, and the gesture was so similar to the way that she used to hold her hands out in a silent ask for you to hold them. You hated the way that your heart lurched, and the way that you craved the feeling of her hands even more. “It was an accident.”
An accident? A two month escapade with another woman was an accident?
“After that long ass ride home on the quinjet, you could have at least come up with a better lie.”
“Princessa-”
“I- fuck you.” Your voice cracked in the middle of the explicative, tears falling into the suitcase pitifully. It made your raging temper even worse. “Fuck you.”
“My love-”
“I don’t understand why!” You couldn’t contain the waves of emotion you felt anymore as you slammed the top of the unfinished suitcase closed. “I give you everything I have every single day. Every day. I love you with all of my heart and I do everything I can to make you happy and you give me this? I tried so hard to make sure that we were both happy together, and we were. So, why?”
The look on Natasha’s face wasn’t unfamiliar to you. You knew it well, but it had never been used on you before. It was the look of a spy who didn’t want to say a damn word, silent resistance that you knew would be unbroken. That’s when you knew that you may never know the real reason. And it broke you. “There isn’t a reason.”
You crumbled faster than you ever had before “Natasha, we were- how could you do this to me?” You collapsed into sobs, falling onto the bed and putting your face into your hands. You didn’t know how long you cried for until you felt a hand on your shoulder, very hesitant to even attempt at being comforting. You didn’t have the energy to tell her to fuck off.
“I’m sorry,” Natasha cooed, and for a second, it felt like something was right again. Natasha being gentle was a regular occurrence, a side to the famous ex assassin that only you saw. It was your biggest safety blanket in life. But when she opened her mouth again, you were brought back to why you two were even doing this in the first place. “I didn’t mean for any of it to happen.”
You shook your head out of anger. The fact that the lie was shitty made it worse, made it hurt more. She didn’t even want to come up with a lie that would make you stay?
“Somehow you convinced that poor girl that you were going to be with her. How did you manage to do that on accident? How did you sleep with her multiple times on accident? You lead her on emotionally.”
“No.”
“Yes.” You pushed her hand off of your shoulder. “You told her some pretty little words and she fell for them as most do, right? Like I did, I guess. Just tell me the truth.”
“I didn’t-”
You remembered the way the girl was so distraught. You remembered the amount of tears that she had. You remembered the way that she avoided looking in your eyes, the way that she looked completely heart broken. Just like how you looked. You scoffed. “She told you she loved you, didn’t she?”
Natasha’s light blue eyes were boring into yours as she was silent. For the first time in a while, there was no telling of what Natasha was thinking in your mind. You were disconnected. “Yes.”
The words hurt to get out, but you had to know the answer to them. At any cost. Even at the cost of your own heart and sanity. “And you told her the same.”
There was a thick silence that spanned across multiple frantic heartbeats. “Yes.”
The next words were automatic. “I’m done.” You opened the suitcase again. The tears were coming harder than ever, warping your voice so much that your not Natasha hardly recognized it. “Done.”
“You can’t just-”
“Yes, I can!” You whipped around, eyes nailing Natasha right in her place. “Unless you can give me a good reason for what the hell you did, I’m done.”
Excruciating silence. It struck like lightning on the last tree in a struck down forest.
You turned on your heel, but then, words bubbled up in your throat, and you couldn’t shove them down. “When you miss me after you’re done, don’t come back to me.” Your voice cracked in the middle, but you kept pushing. “When you stop and think about what we could have been, do not come and find me. Because you’ll figure it out one day, and it’ll get through that thick skull.”
Natasha’s eyes were slightly watery as she looked on, taking a few steps forward with on outstretched arm, looking to latch on to you. “Love, please.”
You scoffed and ran out of the door, with nothing but a suitcase and a bag in your hands. You cried all the way to the elevator, ignoring the fact that Wanda and Vision’s room was right there across the hall, and how they without a doubt heard everything. Hell, everyone had heard everything. The argument weren’t exactly quiet.
You cried even harder when the doors of the elevator closed. Your hands shook as you brought them up to your face, remembering far too late that Tony Stark sometimes watched the tapes, especially elevator ones. You couldn’t even bring yourself to care. You turned into yourself and sobbed as your body and head shook, trying to rid herself of everything that happened. You cried more when you realized that you hadn’t meant a word of what you said to Natasha.
Deep down, through all of the emotions, you wanted her to seek you out when she learned her lesson. You didn’t know why, and you knew that you didn’t want it any time soon, but you knew that you wanted it.
It was supposed to be a magical day. The day you got the dress was the day it all became real, the day that solidified the fact that you would be getting married to the woman that you loved. You were heart broken. The familiar sound of the elevator stopping and the doors opening barely snapped you out of your well deserved pity party.
You only took one look at the new arrival, and that was when it was decided that the universe, was indeed, very unkind.
Abigail stood there like a deer in head lights, swallowing and looking with wide eyes, certainly unsure about whether or not she should just leave or apologize and hop in and pretend like she didn’t know what was going on. She looked like she expected confrontation.
Your wobbly smile shocked her. “You don’t have to be scared. Come in.” Your voice was just as shaky as the smile you offered, stepping to the side a bit and giving the other woman enough room.
You felt bad. Abigail was young, even younger than you. There was no way that she knew. No one really resisted the charms of Natasha Romanoff, anyway, and you knew it. Especially not a wide eyed newbie who was desperate to please on her first mission with the big guys, some of the original Avengers. There was no doubt that she felt terrible based on the way that she didn’t look you in the eye, and how she avoided everyone. There was only one person in the wrong, and it wasn’t this poor girl.
The doors dinged as they reached the bottom, and right before they opened, you smiled at her. “It’s okay,” your voice was a strong whisper. “It’s not your fault.” You gave her one look as you wheeled your suitcase out of the elevator, taking long strides to reach the huge front door of the tower, praying for no more interruptions.
“Y/N!”
You didn’t want to stop at all. You knew who’s commanding voice it was, and stopping to talk didn’t seem like an option. You preferred not to talk to anyone on the team, especially not one of the people who went on the mission. You wiped your cheeks and turned around anyway. “Yes?”
Steve stood before you, a sincere expression on his face as he looked you up and down, your obvious and inevitable departure making him wince. “I’m sorry.”
There was nothing that you could really say to him. He wasn’t the point of your anger and he was a friend, even if he had kept something from you. “You’re not the one who did it.”
“I could have told you.”
“No, she should have, a long time before someone else did. You didn’t do anything wrong.” The story of infidelity that happened was Natasha’s story to tell. While you still felt a little more than bitter about being an idiot in the dark about the whole thing, you would have preferred to hear it from her, one hundred percent. “I’m just pissed I found out after buying the perfect dress and veil and all of it. I was so ready.” You felt like a fool.
“I don’t know why she-”
“I don’t know why, either.” You admitted, shaking your head slowly. “But one day, maybe I’ll figure it out.”
“You’re leaving.” Steve saw it as a closed chapter now that you were storming out. Anyone would, but you knew better. You knew how Natasha worked, you knew how you worked, but most importantly, you knew how you two worked together. “You and Natasha- you and Nat are special. I’ve never seen anything like what you two have in my life, no one has. That’s why we’re all so mad. She ruined the one relationship that everyone obviously knows is true love, for no reason.”
“I know.”
He looked guilty for even saying the words. “You’re not going to try and work it out?”
“Don’t you think that I know what we have is special?” You asked him, new tears welling up in your eyes as you spoke. “I’m leaving this to her because I trust her with it. I don’t forgive her, and maybe I never will, but this is for her to decide.”
“What makes you think that she’ll decide right? Or what she’ll even decide at all?”
“She’ll come back.” You stated with certainty, and these were the first words that hadn’t had a crack or wobble in them since you started talking to the red head. “She’ll miss me and she’ll be over the thrill of whatever happened on the mission, and she’ll find me, wherever I decide to go. She’ll come back to me, just like I would come back to her. It could take weeks or years, but she will. That’s how we work.”
Steve was momentarily stunned, but after a few short moments, you knew that you had convinced him. “And you’re willing to wait for her? However long it takes?”
You lifted your lips at him, even more tears building up in your eyes as your answer flew up to your lips without even thinking. “She’ll come and find out.”
You walked away with heavy steps, already feeling her lingering on your skin, and the haunting memories of the two of you as happy as could be swirling around in your head.
§
You were well aware that removing Natasha from your life would hurt. But you never could have anticipated how much it would hurt.
Natasha was the safety net you never knew you needed. She was the one person on earth who made you feel truly wanted, needed even. She knew everything that you required to feel loved and you knew her just the same, and you both did those things. And that’s what made you two different.
You had been cheated on before. That was how Natasha had met you, actually. Your last boyfriend had cheated on you like the dirty dog he was with nearly every woman he was cute enough to be with for a night, and Natasha met you while you were getting hammered at a bar because you found out. Natasha met you at your lowest point and raised you up with all her might, and still had energy to love you. You felt useless and discarded, thrown under the bed and tossed to the side of the road, but she found you and made you something new. She made you her favorite.
§
Natasha was everywhere.
She was in the way that you made your coffee, because you hated it before you met her, and she introduced you to a kind that you liked. You got as addicted to it as you were to her.
She was in the way that you walked around the park at night instead of in the morning like you did before you met her, because she liked looking at the stars together.
She was in the way that you searched for her next to you in your sleep and when you first woke up. She was in the ring you still had. She was in the way you wrote your letter ‘n’ now, because you wrote her notes for years and always made the ‘n’ fancy just for her. It stuck. She was somehow related to every show and every movie and every brand of ice cream, and from the second week of suffering without her, you knew that she would linger on you like a faded tattoo.
During the third week, you swore that you could smell her perfume, though it made no sense. You had done laundry many times, and all of a sudden the smell popped up, like she was dropping in to spray the perfume and then leaving as soon as she came. The rich smell was something that you would never forget, and it hung around like thick smoke in your mind. You wanted it to leave.
You cursed her name all throughout the fourth week of being alone in your small apartment in Brooklyn. Everything was her fault. The washer broke, Natasha somehow did it. If you woke up with makeup still on your face from the past night, Natasha was at fault.
You went shopping during the sixth week, and you swore you saw flashes of her red hair in the grocery line, pitifully walking faster with your cart to both flee and go towards it. A part of you knew that she would never shop this far out, but you couldn’t help it. You missed her. You missed her a lot.
But that didn’t change that it stung so, so badly.
§
It was disgustingly close to what the wedding date would have been when you were lying in bed with a stray cat that you had managed to nurse back to health and call your own about two weeks prior. In a way, it was freeing. Natasha hated animals. They were a responsibility in her mind, nothing more. You loved the cat quickly, and named him Henry.
There were three sharp knocks on the door that you would have taken for strokes of thunder if they weren’t so close. You frowned and stood up, walking to the window to peak outside and see that there was a thunderstorm rolling through, the wind higher than usual and the rain coming down sideways.
You walked to the door with the small cat trailing behind you like a loyal companion. You cracked a smile when he meowed, and you looked through the peep hole, the bright porch light shocking your eye for a second, and then you saw.
Natasha Romanoff was standing there, soaking wet with her arms hanging at her sides, trembling from the cold.
You took two steps back that startled Henry, causing him to meow louder this time. You breathed in, trying to be quiet, but you knew that she knew you were there. She was so trained that you knew she heard you approaching, and when you took your steps away from the door. You both knew each other were there.
You had indirectly told her to seek you out when she was ready, and here she was.
Were you ready?
Like you were a child trying to eavesdrop, you held your breath as you leaned into the door, putting your ear on it as you struggled to hear something, anything, from her. She wasn’t talking. You looked up into the peephole again, and she was looking at her feet, waiting for something to happen. She knew that you were deciding.
You had spent time looking for her in places you knew she would never be, running to and from things that looked like or reminded you of her, and now the real thing stood in your porch light in the rain. She came back to you.
She came back, but that didn’t erase everything that happened. Not at all. Her two months of fun and new experiences acted as the eraser, painting over everything that they had ever done in black paint. The joy of dancing with her under street lights and kissing in Tony’s limos and her hand under your sweatshirt didn’t amount to the pain it felt when she ripped herself from you.
But why did it hurt so much if they weren’t the same amount of emotion, if not more? If you looked at it with a rational mind, was the joy not worth more than the pain?
The pain weighed like bricks. There was one big brick that weighed half a ton on one scale, nearly tipping the other side.
But the joy? It weighed like clouds, because that’s what joy was. It was the feeling of being above the clouds. And you found that every moment of joy that you had Natasha, even though it was the weight of clouds, still outweighed the fat brick.
But were all of the cloud moments enough to possibly take another brick?
Your hand moved before you knew it, and you were undoing the chain and unlocking the door, yanking it open roughly and staring her down.
She was shocked. Her eyes were wide as she stared at you without any barriers, automatic tears welling up. Had she come all that way to not even know whether or not you would answer? Hell, you had done all of that while in limbo with yourself.
But now, without even knowing how Natasha truly felt, without even hearing one word from her mouth, you knew something changed.
“I knew you’d come back.”
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lustbile-archive · 4 years ago
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Abandoned
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MarkxReader
Word Count: 3.7k
Summary/Warnings: Smut. Exploring an abandoned building with your friend on halloween sounds like a terrible idea, but what happens isn’t terrible, only incredibly weird. Monster!Mark. (also I feel like this may be the weirdest thing i’ve written so take that as you will)
Part 2 Here
This is the final installment of my halloween fic week. Info about blurb night here
You’re not sure why you let your friend convince you to go in the abandoned building at all, but on halloween night of all nights, you’re sure you must have had a death wish.
Firstly, the building didn’t even look safe. Even on a good day with the sun out and the birds singing, the building was old and run down, the only thing really remaining being a rotting shell. And the building itself even had a reputation. Older people in your town spread rumors about monsters that lived there and accidental deaths that occurred when there was still work being done within its walls, and of course you never took it to heart, but something about the chill in the air and the nature of the holiday made the old wives tales swirl in your mind and tug at your nerves.
But regardless of your fear, you went anyways. Your best friend had a sparkling look in her eye that made it virtually impossible to deny her of a creepy venture into the hazardous building, so with an agreement that you couldn’t leave each other’s sides and a 30 minute time limit, you hesitantly entered one of its broken door ways.
It wasn’t bad at first, enough so that you didn’t even feel scared anymore. Yeah it was old, and gross, but still empty. Wood creaked and the floor sunk in a few places, mysterious dried liquid dripped from the floors above and there was a faint stench of rotting, but in the end it was just a building.
As you walked through the rooms, each of you trying to find the grossest thing to jokingly gag at, you could feel your guard falling. Even a large rat running past you only got a yelp from the two of you, but you continued on.
And maybe you got too comfortable. You and your friend would take turns running ahead a few times, hiding behind walls to jump out at each other, and the 30 minute time limit was long forgotten, the you that existed before you entered the building would be disappointed. But the you that existed before you entered would be downright disgusted by what you did next.
“It looks so pretty,” you drawl out with a grin on your face as you stand in one of the building’s many hallways, the glimmering glass that’s scattered on the floor of the room catching your eye as you stare through its door’s small window.
“I dunno,” you friend hesitates as she squeezes her face next to yours, “it’s pretty and all but I’m afraid it could cut up my feet, like there’s so much glass.”
“That’s what you get for wearing sandals to go through an abandoned building you freak,” you tease as you pull away from the window, a faux look of disappointment on your face, “c’mon I just wanna get a couple of pictures please?”
“And no ones stopping you,” she retorts as she mirrors your stance, “I’m just not going to go in with you because I don't want bloody feet.”
“Are you serious right now?” you gawk, a petulant pout falling on your face, “you promised we wouldn’t split up.”
“And we don’t have to,” she says before turning to walk away, her smug voice carrying over her shoulder, “it just depends on how badly you want that picture.”
You standby there for a moment, watching her slowly retreating form with your arms crossed defiantly over your shoulders . You glance between the dark corridor that she enters and the room to your side a few times before you huff.
“Well, don’t go too far!” you yell out before turning and opening the door, “I’ll just take a few pictures so I won’t be long!”
You only hear her response of agreement faintly as the door shuts behind you, the heavy metal closing with a loud bang and making you jump.
The air is a few degrees cooler than it was in the hallway, the bite of it making a chill run up your spine. Your hand shakes as you pull your phone from the pocket of your skirt and squat down to begin taking pictures.
The flash of your phone makes the glass shine beautifully, a bright shimmer that makes small rainbows dance across the walls. Your shoes drag through the piles of glass as you move around, a quiet crunching noise following you everywhere you move.
