#there’s been so much awesome fic this month too

[yndrgrl]

katsuki bakugo is the only man who can help bunnygirl! you during heat.

established relationship. normal! au. first time as a couple.

warnings: nsfw, lowkey angst ngl, fellatio, praise, slight degradation, creampie

if you're here for the nsfw part, i marked it >:)

a/n: dude, idk why my last fic has that "mature" label 😭 also is this a hypersexual comfort fic? yeah.

---

"are you okay? you look hot?"

"your forehead is on fire!"

"you look red. drink some water."

you've been hearing that non-stop all day. of course, you know that everyone has good intentions, but it was so annoying.

no, you didn't feel fine, nor did you feel sick. it was a strange, embarrassing thing to admit. in a world full of truly remarkable quirks, you just had to get a basic one. your quirk was rabbit. you know mirko? yeah, well you two are in the same boat.

you have floppy bunny ears the same color as your hair, a puff ball of a bunny tail, & muscular legs. all so cutesy & alright to deal with. the behavioral traits were what got you though. increased hearing, jittery/easily scared, & most annoying of all, the heat that came with it.

though it wasn't unusual to have heat, it was definitely not something you mention in a passing conversation. heat made it hard to focus on anything except for breeding & sex. your senses are enhanced, making clothes feel itchy at all times. your train of thought always derailed to live making. that's why you were prescribed heat repressant.

no side affects & it worked like a charm.

however, this month you forgot to stock up on them, & you just so happened to run out. you would've just skipped school to get some, but it was midterms, which comes with tests & presentations that simply could not be made up. it was either fail your classes or bite the bullet.

"oi! what's your deal?" someone barked at you. ah yes, your boyfriend of six months, katsuki bakugo.

"nothing," you said with annoyance. another thing about your heat is that you get irritable because of the overwhelming feeling of needing to do a certain activity. "don't worry about it."

taken aback, katsuki reached out for you & spun you around. your eyes welled with tears of frustration & utter embarrassment, the tips of your ears were red, & every thread of your clothes made your skin crawl. "hey, what's going on?"

"i-it's nothing, just leave me alone. class is about to start." you understood how much katsuki prides himself in his academics. you're not gonna be the one to drag him down; that's not very amazing-cool-awesome girlfriend of you, after all.

he wanted to say that he didn't care & let's just ditch class, but you both knew you couldn't. the exams were too important. luckily for the both of you, the last period of the day was study hall. most kids just skip it, starting their free time early.

just a few classes, then i can go get medication, that's not bad at all, i've been through worse, you thought in attempts to calm yourself.

yeah, but imagine how could it would feel to be absolutely railed, oh fuck, imagine katsuki-

you had to cut yourself off, he was standing right beside you after all.

your relationship with katsuki has been slow, healthy, & true. the most you two have done in the span of six months is make out, grind, & grope each other clothed. both of you saw a future together so having sex didn't have to happen right then & there. if it happens, it happens, but there was no need to have it to connect.

you didn't want you first time with the love of your life to be because of your current circumstances.

"did i do something?" he asked, making your ears twitch.

"no, it's not you," you reassured, "there's nothing going on." you both entered the classroom, & you could feel katsuki's worried stare focused on you the entire time.

you took exam after exam, which, in of itself, is a long, stressful process. the bell rang throughout the school, & your classmates shuffled out of the room to go to their last period. finally, it was study hall. you threw everything into your backpack without a care. you were practically panting.

throughout the school day, the pressure building inside of you only gotten worse. you couldn't stop thinking about katsuki. his god-sent body, his perfect face, his rugged voice. god, he turned you on so much-- too much, actually.

you felt bad for ignoring all of his texts throughout the day. if you didn't, however, you had a feeling you would've sent some embarrassing messages.

as you exited your class, someone grasped your wrist, dragging you out of the school. their touch lit you on fire. you knew exactly who it was. "let me go, katsuki."

"no, not until you tell me what i did!" he growled at you. he doesn't even realize how wet i am for him-

you had to shut off your thoughts, but that's easier said than done.

"i told you already. you didn't do anything."

"well something is going on with you. tell me what's happening," he raised his voice, a vice grip still hanging onto your wrist. you were getting overstimulated & overwhelmed. once again, you couldn't help the angry tears from forming. you couldn't help but hyperfixate on your panties brushing against your sensitive clit. you couldn't help that your nipples were painfully perked.

you can't just admit that though. it's such a stupid problem to you. you felt so wrong & disgusting for thinking about sex all day. "you wouldn't understand!" you finally yelled back. "you wouldn't get it."

he didn't respond. katsuki continued to drag you throughout campus, leaving you with your thoughts.

god, i made him mad, you mentally cried out. hopefully he'll hate fuck you then-

you want to rip out your own brain & throw it on the concrete. it was a constant cycle of that the entire walk.

a few moments later, you realized you were in his dorm, sitting on his bed with him across from you in his desk chair. both of your hands were in his as he brushed his thumbs against your knuckles. that alone gave you goosebumps. "please tell me what's wrong, baby," he said in a hushed near-whimper. "i'm worried about you."

"you really wouldn't get it, katsuki," you whispered, finally letting a few tears roll down your cheek.

he placed his index finger underneath your chin. he gently raised your head, your gaze following suit. the two of you locked eyes, his swirling with worry & yours sprawling in uncertainty. "then make me understand."

"it's my stupid quirk," you exasperated. you tried coming up with ways of how to say what you want to say without scaring him off.

"what about it?" he asked.

"you have such a nice quirk, you know," you started, avoiding his question. "it's just so much flashier & cooler than mine. there's already a rabbit hero!"

"what are you talking about? you do have a cool quirk."

"i'm a bunnygirl. nothing more. people already know what to expect-"

"what is this really about? you brag all the time how you get to come up with new ways to make your quirk yours," he countered, not convinced with your answer. "there's something more, isn't there?"

katsuki was so good at reading people-- at reading you. the other times you've confided in him, your voice lacked clarity, stability. why would it be different now? it wouldn't, that's why.

"yeah, there is," you admitted, tugging on his hands so he'd get closer. "i just don't know how you'll react or how to even say it-"

"it's fine. just tell me, i won't get mad or judge you or whatever," he assured. you began to cry even more, staining his dress shirt.

he smelt so good, i can feel his muscles through his shirt, he's so sexy-

"i need you," you muttered into his chest.

"what was that, baby?"

you glanced up at him, eyes glossy, lips pouted. "i need you."

katsuki's breath hitched, "what are you talking about?" yes, he's had theories about your quirk & its drawbacks. was this it? was his theory correct?

more tears of frustration rolled down your cheeks as you tried to explained, "i have... you know."

his cock stirred, scolding himself mentally for getting hard during a time like this. "have what?" he wanted you to say it, confirm his suspicions.

you took a deep breath. "i have this thing every month or so, & it just makes things so much harder."

"tell me." his stern voice sent shockwaves through you.

it made you obey him automatically, robotically. "i'm going through heat." a silence followed. "it's normal for people with quirks like mine to go through this. i usually have repressants! & i know this probably makes you so uncomfortable; i understand if you don't want to be-"

-- nsfw starts here --

katsuki cut off your rambling, almost offended. "don't ever say that. i want you, all of you."

"p-please don't say such things," you begged him as you felt your pussy throb. "i'm r-really trying to hold back-"

"let me take care of you, princess," katsuki purred, finger tips ghosting over your exposed thighs. he buried his face into the crook of your neck. "do you want this, y/n? because i want you right now. if you tell me you don't want this, i'll stop."

all you could do is nod, your breath turning uneven.

"say it, y/n."

"i need you so bad. please, katsuki," you cried out as you rubbed your legs together.

he smirked into your neck before he started kissing your neck. you couldn't help but whimper. he noticed you holding back, so he bit your neck. he sucked hickeys all over your neck. your unsteady breathes turned into needy moans.

"t-take off my shirt, please-"

katsuki took in your demand by ripping it off your skin as if it were poison. he unhooked your bra, throwing it on the floor. "ah fuck," he groaned, cupping your breasts.

"are they o-okay?"

"you're fuckin' perfect, baby."

with one, he replaced his rough, calloused hand with his mouth. you grinder against his thigh as flicked your nipple with his tongue. "k-katsuki~"

he switched to the other one, giving it the same treatment. "all mine," he growled in between. he nipped at the skin around your nipples. your neck & chest were soon littered with purple marks & bites.

"let me touch you," you begged & you began to fidget with the buttons of his shirt. "take this off~"

"so needy, aren't you, princess," katsuki teased, yet he gave into you. he threw off his shirt, looming over you. goosebumps pricked at your skin, all over your arms down to your legs. you found yourself trailing your hands all over his abs, his muscular arms, around his back. it was like your hands had a mind of their own.

you flipped the two of you around, so now he was under you. "c-can i please mark you?"

he let out a laugh of amusement, making your face turn a deep red. "you don't have to ask, baby," he told you. as a response, you mimicked his actions from earlier. your lips kissed all over his neck, leaving marks in its wake. you trailed down to his chest, then his abs then his v-line until you reached the band of his pants.

the entire time, he was groaning, feeding you praises that shot straight through your core. when you stopped, he looked down at you, & there you were, staring back at him with eager, wide eyes. he could read you so well. "go ahead, y/n. pull them down."

to which you did. you hands hooked both his uniform pants & his boxers. you pulled them down, & your mouth watered when his cock sprung out. "i-it's so big," you moaned; you meant to only think that, but you couldn't help it.

his mushroom tip beaded precum, his veiny shaft twitched in anticipation. "you see how hard i am for you? all for you," katsuki told you, watching your eyes dart to his then back down to his cock.

you started licking him to test the waters. you saw as his eyebrows furrowed together, his mouth agape, narrowed eyes. your licks evolved into you sticking his tip into your mouth. your tongue flicked around his cock. you crossed your eyes & whined when you tasted his precum. thanks to his quirk, it tasted almost sweet, salty, & god, was it addicting.

you bobbed your head up & down his thick rod. the tip hit the back of your throat while spit flooded your mouth. it was hard to breath, but you didn't care. having katsuki inside of you was more important than breathing. "slow down. you're gonna make me cum, good girl."

that was enough inspiration for you. you needed his cum. you forced your head all the way down his cock, your nose buried in his pubes. your eyes watered (for the fifth time today), & you stared into katsuki's eyes. both of his hands tangled themselves into your hair. "i'm gonna fuck that slutty, little throat, okay? just tap if it's too much," he informed, but he had a feeling you were going let him do whatever he wanted.

you moaned as a way to let him know that you heard him. the vibrations quivered his tip. "mmm, fuck. you're doing so good," he praised, jutting his hips forward the drawing them back.

his thrusts at first were small, in fear he was hurting you. however, as he looked down at you, your eyes rolled back, drool spilling out of your mouth, rubbing your aching clit for some sort of release, he couldn't hold back. he started using your throat as a fuck toy.

fast & rough, & all you could do was take it. take it, even though you're crying & it's hard to breath. "i'm close," he uttered out in between moans. his sultry voice turned a pitch higher in a humiliating tease, "you want my cum, baby? huh? c'mon, tell me you want it."

you choked out muffled, "yes please" & "cum down my throat please." he laughed at you trying to form sentences with your mouth stuffed. "such an eager bitch. fine, i'll give you what you want."

he thrusted his hips forwards, keeping your head in place. you face smushed against his hips. his cock twitched as he unloaded spurts of cum down your throat.

he pulled away, & strings of saliva mixed with his semen leaked onto your skirt. you looked back up at him, finding his cock still erect. "you look so surprised," katsuki said as he caught his breath. "i'm still so hard for you. after all, i told you i was going to take care of you."

"p-please have sex with me," you barely even whispered.

"what was that?"

"please-"

"i still can't hear you," katsuki told you, stroking his dick. he really knew how to push your buttons

"please fuck me, katsuki! i need it, i need you so bad~ i need your big cock inside of me," you blurted out. you finally let you stupid, nasty fantasies get the better of you.

judging from katsuki's smug expression, he wanted you to indulge in them. "alright, alright. you've been such a good girl for me. it's the least i could do," he shrugged before flipping you over so you were trapped under him. even in your most intimate moments, he was cocky. & god, did it make your pussy wet.

as he started to pull your skirt down, your hands shot to grab his wrists. "no, fuck me now, i can't wait. it hurts too bad," you whined, your glossy lips pouting.

"of course, princess," he said with a smirk. "whatever you want." katsuki's fingers dove under your skirt to push your panties out of the way. he held your legs up, placing your calves over his shoulders.

he lubed the tip of his dick with your juices by running it through your folds. "you're so wet for me, good girl."

"it's all for you, katsuki~" you purred, anticipation practically killing you. you felt pride as he turned his head to kiss the meat of your calf in approval.

"can't let it go to waste," he told you. he lined his thick, heavy cock with your entrance. something must've taken over you because, the moment it lined up with your hole, you shoved your hips forward with your entire body.

you let out a squeal of pleasure, your pussy stretching to accommodate for katsuki's lengthy cock. "shit, baby, you almost knocked me over," he chuckled as he readjusted. both of his hands were on your hips.

"shut up & fuck me," you growled at him. his cock twitched, brow raised in amusement.

"yes ma'am," he replied, "but remember you said that." from the get-go, his thrusts were powerful, immediately finding the cervix. your nails dug into his biceps down to his wrists. moans, whimpers, & screams spilled out of your lips.

katsuki took his fingers to your mouth & demanded in a low voice, "suck."

the action made you quiet down. he found your g-spot soon after, & you felt lightheaded. with his fingers down your throat, his cock abusing your most sensitive spot, & katsuki whispering dirty nothings into your ears, you shut your eyes & released all the tension building up.

"f-f-fuck, i-i'm cumming, katsuki," you rasped, voice having a small lisp thanks to his fingers. you squirted all over his abdomen, breath heavy & uneven.

he didn't stop though. he still rammed his big fuckin' dick in & out of you, not letting you calm down from your euphoric high. in fact, his hand that you slobbered all over found their way to your clit. he drew small circles around it. "ah, katsuki!" you moaned. "it's too much!"

"you'll be a good girl, & take it, won't you? i haven't cum inside you yet," he responded while his other hand pinched your nipples.

"i-i-i'll be a good girl, katsuki~" you slurred, speaking on beat with his thrusts. he made you cum three more times then you felt as his hips became more robotic, shorter, uncalculated.

"i'm cumming," he groaned through gritted teeth. "i'm cumming. fuckin' take all of it." thick jets of hot, white cum stained your walls. his dick pulsated inside of you. you came again; who could blame you?

he took a few deep breaths, collapsing on top of you as he pulled out of your pussy. cum spilled out of you & onto his sheets. he embraced you, whispering, "round two?"

[juniperskye]

Pornstar.

Based on the following ask: If you have listened to the song Pornstar by Nessa Barrett awesome if you haven’t please do because I want my ask to make sense. I want a Reader x Aaron Hotchner fic based on that songs specifically because it’s just spicy and smutty honestly. Even the song Do it for me by Rosenfeld works too. They are just good songs, and they are spicy and when I hear them all I see is Aaron Hotchner – Honeyyyy these songs were SPICY! So, I really liked the beat at the beginning of Pornstar – I ran with that, and this takes place at a club.

Aaron Hotchner x Fem Reader

SMUT

Word count: 1456

Not edited - please be kind. Requests are open and feedback is welcome if it's constructive!

Warnings: My blog is 18+, minors DNI, SMUT, Age gap (non-specified), one night stand, sex with a stranger, alcohol consumption, sex while intoxicated (not drunk), explicit language, no use of y/n, Fem reader, reader has no physical description other than female anatomy, use of pet names, fingering, semi-public sex, p in v, unprotected sex (don’t do this), choking, pure filth tbh…let me know if I missed any!

I do not consent to having my work translated or reposted to any other site. That being said I do not own the characters portrayed in this story.

He couldn’t believe he was here right now. The last time he was in a club…for something other than a case, was never. He had never been the clubbing type, but the BAU had been on back-to-back-to-back cases for the last six or so months, so the team decided it was time to let off some steam. With some mandatory days off, the team finally had the time. Thankfully they were all passed the point of judgement with one another, having spent as much time together as they all had over the years.

Tonight had started that way too. A silent agreement amongst everyone that no matter what happened, there’d be no judgement, and it wouldn’t be spoken of ever again.

That’s why he hadn’t hesitated to order a third whiskey and boldly sent a vodka soda to the woman across the club, sitting in a booth with her friends. When she glanced in his direction after the waitress had delivered the drink, she blushed and send him a smile.

He couldn’t exactly remember what happened next, because one moment you’d been sitting with your friends and the next, the two of you were making out in the back hallway.

--

You were nothing but a mess of tangled limbs and clashing mouths as the two of you kissed fervently in the hallway, hoping to move things to a more private space.

He had one hand gripping your hip while the other held your jaw in place as he allowed his tongue to explore your mouth. You’d tasted like the vodka he sent you along with something inherently sweeter, vanilla lip-gloss maybe?

He pulled back to look at you, your lips were kiss bitten and your skin was glowing as the lights in the club flashed red. The bass of the music had been so loud you could feel it in your chests. It just added to the rush you were currently feeling.

He grabbed your hand and dragged you to the bathroom, quickly locking the door behind you, before pressing himself against you. His hands encased your jaw, holding you in place and your back arched against the door. His lips pressed to your for a second before they trailed down, burning into the skin of your neck.

You let one of your hands pull at his hair while the other pressed against his strong back. You needed to feel him, and you felt like you couldn’t get him close enough. You were desperate at this point.

--

He tugged at the strap of your dress, pulling it down enough to reveal the tops of your breasts. He kissed, bit, and sucked at the skin there, easily eliciting whines from your mouth. You moved your hands to begin unbuttoning his shirt, allowing them to roam over his broad chest. His skin was warm, and he was this solid wall of muscle in front of you…you’d never felt luckier than in this moment. To have captured his attention was your greatest accomplishment.

You hadn’t noticed the shift in his hand placement until it had slipped your panties to the side and gently caressed your heat.

“Fuck, you’re so wet.” He groaned.

All you could do was gasp. Your hips bucking forward to press further into his touch. He’d pulled your dress down more, revealing your breasts completely, swiftly attaching his lips to your hardened nipples, alternating from one to the other. He sucked harshly, sure to leave marks…not that you cared one bit.

“You’re so fucking sexy.” He growled in response to your moans.

You reached your hand down to rub at his prominent bulge, trying to signal that you were ready for more. He took the hint. Grabbing you by your hips and spinning you around, his movements were precise and fast…it was almost dizzying. He lifted you up, so you now rested at the edge of the counter, his finger slipping into your heat as he bit onto your collarbone.

Your head fell back in ecstasy. Your hands busy stroking him through his slacks and pulling at his now tousled hair.

“Oh my – Fuck it feels so good.” You cried.

Another finger slid into you as the heal of his palm pressed deliciously into your clit. Your body was moving of its own accord now, grinding into his palm desperate to find your release.

“That’s it baby, use my hand.” He demanded, thrusting his fingers with a newfound speed.

It only took another moment of this before you were screaming out, allowing your climax to take over you.

--

As you calmed your breathing, you pulled at his belt, needing nothing more that to have his cock splitting you open. With his belt undone, you tugged his slacks open and freed his throbbing member.

You couldn’t even be embarrassed at the fact that you were obviously gaping at his impressive size…the man that stood in front of you was gorgeous in every way.

“You’re beautiful.” You whined.

You could see a hint of a blush rush up his neck, but he didn’t let that overtake the dominance he’d been portraying.

“I want to ruin you.” He whispered, nipping at your earlobe.

“Then do it.” You gasped.

--

His cock slammed into you in one swift motion, taking your breath away. The scream that escaped you was animalistic. One that was reserved for pornstars…not everyday people.

Your hands gripped him tightly, nails dragging down his back, causing a hiss to escape him. His hips snapped into you with a ferocity you’d never experienced before. You were loving every fucking moment of it.

“S-so big. You’re so b-big.” You stuttered.

“You’re gripping me so t-tight. Fuck.” He exclaimed.

His hand slid up, fingers digging into the sides of your jaw as he forced your gaze to his own. You had to force your eyes to his…having a difficult time doing anything other than letting them roll to the back of your head.

You brought one hand up to his, shifting it down to your neck. Pairing it with a subtle nod permitting him to make his next move. He allowed his fingers to press ever so slightly into the side of your neck, restricting your airflow the slightest bit.

This new position had your upper back pressed back into the mirror, ass hugging the edge of the counter, while he stood in front of you pistoning his hips into yours over and over again, his hand still wrapped around your throat as the other was bruising your hip.

You were sputtering out gasps with every thrust that met your cervix. His movements refusing to let up. You were filling the bathroom with his grunts, your gasps and the sound of skin slapping skin. The whole experience was euphoric.

--

Things continued this way a bit longer before you felt that all too familiar feeling in the pit of your stomach. The coil tightening too much…just waiting to snap.

“Jesus, fuck. Are you gonna cum for me?” He huffed.

“Yes. God yes!” Your eyes finally rolling back.

Your orgasm came crashing over you with a strength you’d never experienced before. Your entire body was trembling against his. He let his hand slip from your throat, wrapping behind you and gripping onto your shoulder, chasing his high.

“That’s it. Fucking fill me up.” You whispered.

“Nghhhh Fuck.”

His hips began to stutter, slowing as he pumped his cum into you, filling you completely. He rested his head against your shoulder and allowed himself a moment to catch his breath.

--

After cleaning yourselves up, readjusting your clothes, and assisting one another to smooth out your hair, you made your way out of the bathroom. Not without noticing the glare you were getting from the blonde, who’d clearly been waiting.

“So, um-”

“Did you-”

“Sorry, you go ahead.” You offered.

“I was just going to ask if perhaps you’d like to continue this evening elsewhere.” He suggested.

“I’d love that.” You smiled. “Let me just go let my friends know I’m leaving.”

“Yeah, I should do the same. Meet back here in a few?”

“Okay!”

The both of you moved back toward your respective groups, your girlfriends cheering for you and giggling at all the marks currently littering your neck and chest. While his colleagues gave him knowing looks and smirks at his uncharacteristic behavior. You blew your friends a kiss while he waved his friends off. Coming face to face with you in the spot you’d just been.

“You ready to go?” He asked.

“Yes! But first…what’s your name?” You blushed.

“Oh shit, it’s Aaron.” He laughed sheepishly. “I guess we never really got around to introductions.”

“It okay!” You giggled. “Nice to meet you Aaron, I’m – ”

Tags: @seraphenaadria @bernelflo @pastelpinkflowerlife @just-moondust

[fayes-fics]

The Secrets We Keep: Pt II

<< Part I

Pairing: Benedict Bridgerton x fem!reader

Summary: Knowing someone your whole life doesn’t mean they can’t surprise you… (part II, see above for link to part I)

Warnings: 18+ smut, minors DNI, loss of virginity, vaginal fingering, oral sex (m to f), cunnilingus, hand job, vaginal sex, woman on top, orgasm. Also a lot of fluff and a few dashes of angst.

Word Count: 8.5k (13.6k for complete fic, including Pt I)

Authors Note: Part 2 of 2. Part 1 linked above. My longest gestating WIP! It’s been more than 18 months since I received a request for this secret diary fic. Tulip Anon, I have no idea if you still follow me, but I hope you think I did your detailed request justice. Here is the conclusion to this Benepic! Betaed by the awesome @colettebronte, who I can’t thank enough. Enjoy! 🫶

-vii-

The first thing you feel is throbbing pain, an insistent drum in your head, mouth dry as if you have been chewing cotton wool—the instant regret of excessive drinking floods through you. However, when your eyes reluctantly peel open, your predicament escalates.

You have no earthly idea where you are. Or how you got here. The last thing you remember was Benedict kissing you; then the room was literally spinning from entirely too much brandy. 

Still in the dress you wore yesterday, but tucked under crisp white linens. A trace of a familiar scent upon the pillow that you cannot quite place in your fuzzy state. Gingerly sitting up, you try to get your bearings, not yet awake enough to have any reaction beyond puzzlement. 

The room is darkened, thankfully, save for a sliver of the rising sun that slashes across the bed through a narrow gap in the curtains. You are in a large mahogany four-poster bed; the room is decorated in rich jewel tones—heavy velvet burgundy drapes and dark blue Persian rugs, panelled walls on which stunning artwork hangs. Embers glow in a nearby fireplace as you spy your pelisse hanging on the back of a door and your shoes neatly arranged nearby.

Then you twist and see the bedside cabinet, and your stomach plunges.

There, alongside a glass of water, is your notebook. Your secret notebook. The one that should still be concealed within the hidden pocket of your pelisse. But instead, it is here. And what is worse, it is open. Open to a page with one of your favourite sketches of Benedict: his eyes crinkling against the strong rays of the sun, a carefree smile on his face.

Instantly, you grab it and slam it shut. Fingernails drumming urgently on its silken cover, now hugged into your chest. Horrified that your mystery generous benefactor, who must have seen you to bed, has also been privy to your most private thoughts. 

Galvanised by a need to solve the mystery of who, you relinquish your tight hold on the tome. It is then that a folded letter slips out of its pages and drops into your lap. Tentatively, you unfurl the paper and are aghast by the headed notepaper declaring the author and revealing your host. The worst possible person you could think of.

But then your gaze falls to the elegant script inked onto its thick parchment, and your life is indelibly altered.

Dearest Y/n

I hope you are well-rested. There are so many things I am impatient to impart, but I must begin with an explanation and, indeed, an apology.

You are in my bedroom, at my lodgings. I brought you here as I saw no other option that would guarantee your safety and welfare, which is always my utmost concern.  I made pains to ensure your arrival here was not seen, and I must assure you, in case your recall is uncertain, that nothing has happened between us beyond our kiss. 

Now onto my apology, which is two-fold, although I suspect it should contain multitudes more. Firstly, my most sincere and unreserved apologies for my ungentlemanly conduct at our last two encounters. As wondrous as those kisses were, they were nonetheless inexcusable. I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive my impulsive actions.

Secondly, I must apologise for my discovery of this, your private diary. My knowledge of its existence is purely accidental; I removed it from your coat merely as a wish for your possessions to be in neat order upon your awakening. My knowledge of its contents, however… for that, I must throw myself at your mercy and beg for your forgiveness. Curiosity and liquor are not the best companions, and it seems both got the better of me. 

In what I hope is partial recompense, I will confess a secret of mine. Arguably selfish in nature and most likely the worst possible timing, too. However, given what I have now seen, I am utterly compelled to convey it….

I love you, y/n.

Most ardently and most truly. 

There is no person in the world I would rather spend time with. Whose thoughts I am always impatient to know and whose every moment I wish to be a part of. For some time now, you have occupied my every thought. 

It is why I felt compelled to act when I heard from Eloise about your impossible situation. I will do anything within my power to assist you. It is why I said that I want to alleviate your burdens. I meant every word and more. My happiness is seemingly inextricably calibrated to yours—when I see you happy, it brings me great joy, and when I see you are not, it brings a pang to my chest I know not what do with. 

I would have taken these feelings to my grave… were it not for this diary. When what I found hidden within ts pages gave me the exquisite burden of hope. Hope that perhaps you return my affections? May indeed have done so for quite some time as well? 

I must also take a moment to compliment your poetic talent, and that is to say nothing of your artistic abilities, which quite frankly are humbling. Dare I dream of a day that we could paint together? Sorry (Again! Multitudes indeed!), I am likely getting far ahead of myself.