You’re moving to the far corner of the room when you see it, a pitch black closet that’s missing it’s door, the placement of it making it impossible to see from the hall. Just looking at it makes your skin crawl, and you stay with your back pressed to the opposite wall.
“Just a few more,” you murmur to yourself, squatting down again to get a better angle. Your flash only goes off a few times before you see it.
You try to tell yourself that it’s just your imagination, that the eerie feeling of the building and the fact that you’re on your own is just making you see things. But as you lift your phone towards the doorway of the closet and take another picture you see it again for the split second the flash is on.
You’re frozen in your spot and your stomach turns as your brain tries to wrap itself around what stands in front of you. The outline of a figure burned into your eyes as you felt your rapidly beating heart clog your throat.
You try to convince yourself that maybe it’s an old vacuum or broom that you saw incorrectly, but as you find the strength to lift your phone to check the photo you feel nauseous when you see him clearly.
“Did I scare you?” a soft and concerned voice sounds from the closet making you yelp as you jump to stand, the sound of your phone falling to the floor and cracking on impact ringing out.
He creeps from the dark, entering the dim lighting of the room as the full moon shines through its window. His face is slim, and his eyes are wild as he watches you, his feet moving slowly and dragging on the floor with an inhuman gait as he walks closer. You’re backed into the corner of the room as you watch him approach you as if you’re a spooked animal.
“I didn’t think you’d see me,” he laughs quietly but you're too scared to respond, your voice completely lost as you watch the boy creep towards you.
“Don’t talk much huh?” he asks, the smile on his face growing unnaturally as he speaks, the sight of him making your face grimace and press harder into the wall as you try to create more distance between you.
It’s not that he was ugly, no if he was normal you would think he’s really cute. But there was something wrong, something off. The way his shoulder slumped and his legs carried him, his smile that stretched across his face too wide and his eyes that shake and burn into your skin as he watches you. From a distance he would look like a normal boy, but as he gets closer, only a few feet at this point, there’s a nagging voice in your mind that tells you that whatever stands before you, is not human.
“Wow,” he speaks as his eyes trail the length of your body, his stare making a weird heat spread over your skin, “you’re so pretty.”
Your heart drops at his words, not only what they mean but also what follows. He’s only an arms length away, and when he’s halfway through the last word, a thick black liquid spills from his mouth.
There’s a soft pattering sound as the liquid hits the floor in drops, the sight of it making your mouth hang open as your lunch turns in your stomach. You can feel your body tremor as you try to connect what’s happening in front of you in your brain.
“So, so pretty,” he continues to mutter as he gets in your personal space. The liquid that bubbles from his lips with every syllable is completely void of any smell as his face moves only inches away from yours, but his eyes ignore yours as they widen with confusion as his are trained on your chest and torso.
“I’ve never been this close to someone else before,” he admits before his hands start to tug at the hem of your shirt. The shock of the situation continues to stop you from speaking, but it’s when his hands start to trail up your stomach and towards your chest, that you start to believe that you’re some sort of deprived. Something about the heat of his hands runs a shiver up your spine, and when they press against your chest, you let out an involuntary whimper.
“Can I see you?” he asks, moving his eyes to meet yours and his hands to the buttons of your shirt. You’re not sure what makes you nod, but the movement is happening before you can think about what the question entails. The grin that pulls on his face in response makes your blood cold, and his nimble fingers begin to pop open the buttons of your shirt one by one.
“Wow,” he whispers out once your shirt hangs open, your bralette being the only thing covering your chest. He doesn’t show any interest in removing the fabric, but his hands return to pet over your skin.
There’s a heavy pause where his hands grope and mold over your skin, and you only stand still as he moves against you. With the black that drips from his lips and the way he stands before you terrifies you, but you also feel disappointed in yourself as the feeling of his hands makes your muscles lose their tension and your eyes fall closed.
After a moment of his hands exploring you, you feel his eyes return to your skin. You slowly peak your eyes open, and when they connect with his, you take in a shuddering breath.
He doesn’t speak, just stares at you for a moment, his intense eyes making you feel like whatever is happening before you isn’t real. The way he watches you makes you feel like maybe he can hear your thoughts, as you can almost see the gears in his head turning as he thinks. You’re about to try to speak again when he lunges at you and his mouth latches on the side of your neck.
You let out a loud gasp at the heat of his mouth suddenly on your skin. A part of you thought he was going to bite you, rip out your throat with his teeth even, but all you feel is his tongue starting to lap at the skin and the warm liquid streak up your neck.
He groans against you, his mouth kissing and sucking at the skin of your jaw. You feel yourself melting against the feeling, almost fully succumbing to the feeling when you notice it start to get weird. His tongue begins to lick at the place that his mouth covers, slipping past his chin a few times, but after a few heavy licks, you feel it gaining more surface area.
While his mouth stays on and around the same space of your jaw, his tongue has begun to reach the center of your neck, and before you can comprehend what is happening, you feel the tip of his tongue flicking against the other side of your neck.
If the black liquid from his throat wasn’t enough of a hint, his inhumanly long tongue was enough to tell you that the boy against you isn’t human. The voices in your mind start to argue, one yelling that you should have never split away from your friend and you should shove him off you and run away, the other telling you to admit the truth. The truth is you don’t hate the feeling. His mouth is eager and whatever liquid that’s started to coat your skin is warm and slick. His wandering hands has you squirming and panting into the air, and there’s a part of you, a part that feels dirty and terrible, that enjoys what's happening with the creature that lives in this abandoned building.
You let out a soft moan as his mouth moves down your neck, his tongue following suit as it licks down to your collarbones and the center of your chest. With curiosity you tilt your head slightly to look at what he’s doing to your skin, and you’re greeted with something you fully expected but still fills you with disbelief.
His tongue looks like a normal tongue, soft and pink, the only difference is its unnaturally long length and the sharp tapered point it ends with. You also quickly notice that the liquid that pours from his mouth is now coating your entire torso, dripping down your chest and stomach and even begins to stain the waistband of your skirt and drip on the floor between your feet.
You move your head up to stare at the ceiling, hoping the lack of visuals would help you convince yourself that what's happening to you is normal. Your curiosity takes over though when his traveling mouth reaches your stomach, and your shaking hand moves to touch the liquid that remains on your neck.
It’s begun to cool from the night air. It’s thick and sticks to your fingers slightly as you move your hand to hold in front of your face, and the black color is so dark and saturated, it almost looks like a hole to the void has been bored into the tips of your fingers.
You’re so distracted by the slippery substance that coats your fingers, you don’t feel his hands lifting your skirt. You don’t even notice his mouth pressing against the skin of your thighs, until they brush against your inner thigh making you jump.
Your hand falls, and you quickly look down. Your skirt obscures the top of his head, but you can still feel as the tip of his nose digs into the seat of your underwear and he takes a breath in.
“You smell very good,” he compliments, and you can't help the way your legs try to slam shut around his head and your skin warms in shame, “can I take these off too?”
His head pops out from under your skirt quickly as he asks, and you feel your heart clench slightly as something about it is weirdly cute. Again, you feel yourself nodding instead of verbally responding, but he only grins and returns to his place between your legs at the motion.
His hands waste no time in shoving your underwear to the ground, and while you fully expected it, you jump again when his nose presses against your bare skin.
You let out a squeak of shock when you first feel his tongue, the warm muscle only slipping partially out to lick at you. He must enjoy what he finds, as he happily hums before the full length of his tongue is covering you.
It never leaves your skin as he licks up the length of you, its long size keeping at least some of it on your skin every time. Your legs shake as his saliva and the liquid drenches your skin, the sheer amount coating you and dripping down the inside of your thighs. You think you may go crazy just by the situation itself, but also from the way his tongue covers you enough to lick at your entrance and clit, and even slipping further back than you had anticipated.
He hums against you, the vibrations sending a shot to your neglected clit, and you return to yourself enough to realize he may not know exactly what to do.
You notice that your hand continues to resemble a leaf as it shakes as you reach down. Your fingers grip harshly as you lift your skirt, and you're greeted by him tucked between your legs with his eyes shut tight. It throws you a bit to see him enjoying himself so thoroughly that you have to pause before you do what you were thinking.
“Here,” you whisper as you hesitantly tap at his forehead, your voice strained from the lack of use. He leans away almost immediately, his tongue slithering back into his mouth and his eyes opening wide with curiosity at hearing you finally speak, “r-right here.”
Your forearm holds your skirt against your stomach as your fingers tap gently at your clit. His eyes follow the motion, his head tilting softly as he looks at what you touch, before he’s looking at you again in curiosity.
“What about it?” he asks slightly confused, “does that part feel good?”
“Yeah,” you respond, your voice still quiet and scared, but he only shows you his too wide smile in return.
You only get a bob of his head as a warning before he moves back onto you, his mouth immediately latching onto your clit. Pleasure shoots up your spine as he starts to suck at the bundle of nerves, and your hands move to hold onto his hair before you can even think about it being the first time you touch him.
You push him against you, your hips moving slightly as his tongue roams the exact spot you pointed to. You're already enjoying the feeling much more than you had expected, but when his tongue slips out again to wander, you feel delirious.
The longer muscle licks at you desperately, the end of it prodding at your entrance as he finds it's the source of the arousal that spills from you. His hands move to wrap around your thighs, and you fear he’ll begin to suffocate himself with how deep he presses his face into you.
His tongue is a lot stronger than you thought when you feel it start to slip inside you, the thick muscle throwing you off as it reaches deeper and deeper inside. He groans loudly, gross slurping noises following, as his tongue begins to move in you, the muscle starting a soft twisting and thrusting motion against your walls. The feeling in you is far different than anything you’ve felt in your life, and combined with the way he keeps his hot mouth attached to your clit, you feel like you’re losing your mind.
You’re grateful for his hands as they hold you up as your legs become weak. Uncontrollable noises fall from your lips, encouraging him to fuck the dark liquid into with his tongue. With your whimpering and cries, you momentarily remember your friend as she wanders the hall, and you beg that she can’t hear what happens between you and the mysterious creature between your legs.
Your toes curl in your shoes as his nails start to scratch at your skin, and you feel your face start to scrunch up tightly as the pleasure builds an aching knot in your stomach. Your hips move with the motion of his tongue as it pulls you apart. If the length of it was jarring as it wrapped around your neck, it was even more intense as if pushed and licked inside you. You shake and jump as he curves it to press perfectly into the hypersensitive spot that sits in you, and you fear that you may rip his hair from his scalp from the way you fist at the strands.
Your eyes begin to roll back in your skull as the pleasure begins to get too much, the foriegn feeling of his tongue and the heat from his mouth and the liquid makes you feel gross and dirty in the best way. You’ve seemed to have lost access to your voice once again, as when you try desperately to warn him of what is about to happen, only squeaks and whines come out.
You feel his tongue twitch inside you in his surprise as you start to come, your walls fluttering around him and your moans growing in volume as the feeling consumes you. You feel yourself jerking uncontrollably as he only groans at the sight and feeling of your orgasm overtaking you, and his licking only grows in speed as he carries you through the feeling.
The tugging your hands deliver on his hair gets harsher as you try to pull him away from your body. He hesitates, his tongue still licking to collect as much of your come as possible, before he finally moves away. You shiver as his tongue slips from your body, your legs trembling at the small sparks of pleasure it hits you with.
His face is covered with your arousal and the black liquid as he stares at you from his place on the floor, his weird grin getting slightly more endearing every time you look at it, even with his sharp teeth stained with black. He clambers to his feet and presses his face close to yours as he speaks.
“Did you like that?” he asks, seemingly oblivious to the way you pant and slump against the wall. His eyes sparkle as you nod softly, “cool, that’s so cool. I didn’t know people could do that. Can I do that?”
A soft puff of air leaves your nose in a laugh as your head shakes in confusion, “I.. I dunno.”
“Do you think we can tr-“ he starts to ask, when there’s a loud crash from the closet that he came from. He immediately straightens, a look of shock crossing his face before morphing into one of disappointment. His head to turns to look at the closet for a moment before he sucks on his teeth and turns back to you.
“Maybe some other time,” he suggests as he starts to move away. He stops with a jump as if he remembers something important, “there will be another time right? You’ll come see me?”
“I mean, I don’t,” you stutter as you stand, the strength returning to your legs, “I mean sure? I guess?”
“Cool,” he smiles walking away again, “just meet me here whenever, i’m the only one who comes out here.”
You can't help but be reminded of your friend as you whisper an ‘okay’ at his retreating form. The room feels colder once he’s gone, much more quiet too with his mouth no longer on you, and you almost begin to think none of it ever happened in the first place.
Part 2
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starshine583 · 4 years ago
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New Girl on the Block (1)
(Hey guys! I finally got around to posting the first chapter of this! I hope you guys enjoy it, and please tell me if you’d liked to be tagged or want to read more! there’s also a mini-series of Journal Entries connected to this fic.)
Ch.2
Chapter 1: Happy Accidents
Rosemary Highschool, a private school for the truly gifted and the rich. Anyone who attended this facility was either poised and reserved, or uptight, or all of the above. Therefore, when a stuttering, stumbling raven-haired girl came tripping through their doors, it was only natural that the students became curious.
Felix couldn’t care less, if he was being honest. The girl was just another student, and he had better things to do than waste his time meddling in the personal life of a complete stranger. 
His friends, however, did not share his sentiment. 
“Did you hear?” Allegra asked as they walked to their lockers, her sky blue eyes wide with delight. She leaned forward slightly to catch a better view of their expressions, causing her golden braid to fall gracefully over her left shoulder. 
“About the new student? Who didn’t?” Claude replied, wearing his usual grin. 
“How do you think she got in?” Allan wondered aloud, fixing the green cap on his head in thought.
Felix rolled his eyes. His friends had always loved picking up on the latest gossip. He never understood why. Take this new student, for example. She hasn’t even finished enrolling in the school yet, but everyone’s already chattering relentlessly about her. Why? Because she was rumored to be clumsy? That was hardly an achievement, let alone something to be talked about by the entire school. So what was all the fuss about?
Allegra gasped, a smile lighting up her soft features. “Oh! We should show her around! This school is huge, so she’ll definitely need a guide. Plus, we can get the first scoop on her.”
“Absolutely not.” Felix finally cut in, giving her a sharp look. He refused to galivant around the school with a complete stranger while his classmates tried to pry into the poor girl’s personal life. 
“We didn’t say you had to go.” Claude pointed out.
“But you should at least say hi.” Allegra hastily added, a motherly tone coming to her voice.
Felix scoffed. Right. He would say ‘hi’, then they would ‘convince’ him to stay- i.e. drag him by the collar -and he would end up going around the school with them anyway. He’d gotten used to their tricks by now.
Allan frowned in disapproval. “Come on, Fe. It’s the polite thing to do. We are her new classmates, after all.”
“Yeah, Fe, don’t be a jerk.”
“When am I ever not a jerk.” Felix retorted.
Claude smirked. “He’s got a point.”
“Felix.” Allegra pressed, fixing him with a stern glare and putting her hands on her hips.
Felix groaned, irritation prickling up to the forefront of his mind. What did it matter if he saw the new student? He wouldn’t be talking with her often, and they would probably meet later on during classes anyway. Why did they have to be so pushy?
He reached up to rub his temples and closed his eyes. If he couldn’t see them, it helped him imagine that they weren’t annoying him to the point of insanity. 
“Alright, fine, but if any of you-”
Felix barely registered the hit. He heard his friends gasp, and the sound of his books and pencils scattering across the floor, and he felt the dull pain of someone smacking into him before he unexpectedly hit the ground.
Then his ears tuned into a light, yet panicked voice.
“I’m so sorry! I can’t believe I just did that- are you hurt? Do I need to call the nurse?”
Someone was talking to him. Well, they were more of rambling, really. 
“Pardon?” He said, interrupting the person’s ramble as he rubbed his back. He glanced up to see a young girl kneeling on the ground in front of him. She was scrambling around on the floor- gathering up his books, he realized -and appeared to be even more disoriented than he was.
His question spooked her, apparently, because she jumped, and her eyes darted upwards. They were an overwhelming blue, bright and sparkling despite being filled with anxiety at the moment. 
“I-I’m sorry!” She repeated, briefly setting the books down so she could nervously pull on the tips of her raven-colored pigtails.
Felix’s eyes widened. 
Raven.
Claude stifled a laugh behind him. 
“It’s not a problem.” Felix sighed, swiftly taking his books back from her and moving to retrieve the others. This was exactly what he had wanted to avoid. 
The ravenette furrowed her eyebrows, now bringing her hands down to play with the zipper of her black, half-sleeved jacket. “A-are you sure?”
He gave a short nod, scooping the rest of his books into his bag and slinging it over his shoulder. 
“I wasn’t looking where I was going, and I ran into you. If anything, I should be the one saying sorry.” His tone was composed, calm, if only for the sake of dignity. Claude and Allegra were never going to let him live this down.
He picked up her small handbag, holding it out to her. “So, I apologize. I’ll be more careful next time, and I am willing to replace anything of yours that is broken.” 
A wash of color came to her cheeks.
“Oh, That- that won’t be necessary, thank you.” She insured, taking the purse and clutching it to her chest.
Felix didn’t reply, instead using the brief pause to look her over. With her light pink capris and child-like pigtails, she didn’t exactly give off the impression of being rich or poised. Perhaps a relative bought her tuition? That’s happened before. 
“Aw, look! Felix made a friend!” Claude’s snide remark broke Felix from his thoughts, and he shot the brunette a glare. That clown can never keep his mouth shut.
Allegra pushed past the two and extended a hand to the girl just as they got to their feet. “Hi! I’m Allegra. What’s your name?”
The girl smiled- which Felix found surprisingly pleasant -and took her hand. “Marinette. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Like the doll?” Allan asked curiously, stepping forward as well.
“Sort of, yes.” 
“That’s pretty cool. I’m Allan, by the way.” He introduced himself, also shaking her hand. He then pointed behind him, towards Claude and Felix. “The one in the blue striped shirt is Claude, and the stiff board you just ran into is Felix.”
Felix hunched his shoulders slightly, a scowl tugging at the corner of his lips, but Marinette only laughed. It oddly reminded him of the sound of tinkling bells. 
“You’re new here, right?” Allegra asked before Felix could snark off to Allan. “Mind if we show you around?”
A sigh of relief tumbled from Marinette’s lips. “Please do. This place is like a maze!”
Claude chuckled and nodded in agreement. “Yeah, it’ll make your head spin. We-”
“-Can start with the cafeteria.” Felix interrupted. The sooner they could start the tour, the sooner he could go home. “Then we’ll work our way around the classrooms.”
He spun on his heel, ignoring his friends’ smug smiles, and marched off. It wouldn’t take long for them to follow.
Allan was the first to catch up, throwing Felix a sly smirk as he whispered, “I thought you said you weren’t going to show her around.”
Felix shrugged. If he was going to suffer through the embarrassment of running into somebody, he might as well get something out of it. He would take her on a quick tour, and perhaps his friends wouldn’t feel the need to meddle in his social life for at least another month.
“We’re her new classmates, right?” He said. “We should exercise basic politeness and guide her through the school.”
Allan hummed. “Sounds like good advice. I wonder who could’ve told you that.”
“The name escapes me.” Felix replied, a hint of a smile tugging at his lips. He stole a glance over his shoulder to the rest of the group. Marinette was talking cheerfully with Allegra now, her previous show of anxiety all but gone. She even looked a bit confident with the tripping matter settled. Isn’t that strange?
“...What else do you know about her?”
~~~~~~
When Maman suggested that Marinette start attending Rosemary Highschool, reluctance couldn’t begin to express how she’d felt. She’d heard the rumors, how the kids were spoiled, snobby brats, how the classes were just a room full of fancy trinkets to keep the kids satisfied for a while. Marinette honestly didn’t want any part of it, but at that point, any school was better than her old school. She simply couldn’t stand Lila’s schemes anymore, nor Adrien’s relentless pursuit of having them get along. As bad as Chloe’s bullying was, Marinette almost wished that she could go back to that time. At least then she’d still have friends. (Well, calling her old classmates “friends” would be over exaggerating now. At least then she wouldn’t have to deal with getting bullied from everyone at school.)
Either way, Marinette chose Rosemary over Dupont in a heartbeat, despite her uneasiness, and found that it actually wasn’t all bad. The endless halls were a bit confusing, but the classes were more advanced than others had let on, and though a select few of the students could be considered snobbish, everyone else seemed quite nice. A small group even offered to show her around. (After she ran into their friend, that is. Only Marinette could make such an embarrassing introduction.)
“I think that covers everything.” The girl of the group, Allegra, said. “But in case you’re still confused, I have a map for you.”
“A map?” Marinette echoed. She didn’t think they presented those at the school, though they probably should.
Allegra nodded and pulled a folded piece of paper from her school bag. “Claude gets lost all the time. So I started making maps for him. I have multiple maps because- typical Claude -he loses the maps too.”
“How was I supposed to know that it got mixed in with my history homework?” Claude, obviously the jokester amongst them, defended with a flail of his arms.
“If you ever need help,” Allegra continued, ignoring Claude’s comment as she scribbled something on the map, “feel free to text me.” 
“Thank you so much.” Marinette smiled, peeking at the phone number that was now on the corner of the page.
“It’s the least we can do.” Allan, probably the most relaxed of the group, replied. 
“It’s not as complicated as it looks. I’m sure you’ll get the hang of it within a week.” Ah, yes. Then there was Felix, the poor boy she’d run into earlier. He’d been extremely mature about the matter, even insisting that it was his fault and that he’d pay for any of her damaged belongings. Naturally, she refused the offer, but it was a thoughtful gesture nonetheless. 
“If not, you know where to find us.” Claude added, before scooping her hand into his and pressing a quick kiss to her knuckles. “But I certainly wouldn’t be opposed to you finding me for non-school related purposes as well.” 
Allegra rolled her eyes with a sigh, and Allan pinched the bridge of his nose. Felix just scoffed, especially when Claude winked at the end. 
Jokester and flirt of the group. Marinette thought with a smirk. In one quick motion, she slipped her hand out of Claude’s grasp and pushed him away by the tip of his nose. 
“I’ll keep that in mind.” She said, flashing him a wry smile.
Claude stumbled back a step, clearly shocked by her reaction. Allan straight up laughed next to him, and Marinette, to her delight, caught a glimpse of Felix smirking.
“Oh, I like you.” Allegra snickered, slinging her arm over Marinette’s shoulders.
“So do I.” Claude grinned. 
Allan, once his laughs died down, stepped forward. “Do you mind if I give you my number too? I can’t imagine not hanging out with you now.”
Marinette blushed from the compliment, but nodded and handed him the paper. Claude eagerly jumped at the opportunity and wrote down his number too. Then the boys turned to Felix.
“What about you, Fe? Are you giving her your number now or are you gonna beg for it later?” Claude asked, his grin turning devilish.
Felix shot him a glare- which he apparently did quite often. “I don’t beg.”
Allegra- ever the patient friend -let out a huff and shoved the paper into his hands. “For Pete’s sake, Felix, just write your number on the dang paper.”
“O-Only if you want to.” Marinette interjected. She didn’t want to cause a fight amongst them on her first day.
Felix’s glare faded slightly at her input, and he sighed. 
“It’s fine. You would probably need it eventually, anyway.” He relented, plucking a pen out of his left vest pocket and jotting down his number on the paper too. Marinette smiled despite herself as she took the paper back. It was only her first day, but she’s already made four, lovely friends. She liked to think of that as a good sign.
“Have you gotten your class schedule, yet?” Allegra queried now that the phone number matter was settled.
Marinette shook her head. “I was actually trying to find it when I bumped into you guys.”
Claude snorted. “‘Bumped into’. Good one.”
Marinette giggled along with Allegra and Allan. She hadn’t meant it that way, but the irony was a bit humorous. 
“Let us walk you to the office.” Allan requested. “The school tends to overcomplicate things, class schedules included.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to hold you guys up.”
Allegra waved her hand dismissively. “Classes are over for the day, and our drivers are paid to wait for us.”
Marinette furrowed her brows slightly. “Your drivers?"
“You know, the people who drive us to and from school and anywhere else we want to go.” Claude helpfully supplied.
So, like Gorilla. Marinette thought. It made sense. This was a school of kids who had fortunes of the same extent, if not greater than, the Agreste’s fortunes. If Adrien had a driver, then the students here would certainly have one too.
“You don’t have a driver, do you?” Allegra guessed.
Marinette glanced up at the blonde, a strange mix of surprised and embarrassed. Was it that obvious? Would it be weird in this school if she didn’t have a driver?
“Please don’t take that the wrong way.” Allegra rushed to add, noticing Marinette’s sheepish expression. “I’m just curious. We don’t get many students here who aren’t drowning in their own money.”
“That makes sense.” Marinette replied. The tuition for this school had been unbelievably high. “But no, I don’t have a driver. My family was granted an early scholarship for me to come here.”
Surprise flashed across the group’s faces, including Felix’s. 
“Well, isn’t that interesting.” Claude muttered. 
Marinette shrank back slightly. “I-I’m sorry-”
“No, don’t apologize.” Allan cut her off. “We’re just impressed.”
“Getting a scholarship here isn’t easy.” Allegra explained. 
“I-It’s only in the fashion section.” Marinette admitted, fiddling with the ends of her bookbag.
Claude gasped, a sparkle coming to his chestnut eyes. "You're a fashion designer?!"
“Uh oh.” Allan smirked.
Allegra shot her an apologetic look. “I’d say that there’s an escape to this, but I don’t want to lie straight to your face on our first day of knowing each other.”
Marinette held back a smile. Did that mean she would lie to her face when they knew each other better?
“How many outfits have you designed? Can you sow outfits too? I’ve had a few ideas, but none of the other art students listen to me-” Comments and questions started spilling out of Claude left and right. Things about smeared pencil drawings, pricked fingers, and his strange obsession with ruffled, prince-like sleeves seemed to explode out of his mouth all at once. Marinette knew her rambles could fall on the fast side, but this was a whole other level. 
“I’d have to look through my notebook, but I think the ruffles are doable.” Marinette managed to say when Claude paused to take a breath.
“Really?!” He exclaimed, going so far as to clasp his hands together with a grin.
She nodded, smiling herself. “I’m not sure how princely sleeves would fair on modern sleeves, though. They’d look much nicer on a full prince costume.”
Claude’s eyes bulged out of his head. “You would design a full suit for me?”
“I can’t promise that the fabric will be of good quality when I sow it, but yeah.” 
Claude threw his fists in the air in celebration, and Allegra took the opportunity to lightly pull Marinette aside.
“You know you don’t have to do this, right?” She whispered. “Claude’s not going to be too disappointed if you decide to change your mind.”
Marinette’s smile softened. “Thanks, but I really don’t mind. I needed a new project to work on, anyway.” 
Allegra studied her for a moment, then smiled as well. “Well, if you’re sure. He’s going to send you cars full of fabric though.”
She laughed. “Guess I’ll tell Maman to start clearing out the guest room.”
~~~~~~
Felix stared at his book, rubbing the corner of the page between his thumb and index finger. His phone buzzed relentlessly beside him on the arm of his recliner, no doubt the group chat that he'd been roped into. It was chaotic enough when it was just Allegra, Allan, and Claude, but now that they've added Marinette to the group, Felix wondered if his phone would ever be silent again.
He supposed he should have known better than to assume they would show Marinette around the school and be done with her. Allegra, Allan, and Claude were always overly friendly. However, he also couldn’t say that he minded having her around either. At least, not for the time being. She was considerate enough not to push his buttons and lively enough to keep the others occupied. No more on-the-spot activities from Allegra and Claude to cure their boredom.
"They're chatty today." Bridgette, his mother, commented from the loveseat couch to his right.
Felix hummed in agreement. "A new student arrived at the school today."
"Is that what they're talking about?"
He shook his head. "It's who they're talking to. The leeches have already adopted her."
Bridgette chuckled. “You mean Allegra, Allan, and Claude?” 
“Who else insists on sticking to me like glue?” 
She tilted her head in a “True” gesture. “Who’s the new student?”
“Her name’s Marinette.” Felix answered, flipping the page of his book.
“Oh, that’s a unique name.” Bridgette replied thoughtfully.
Felix hummed in agreement. “She said it was supposed to be similar to the doll ‘Marionette’.” 
“You talked to her?” Bridgette asked, surprise lacing her tone.
Felix resisted the urge to roll his eyes. He knew she didn’t mean to sound patronizing, but sometimes her questions irked him. For example, why wouldn’t he talk to the new student if Allegra and the others were? Even if he didn’t particularly enjoy human interaction, there was still such a thing as common courtesy.
..Which he supposed he didn’t usually have either.
Okay, maybe her question was more reasonable than he originally thought.
“Yes, I actually ran into her while we were walking down the hall.” He finally said.
Bridgette tried- and failed -to hide her laugh. “You ran into someone? That’s not like you, Felix.”
Felix sighed, slipping a bookmark into his book so he could close it. “I’m aware. I was trying to ignore Allegra’s prodding when it happened.”
“I see. What did Marinette say?”
“She actually started apologizing.” Felix admitted. “Even though it was my fault, she picked up my books before tending to her own things and asked if I was alright.”
Bridgette smiled. “She sounds delightful.”
He nodded without thinking. “Allegra even invited her to our routine luncheon tomorrow.”
Felix missed the twinkle in his mother’s eyes as she said, “Wow, to your personal lunch? They must really enjoy her company. You’ll have to invite her over here sometime.”
“I’m sure Allegra will arrange it eventually.” Felix replied dismissively.
“Then I shall have to thank her when she does.” Bridgette remarked, standing up from the couch. Her fingers ruffled through his hair as she passed him. “I’m glad you had a good day at school, sweetheart.”
Felix almost objected, since he hadn’t necessarily claimed to have had a good day at school, but decided against it. There was no point in arguing, especially when his day had, in fact, been satisfactory. He’d met someone new, someone that intrigued him. (A rarity, indeed, but it was true.) In the short time they talked, Marinette had shown herself to be both kind and anxious, but also witty and confident. It was an interesting mixture that stuck out to him. What type of life must one live to create such a paradox of a personality?
Unfortunately, Allan and the others knew about as little as he did when it came to her. She was a new student that had a passion for fashion and a bright smile. That was all. This was why he’d elected to remain silent instead of sharply opposing Allegra’s inviting Marinette to their lunch. (The sly smiles that were thrown his way by Claude and Allan afterwards were above irritating, though.)
Nevertheless, Felix felt she was worth the teasing for now, because Marinette, in short, was a puzzle.
And Felix loved his puzzles.
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oveliagirlhaditright · 3 years ago
Text
The Mom Friend
Yeah… though Neku had certainly never signed up to be these four’s mom—and he still had no idea how that had happened—he now knew he wouldn’t change it for the world. Oneshot. Canon compliant. Mom friend Neku. Neo spoilers.
https://archiveofourown.org/works/33385999
At first, if you had asked Neku if he had become the mom friend of the Wicked Twisters, he would have laughed in your face.
Because while he would admit he loved the youngins’��and was very protective of them—some old habits of wanting to be cool, and being somewhat rough around the edges, died hard.
But it was with Nagi that Neku finally realized that this was the case.
The girl had decided to go vegetarian, but her body was rejecting not having a lot of protein and thus needed something like nuts this very instance? Who was it but Neku, who went out to buy her some, at near three o’clock in the morning (because he was a good friend and had expanded his horizons that much), since her parents had recently died in a car crash and they could no longer do it for her, the poor girl.
So, Neku crept into Nagi’s dorm window around one-forty-five-ish—which, looking back on it, probably hadn’t been a good idea and could have scared his friend. But, hey: Neku had gotten used to being in the Game. And the week that Coco brought him back before he ran into Beat, he’d been in hiding, and had maybe gotten used to the idea some; and Nagi didn’t seem spooked, so maybe her mind was still stuck on sneaking around in the Reapers’ Game, too—and Nagi took the food out of Neku’s hands like it was the easiest thing in the world before ruffling his hair.
“Much obliged, Lord Neku,” she said as she fixed her glasses in this dim lighting, so she could see him better. Or so Neku guessed. “Now, hopefully, I can feel better enough, that I can work on my essay about the Canterbury Tales. …No one knows such suffering as me,” Nagi moaned, before going back to her bed and starting on the cashews.
“No, problem,” Neku said then—feeling sort of awkward, as he went to mess with a pair of headphones that were no longer on his person anymore—“if you need help with it… I, uhh, guess I could try and lend a hand. I have university coming up soon, too. And I know they’ll have me doing some English stuff, so…”
“Unless you want to be bored to tears, I suggest that you not make such a promise, unless your heart knows little joy,” Nagi warned him.
And Neku didn’t have to be told twice. So, he did backout of helping her with that paper.
But he knew when he visited Shiki soon—and she asked him what he’d been up to—she would still tease him about being the mom friend, for going out and buying protein for Nagi in the wee hours of the morning.
And it continued on like that… and Neku was somewhat loath to admit it, because hey: he had an image to uphold here.