I will not be home when you read this. Partial cowardice on my part, no doubt, but born out of utmost respect. You always deserve the right to choose, y/n, and that includes what you do with this confession. I do not wish for you to be obligated to see me or let me know your response, thoroughly eager though I am to hear of it. 

If you wish to speak to me before your wedding ceremony, please leave your hair ribbon tied to my phaeton upon your departure. I will find a way to see you. If you do not, I shall, of course, respect your decision. 

A vila mon coeur, gardi li mo: You will always have my heart; I hope you also choose to be its haven.

Benedict

You could read this confession a thousand times over and still scarcely believe it; the depth of his feelings declared plainly, boldly, and so lyrically in writing. You pour over it once more, giddily aglow, your fingers tracing across his elegant, looped script, your lips moving as you mouth his words, needing to have them within you somehow. Then, you lovingly refold and place the letter between the last two blank pages of your notebook—a more fitting denouement to its contents you could not imagine.

You put on your shoes and pelisse, still floating on a cloud. A valet meets you in the hallway and, with a wordless nod of acknowledgement, leads you out of the rear mews entrance, handing you a large silk scarf to conceal yourself under. With one final glance up at Benedict’s abode, you unfurl the ribbon from your hair and, insides aflutter, tie it in a neat bow onto his phaeton before wrapping the scarf around your head and stealing out onto the streets of Mayfair. 

-viii-

Still in a daze about Benedict’s confession, you slip into the servant's entrance of your family home, tiptoeing through the dormant kitchen and tugging off the scarf. Just as you believe yourself home-free, Mrs White, head cook and ersatz maternal figure, materialises from the pantry, nearly dropping a bag of flour in surprise.

“Lawks alive, sweet child, you gave me a fright!” she exclaims, clutching her chest. “Pray tell, why are you sneaking into my kitchen at the crack of dawn?”

You cringe and turn sheepishly to meet her gaze. “Sorry for the scare, Mrs White. I, um, indulged rather too heavily last night. I was in no fit state to return home. I stayed with a trusted friend.” The truth, albeit behind a veil of obfuscation. “Please do not tell Father!” you add hurriedly.

As she plunks down the flour and smacks her fingers together to rid them of its nascent dust, she chuckles. “I shall not divulge if you do not… for I was already under your father’s employ when I did the same many years ago, the night before I made my Harry an honest man.”

“Deal!” you giggle, clutching your notebook tight to your chest, unable to quash the ebullience fizzing in your being.

“You look as if you caught a rainbow and sold it to the sky,” she declares, crossing her arms and observing you closely. “Wedding day excitement, yes?!” she adds pointedly with a raised eyebrow, even as her tone very much suggests she suspects otherwise. 

“Of course, Mrs White…” you concur, attempting to conceal the quirk of your lip. 

She rolls her eyes and shoos you affectionately towards the hallway. “Away with you! I suspect the less I truly know, the better…”

You say nothing; just give her a nod and race up the servant's stairs, keen to make it to your bedroom unseen. 

As soon as you are safely there, you toe off your shoes and only then relinquish your vice-like grip upon your notebook to hurriedly change into your nightgown as if you had been asleep in the house all night. Enacting a plan you conceived on the brisk walk home, you grab a night bag from your ottoman. Flinging open your wardrobe, patently ignoring the wedding dress hung upon its door, you bundle the notebook with a couple of your favourite outfits and stuff them into the bag. Buckling it shut while you scoot across the room, you open the sash window and  - with a quick check of the garden below - drop the bag into the large rhododendron beneath, hopeful the dense, fragrant blooms will conceal its presence for now.

Just as you are closing the window, a gaggle of ladies descend upon your room, led by your fussing mother, your ladies' maid Rachel among them. Realising she has had to lie to keep your cover since yesterday at the modiste, you silently shoot her a brief look of reassurance.

“Rise and shine, darling!” your mother chimes. “‘Tis your most special day!”

And then everything is a blur as the preparation for your wedding starts in earnest, you still slightly detached from it all, your thoughts purely of Benedict. It is only sometime later that you get a few moments of peace with just Rachel as she puts the finishing touches to your look.

“You seem changed, my lady…” Rachel opines sotto voce, sliding a pin into your hair.

You say nothing, even as your eyes meet in the vanity table mirror, unwilling to confess details of what has transpired just yet. Unsure yourself even what it could mean until you get the chance to see Benedict yourself, your stomach in knots to do so.

“I told your family you took dinner alone last night in your room after returning from the modiste, and then you went to sleep…” she whispers, leaning in even though you are alone.

“Thank you. I am truly grateful,” you offer sincerely before adding: “I will tell you more when I am able. I do beg one more favour of you…?”

She makes eye contact again in your reflection, giving a brief tentative nod after a pause.

“If you should hear from a Bridgerton valet, please follow any directions he provides,” you implore, the image of your hair ribbon fluttering gently in the breeze emblazoned in your mind.

“A valet? Not a ladies’ maid?” she checks softly, frowning.

“Yes, just please… do as he asks?”

“Yes, my lady,” she demures before reaching for your jewellery.

It is only as the carriage you and your mother ride in shudders over the cobblestones towards St George’s church an hour or so later that reality comes crashing in. 

So engrossed in thoughts of seeing Benedict all morning, you had almost forgotten the dreadful fate that likely awaits you. A sudden spike of fear that he will not turn up, that something will prevent him from seeing you, or, heaven forfend, today’s stiff breeze has blown your hair ribbon asunder. 

All at once, your head is spinning, your dress feels too tight, and there is a plunging dread in the pit of your stomach, your skin prickling hard before your vision seems to swim with dots before narrowing to blackness…

“Y/n!? Whatever is the matter?!” your mother’s alarmed voice rings out as you woozily return.

You are slumped sideways against the glass window, its cool surface a balm on your suddenly fevered temple.

“Is it what I told you about your wedding night…?!” she frets, her laced glove tickling your forehead as she appears to be checking your temperature. “I can assure you, you will get used to it…”

You bat her away and slowly sit upright, taking a calming breath while also trying to blot out the memory of her talk about marital relations right before you left the house. Not able to confess it as unnecessary without raising suspicion, you had to endure a stumbling, unhelpful explanation of things you already know. Indeed, you have witnessed at Granville’s parties, even if you have not taken part yourself. 

But then the sudden thought of being required to do such with Lord Farringdon has you grasping the curtain, your empty stomach heaving at the mere prospect. The silent hope that Benedict can assist you at the eleventh hour is the only thing that stops you from passing out anew.

With a shaky gait and a queasy, oily feeling, you alight a few moments later, your mother lending an arm of support as your father and brothers pile out of the other carriage. This is to be the entirety of your wedding guest list. You have pulled into a side courtyard of the church, concealed behind high walls, away from the inquisitive sights of the Ton. The rushed nature of the union and Whistledown’s latest means your family has no wish for this to be a public event, keen to be rid of scandal. Only your immediate family, your husband-to-be and the vicar - a friend of your father’s - know of today’s ceremony. Well, and Benedict. You did not even get the chance to inform Eloise of this expedited schedule.

As he leads you up the stairs and into the side vestibule, your father informs you that Lord Farringdon is already awaiting you at that altar and that he will appreciate a swift ceremony. You swallow thickly and nod mutely, sensing the window of opportunity creaking closed with alarming alacrity, each incessant tick of the church clock seeming like both forever and not enough time, scrabbling for any chance to stall.

Just as you are about to lose all sense of hope, you see movement over your father's shoulder that has your heart leaping into your throat. There, through a mullioned window, you see the distorted outline of a phaeton swiftly pulling up on the other side of the church from where you entered, a palpable wave of relief and excitement washing over you. 

Benedict has come!

-ix-

“Father, may I please have a moment alone?” you rush out breathlessly, pulse-pounding hard in your ears. Hoping he will interpret your request as mere nervousness about the imminent ceremony, you add: “Before I must take this big step and become a wife?”

He reluctantly grants your wishes, brusquely telling you it should be brief before following the rest of your family through the doors into the nave. 

As soon as the coast is clear, you are darting out the entrance again and running around the outside of the church, wedding dress swishing around your legs, until you skid to a halt next to a pillar that conceals you from the street.

There, before you, arrestingly beautiful and jumping athletically down to the pavement, is Benedict—a vision in a blue velvet jacket and teal cravat. 

Your eyes meet, and your knees want to buckle; such is the magnitude of the moment. He bounds up the granite steps and crushes his lips to yours briefly.

“No time to talk,” he rushes out. “If you wish to escape, take my hand, for we must depart now!”

Your heart hammers as you do the only thing you could ever want to: grab tightly onto his proffered hand as his face breaks out into the most arresting smile. Then it's a blur as he whisks you down the steps to his phaeton, hoisting you up onto its leather bench and throwing a blanket into your lap, then clambering in himself. With a shake of the reins, you lurch and take off down an alleyway at a rapid pace. The velocity of motion, red bricks of buildings whizzing by mere feet away, has you momentarily stunned and so you almost jump out of your skin when he speaks loudly over the rushing noise.

“Cover yourself before we get to the street,” Benedict advises quick-fire, only taking his attention off the road briefly to nod to the blanket. Just as you are struggling to conceal yourself, the horses careen onto Park Lane, attracting attention for the speed you are already travelling.

“Benedict!” you chastise, your arm shooting out to grab the side of the partial umbrella-like hood that arches over you, having to cling on for dear life. “This is not exactly a stealthy escape!”

“I know,” he grimaces, not looking at you, “but we must make haste and be as far away as we can as soon as possible.”

“Regardless of destination, we will need to stop at my house!” you almost have to yell to be heard over the jostling wheels on either side of you.

“Why??” His whole face screwed up in disbelief.

“I must gather some things! I will not leave without them, Benedict!!” you warn.

“What could possibly be worth stopping for?” he decries, the whole vehicle swaying violently as he rounds another bend.

“Perchance, other clothing?!” you wither loudly, frowning that he had not considered such, before adding: “And your letter!?” 

His head whips around to look at you and there is an intensity in his gaze that has your heart stuttering. An all-consuming want to kiss his lips as his gaze falls to your mouth. Only the urgent yelp of a pedestrian you narrowly avoid colliding into rips your attention away from each other. 

He rights the phaeton, tugging the reins so the horses slow.

“Alright,” he concedes, quieter, calmer. “But please do be as quick as you are able…”

You don't get the chance to inform him you have already packed and stowed a bag because he is pulling up in the quiet mews behind your family home. You jump down and take off, sprinting through the small gate and across the lawn. Soon, you are diving into the large bushes on the side of the house beneath your bedroom window. Fumbling around, you have to wrestle your dress from a branch before you reach the wall. Emitting a muted noise of victory as you are finally able to grab your bag and out of the foliage without looking.

“Miss y/l/n!?”

You jump out of your skin, spinning to see Mrs White standing at a nearby door, wielding a rolling pin.

“Mrs White, please,” you beseech, “please, do not tell anyone!” 

She takes stock of you: your animated state, your wedding dress torn over your knee where it snagged upon that branch, a night bag grasped in your ringless left hand… and she appears to make a calculated decision.

“I fear I could not, my child,” she offers with a shrug, “I do not see anyone for me to tell of…” 

The small, sympathetic nod and smile toying her lips has you barreling towards her, throwing your free arm tight around her as flour dust puffs onto the silk of your dress. You utter your thanks, flooded with gratitude, hugging her close before disentangling, you take off sprinting before she can say anymore.

-x-

As you depart from your family home, a companionable silence settles between you—a tacit understanding that there is much to discuss, but the journey is not the ideal place to do so. Both resolute to put some miles between yourselves and your family, likely now emerging from the church and wondering where on earth you are. A flare of guilt in your belly for not informing Rachel or even your mother. You resolve to send word tomorrow that you are safe without providing details.

As the edges of London give way to the countryside, you do decide to ask one simple question. 

“Where are we headed, Benedict?”

“I have a suggested destination….” he begins enigmatically, an odd cadence to his voice, “but we will discuss that later, once we stop for the night at an inn.”

There is a little flutter behind your ribs at the thought, but it is forgotten as a strong gust of wind whistles over the carriage, making you shiver and burrow into the blanket, wishing you had grabbed your pelisse from the night bag before setting off.

You startle as Benedict pulls you snugly into his side, adjusting the carriage hood and then the blanket, too, so he provides partial shelter from the winds as they whip across the fields. 

“I am sorry I do not have an enclosed carriage for you to journey in comfort,” he winces, his speech humming into you. “But it is best we use this speedier option anyway. We will cover more ground swiftly travelling light.”

You nod in acknowledgement. “Thank you for the blanket, at least; it is very considerate,” you respond, not unpleased to have an excuse to cuddle into him as you reassure him: “I am well now.”

Indeed, the warmth of his flank on yours and the steady rocking motion of the carriage is soporific, the whirlwind of the day hitting you even though it is merely lunchtime.

“Please rest if you need to,” he intuits, “I will wake you if needed.”

And despite the elements, you find the lure of sleep inevitable.

A warm wetness on your brow stirs you.

“Y/n…”

You wish you could always be roused like this; your name a soft rumble from Benedict’s lips as they trace gently over your forehead. You nuzzle unthinkingly into the sound and feel, which has him chuckling into your skin.

“We are here, at the inn….” he murmurs, his breath hot into your hairline.

You blink awake. “We are?!’” You twist to see you are stopped alongside an elegant Tudor wood building. “How long have I been asleep?!”

“All afternoon,” he admits, a touch sheepish. “You looked so peaceful and I assume you must need the rest after a tumultuous few days.”

His touching manner has a warmth spreading behind your ribs that makes you push up and land a kiss on his jaw.

“Thank you,” you whisper, pulling away but pleased to see a dot of colour high on his cheekbones.

“‘Tis nothing,” he demures before changing the topic. “I am sure you are hungry and in need of refreshments. So we shall dine and remain here for the night. We have covered a considerable distance from London already—around forty miles.” He jumps down and stands expectantly holding out a hand for you to follow suit as he continues speaking. “To avoid attention, we should present ourselves as family relations—cousins, perhaps?” 

“I am in a wedding dress,” you remind as you wrestle your way out of the blanket and reach for him to descend.

His Adam’s apple bobs as he scans down your form, lingering slightly.

“Oh yes. Well. Umm. Perchance as husband and wife then?” he flusters as you step down with his assistance.

“Would that not draw the attention you mentioned we should avoid?” you murmur, your hands still joined even though you are on the ground now.

“Do you have another suggestion?” he queries, his breath warm on your face as you stand entirely too close, fingers flexing around yours.

“Unless you wish me to remove my dress out here…” you goad, a little crest of victory as his pupils rapidly dilate and he huffs a breath, “...then I do not.”

“We have much to discuss,” he almost growls, which stokes something low in your belly as he tugs you along towards the entrance, only stopping to nod briefly to the inn’s groomsman who emerges to take care of your horses.

-xi-

The tavern at the inn is a warm, convivial space, wood-panelled, the smell of delicious foods wafting in the air alongside the tannin of wine and the ferrous tang of dark beer as crowds of people of all walks of life gather. Benedict sees you into a corner booth away from other patrons as he orders food, then goes to secure your accommodation for the night.

As he returns, passing you a glass of wine, there is a nervous churning in your gut; this is the first opportunity you have had to talk properly since you awoke to his life-changing letter.

“I have no idea where to begin,” he confesses, looking perplexed, and it makes you reach out in reassurance over the table, pulse strong in his raised veins under your fingertips.

“Your letter was the single most wondrous thing I have ever received,” you offer honestly, his eyes softening, making your heart flutter. “Benedict,” you take a steadying breath before ploughing on with the truth you have never spoken aloud before, “I have loved you for as long as I can remember…”

His face lights up, and his hand turns under yours, your palms touching as he laces your fingers together in a tight knot, then brings your joined fists to his lips, kissing your knuckles gently. 

“Why did you never tell me?” He entreats softly.

“Why did you never tell me?” You return lightning quick, a quirk on your lips that has him chuckling.

“An entirely fair accusation,” he concedes, shuffling closer and grabbing your other hand, your heads so close together now. “I suppose I thought my feelings irrelevant, futile even, that you would secure a titled husband. Though why your father chose such a vile one confounds me, I must confess.”

“I believe that a chastisement,” you commence but are interrupted by food arriving at your table. 

So, as you eat, you explain the whole story between mouthfuls. That you were able to delay your debut last season in your father’s absence, but it meant this season, he was determined to see you matched swiftly. Recounting fondly your time spent with your Aunt Eliza, Benedict appearing impressed as you reel off all the skills you now possess. You also talk in detail about how her encouragement meant you fell into the London art scene and how you know Henry Granville. Benedict listens intently, taking bites of his dinner, but his attention never wavers from you as you recount everything. 

“So yes, I believe the match was about my father’s wish to quash a perceived rebellion more than a match society might deem appropriate for the firstborn daughter of a Viscount.” 

“An untitled second son, even less so,” Benedict muses softly, downcasting his eyes, a flare of insecurity that has you putting down your cutlery and grabbing his jaw.

“Benedict, please do not,” you petition, rubbing a thumb over his cheek. “You know me. You know that I have never cared what society might think! If I were to marry, I would only ever want it to be a love match. I would not give a damn if my husband were a penniless beggar as long as he loves and respects me.” 

You pause as he raises his soulful gaze to yours, your faces so close.

“Luckily for me, the man who stole my heart fifteen years ago is neither penniless nor a beggar. He is a wonderful, caring, handsome, passionate artist who I would indeed be lucky to paint next to,” you conclude with reference to a line in his letter, a scene you can picture so clearly it seems more premonition than a dream.

“Fifteen years?” he repeats, a look of utter wonderment as he turns his lips aside to kiss your palm where you still cup his face. You nod, a little nostalgic smile tugging at your lips as he adds: “Then I must confess… I have never been more grateful for my incessant curiosity; it led me to your diary and thus to this very moment.”

He takes your hands from his jaw, then kisses both of your knuckles again in turn, but this time, he lingers, his lips warm, damp and pursed open, and a trace of his tongue dabs your protruding bone. A shiver runs down your spine, stoking something acute, dangerous and exhilarating.

“Do you know I have kept that notebook hidden since I was fourteen? Sewing a secret pocket into all of my coats or hiding it under floorboards so it would never be found. For six years. Yet it took you less than one evening…” 

“Maybe it was waiting to reveal itself to the one person who needed to see it the most…” he muses between kisses, his breath gusting hot over your fingers. 

That seismic but simple poetic sentence devastates your ability or wish to talk anymore—a thronging need for him that you are powerless to resist any longer.

“Take me to our room, Benedict,” you command, voice tremulant with want and hope. 

His head shoots up, his face a captivating tapestry of barely bridled passion and astonishment.

“But I-I booked us separate rooms,” he stumbles, confounded, and that gentlemanly act just makes you want him all the more.

Uncaring that you are sitting in a wedding dress in a public tavern, you pitch forward and capture his lips in a kiss that instantly becomes passionate and demanding, your hand running into his hair and tugging him closer.

“You should return the key and request your money back, for that will not be necessary…” you decree, breathing the words into his mouth.

That seems to light a fire in him. He shoves back the table and sweeps you into his arms bridal style, striding out of the room purposefully, his mouth hot on yours, your pounding heartbeat almost drowning out the bawdy, raucous cheers from the drunken patrons you pass.

-xii-

Once the room door clicks closed behind you, his demeanour softens. He gently removes your shoes before setting your stockinged feet down on a plush rug in front of a roaring fire. He tugs his jacket off so he stands before you in a colourful waistcoat and ruffled shirt.

“Are you certain?” His ask is chivalrous, tinged with such delicate hope it makes you melt.

“I have never been more certain of anything in my entire life,” you declare candidly, boldly stepping towards him.

His hands encircle your waist as yours slide up his biceps, the warmth of his skin through the crisp white fabric making your blood run warm. 

“I may be chaste, but I know of what we are to do; I have been at Granville’s, remember. I also know that I want this. So very much.”

“I am the luckiest man…” he asserts in a low rumble, your honesty seeming to ignite him again as he crowds into you.

It’s an electrifying kiss that has your scalp tingling: his hands moulded to you, mapping your every curve as you take from each other as you never have before, desperation bubbling over with each parry of tongues. His fingers land on the buttons of your dress, between your shoulder blades, silently asking permission.

“Rip it off me,” you urge impulsively, chest heaving within your stays. “I want you to destroy this very dress and everything it represents….”

His responding growl inflames your core, molten liquid heat as his large hands grab the material and tear it asunder from your body so you stand before him, trembling with desire in just your stays and chemise.

He guides your fingers to his waistcoat, the crackle of the fire and the huff of his breaths the only sound in the room. His chest rises and falls steadily as you work on each button. When you reach the last one, he shucks the garment from his torso, then crosses his arms and discards his shirt in one swift motion, sailing away in a puffed arch. The broad expanse of smooth chest before you has you tongue-tied. A lean musculature and pale complexion reminiscent of Italian renaissance sculpture… but living, breathing and looking at you as if you are the most precious thing on earth. 

Long arms wrap around you, enveloping you in his warmth, fingers spidering up the notches of your spine through the thin cotton of your chemise until they reach your stays and pluck upon the laces there. He unties them slowly as his lips trail hotly down your throat. You have observed forms of intimacy but didn't expect the firsthand experience to be so rich, so all-consuming. The sights, the sensations, the scents. Like the tangy undernotes lurking beneath his woody cologne, an aroma that is all him, his bare skin. It makes your mouth water and lean into him; a want to be a part of him almost—so much heat and touch.

As your loosened stays drop to the floor behind you, a clawing need for his flesh on yours has you rapidly discarding your chemise over your head, naked now save your stockings. But before he has the chance to see, you propel yourself into him again, his solid chest colliding with your breasts, your peaked nipples trapped against his warmth. A loud groan from his lips that you swallow as you push up onto tiptoes and wrap your arms around his strong neck, kissing him ferociously. His grip slides down to grasp your bottom, pulling you into him, something rigid pressing your stomach through the refined wool of his trousers. 

“Let me look at you,” he pleads, withdrawing a half step, his eyes sweeping covetously down your body as you feel aglow in the heat of the adjacent fire. “You are so beautiful,” he attests shakily, an insistent throbbing between your legs that is all of his making, so close without any stimulation.

“Touch me, Benedict.” 

It’s equal parts order and request, grabbing his wrist and guiding it low over your belly. His elegant fingertips curl through the patch of hair before swiping between your legs, dilated pupils boring into yours as you emit a wanton moan, knees almost buckling. A strong arm wraps around you to keep you steady as he observes you up close, repeating the motion, parting your folds this time, you honeying upon his fingertips as he glances over your swollen clit. 

You whimper his name, and he claims your lips again, sliding the pad of his fingers over that spot over and over. Fingernails digging into his arm at his expert touch, the air swirling with the wet sound and scent of your arousal.

“You smell so utterly divine,” he groans, pitching forward and almost biting your bottom lip in a toothful, desperate meeting, your moans echoing over his tongue. “I need to taste you,” he stutters.

You have to shoot out an arm to grasp the mantlepiece as he suddenly drops to his knees before you and buries his face into your mound, inhaling deeply, his nose pressed onto your clitoral hood. He is so primal in his desperation as he lifts one of your legs and places it over his shoulder, diving into your folds, his tongue a wet, hot spear over your swollen nub. Your other hand burrows into his thick head of hair, scratching along his scalp as he hums his approval into your damp heat, the vibration causing sparks of pleasure to fan out.

It takes what little shred of concentration you have left to stay upright, clinging to the fireplace and him, rocketing skyward so dizzyingly fast, slack-jawed, breathless, rooted in your body as you gawk down at him. You had no idea this would be so intense, so carnal. His stare is fixated upwards on you, reading your reactions like a book, his glazed jaw moving with expert precision buried between your legs—an intoxicating sight that burns into your retinas.

“I need you to come for me, y/n,” he begs hotly into your soaked flesh, his tongue a muscular swipe greater than his fingers, his fingers plucking the ribbons holding your stockings loose so they slide down to your feet.

“I want to do so with you…” you gasp, unable to prevent whatever forms in your mouth from slipping out, leaking profusely onto his chin.

“You will; I promise,” his gravelly assurance, the permission you need to let go, riding his tongue with abandon, your body undulating, chasing that ephemeral high you have only experienced from your own touch before. But this is so much more, so wholly other, magnitudes indeed, the words from his letter never far from your thoughts even as you spiral somewhere close to bliss. His gaze locked onto you, able to read all your signs: skin flushed, ragged pants, shuddering with each quest of his tongue.

And then he gently bites your clit, and you are gone, his hands needing to clamp onto your hips to hold you upright as your body convulses. You cry out, sagging onto him as your body races with a high that fizzes in every cell, radiating in waves of pleasure that have you calling out, uncaring who may hear, incapable of anything but clinging to his hair for dear life and scrunching your toes into the thick wool rug underfoot.

You know you utter a curse, entirely overpowered by the euphoria coursing through you as he stands back up and pulls you into his arms, kissing your cheek chastely, the scent of you strong on his face. But as you come back to yourself, renewed passion stokes in you, determination to give as good as you have been given, a drive for mutual pleasure that has you shoving him backwards forcefully.

He falls back onto the bed, a look of total surprise claiming his face as you crowd over him, laying prone, attacking his trouser buttons with a vigour that has him stunned, his mouth agape. But he doesn't move to stop you, far from it. There is a flash in his eye as you grab his hands and cage them onto the sheets briefly before returning to attack his clothing. Wordlessly, he lifts his pelvis when you tap his hipbone, and then you are tugging his trousers down and off, flinging them across the room.

You are momentarily taken aback when you look down and realise he is without underwear, now as naked as you. His cock, nestled in a small patch of hair, is larger than you have seen before, tinged dark pink and leaking from the tip. It looks so good you bite your lip, a twinge deep inside that is pure want. 

His moan is beautiful as you take him in hand. He is hot and steely in your grip as you move your hand up and down, learning his contours, fascinated by the contrast of how silky his skin is.

“I am so glad you have seen things you should not have,” he groans, squirming delightfully, so very responsive to your touch. It makes you greedy always to have him like this, yearning for you as much as you do him, stuttering your name as you change your grip and move a little faster.

“Please stop…” he grits out, his hand covering yours and slowing your motions, but you can tell it is utterly reluctant. “I am too close, my love…”

That reflexive term of endearment makes something melt behind your ribs, and you crawl up over him as you release his cock, claiming his lips in a kiss, his hands encircling your waist, pulling you down so that his cock is trapped under your pubic bone.

“I love you,” you breathe quietly over his lips, holding his face, wanting to convey the depth of feelings you have for this man.

“I love you too, y/n,” he replies earnestly, his eyes glassy, a cloud of emotion claiming his expression as his hands cup your jaw as well, a profound moment of heartfelt sincerity amid this tableau of fevered physicality.

“May I?” 

Your ask is hesitant as you rearrange, sliding your legs up either side of his hips, signalling your wish to ride him, a need to be the one to give your virginity to him more than him to take it. Something achingly significant in the ability to choose.

He nods a reassuring and spellbound look, and a beguiling hitch in his throat as his tip brushes your entrance.

“It may hurt a little, my love,” he advises, wincing as if wishing that was not the case for you.

“I know,” you murmur back, grabbing his hands to aid you in sitting up so you have more range of motion. 