But then again… maybe not, because if this was him pushing out his borders as far as they would go—as Mr. H had instructed him to do three years ago—Neku knew he would gladly do so… even at the risk was being called a “mom”, and even an “old maid”, or something.
Right now, Rindo had severely hurt his ankle… and who was he holding onto as they hobbled away, with designs to get him to a hospital? Neku.
“This is the last time I ever try something from the 90’s again!” Rindo complained, as Neku was half-carrying him to his car now (and how nice it was, that Neku could drive now—from memories of another him that hadn’t lost such formative years—that Joshua had implanted into his head).
“Yeah, Rindo… scooters were cool and everything—yours truly had one—but even I don’t know why you decided to try and bring them back now of all times… Especially since they had a bad habit of spinning right back around and nailing you in the ankle… which you know all too well now,”
And godamnit. Neku really had become the mom friend, huh, if he was now telling his younger friend this venture had been dangerous from the get-go, and how he could have easily seen that if he’d tried to?
Neku pulled on one of his spikes, irritated with himself here, but tried not to show Rindo, lest he think he was mad at him.
“Well, I’d thought about getting a motor scooter,” Rindo explained, Neku loading his pal into his backseat now. “So, I think that’s what got scooters on my brain… But I was trying to be green, and still think of a faster way to catch things in FanGo than walking! And now look where it got me. Oy! …But I guess I shouldn’t be complaining. This should be the least of my problems, when just a few weeks ago I was fighting for you guys’ survival, huh?”
And Rindo paused in where he’d been about to put a hand over his eyes, to peek at Neku now who was currently getting into the driver’s seat—as if he was asking for the past Living Legend to remind the new one to have his priorities straight.
“For real,” Neku told Rindo, whilst he started to pull away now. “When I got out, I was mostly thinking about the Game… about what Joshua did, and how even then, I still trusted him but couldn’t forgive him. And I was so excited to finally meet up with my friends—to finally have some and care about that—be glad, Rindo, that you got out with your friends, and there’s so much trust between you. Like there is between Josh and I now.”
And Rindo set down his phone then—apparently like he had when he first met Shoka in the RG—like he was really listening to what Neku had to say, and he had to appreciate that.
And it might have been his imagination… but Neku could have sworn he saw a flash of blue nodding his head at Neku’s words, as it sat back there with the injured Rindo.
The next time Neku ended up being the “mom” for someone in the Wicked Twisters, after the Game, it was with Fret.
It was towards the end of his and Rindo’s sophomore year of high school…
Fret had been ecstatic to come back to life, Neku had known, and wasn’t wasting his second chance. He had really thrown himself into his studies, Rindo had told Neku in private (quite proudly, Neku might add).
If he could keep it up, he would probably even be able to graduate early. And talent scouts were looking at him, Neku had been told: towards a kid who hadn’t strived that hard in school, but now was and excelling because of it.
Naturally, Fret had decided that his calling was fashion—everyone who had been playing the Reapers’ Game with him would have gathered just how much he loved clothes—and apparently he had really thrown himself into designing towards the end of the year, and was trying to put a portfolio together for Jupiter of the Monkey to look at: who the school was suggesting he try and intern with, as they had some connections with (and damn, if Neku didn’t wish he’d gone to Fret and Rindo’s school now, being a huge J of the M fan himself).
Part of Neku wondered why Fret just didn’t try to intern with Shiki during his senior year, but perhaps it was because he was afraid Shiki would just give him the position because they were friends and not because she really thought he was talented.
Anyway… Fret hadn’t gotten the internship. J of the M had said the Fret should try to use less color (you know what? Maybe Neku didn’t like them very much anymore…).
And since then… Fret had seemed to give up on his dream of being a fashion designer, and was trying to be an actor.
And, look: Neku had no problem if him wanting to do both, if he thought he could do it and this was really what Fret wanted… though call him crazy, but he felt like something else was at work here: something that Neku and Shiki had both experienced before.
So, Neku had sat Fret down to talk about it at Ken Doi’s—away from the filmmakers who were currently trying to film in Dogenzaka, that Fret had just been a part of—and laid it all out on the table, “It’s okay… to get Imposter Syndrome. I’ve had it before with my art. Even Shiki has before. But if you want to be an artist, you’re going to fall down a few times… Fret, I feel like you don’t want to be an actor, so much as you don’t mind people dinging your acting, because that isn’t something you care about as much as your designing.”
And after Neku had spoken, Fret somehow looked both like Neku had made him had an epiphany he hadn’t quite realized, and like Neku had stumbled upon the horrible truth he hadn’t wanted anyone to figure out.
Neku took a bite of the yummy curry that Ken Doi had been kind enough to make just for him, after he’d brought Joshua around recently (he’d said he’d missed the two of them. Go figure), and let Fret get his bearings.
And now he was sighing, and running a hand through his hair, much like Neku often did. Neku smiled, finding it hard not to sympathize.
“Oh, man. I really do have to get back into fashion, huh?”
“You do,” Neku agreed, wondering what wonderful articles of clothing Fret might come up with for him to wear in the future. Shoka, too. Really, with those two and Shiki and Eri, Neku had it made in the clothes department, and he was not complaining. “And it’ll be hard sometimes. But most things in life worth gaining are.”
And when Fret smiled back at him, Neku knew he’d made some progress here—which was good—and then he did one thing that was decidedly not mom-like, and let Fret get the bill. Why? Because Neku was a starving college student at this point, and Fret still had parents who paid for stuff for him.
And then the last person who needed Neku’s help (…for now, he guessed. Because apparently this was a full-time gig. And at this point, Neku wasn’t complaining because he happily would have taken custody of all the Wicked Twisters long ago if he could’ve), was Shoka.
…Who was freaking out after Rindo having tried to give her a promise ring and wasn’t at all being her usual FanGo loving self, where Rindo was concerned.
And, yeah… Shoka could be a bit of a tsundere sometimes, but Neku felt like the issue ran much deeper.
Neku also happened to see Shoka looking into the mirror a lot lately… And at first, he wondered if she’d become self-conscious like Shiki had been.
But upon hearing the arrogant comments that Shoka still said about herself—that Neku’s surrogate little sister so deserved to say, he thought—he knew that wasn’t the case.
He tried to use a bit of his soul power on her… because it turned out that Neku was strong enough to use it in the RG some, but all that really told the ginger was that it was a deep-rooted issue with Shoka and not what said issue was.
Finally, Neku knew he had to just talk to her.
“Let me in, Shoka,” he urged her—after he’d caught her looking at wedding dresses in her apartment at a group hang-out (it was just the two of them at said hang-out right now; everyone else had gone to get food for everybody). “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
And it was pretty fitting, Neku would later think, that he used Shiki’s old words to him with Shoka here, since she made him think of Shiki some—what with her favorite Mr. Mew hoodie and all. Especially when they’d been in the Game.
And at his question, Shoka sighed—like opening her thoughts to Neku was the biggest burden in the world—and dropped the magazine like it had burned her.
“What?” she demanded, fiddling with the zipper at her neck. “About Rindo? I feel like him wanting to give me a promise ring is silly—and of a time gone by—so of course I told him ‘no’, and give him a hard time about it. Not all of us can be you and Shiki, you know…”
And with that, Shoka seemed content to ignore Neku, and to go boot up her PS5 so she could play the “Stranger of Paradise” demo.
And, hey: more power to her—Neku thought it looked sick, too—but no way was he letting her get off that easily. “That’s a lie, Shoka, and we both know it. So, what’s really going on here?”
Shoka was sighing once more now—as if the weight of the world was on her shoulders. And it probably was, with this tragic girl—but she shuffled on the couch closer to Neku, which he saw as a good sign. “Fine… I guess I should have known that I couldn’t lie to Mr. Soul-Reader… I just- I feel I look too much like them: Ayano and my little sister. And I know it’s dumb, but I worry about it.
“Will I be like Ayano and settle into one thing? Like, say I get really into being Rindo’s girlfriend here… but I force myself to marry him one day, because he really wants that: what if we end up living a loveless life because of that, I didn’t want to tie the knot but forced myself to just because it was what he desired? And since I look like Little Sis… If Rindo and I do end up together, what if I end up dying young like she did and leaving Rindo alone. It’s too much.”
And here Neku had to pull Shoka into a small hug and kiss the crown of her head, whilst he ran calming hands down her arms. Shoka had been through way too much trauma for someone so young. It wasn’t fair. But even with all of that… Neku had to make sure she was sure of one thing right now.
So, he got off the couch and kneeled in front of Shoka, so she was looking into his eyes, and wouldn’t miss how serious this was. “Shoka… you definitely have a lot of baggage there, that I do think you should talk to Rindo about. And I’m so sorry that you’ve lost so much family for someone so young… but know that your family isn’t you. Their lives aren’t yours, nor are the things that they did. The things you do are going to be totally different from them, and you have to make those decisions for yourself. Got it?”
“Okay, Neku,” Shoka allowed, while she helped to pull Neku back up now. And she seemed to be blushing a little… but that was okay, because so was he. Neku may have been the mom of this little group, but big declarations of the heart like that could still be hard for him.
“Thanks!” Shoka beamed, before throwing herself at Neku to give him a quick hug this time.
And Neku laughed slightly. “No problem. Now, what do you say we get super far in this awesome demo before our friends get back, for being losers in forgetting to take us with them to get the food?”
“I think that sounds like a pretty sweet deal!” Shoka agreed, already pulling away from Neku and going for the controller.
Yeah… though Neku had certainly never signed up to be these four’s mom—and he still had no idea how that had happened—he now knew he wouldn’t change it for the world.
Especially when the rest of his children came back happy—which was always a perfect sight to see—and Shoka did end up working things out with Rindo.
It was a wonderful world, indeed.
Author’s Note: Yeah, I’m headcanoning here that the last Dive that you do (not counting Rhyme) for the little ghost from Shinjuku was Shoka’s sister.
Hope you all enjoyed!
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weasleypogues · 4 years ago
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jealousy is a two way street
request: Hi could I request a young Sirius black imagine where reader and Sirius have a argument blow up infront of the rest of the marauders in the dorm with lots of shouting because they are both to stubborn to admit either of them are wrong. Lots of snide remarks and sarcastic comments (also reader and Sirius are already dating) I love your writing 
thanks so much!! hope u enjoy xxx
finally trying to get back into the groove of writing!! requests are open <3 
masterlist.
“Fuck, Marry, Kill: (Y/N), Emma Cooper, and Allison Wood.” James called off names as the Marauders, Lily, and you sat in a circle in the common room. It was approximately 2:45 AM and after a stop at HoneyDukes, needless to say no one was falling asleep till later or at all for that matter.
“Kill Emma, Fuck Allison and Marry (Y/N) for sure.” Sirius answered without even hesitating. You slightly clenched your jaw and looked at the ground.
“Course.” You muttered under your breath and looked in the opposite direction of Sirius immediately. You mentally cursed James for even bringing up Allison and cured Sirius even more for choosing her. In the past you two had arguments because of Allison whether it be that she was getting too touchy with Sirius and he wasn’t stopping it or constantly talking about her when you two were alone. But why couldn’t he just choose Emma? Was he completely oblivious to the months of constant arguing?
Sirius Black knew how to get under your skin. As much as you loved him as your boyfriend, he could be a dick from time to time and found it hot when you would get frustrated after he would push your buttons. But this time he’d gone a little too far.
“What was that?” Sirius inquired, raising his eyebrows at you. 
“I said ‘Of course”. Of course you would pick Allison instead of the sweet Emma. I knew this game would make me jealous but your dumb fucking answers are making me infuriated.” You replied, feeling like your whole body was on fire.
“Babe, we’ve been over this. She means nothing to me, I’d rather spend the rest of my life with you than be with Allison.”
“First of all, don’t babe me. Second of all, we endured months and months of conflicts because of her. She hates me! I hate her! It’s a two way street and you seem to stick yourself in the middle of it instead of choosing a side. You know how jealous I got when she would put her hand on your leg or on your arm. Run her hand through your hair. Or on date nights when instead of a nice and loving conversation it’s ‘Guess what Alli did today?’ or ‘Alli is actually too funny’.” You said, not taking a breath until the end. All of this anger and emotions that have been bubbling up inside of you were finally released and you didn’t feel any remorse at all.
He opened his mouth to say something but chuckled darkly and shook his head. “I’m not even going to say it.”
“No, say it. Please do. I’m sure we would all love to hear what you have to say.” You spat back, crossing your arms. 
“For months on fucking months during our fights you know who you would constantly go to? James. My best fucking mate. My fucking brother. At points, I felt like you liked him better than you liked me. It made me feel like shit to see you two always having a good fucking laugh. You could have came to me! Yes, there was tension between us but never on earth would I turn you away. We could’ve figured this out a lot quicker and calmer if I didn’t believe you were out shagging my best friend.” Sirius admitted, his face beet red and hair wild. Your jaw dropped and you were at a loss for words. What you were feeling was exactly what he was feeling?
“Sirius I had no-” You started but were soon cut off.
“No idea, yeah I know. If you haven’t noticed I’m an expert at keeping my feelings hidden.” He grumbled. “You know what. I’m done. I gotta go.” And with that he stood up and left the room, walking up the stairs to the dormitory. You immediately stood up and was about to take your first step until a hand held you back.
“Give him some time to cool down. If you speak to him any more he’s only going to get more heated and it won’t help anyone.” Remus spoke softly and gave you a sympathetic smile. 
“Fuck that, I’m going to talk to him.” James bursted out and shoved himself off of the ground and walked up the same stairs Sirius had moments ago.
“I really fucked up this time. If I had just kept my mouth shut.” You mumbled and ran your hand over your face and let that run through your hair. 
“You didn’t fuck up. You were angry and there were still some unspoken feelings between you two. This will get resolved. Sirius is so whipped for you that he wouldn’t do anything to lose you. Trust me.” Lily state simply and gave you a reassuring smile. You let out a shaky breath and nodded before getting up and walking to your dorms. 
“I’ll just let us both sleep on it.” You responded, though you were not completely sure of that.
“Give him a couple of minutes for he and James to sort this out between them. But you don’t want to go to bed angry, that’s not going to work.” Lily said, looking extremely sympathetic. You groaned loudly and let your head roll to the back of the couch.
“Why must you always be right, Lily?” She laughed in response.
“It’s just in my DNA.”
You waited downstairs for another half hour, fiddling with your thumbs and going through mini arguments in your head on what to say to him to clear this up. You heard the creak of the boys dormitory door open and looked up immediately to only see James walking out with his hands in his pockets, looking quite sheepish.
“I told him I’d send you up there.” James stated, taking a seat on the couch next to you. 
“How’d it go with you?” You asked, worry written all over your face.
“Not that badly. He just needs a pair of ears. He may be dramatic but he isn’t the type to want to start yelling at you.” You nodded and with that, lifted from the couch and made your way up the stairs. You chose not to knock but just walk right in to see Sirius sitting on his bed and looking out the window that was next to it. He had his hands folded in his lap and was quiet.
“Sirius...” You said, hoping not to spook him, but in reality you just wanted to soflty grab his attention. Sirius moved his head slightly but still didn’t look directly at you.
“I’m sorry about, you know, everything. I never put myself in your shoes to take in what you must have been feeling when all of that was going down. It’s just that James knows you the best so I thought that he could give me guidance on how to make things right but I never realized how it must’ve looked to you. I really do apologize for that.” You said, still feet away from him, standing with your fingers interlocked with themselves. Sirius finally looked in your direction and gave you a small smile.
“Thank you, (Y/N/N). But really I should be apologizing. I shouldn’t have blown up on you down there. I just got jealous and didn’t want to admit I was wrong considering you going to James for advice is way different than Allison heavily flirting with me all the time. It’s hard for me to take blame where it’s deserved and I let my pride get the best of me. But I want to assure you that you’re the only girl I ever want to be with. Allison is Allison and that’s it. You mean the world to me and absolutely no one could ever get in the way of that. Not even my pride.” Sirius responded, worry etched in his furrowed eyebrows and glossy eyes as he slowly made his way towards you and grabbed your interlocked hands. 
You subtly smiled, realizing if you showed anymore emotion that the overwhelming amount of emotions you were feeling right now might make you start crying. You instinctively let your body nuzzle right into his chest and you wrapped your arms around his torso, taking in his warmth and scent. He didn’t hesistate to wrap his arms around you and kiss the top of your head a couple of times. 
Pulling your head away but keeping your arms around his body, you looked up at him and smiled. “I love you.”
“I love you too.” Sirius responded with, not hesitating whatsoever. You leaned in for a long kiss and were in each others arms for a few moments longer.
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xomarauders · 4 years ago
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posted this on ao3 awhile back and had a hard time getting tumblr to upload it, but it finally worked so here you go
content warning for referenced child abuse
~
The warmth of summer filtered through the window, casting rays of sunshine across the floor of James Potter’s bedroom carpet where Remus was splayed out, tracing patterns into the ridiculously soft material. He was sure that James charmed it to keep it so fluffy, otherwise it would not have survived the footfalls of four, rowdy boys that found refuge here during the summer. It used to be only the three of them—James, Remus, and Peter, that is—until Sirius was able to join permanently halfway through the summer season. His parents had never allowed for him to visit the Potter’s while he was still living under their roof, but now that the raven-haired boy had run away and was officially disowned, well, Remus was sure the carpet would have wilted under Padfoot’s grubby paws by now.
Either way, Remus was sure that there was nothing better than laying on James’ charmed carpet with his three best friends, listening to music from the record player—that had also been charmed to work without electricity—and chatting about whatever came to their minds. They were all sat on the floor aside from Sirius, who was perched in the window, smoking, and watching as the birds flew around outside. Remus smirked—the boy really was such a dog.
“It’s our last years at Hogwarts, boys,” James announced as he pushed his glasses further up his nose, “what are we going to do once it’s all over?”
It was a question that held a lot of weight, depending on how you looked at it. What were they going to do as far as it came to pranks and leaving their legacy at Hogwarts or what were they going to do as soon as they graduated. Maybe get jobs, possibly go to university, more likely join the Order to fight a war they didn’t start. Remus didn’t care to think about any of these things. His future had been something he considered to be doomed since he was four years old and suddenly had to share his mind with a beast that tore apart his body every month. He had never even planned on having the life he had gotten—the chance to go to Hogwarts, to make friends…to fall in love.
He cast glance toward Sirius, whose own gray eyes were already looking to Remus, a thoughtful expression on his face. Remus grinned at him, tilting his head so that his curls fell into his eyes. Sirius smiled back, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. He’d been smiling like that a lot, lately. Remus made a mental note to ask him about it later that night.
“I don’t know about you lot, but I have no idea what I’m going to do without all of you around,” Peter said.
“Don’t worry, mate,” James said, patting Peter on the shoulder, “you can’t get rid of us that easy! Marauders till the end, right?”
There was a certain admiration that Remus held for James Potter, the savior of the cursed and the damned. He had banded them all together; the timid boy, the broken werewolf, and the wayward heir to make a family. Remus would never be able to repay James for the unconditional love he’d shown him, but he was willing to try everyday for the rest of his life.
“Marauders till the end,’ Sirius repeated, extracting himself from the window as he put out his cigarette. He joined them on the floor, laying down next to Remus and pressing himself tightly against the other boy. Remus wrapped his arm around Sirius, partially out of habit and partially because it was what Sirius needed, something he was starved of. Touch had been something of a guessing game between the two of them ever since they started their relationship. Neither of them were quite used to being touched in such casual ways until they became friends with James—who was constantly giving out hugs like they were candy—and starting a relationship had made the concept even more confusing. Not only did they have to think about what sort of casual touching was okay for each of them, but now they had to factor in intimate contact. Kissing was okay, just as long as they were alone in the safety of Remus’ four poster bed or hidden in one of the various alcoves they had discovered while creating the Marauders Map. Remus thought it might even be okay here, in James’ bedroom, to sweetly kiss his boyfriend without fear of judgment or ridicule. Still, he let Sirius make those decisions, allowed him to initiate any sort of contact between them because while Remus’ aversion to touch stemmed from not being able to trust himself, Sirius’ came from not being able to trust others. He was easily spooked by any sort of sudden movement that came his way, a side effect of Walburga Black’s outstanding parenting skills, and no amount of James’ casual hugs or Remus’ gentle caresses have seemed to break him of this habit.
“What are you thinking about, Moons?” Sirius whispered. James and Peter were too busy arguing over which record to play next to notice their other two friends.
“You,” Remus said easily. Sirius blushed—an image Remus would never tire of seeing—and reached up with his slender fingers to brush away the curls that had fallen in Remus’ eyes.
“Me,” Sirius said, a hint of astonishment in his voice.
Remus wished Sirius wouldn’t sound so surprised at the idea of someone thinking of him. It hurt to know that Sirius did not quite value himself the same way Remus, James and Peter did and it was times like these where Remus wanted to meet Walburga and Orion Black in person just so he could give them a piece of his mind.
“Lads,” James said, throwing himself on top of them unceremoniously, “let’s head on downstairs. I think mum’s made dinner.”
The four of them trailed down the stairs, Sirius holding Remus’ hand while James raced ahead to slide down the railing. Fleamont was in the parlor, reading the newspaper and looking up as the boys made their presence known. He greeted them all, and asked James in a calm tone to perhaps not ride the staircase like a broomstick. James at least had the decency to turn red before assuring his dad it would never happen again (everyone knew it would). Euphemia was in the kitchen, apron tied around her waist and her gray hair up in a knot on her head. Sirius leaned in and kissed her on the cheek, and she gently reached out to him, not quite taking his face in her hands until she saw the smallest nod of permission.
“My darling,” she said, her eyes welling up with tears, “you look well.”
Remus knew what Euphemia was thinking about as she took in Sirius’ appearance. It was the same thing he had thought of over and over again as he laid in bed at night, his arms wrapped tightly around his boyfriend in attempt to keep him safe from the nightmares that occupied his mind. The frail and beaten Sirius that had collapsed on the Potter’s doorstep those few weeks ago had been nursed back to health by the healing powers and carefulness of Euphemia Potter. Still, it was hard to get that image of Sirius lying half dead out of Remus’ mind. He could hardly imagine what it was like for Euphemia who had seen the worst of his injuries after shoving everyone else out of the room in order to heal him. James, Remus, and Peter had stayed up all night, waiting outside the spare bedroom door where they could hear Euphemia sobbing over Sirius’ sleeping form. Remus would rather have faced the full moon a hundred times instead of waiting those long three days for Sirius to wake up.
“Thanks, mum,” Sirius said. The four boys crowded around the kitchen table, eagerly reaching toward the various dishes Euphemia had spread about. Fleamont had joined them, sitting between his wife and Sirius. James immediately went for his mother’s main dish, filling his plate full before passing it to Peter, who was already nibbling on some naan. Remus loved Euphemia’s cooking. It was different than that of his mother’s—not that he would ever pass up his mam’s wonderful Sunday dinners—and he was happy to able to enjoy the different flavors offered whenever he visited. Euphemia always made far too much, making sure that everyone got their fill as well as some leftovers. She was an angel, truly.
Sirius did not fill his plate as full as the others. He was still very thin, with his jaw looking more pronounced and Remus knew his hipbones were a bit more jutted out. Punishments at Grimmauld Place were harsh and Sirius had been starved well into the first few months of summer. It was still a process, trying to get him to eat without getting sick, but they were managing best they could. Remus watched as Sirius poked at his food, looking a bit scared of it before setting his fork down and letting out a frustrated sigh. James looked up from his own plate, regarding Sirius with a look of concern from across the table.
“You okay there, Padfoot?” He asked, keeping his tone light but Remus could see the worry in his dark eyes. Sirius nodded, picking up his utensils once more.
“Yeah. I’m fine, just…” He trailed off, looking down at the table and not daring to meet anyone’s eye. Remus felt a sudden need to shield Sirius away from everyone else’s intense gaze, the wolf within him becoming quite territorial. He pushed those feeling away, not permitting the wolf access to its most basic instincts in the fear that the wolf might be visible on the surface. Still, even his human mind seemed to want to take Sirius away from the scrutiny.
“Darling,” Euphemia said, “you don’t have to eat it all. Just a few bites of naan if you can bear it. Just to keep up your strength.”
Sirius smiled tightly at her but did not move to eat. The rest of them reluctantly picked at their own food, trying to keep things as normal as possible. Fleamont engaged his son in conversation about Quidditch, asking after the Gryffindor team and what he thought their chances were this upcoming school year. Peter politely asked after the herbs Euphemia was growing in her kitchen—he had a thing for herbology—and she answered each question with detail. Remus turned his attention to Sirius, his hand coming to rest on the older boy’s knee. Sirius flinched slightly and then blinked as he realized it was only Remus.
“Do you want to go on a walk?” Remus asked quietly, rubbing circles with his thumb into Sirius’ thigh. The other boy nodded, standing quickly, and exiting the kitchen. The conversations happening came to an abrupt halt and Remus could feel James’ gaze turn towards him. He looked to his friend, a silent conversation passing between them.
Is he okay?
No, but he will be.
Remus walked out, trailing through the living room and out the back door which lead to the Potter’s spacious garden. When Remus had first visited the Potter’s home when he was thirteen, he had the startling realization that James Potter was very well off. It was a bit daunting, especially since Remus’ whole house could probably fit within one room of the mansion and he had been a bit nervous to even touch anything in fear of breaking it. Of course, Fleamont and Euphemia were no stranger to rough-housing, having known exactly what they were getting into with their own son, and Remus’ worries were quickly put to ease when Euphemia simply waved her wand at a vase that had tragically fallen to the floor amidst their game of dog-pile on Peter. Young Remus had almost forgotten that magic existed outside of Hogwarts, and he was in awe at seeing performed in such a domestic setting.
His favorite part of James’ home though was the garden. It was so big! There were wonderful trees that provided much needed shade on hot summer days, and pools of water run by magic to keep the vegetation alive. There were many times the boys pretended to be magizoologists searching for creatures in a jungle, or highly trained aurors on the hunt for evil wizards and—Remus’ personal favorite—pirates looking for treasure. It was a place filled with joy and adventure and even as the boys got older, it remained their sanctuary. Sirius had spent a lot of time in the garden since he arrived, sitting by himself beneath the starlit sky, crying out for his brother and the family that had hurt him. Remus had watched in privately, not daring to intrude on such moments, but wanting to be within reach just in case.
Sirius sat there now, next to a bed of deep red roses, softly running his fingers across the petals. Remus walked up, careful not spook him, and sat down beside him. He flickered his eyes in Sirius’ direction and noticed the other boy had started crying, but he did not pry. Now was not the time for that. Instead, he let his fingers trail through the grass beneath him and let his words fall lazily off his tongue.
“I read a new book at the beginning of summer,” Remus began, his tone light. “Mrs. Dalloway. It was a quick read. The entire novel takes place over the course of one day, how interesting is that? It’s become one of my favorites I think. Woolf is a great author—Virginia Woolf, she’s the one who wrote it.”
Sirius seemed to perk up at this. “Woolf? Could you be anymore ironic, Moony?”
A light laugh escaped Remus. “Believe me, I know. Mum was worried about that when she got it for me.”
The tension snapped back into Sirius as quickly as Remus realized his mistake. Hope Lupin was a generous woman, young and vibrant with a taste for progressive ideologies and love for everyone she met. She adored her son and kept him safe, never shying away from him despite his affliction with lycanthropy and Remus sometimes forgot how lucky he was to have her in his life until he was sat next to Sirius and realized that the Hope Lupin’s and Euphemia Potter’s of the world were unfortunately not the norm for everyone.
“They hate me,” Sirius says abruptly. “They hate that I don’t agree with them. That I don’t want to fucking pledge my allegiance to some dark lord who wants to kill all my friends and I—” he chokes off, a sob escaping him, “I don’t want to care, Remus. I don’t want to be bothered by the fact that my mother would rather curse me instead of hug me and that my father would rather have me dead instead of tarnishing his precious family name. But I do. I do care because they should care. I’m their son, I am their fucking flesh and blood and if blood is all that matters to them then why don’t they care about me?”
There were tears in his eyes as he looked at Remus, tears that Sirius had been holding back ever since he was eleven years old and discovered that parents were not supposed to punish their children for wanting to be loved, the pain and anguish of that realization that had built up over time finally reaching a breaking point. Remus’ own heart was breaking as he stared helplessly, not knowing what to do. These were not problems children were supposed to have. They were supposed to be young, careless, and dreaming up pranks to pull once they got back to school. Instead, they had to contend with a looming war and parents who were cruel and a curse that transformed you into a monster. This was their life, and it would never be easy, Remus thought, not for them.
“Sirius,” Remus whispered, “there are no words I can say to express to you how sorry I am that you’ve had to deal with any of this. Your parents…they’re wrong. They are so fucking wrong and they are so fucking blind for not being able to love you. You are the most loveable human being. You’re generous and caring and you…you take notes for me. When I miss class. And you always make sure my pillows are nice and fluffy after the moon and you rub those soothing salves on my skin at night. And you make me that special tea whenever I’m sick and you read to me when I can’t sleep. You kiss me like it’s the first time every time and you love me like it’s the only thing you’re meant to do. You clean James’ glasses for him and you make sure his Quidditch gear is ready to go on game day. You help Peter study and you let him go on and on about divination with you despite it being your least favorite subject. You’re the first one up to dance with Marlene at the parties and you braid Lily’s hair whenever she’s feeling upset over her sister. You are one of a kind, Sirius Black. You are a good friend and a good brother and you are the love of my life. Believe me when I tell you that you are loved.”
Sirius stared at him, the tears falling from his eyes leaving trails across his cheeks. He reached out for Remus, pulling the taller boy closer to close the distance between them. Sirius’ lips met Remus’, a tender kiss filled with gratitude and love and the promise of forever. When Sirius pulled away, his eyes were still shining, but there was new fervor there, a look of life that Remus had not seen reflected in those silver orbs for a long time.
“I love you so much,” Sirius said. And he smiled genuinely for the first time in months.
Remus smiled back. “I love you, too.”
“Come on,” Sirius said, standing up and offering his hand. “Let’s head back in.”
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i-am-trying-my-best-okay · 4 years ago
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I know I’m the only person that wants this but I want that movie Stand By Me, the adaption from the book The Body, to be made into a tv show. Like, the first season would be before the events of trying to find the dead body, where Denny Lachance is still alive and the characters are just living their lives and Ray Brower could be there and then the season ends with Dennis dying and Ray going missing. Then the second season would be about the dead body of Ray and going to go find it. And then the third season would be when they are still kids, and they all deal with the aftermath of all that’s happened in the first two seasons. Do I want this just because the lives of these characters and their relationships intrigue me a strange amount and I want to see flashbacks of how these two different friend groups met and I imagined entire personalities in Ace’s gang for those who didn’t have one? Yes, thanks for asking. Speaking of flashbacks on how they met:
The older boys:
I have this feeling that Charlie Hogan and Billy Tessio probably knew each other since preschool. They probably both wanted to slide down the slide first and ended up getting into an actual fist fight that the teacher didn’t care enough to break up. Afterwards Billy was probably like, “Okay, we fought so we’re friends now.” “Huh?” “Yeah, I heard that if you fight with someone, then you become friends.” “Nuh uh!” “Yeah huh! I heard it on TV.” “Oh, okay.” Unfortunately, nobody else seemed to share this mindset as they started beating up people they wanted to be friends with, and nobody wanting to return that offer of friendship for some reason. They were the epitome of single brain cell shared between them even back then. And nobody gave a damn about either of them enough to explain why their friend making strategy was a bit flawed.
Then there was Ace Merrill, or John Merrill, who Charlie and Billy didn’t really pay attention to until in the third grade when he demanded everyone started calling him Ace. Everyone immediately complied, since Ace was absolutely terrifying, known for going batshit insane at the hint of disrespect. Once a kid didn’t let him borrow a pencil, so when Ace did get his hands on a pencil, he stabbed the kids eye with it. But Charlie and Billy kept forgetting to call him Ace, which Ace took as a slight, and beat them both up. Ace expected that to be the end of it, only to be completely baffled at how now Charlie and Billy wanted to be his friends. As they tried to explain their ideology, Ace thought it was stupid but the two of them were persistent, and that’s how Ace begrudgingly allowed them to hang around him, but had to explain to them that not every person they would beat up would become their friends, which they had to come to terms with much to their dismay. They did start remembering to call him Ace, although it took months.