And then, with a steadying breath, you lower yourself onto him, mouth falling open at the invasive stretch with barely a fraction of him inside you. His face is a kaleidoscope of everything you hope for him—joy and bliss. Your fingers grasp tight around his knuckles, your joined hands a knotted fist, as you feel a pinch of pain that makes you suck air through your teeth, knowing this is the moment you become a woman. So glad it is with him, the categorical love of your life.

Luckily, the ache is fleeting, and you sink lower, him moaning your name lyrically, you puffing a breath at the complete fullness. A pressure holding you open that is so galvanic you now understand the hedonism of what you have previously witnessed—the drive to satisfy an urge that is innate and potent.  

“Oh my god, Benedict,” you stutter, as finally he is fully seated within your body, clinging to him, held open in the most arresting way.

“I know, my love, I know…” he soothes, untangling your hands to touch your skin, running his palms reverentially down your body. “You are amazing, a wonder…” 

“Guide me…?”

He smiles and whispers gentle instructions for you to push up with your thighs and then sink back down, his hands now clamped around your waist to assist you. The sensation is indescribable, the drag of his cock against your walls as you slowly ascend and descend, trying to catalogue every second as a precious memory.

Your speed increases as you get used to the physicality of movement, a cloying, dewy heat spreading over both your bodies as you move in unison. He starts to tilt his hips off the bed to assist in your strokes, pushing to a new depth that catches your breath and has you muttering a curse, your hands scrabbling his abdomen, enjoying the flex of muscles there. His grip moves to your breasts, teasing your nipples in a way that has you gasping and riding harder. His fingers snagging on your sensitive buds is a beeline zipping to your engorged clit, that mashes into his body with every downward stroke you take. Still on a high from your last orgasm, it won't take much more for you to come again; this time, you hope in tandem.

His movements become more urgent, his noises louder, his touch firmer, squeezing you, bucking up with force now, making you moan with each new plunge onto him, as if he craves to leave an imprint of himself inside you.

“Are you close, my love?” you query, borrowing his term of endearment. It has his screwed-shut eyes flying open, his hands flexing on your hips, and a ripple up his rigid cock you can actually feel.

“Yesssss,” he hisses back, “please call me that again,” he entreats through clenched teeth, a prominent vein in his neck pulsing hard as his whole being seems to tense.

“My love,” you coo, treating it like a gift to bestow, addicted already to the effect it has on him, his fingers digging into your flesh in a way that will leave marks you will be proud to wear.

You move faster now, the sturdy bed squeaking in protest, the sound of your damp skin slapping together, taking even yourself by surprise at how visceral this is, especially for a first time. Expecting it to be less somehow and enraptured that instead, it is better, burning brighter than anything you have ever fantasised of—skin and sweat, muscle and bone, heart and body in rhapsody. 

One of his hands squirrels between your legs, fingertips hooking against your clit, and within seconds, you are breaking. Your vision whiting out as you slam onto him, your pussy clenching in waves, his cock almost too much as you float somewhere that is both within you and a thousand miles above. Dimly, you sense his nails scrape your flesh as he calls out your name, loudly, debauched, wrecked, a strong pulse through his length as he shudders then goes entirely still, a warmth blooming deep inside your channel that is his seed, something about it so very primaeval. 

You slump inelegantly onto his chest, huffing breaths, altered fundamentally by this magical experience. His touch is soothing, encouraging to lay upon him as he softens within you, eventually slipping out as you lay nuzzled together, exchanging soft words of sated joy—a sudden tide of fatigue lapping your edges. Fuzzily, you feel Benedict chuckle under you and, with hushed, tender words, rearrange your pliant body, rolling you onto your side and curling protectively around you, a warming presence that has sleep seizing you almost immediately.

Awakening the following morning in Benedict’s arms is sublime, his stubbled lips grazing your neck as he rolls you under his warm weight. Just as your body stirs under his sensual kisses, he stops and sighs, dropping his forehead onto your clavicle.

“I wish to spend a lifetime right here, entwined naked with you, my love, but alas, I must desist,” he laments softly. “We need to get moving…”

“You never did say your planned destination,” you point out, running your fingers into his lush hair as he tilts his handsome face up to meet your gaze.

“Did I not?” He lilts, feigning ignorance. “I blame you entirely; your beauty is far too distracting..” Flattery falling from his lips reflexively. “Well, anyway, we must make haste if we are to reach Scotland by Friday as I have planned.”

“Scotland?” you echo breathlessly. “That is so far! Why there?”

“Gretna Green, my love,” his eyes sparkling as he hovers over you, entwining the fingers of your left hands together, his thumb brushing your ring finger. “I hope you are amenable to my proposal...”

And your heart veritably explodes.

-xiii-

The journey is long but worth it. Your wedding, five days later, over the border in Scotland, is everything you could hope for—a beautiful, romantic, private moment for just the two of you, promising your lives to each other in secret. Something thrillingly illicit about its location, too, the place to which all forbidden lovers escape. You do not wear a wedding dress, just a simple light blue chiffon one you had thrown into your night bag, always a favourite since Benedict once complimented you in it. He wears a cravat in the same colour. Exchanging matching wedding bands engraved inside with the same phrase Benedict signed off his love confession with: A vila mon coeur, gardi li mo (Here is my heart, guard it well).

You are happily ensconced in his idyllic Wiltshire cottage by the time family reactions to your elopement reach you almost two weeks later. The Bridgertons are supportive if a little shocked; the dowager Viscountess is always enamoured with a dramatic love story. Your family is less so, but they cannot deny a match with a Bridgerton is no bad thing, even if it was fleeting gossip fodder. You hear from your mother that Lord Farringdon did not demand compensation for your abscondment from the altar. Apparently, you were not the first to do so. Rumour has it that the odious man is negotiating a marriage deal with the Cowpers for their wayward daughter. It may be the first time you have felt a pang of sympathy for Cressida. 

Mostly, you are grateful that the more scandalous truth surrounding your union - Benedict stealing you away on your wedding day - never becomes public knowledge. Every couple must keep some secrets from the world, no? 

Although, a couple of weeks later, on a leisurely Sunday morning, you discover your marriage can no longer be considered as such.

“Darling, you might want to see this…” Benedict drawls casually, wandering into the bathroom as you luxuriate in warm water. 

He drops the latest issue of Lady Whistledown onto a nearby stool as he tugs off his shirt, apparently planning to join you in your bath. Your mouth falls open in shock as you grab the pamphlet. But it is not from his naked form as his trousers hit the floor; it's from what you read:

Lastly, this author may have to eat her hat. News has reached me that Mr Benedict Bridgerton had indeed done the almost unthinkable and married the spirited Miss Y/n Y/l/n. They exchanged vows in a quiet ceremony far from the prying eyes of the Ton and will now settle in Wiltshire, I hear. 

“How did she find out?” you ponder aloud as he slides into the tub behind you. Surely Whistledown must be close to the Bridgertons to discover as such?

“I have not a clue. But perhaps I should send her some honey from our hives to make her headwear more digestible?” he jests, interrupting your reading by pulling you backwards into his arms. 

“Mr Bridgerton!” you chastise playfully, holding the paper aloft to save it from the sloshing he creates as he surrounds you, laughing carefree, so much delightfully naked skin around yours.

“Are you done reading Mrs Bridgerton?” His tone changes to a husky murmur in your ear, his fingers trailing distractingly upwards over your ribs under the water.

“You just brought this to me, husband,” you riposte pointedly, but your argument dies off into a wanton noise as his hands slide up and cup your breasts, his thumbs circling your nipples expertly. You abandon any attempt to focus on the page, tossing the paper aside and twisting to capture his lips with yours.

Upon the floor, as water splashes onto the wood nearby, the last few sentences you missed glow in a shaft of sunlight:

Congratulations on the latest Bridgerton love match, and I wish them a lifetime of happiness. As I am certain, do all of you. 

What secrets will I unearth next, dear readers? Even I do not yet know. But I look forward to it. Don’t you?

Yours sincerely,

Lady Whistledown

masterlist • wips • taglist (follow this blog to be tagged)

Benedict taglist pt1: @makaylan @longingintheuniverse @iboopedyournose @colettebronte @aintnuthinbutahounddog @severewobblerlightdragon @writergirl-2001 @heeyyyou @enichole445 @enchantedbytomandhenry @ambitionspassionscoffee @chaoticcalzoneranchsports @nikaprincessofkattegat @baebee35 @crowleysqueenofhell @fiction-is-life @lilacbeesworld @broooookiecrisp @queen-of-the-misfit-toys @eleanor-bradstreet @divaanya @musicismyoxygen84 @miindfucked @sorryallonsy @cayt0123 @hottytoddyhistory @fictionalmenloversblog @zinzysstuff @malpalgalz @kinokomoonshine @causeimissu @delehosies @m-rae23 @last-sheep @panhoeofmanyfandoms @kmc1989 @desert-fern @corpseoftrees-queen @magical-spit @bunnyweasley23 @how-many-stars-in-the-sky @sya-skies

[holycrimin]

In honor of me getting my first ever TMNT Comic,

here's Leo with a crush who gets overly excited when gifted something they're obsessed/hyperfixated with (cough definitely not me cough)

while I did buy the comic for myself (it was an Eastman and Laird's TMNT adventure special) I wanted to explore this more because my brain is way too active and i need an outlet lol

pls dont blame me if its a little ooc, im trying my best and this is impulsive T0T

note: Reader uses they/them, Leo is a massive dork, semi proofread

2012!Leo x Expressive!Reader

Saw something he thought you'd like while on patrol,

"Hey guys, you think they'll like this?" He looks throught the window.

They snicker and shit on him (lovingly in a sibling way)

Whether it was a poster or figurine or comic, he's getting that baby just for you

Obviously he'd get it by paying because stealing would be wrong.

And by paying he means snatching it in the middle of the night and leaving a twenty with an apology note

Because that's what heroes do

anyway

Hops up to your apartment,

(with his brothers watching from the shadows because they absolutely cannot resist a good show. yes, even Donnie; like a true hypocrite)

He makes sure that neither your parents are there with you and he knocks on the window

You, with your ultra smart brain, immediately knew it was him because it was either that or a murderer that climbed up to specifically your window to murder you

which was unlikely, but hey, so was being friends with a giant turtle

You open your window and are immediately greeted with a shiny (not-so-brand new) comic/poster/figurine of the thing you talked about nonstop for weeks. maybe months. actually now that you think about it it mightve been year—

"Hey."

"Wh-"

"No way. NO WAY." You take it out of his hands (gently) and look at it in awe, before looking up at him with a dazzled expression

(If you squinted you could see sparkles coming off of you)

"What- Where- Dude. Where'd you even find this?!" A wide grin on your face as you look at him.

"Oh y'know.. Patrol and fighting bad guys, awesome stuff. Uh, then, y'know.. I found some merch that I thought you'd like."

"Dude he's seriously blowing this." one of the guys (mikey) whisper. "Yeah, he's worse than Donnie." he says, earning a 'Hey!' from Donnie.

Leo glares at them for a second before turning his attention back to you.

You let out a giddy giggle, "ahh! dude!"

"Dude." You set it down gently and put both of your hands on his shoulders. "I. Love you. So much. You know that?"

He blushes a little, "Well, I mean, it's not really a big de-"

"Not a big deal?! DUDDEE I LOVE IT SO MUCH. Is this a marriage proposal?" You say, shaking him a little.

"Wh- um.. What?" Leo lets out a weak chuckle, he feels his face heating up. "Because I accept. Let's get married, I love you so much. Oh my god, you have no idea-"

Ohhh god.

Yeah, that does it.

Well, even more than it already has.

"Whahahaha... Okay, uh, You don't really mean that, do y-" Oh.

"..Oh, sorry, is that too far? I mean, I do it with my other friends, but I'm not sure- Leo?" Yeah, no this is going to kill him. Kinda pathetic, huh? That a kiss on the cheek could send him spiraling just like that.

"Ah.. hahahah! Okay cool, haha.. uh, bye! I'll ah.. see you tomorrow? yep. Yeah. Okay, bye!"

He runs off.

Aw crap.

Did you do something wrong? God, you hope not. Maybe you should tone it down next time.

"Smooth moves brother, really got them falling for you."

"Shut up."

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

Total writing time: idk like 15-20 mins?

Any fellow fic writers feel free to take inspo or even write a direct sequel to this, I just really like this idea and would absolutely love to read more abt it lol

[theladyheroine]

🥞 Pancakes 🥞

Movie! Shadow x Platonic! Reader

Genre: Fluff, Cozy, Silly

Word Count: 1,503 words

⚠️ Warning: None, except little embarrassment

Summary: Hi guys! I got excited about my last Shadow fic so I wrote another one! The songs I used are this one & this one btw, but this fic is more casual than the previous one so it’s much shorter too. Inspired by when my Mom recently caught me dancing (lol).

I want to spend my life 

With a girl like you!

Ba-ba-ba-ba-ba,

Faint words filtered through Shadow’s ears as his eyelids fluttered open. It took him a while to fully realize he was awake, but thankfully he didn’t feel too heavy. He rested for a minute before sitting up and scooting over to the bedside. 

It wasn’t very bright, surprisingly. He saw the blinds had been left open and the dark gray sky filtered over the room. Raindrops scattered across glass, making a rhythmic noise, but it felt nice. 

Till that time has come, 

That we might live as one!

Can I dance with you?

Perking up at the cool words, he shuffled his way towards the door and into the hallway. The sound grew louder before Shadow realized it was music playing, and a buttery smell accompanied it. 

Most of the lights were off since it wasn’t exactly dark out, but only one or two yellow lights shone above the kitchen stove. With you moving and swaying there in a very strange manner. Shadow would hardly call it dancing: you were just bobbing up and down, tossing your head and holding a spatula to your face. If he didn’t know you prior he would’ve thought you looked foolish. But you were his friend now, he wasn’t about to judge. 

Girl, why should it be 

That you don't notice me?

“Can I dance with you?— OhmygoshShadow!!"

You yelped loudly as you quickly jolted back, surprised— and embarrassed— to find Shadow standing behind you. Your spatula knocked into a bowl of pancake batter, sending a blob of beige-white goo down to the floor. 

“Ohshoot-sorry! I didn’t see you there bud!” 

“No, I should’ve said something.” 

You rushed to grab a paper towel and swipe the batter off your tiles, but Shadow beat you to it. 

“Nah, it’s all good! I should’ve been paying attention.” You chuckled and grabbed another one, soaking it under the sink then cleaned any excess mush. 

“Is that The Troggs playing?” Shadow asked, tossing the mess into the trash can. 

You quickly lowered the stove temperature and nodded, “Yup! They’re awesome huh! I love their songs.” 

You were about to scoop up some more batter, then paused for a minute. 

“Wait—You know The Troggs?!” You exclaimed, swinging your face back around. 

“Mmhmm,” Shadow nodded. “I’ve heard only one song, until now.”

You gave a mental “huh” before going back to your pancakes. Even hedgehogs had good taste in music. Who knew?

It had been a full month now since Shadow started living with you, and even without teleportation, he still had ways of surprising you.  

You were home all day since it was the weekend, but Shadow had spent most of his time in his room. He usually did; if you weren’t up and about neither was he. In a way, he was like your own little shadow. You never pressed what he did alone, but judging by his expression, he had just woken up from a nap. 

“What are you doing?” Shadow peered over the counter, quills twitching with curiosity.

“Just makin’ some pancakes. They’re a little crispy though.” 

You slid a slightly burnt piece onto a plate. The pretty golden circles stood in a short stack and gave off an amazing smell. You could see Shadow lean closer as his red eyes grew bigger. 

“They’re…pancakes?” He stated his words as if asking a question, but to himself. Which made you curious. 

“Yep! I know it’s weird having breakfast for lunch, but I wanted to make something different this time.” 

“Uh huh.” He drawled. “They smell nice.”

His brows scrunched up and down, spreading more confusion across his face as Shadow watched the pan sizzle. Pancakes seemed like such an alien concept to him, ironically. 

“Shadow?” You asked. “Have you ever had a pancake before?” 

He paused again, but shook his head. “No. Are they any good?”

“Uh–yes!! They’re delicious!” 

To say you were surprised was an understatement: how could he not know about pancakes? 

Until the realization hit you that he probably hasn’t even seen pancakes before. You didn’t know where Shadow came from, and have avoided mentioning it in the past. Even after you became friends. In all that time spent together, you hardly knew a thing about him. And he still seemed reluctant to share. 

Movement shook you from your daze as Shadow picked up your spatula, poking the goo in the bowl like a little kid. His story would have to wait for another day. Your top priority: showing him the best brunch ever. 

Life could be a dream! Life could be a dream!

Do do do do, SH-Boom!

Your phone quickly changed its tune as The Chords started playing. It couldn’t have picked a more perfect song. 

“Why don’t you give this a try Shadow!” You scooted the pan closer to him, turning off the heat and switching it to the other side. 

“Me?” He fumbled with the spatula. 

“Yea, why not! Don’t worry I’ll help you.” You gave a cheeky grin, “Besides, it’ll be fun to learn. Right?”

Shadow opened his mouth to reply, but shut it quickly. You had always made meals for him, or either helped him make them. Even when you were gone there’d always be something from the previous night, or wrapped up in plastic. 

But you had a point, he couldn’t rely on you for everything. Especially now. If he was going to stay, he’d have to start pulling his weight around. 

“Alright,” He tugged back his gloves and set himself behind the stove. “I’m ready.”

You poured a cup of batter into the pan. For such a serious character, he looked so adorable.

You two waited for a few minutes before you set your hand on his arm, helping him flip the pancake to the other side. It shifted a little, making tiny splatters, but the color was perfect. For the second one you let him do it himself, and it looked far better than the first.

Life could be a dream! SH-Boom!

If I could take you to a paradise up above,

SH-Boom! And tell me darling, 

“I’m the only one that you love!” You shimmied back and forth to the music as Shadow continued to pour and flip the batter. 

For a first timer he was doing incredibly well! Fast even; his pancakes came out looking far better than yours! To which Shadow claimed could only come natural to him. You shot a surprised look, but you were happy seeing him loosen up. After a little while, Shadow even joined in your silly dance moves. His shoes tapped along to the beat, and you could see his body bouncing as he mouthed the lyrics. You tried giving him a little bump of encouragement, til he stopped and looked at you strangely. 

“Wow!” You coughed, “You’re really getting the hang of this bud.” 

Shadow rolled his eyes but he kept smiling. “Thanks. This is..easier than I expected.” 

After a short while, you two had a full stack of pancakes. You quickly shut off the stove and tossed the bowl into the sink. Maneuvering the food to the countertop, you pulled out two little plates. You were about to grab the butter, but Shadow beat you once again. 

“Can I do it?” The container looked so small in his big hands. 

You nodded and found a plastic knife in the drawers. Leaving Shadow to butter the pancakes while you looked for the syrup. 

You came back from the pantry with a tall bottle in your hands, and to say Shadow was amazed was a clear understatement. The light in his eyes when the dark syrup trickled down the edible tower was enough to brighten any room. 

You two settled at the table, plates in hand. Meals were typically had together nowadays, but each time it felt different somehow. Shadow had come a long way, going from a worrisome little thing to a happy hedgehog! And you couldn’t be prouder.

“‘Kay bud, dig in!” You pushed your fork into the food and Shadow did the same, cutting it into bite sized pieces. 

Everything seemed normal, until after a few bites Shadow stopped. He just sat there, chewing, but his expression quickly changed. It wasn't confusion, more like—a blank expression? 

“Shadow?” You said through your food. “You doin’ okay there?”

Oh how you hoped he didn’t grab the burnt one.

In an instant, Shadow took a larger piece and shoved it in his mouth. He only half chewed before doing the same thing. He did this three more times and it took him about a minute to finish half the plate. 

Syrup coated his mouth, and he swallowed hard before speaking. “You were right. Pancakes are the superior choice.” 

That was all he said before stuffing his face again. 

“Yea-I-erm—yea! Well, I’m glad you like them!” 

You rushed over to sink and grabbed a cup of water. Thinking next time, you should just make eggs instead.

❣️—THE END—❣️

[ghost-proofbaby]

twenty four hours (modern!eddie munson x fem!reader)

→ tropes: enemies to lovers, forced proximity, slow burn

→ warnings: strong language, smut (oral, f receiving), overload of cheesiness, upside down does not exist, minors dni

→ wc: 11.8k+

→ a/n: this might be the cheesiest, fluffiest thing i've ever written, and i can't even be bothered to care. it might be unrealistic. it might be too much. i do not care. this has been a long time coming and i think we all deserve all the cheese after this story.

i don't even know what to say besides thank you. thank you to everyone who followed along from the beginning, to those of you joined the journey along the way, to those of you who are reading as we finish it up. thank you for all the support and love you guys have shown this fic. i will always, always, appreciate it more than i know how to say. i love these idiots, and i love you all.

if you would like to see this story continued through small blurbs, my ask box is officially open to requests from this universe. i will also probably be posting some "beyond the hours" content over the next few weeks.

thank you. i love you.

without further ado...

masterlist.

spotify playlist.

EPILOGUE: A BET

TWO MONTHS LATER

“Why are there so many fuckin’ options?” 

Eddie stares at the line up of smartphones before him, all different models and different physical sizes, different colors and different memory amounts. 

“There’s not that many,” you murmur, wrapping your arms around him from behind as you rest your chin on his shoulder. It’s a bit of a stretch, making you lean up onto your tippy toes, “Besides, isn’t having options a good thing?” 

He scoffs as he brings a hand up subconsciously to where your arms overlap on his torso, grip gentle as he runs a thumb over your skin and gives a squeeze, “Sure, options are great. But there’s at least twenty different iPhones on display here, sweetheart.” 

The last few months had been interesting, to say the least. A new and exciting journey initially, but also a fairly stressful ordeal given all the hoops you two had been jumping through. You’re both busy people, having to suddenly figure out how to carve out a specific space for each other amongst bustling lives. It wasn’t the same as making time for friends or a weekly night out; it was figuring out times for dates, times for lazy afternoons, times for just you and just Eddie.

And, occasionally, time to take Eddie shopping for a new phone. Finally.

“Well, better pick one fast,” your fingers dig into his side playful, and he blows out an annoyed breath as he side-eyes you. You only retaliate in a fast peck to his cheek before whispering in his ear, “We’re gonna be late if you keep taking all day.” 

It was Argyle’s birthday party tonight. His actual birthday wasn’t for another week, but he’d be venturing back home to California for that. And so the group elected to throw him a preemptive party at one of the group’s favorite bars. 

Which — fine. Awesome. You were excited, you really were: you loved Argyle, you loved your friends, you even found yourself warming back up to parties.

But your friends didn’t know. 

Two whole months, and neither you nor Eddie had told a single soul of what had become between you two. Not even Steve. Not even Nancy. 

At first the excuse was to give this time to grow, to find your footing before you brought your lovable yet rambunctious group of friends into the equation. But then you two had found your footing, and you’d worried what they would say. Eddie had nearly made himself sick with anxiety over Nancy finding out he’d kept this relationship from her. They’d support you two — that wasn’t a worry. They’d proven that since the first time the entire group had hung out after the bet.

“So,” Robin started, narrowing her eyes at you and Eddie sitting on opposite ends of her and Steve’s couch. Neither of you had said a word to each other yet (Plenty had already been said that morning as you’d snuck him out of your dorm), “You two really aren’t together?” 

“Why is everyone so adamant that the bet has to end with us getting together?” you jeered.

Eddie didn’t help the cause when he was quick to take your side, “Exactly! The bet’s over. We lasted twenty four hours. We’re friends now — isn’t that what you guys wanted?” 

“I actually wanted to help you dudes plan a winter wedding,” Argyle chimed from the kitchen where he was retrieving a coke, “So I’m gonna side with Birdie on this one.” 

“Of course you are,” you muttered beneath your breath. 

Everything in you ached to be sitting next to Eddie rather than so far. You ached for his arm around you, his lips pressed to your temple. Just to share body heat, even — innocent thighs brushing with layers of denim between would have been enough.  

“It’ll happen eventually,” Nancy mused from her seat on the kitchen counter, Jonathan beside her and matching her confident energy with a sly grin, “Just give them time.” 

What they hadn’t realized is that it already did happen. The moment Eddie showed up to your dorm and the two of you said to Hell with space, it was inevitable. 

Now, it was just the challenge of letting your friends in on the secret.

“What about the red one?” Eddie asks you as you finally unravel from him.

“Of course you’re choosing the red one.” 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he scowls, no malice behind it as you step up to occupy the space next to him, brushing shoulders for only a moment before his hand is grabbing yours, intertwining fingers like second nature. 

You recall that moment on his balcony, where he had once been so nervous and hesitant to hold your hand. 

“Nothing,” you shake your head, smiling to yourself as you look at the specific model he was talking about, “You’re just getting a little bit predictable, Munson.” 

He opens his mouth to argue, to nip back at what you always offer him, when one of the salesmen approach you two.

“Hi folks! Can I help you with anything today?”

Eddie squeezes your hand, no doubt in an effort to withhold his laughter at the man’s overly chirpy tone. You squeeze back, if for nothing more than to let him know you felt him.

Despite Eddie’s previous claim to a decision, he still chooses to entertain the man. Asking questions about different models, inquiring for recommendations as if they’d change his mind. They go back and forth, both polite enough, but the conversation easily bores you. In five seconds flat, your mind has officially wandered off.

You two hadn’t really discussed the specific details of the night to come. Whether you’d ride with Eddie there, how you’d navigate Eddie’s natural born clinginess once he got a few drinks in him, if tonight might be the night to finally tell your friends. 

The last one felt a bit obvious. It was Argyle’s night — you didn’t want to snatch the attention from him for even a second. 

But there were layers to your anxiety. Because it was more than just how to navigate how you two would display yourselves to your friends on nights out. 

It had been two months, and you still hadn’t said those three little words back to Eddie.

He didn’t pressure you. He never once brought it back up, never once pressured you. But just because he wasn’t constantly reminding you vocally that he loved you didn’t mean you didn’t feel it. You’d felt it, impossible to miss, when all those lazy morning fantasies became reality. You felt it during movie marathons and you felt it every time he’d worship your body. It was there — in the late nights, in the early mornings, in the dull afternoons. A wild thing unleashed in your gardens, all those vines you’d worked so hard to see flourish threatened to be torn up by impatient claws at the feeling growing rapidly in your chest every time you looked at him.

And slowly, surely, you knew that there was only so much longer that like could suffice in describing your feelings for Eddie. 

You were falling, whether he was aware or not. You just needed to figure out the right moment for those three little words to unstick, to go from hot honey on your tongue to easy breaths between you two. He’s given you time, he’d filled the months you’d awarded him with making up for every previously bitter exchange, and yet you still couldn’t give him this. And you’re starting to believe maybe that’s why you couldn’t imagine telling your friends yet. 

You sort of hated yourself for it.

You’re pulled back to reality once the salesman departs, no doubt into the back to grab Eddie’s choice of phone. You don’t even have to ask; you know he got the red one.

“Hey,” Eddie fully turns to you, bringing your knuckles to his lips in chaste kisses. Your stomach still kicks with flutters, your heart still warms at the gesture. Eddie’s affection has yet to lose novelty, “Where’d you go?”

“What do you mean?” you twist your face, “I was here the entire tim-“

“Not where’d you physically go,” he clarifies, letting your conjoined hands drop back to the sliver of space between your bodies, “Mentally. Where’d your mind just go?”

 You hadn’t thought he’d notice your drifting.

“Nowhere,” you shrug off.

“Nowhere? So you’re really just that interested in the newest iPhone model?” 

He pointedly looks up at the widescreen display you don’t doubt you’d been blankly staring at the entirety of his conversation with the man who had yet to return.

“Oh, absolutely. You know me so well.” 

All bark, no bite. These days, all the previous venom that had infected exchanges with Eddie prior to the bet had finally been sucked clean from the wound, long gone to make room for all the genuine affection to seep into its place. You still argued — or perhaps bantered was a better word for it — but you didn’t fight. You both still grated on one another’s nerves and managed to slither beneath the other’s skin, but not in an unwelcome way. 

It was a nice change.

It made you hate yourself even more for not saying those three little words. 

Eddie seemingly reads your mind, “Are you nervous for tonight?”

“I-“ you consider lying to him and saying it hadn’t even crossed your mind, but the look he gives you warns against it, “We just haven’t… discussed it.” 

“What’s there to discuss?” 

You hold up your interlocked hands for emphasis, raising your eyebrows at Eddie.

His mouth falls open softly, eyes widening, “Oh. Are you- Are you wanting to tell them tonight?” 

No, your gut screams, absolutely not tonight.

“Is Argyle’s birthday party really the best time to explode their minds?” 

You try to keep your tone teasing as you sense Eddie’s own nerves creeping up. Sometimes it was fun, standing in a room with everyone and pretending to be more akin to strangers than lovers. But sometimes, it was just plain painful. Sometimes, the entire group would be laughing at something, and you craved nothing more than to be pressed into Eddie’s side and feel the vibrations of his shared joy rather than just having to listen to it from across the room. 

It’s not that you wanted to tell your friends and cause a scene — you just didn’t want to have to hide anymore. And maybe you wouldn’t have to, if you’d just tell him how you felt.

“Probably not,” Eddie murmurs, “I mean, it’s his night. We can always tell them the next time we all get together.”

The issue is that’s what the two of you always say. You always brush it off for the next time. 

You can only sigh in defeat as you see the salesman finally bounding back out from the back room, a small box holding Eddie’s purchase in his grip, “Yeah. Next time.” 

You can’t even be mad at next time. It’s the same thing you tell yourself every time you felt those words on the tip of your tongue, so close yet so far from revealing the most terrifying truth you’d discovered yet to Eddie.

You let go of his hand long enough for him to check out, hardly overhearing when he questions how they can transfer all the data from his current flip phone. When he seems particularly worried about pictures transferring, you don’t think anything of it.

—

STEVE-O: do i need to pick you up tonight? 

You don’t see the text. You’re a bit busy with something when it comes through.

Something is currently still between your legs, curls threaded between your fingers as your back arches off his mattress and his name starts to come out as a desperate whimper rather than a chant. 

STEVE-O: ???

The initial buzz of your phone on his nightstand doesn’t phase either of you. Eddie’s tongue still works you eagerly, circling your clit as you tug particularly harshly at his roots. Each flick sends white hot pleasure through your bones, nearly making you see stars.

“Fuck,” you gasp out when he brings his fingers into the mix. You can feel his smile against you as he curls his fingers inside of you, mimicking a come hither motion and relishing in your little pants as your thighs tighten around his shoulders, “Oh, fuck. Right there, Eddie. I- Eddie.” 

The way you’re moaning his name only encourages him as he slips in a second finger, stretching you further. You feel cool metal bumping your entrance, sending shocks up your spine as his lips suction against you and he sucks hard.

He hadn’t even taken the time to remove his rings when the two of you had gotten home. He had been too eager, dragging you to his bedroom with his lips attached to your neck from the moment he’d shut the front door behind the two of you until he’d thrown you down on his bed.

“That’s right, baby,” his voice vibrates against your clit, “Say my name. Tell everyone who’s making you feel this goo-“

STEVE-O: helllooooo????

“Okay, who the fuck keeps texting you?” Eddie finally pulls back when he realizes you’re slipping out of that bubble he’d created, your head having turned towards the nightstand in curiosity, “Let me guess, it’s your other boyfriend?” 

Your head is still spinning and your chest continues to heave from that lingering pleasure he’d been offering so generously to you. He sounds annoyed, but you can guarantee you’re even more irked. 

“I don’t have another boyfriend,” you blandly reply, not taking his bait.

It only makes him wrap his hands around your thighs on his shoulder, giving a playful squeeze as you reach out for your phone. 

“You sure?” 

You squint at the notifications, but don’t properly read them, only rolling your eyes at both the fact that Steve’s the one interrupting this precious moment and at Eddie’s valiant teasing.

You slam the phone back down, eyes trailing down to his, “I am, but I can certainly find another boyfriend if you don’t get your mouth back on me in the next three seconds-“ 

He doesn’t need a second warning. In an instant, the warmth of his tongue is back on you, lapping at all the spots he’s come to memorize as of recently. That pleasure comes back into reach, edging your vision with feathery black as your eyes flutter shut and the coil in your stomach tightens.

You throw your head back into one of his pillows, one that has started to smell like your shampoo now rather than his, and let a drawn out whine escape your lips.

“You were saying?” he teases, grinning wickedly. He takes that brief moment to come up for air, turning and sinking his teeth into the soft flesh of your thigh beside his cheek. Not hard enough to draw blood, and probably not hard enough to leave indents. But it is enough to have you preening once more as your heels dig into his bare back and you try to lift your hips, desperate for his mouth again.

He was edging you. Without even meaning to, he was repeatedly bringing you to the edge only to leave you teetering. 

With your focus back on him, you can admire how pretty he looks. Mouth slick with you, pupils blown out, hair an absolute mess. You like him best this way, you think, when he looks so absolutely devoted to you. When he’s looking at you with a hunger you almost can’t place. It makes you want to scream from the rooftops about how you’ve fallen for him. How you feel so much more than like for your boy. 

STEVE-O: seriously. if you don’t respond, you can just walk. you have five minutes.

At the buzz of the phone, your hands leave Eddie’s hair to form fists, pounding them into the mattress at your side in a brief tantrum. He ceases all actions, pulling his lips away from you again, and it only makes you pout more. 

“Baby,” he coos, fingers trailing up the sides of your thighs before he reaches out to hold your fists down, “Maybe you should answer him. Tell him to fuck off-“

Eddie’s interrupted as your phone fully bursts to life with your ringtone.

You were going to kill Steve Harrington. 

“On second thought, let me answer it,” Eddie groans as you reach out and grab it once more, “Give the fucker a piece of my mind.”

“Shut up,” you hiss as you realize it’s Robin calling. You turn the screen so he can see, and his eyebrows lift in surprise.

He makes no move to remove himself from between your legs, though. He stays face to face with your aching core.

“Hello?” you snap after swiping to answer.

“Finally! My God, Steve’s been texting you-“

“I didn’t see the texts.”

“Do you need a ride?”

“Nope.” 

You’ve never been so short with your friends. 

But that pleasure is slipping from you, the flames of your impending orgasm dying down to nothing more than embers. It’s enough to piss anyone off. 

“Are you sure?” Robin asks, sounding genuinely concerned, “It’s kind of a far walk-“

“I’m running late,” you sigh, realizing that you were going to have to come up with a lie to get off the hook. Another thing you hated about the hiding — it led to your friendships being littered with dishonesty. Always a new excuse as to why you weren’t available, always feigning reasons as to why you didn’t reply to texts as timely as you used to. “With getting ready. I could- I don’t know, do you think Eddie might pick me up? Isn’t my dorm along the way to the bar from his place?” 

At the mention of his name, he perks up. His cheek settles against the exact spot he had bit just moments before, nearly nuzzling into you as your free hand comes down to gently push back his bangs. On instinct, you find yourself soothingly pressing your fingertips in slow circles against his scalp. You’re nearly melting beneath his soft gaze, those big and wide eyes locked on you with bated breath.

“You want Eddie to pick you up?” you suddenly hear Steve exclaim in the background.

Your face scrunches up, a wrinkle forming across the bridge of your nose and between your brows. It’s so damn cute to Eddie that he can’t help but press a quick kiss to the skin he continues to lay into, beginning to smile as your absent-minded head massage continues. 

So much more than like.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know I was on speaker.” 

“Why do you want Munson to pick you up?” Steve ignores your sarcasm, voice sounding closer to the phone now, “He drives a motorcycle, you know. That’s dangerous.” 

Eddie must be able to catch some of Steve’s shrill exclamation, his eyebrows raising ever so slightly. You feel his curious hum against your skin and you don’t hesitate putting your own pesky friends on speaker. 

“Motorcycles are not that dangerous,” you retort, and it makes Eddie have to hide a slight scoff into your thigh in an effort to stay silent. It was ironic that they cared about how safe it would be for you to ride with Eddie on his bike now, after that allegedly dangerous vehicle had been your main source of transportation for nearly two months now, “He has a helmet, right?” 

“Isn’t your dorm the opposite direction of the bar from his place?” Robin questions, “I mean, I’m all for you asking lover boy if he’ll give you a ride but-”

Steve interrupts her flatly, “It’s making him go out of his way. Besides, he might have already left for the bar by now.” 

You don’t know what to silently laugh at first. The assumption they were making that couldn’t be further from the truth, or Robin’s new nickname for Eddie. 

Lover boy is fitting for him in this current position. He’s still latching onto your leg, cuddling you in every way he could from where he laid, staring at you and hanging onto your every last word. The poster boy for pathetically in love, he gives your leg another kiss, starting a fiery trail with his lips until he reaches your knee. It pangs in your chest, wondering if he can see your feelings also painted so obviously across your face. 

“Steve,” you murmur, breath catching in your throat as Eddie’s lips linger in the ditch of your knee. It takes a second to remember you’re on the phone, “No offense, but Eddie hasn’t been on time to a single get together the entire time I’ve known him.” 

Eddie reacts in real time to your insult, forcing an over-exaggerated offended look before he bites you again. This time, his teeth do leave an imprint from his nip, and it makes you slap a hand over your mouth to avoid yelping. 

Don’t bite me, you mouth at him. 

Don’t be mean, he answers right back, silent as ever. 

“Technically we’re all already late,” Steve points out. It makes you sit up quickly, startling Eddie in the process. You squint at the clock across the room and- fuck. Steve was right, “Nancy just texted me that she and Jon are there, Argyle’s on his way. She said she tried texting Eddie but didn’t get any response,” there’s a long pause as you motion wildly for Eddie to get up with you, the boy watching as you fling yourself off his mattress and carry the phone with you to his dresser, “Have… you heard from him recently?” 

“Why are you saying it like that?” you jab, throwing open one of the drawers Eddie had cleared out for you to keep some clothes here in his apartment. At this point, a good chunk of the tuition you paid was going to waste considering the fact you rarely spent the night at your dorm. You were already half moved into Eddie’s space. 

You try not to think too hard about it, because just last week, you’d had a panic attack at the revelation. 

You were afraid of smothering him, even if he was the one always insisting you could leave more of your things here. He was always the one conning you into spending another night, promising soft murmurs of giving you a ride to class the next morning if you did. You rarely ever had much of the choice in the matter; once he’d wrap his arms around your waist, curl his body flush against yours, it was always game over.

Practically living together, and you still hadn’t said those words back to him. 

“I’m not saying it like anything!” Steve defends himself, “I’m just asking an innocent question!” Eddie’s snort this time is audible, and you freeze as Steve clearly mistakes it for your laughter, “Shut up. It’s a reasonable question. You guys are friends now, remember?” 

Friends. Of course, because all your friends jumped at the chance to bury their mouths against your cunt and make you cum repeatedly until you had tears streaming down your cheeks. Because you let all your friends sleep in the same bed as you, and wake you up by burying deep within you as they bite your shoulder with a moan. You and Eddie were friends. 

“Trust me,” you glance over your shoulder in your haste, looking at Eddie as he stretches out on his side and props himself up on his elbow, “I remember.” 

He gives you a knowing smile, squinting his eyes at you in entertainment. 

“Babe, it really would just be easier for you to ride with us,” Robin’s voice sounds again as you tug a shirt out of the drawer, something casual and comfortable that you could style for the night, “Unless you’re just hellbent on having alone time with Eddie for some reason-”

“I’m not hellbent on being alone with him, Robs.” 

Another lie. I definitely am. But not in the context you think. 

“You just sound like you are.”

“Well, I’m not,” you yank a pair of black jeans free from the drawer and slam it shut, standing and turning to Eddie. 

He hardly has time to react before you’re tossing your phone down on the mattress in front of him, the small device bouncing and hitting his chest. He winces and throws himself back dramatically, letting out a small oof that you pray neither Robin or Steve pick up on. 

As you dress, throwing on the random t-shirt and shimmying on your jeans, Robins laughs, “Denial isn’t a good look on you.” 

Eddie watches you, never moving to get ready himself. All he does is stare as you button up the pants. 

When you give him an expectant look, he merely mouths, bra? 

You shake your head. You don’t know where Eddie had flung your undergarment, and you’re not in the mood to frantically search for it. You’ve gone without a bra before – you can survive one night out without one. 

Eddie’s entire face and chest immediately flushes pink. Cute.  

“Now you guys are just being assholes,” you scowl despite the fact that only Eddie can see it, waving your hands to motion for him to get up and also get dressed, “I’m texting Eddie. If he has already left, I’ll just walk. Fuck you guys.” 

“Tell lover boy I said hi,” Robin teases. 

“Even if he’s already parked at the fucking bar at this point, we both know he’d jump right back on his bike and come pick you up,” Steve’s voice grumbles over the line. 

It almost makes you smile.  “Someone sounds jealous.” 

“Not jealous, just annoyed,” Steve corrects as Eddie finally stands from the bed, “When are you two going to get your shit together?”

“What do you mean?” you play dumb.

You’ve had this conversation with your friends multiple times. They were truly going to have your head once they realized what you’d been keeping from them for months now. 

“Don’t you have a 4.0 GPA?” Robin inserts herself back into the conversation, “You can’t possibly be this stupid.” 

Eddie pauses in his fumbling with pulling his jeans from the pile he’d left his clothes in at the end of the beg, face scrunching in silent laughter. You almost walk over and smack his bare back angled towards you. 

“First of all, no. I don’t have a 4.0 GPA. Thanks for the reminder,” you grab your phone back off of the bed and decide to leave Eddie behind in the room, heading into the bathroom to finish getting ready. You hate to admit it, but if you have to keep watching him giggle so cutely to himself, you’ll also probably break. And you aren’t in the mood for any further interrogation from Robin and Steve, “Second of all, I’m hanging up now. I’m going to call Eddie. At least he won’t be such a dick to me.” 

“Oh, you must see the irony there-” 

You cut Steve off, “Bye! See you in… like, ten minutes.” 

Once you’ve hung up, you put your phone down on the bathroom counter and look up into the mirror. Your hair is a mess, wild and tangled from all the writhing you had been doing before being so rudely interrupted. You give it your best effort, trying to tame it a little bit to look more presentable, but it’s a lost cause at this point. Fuck it. 

Eddie appears in the doorway behind you, fully dressed and his hair pulled back into a bun, leaning into the door frame with his arms crossed and an impish grin on display, “Oh, you’re going to call me now, sweetheart?” 

You glare at him in a jocosely manner through the reflection, “Don’t look so proud of yourself.” 

He pushes off the frame and comes up behind you, still locking his eyes only through the reflection as he leans his chin over your shoulder, “And what if I don’t want to give you a ride? You have been awfully mean – insulting my punctuality, throwing your phone at me, teasing me by going without a bra. The list goes on and on.” 

Something deep within you stirs, those embers that still ache to burst into a forest fire. You hate that you could easily spend the entire night here with him, letting him take you every which way between his sheets. And even without sinful actions involved, you would be plenty content with just his presence tonight. As a matter of fact, you might be more content with that outcome rather than heading out to see your friends.

Sorry Argyle, you think guiltily. 

“I’m teasing you?” you question just as his hands land on your hips, moving so that he was pressed firmly against the curve of your ass. Making sure you could feel how hard he was against the seam of his jeans’ zipper, “You didn’t even make me cum.” 

“Seems like we’ll both be spending the night frustrated, then,” he smiles, almost gleefully, almost devilishly, “Besides, that was technically Harrington’s fault, not mine. We both know I usually have no problems making you cum on my tongue – without interruptions, of course.”

He rolls his hips ever so slightly into you, and your mouth falls open, eyes going glossy as you continue to stare him down through the mirror.  The stirring in your abdomen is persistent now as your heart hammers against your ribs, mind melting and completely forgetting the obligation at hand. 

And Eddie knows this. He’s well aware of the effect he’s having on you, and it’s deliberate. 

Suddenly, his body completely pulls away from yours, “I’ll meet you downstairs. Don’t want to keep them waiting any longer, do we, sweetheart?” 

Damn him. Damn him, and damn his dimples, and damn how good his legs look in those jeans as he’s walking away from me right now.

You linger in the apartment, alone, for a few extra minutes to compose yourself. Trying to quelch the heat between your hips that had slowly spread across your entire body, threatening to consume you. You even go as far as to splash cool water across your cheeks, giving yourself a few smacks for good measure as you try to prepare yourself to go into public and put on the usual act. And beneath it all, you also hush the animal in your chest, the one that claws at you to tell him. The one that wails everytime you simply tell him you like him, the one that roars when you let another moment slip you by. It has to quiet, just as your flames need to settle, all for the sake of the act.

You deserve a goddamn Oscar at this point. 

After deciding that touching up your makeup would take up far too many precious seconds, you’re darting out of Eddie’s apartment, locking up behind yourself before you head down to where he’s waiting. He’s already straddling his parked bike, the engine roaring to life like the animal inside you as you exit the main doors of the building and his hands extend his only helmet. You don’t fight him on who’s going to wear it – that’s a battle, you’ve learned, you will always lose. 

We really need to just buy a second helmet. 

The thought makes you smile as you hold the clunky thing. Buying a second helmet. Something Eddie had never done before, because he had never had a regular passenger before. He had never had someone glued to his side as you had become, not even Nancy. It sounds terribly domestic; perusing aisles with him, debating which helmet fits your style best. He’d probably make a joke about your head being big. He’d probably tease you for looking at the ridiculously expensive ones and tell you to opt for a cheaper one. You’d probably end up with a pricier one in the cart regardless, and Eddie would probably refuse to let you pay for it. 

Domesticity. The image of it doesn’t ache like it had that night all those months ago. This isn’t something you yearn for hopelessly, smoke and mirrors that dissipate when you dare to reach out for it. It’s something finally in your grasp. Something tangible and something bound to happen, all you’d have to do is say the word and Eddie would comply eagerly. 

Anything to keep my girl safe, as he would tell you any time you pointed out how dangerous it was for him to go without a helmet. He’d gotten creative in saying his own version of those three little words. 

“M’lady,” he hums, nodding for you to put the helmet on before sweeping a hand over the empty space in the seat behind him, “Your chariot awaits.” 

You don’t have a snarky quip to throw back at him, only grinning at the ground as you flip the helmet around a few times to prepare to put it on. All those embers aren’t just desire for him – there’s a warmth there that always exists. A candle on the windowsill of the home you had finally found. 

You raise the clunky thing and tilt your head when Eddie suddenly says, “Oh, and babe?” 

Immediately, you lower it, eyes wide in curiosity, “What?” 

“That’s my shirt.” 

“What?” 

He motions to the t-shirt tucked carefully into your jeans, “That fine shirt you are currently wearing is mine.” 

You look down, and he’s right. It’s too late to go back inside to change, and you know he’s aware of this when you catch his amused smirk. He probably noticed the moment you had put it on, and had deliberately waited until it was too late for you to do anything about it to inform you. 

Bastard. 

“I-” you pinch the fabric between your fingers, looking between it and Eddie wildly for a second before your shoulders slumped in defeat, “It’s fine. I doubt they’ll even notice.” 

—

You were wrong. They do notice. 

Everyone is already waiting inside for the two of you, nestled around a table in the bar in a similar arrangement to the very first night you’d been introduced to the group. There’s only two empty seats left conveniently, right next to each other. You don’t miss that mischievous look of success on Robin’s face as she looks overly proud of herself.

They’d set it up so we’d sit next to each other. 

You’re grateful for your friends’ antics until you go to take the empty seat next to Steve.

“Is that Eddie’s shirt?” 

Robin is leaning around Steve eagerly as she says it, ridiculing the shirt intensely. 

“What?” you laugh nervously, looking down and tugging at the fabric. 

Lie. Make up a lie. Make it good. 

“That is Eddie’s shirt,” Nancy looks surprised across the table, looking up at the two of you questioningly. 

“What?” you repeat yourself. Eddie has already taken his seat, and is avoiding the stares of everyone, “No, it’s not.” 

“He has one just like it,” Jonathan adds fuel to the fire, “He literally wore it - what? Two days ago?” 

In a pathetic attempt of an excuse, you plop down in your seat and force an offended look, “People can own the same shirt. He’s not the gatekeeper of-” you look down, and nearly erupt in embarrassment when you see what the shirt is. “Deftones.” 

Ah, fuck. 

It’s not just the embarrassment of being on the verge of getting caught in your lie – it’s the memories that flood back. You, on Eddie’s lap. Your mouth and his becoming one. Steve calling, and you sucking so innocently on Eddie’s neck. 

Fuck. 

You really wish Steve and Robin hadn’t interrupted earlier. 

“It’s not like I got it at a show,” Eddie shrugs, and you wonder for a moment if he’s lying, “They’ve gotten more popular lately. I’ve seen their shit in Target.” 

“Exactly!” you exclaim a little too loudly, a little too quick to defend yourself, “Exactly. I just thought it looked cool at Target. Besides, tonight is about Argyle.”

You smile at the birthday boy, and he returns the joy as he waves a little at you. The reminder is all it takes for everyone’s attention to return to the focus of the night – everyone’s attention but Nancy’s. 

You can feel her eyes on you as conversation sparks up and debates of ordering shots begin. Everyone is busy asking Argyle what his plans for next weekend are – which are mostly composed of normal family gatherings, probably a homemade cake, etc. – but Nancy is watching you and Eddie like a hawk. In the peripheral of your eye, you watch the way she leans back so casually into Jonathan's around her shoulder, looking like she knows. You’re probably just being paranoid. You’re definitely just being paranoid. 

You try to ignore it, and instead let yourself just enjoy the moment. All your friends gathered, a group in which you finally feel like you belong to, jokes being made and laughter being exchanged that has you feeling a bit giddy. It’s nice. Even between the smoke of the room and the flickering lights overhead, murmuring chatter of nearby patrons mingling right in with your group’s noise, it’s homely. The smell of drunken cigars and fruity cocktails should be overwhelming, but you just let it wrap you up instead. 

And when you turn your head, inhaling deeply the smell of cinnamon and musk rather than all those other foreign anomalies, you find Eddie already looking at you. Soft eyes, bitten grin, a few loose curls framing his cheeks as his bangs curl up into his forehead. Even in the shoddy lighting, he takes your breath away. 

He’s looking at you. Just like that first night. Dozens of other people in this room at this moment, and he only has eyes for one – he only has eyes for you.

“So!” Argyle announces, “I think, my dudes, instead of doing what Birdie had so… excitedly suggested,” and oh, he was being generous and calling Robin suggesting he took twenty three shots for his twenty third birthday just her being excited rather than foolish, “We should just take the twenty three shots and split them up amongst the group.” 

Steve and Jonathan immediately groan, protesting how they’re driving, and Eddie only shakes his head with a chuckle. So far, he’d only ordered and been nursing on a plain coke, no whiskey. 

Somehow, sitting beside him with the group is worse than keeping distance. 

When he’d taken off his jacket, you’d silently begged for him to rest an arm across the back of your chair just as Jonathan was doing to Nancy. And he had, almost too naturally before he’d caught himself. It would have been easier to play off cooly, probably would have gone unnoticed, but your boy had practically jumped out of his bones as he’d flinched and tucked his arm back into himself suddenly. He’d even bumped his elbow against his own seat in his haste.

And Nancy had noticed. 

“That’s only three shots per person!” Argyle defends, “Four for me, since you know – birthday boy.” 

While Eddie may be avoiding alcohol tonight, you aren’t. Not unusual, but it had been odd when Eddie had told the waitress your order of an amaretto sour rather than you telling her yourself. 

Another strike. Another thing Nancy had noticed with her watchful eye.

“I’m down,” you shrug, “Hell, I’ll even take an extra shot if those two dumbasses won’t.” 

“Is that a good idea?” 

You wish Eddie had been drinking to excuse his idiocracy. Because all it takes is him saying that, not with malice but with concern, and the look on Nancy’s face told you she was officially catching on.

He hadn’t said it with the concern of a friend prepared to warn against drinking yourself sick. He’d said it with the concern of someone who would be taking care of you by the end of the night, of someone who would be dealing with the aftermath of that many shots. 

You two were bombing this whole secrecy, to put it lightly. 

You try to save the moment but laughing it off, turning to him slightly and teasing, “What, are you my keeper now?” 

Despite your best efforts, the statement doesn’t come across as friendly banter. It’s not quite fighting either. It’s a dare, you dangling something in Eddie’s face that no one else at this table quite sees. A stupid, idiotic continuation of your flirtatious game of cat and mouse from earlier in the apartment, when he’d deliberately gotten you hot and bothered. When he’d deliberately let you leave in his shirt. His palm is warm when he shifts ever so slightly, placing it on your thigh beneath the table. Out of sight from everyone else. Fueling and fanning all your growing flames. 

You two were toeing a very dangerous line tonight. 

His eyes darken a bit, and you pray no one else notices in the dim bar lighting, “I don’t know, am I?” 

Everyone is distracted enough with your idea. Steve and Jonathan were agreeing, saying they could take one shot and then others in the group could shoulder the extras. Robin was quick to also say she’ll take an extra one. But Nancy is silent, watching your quiet exchange with Eddie. 

“I don’t think you are, Munson.”

Except he is. Without a single doubt in your bones, you know that he is. 

Your playful smile betrays you. It tugs up the corners of your mouth and it’s clear to any outsider this wasn’t a brewing argument. The game was obvious if anyone was watching close enough. And Nancy, ever the smart one, was watching close enough. 

She’s playing her cards right, you realize, when she waits until the group has ordered the round of shots to say anything. 

“So, Eddie,” she begins, drawing the entire group’s attention to her best friend, “Do anything fun today?” 

He nearly chokes on his coke subtly. “I- Um-” 

“You just didn’t answer any of my texts today,” she continues on, “Must have been busy, yeah?” 

Eddie retracts his hand from your thigh, far more elusive in this action than he had been about removing his arm from your chair, before he fiddles with his hands in his lap. “Yeah – no, yeah. Sorry about that, Nance.” 

He pulls his phone from his pocket for no apparent reason. The shiny new smartphone, having not even bought a case or screen protector yet. You’d already yelled at him for that, claiming out of everyone, you trust him the least to not break the phone on the first day. He’d only laughed and shut you up with a kiss. 

His new phone is placed face down on the table, cherry red glinting, “I just had to go to the mall and-”

“Is that a new phone?” Argyle interrupts him, catching sight of the movement and the glinting, “Oh, holy shit, my dude! That’s a new phone! That is an iPhone if I’ve ever seen one!” 

Everyone – Robin, Steve, Jonathan – are rapidly leaning to catch sight of it as if they can’t believe it. Eddie continues to shrink at being the center of attention suddenly. 