In the sixth grade is where Eyeball Chambers comes in, or Richard Chambers. Upon entering middle school Ace and his ‘lackeys’ Charlie and Billy had gotten quite the reputation. Ace has evolved his batshitness into something a bit more terrifying; he’d talk gently to you while making threats, smile at you, right before breaking every bone in your body while yelling angrily at you. Now, Richard was a pretty quiet kid, always covered in bruises from his old man, not wanting any attention. But one day he gained Ace’s attention; walking home from school he accidentally tripped over Ace’s bike, breaking it. Ace was unhappy about this, so he gave his usual gentle talking before he pinned Richard to the ground and put out his cigarette just under his eye, accidentally missing his eye, while Charlie and Billy shouted insults and threats. He was going to do more but than Richard was so nonchalant about this injury, not even making any sound of pain. Richard calmly said that he would fix Ace’s bike, to which the three other boys called bullshit, saying that Richard wasn’t smart enough. The three boys followed Richard to his work shed, surprised to find all sorts of little built machines. As it turns out, Richard was good at making things. He fixed Ace’s bike easy, but at that moment Richard’s dad came in drunk and started attacking Richard, breaking Ace’s bike once again. The three boys fought off Richard’s dad and took the bike and Richard and ran. Richard apologized for the bike and Ace just shrugged, saying he could just fix it again. After that, the three boys, especially Ace, would start hanging out with Richard, asking him to fix random stuff, him gaining the nickname Eyeball. Ace actually gave him that name as a strange way of apologizing for the scar. The more Eyeball and Ace hung out, it became clear that Eyeball was somehow special to Ace, and Ace’s favoritism of him was so blatantly obvious it wasn’t even funny. While Billy and Charlie would occasionally suffer the wrath of Ace, as well as the later members of the gang would, never Eyeball.
A year later in 7th grade is where both Vince Desjardins and Fuzzy Bracowicz, or Norman Bracowicz, would join this dangerous group of messed up kids. Vince was easily scared, and when someone or something scared him he would just throw one of the rocks he always kept on his pockets at them and run away, and he was a damn fast runner. So people kept their distance from Vince, not wanting to be on the receiving end of his rock. Now with Ace’s gang, they were an even more dangerous threat with Eyeball. He was still a quiet kid, but if people messed with his friends he would beat them up, although he didn’t care if people messed with just him, having gotten used to it from his dad. His friends however, especially Ace, would care a great deal, so nobody messed with him either. But then Eyeball accidentally spooked Vince which resulted in a rock to the face. Eyeball really didn’t want to make a big deal about it, but his friends thought otherwise. He tried to argue that he’s had worse injuries, AKA his dad, but that was evidently an ineffective argument as they would spend the next week trying to beat up Vince, only for him to out run them each time. They were then approached by Fuzzy, having gotten that nickname in the 5th grade when he threw a possum at his teacher and laughed, and he offered a plan to offer a truce to Vince to hang out and drink, and then jump him once Vince was drunk. They asked why he was helping them, and Fuzzy apparently just thought this entire situation was hilarious, and he wanted to witness the whole thing. So Fuzzy goes and convinces Vince, the most jumpy kid they knew, to come hang out with the most dangerous group in town who have spent the entire week trying to beat him up, a feat that truly impressed the gang. The rest of the gang tried not to get drunk along with Vince but as it turned out Vince was actually a fun person to hang out with and they ended up getting just as plastered. And sure enough, both Fuzzy and Vince began hanging out with the group. They told Vince later what their original plan was, to which he responded that he hated every single one of them, while leaning against Fuzzy and his legs on Charlie’s lap. (I like to think that this group of friends are very physically intimate with each other)
And finally, in the 9th grade is when the final addition to the group was made; Jack Mudgett. Jack had just moved to town, and had made an impression when he was asked to introduce himself to the class, to which he looked straight at the teacher and said, “If you make me do that I will shit all over your desk. Seriously. I’ll take the shit and rub it all over.” Evidently, he wanted to be left alone. And naturally, Fuzzy thought messing him was the peak of amusement, and he recruited Charlie and Billy into his cause, with Eyeball, Vince, and Ace only joining in occasionally. At this point, even upon entering high school were the older high schoolers thought they could knock Ace’s gang down a peg, they found themselves sorely mistaken, and at this point even the police didn’t want to handle them. Vince, while still jumpy, can now hold his own in a fight, although if something spooks him he will throw the rock first, only running if he’s alone. Jack, in response to this bullying from the most feared group in the town, was to be perfectly blunt and tell them they disgust him. Ace, naturally, beat him up so badly that he had to go to the hospital for a few days. But when he came back to school, he continued acting blunt towards them like they didn’t just send him to the hospital. This happened again and again, with Jack never learning his lesson, and at this point Ace is ready to cut off a limb or kill him or something, but Fuzzy thinks this is fantastic and practically begged Ace to let him join the gang. Ace said no, of course, even when Fuzzy got the other friends to ask too. But one day in the cafeteria, while Fuzzy and the rest of the gang were loudly making their case to Ace with Ace threatening to stab all of them, Eyeball spoke up and said that having Jack in the gang could be fun, to which Ace immediately complied and walked over the Jack immediately and practically dragged him to the table; again, blatant favoritism. Jack of course is unhappy with this arrangement, not wanting to be friends with them, but after some time actually fit into the group very well, and he joined the close knit nature of the group.
They probably all bullied Denny to be honest. Jack was the one that came up with the idea to carve a word into their arms, although he was being sarcastic, but Charlie and Billy hatched onto the idea and persisted until it was decided to actually go through with it.
The younger boys:
Gordie Lachance and Chris Chambers probably met in kindergarten. Gordie was always by himself, having trouble connecting with other kids, and Chirs was by himself too, since the other kids parents had warned them all to stay away from that Chambers kid. However, one day Gordie was by himself in the sand, talking to himself. Chris saw this and approached him, asking what he was doing. Chris didn’t really expect a response since most kids ignored him, but Gordie was thrilled at the possibility of a friend, and told him all about this story he was making up. Gordie didn’t really expect Chris to care, since nobody cared except Denny, but Chris was enraptured by his story. And so they became each other’s friends, since nobody else would bother with them.
It was just the two of them until 2nd grade, when both Vern Tessio and Teddy Duchamp joined in, although the came into the group separately. Vern was first, probably struggling hard with some assignment, and all the other kids would always make fun of him for being stupid, except for Gordie and Chris; they only make fun of their friends, which at this point in time was just the two of them. Gordie felt bad and let Vern copy off of him, although they were caught by the teacher and both got in trouble. Chris told them both off and said that Gordie should have just taught Vern how to do it rather than let him copy off him, the mom of the group even back then. And so both Chis and Gordie would help Vern study with varying success, but those study sessions quickly formed into hang out sessions.
It was later into the year when Teddy would join them. The trio were hanging out, and they saw Teddy actually trying to steal a car, although having no idea how to go about it given that he was in the 2nd grade. They went over, Chris saying that if he didn’t know how to steal a car then he probably shouldn’t go ahead and do it, since he’d probably just get caught. Vern said that this reminded him of something and then rambled on about, while Gordie actually managed to get the car door open and start the car. They all turned to Gordie, to which he shrugged and said he read about how to do it, since he was thinking of a story that had someone stealing a car. And Teddy the whole time was just standing their thinking who the hell were these weirdos? But with the now properly stolen car, Teddy wanted to take it for a spin and got Gordie to scoot over. Not wanting to leave Gordie alone in the car with the class maniac, Chris got in to, and Vern got in as well, not wanting to be left behind. Teddy immediately crashed it and they all had to run away from the scene. After that, Teddy just started hanging around them, and before they knew it they were the infamous gang of misfits; the bad news Chambers kid, the Lachance’s failed son, that Duchamp loon’s even loonier kid, and the second idiot the Tessio family produced.
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batboyimagines · 4 years ago
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Cold-Blooded [Damian Wayne x Male Reader]
Your Dad and your Ma’s relationship is... rocky to say the least. They were never actually together, no marriage or anything. It was just one night of bad decisions that made you.
So your birth wasn’t well planned. You think the reason your ma even kept you was because she was lonely. She’s raised you to the best her ability for they past fourteen years but it was only recently your dad found out. Now they have joint custody.
See, all of that isn’t normal per say, but it’s not bizarre or anything. Just two inexperienced, lonely people screwing up in more ways than one to make a whole nother screw up. However, your parents aren’t exactly average. One’s not even human. Anymore.
Medusa and John Constantine. By the gods, that’s probably the worst match imaginable. Moms great and all, you really do love her, but she’s a little crazy. Being exiled on an island all alone does that to you. And Constantine’s just... a mess. Not even a hot one.
Even so, you don’t mind being pawned between the two. They’re both great in their own ways and you appreciate the both of them. Right now you’re hanging out at your dad's house. Though it feels more like hanging out with an awkward uncle than a dad.
It’s nearing about 8:00 in the morning, not that you know that. You’re asleep on the couch, gazing blankly at the ceiling. You forgot to close your eyes while you sleep again. It’s sort of creepy.
A sudden pounding on the door startles you up, breaking the staring contest you were having with the ceiling. A contest which you totally won. You blink dazedly and the pounding starts up again.
Mournfully slipping out from under the soft, warm stack of blankets you slept under, you lumber towards the door. You squint through the peephole.
Through the peephole you see a warped view of six costumes lunatics of all sizes. You lean back from the door and let yourself have a begrudged yawn. Gods, it’s way too early for this. Dad’s still asleep even with all the racket.
The littlest lunatic in the hood pounds the door hard enough for it to shake in its frame and you decide you’ve had enough. You don’t bother with the chain latch and just open the door a crack.
“Do you know how early it is?” You groan. The little lunatic, who is actually around the same height as you, scoffs.
“It’s eight pm. A normal person would be awake and ready for the day by now.”
“Well, I don’t know how you people are up then because anyone who dresses like that isn’t normal.” The green guy snorts.
“Listen, we’re sorry to wake you, but is this the residency of John Constantine?” The guy in the black leotard asks.
“... no, why?” You ask suspiciously.
“We are the Teen Titans and we are in need of magical assistance.” The really tall, really exposed, redhead says. “We require his assistance, on behalf of the justice league.” You tense a bit at that.
Okay, you don’t hold the things that the gods did to your mom against those two members of the justice league, Aquaman and Wonder Woman. They seem like nice folks who really do want to do good and not for the selfish, vain reasons gods usually do, but…
They got their abilities from the same gods who really, really messed your mom up for no good reason. So call you petty, but you don’t want to associate with them.
“Sorry, he’s not here.” You say attempting to close the door on them. The hooded lunatic jams the door with his hand.
“This is a matter of utmost importance, you will take us to Constantine.” He demands. You scowl at him and try to shut the door on his fingers.
“Screw off weirdo, he’s not here!”
“He is, you are lying!”
“Am not!”
“Are too!”
“Am NOT!”
“Are TOO!”
“Christ on a cracker, what the bloody hell is going on?!” Your dad shouts, slamming the door shut, fully unlocking it and swinging it back open. Looks like the racket finally got him up. He sags at the sight of the troupe of crazies. “The hell do you people want?”
“We need your help.” Leotard man says.
“Of course you do. With what, I mean?”
“My father, Trigon, has possessed the justice league and we need a way to stop him.” The girl in purple replies. Your dad tenses.
“Trigon, eh? Sounds like a piece of work.” He says. You pretend to cough.
“Says the piece of work.” You tease under your breath because what’s even the point of a dad if you can’t make jabs at his life choices? He gives you a look and you just grin up at him.
“Why should I help you? The kind of magic that I’d have to use against that guy is expensive and tricky. I’m not gonna do it outta’ the good of my heart.”
“Because if you don’t help us, he could destroy the world.” Leotard says.
“Of course he could.” Dad breathes out as he sags against the door frame. You pat his arm. He looks at you and you give him an awkward smile. It seems to help him to a decision. He straightens up. “Well, I guess I don’t want the world to end. I need somewhere for this one to grow up.” He pats your head affectionately.
“Thanks.” You say, a bit embarrassed. Half because that’s the sappiest thing he’s ever said to you and half because, well, it’s nice to know you mean something to him. Even if he didn’t know that you existed until a few months ago.
“Well, come on in then.” He says turning from the doorway and into the apartment. The troupe of crazy people that nearly just broke into your house follow. You flounder for a moment.
“Wait, seriously? We’re just gonna let some random strangers, who nearly just broke in our house, inside just like that?” Your dad looks a bit guiltily at you. 
“Sorry bud, but this happens a lot more than I’d like.” He raises his hand hesitantly and gently lays it on your shoulder. “You can go back to your mother while I deal with this, if you’d like.”
“No, no it’s okay,” You quickly reassure, “it’s not bad it’s just… kinda weird. You know it’s weird right?” He snorts.
“Of course I do, but to be honest it’s almost normal for my line of work.”
“You should get into a different line of work then.”
“You know, I probably should.” 
Leotard man clears his throat- you know what? You want to know their names before they commandeer any more of your father-son bonding time. “By the way, what are your names? I feel I should know them before we do anything else.”
“Oh! My apologies,” Redhead replies, “I am Koriand’r, of Tamaran. And this is Blue Beetle, Beast boy, Raven, Nightwing, and Robin. We are the Teen Titans.”
“No offense, but you look more young adult than teenager?” She smiles sheepishly.
“Well, I was part of the original titans. I am now the leader.”
“Oh, okay, makes sense.”
“Alright,” your dad cuts in, “so what’s your plan for Trigon? What exactly do you want from me?” He and the Teen Titans begin to plan. You stick around for a bit, to get an idea of what your dad does. It’s not very interesting. So ten minutes into planning, you slip away to make breakfast.
Now, your dad is a mess. Not kind of a mess, a straight up mess. The kitchen is almost a reflection of your father. It’s a huge mess. There’s takeout boxes and dirty dishes strewn across every counter, no room for literally anything there is so much garbage. And this is only a few weeks worth of build up. Dad actually cleaned up before you arrived. 
Before you can even begin cooking you have to clean off the counters for some space. You’re trying to balance takeout boxes on top of the overflowing garbage can when a voice sounds from the doorway.
“This place is repulsive.” 
“HUAUGH FUCK!” You whip around flinging the takeout boxes across the room. Hooded lunatic, uh Robin you think, dodges them expertly. He seems a little surprised. You clutch at your chest, “Jesus, Christ man!”
“Apologies, I… did not mean to startle you.” He raises his hands a bit, as if calming a rapid animal. 
“Apology accepted.” You calm your rapid heart. Your freak out seems to have spooked any animosity Robin had earlier. The two of you stand around awkwardly. He’s a stranger in your house and he’s in a strangers house, which does not make for easy conversational partners. He looks around, avoiding your gaze. His eye catches on a painting on the wall.
“That is… an interesting picture.” He tries.
“Uh yeah, that’s actually a picture of my mom.” You say, playing with your hands.
“That is Medusa.”
“Yeah, she’s my mom.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
“I see.”
“She doesn’t actually look like that, that painting’s really inaccurate.”
“Why does your father keep it up?”
“I dunno,” You’d feel weird cooking with him watching you, so you make your way past Robin and into the dining room, “I think either pettiness or affection.”
“Pettiness?” He asks following you.
“Yeah, I mean, they aren’t together? I think they were at least acquaintances before they, uh, ‘conceived’ me. But they don’t seem to like each other very much nowadays.” You say, pulling a chair out from the table. You push the one across from you out with your bare foot and gesture towards it. Robin hesitates a moment, but decides to sit down. “What about your parents? They like each other any more than mine do?”
“No,” He snorts, “I think they like each other much less.”
“Oh.”
The conversation stalls. You shift uncomfortably. Robin stares a hole into the grimy table. 
“Why not?”
“Pardon?”
“Why don’t your parents like each other?” He seems to think over his answer. 
“They are on opposite sides of the law.” 
“Oh, that’s tough.”
“Yes.”
“There’s tons of couples on opposite sides of the law though.” 
“Not them. My father’s moral code cannot bend to suit my mother.”
“Ah, I see.” You lean across the table and pat his arm. He looks at it a bit suspiciously, you pull it back. “I’m sorry about your parents.”
“No need to apologize, I’ve already come to terms with it.”
“Yeah, well, still sucks.” You say standing up. “I was gonna make food, wanna lend me a hand? I’m still new to cooking appliances. And electricity.”
“How are these things new to you?” He asks, even as he stands up to help anyway.
“Dude. I grew up on an island with no electricity or WiFi. All of this,” you gesture to the space around you, “is totally alien to me.”
“Ah, I see. Yes, I will assist you.”
“Thanks.”
He failed to mention that he has never used a toaster either. You both nearly burn down the apartment, had it not been your dad’s fire extinguisher.
TO BE CONTINUED
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forasecondtherewedwon · 3 years ago
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If You’re a Robot and You Know It, Clap Your Hands
Fandom: Loki Characters: Sylvie, Ravonna, B-15, Mobius Rating: G Word Count: 1774
Summary: Sylvie faces off against Ravonna while Mobius hangs out in post-prune purgatory with... himself?
“You’re more stoic than he was,” Ravonna noted, nodding at the empty air between them where Loki had lately stood.