“It is,” Steve laughs in disbelief, “Never thought I’d see the day, Munson.” 

Robin scrunches her face, “Does this mean we have to add him to the group chat?” 

You let out a giggle at that, lips pressed to try and contain some of that smile breaking through as you look at him and wiggle your brows. He immediately rolls his eyes, but picks up the phone regardless to give everyone a better look. 

“Yes, yes. I’ve finally joined the dark side,” he teases everyone just as the waitress returns with the tray of shots. Jonathan is the only one with enough sense to look away from Eddie’s spectacle, thanking her kindly, “Feast your eyes, my friends, for this is where my five hundred dollars went-” 

“Holy shit.” 

Nancy’s sudden whisper of an exclamation has everyone freezing. Eddie stops spinning and flipping the phone to show it off, staring at her with nothing but concerned, “What? What happen-” 

Nancy shares a look with Robin as they both grin.

Oh no. 

“Eddie,” Nancy says slowly, turning her head back his way slowly. 

“What?” Eddie frowns, eyes flitting back and forth between Nancy and Robin.

Robin is the one to ask the question rather than Nancy, “What exactly is your lockscreen?” 

Eddie goes pale. You’re confused, looking at the phone he’s currently cradling with the screen against his palm. 

Did he even change it? Wouldn’t it just be one of the default ones? 

“Guys,” you decide to come to his rescue, still impossibly confused, “It’s probably just some default screen, don’t tease him.” 

“That was not a default screen,” Nancy laughs out. 

Argyle looks around at everyone. Nancy and Robin, both with mischievous glints in their eyes. Eddie, still ghostly white as if he’s been caught red-handed. Steve and Jonathan, both just shrugging at each other. “Uh…. Why do I feel like I’m missing something here?”

“Show the class your lock screen, Eds.”

“Fuck off, Nancy.” 

“Oh my God,” Robin coos, leaning across Steve and pressing you back gently to catch sight of Eddie, who’s dipping his face down, “He’s blushing!” 

“Guys, leave him alone,” Steve insists, sharing a look with you now. But you have no clue what’s going on.

You have no clue what his lockscreen is. 

“Edward Munson, show us that lockscreen right now, or I’m Venmo-requesting five hundred dollars from you,” Robin continues to threaten. 

You look away from Steve and at Eddie immediately, leaning in closer to his space. He looks at you, clearly focusing on your presence more than everyone else’s, and smiles like a child trying to get out of trouble. 

“Eddie,” you say quietly, almost impossible for your friends to hear, “What the fuck is your lockscreen?” 

He slowly and carefully turns the screen towards you, making sure only your eyes can see it, and- oh.

It’s a low quality photo. Clearly taken on his flip phone. Details just a little fuzzy, and the darkness of the photo wasn’t helping. But you can see it clearly. You can make out exactly what it was that had Nancy and Robin losing their minds. 

It’s a picture of you and Eddie, with your head on Eddie’s chest.

For a moment, everyone else at the table doesn’t exist. You hadn’t been insane that night – he had taken a photo. A snapshot of the moment where everything had changed. The moment in which you had given up the fight and completely succumbed to just how much Eddie meant to you, how badly you pined for him and how deeply you liked him. 

“I was going to make it the one of you at Betty’s,” he whispers, “But, I just- I really liked this photo.” 

He’s still tense, as if he expects you to be upset with him. 

You’re the farthest thing from upset at him. 

“You made me your lockscreen?” you breathe out, a slow-growing smile beginning to stretch your lips. 

You’re not upset at him. As a matter of fact, you’re in love with him. You want to scream it from every rooftop, shout it to every stranger on the street – you are in love with Eddie Munson.

And you have been for a while. You just hadn’t found a way to tell him yet.

“Yeah,” he loosens up a little when he realizes you’re happy, enamored with the fact, “Yeah, of course I did. Who else am I going to make it besides my favorite…. Enemy?” 

He says it loud enough for everyone to hear clearly. All of Nancy’s teasing has come to a halt, Robin has settled back into her chair, and Steve is finally looking too curious for his own good. 

“As birthday boy,” Argyle breaks the moment, shatters away the bubble you and Eddie always seemed to end up in, “I am demanding I get to see this lockscreen.” 

Eddie doesn’t make any move to show the screen to any other person, only watching you for approval. 

Well, so much for next time. 

You give him a little nod. 

Eddie makes a dramatic show of it, sighing heavily before he very slowly turns his lockscreen to face everyone else. But even in his dramatics, you can see that weight lifting off his chest.

This, as a matter of fact, changes everything. 

No more hiding, no more lying. One simple flash of his phone screen, of a photo he had taken on a night that no one has even been gifted the details of yet, and all your friends suddenly know.

The reactions all vary. 

Argyle leans forward and squints before his face breaks out into pure joy for the two of you, “Oh, fuck yes! Best birthday gift ever. Pay up, my dudes!” 

Jonathan leans backward, digging out his wallet as he murmurs, “Son of a bitch.” 

Steve only smiles and shakes his head, also digging for his wallet as he seemingly chastizes himself, “I should have fucking known.” 

“Hold on,” you look between everyone as Jonathan digs out a couple twenties, “Wait, did you guys fucking bet on this?” 

“We did,” Robin answers you, holding up a hand to make Jonathan and Steve pause their retrieval of cash, “What do you take us for? Idiots? Now, gentlemen, before either of you payout, we’ve gotta ask the most important question,” she shoves a palm against Steve’s chest so that he’s out of line of sight, gaze set on you and Eddie, “When did this happen?” 

You don’t have any time to be mad at your friends. Because when Robin asks you this, suddenly you’re back to two months ago. You’re outside your dorm with Eddie, kissing him as if tomorrow would never be promised, and you’re home. 

You pulled back from Eddie finally, both of you gasping for breath as he held you steady. Your exchange from moments before still hung heavy in the air. 

You liked him, you liked him, you liked him. 

And the feeling was mutual. 

You’d already known, but it was nice to hear. It was nice to be reminded that this, what had happened between you two, was so very real. 

“I don’t wanna start over,” the words tumbled from your tongue before you could consider them, upheaving from your chest, desperate for Eddie to heard them, “I- I don’t need to start over. I like our story, okay? You had been right – it wasn’t all bad, and… and I don’t want to start over. I never want you to be a stranger again, and I know that sounds stupid-” 

“It’s not stupid,” he interrupted you, forehead meeting yours, “So very not stupid.” 

“I don’t care if you were a dick,” you continued on, carefully, “I was, too. We were both… shitty. I forgive you. I’ll forgive you a thousand times over, as long as you keep trying to make it up to me.” 

“Make it up to you?” he grinned playfully, “And just how do you suggest I start making it up to you?” 

“Ask me out,” his eyebrows raised in surprise, and you knew you must have looked like a wild idiot to everyone else, but you didn’t care, “To dinner, to a movie, to just hang around your apartment with you for another twenty four hours – I don’t care. Just… Just please, Munson, ask me out.” 

And so he had. A first date, a second date, a third. You two had gone through the entire ordeal of every cliche relationship despite the unconventional beginning. You’d gone to dinner, you’d gone to a movie, and you had done plenty of hanging out around his apartment and more. 

“The night of the bet,” Eddie answers as he finally brings an arm up around your shoulders, just as he had wanted to earlier. 

Immediately, both Robin and Argyle let out their own curses, pulling out their wallets just as Steve and Jonathan had. 

You look between them, all the annoyance you should feel just being run over with adoration for these idiots. Your eyes land on Nancy, and when you realize she’s the only one at the table not coughing up any cash, you ask her, “I’m assuming you guessed correctly?” 

“I did,” she nods, looking proud of herself. 

“How’d you know?” 

Nancy raises a threatening finger, before suddenly pointing it right in Eddie’s direction, “That idiot has always been down bad for you-”

“Okay, okay,” Eddie stops her, “I’ve already told her the nitty gritty details. No need to embarrass me.” 

“No need to embarrass you?” Nancy asks in disbelief, “Good God, just how many times did I have to sit and listen to you pine for her? No, no – I have earned this, Munson.” 

You look at Eddie, a glint in your eye, “You only told me about the first time.”

“I only remembered the first time,” he counters, blushing under yellow and faded lights, “I was usually dru-”

“Don’t lie,” Nancy stops him, “There were plenty of rants where you were dead sober.” 

Everyone only smiles at Eddie, a few teasing comments made his way, but none of them matter as you lean into his side, your shoulder bumping his to the best of your ability with his arm still around you.

“Aw, babe,” you coo, warm all over for the man beside you, “You had a crush on me? That’s cute.” 

His chin lowers, eyes boring into yours with unlimited affection. For a moment, it’s just you and Eddie. The guise of you two having your own bubble of a moment. 

His head tilts further, his ears brushing your ear as he whispers for just you to hear, “So did you, if I’m not mistaken.” 

“Not mistaken,” you whisper back. Money is now being exchanged, tossed across the table with grumbles that hold no heat. 

Yeah, you did have a crush on Eddie. You still do. You don’t think you’ll ever stop having a crush on him, even as he’s surrendered himself as yours. Especially not when his thumb is stroking your shoulder as it is now. 

Just like that very first night. The smoky bar fades to nothingness, your tunnel vision focused on Eddie. You know jokes are being made about the two of you by your friends, but it’s all white noise when he’s looking at you like this. Like you’re everything to him, like he’s just returned home after a long week. 

You’d really like to be his home to return to after every long week, for the rest of your lives, but there’ll be time to ponder on that later. For now, you two have time. 

The voice inside your head suddenly comes to life as it recognizes that this is your moment. You can tell him. Now that you’ve told everyone else, you can tell him those three words. Finally get them off your chest. Make it real. 

“Hey, Munson,” you say, still quiet enough for the words to only reach his ears. He perks up, eager to drink your next words. You have all his attention. You always have all his attention, “I-” and then you choke. He stares curiously for a few seconds, and the words just won’t come out. You want to scream – you wonder if it would work if you screeched the three words at the top of your lungs. Probably not, “I’m just really glad you didn’t really hate me,” a pathetic excuse at a coverup,  “And… I’m really glad they made that first bet.” 

He smiles so softly, it strikes you right in the center of your chest. Right amongst your garden that not only had you tended for him, but that he had also had a hand in watering these last few months. 

You should have told him. You love him, and you should have told him. 

“I’m really glad I didn’t hate you, too,” he remarks, squeezing your shoulder a little tighter, “Actually, I’m glad you don’t hate me. Not anymore, at least.” 

“I never really did.”

“You definitely sort of did. You tried to take me out with a glass, remember?” 

You burst into secluded laughter, hearing your friends beginning to pass around the shots but paying them no mind. 

Eddie can’t help it. He pulls you in close, placing an impulsive kiss to your temple and letting his lips linger there. Just pressed against you, breathing in the scent of you. 

That kiss sends shivers down your spine, warmth through the center of your bones. You love him. 

You love him, you love him, you love him. 

So why can’t you just tell him that?

“Aw!” Robin pulls the two out of your bubble, “Aren’t they just adorable?”

“Yes, yes,” Steve passes two shot glasses down to your end of the table, “Absolutely adorable. It’s nauseating. Also, I’d like to go on record – I totally knew the entire time. I was just giving them the benefit of the doubt.” 

“Playing the Devil’s advocate?” Argyle asks, lining up his multiple shots, “I dig it. Even though you’re totally lying right now.” 

“You’re so lucky it’s your birthday, dude,” Steve rolls his eyes, clearly holding back an insult. 

Eddie’s arm stays heavy on you, a welcome weight as you sit up straighter to take your own several shots. 

These were your friends. Somewhere you belonged, filled with people you loved and a boy you could come home to after all your long weeks. A certain happiness that is rare, and impossible to place, and can nearly bring you to tears overwhelms you as you grab that first shot. 

“Also-” Steve turns to you and Eddie, “I knew that was Munson’s shirt. The day he got it, all he did was brag about what a rare find it was. Fuck off with your Target bullshit.” 

Eddie’s hand leaves your shoulder long enough to reach out and thump Steve, laughter booming and vibrating against you, “Sure you did, Stevie.” 

“Target has some nice things,” Nancy offers with a shrug, now holding her own shot glass. 

The seven of you all hold up the first of what will probably be too many shots tonight, the beginning of a night that will probably be remembered through killer hangovers tomorrow and possibly even captured on camera by the likes of Jonathan, Steve, and Eddie. 

“To Argyle,” you take the lead on the cheers, jittery and anxious as all the love you continue to withhold buzzes in your chest, lifting your small glass in his direction, “The most lovable twenty three year old I know.” 

Everyone moves to drink, but Argyle immediately shakes his head, “Nah, fuck that. It’s not even my birthday yet – I demand a new toast.” 

He lifts his brows, staring you down and silently adding, you know what to do. 

And yeah, you did know what to do. 

“Fine,” you sigh dramatically, leaning further forward, Eddie’s arm following. You relish in the tense silence as everyone waits for what you’re about to say instead. Even Eddie is waiting with bated breath, watching your every move, a contrasting yet easy smile on his face, “To bets.” 

A booming applause from your group. Glasses tapping against the wooden table before shots are downed. Groans of disgust as the tequila hits everyones’ tongues. 

Eddie hardly waits before you’ve both swallowed to remove his arm and grab your face, turning your cheek so that his lips can capture yours. Everyone only cheers louder, Steve letting out an obnoxious whistle as Argyle claps. You’re surely going to get kicked out of the bar at this rate. But you really don’t care as you kiss your boy back. 

Next time. You have to tell him next time. 

—

The night ends in more of a whisper than a bang, surprisingly. 

Everyone has suddenly become a happy drunk, probably from all the love and good news passed around throughout the night. It’s all warm feelings and warm hugs, tequila on the breath and love on the mind. 

You don’t even get kicked out of the bar. Your waitress only smiles at your rowdy table from time to time, and you figure that all the good vibes must be rubbing off on her. 

Steve is the first to call it quits. Robin has drank enough to give herself the hiccups, and he says that after that, she almost always gets viciously nauseous. He wants to get in the car and home before she gets to the point, for the sake of his car’s interior not getting covered in puke.

It’s a domino effect from there.

Argyle quickly agrees, Jonathan offers a guiding arm to Nancy, and Eddie’s arm only tightens around you. The group closes out the tab, putting off worries of everyone paying Jonathan back until tomorrow. Quick, simple, painless. 

Until you all get outside. And goodbyes are exchanged – that’s not the part that gets to you – with promises of seeing each other throughout the week. Everyone congratulates you and Eddie one more time for good measure, Nancy and Steve looking the most proud of you two as Argyle and Robin giggle like children about it. And it’s fine – you laugh along and it’s all good. You let them get in all their I told you so’s and know it’s all in good fun. 

It’s all fine. Until you two branch off from the group, Eddie’s bike across the lot from everyone else’s cars. 

The moment you two are alone, you can’t tell if it’s the alcohol or if it’s the levity of suddenly having a moment that only belongs to you. Your mind wastes no time of reminding you of your pathetic cop out: I’m just really glad you didn’t really hate me. None of those words even sound akin to the real ones you should have said.

I love you. 

It’s not because your friends have found out. You know it’s not that, because just last week, right after your breakdown about whether you were smothering Eddie by half-living in his apartment, you’d had a breakdown because you realized you wanted to fully live in his apartment. You’d had a breakdown because you hadn’t grown tired of him yet, hadn’t satisfied the need to see his face every morning when you first wake up yet. You hadn’t gotten bored with all his lingering affectionate touches. You hadn’t gotten used to the way he’d kiss you in the middle of sentences. He was still taking your breath away, two months later, and you had a breakdown because you realized it wasn’t novelty or a pathetic crush making you feel this way.

You had a breakdown because you love Eddie. 

You love him, ardently so, and you still can’t find the right moment to say those words to him. He deserves to know – the entire foundation of this relationship was honesty.

It’s all you can think about as his hand finds yours and he’s walking up to his bike, practically dragging you up to his bike as your legs forget how to work amongst nerves. 

“So, I was thinking,” he carries on conversation so casually, “You want to spend the night at my place? I know you said you don’t have any class-“ 

Now. Not later, not next time. Now. 

“Hey, Eddie?” you interrupt him, stopping the two of you a few paces away from his bike. 

His face is impossibly concerned as he looks down at you, clearly reading the worry on your face, “What’s up, babe?” 

Here goes nothing – be brave.

“I-” 

Why is this so hard? 

It shouldn’t be this hard, because loving Eddie is easy. 

It’s easy when he’s looking at you like this, like he always does. It’s easy when he wakes up after you, and he comes into the kitchen to just wrap himself around you as you make him coffee, no matter what time of day it might be. It’s easy when he catches your eye from across the room during outings, sometimes winking once he knows you’ve found his gaze, just to see you laugh. It’s easy when he tries to distract you from homework when you’ve been spending far too many hours hunched over your laptop on his couch, coming and bugging you, laying his head on your lap and insisting his girl needs a break. It’s easy when he kisses you and everything just feels right. 

It’s easy. He loves you – you love him.  It isn’t hard. You’re making this hard, when it never was. 

“I love you,” you admit quietly, voice shaking as the words leave you easily. 

Loving Eddie is easy. 

“I love you,” you say more surely, voice raising in volume as you find the willpower to look into his eyes, “I love you so fucking much, Eddie.” 

Each time you say it, you gain confidence in it. It’s true – you love him. You love him so much, it encompasses every inch of your being. It entirely consumes you. You love him. 

His face falls slowly, mouth agape and eyes boring into yours.

You don’t wait for his response. You already have it – in the way he’s still holding your hand, in the way he holds you at the end of each night, in the way he knows both your orders at bars and coffee shops. In the way he will always put himself between you and the street when walking down the sidewalk, in the way when he roughly stops his bike at stop lights that his hand always flies back to hold onto you. In every soft touch and every expression of devotion he has offered you for not just two months, but for over a year. 

“You love me?” he softly asks, finally beginning to come back to life. 

You nod without hesitation, “I love you, Eddie.” 

Now that you’ve started saying it, you can’t stop it. And each time, it’s still heavy and sweet like honey, even as the confession comes as easy as breathing. It’s pouring from every crevice, filling up the night air around you. 

He takes you off guard with a harsh kiss. His teeth colliding with yours, his breath stealing yours, his entire being molded with yours. 

“Say it again,” he begs in a murmur as he pulls you in even closer, desperate as you break into a smile, “God, please say it again, sweetheart.” 

“I love you,” your cheeks begin to ache, the kiss no longer even to be a considered a kiss as you two are just mindlessly pressing your smiles together, “I love you, I love you, I love you,” with each repeat of the sentiment, Eddie drinks it in, “I’m so fucking in love with you, Eddie Munson. You and your stupid lockscreen and-”

“You do not think my lockscreen is stupid,” he pulls away, raising his eyebrows as his palms squish your cheeks, “I saw the way you looked at me. You were eating that shit up.” 

You bite your lip, trying to pull further away from him, but he won’t let you, “I was not-”

“You were,” he cheekily teases, eyes bright as he looks at you, “You were, and it was the best thing ever. Totally worth stealing Argyle’s spotlight.” 

“We didn’t steal Argyle’s spotlight,” you try to defend yourself. 

“We so did.”

You shake your head to the best of your abilities, face still between his hands, “We… Okay, we sort of did.”

He grins like a young boy, all his youth and all his love on show for you as he leans down, pausing right before pressing another kiss to your lips, “We definitely did. And it’s fair, because they fucking bet on us.” 

“They did,” you agree, not even feeling guilty anymore, too consumed by the love for the man right in front of you, “They tend to do that a lot, don’t they?” 

“They do.” 

He finally surges forward, lips sealing against yours one last time. It’s less messy this time, more meaningful. A bit more patient as he takes the time to fit his lips into yours, just as they should be. 

You have an audience. You’re completely oblivious until you hear the cheering from across the parking lot, snapping apart to both glance at where Argyle and Robin are jumping up and down, screaming their heads off. 

“Hell yeah, my dudes!” Argyle’s voice booms as Robin only produces incoherent coos to echo. 

Nancy, Steve, and Jonathan are all just watching silently, shaking their heads, but you can also see their grins. Almost as radiant as you felt.

Steve finally cups his hands around his mouth, sending his voice to you over Argyle’s continuing whooping, “Get a room!” 

Perfectly in sync, you and Eddie both throw up a hand with your middle fingers raised in their direction, still half tangled in each other. 

Your eyes find Nancy. She’s looking at you two with overwhelming pride, a certain satisfaction that breathes out the relief of finally. This may be a weight off not only your chest but Eddie’s as well, yet you can’t help but imagine just how she feels. How many nights she had stomached Eddie’s rambles about you leading up to this very moment. The pay off must be unimaginable. 

Finally. 

“Congrats on finally getting the girl, Munson!” she calls out, but her eyes are on you, winking. 

You see it now. Why they’re best friends. How all her best parts and Eddie’s best parts overlap and compliment one another perfectly. 

Jonathan is the final one to yell across the parking lot at you two, one arm slung around Nancy as the other moves to unlock his car, even his usually grumpy face showing signs of elation in that timid smile, “Now take your girl, home, dude. Spare the rest of us the gory details.” 

Eddie’s laugh reverberates against you physically from how he holds you, also making its way to burrow deep within your chest where all that liquid bliss belongs, as he throws his entire head back and makes you finally focus on just him again. Home. Not just his apartment, but him. You realize now that it’s simply wherever he goes. Where he leads, you’ll follow. It could be a shitty dorm room with a mattress that leaves your back aching, it could be a comforting apartment that holds you ‘hostage’ for twenty four hours straight – it doesn’t really matter. Wherever he is, home is. He’s your home; you love him, he knows you love him, and he’s your home. 

When his laughter finally fades, and he’s looking at you again, his dimples are prominent as ever through his whisper, “Just in case you’ve forgotten – I’m very much in love with you, too, sweetheart.” 

His lips meet yours for good measure. 

It’s been the longest week of your life, the longest year, but you’re finally home.

taglist: @catherinnn @haylaansmi @gaysludge @paprikaquinn @manda-panda-monium @audhd-dragonaut @blushingquincy @hellkaisersangel @eddieslittlewh0re @ajkamins @prettyboy200 @munsonzzgf @blue-eyed-lion @digwhatudug @madaboutjoe @wickedslashdivine @sweet-villain @somespicystuff @big-ope-vibes @jadequeen88 @sylviin @emma77645 @notbeforelong @lolalanaie @lo-siento-ama @happy-and-alone @micheledawn1975 @aysheashea @moon-huny @munsonswrld @bambipowerblueaddition @averagestudent03 @bakugouswh0r3 @mattefic @mxcheese @bietchz @nativity-in-black @stezzil @vngelis @coley0823 @folklorebau @luvmunson86 @theherothesavior @keene200213 @hargrovesswifee @m-chmcl-rmnc @cherrymedicine13 @iunaelumen777

[nikkento-writes]

Rub You the Right Way - Part 3

Part 1 | Part 2

Pairing: Choso x f!reader

Rating: Explicit – MINORS DO NOT INTERACT!

Word Count: ~3.0k

cw: female reader, 2nd-person POV, explicit language, explicit sexual content, smut – cunnilingus, use of sex toys, cum eating, PIV sex (missionary), breeding and pregnancy kink

Summary: You and Choso are next-door neighbors who are very much smitten with one another. After a month of dirtying up third base as much as possible, the both of you are finally ready to hit it out of the park. 

Author’s Notes: Baseball euphemisms because why not LOL? Thank you for reading! I love these dorks so much! This is the final installment of this teeny tiny series, so thank you all so much for the love and support on this, it means the world to me! Likes, reblogs, and/or comments are not expected but always appreciated. Thanks for reading! Divider credit to @/fic-dumpster.

“Damn, that was good!” Yuji exclaims, licking off the last of the chicken katsu curry from the rim of the bowl. He leans back on one hand, rubbing his belly with the other, a loud belch escaping his mouth. “Oops, sorry,” he apologizes, only a little bit embarrassed.

You giggle, stacking his empty dish on top of the others, standing up to place it in the sink. “I’m so glad you liked it. I couldn’t have done it without your brother, though. He’s a really good teacher.” 

“See, I told you, didn’t I?” Yuji smirks, pleased with himself. 

“It’s not hard to make, especially with the boxed curry mix.” Choso’s voice is bashful, downplaying the praise from both you and his brother. Still, you can sense the tiniest hint of pride in there.

“He’s too modest.” You return to the table to sit next to him, nudging him playfully.

Yuji rolls his eyes. “I know! It’s so frustrating! Seriously, you’ve got to give yourself more credit, bro. You’re awesome.” The blush on Choso’s cheeks are adorably obvious now as he continues to wave off the compliments. 

“Yeah, you really are,” you reiterate, resting your hand on top of his thigh, squeezing him gently. With the table obscuring his view, Yuji can’t see this small gesture, nor does he notice the subtle way Choso reacts, flustered and slightly aroused. He’s been wanting to touch you all night, but not in front of his precious baby brother, who remains clueless to the extent of your relationship. Before you can pull away completely, not wanting to rattle him any further, he hooks his pinky with yours, his grip unyielding. You smile to yourself, the two of you linked together while you chat with Yuji about your plans the rest of the night, which consists of Choso teaching you how to make a lovely castella cake, amongst other not-so-innocent activities. For the sake of Yuji’s virtue, you decide to leave that part out. 

It's been over a month now that you and Choso started your relationship after that unfortunate package mix-up, which ended up not being unfortunate at all. By total accident, you unboxed his brand spanking new Cock Sucker 3000, and in a bizarre attempt to alleviate any awkwardness from the situation, you proceeded to use your own sex toy in front of him while he demonstrated his, resulting in the hottest night of your life. Two days following that, after another ridiculous misunderstanding, the both of you realized your feelings for one another and decided to give this a shot. 

You’ve learned so much about him, most importantly that he’s quite the fragile soul, often distrusting of strangers right off the bat. The last thing you want is for him to lose his trust in you, so taking it day-by-day, little-by-little, is what works the best for the both of you. The two of you have remained on third base when it comes to sex, which you’re not complaining about one bit, considering how voracious you’ve been with each other. You’re waiting for the right time to finally hit that home run, a grand slam at this rate. It could happen tonight, tomorrow, maybe even a few more months from now. All you know for certain is that you’re happy with Choso, and he’s happy with you. That’s all that matters.

However, you’d be lying to yourself if you said you weren’t fantasizing about it already. You can’t help yourself when you’re with him. In front of others, he’s usually more reserved, timid. Alone with you, his confidence unveils. His touches are assured all over your body, an expert at all the big and little ways to make you moan in pleasure. The range of expressions he’s willing to show you, from unabashedly needy to absolutely feral, make your body tingle just thinking about it. And that voice, sweet and soft when he’s coaxing you, then to that sexy, gruffy tone as he ravishes you, whether it’s with his fingers, his mouth, his firm grip on the vibrator. It’s no shock that you’ve imagined the perfect way he’d slide into you, filling you up to the brim with his massive cock. Hell, you’ve admitted it to each other several times already, how badly you both want it, how good it’d feel to be bounded together as one. You keep reminding yourself to be patient, because when it does happen, it will be well worth the wait. 

The three of you hang out a while longer until Yuji announces that he’s leaving to get ready for a party with his friends. Choso gives his brother a big hug, handing him a small bag of leftovers to take with him back to his university apartment. “Don’t party too hard this weekend,” he warns him sternly, sounding like a protective parent. “Behave yourself. Don’t make Fushiguro take care of you and Kugisaki again.” 

Yuji beams at him. “Megumi likes taking care of us! That’s his idea of fun!” He looks at you, a mischievous grin on his face. “You two behave yourselves too, alright? Don’t forget to use protection.” 

Shit. Okay, so maybe he does know.

Choso stiffens, an uncomfortable noise gurgling in his throat, clearly stunned by Yuji’s remark. You let out a loud and nervous laugh, desperately trying to play it cool, though you two idiots couldn’t make this any more obvious. “We’re just making castella cake, remember? We’re not having sex at all! Just some good clean fun here, nothing naughty! Right, Choso?” You’re so frazzled that you accidentally kick your boyfriend a tad too hard in the ankle, enough for him to yelp. “Right, Choso?!”

Sweat beads on your forehead while he bumbles incoherently now, failing to his explain your bizarre reactions to his younger brother, who just stands there, very pleased with himself. “Oh, I meant oven mitts,” Yuji smiles innocently, completely unfazed. “You know, for your hands.” He turns on his heel to see himself out while Choso continues to gape at him. “See you two lovebirds next week!” he calls out from over his shoulder, waving until he’s out of sight.

Choso unclenches to close the door while you bury your face in your palms, ashamed of yourself. “I can’t believe I just did that.”

He surrounds you in his sweet embrace, relaxed and actually laughing. “At least you said something. I just stood there like an idiot.”

You peer up at him, pouting at him. “You’re not an idiot, take it back.”

“I take it back,” he relents, giving you a kiss on the forehead. 

Nuzzling your nose to his, you mention, “I guess that was our way of telling him, right?”

“I had a hunch he already knew,” he responds. “Yuji’s no dummy. He was already telling me stuff a few weeks ago.”

“What did he say?”

“Well, he was the one who told me to be friends with you. He’s even the one who first suggested inviting you to our family dinners.”

Your heart swells in your chest. “Really?”

He nods, a kind smile on his face. “Yeah. Yuji is a sweet kid, so I figured he was just being polite. But maybe he sees you and me being…y’know.”  

You smirk, giddy to hear the rest of his sentence. “What?”

His voice is quiet, shy from the sudden vulnerability he’s displaying. “A good fit? I don’t know, what do you think?” Despite all that’s happened between the two of you within a month, Choso still has his doubts, his insecurities. The last relationship he had ended because he caught his ex cheating. From then on, he’s been reluctant to let his guard down and trust someone with his heart again. You don’t blame him for being so cautious when it comes to love, so you do everything in your power to validate his emotions, reassure him that you care for him just as much as he cares for you. 

You hold him close, your heart thumping at a rapid pace. “I think we’re a perfect fit.” 

He swallows down whatever nerves were tightening in his throat, relieved to hear you say it, even though he’s never doubted your true intentions. Hearing it in your voice, seeing it in your kind eyes gives him the strength to tear down all the walls he’s built around himself to let you in. Inching closer, voice still quiet, he asks, “Can we…?”

You don’t let him finish his thought as you lean forward to press your lips to his. His arms squeeze you in a tighter embrace, nearly lifting you off your feet as he kisses you passionately. Your mouths move seamlessly together, his hands gliding smoothly along your waist, yours gently caressing his face, proving that the two of you are the perfect fit indeed. There’s dishes in the sink waiting to be washed, a castella cake waiting to be baked, but who are you kidding? This is what you need right now, to have Choso’s body on yours, to taste him, to devour him, completely lose yourself in him. And that’s exactly what he needs too. 

The two of you make your way inside his bedroom, not letting the other go for even a second, kisses sloppy now, all tongue and spit. He’s quick to undress you, palms moving evenly beneath your blouse. You stretch your arms up, letting him remove it completely, his eyes fixated on your breasts, still covered by your bra. He squeezes at them, his grip firm, thumbs brushing across your nipples. Desperate to feel him without this extra layer of clothing, you turn around, wanting him to unhook the clasp, which he does. His lips graze you, peppering soft kisses along your shoulder while he pinches at your nipples with the perfect amount of pressure to have you moaning. “You love it when I play with your tits like this,” he whispers, mouth hot on your ear. It isn’t a question; he says it with confidence, bordering on cockiness with the way he smirks at every little whine that escapes you. You love this switch from shy and sweet to bold and unashamed, always eager to fulfill his sexual appetite for you. 

“I do,” you answer breathlessly, his cock hard and throbbing between your ass cheeks as you grind against him. “You know I do, baby.”

“Fuck, I love it when you call me that,” he groans, sucking on your ear lobe. One hand travels past your navel, tugging at your waistband. 

Your crane your neck to meet his lips. “You’re my baby. You’re all mine, Choso.”

He moans into your mouth, lapping at your tongue. “Yeah, I’m yours. I’m all yours.”

You slide out of your pants, leaving your panties on, the silk ones he adores on you. On the bed, you lie on your back, watching him strip the rest of his clothes off while he towers over you, licking his lips when he positions in his head between your spread legs. He’s been indulging in this recently, eating you out through your panties, getting them soaking wet with his spit and your slick. His gaze meets yours, those typically kind eyes hiding something feral brewing inside him. He’s masterful with his tongue, spreading it wide on your clit, puckering his lips around you until you’re squirming. You grab hold of his head, grasping strands of his soft hair as he devours you. 

As if this wasn’t enough for him, he hums into your skin, pointing at the bedside drawer. He doesn’t have to say it; you already know what he wants. You’ve made it a habit now to keep a few of your sex toys at his place, including your most favorite vibrator, the same exact one you demonstrated for him when all of this first started. It soon became his favorite too. You pass it to him shakily, already at the edge, ready to burst any second. He takes it, holding the tip to your covered clit, the fabric properly drenched now. The vibrations start instantly as he pushes the button, causing you to jolt from the sensation. “Fuck!” you cry out, toes curling, knees wobbly. “Please, Choso.”

“Please what?” he teases, stroking his cock with his free fist. 

“Please take them off,” you beg, writhing below him.

He smiles wickedly, hooking the waistband of your underwear, slowly peeling them off you. “That’s my good girl.”

You kick them off frantically, immediately spreading yourself for him once more. “Hurry, baby,” you whine. 

With the vibe still buzzing in his hand, he leans down, giving you a wet smooch on your clit, then presses the fluttering tip to it. Pleasure radiates from your core to every limb of your body and you eventually reach your first climax of the night. 

“God, I love how fucking wet you get,” Choso moans, licking up and down your slit, savoring your orgasm. “So fucking sexy. Makes me want to come.” Precum leaks from the tip of his dick as he jerks himself faster, lips coated in your arousal as he continues to use the toy on you while drinking every drop of you up. 

“Fuck, you’re going to make me come again,” you say, trying to catch your breath. It’s both too much and not enough. The vibrations are relentless on your clit, his tongue hot and wet on your pussy. You’re drunk off this, head light as air, vision getting hazy. Drool spills from one side of your lips, losing control of your composure as you succumb to yet another orgasm, this time, with two of his fingers inside you. 

“So greedy,” he grins, his cock stiff against his abdomen. He takes his digits out of you, spreading your cum on his shaft. “You want more, sweetheart?”

You reach for his cock, desperate to have him fully inside you. “I want all of you.”

His demeanor changes at this, almost like you’ve said the magic words. He swallows nervously, stopping the toy and setting it aside. “Are you serious?”

You smile, nodding at him. “I want all of you, Choso. But if you’re not ready – ”

“I’m ready.” It stumbles out of his mouth in a rush, as if he’s been meaning to say it for a while now. “I want you. I always want you.”

“You have me.” You tug him towards you, wrapping your arms and legs around him, nuzzling your nose to his. “You’ll always have me.” 

He kisses you, humming softly against your lips. “You’re amazing,” he whispers, tapping the tip of his dick on your swollen clit. 

You twitch at his touch, already sensitive from earlier, but still so needy to be filled by him. “Hurry,” you beg him, gyrating your hips, losing your patience. 

“Condom,” he mutters, reaching towards your nightstand, eyes focused on how close his cock is to being inside you. 

You snap yourself out of whatever dangerous desires are playing through your head and nod in agreement, stretching your arm out to open the drawer, blindly retrieving the box of condom wrappers and small bottle of lube. With trembling fingers, he unwraps the condom, rolling it over his cock, coating a generous amount of lube on it. He eases inside you, both of you moaning as you stretch around him perfectly. When he’s to the hilt, he stays still for a moment, kissing you fervently, so happy to finally be connected with you like this. “Is this good?” he asks, always adorably concerned about you. 

You giggle, hugging him tighter. “It’s amazing baby.”

Reassured, he starts thrusting, pulling out ever-so-slightly to pound right back inside you. You squeeze every inch of him as he fucks you deeper, fighting the urge to come on the spot. It’s so damn good, too fucking good, like he’s on this euphoric high, impossible to come down. He can’t believe how incredible this feels, even with the condom on, and it makes him want to burst thinking about the near future when he’ll have a chance to do you without it. How pretty you’d look with his cum spilling out you. That fucked-out expression on your face as you beg him to breed you. The gorgeous belly when you’re pregnant with his baby...

Choso has to physically shake his head to rid these obscene fantasies from his thoughts. He really can’t help himself when he’s with you. Grunting with each thrust, he resists the temptation to pull this condom off to give it to you raw, reminding himself that patience is a virtue and that the two of you have all the time in the world.

It doesn’t take long for the both of you to come. As soon as you’re right at the edge of your third climax of the night, you cry out, “Right there, baby! Fuck me right there!” holding him tight as you spill all over his cock. He comes as soon as you finish, certain that if you weren’t using protection and assuming you’re currently ovulating, he’d surely get you pregnant with how fucking intense this load was. Choso pulls out, carefully pulling off the condom, taking a couple of seconds to marvel at all the cum you managed to draw out of him. You laugh, watching him as he ties the open end to toss into the nearby trash bin. “Is it a lot?”

He snuggles up next to you, nuzzling his nose to your neck, back to his precious puppy-dog cuteness. “If we weren’t using protection, it would have definitely gotten you pregnant.”

You joke, “And is that a bad thing?”

He rests a hand on your stomach, his touch tender and sweet. “Not at all. I wouldn’t mind raising a little baby with you.”

Normally, you’d freak out. Normally, Choso would freak out. But for some odd reason, the idea of sharing a future together, of raising a family together, seems right. And while it’s only been a month, you’re both confident that the two of you will be spending a long, healthy, loving life with each other. 

Choso’s phone vibrates on the nightstand, rousing the two of your from your post-coital snuggle session. When he reads whatever notification he’s received, he chuckles, turning the screen towards you, displaying a text message from Yuji:

So…how’s that castella cake? ;)

He types up a quick reply before putting his phone on silent to spend the rest of the night cuddling you uninterrupted. 

Absolutely perfect.

[noiriarti]

Just Practice: Anakin Skywalker x Reader (Modern Best Friends AU) Ch. 3

NSFW!!!!!!! Literally so NSFW!!! Summary: Anakin is your best friend, the one person you can't survive without, and you're about to go to different colleges. You bring up your worries about your inexperience and he offers to help. Pairing: Anakin Skywalker x AFAB!Reader Word Count: 5.4k CW: usage of 'good girl,' rough sex, lots of masturbation, orgasm delay/denial, overstimulation AN: All the love for this fic has really blown me away!! This is quite possibly the raunchiest thing I've ever written and I hope you all enjoy it! As always, requests and asks are open!

Ch. 1, Ch. 2, [Ch. 3], Ch. 4, Bonus Chapter

Chapter 3: Black Lace

Did you love Anakin? Laying on your bed that night after he had just upended your world by kissing you for the first time, you were coming to realize that the answer was likely yes. You loved him platonically, that was a given, but the amount of desire you felt to hold his hand and kiss him wasn't quite normal friend behavior. Over the past year, you had found yourself breathless a couple of times that surprised you. Once, the two of you were wrestling over something (a water bottle? A keychain? It was unimportant), and he pinned you down harshly, a memory that plagued you when you were in bed touching yourself for three whole months after. His eyes, boring into you with that look that you now realized was desire haunted you.

Now that you had finally had his lips on yours, you had started thinking that you weren't just horny, that there was something there. Maybe you had always wanted him a little. Hearing about him and Padmé had made you jealous, but you chalked it up to how he had pulled away from you just slightly to spend more time with Padmé. But that was normal friend stuff, right? Sometimes, when you were in the stands, watching him play, and he ran over to the bench for a drink of water or during a break, his golden brown hair glinted in the sunlight, fluffy pulled back with a headband. The thin sheen of sweat would cover his brow, and Padmé would rush up to the front of the bleachers to wave to him and get his attention. When he waved back, which he always did, though with differing degrees of enthusiasm, you wished he was waving at you. Playing for you. That he'd run to you when he won the game like he ran to Padmé.

So that settled it. It turned out that you were in love with Anakin. What you would do about it depended entirely on him. If he was into you, awesome, but, if not, you couldn't risk your friendship. It was too important.

You made three decisions that night. First, you had to get through tomorrow at the airport with dignity, and not shake things up too much. Second, you had to "practice" with him again, and as soon as possible. Third, you could not get naked in front of him before you knew that he felt the same way about you. The third decision came from your own knowledge. If you were naked in front of him, and he didn't want to date you, you'd spend the rest of your life thinking this man has seen me naked, and he knows how my nipples look whenever you laid eyes on him. So you couldn't get naked yet, but you were planning to tell him how you felt as soon as you were more certain that he liked you than not.

It had been an incredibly horny two weeks for you. Your discovery that you, in fact, loved Anakin resulted in you getting horrendously turned on by every single move he made. Every text had you rushing to the lecture hall's bathroom to shove your hand down your pants. One time, he sent you his official team photo, in his pretty jersey, and you literally ran across campus to your dorm to jerk off. You were down horrendous.

Ahsoka had listened to all this (minus all the masturbation) with an amused expression and insisted that you were stupid, and he obviously liked you. But she didn't know him like you knew him. He was really, really friendly. This was all plausibly deniable. Ahsoka, however, was not stupid, so she just rolled her eyes. It was kind of cute, watching this develop. Ahsoka asked you if you'd seen any cute guys, and you mentioned that the guy who sat next to you in Intro to Sociology was passable, some guy named Jake who you exchanged numbers with for homework sessions. Jake didn't matter at all, though, really. You had eyes only for Anakin.

In your horny haze, you started watching more and more porn featuring men who kind of looked like him. When they would call the girls they were fucking sluts, you felt a shiver as you imagined Anakin saying that to you. In that one session, you really dropped down a rabbit hole that culminated in you taking the BDSM test and lighting up like a Christmas tree. Well, shit.

You desperately wanted to try some of what you had seen, so you found a local sex store and decided to go on Tuesday. There, you walked through the aisles and made mental notes, like research. In the back, you found a rack of lingerie in your size, one of which was a black lace set on sale. Perfect. They were out of fishnets in your size, which you cursed. You really wanted him to rip them. After that, you still had an hour left to explore the store before Ahsoka would be home. For a long time, you stood in front of a display of plugs and debated whether to buy one. Then you moved on to the wall of vibrators, which was overwhelmingly brightly colored. Every box yelled out the benefits--Xtreme Suction, Boyfriend Experience, 17 Vibrating Settings--and you almost didn't buy one. Almost. You took a big vibrating wand off the wall, which at least seemed beginner-friendly. So, after spending altogether too much, you half-walked, half-ran back to your room to try out your new toy while you thought of Anakin. It turned out that the vibrator was incredibly powerful and made you cum in one minute flat, which was lucky because Ahsoka's class let out early.

For the rest of the week, every time you thought of what he was going to do to you, you used the vibrator. Even on the day he was arriving, when the two of you texted about kinks, you pulled the vibe out even though Ahsoka was due to return any minute. You were halfway to your orgasm when you heard the key in the door, so you turned it off in a hurry, shoved it under your pillow, and pulled up your blanket. You just had to masturbate as soon as you heard about him enjoying thinking about you two doing kinky stuff. That's how crazy Anakin made you. 

One short hour later, Anakin was with you. You were trying your best to be normal around him, but that was an impossible mission. When Ahsoka brought up Jake in front of Anakin, you died inside. It wasn't like that with Jake. Only for Anakin. Then, when she asked if you were dating, you had to deny it, hard, so that Anakin wouldn't think you were telling your roommate how in love with him you were.

But you did love him, and you were about to do your best to rock his world. (This failed, almost immediately. He was about to rock yours, hard.)

♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡

"Okay. First of all, I won. You touched me first," he said. He was right, you had, but it was unfair. How were you supposed to resist when he asked you like that? He was always telling you what to do teasingly, but when he did it seriously, it set something off within you. You opened your mouth to snark back in defense, but he interrupted you. 

"And, second of all, shut up and kiss me." You rose up on your toes, tangling your hands in his hair and giving him a long look before finally connecting your lips. His kisses were needy and bruising as he devoured you, wrapping his strong arms around your lower back and drawing you to him. Your bodies slammed into one another, connecting from thigh to chest, and you felt him grow harder against you. You definitely weren't imagining it last time, he was big. You mewled into his mouth, and felt him smile against you at your noisiness. Then he grabbed your bottom lip between his, swiping his tongue across it, and you made an even louder noise, which drew a groan from him. As you tilted your heads this way and that, trying to get even deeper, he slipped his tongue past your lips, exploring tentatively. He had a vague aftertaste of mint, and some distant part of your brain registered that he had probably prepared for this with a mint or gum or something. When you started teasing his lips with you tongue, he pulled away, and you feared for a moment that he was about to tell you that you had done something wrong. Instead, he just said, with his telltale smirk and half-lidden eyes full of desire,

"You're such a good kisser. Been practicing without me?" You shook your head no, and that was the truth. Was he worried about someone else? There was no one. There hadn't been anyone but him in your heart for a very long time.

"Good," he growled. You weren't sure what that meant, and it didn't seem like Anakin thought about it before saying it, based on the way his face fell for a millisecond before he recovered his cool. He dove back into kissing you with grace, like that didn't even happen. Somehow, you found yourself pulling him toward you so much that the back of your knees hit the bed, and you almost lost your balance. He caught you with those strong arms and turned you around so that he sat on the bed, with you standing over him. Just like last time, you yearned to be in his lap, so you straddled him. As soon as you sat on his dick, Anakin groaned, and you dragged yourself along the length trapped by his zipper. He rolled his hips in tandem, which only made you intensify your actions, rutting against him and practically bouncing on his lap. At some point, the friction finally rubbed your clit in exactly the right way, and you threw your head back while you rode him as a broken moan tumbled from your lips. The denim skirt you were wearing was intentionally short and tight, and, with your feverish movements, it rode up until it sat on your hips. You could feel the cool air hit your warm pussy and thighs, so knew he could definitely see the lace you were wearing underneath it. You just hoped it was something he liked.

"What are you wearing? Let me see, baby," he cooed. That pet name, baby, and the sultry way he said it, were enough for you to let the hope in your chest that he felt the same way about you flourish. He pushed up the hem just a bit more with his right hand, running his finger along the top of the underwear, back and forth. You were about to scream in frustration, and you tried to thrust into his hand, but he shook his head.

"Patience," he tutted, as if he had any himself. Anakin's thumb moved down the front, tracing you until he reached your clit. He cast a tentative look at you before he touched it, but you tapped him twice with your hand, and he gently pressed against it. Your moan sounded so loud in the small space that you were worried the neighbors would complain, but he kept going. The little bundle of nerves was so sensitive under his touch that you were shocked it could even feel this way, so intense just because someone else was there. Anakin moved his thumb in small circles, the tendons in his hands jumping as he applied more and more pressure. You kept letting out a string of curses and his name, not caring who could hear. This was too good not to enjoy fully. His other hand gripped your hip so roughly that you were certain it would leave bruises that you would masturbate over for weeks.

Just as you felt it all start to build, not quite there yet but definitely on the right track, he drew his hand away. He tugged on your skirt, which was like an extra-thick belt at this point.

"Why don't we get this off you, baby?" You nodded, and Anakin quickly popped the button and helped you stand up and kick it off. You could pick it up later. You felt a bit silly in your crop top and nothing else, so you took it off in what you hoped was a sexy way, lifting it over your head to expose the black lace bralette you had bought just for him. Anakin's gaze was locked onto your body, practically drooling. When your shirt was off too, he grabbed his cock through his pants and stroked it, to your joy. He found you sexy. You didn't know if he loved you, or if he wanted to date you, but, in this second, it was enough just for him to want you.

You climbed back up onto him and tugged at the simple burgundy tee he was wearing, as if to say I want to see you too. He obliged, shirking it quickly. As he did, you took a long look at his bare chest. 

When you were kids, you would go to the pool, so you knew what he looked like shirtless. But he had started training so much more since then, and some of the softness was gone, replaced with nothing but muscle and sinew, taut under your touch. You ran a hand down his pecs, to his abs--he had actual abs-- going lower and lower until you reached the trail of hair under his belly button. Anakin's eyes were following your hand, then flitted up to your face. His skin pressed against yours when he tightened his arms, letting them fall to touch your ass. A tense second passed with you staring at one another before he continued to kiss you feverishly. One of his hands trailed up your body to grab your tits, pawing at them and occasionally rubbing gentle circles where he could feel your nipples hard under the fabric. The feeling was so intense that, as you groaned into his mouth, you kept moving your hips until he grabbed your hips to hold you still.

"If you keep going like that, baby, I'm going to cum," he whispered raggedly into your ear, still holding you tight. Hearing your best friend say those words, so dirty and sexy, almost drove you mad. You wanted to see him try to hold back as you rutted against him, then get overwhelmed by pleasure. Next time, you vowed.

"Can I go down on you?" You asked, not sure of the sexiest way to phrase the question, but it seemed to work for him. He smiled widely, nodded, and leaned back on his arms as you got down to your knees on the floor, sitting between his legs while he stayed on the bed.

Nervousness washed over you again. After this, there was no going back. You would have seen all of him, and touched it. He wasn't just your best friend anymore, he was more if you did this. So much more. And that was exactly what you wanted.

You fumbled with the button of his pants for a second before it finally opened, then you pulled the zipper down slowly. You'd never understood why people found that sound sexy, but, now, it was making you soaked. You were met with his briefs, which had a wet spot on them that turned the grey fabric dark. You grabbed the waistband and pulled them down, following the dark brown hairs until you saw the base of his cock. When you pulled it down, and his cock sprang out, you paused, sitting completely and utterly still. Seconds passed in silence, and Anakin started staring at you.

"You okay?" He asked the question so gently, so caringly with those eyes full of worry that you thought for a moment, just for a second, that you could sense a flicker of love. It was enough to keep you going for years. You nodded up at him, eyes wide, and he cupped your face tenderly. He could tell you were a little worried that you would be bad, but he was going to make it better.

Holy fuck. This was Anakin's cock. Of course, you'd seen photos before of penises. This was something completely different. He was big--almost huge, as far as you were concerned, and thick. The tan skin of his cock accentuated the darker head. The gently upward curve of his shaft was wrapped in veins, some bluish and some purplish, and you felt a pull to trace them with your tongue. At the very tip, a bead of precum was gathering, and you wanted desperately to see if it tasted how you imagined. You looked up into his eyes, and he was giving you a concerned look, like he was about to suggest you pause for your sake. Instead, you reached out one shaking hand to grip the base of his cock, which was so much warmer than you imagined. Anakin hissed at the contact, then muttered out a "good" as you started stroking the base gently. His praise sent a rush of joy and arousal through you, and you vowed to get more. 

You lowered your lips on the tip of his cock, kissing it with your slightly open mouth as Anakin hissed. Your tongue flicked out to lick off the precum, which was salty, musky, and a bit bitter, but definitely better than you expected. You licked your lips before tracing the contours of the head of his cock, teasing the slit and the edge before trying to take some of it into your mouth. You opened your jaw as wide as you could, because, based on what you read, teeth were to be used sparingly. His cock was surprisingly warm and wet in your mouth, and when you glanced up at him from between his knees, his lips were parted and his face had gone slack as he groaned your name. You sank down further on his cock until the entire head was in your mouth. His skin was so smooth under your tongue as you swirled it around, so incredibly delicate. As you started to bob up and down, getting a bit deeper each time, the noises and words started pouring out of him.

"God, that's great--ah, right there baby, fuck, that's my good girl." The words were so dirty, so right. The praise tumbled out of his mouth so easily, and it only made you get more and more frantic on his cock, taking him in deeper and deeper. At one point, you went too deep, and he hit the back of your throat, making you gag around him. The spasm of your throat around his cock drew out another groan from Anakin, but he gently grabbed your hair and pulled you off.

"Are you alright?" It was your first time gagging around it, taking it deep, and all you could think was how you wanted him to make you do that. To make you gag on him over and over until you couldn't think straight.

"Yeah, Ani, I'm fine. I just--I. I want to do that again," you admitted. He leaned down to kiss you gently, then took your chin in his fingers.

"Can I fuck your throat, baby?" He hid it well, but you could tell he was a bit nervous, most likely worried about hurting you. Anakin was always like that with you, so gentle, so considerate, that it made you all the more certain. You nodded emphatically, because God yes you wanted that, and then he stood up, getting to his full height above you. You shifted to your knees, which were aching from the carpet at this point, then looked up and found yourself in line perfectly with his cock. He dug his fingers into your hair, grabbing hold of it at the root, then started drawing your head closer until he was engulfed in your mouth again. Once he reached a bit of resistance, he drew back and thrust, shallow and quick, then drew back again. Anakin went a bit deeper the next time, then started thrusting faster. The physical feeling itself was nothing compared to the heady rush from the look he was giving you. Anakin was always sunshine, but now he was dark and sinful, using your throat for his pleasure. Your eyes locked, which obviously affected him based on the way he took a ragged breath and tipped his head back.

Watching him get so much pleasure from you made your right hand go down to your pussy, giving it much-needed relief by slipping underneath your underwear and rubbing your clit directly. The stimulation only made you more relaxed, which then allowed him to thrust further into your throat. He was getting faster, so you hollowed your cheeks and put your left hand on his tense thigh, which was almost shaking, before wrapping it around the base of his cock and stroking. Anakin growled and sped up, losing himself in the pleasure of your mouth, about to cum.

"Fuck, baby, I'm gonna--ah, fuck, I'm cumming," he choked out as he buried himself deep inside you. Your hand sped up as you felt his cock start to spasm. It was thick and warm and incredibly bitter, but it tasted like Anakin, so you swallowed it as the cum slid down your throat in spurts. After he came, he pulled out of your mouth with a sigh, then slid his thumb over your swollen and spit-covered lips.

"That was amazing," he said, out of breath, "How are you feeling?" The hand on your mouth went to your cheek, holding it gently.

"Good," you breathed. "Horny." He chuckled, still panting and looking down at you with genuine adoration. Anakin sat down on the bed, then got on it as he pulled up his briefs to cover up his sensitive cock.

"Come up here. I'll take care of you," he said as he shifted backward onto the bed, leaving space for you to lay down next to him. As he moved, then adjusted your pillow so you could be comfortable, you realized you had made a mistake. You stood up to try and stop it, but it was too late. You hadn't moved the goddamn vibrator. He found it, of course, with a gentle "oh." He held it up for you to see what he had found, and the dread nestled in your stomach. He was so going to make fun of you for this.

"Someone's been practicing on their own, I see," he said with a raised eyebrow as he flicked the on button, sending the tip of the vibrator shaking in a frenzy. Anakin gave you a shit-eating grin. You felt your cheeks and the tips of your ears grow warm.