Why the taunting, Sylvie wondered. Who was there left for Ravonna to impress? Her subordinates were all dead or unconscious, Loki was gone, the animatronic lizards who were not in fact ruling rigidly over time sat slumped in their seats. There was only Sylvie. Even when she had been a child, thin arm in the grip of a stone-faced woman in black armour like the shell of a beetle, Sylvie had not felt so alone with Ravonna as she did in this moment. It made her very angry. She would much rather have been alone with herself.
“How do you know how stoic Loki looked?” Sylvie spat. “You pruned him in the back!”
Ravonna tilted her head, glowing baton still raised.
“I don’t mean in the face of his own erasure from existence, I mean watching someone he cared about disappear.”
Sylvie’s expression had been hard—more than once, to get by, she’d imagined herself protected by that beetle armour from her childhood, closing her vulnerable parts away behind a scowl—but it slackened slightly in confusion.
“Agent Mobius,” Ravonna explained impatiently. There was a twitch of her eyelid that Sylvie caught and homed in on.
“They were friends,” she said slowly. Then, she stared hard into the Judge’s eyes. “You were friends. You and Mobius. You killed him?”
“I didn’t! I—”
“You had someone else do it?” Sylvie narrowed her eyes scornfully.
With an irritated groan, Ravonna lunged for her, but Sylvie hopped backwards over the head of the fake Time Keeper. She looked down and Ravonna followed her gaze, distracted from her attack by the sight of rubbery faux-flesh and protruding, crackling wires.
“And this?” Sylvie asked quietly, trying not to spook the woman with the weapon. “Did you have a hand in this deception? I never sensed it in you.”
Ravonna scoffed and looked away from the head on the floor.
“You were a child.”
“I was a Loki,” Sylvie snapped back.
Saying that name—the name she’d rejected but never forgotten, the name that had also been his—jolted her into action once more. She wedged the toe of her boot beneath the Time Keeper’s decapitated head and flipped it up, striking Ravonna in the stomach. The Judge folded forward and defensively swept the baton in a wide arc. Sylvie stepped out of the weapon’s path, not anticipating the way Ravonna swung her arm quickly back to hit her with the non-pruning end of the rod; she hadn’t been a Hunter in who knew how long, but she clearly hadn’t lost her skill with the tools of the trade.
The blunt end thudded into Sylvie’s ribs.
She was knocked back, but when Ravonna advanced, Sylvie’s hand shot up to grab the baton, hauling the Judge forward. Unbalanced, Ravonna was no challenge to send sprawling at the foot of the stairs leading up to the Time Keepers’ dais. She landed awkwardly. Sylvie breathed hard as she wrenched the baton completely free of Ravonna’s hold and went to retrieve her sword as well.
As she then moved to assess B-15, who was rising shakily to her knees, Sylvie never put her back to Ravonna. Pruned in the back. What a Loki death.
“You alright?” she asked B-15 softly.
The Hunter grunted and allowed Sylvie to support her into standing.
“Better if I knew where to go from here.”
“Let me worry about that,” Sylvie said.
Ravonna struggled to her own feet and Sylvie held the baton at arm’s length between them, keeping the Judge at a distance while B-15 opened the door behind them.
“Ah ah ah,” Sylvie warned archly, chin and eyebrows raised in impish caution. “You stay here and play with your robots.”
“This is temporary,” Ravonna said as Sylvie edged back through the open door.
Sylvie performed her signature cocked head and smirk.
“Isn’t everything?”
The second they were out of the Time Keepers’ chamber, B-15 slammed the doors and leaned into them, as if Ravonna would imminently begin trying to break them down from the inside. Which Sylvie supposed she might. She really almost admired Ravonna—or would have if the Judge hadn’t ruined her entire life.
She stared at the door handles, then at each of the weapons she held in her hands. Sword or baton, sword or baton? With a deep breath, Sylvie jammed the blade of her sword through the handles to bar the door, electing to keep the baton close. Though it was a less familiar weapon, she was nothing if not highly adaptable. Besides, touching the glowing end of the rod to a person was certainly more efficient than dispatching them with a blade. She wasn’t sure how many TVA workers they would encounter before they were out of here. This place and this time. Keeping the baton was the right choice.
She stole a last glance at the sword. Another little piece of herself left behind.
At the sound of reinforcements headed towards them, she and B-15 hurried away from the chamber.
“She used to be a Hunter,” B-15 said, shaking her head as they strode down the corridor, “like me.”
“I suppose she might have been like you at some point,” Sylvie said. She was interpreting the words a little differently. “I wonder when she stopped.”
“Do you?”
“Not really. I can trust you but not her.” Sylvie shrugged as she walked. “That’s about all I need to know.”
“Do you trust me?”
“I have to.”
“Same for me. Though I can’t say my faith in allies hasn’t been shaken recently,” B-15 said sarcastically. “The Time Keepers aren’t real, Ravonna’s been helping to cover up the truth, and I wasn’t even created here! I probably had to go through that degrading process of having my clothes zapped off!”
“Probably. I didn’t think you’d want to see that as a prioritized memory,” Sylvie said, half-apologetic. While they’d stood in the torrential rain outside Roxxcart, she’d allowed a highlight reel of memories to flash through the Hunter’s mind.
“You know, I always found it kind of strange that one of the few tests we run in this department is to judge whether or not someone is secretly a robot. I guess whoever designed the Time Keepers got paranoid.”
“Whoever that person is, paranoia is the least of their worries.”
“True,” B-15 agreed as she produced a TemPad. “Now, they’re going to have to deal with us.”
“If they’re still out there somewhere and not dead like Loki and Mobius,” Sylvie said bitterly. She flipped the TemPad open and programmed their destination.
“Maybe they aren’t dead. We’ve been misled about everything else. Maybe everyone who’s ever been pruned just ends up someplace… else.”
“It’s no place I’ve ever been.”
“Yet,” B-15 said.
The Time Door appeared before them. Pounding footsteps raced against Sylvie’s accelerating heartbeat as she prepared to step through and leave this place behind. They had to go now, her and her one ally. She couldn’t get above one ally these days. It was better than none.
“Yet,” Sylvie agreed.
Meanwhile in Jet Ski Land…
“That’s why I always felt such an affinity for that Earth actor,” Mobius said. “I am Owen Wilson. Or was.”
He dug his bare toes deeper into the slightly rocky beach and watched the slow wash of trash along the shore. It was almost nice here, but not quite. Not a place to stay. Everything inside him had already been screaming that. A lifelong (in this life, anyway) bureaucrat, he’d never felt such restlessness.
“Am… was… what does it matter?” the man next to him asked rhetorically.
He was also Mobius. No, Mobius was him. No, that wasn’t right, they were both Owen Wilson. Variants of him. But this man had shaggy blond hair where Mobius had been grey for as long as he could remember. Also, he appeared to be the only Owen Wilson in sight who had a mustache and he was a little proud of that. Probably stupidly, but it was helping him hold on to his sense of identity in the presence of so many hims.
They were on the beach around him, sitting in the dunes behind him, swimming in the water in front of him. One of the Owens was freaking parasailing through the air up above while another Owen drove the boat that towed him.
“How long have you guys been here?” Mobius asked in awe.
“You know, it’s hard to say,” Owen said, folding his arms thoughtfully. “It’s tough to figure out exactly how time flows here. A little like what you were describing, with your experience at the TVA.”
“Have you gotten to know everybody?”
“Oh yeah, they’re good guys. And all of us Owens are naturally social.”
“What about that one?” Mobius asked, pointing. He could hear the raw admiration in his own voice as the geriatric Owen he’d indicated revved his jet ski, bouncing over the low swells of the turquoise water.
“One of our actors. He was in the middle of filming a movie in Indonesia before he ended up here. Played an international, jet ski-riding spy in sort of a buddy comedy. Eighty-three years old and still a star.”
“What? That sounds incredible! What the heck happened?”
“Well,” Owen told him with a grimace, “the tsunami of 2051.”
“Right,” Mobius said, recalling the list of 21st-century apocalyptic events he and Loki had so recently sifted through together.
“He wasn’t supposed to survive the wave. The film crew had tethered him to the jet ski for safety while they were shooting and, as far as Owen can guess, that should’ve been enough to kill him. That’s what the TVA was counting on. They had to bring him in when he didn’t drown.”
“What a story though! That old Owen is one tough nut!”
“I know!” Owen gushed proudly.
Mobius shook his head in amazement, scanning the water. His gaze landed on something he couldn’t immediately understand.
“And what’s that?” he asked.
“That’s jet-ski Owen.”
“I thought the old guy was jet-ski Owen.”
“Nah, that one’s Owen on a jet ski. This one’s Owen as a jet ski.”
The riderless craft surged across the water until the speed had its front end lifting high off the surface. With a glorious final burst, it escaped the water entirely, executing a barrel roll in midair before touching down once more.
Mobius felt the praise leave his own lips and heard it echoed up and down the beach by all other versions of Owen Wilson in attendance: “Wow.”
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notveryglittery · 4 years ago
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absolutely smitten
summary: sometimes your coworkers are ridiculously in love but too dumb to make a move so obviously you've got to give them a push in the right direction. wc: 4,700 / ship: roman/patton (royality) content: human au, actor au. patton-centric. some crying, some kissing. mutual, oblivious pining. confessions of ~love~! background talyn, joan, remy, and thomas.  background brotherly moxiety, romantic analogical, and frenemies(?) moceit. janus is kind of an asshole (but that’s patton’s opinion dot vine).  author’s note: so, sometime in october 2019, i saw this post by @sirasanders  for the first time ever which was, frankly, a Crime. because it had been posted in february 2019 and the fact that i had gone that long without seeing/being tagged in a royality post? Illegal. anyway, i was struck with inspiration and began writing and sure it might have taken nine months but... here it is! i'm really proud of it! i hope you enjoy! 
many thanks to @rosesisupposes​ for beta reading!! <3 read on ao3!
— — —
Patton was not a morning person. Sure, he liked the idea of sunrises and consistent schedules and having time to make himself a big breakfast. All of that, however, required waking up. So to put it more accurately, Patton was not a waking up person.
Usually, all it took was a cup of coffee.
Thankfully, that part was never something Patton really had to worry about. The sweet, sweet bean elixir was delivered to him personally each morning sometime after arriving on set. Something he did worry about, though? Constantly? Nearly every hour of every day? Just what exactly he and the bringer-of-drinks were.
Like… yeah! He and Roman were… friends? They were coworkers for sure, without a doubt, and Patton liked that a lot! Working with Roman never failed to brighten even his darkest days. Patton could arrive on set in the lowest of moods and sometimes all it took was one warm smile from Roman to melt the icy feeling in his veins. Sometimes, it was the way Roman would slide up next to him at the catering table, moaning about how hungry he was, asking for Patton’s opinion on what he should treat himself to. Sometimes, Roman would take Patton’s hand and lead him to The Sanders Couch and Roman would sit and then he’d pull Patton down onto his lap and they’d just stay there for a bit, Roman combing his hand through Patton’s hair and singing quietly… If Patton was being honest, that was the easiest and quickest way Roman helped him to feel better.
Just friends, though! Right?
Roman remembering Patton’s usual go-to orders from Starbucks didn’t mean anything. He was just being courteous. Maybe it wasn’t even that; maybe it was just Roman wanting to make sure Patton would be at his peak during their scenes. Actors had such bad reputations after all and the last thing Patton wanted was to be a nightmare to deal with on set. He was grateful, really, of all Roman did to help him!
He just wished he wasn’t so confused.
“Patton! Good morning!”
Okay, time to put all those confusing feelings away.
Talyn’s bright grin and brighter hair never failed to impress Patton. Maybe one day he’d learn their secret to feeling this energetic so early in the morning but until then, he’d just have to keep wishing for the day coffee chains lowered their prices.
“Morning, Tal,” Patton responded, unable to help himself as he reached out and ruffled Talyn’s colorful locks.
They grumbled and swatted his hand away. “I’d be offended that you don’t seem to realize how much time this takes but I don’t think you even know what a hairbrush is.”
Patton pouted and reached up to tug on one of his curls. “I’m hurt.”
Talyn huffed, a sort-of laugh that reminded him of Virgil, and rolled their eyes. “I’ll be extra gentle with your makeup to make up for it, then.”
Before Patton could express appreciation for the play on words, Talyn was swept up and away in a blur of blue plaid and orange. He was pretty sure it’d been Joan, given how they were scarcely seen without their tell-tale flashy beanie.
While interacting with Talyn had helped Patton wake up a little bit, he was already feeling the heaviness of being up early weighing him down again. The reminder of the scene they were supposed to be filming today probably wasn’t doing him any good, either. Not only was it going to be a lot of crying, which was already exhausting on its own, he and Roman were supposed to kiss. Patton was supposed to kiss the possibly-maybe-wouldn’t-it-be-nice love of his life.
His cheeks went hot at the very idea and Patton all but slammed his face into his hands and screamed into his palms.
“Easy, buttercup, wouldn’t want you bruising, hm?”
Patton lowered his hands and glared at Janus over his fingertips.
“Oops,” Janus smirked and stepped back. “Didn’t realize you haven’t had your coffee yet.”
Patton frowned and folded his arms over his chest. “Is it that obvious?”
Somehow, in the time it took him to blink, Janus had moved, loping around Patton with a contemplative hum. One of these days, he’d learn how Janus managed to get around so fast.
“Look,” he said, draping an arm over Patton’s shoulders and pointing, “right there.”
One of these days, Patton would stop falling for Janus’s pranks.
Today was not that day and so when Patton directed his gaze towards where Janus was gesturing, he was provided the very startling sight of Roman coming in from outside. He was practically glowing in the sunlight, his hair was tousled from the wind as if he’d rolled out of bed but left it intentionally disheveled, and they’d just made eye contact and so Patton saw clear as crystal the way Roman’s smile curled up so easily and prettily.
Oh no, he was so pretty.
Patton ducked out of Janus’s hold and bolted away, towards his dressing room.
That… could have gone worse? Yeah, he could’ve tripped while running away and face planted and made work super difficult for Talyn and ruined the whole shoot today and everyone would be mad at him for wasting their time—
“Patton?”
By absolute sheer willpower, Patton didn’t scream.
“I’ve got your caramel macchiato.”
Patton was going to melt.
“Extra extra espresso.”
Scratch that, Patton was already melting.
“Thomas said it looked like you’d need it.”
Wait, what?
Patton opened the door to handsome Roman, considerate Roman, lovely Roman, and spoke before his brain could get any more mushy at the sight of handsome considerate lovely Roman. “Thomas hasn’t even seen me today?”
Roman held the reusable tumbler out for Patton to take. “Extra caramel, too.”
Patton took the offered drink and if it weren’t for the fact that this happened nearly every morning, he’d surely have dropped it the moment his and Roman’s fingertips brushed. Thankfully, he’d gotten used to it by now. Mostly, his heart reminded him when butterflies took flight in his stomach. Right, yeah, mostly. Anyway.
“I’ll see you in a bit, then,” Roman said and Patton was probably imagining the soft earnesty in his tone. He tried to dial down his high hopes.
“In a bit, then…” Patton managed, smiling sweetly, before stepping back and closing the door.
By some miracle, he didn’t sink immediately to the ground despite definitely feeling like a melted marshmallow. Instead, he drained half of his drink and then finally let himself scream.
In a bit turned out to be a couple of hours. It wasn’t anything Patton wasn’t familiar with but that didn’t make it any less agonizing. An indie film meant a smaller crew which meant Talyn could do the makeup on only one actor at a time. Fortunately, the scenes today weren’t very extensive which meant less folks to work on. Unfortunately, the scenes weren’t extensive because they were all plenty aware of how emotionally draining they’d be and had essentially planned for it. Crying came pretty easily to Patton so he wasn’t worried about that part. It was the after: the headache, the puffy red skin, the sore throat.
Talyn muttered as they worked, wondering why they were even bothering with makeup when it was all going to be ruined by the end of filming, anyway. In the reflection of the mirror Patton was sitting in front of, he could just barely see Roman getting his hair fixed. He was gesturing, no doubt telling a story of some sort; Remy had to keep pushing his hands back down anytime they got in the way. Patton was sure the hairdresser was scowling as he worked. If anyone was less a morning person than Patton, it was Remy.
“I love that smile as much as the next, Pat,” Talyn said, sighing, “but I don’t need it just yet. I can’t work when your eyes are all cute and crinkly.”