"Fuck, I meant to move that, I--" He interrupted you with intense eyes. His hair was wild around his face, waves messed by your hands earlier.

"Embarrassed?" Yes, obviously. You nodded, looking away and adjusting a strand of your hair that had fallen into your face from when he fucked it. He was obviously enjoying this more than a little bit, and you started to wonder how much he really enjoyed you being embarrassed in other situations too. If his teasing was all platonic. His grin grew wolfish.

"How many times have you used it?" That caught you off guard. Your teasing was something you had both enjoyed, but the way he turned it into a little game for his own pleasure made you want to be teased by him all the time. Your stunned silence had obviously riled him up, so he kept going.

"Huh? How many times, baby? How many times have you made yourself cum with this?" Oh, he really wanted to know. He brought the still-humming vibrator to the inside of your knee, then slowly started tracing it up your thigh. You jolted, but answered him.

"Got it four days ago. I--five times," you whispered as he brought it closer and closer to where you wanted it. Anakin chuckled, a sound so dark and almost condescending that you could hardly believe it came from your best friend. It flared in your pussy, sending blood to your clit until you could feel your heartbeat in it. The vibrator was so close, you could practically feel it already.

"Twice in one day?" Anakin gritted the question out with a hungry smirk, the dark echo of the one you knew so well. You loved it. You wanted him to devour you and destroy you. You nodded slowly, well aware of how close he was to finally touching you. He finally reached your clit, and gave you one-two-three seconds of pleasure before he switched the vibrator off.

"Get on the bed," he commanded, pulling you by the hips into his embrace on the bed. He shifted to the headboard, so that you were between his legs and laying back on his chest. Anakin was so warm, so comforting behind you as his arms wrapped around you and brought the vibrator back to your clit. When it hummed to life, you turned your face and buried it in his arm, muffling the moans and words you babbled out.

"Ah, FUCK. God yesyesyesyes more, please, Ani!" The vibe never failed you before, and it wasn't now. The stimulation, the aftertaste of cum in your mouth, and the smell of Anakin's sweat and shampoo all mingled together to bring you closer and closer, until you were about to finally--Anakin ripped the vibrator off of you, and your hips thrust up into the empty air as you mewled and cried out for him.

"Fuck, please let me cum! I'm so fucking horny Ani, please," you begged, not even caring about dignity anymore. You needed this, so so fucking badly.

"You want to cum? Fine. You get to cum, but you're gonna do it twice." He pressed the vibrator to you again and gently circled it on you. It was so much, the heat of the room, the strain in your legs, the way your mind was going fuzzy at the edges, filled with nothing but Anakin. You came like you never had before, jolting as your legs shook and making a series of strangled noises that included shouts of his name intermixed with breathy moans. You could hear him, vaguely, curse at the sight in front of him. The waves hit you over and over, extending longer than you thought you could, your pussy twitching repeatedly. But Anakin didn't take the vibrator off you. It almost hurt, but your sensitivity made it overwhelmingly good, like the breath was leaving your chest. Getting back to being able to cum took a minute, but you were feeling it build again, stronger this time. Your abs clenched, and Anakin started to read your tells. He could tell, just like you could, that you were about to cum.

"That's it, baby. Cum again for me, you can do it," he murmured in your ear as you let out a desperate wail and came violently. Your whole body was shaking, back arched, and your breathing was ragged like you had just run a marathon. Your pussy was desperately clenching on nothing as the feeling surged over you, so much stronger this time around. The knowledge that it was Anakin making you cum only made it more powerful. When you had come down from the peak of it, and were just riding out the last aftershocks, Anakin turned off the vibrator and rested his hand on your knee.

"That was perfect, baby. You were so good for me. So amazing," he whispered as he pulled you closer. If you were less floaty and light-headed, you would have thought more of his use of baby, like this was something more than practice. Now that he had touched you like this, you knew that there wasn't any going back, and that you were going to tell him eventually. Tell him how you felt. But not right now. Right now, all that mattered was his strong arms engulfing you, keeping you warm and safe after everything you had done. 

Nearly fifteen minutes passed with him holding you like that before you realized that you should probably pee and change. But he was so comfortable, rubbing your knee with his thumb idly as he monitored you. His hands supported you as you tried to sit up, still tired and shaky from the effort of all of it.

"I should really go pee," you said, obviously unenthusiastic. 

"You okay? Feel good about everything?" When you turned around to look at him, Anakin was so visibly concerned, it was too sweet. His pupils were blown wide, his features soft in the low light. Your heart tugged when you realized this was only making you love him more.

"Yeah, you?" And that was the truth. You did feel good about everything, almost too good. He was so perfect for you, kinky in just the right ways, and you were terrified you wouldn't find that again. When he heard you were alright, he grinned, back to his usual bright, happy self. There was also that. You were terrified you wouldn't find someone who loved you this much, even if he only loved you as a friend.

"Fuck yeah. Alright, go clean up," he said. His hands on your lower back gave you a gentle push to help you get going. With your PJs, you stepped into the bathroom you shared with the double bedroom next door, locking both doors, and tried to wipe up the wetness on your underwear. There was no use, they would go straight into the wash. Whatever. You tossed them into your hamper and got ready for bed.

When you left the bathroom, you were shocked to find Anakin naked in the middle of the room, halfway through changing. It felt almost normal, which was weird, given that you couldn't conceive of him having a penis a year ago. He noticed your strange look and pulled up his flannel pajama pants.

"What? It's not like you've never seen me naked before," he joked with a wink. You supposed that was true, but this seemed very... intimate, somehow. The first time was practice, but what was this?

"Oh, could you grab my phone charger? It's in the big pocket of my backpack," he called idly from the bed. His shirt was still off, and the flannel pants sat low on his hips, so you found your eyes roving over the wide expanse of his chest. On your way back to the bed from the bathroom, you stopped by the bag he had left on the floor. As you dug through it, you found underwear (ew, though really not ew because you had just had his cock down your throat ten minutes ago), his computer, and a couple shirts, but no tell-tale charger cord.

"I don't think it's in here," you said to him, but you stuck your hand deeper into the layers of his overstuffed backpack. This must be what performing a colonoscopy is like, you thought. Your fingers closed around something thin, wrapped up with what felt like a crumpled paper, and you started fishing it out. He was notorious for stuffing paper in his bag without thinking in high school, and you once found his report card somewhere in the depths of it during senior year. It was from four years ago. You chuckled to yourself at the memory as you finally got the knot loose, along with the crumpled paper trapped within it.

You unwrapped it carefully. The piece of notebook paper looked frequently used but recently discarded, and was covered in Anakin's distinctive scrawl. Your flitted over the first line, expecting to read something about resistors. Instead, you saw something else. Since we were kids, I've considered you my closest friend. You kept reading.

"Anakin, what the fuck is this?"

♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡

Tag List (let me know if you'd like to be added!): @doblasftcisco @aliciaasky @cultofsin @avalovesjoe1 @akixxrafiiy @princearthur4 @sythethecarrot

[vaguesxrrow]

hii! i was wondering if i could request a Dean Winchester x reader with an established relationship, and i had this prompt in my head [could possibly be used as future inspo's for you fics too if you'd like :>]

basically, the relationship between them is pretty new, like only a month or two new, and reader has claustrophobia, but never told him or Sam.

and for a case, they have to go into an elevator, which is fine, and reader seems to do a good job at pretending it doesnt freak them out that they're in a convined space (elevator is pretty tiny, even for elevator standarts)

but then it suddenly stays still, and gets stuck bc of electrical issues.

so now they're stuck in an elevator for who knows how long, and reader tries their best to stay calm, but Dean knows better and now that the elevator is staying still he notices the microexpressions, the panic, the fear.

and its just super fluffy with him helping reader deal with it untill the elevator is back on track

thanks! and have a great day!

i lovee all your requests sm, especially bc they challenge me to write new things <33 i rlly like how this turned out so i hope u do to !

dean winchester / claustrophobic!reader

a/n: i have no personal experience with claustrophobia but i researched it as much as i could. however sorry if it still sounds unrealistic !

cws: panic attacks, claustrophobia

wc: 785

tags: gender neutral reader, hurt/comfort, fluff, humour

"can we even fit in there?" dean asked dubiously, clearly unimpressed at the elevator that stood before you. "i mean, this has gotta be a health hazard, man, cause what is this?" he banged the doors as he stepped inside.

"it's fine, dean, stop being dramatic." you rolled your eyes, trying to fight the wave of panic (or was that vomit?) rising up inside you.

not letting yourself think about it any further, you stepped in after dean. at first, you thought it was just your claustrophobia whispering how this elevator looked like a death trap. but then your (wonderful, by the way) boyfriend dean had pointed it out himself, and wasn't that just awesome?

you weren't irritated at him, but at the situation itself. you and dean had only been dating for a month, and definitely hadn't reached the 'divulge your deepest fears and secrets to each other' stage.

you could tell dean about your claustrophobia now, but what else was there to do? the stairs in this building had been destroyed by the vampires you knew nested on the top floor.

in conclusion, the elevator was the only way.

determined, you punched the button to the 17th floor. this was fine.

dean prattled on about the job. something about 4 vampires, killing 3 residents until the others had to evacuate...

suddenly, the elevator groaned to a stop, on the 10th floor. you hit the buttons again. god, it had been going so well.

"what happened?" you asked. the lights began to flicker. "is there a ghost here, too?"

both of you scanned the area as best as you could, having to shuffle around awkwardly to look at the whole area.

"nah," dean finally said. "probably just electrical issues."

you sighed. "it's gonna be humiliating calling sam to rescue us."

"tell me about it." dean rolled his eyes, even as he dialed his brother's number. "yeah, sammy, [name] and i got into a bit of a situation... no, dumbass, we're not dying-"

you forced a laugh at the boy's banter, even as the walls seemed to be closing in on you. breathe in and out, you chanted internally.

"-if you could just come get us..." dean glanced at you, pausing in surprise for a second. "hey, sammy, i gotta go, just get here as quick as you can, would ya?" he hung up, tucking his phone back into his pocket. you were too focused on keeping your emotions in check to notice dean had become alerted to your subtle panic, and was now giving you his full attention.

"you okay, [name]?" he asked.

you forced a teasing grin. "fine, just wishing i had some fresh air to get away from your stink."

"that's a smooth evasion if i've ever heard one, but it ain't gonna work on me, hot stuff." he wiped away a miniscule bead of sweat from your forehead. "literally."

you closed your eyes. he had clocked you - no point in keeping up the act now, even if it was embarrassing.

"can i touch you?"

you nodded. he put an arm around your shoulder, his other hand lightly grasping yours. he guided it to his chest where his heart was. "you feel my heartbeat?"

you murmured an affirmation.

"alright, it quickened a bit there, but that's the effect you have on me." he winked. "how fast is it? does it match the.. what was it, bpm, of any song?"

you shook your head at him in confusion. "what?"

"answer the question, [name]." he rolled his eyes, flushing slightly.

you furrowed your brow as you thought. "wanted dead or alive, bon jovi?"

he smirked. "awh, that's awesome. now you get to bear witness to my rendition of it."

that alone was so unexpected it startled a laugh out of you. "excuse me?"

he began swaying, jostling you in the process. "you heard me. i'm a cowboy, on a steel horse i riiide." he spun around, although it was more of an awkward twirl. "i'm wantedddd..." he held out both hands to you, tugging you close when you took them. "dead or aliiiveeee!"

you snorted loudly at his attempt to hold the last note, and yelped in surprise when the elevator lurched back into movement. dean's hug tightened, steadying you.

"i must be one hell of a singer if that was all it took to get the elevator sorted," he remarked, looking hilariously proud of himself.

"that's one way to put it." your previous panic and embarrassment had dissipated, leaving only gratitude for your boyfriend. "thanks."

he kissed you briefly. "no problem. but can you imagine the look on sammy's face when he gets here and we don't need help anymore? ha, imagine that!"

[spoonfulofmilo]

Full fic??

I’ve read that Logan S. felt really lonely being the only American in F1. Like, he wasn’t completely accepted in the grid. Maybe he has an overprotective older sister who is a professional soccer player (like World Cup level good) who finally has time to attend his races. She dislikes most of the grid, except Alex and Oscar, for how they treated her brother. quick to defend Logan and even as far as annihilate them during the annual driver soccer match to prove a point. Im thinking G. Russel pairing due to Logan living in England. he wins her over by treating logan right, acknowledging he could have been welcoming, etc. Just a thought!

OKAY I HONESTLY LOVED THIS! IT WAS SO MUCH FUN TO WRITE (let me know if you want a part 2, because it is a bit of an interesting ending haha)

my masterlist can be accessed here

Please keep requesting - y'all have awesome ideas we agree on a lot of stuff :) - my guidelines are here, and if you want some prompts, they are here.

also feel free to come in and start chatting to me in my asks, would love to get to know y'all better

and if you want to be added to my taglist lmk :)

edit: i wrote part 2 - it is here

part 3 is here

George Russell x reader, logan sargeant x sister!reader

---

Y/N loves her brother, she really does. Yeah, she’s tried to get to a few of his F2 rounds, but with her soccer taking her around the world, she has had very little time. She has the entire month off though, so what better to do than visit her brother at his home grand prix. Miami is always a party, so maybe she could let loose for a bit, try and relax, and find a guy.

This is quickly vetoed when she finds Logan cooped up in his drivers room. While most people would think that he was excited for the race, most people weren’t Logan’s sister. She could tell he was thinking too hard about something, and it wasn’t good.

“Hey Logie Bear! Whatcha thinking about?” She tried to appear happy, but she could see that Logan’s smile did not reach his eyes

“Nothing, just excited for the race, the car is quick, just aiming for some points, hoping for a safety car. The garage is over there, sorry I have to warm up.” Y/N looked up as Benny entered the room and Logan stood up. She could tell how closed up he was, how he didn’t want to talk at all

“Okay, we’ll talk after the race Logan! Good luck, you'll smash it!” Y/N walked out of the drivers room towards the garage seeing the chaos of it.

Y/N watched as Logan apologised over again and again to his engineer for not making up any more places. She stood there listening to his engineer reassure her younger brother. She eventually decided that she couldn’t listen to it anymore and decided to wait in his garage room.

When he walked in, Y/N could tell he wasn’t sure whether to throw stuff or cry. 

“Hey, hey, come here! It’s okay, it’s okay!” She opened her arms and sat down as Logan fell down into them and hugged her baby brother, as he started talking the words just rushed out

“I just wanted to prove that I deserve to be here, feel like I’m a part of the paddock.” Logan hugged his sister back tightly, hesitating slightly.

“What do you mean? Of course you’re a part of the paddock, you’ve got your seat, y’know?” Y/N was confused as to what her brother meant, from what she had seen, he was welcomed warmly by everyone.

“Yeah but, I’m never invited to the grid parties, no one really ever talks to me, except Alex and Oscar, and Oscar is getting into the rest of the grid through Lando, and Alex is only really talking to me because I mean, he’s my teammate we have to be friends, and I just want everyone to like me… so I thought maybe if I got some points and good overtakes, then people would like me..”

“Oh, Logie… It’ll be okay. If they don’t like you then I think they’re just idiots, but they won’t. They’ll warm up to you, I promise.”

---

George watched as Y/N sprinted up and down. Okay the F1 team was never going to win, particularly when multiple women who were playing in the world cup were playing on the opposition team, but ‘Sargeant’  (who also had the same name as the rookie driver this year, who was sitting in the stands) was dominating, she had more goals then all of the f1 team, so of course the celebrity team won 4-1. She’d almost immediately jumped into the stands once the referee blew the whistle and started talking to Logan, maybe the kid got married young and just didn’t want anyone to realise. 

Although she looked quite similar to Logan, so maybe his sister instead. Either way, she did not seem to like them, she called them all dickheads and shoved them over a few times. George’s knees were sore. But she was still pretty. So he approached Logan and the girl.

“Hello! I’m George and…’

“I’m pretty sure my brother knows your name, Georgie! Why don’t you say hello to him?”

“Y/N-”

“No. Say hi to Logan, George.” She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes, almost forced.

“Hey Logan! Looking forward to the grand prix this weekend?”

“Uhhhh… yeah. ” He turned back to Y/N “I’ve got some stuff to do, so you can make your way back. See ya!”

As soon as Logan was out of listening range, Y/N pulled George in and started whispering, “Listen, I don’t know what problem you have my brother, but you need to get over it ASAP, understood?”

“I.. don’t have a problem with your brother.”

“Well, then why is he telling me that there have been 2 people, Oscar and Alex, who have actually welcomed him to F1. Everyone else has snubbed him and he doesn’t understand why you don’t like him. He’s lonely. So fucking sort your shit out.”

George stood there, mouth gaping as she stormed off to grab her bag and then sprinted after Logan. He could almost hear the f1 team laughing at his failed attempt at flirting, but all he could think about ‘was what she said true?’’

---

Y/N was going to cry.

She could see Logan in the family and friends box, hands over his mouth, eyes glassy.

That corner kick should’ve gone in, she thought, we had so many chances and we still fucked it all. Couldn’t even give Megs a proper farewell.

She walks slowly over to her younger brother and let his arms wrap around her

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Dragged you halfway ‘round the world when you should’ve been training only to lose the first game.”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, don’t worry about it. Go pack up, we can head home and spend some time in London relaxing. I’ve got next week off before I need to be back in the factory.”

—

Y/N was awoken by a knock on the front door. Hearing Logan snoring from his bedroom, she got up off the couch, rubbing her eyes and opened the door.

Of all the people she was expecting to see, George Russell would’ve been just about the last on her list “Uhh, hey?”

“Oh, morning! Is your brother up?”

Y/n paused for a moment to let George hear the snores coming from Logan’s bedroom. “Yeah, no, sorry. I can pass on a message?”

“Oh, No I was just going to offer if he was still up to go on a morning jog with him, but as he isn’t…”

“You been doing this often?”

“Almost every week we’ve been in town. I don’t think he understands what or why I’m doing this. But, he’s a good kid, opens up a bit when you talk to him. He likes you, respects you a lot for 2 siblings pursuing their sport across the globe.”

“I’ll make some breakfast and you can stay til Logan wakes up, okay? As a thanks for looking out for him. Hard for me to do from across the globe.” Y/N looked tense, with an almost forced smile. She looked awkward, before stepping back, holding the door open so George could come in.

---

“LOGAN SARGEANT!”

“Hello, dear sister, what do you want?”

“YOU GOT POINTS!”

“I think you must have watched a different grand prix, I got P12.”

“Hamilton and Leclerc got disqualified, something about wood, but you got points!”

“OH MY! AHHH! I had no idea, oh god!”

“YEAH! MY LITTLE BRO FINALLY GETTING F1 POINTS! WOOHOO! We must celebrate when we’re both in town!”

“AHH! Shit, wait I think people are coming in, give me a sec.

You’re on speaker dear sis, Alex, Oscar and George are here.”

“HELLO OSCAR! HI ALEX! HI GEORGE! DID SOMEONE BRING CHAMPAGNE???”

---

Y/N looks at the buzzing phone on her bedside table. Well clearly she had grabbed Logan’s phone before bed last night. She looked at the contact name

‘George - probably calling about something from the GDPA.’

She picked up.

“Before you start talking, I’m not Logan and I have not signed any NDAs related to his contract so, don’t talk to me.”

“Hi Y/N, do you know where Logan is?” George’s voice was way too cheery for however fucking early it is right now.

“Yeah he’s in his bedroom, he grabbed my phone and I grabbed his, why?” Y/N swung her legs out of the bed and stood up, still rubbing her eyes.

“Oh, can you come answer the door?”

“The door, why?” Y/N got up, and walked to her front door and opened the door to …nothing.

“George, are you pulling a prank on me? There’s nothing at the door.”

“You haven’t opened the door!”

“George… Logan and I are in Florida for Christmas. I’m guessing you’re in London.”

“Oh…yes. Bugger. I came to congratulate him on his contract renewal and so now I’ve got food and flowers and stuff and he’s not here!”

“If you go round the block to 20 XXX Close, there’s a single mom there, who will appreciate some Christmas cheer Georgie.”

“Oh, thank you. I’ll send it over.”

“Why were you congratulating Logan, George? I didn’t think you cared. Only Alex and Oscar have reached out so far.”

“I..I remember what you said at the soccer match, about Logan feeling ostracised by all of us. So I’ve been trying to make him feel welcomed… not just because you said that, and I like you, but also because I kinda realised we’d all be failing him as a grid, so i thought if I started it, maybe others would catch on. It didn’t work, but I think he feels more included.”

“That’s very nice of you Georgie. I’ll pass on your congrats. Now it’s like 7am here, and I didn’t need to be awake today, so i will be heading back to bed. Night Georgie boy.”

[ymaohoh]

Hellcheer Fanfiction Recs

So I've gone mad and read like a hundred hellcheer fanfictions over the last two months. I wanted to make a list of my favourite ones to share. Updated: May/2024

You want Chrissy joining the Hellfire Club AU? take a chance on me by WomanOf1000Faces Roll For... by Not a Little But A Lottie (klarolineagainnaturally) The Matchmakers by margaerystark and rebeccacatherine You want Hellcheer from an alternative character POV? still awake, playing chase with the sunrise by cyraclove (Max) The Cheerleader and the Hellfire King by cunninghamschrissy (Dustin) she said to me, forget what you thought by kattyshack (Max) You make me the best kind of nervous, pretty sure you do that shit on purpose... by PhoenixTalon (Will + the freshmen) for the freak and the princess by thehellcheervoid (Anysia) (Jonathan) Stereotypes by shroomyystar (Mike) A Gentle Nudge by bigdumbbambieyes (Billy) You want some smut with awesome plot? honeycomb by cyraclove Late one night by AdelaideElaine and sequel (featuring Rocky Horror) Rose-tint my world talk me up so sweet by kattyshack A Very Harrington Christmas by justhere4thevibez Play Me Better by justyrae (featuring sexting) a king beside you, somehow by justyrae The Long Way 'Round by Anonymous when you’re dressed in black from head to toe (think I like you best) by cunninghams You want some smut with fluff? love you as much as i do by thehellcheervoid (Anysia) the only thing i want (when one drop hits my mouth) by cunninghams and justyrae wilted by cunninghams You want some daddy kink smut? oh, pretty baby, where’ve you been? by kattyshack got someone to hold me, call me his by agentmmayy You want some longing? synchronized denial by empress_of_snark Silver Smile by shroomyystar worthless players of a non-believer by cunninghamschrissy he comes to visit me (when i’m dreaming every now and then) by cunninghams i can see you by rose_n_gunses dust off my clumsy words & bad pick-up lines by kattyshack You want hellcheer beyond the grave? (brb - crying) Haunt me by IntotheTrees (Chrissy haunts Eddie) All Around Me by she_who_the_river_could_not_hold (Eddie haunts Chrissy) You want some wibbly-wobbly time travel stuff? i just died in your arms tonight by shroomyystar someone reaching back for me by enoughtotemptme You want a body-swap AU? Duality by broomclosetkink (also features the best Chrissy/Wayne moment I've ever read) You want a Eddie vs Jason moment? always be here (from now on) by brightblackholes You want a re-do of Season 4 where Chrissy lives? Chrissy and Eddie’s Infinite Mixtape by LovelyThings aesthetic chills by sloelimbs On the Other Side by JohnGreenGirlAo3 You want a Chrissy/Eddie moving on from Vecna fic? heart begins to beat by makeshiftcandy graceland, too. (whatever she wants) by cunninghams (bucket list AU) trailing stars behind us by HearJessRoar and the twain were casting dice by thehellcheervoid (Anysia) You want an AU Chrissy/Eddie friends to lovers with no Vecna at all? Confrontations with the Devil by Spitecookie You want a fake dating AU? twenty-one rules by elanor_gamgee we're a lie (you and i) by makeshiftcandy

[thetriumphantpanda]

i'm not the only one | joel & tommy miller

Summary | You have your baby. You have your family. But can you really have everything you want? Can you really have your cake and eat it too?

Warnings | Fluff, mentions of breastfeeding, small children (in my world they need to come with a warning because ew), let's say it one more time for old times sake: TOMMY GETTING CUCKED BECAUSE HE LOVES IT, dirty talk, fingering (f) and allusions to other smut.

Word Count | 1.9k

Authors Note | Wow. I just wanted to take some time to say a huge thank you to everyone who has read and supported me through this little fic. What started as a filthy little one-shot has become something super special to me. I'm so proud with how this turned out and I really hope that you love this ending as much as I do. I need to say a massive thank you to the JFC - @cavillscurls @dinsdjrn @morning-star-joy @cupofjoel @tightjeansjavi @sinsofsummers for continuously losing their mind over this fic with me and helping me come up with the ending where no-one gets their heart broken, I love you girls more than I can express 🧡 Thank you to each and every person who has read this, has given me their love, interacted with me and generally just made me the happiest girl for deciding to come back to fic writing. You're all awesome and I love each and every one of you. Please let me know what you thought of this, either by commenting, reblogging or sending me some love in my ask box, and if you'd like to support me with a donation, you can do so over on Ko-Fi.

Series Masterlist | Main Masterlist

The late September sun is still warm, even as it begins dipping below the horizon, painting the sky a beautiful mix of pink and orange. The beer in your bottle is lukewarm, but you finish it off anyway, attention dropping to your son, sat on your knee, as you bounce it up and down to keep him occupied at the table. He’s just turned two and is a much better table companion at Joel’s birthday cook-out than he had been last year. He’s starting to show a little personality, babbling along when Sarah tried to talk to him, teasing Tommy when he hands his son a toy, throwing it to the ground because he already knows he’ll pick it right back up and play along. 

Everyone else has long gone by this point in the evening. This year’s celebration of Joel’s birthday being held at your house because he’s having his garden landscaped. It’s just the five of you, the people who matter most to you in life, sat around, finishing drinks and just enjoying each other’s company. Sarah yawns to your left, the day finally catching up with her. 

“You tired, bug?” Joel asks, smoothing a hand over her hair. 

“I’m not tired.” But she yawns again, chuckles erupting from the table. 

You poke at her arm, “Your room is ready whenever you are.” It had already been agreed that Sarah and Joel would stay here tonight, so he could have a drink and enjoy his birthday without worrying about driving home. 

To her credit, she lasts another hour sat at the table, but once Joshua starts fussing as well, it’s clear it’s time for everyone to call it a night. Joel kisses Sarah on the forehead, wishing her a goodnight as she heads inside. Tommy takes Joshua from your arms and presses a kiss to the top of your head, leaving you and Joel together for the first time that evening. You reach out your arm across the table, palm up to the darkening sky, Joel’s own, much larger hand, slipping into it. 

“Shall we go?” You ask, the smile across your face mirroring his own. 

“I think we should.” 

As you’re walking through the neighbourhood your mind drags back to this time last year and the conversation with Tommy as Joel’s birthday loomed on the horizon. 

“What do you think we should get him for his birthday?” Tommy asked, flipping through the catalogue of construction gear that comes through the letterbox every few months, “He was saying his toolbox is too small these days, maybe we can get him a bigger one?” 

Joshua is cradled against your chest, suckling as you feed him. You’d always wondered how the other women you knew could multitask before he’d been born. One of your best friends could breastfeed her child, cook dinner and talk to her older daughter all at the same time. Now, standing in the kitchen feeding your son, two pans on the stovetop as you cook, holding a conversation with Tommy, you realise it just came naturally. 