He murmured a quick apology and schooled his expression into one carefully blank. Talyn got back to applying his eye makeup. It didn’t take much longer before they were finished and Patton was sent on his way to get his hair done next. He and Roman passed by each other and Patton did his best to not swoon quite so obviously when Roman grinned at him. This part went by considerably quicker given that Patton could no longer see Roman in any reflections and that Remy had no patience for anything taking longer than absolutely necessary. He was finished before Talyn was with Roman which meant Patton could head off to see their director for any final adjustments or tips.
Thomas looked like he’d been through the wringer and the day had barely begun. Patton was frowning as he approached, wondering if anyone had told Thomas that his shirt was inside out.
“Morning, kiddo,” Patton greeted, coming to a stop beside him.
Thomas startled, nearly dropping the script he was holding. “Patton!”
“Oops,” Patton said sheepishly, “didn’t mean to spook you.”
Thomas waved the papers dismissively. “Nah, I oughta be better aware of my surroundings. Especially with someone like Janus around.”
Patton scowled. “Yeah, he got me this morning.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Thomas responded and Patton did not like how cheeky he looked all of a sudden. “That one seemed more like a treat than it did a trick.”
Patton really wished he didn’t blush so easily! He couldn’t even try and cover his face because then he’d risk messing up Talyn’s hard work. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Uh huh.”
“Anyway,” Patton interrupted loudly before Thomas could keep teasing him. “Has anything changed with filming today that I should worry about?”
Thomas shook his head. “Nah, we’re still all on the same page.” He hesitated. “Sorry that today’s gonna be so taxing on you guys.”
“I’m just hoping we can get it done in one take.”
“If you don’t, Talyn will have to fix you up again,” a new voice said, effortlessly joining their discussion.
“Speak of the Devil,” Thomas muttered.
“And he shall appear!” Patton finished for him before turning to Janus with a glare. “You know it’s rude to eavesdrop?”
Janus shrugged carelessly. “Joan’s looking for you,” he told Thomas, as if backstage and onstage weren’t small enough for Joan to find Thomas relatively easy on their own.
Still, Thomas shot Patton an apologetic look and went off to find his best friend.
In a near perfect match of their earlier interaction, Patton faced Janus with crossed arms and a frown. “Could you stop messing with me? I really don’t need it on top of everything else going on today.”
“I haven’t a clue what you’re referring to, dear Patton,” Janus said sweetly, all faux innocence.
Patton tried to not let it get to him. The two rarely got along, even on their good days, and Janus knew this, which meant he especially delighted in bothering Patton on his bad days. There really wasn’t any reason for them to be like this except that Janus had been why Patton nearly missed his audition for this film and he’d never apologized and Patton was still holding a grudge.
“Darling, is he bothering you?”
Before Patton could react to the question, an arm slid around his shoulders. The body he was pulled against was warm and firm and smelled of cinnamon and oh no.
Janus was smirking wickedly.
“Roman,” he all but purred. “I would never bother the object of your affections. I wouldn’t even dream of it.”
Patton.exe has stopped functioning.
The conversation continued, if Janus’s moving lips were anything to go by, but none of it processed for Patton. Roman’s what? Surely they weren’t talking about him? No, it was just Janus playing another one of his mean pranks. It had to be! Roman couldn’t like Patton back because if he did… well, if he did, that meant the kiss they were supposed to share on screen today wouldn’t be quite so one-sided and… and that would mean Patton’s feelings weren’t entirely unfounded… Roman did always bring him coffee. He was there for Patton’s low moods. His smile was sometimes so sincere and soft that Patton thought he might melt anytime he was on the receiving end of it.
Patton blinked and tilted his head up just a bit so he could get a better look at his knight in shining armor. Thinking back on it, Roman was often there to help save Patton from Janus’s crueler comments or jokes. He encouraged Patton through each scene, eyes bright and eager when the camera wasn’t pointed at him. He looked a little tense and Patton wondered if he was angry with what Janus had implied or… or if he was embarrassed to be called out on his feelings.
His gaze returned to Janus and he blinked again. Sound started to filter back in. Janus sneered at him.
“Back with us, then?”
“Alright, folks!” Thomas' voice rang out then, commanding attention. “Let’s get started! If we finish early today, I’m treating y’all to ice cream!”
A chorus of cheers followed as everyone moved to get where they needed to be.
Patton slipped out from Roman’s grasp and gave him a grin that he hoped wasn’t as shaky as it felt. In theory, Roman liking him back should have been a good thing. So why was Patton feeling so icky all of a sudden? Was it because, if it were true, Roman hadn’t been the one to confess? It was hardly fair of Janus to go around sharing other people’s secrets.
“Places!”
Patton snapped out of his daze to find Roman standing in front of him. He looked concerned.
“Hey, deep breaths, okay?” He took an exaggerated one to make a point and Patton found himself mirroring it. The slow exhale lightened the weight on his shoulders.
Patton nodded and Roman smiled at him. It was that sincere, soft smile that made Patton melt and, gosh darn it, hadn’t he already done enough of that this morning?
They hurried to their spots. The script was playing through Patton’s head, his lines and then Roman’s following lines, and Patton’s reactions to each line. He focused on the scene and the reason his character was upset and how it’d feel if he were experiencing it personally. One take. They’d get this finished in one take and then Patton could have ice cream and go back to his hotel room and take a nice long nap.
It was easy to forget everything that had happened earlier once he was onstage. Patton had no trouble getting into his roles most of the time; it certainly helped having someone like Roman opposite him. Roman was the best actor he’d ever had the pleasure of working with: self-assured and reliable and knowledgeable. The confidence he exuded was often contagious. The lights came on and out of the corner of his eye, Patton saw the red light flashing on the cameras. Roman winked at him and Patton only resisted giggling like a lovestruck teenager because Thomas had just called “action!”
It went as effortlessly as it usually did. Roman recited his lines with nary a mistake. Patton worked off of him easily, responses slipping from his tongue before the worries or fears of messing up could even try to take hold. The cast and the set around them faded away until it was just Patton and Roman - Patton’s character and Roman’s character - and this moment and this scene and these feelings. He could feel the tears spilling over, his heart felt as if it were being squeezed in his chest, his throat closing up with choked back sobs. Roman’s expression only aided in Patton’s despair; he never wanted to see Roman this miserable ever again.
It felt like a dream, the way Roman’s hand came up and cradled his cheek so gently and carefully. He wiped away a few of Patton’s tears with his thumb. He wasn’t sure which of them leaned in first, just that his eyes slid closed before Roman’s lips met his. Strangely, Patton’s first thought wasn’t incoherent screaming. It was that Roman tasted of peppermint. Then it was who knew kissing distracted so well from crying? Finally, eventually, it was incoherent screaming.
“And cut!”
They didn’t leap away from each other as if electrocuted, though Patton’s surprise at the reminder that they weren’t alone did shock him. Instead, they separated slowly, Roman’s hand drifting from Patton’s face to his shoulder.
“You’re… you’re a really good kisser, Roman.”
It wasn’t until Roman’s face went bright, bright red that Patton realized what he’d said.
“That was great, guys!” Thomas exclaimed, slinging his arms around them both and shattering the fragile space between them. “We’ll look over it real quick for any glaring mistakes but I think it went perfectly! We can fix the little things in post. I think you both deserve a break.”
“Thanks,” Patton squeaked, shooting up from where he sat. “Bye!”
For the second time that day, Patton bolted away and to his dressing room.
The door had barely slammed shut behind him before Patton was diving for the countertop he’d left his phone on. He was calling his second emergency contact and throwing himself into the pile of beanbags, cushions, and pillows in one corner of the room, all in one breath.
“Hey, Pat,” answered the low, rumbling voice of his brother.
Even if Patton had wanted to coherently explain what was going on, he couldn’t have. The words came tumbling out of his mouth without any sense and he kept cycling back to “kiss” and “Roman.” It didn’t help that he was half-sobbing, half-laughing, and all-panicking. At some point, he thought Virgil might have covered up his end of the receiver and spoke to someone else, but Patton was too flustered to be sure.
“Okay, bud, let’s take a minute to breathe.”
And so Virgil counted his younger sibling through several deep breaths, inhaling four and holding four and exhaling four. Once Patton had calmed down, Virgil asked him to repeat what he’d tried to say earlier.
“Oh. Ohh, right, that scene was today.”
“Virgil,” Patton said very seriously, pacing the room back and forth. “I… I think he likes me back.”
“Nooo,” Virgil responded and Patton frowned at his tone. “Really?”
“Why’d you say it like that!”
“Dude… Roman’s crush on you is as obvious as your crush on him.”
“His what?!”
“I’m sorry to say that you got all the gay disaster genes.”
“Tell that to your unsigned Valentine’s Day confession card to Logan.”
“Hey! We agreed to never mention that again!”
There was muffled speaking on Virgil’s end of the call and Virgil snorted. “Oh, that’ll be fun,” Patton heard him say in response. Before he could ask what would be fun, there was a knock at his door.
“Patton?”
By absolute sheer willpower, Patton didn’t scream.
“Answer it before I die of tension,” Virgil deadpanned.
Would it really be so bad if he did? After everything that had happened today, it really did seem like Roman might truly like him back… Sure, Patton wanted to bury himself into a hole and never leave out of embarrassment because of what he’d said after the kiss, but… It wasn’t like they were finished filming. Patton was going to see Roman again, whether he liked it or not.
“I’m hanging up now, okay?”
“Okay,” Patton whimpered. He was frozen a few moments longer, the phone still pressed to his ear.
“I can come back later,” Roman said, voice muffled. “Or not at all, if you’d prefer that. I don’t want to make you uncomf—”
Moving faster than he thought he was physically capable, Patton dropped his cell, and lurched across the room. He yanked the door open to handsome Roman, nervous Roman, sheepish Roman, and acted before his brain could get any more conflicted at the sight of handsome nervous sheepish Roman. “Please don’t leave.”
Roman went from worrying nervously at his lower lip to a small hopeful smile. He looked… strangely vulnerable. Patton wanted to protect him from everything bad, just as Roman had supported and kept him safe in the past.
“Hi.”
“Uhm… hi,” Patton replied. After a moment’s hesitation, he stepped back and gestured for Roman to enter.
For the time they’d been working together, neither had been inside the other’s dressing room. Actually, Patton hadn’t gone by Roman’s at all; maybe his was the one with the star-sticker-decorated door. Roman caught sight of Patton’s Comfort Corner and sent him a curious glance.
“It’s better than a chair?” Patton answered with a half-shrug.
“It’s like The Sanders Couch,” Roman said agreeably.
“Did Thomas ever tell you the story behind it?”
“Which one?” Roman asked, laughing. “There’s so many. He has it sent with him to every filming location, you know. Apparently, it’s magic.”
Patton’s apprehension was falling away slowly but surely and he thought it amazing how even being near Roman had that effect on him.
“May I?”
Patton blinked, confused. Roman gestured to the corner.
“Oh! Yeah! Yes, of course.” Patton hurriedly responded, stumbling a little over his words.
“May…” Roman rubbed the back of his neck and Patton didn’t understand what he could possibly have to be bashful about before remembering oh, right, he likes me back. “May we?”
It felt like Patton’s whole body was submerged in scalding hot water. “O— okay,” he squeaked. Before he could melt on the spot like his jelly-wobbly legs wanted him to, Patton joined Roman in settling cozily amongst the beanbags, cushions, and pillows.
It was like second nature to them. Without even meaning to, Patton gravitated towards Roman, curling against his side as if it was right where he belonged. Roman’s hand was carding through Patton’s hair before they’d even fully got their legs positioned just right. In the time that Patton had made this dressing room his own, he’d added frequently to this pile, and he knew for a fact that there was room enough for two people to lounge on it without having to sit too close. As if he weren’t already in a tizzy, realizing how easy it was for him and Roman to be like this… Well, it was a miracle he hadn’t fainted already.
“So…” Roman began at the same moment Patton exclaimed, “I’m sorry!”
Naturally, Roman looked bewildered.
“I should have told you sooner,” Patton barreled on. He pointedly avoided looking up, instead keeping his gaze trained on his hands folded in his lap. “I was just… scared, I guess? Mostly of rejection… uhm, duh… But also of ruining this movie for you? I didn’t want to make filming difficult for… well, for anyone! And I didn’t want to risk doing that just because of my silly feelings.”
“Silly?” Roman echoed.
“And I know it’s not something I need to apologize for,” Patton continued in a rush, “but I’m still so sorry that Janus said what he said. A… about me being the, uh… your… Well, you know. He didn’t have any right doing that.”
Roman laughed, sounding a little incredulous. Patton wasn’t sure what part Roman had trouble believing. It was true, after all! The very idea of someone spilling Patton’s crush without his say-so was absolutely horrifying.
“If I’m being completely honest?” Roman began, shifting just enough that he could cradle Patton’s cheek in his hand and tilt his face up. “I don’t think I’d have had the courage to do it myself, anyway.”
He… He was being genuine, Patton realized with a start.
“You’re the most courageous person I know!” Patton argued.
“I am also terrified of rejection,” Roman amended.
“Now hold on, if I’m scared of rejection and you’re scared of rejection, then who’s flying the plane?”
Roman laughed so hard, Patton was jostled by it in his embrace. It was a sensation he wouldn’t mind getting used to.
“Regrettably, I think that Janus is our pilot.”
Patton pouted. “Don’t like that.”
“We might owe him a thank you.”
“Don’t like that!” Patton repeated.
“Well, how about something that you do like?” Roman suggested, still holding him so carefully, still looking at him with such a sincere and soft smile. Still, there was just a hint of trepidation in his tone, the tiniest bit of unease in his eyes.
Patton realized awfully late that neither of them had actually, completely declared their feelings yet. He sat up in a hurry, placing a hand on Roman’s chest, and taking a deep breath. He thought it might give him at least a moment to sort his thoughts so that he could give Roman the confession he deserved. He thought wrong.
“You!” he practically shouted. “I like you! So much! It’s ridiculous! It’s exhilarating and scary and wonderful and well, I mean—” He stuttered to a halt, dissolving momentarily into breathless giggles. “You’re so considerate, do you know that? You care so much and you have so many little ways of showing it! And oh my god, you’re the best coworker I’ve ever had. You’re so full of passion and dedication, it’s an absolute joy to act alongside you and, and—” Again, Patton paused, but this time it was thanks to Roman’s slack-jawed awe. Raising both arms, Patton took Roman’s face in his hands and squished his cheeks a little. “And don’t even get me started on how handsome you are.”
In the time he’d known Roman, Patton had never seen him speechless. Patton was worried that he’d broken him. The seconds ticked by until, eventually, Roman made a sound akin to a tea kettle whistling. He slowly leaned in and down until Patton had to let go, instead opting to wrap his arms around Roman’s neck. With his face hidden now in Patton’s shoulder, it became clear how hard Roman was shaking.
“Was that too much?” Patton asked quietly.
Roman mumbled something but Patton couldn’t have understood it if he tried. Maybe he just needed a few minutes to collect himself. After some time, Roman did emerge, looking a bit more calm. Patton hardly had time to worry what this meant for him before Roman pulled Patton’s hands loose from where they’d been curled in the hair at the nape of his neck and held them gently in his own.
“I like you,” he started, oh-so-seriously. “I think I like you more than I like theatre?”
Patton gasped.
“Hush,” Roman teased, stifling a laugh. “I wake up some mornings and make it out of bed just because I know I’ll see you. It’s so easy to exist around you. I’ve never felt judged or hurt by you; you’re exceedingly kind and thoughtful. I cherish all of our moments, whether candid or staged. You’ve brought stability to my life in a way I never expected and I can’t tell you how important that is to me. Your grumpy pre-caffeine face cheers me up more than the sun in the sky does!”
“You hush,” Patton muttered, only able to fake offense for a few seconds.
“When Thomas takes us all out for ice cream, could we share a sundae?” Roman requested and he almost sounded shy about it. It made Patton’s heart flutter.
“There’s no one else I would want to banana split with,” Patton quipped.
Roman dropped Patton’s hands and groaned, planting his face into his palms. The last of the tension in the air vanished and Patton finally felt like he could breathe a little easier. He leaned back a little, trying to keep it together.
“Aw, come on, that was really just the cherry on top!”
Roman’s response might have been muffled but that didn’t hide the sound of his grin.
Patton shimmied and wiggled his way out of the Comfort Corner until he was back on his feet. “I hope you aren’t considering Taking Back Sun-dae,” Patton said, putting on his best pout.
“Oh my god,” Roman managed before he broke and fell into a fit of laughter.
Patton gave in too, though he was slightly distracted by the sight of Roman so carefree and happy. That was another thing he’d have to get used to, he supposed… Not that he minded. In fact, Patton decided as Roman eventually got up and pulled him into a tight, warm hug, he was really looking forward to it.
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