“I mean, we can,” You throw over your shoulder, “But I think that man deserves more than a toolbox for his birthday.” 

Once Joshua has finished feeding, you hand him to Tommy, along with placing a rag over his shoulder – you fed him, Tommy gets to burp him, that’s the deal. 

“I just feel bad,” You comment, going back to pushing the steak around the pan, “Do you not feel like you’ve kinda just abandoned him a little?” 

“What do you mean?” Tommy asks, patting his son on the back. 

You sigh, trying to focus on cooking as you speak, “I just mean that he did this for us, gave us this life we have now, and what are we going to do to thank him? Give him a toolbox? Just seems like we don’t care.” 

“Well, what would you suggest?” He asks, you're quiet in response, trying to think of how best to put this, "You miss him, don't you?" He finally asks.

You turn around, leaning against the counter to the side of the stove, “I do miss him,” You say simply, not afraid to admit it, “You said before Joshua was born that you understood the connection we have, I just want to give him something good.” 

Tommy has Joshua cradled in his arms now, trying to get him to go to sleep so he can lie him down and enjoy dinner with you in peace, "You wanna fuck him for his birthday?" There's a smirk on his lips, just like there was when you'd needed Joel before Joshua was born.

“Hey, language!” You chastise, pointing to his son in his arms, “Don’t say it like that either, you know you come first, you always have, I love you Tommy, but can’t we just give him one time, once a year, where I can really show him how grateful I am for what he gave us?” 

You can see him mull it over in his mind as he bounces his son in his arms before he relents, “Okay,” He’s smiling, and it reaches his eyes, so you know he really means it, “If that’s what you want, I’m happy.” 

You smile, walking over to kiss him, “I don’t deserve you,” You murmur against his lips, “I love you so very much, Tommy Miller.” 

Joel thinks, as he walks hand in hand with you back to his home, that he really didn’t need this. He didn’t need thanking for what he’d done. He remembers walking into your hospital room with Sarah after Joshua had been born – she’d insisted on picking the biggest and brightest bouquet of flowers for you and had been so excited to finally meet her nephew. He’d pushed open the door for her that day and had been overcome with a strange sense of satisfaction. 

You were propped up in bed, Joshua cradled in your arms, his tiny hand clutched around one of your fingers, Tommy stood, hand brushing your hair as he looked down at the both of you with pure adoration. He knew he’d given you everything in that moment, that he’d managed to make the two of you the happiest people ever, and that was enough. A fleeting moment in time between you and him, that had created the most beautiful baby boy he’d ever laid eyes on, he’d been happy to let it lie, to wait and see if you wanted more and came back to him down the line. 

He hadn’t expected that on his birthday last year, you’d have cornered him and kissed him with such passion that he wasn’t sure he’d survive once he pulled away from you. Then you explained, one night a year, he could choose when, where you could show him how thankful you were to him. A night just to yourselves, without Tommy’s eyes trailing over you both. Secret and sacred between the two of you. 

Once Joel has unlocked his front door and brought you inside, he wastes no time. He craves this, has spent the last year thinking of the moment he gets to fuse his lips with yours. It’s soft, as his mouth opens against yours, slow as your tongues meet, he doesn’t have to rush with you anymore, he gets you to himself for the whole night. He pulls away, pressing his forehead to yours. 

“Hey.” You smile softly. 

“Hey, pretty girl,” He’s smiling, palms resting at your hips, “You want me to take you upstairs? 

You bite at your bottom lip and breathe out, “Yes.” 

He leads you up the stairs, your hand clutched in his own, through the threshold of his bedroom. He settles himself on top of his sheets, head propped up on his pillows as he motions you to join him. You clamber onto the bed, crawling up his body on your hands and knees until you’re straddling his hips with your mouth back on his. 

As you grind your hips down onto him, his hands coming to cup your ass under your dress, you can feel him growing hard for you. All you want is to strip him down and put your mouth on him, but it seems he has other ideas, and since this is all for him, you let him take the lead. He slips his hands under the waistband of your panties, warm hands on your flesh as he pulls them down as far as they’ll go in this position. 

“Lie down for me, babygirl.” He whispers against your lips, you oblige, settling yourself down on your back as he pulls your underwear off fully, shucking the hem of your dress up to your hips. 

He’s got one of his arms under your head, his lips at your ear as you spread your legs for him, letting his fingers slip through your folds to gather the slick that has slowly been gathering there all evening as you both watched each other, knowing what was coming. 

“So wet for me, pretty girl,” He breathes into your ear, taking the lobe between his teeth to nibble as he slips two of his fingers into your tight pussy, “Been thinking about me?” 

He drags those fingers from your core, up to your clit where he begins to play soft circles across it, it’s so gentle that your breath catches in your throat as you arch yourself into his hand, “Couldn’t stop,” You admit, turning your face to kiss his lips, “Thought about you all day.” 

He dips his fingers back into your cunt as he kisses you, you can feel him smirk against your lips when you grind down to meet his fingers, “I’ve been thinking about you all year, hot mama, couldn’t wait to get my hands on you.” 

He brings his slick fingers back up to your swollen bundle of nerves, showering it with attention as you whimper for him, arching your back and bucking your hips, fingers gripping at his arm as he works you to the crest. You come for him, moaning into his mouth as he kisses you, his fingers making sure they work you for every ounce of your orgasm. 

Joel has you more times than he can count that night. He brings you over the edge over and over again until you can do nothing but sob, beg for a reprieve but beg him not to stop. You let him put you in positions you didn’t know possible, his cock thick and heavy inside you, brushing that spot within you that makes you sing and scream for him. He fills you up with his cum, protected by the pill you take each morning, and then, when the sun is rising and the beginnings of the day break through his drawn curtains, you lie on his chest, fingers drawing patterns on his skin, slick with sweat. You’re both sore, both spent, and both happy, most importantly. You know that within the hour you’ll have to start the walk back to your own home and it’ll be like nothing ever happened. Sarah will think her dad slept on your couch and you were in your rightful place, in bed next to Tommy, and that's how it will continue to be for another year, happy with the man you love, but safe in the knowledge that you still have this slice of heaven each year. The play will continue for another year – the doting uncle and niece, the happy family with their growing son, and you’ll be happy, because this is all you’ve ever needed. 

“I love you.” Joel whispers, lips pressing a kiss to your forehead as he brushes the sweat slicked hair from your face, his eyes mapping every inch of you, claiming this scene as his own, committing it to memory so he has one thing he can think of, in the depths of his nights, when he feels the loneliest. To remind him that he’s not lonely at all, because even if he can only have you once a year, at least he can have you. He’s a simple man and he’s happy to take this one moment with you, until you decide you want more from him, if that’s ever the case. 

“I love you too Joel.” 

[justarandompersononthehellsite]

So... @muffinlance wrote a really awesome story. I read a post from a point in time, though I truly do not remember when since it seems like I've been working on this project forever, saying that she gives blanket permission for people to print and bind the story into a book (I think there was an also addendum saying that they do not give permission to be sold, since selling fic is illegal). This fic has had total control over my whole brain since it was sent to me (@creatorofthemind I believe it was you, so thank you forever for tuning me into it) back during the days of like chapter six or seven.

So here I am now, sharing this amazing journey of my first ever bookbinding adventure. Further reading below.

So to give you an idea of what's going on, this is a fanfiction about Zuko (Avatar the Last Airbender) (animated show version, the LA show did not exist yet and we do not speak of the movie) being adopted by Hakoda, Father of Katara and Zuko. (This might have also been what kicked off the Give Zuko A Parent craze, but don't fact check me.)

Overall, the characters from the show stick very well to the cannon versions, but where MuffinLance really shines is in the rich backstories and fleshed out feeling of all the non cannon elements. Especially the background characters. I would argue that the writing in this peice of fanwork could easily rival the cannon show at many points of comparison.

Now that you have context, we can get into the actual process.

To start, I used this guide to figure out where to even begin, and fount the included resource list to also be quite helpful. I cannot for the LIFE OF ME figure out where I found the template I used for the front matter and such, but it must be somewhere and I will link to it when I inevitably come across it again.

Then I began to typeset. This step took... a long time. I worked in chunks from about September of 2022 to late March of 2024. I would get a big section done, sometimes even the entire thing, but then find I hated the way I had done it and give up for months at a time. Such is the life of ADHD and flitting interest in projects I suppose.

And then finally, step one was done, and I was left with pages on a word document that look like this. (And do please let me know if you want the link to the document. It was so much work, and I would love to not be the only one to use it.)

Next step was printing out this beast. Ended up being about eight pages of front matter, and about 630 pages of body text.

That I printed wrong.

Twice.

Before finally getting it right. And then not getting a picture of it, because I finished at 4 am and had work at 7, and am also an idiot.

Then I simply stitched along, putting everything together into a beautiful text block.

And came up with a design for the cover.

Yes the glue did end up lumpy. Ignore it.

Yes I did have to sketch out the design onto a scraped page several times before I figured out what I was doing. Ignore that too.

The cover design does wrap around the entire cover. No I did not get a picture before I glued the thing down. See again: I'm an idiot. And just... massively impatient.

Finally, we get to the stage of gluing. Behold, my bookpress.

Of course, topped with Madam MuffinLances own actual professional-people book, Fox's Tounge and Kirin's Bone. It is Excelent. Here is the LINK so you can go and support this amazing author with the real-monies as well as the internet-kudos.

Then, once everything is glued together, one must give the book its "gilt" edges.

[blackkatmagic]

What’s the next “weekly update” fic after amongst dust gonna be? I think you posted the last chapter of that on patreon recently so I’m curious what’s slated next.

Actual questions out of the way, have I recently told you how amazing you are? I’m a very inconstant person, but I always come back to your fics, even if I sometimes take longer breaks. I think it’s been, what, nearly 8 years now? Since I started? I turn 25 in a month, which is kinda insane to think about. A lot has changed, and I haven’t kept up with you beyond your fics the way I used to. I hope you and everyone is doing well! The wife, and the cats, and the brother and such. Happy new years!

It was the next to last chapter, so the last one will go up this Tuesday. There was a Patreon poll a while back to pick the MCs of the next fic, and Alpha-17 and Luke won, so it will be something with them. I have ideas, but I am probably going to take a week off between the end of amongst dust and the new fic, just for some breathing room. xD

Honestly it's wild that you've been reading that long - i always kind of stop dead when people tell me stuff like that, but it's so cool, too. To be that much of a part of someone's life for that long - I've had romantic relationships that haven't lasted as long as some people's relationship with my writing, and that's just awesome. ❤️

[writing-whump]

Routinely nauseous

After some time a proper emeto no-plot fic. Isaiah is sick with Matt caretaker.

Isaiah let go of the rim of the toilet only with great difficulty, his fingers curled up around the cold porcelain like claws.

Matthew eased his away from it though and Isaiah promptly collapsed on the floor on fresh folded towel waiting for him on top of the carpet.

Matthew sat cross-legged next to him like they were having some kind of weird pyjama party. He moved with such ease, like he had done this a million times. And Isaiah supposed he had.

"Is this from exhaustion? I knew you were taking on too much-"

Isaiah coughed and curled up around his aching stomach. "Nonsense. There is plenty of other stuff to choose from." He muffled a burp against the towel under his cheek. "Skipped a meal in the morning, dozed off after lunch in the study room and don't forget the weather is changing..."

Matthew gave him an unhappy pat on the arm. Isaiah squeezed his eyes shut against a new wave of nausea. They were rolling through him since midday, the effect of the heart medication worsened by not eating.

He had been doing pretty fine the last month. Almost a proper schedule, law studies, wolf meets and random patrols, training Rip, talking normally with both Matt and Sel...he wanted to appreciate small mercies of being back in shape, except apparently he couldn't.

"It always come back for some incredibly mundane stupid reason..." Isaiah grumbled under his breath, somewhere between resignation and frustrated anger.

His stomach let out a long whine that caused him to wince, gulping the excessive saliva pooling in his mouth. Which was weird, because his tongue tasted dry and horrible, like he was eating clay.

"You are holding up really well, Zaya. It's fine." Matt rubbed his arm in a soothing way that was just underlining to Isaiah how abnormal it all was.

"Just awesome," Isaiah said sarcastically. "Went almost a month without puking. New record."

"Nobody else even noticed. They all seemed to have forgotten, in fact." Matt said it with a grunt, like he expected better of Hector and Arnie.

Isaiah was glad everything was normal on that front though. He spend the weekend with them touring whatever hills there were around Vienna to tour. They treated him fairly, no concerns, no special considerations.

He was immensely glad nothing about his condition reminded them of it. Even if Arnie watched him like a hawk and Hector tried to kinda of leave the topic hanging open in the air, they didn't actually dare to address it, so he was doing well enough.

Except this stupid Monday morning. He got used to the nauseous effects of the meds, but whenever anything in his routine changed—he ate too quickly, skipped a meal or it was too salty or heavy or foreign or his sleep got messed up just a little—his chest would get heavy, which usually led to his digestion process completely stopping.

His stomach was sore, bloated and hard to the touch, currently twisting the remnants of his lunch into confetti he didn't have much hope to hold down either.

Isaiah rubbed at it with distate. Not to mention the tiredness that came with it, he could barely lift his head.

Another angry ripple went through him, echoing with embarrassing loudness through the bathroom.

The slithery disgusting feeling was back around his teeth and he curled his fingers, hiding his face against the towel with a groan.

"Zaya? How is it going down there?"

"God, don't ask."

Matthew sighed. "Come on, up with you. You will feel better once you puke it up."

"Nothing about puking makes me feel better," Isaiah complained, but let Matt slid his hands under his back and prop him up against the toilet.

He was aware he was rather whiny today, but the constant worried frustration with the state of his body that wasn't coming back together like it was, that reacted differently, that disappointed him when it used to hold him up...

He braced himself against the toilet rim, letting some drool hang from his lips. What a sight he must have made.

The next ripple was downright painful, gnawing and he hang his head as a bubble of air forced its way up. He gagged emptily, a shiver running up his spine.

"Are you cold?" Matt rubbed his back with one hand while holding him up by the shoulder with the other.

"Just nauseous. Getting bad again," Isaiah said through gritted teeth, shutting his eyes. The wave started in the pit of his stomach and slithered through him with a powerful cramp.

He heaved with the force, gagging as a few mouthfuls of spit surged out. So much trouble for such meager results.

But the nausea was still rising, so it wasn't the end for sure.

Isaiah shivered again, gagging emptily at the wavy sensation, wrapping a hand around his stomach where it cramped up the most. His heartbeat was in his ears again, chest heavy and he had that shaky feeling in his hands.

"Shhhh. Almost over. Just get the rest up and you will get a break."

"You know something I don't?" Isaiah mouthed, spitting up but he couldn't seem to force the next wave to come. Or end. Or just move. This stuck in state was horrible.

Matthew shuffled behind him so he could wrap an arm around his chest. His hand landed in the middle of Isaiah's back, tense and ready. "On three, okay? One. Two. Three."

He gave Isaiah's back a strong decisive pat and it seemed to be the spike needed.

Isaiah heaved, whole body rolling as a thick wave of vomit came out. Another and another, leaving him breathless and dizzy from the force, having to brace himself against the rim with both hands to keep his balance.

It felt beyond humiliating to be heaving and gagging in Matthew's hold like that, but when it temprered off, he sagged against the red wolf's chest like a ragdoll.

"There you go. Good job. It will get only better now."

Isaiah let him ease him against his lap, content to curl up against Matthew's tight. He was shivering, so Matt grabbed another towel to throw over him like a blanket.

"I'm so tired of this," Isaiah said, downright pitiful and pitying himself, which he hated but had no strength to fight at the moment.

Matt said nothing, cradling his head in his lap. He took the edge of the blanket-towel and mopped at Isaiah's sweaty forehead, freeing the bangs plastered against the skin.

Isaiah sighed, the most content sound of the evening and let the gravity pull his control and tension apart. Completely boneless in Matthew's grip, relieved as the nausea finally eased.

[turcott3]

love language

jamie drysdale x fem! reader

warnings?: cursing, smut!😝 (loss of v card, fingering, unprotected sex) fluff!!!!

positions fics masterlist

~teach me how to love you, i’m not learning what ain’t right~

-

another morning waking up in jamie’s spacious anaheim apartment was a strange feeling to you. you’d grown incredibly fond of him over the past few weeks of staying with him. you were just trying to get on your feet and were looking for a place of your own. trevor, a childhood friend of yours, introduced you to jamie some months ago and jamie was willing to help you while you sorted everything out with your move, trevor’s house being full and your urge to stay with that many guys was at a minimum, but jamie has a place to call his own which was something he always wanted and was willing to share his space with you.

“good morning.” jamie greets you from the couch with a mug of hot coffee.

“morning.” you reply rubbing your eyes and walking into the kitchen to make your morning coffee.

“i bought you a new bottle of creamer because i saw you were almost out.” he says once you open the fridge door.

“oh thank you.” you smile appreciating the small gesture.

“yeah you’re welcome, oh by the way, z, mase and leo are coming over tonight. we have like two days off so i figured you’d want to see them.” he says getting up off the couch and leaning on the tall counter.

“yeah that sounds awesome,” you smile taking a sip of your coffee, locking eyes with jamie. it was always hard for you not to stare for too long at his big, beautiful, blue doe eyes.

“great, i’m gonna get to cleaning the place.” he says drinking the last of his coffee and setting his mug in the sink.

“i’ll help?”

“no it’s okay, didn’t you say you had homework or something?” he says towering over you, standing a little too close.

“oh yeah, i do. we’ll just let me know if you need any help.” you say smiling awkwardly, exiting the kitchen with your coffee, quickly shutting the door behind you. you open your macbook trying to shake the funny feeling he left in your stomach during your short lived conversation in the kitchen. his proximity, his eye contact, his demeanor. it made you overthink, or so you thought.

“what the fuck?” you swear, blinking a few times after seeing how much time had past. it was already reaching 3 pm and you had spent the last 5 hours working on homework and an essay for your english class.

“i think i just got stuck in an alternate dimension, no way i was at my desk for five hours.” you say swinging your door open to jamie sitting on the couch watching tv.

“i didn’t want to interrupt you, when i opened your door you were locked in. i got you lunch tho, i put it in the microwave so it wouldn’t get too cold.”

“oh thank you, you didn’t have to.”

“well i felt like i should because you were drowning yourself in work and you needed to eat something.”

“i appreciate the gesture.” you say pulling the chipotle out of the microwave.

“they’ll be here at 5.” he says.

“okay, let me eat and shower and ill be out here.” you smile walking over to the couch to hug him, “ you’re the best.”

“yeah of course.” he says hugging you back gently. you took your meal into your room and ate it while you picked an outfit and let the shower warm up. right before you step in, your phone buzzes on the counter.

“hey z.” you say picking up.

“hey y/n, can’t wait to see you tonight. it’s been a while since we caught up.”

“yeah me too, i’ve missed you.”

“still a virgin y/n/n? i feel like it’s been long enough since i last checked in.” he asks.

“yes trevor, i told you that you’d be the first to know once i lost my virginity.”

“yep i’m waiting for that text that says ‘harmonica’.”

“oh yes, the code word.” i laugh.

“alright well i’ll let you go, ill see you at 5.”

“bye trev.”

“bye y/n.” he says, ending the line, finally allowing you to step into the shower. you longed for it to finally happen, you’re 20 how has it not yet? once you wrap up your shower you step out, flipping on your hairdryer, humming while you dried it almost completely. you slip on your leggings, throw on your crewneck and spray yourself generously with perfume. you walked back out into the bedroom and heard trevor’s familiar laugh. you slipped on your slippers and walked out into the living room, seeing all the boys sat at the table.

“y/n!” trevor says standing up and walking over to you, hugging you tightly.

“it’s good to see you too trevor.”you laugh as he lets you go. he brings you to the table where you sat directly across from jamie.

“wine anyone? mom got me a wine fridge and i just stocked it.” jamie says and presents a bottle of red wine proudly.

“sure.” you reply smiling, happy to see how proud he is of his wine fridge. he grabs you all glasses and pours one for each of you.

“cheers to being reunited.” mason says raising his glass and everyone following suit, jamie and i locking eyes for a brief moment before looking away, feeling occasional glances in my direction.

“how about some truth or dare?” trevor offers, setting his glass down.

“sure.” mason says with a smug smirk on his face.

“i’m in.” leo replies looking in your direction.

“yeah, yeah let’s play.” you say taking your last sip and setting your glass down.

“i’ll go first.” mason offers, “jamie, truth or dare?”

“truth?” he replies hesitantly.

“how many bottles of wine did you buy for that fridge yesterday?”

“seven.” he quickly replies.

“oh damn ok.” mason laughs, taking another sip.

“trevor, truth or dare?” jamie says turning to look at the clueless boy.

“dare.”

“call terry and tell him you still wanna walk his dog.”

“god, fine.” he says pulling his phone out and calling him.

“hey troy, what’s up?” he says followed by silence.

“yeah i was just calling to ask if i could walk your dog tomorrow? no? oh, okay. great, well thanks for the trust terry.” he laughs hanging up.

“tell you no?” leo asks.

“hahaha yeah.” he replies.

“it’s your turn.” you say cutting him off.

“jeez okay, y/n.” he says smirking looking at you.

“truth.” you say hoping it’s the safe route. trevor looks at you then looks at jamie, then to mason and leo before coming back to you.

“is it true that you’re still a virgin?” he asks with a smug look on his face, causing you to choke on your second sip of your new glass of wine.

“really dude?”

“it requires an answer.”

“yes trevor. i am still a fucking virgin.” i say, face flushing red now that jamie knows.

“alright your turn.” he smiles.

“last round. leo?”

“truth.”

“did you wanna get drafted by the ducks?”

“honestly…… no but i’m glad i am here now.”

“wow didn’t expect that one.” you say expecting a much more underwhelming reply. you finish your wine and rinse your glass out in the sink, finding your way to the couch leaving the boys at the table. they continue their conversation and you sit scrolling through your phone, thinking it would be rude to go to your room with guests over.

j: you good?

y/n: yeah i’m fine

j: okay, talk later?

y/n: sure

you reply one final time, turning on the tv and putting on a movie, distracting yourself from the elephant in the room. not to long after the boys join you on the couch watching the movie as well. jamie sat close to you, arm draped around the back of the couch where you sat. no one said a word to each other for at last 30 minutes. you scoot closer to jamie, leaning your head on his shoulder, eyes drooping with sleepiness. he rested his arm around your shoulder snuggly, his thumb gently caressing your arm.

“boys i think it’s time we head out.” mason declares standing up. it had been a few hours and it was starting to get late.

“i’ll see you guys tomorrow.” jamie says fist bumping them all as they filed out of the apartment. he olaced his arm back around me, this time more snuggly and boldly.

“you okay?” he asks, brushing his thumb in your bicep.

“yeah i’m just embarrassed. he always finds a way.” you admit to the brunette.

“he has a way of rubbing people the wrong way, i’m so sorry y/n.” he replies honestly.

“yeah he does.” you sigh

“so is it true?”

“is what true?” you ask fearing his question.

“are you actually a virgin?”

“yes, i am.” you sigh, embarrassed all over again.

“i mean is there like a reason why?”

“jamie i’m 20, there’s obviously not a good reason. i mean no one’s ever wanted me like that or been attracted to me in that way.” you say picking at your cuticles.

“that’s crazy.”

“what?”

“how has no one been attracted to you in that way?” he repeats and i turn to look at him.

“i mean they just haven’t.”

“they’re crazy.”

“what do you mean?”

“have you looked at you?”

“well yeah but-“

“no buts, come here.” jamie says moving you onto his lap, your hands locking behind his neck.

“what are you doing?”

“giving you the attention you deserve.” he smiles, pulling your chin to his, pressing a short kiss to your lips, sending butterflies through your stomach, leaving an anxious look on your face.

“jamie-“ you start.

“if you don’t want to do anything with me, tell me now and i’ll stop.” he says interrupting you.

“no it’s not that i don’t want to do anything with you, i’m just scared.”

“why are you scared y/n? tell me.” he replies, pushing strands of hair behind your ears.

“i’ve never felt beautiful like other girls so maybe ive just been afraid to ever put myself out there. that’s why im scared. that im not good enough.” you admit to him, never even wanting to admit that to yourself.

“well you should put yourself out there. sure there’s “beauty standards” but who gives a fuck? look at you. you’re so beautiful.” he says with his hands placed delicately on your waist.

“it’s just hard.”

“i’ll make sure you know how beautiful you are love, i promise.” he says running his hand lightly up and down your thigh.

“okay.” you say caving into his words. you grab onto his cheeks and pull him in for a kiss again. this time trying to assert yourself, showing him the direction you want the kiss to go. he puts his arms beneath you, picking you up bridal style, carrying you to his bedroom. a place you’d only entered a handful of times. delicately, he places you on the bed, removing his shirt and climbing over you, reconnecting your lips once again. you began to feel more comfortable, even thought him being shirtless was intimidating to you, you never realized just how toned he actually was.

“you’re so fucking fit jamie.” you say as he backs away to look at you.

“don’t make this about me honey, this night is all about you.” he says running his hands up your legs to the waistband of you leggings in which he assists you in removing. he tosses them in his hamper, clearly having no intentions of giving them back tonight.

“if i need to slow down or stop please tell me.” he says staring down at you, our faces mere inches apart.

“okay.” you reply, face turning rose. he connects your lips once more before assisting you shimmy out of your crewneck which you wore no bra under.

“no bra around the boys? bold move.” he giggles taking your breasts into his hands and kissing you as your hand found their way around his neck. he pulls away standing up again, removing his sweatpants leaving him only in his boxers. delicately, he runs his middle finger over your soaked core on top of the fabric of your lace thong.

“wow so wet huh?” he smirks.

“can’t help it, just want you.” you say boldly, encouraging him more. carefully, he removes your underwear tossing it aside as he runs two fingers through your folds. you were unsure what you were feeling, but knowing it was good was enough. suddenly he finds a sweet spot, kicking your feelings into high gear, unleashing a moan you’d never heard from yourself.

“oh my god jamie.” you say and he giggles.

“you like that?”

“yes fuck yes.” you huff out, never wanting the feeling to end.

“what about,” he pauses, inserting one finger into you, “now?”

you jump at the sensation, it doesn’t hurt too bad but definitely doesn’t feel great.

“a little uncomfortable but not bad, you can keep going.”

“okay.” he says beginning to slide his second finger in, causing a sting.

“okay that hurts a little bit.”

“well good thing i decided to do this first.” he smiles leaning up to kiss you, moving his fingers in and out of you carefully. it still felt weird but you didn’t want to get off on his fingers so you decided to let him go until you felt good enough.

“jamie?” you say opening your eyes and he lifts his head off your shoulder.

“mhm?”

“i’m ready.” you say and he removes his fingers, sucking them clean.

“are you sure baby, like 100% sure?”

“i’m 100% sure.” you reply.

“okay,” he says kissing you once again. he pulls down his boxers allowing his dick to spring free, your eyes directing right to its leaking tip. anxiety trying its best to hold off as he pulls you closer to him as he kneels on the bed, running his tip through you folds just the way his fingers had.

“tell me when it’s too much.” he says pushing in the tip warning a hiss from you.

“you okay?” he asks and you simply nod. he pushes in a little further, feeling your walls stretch out.

“okay wait stop for a sec please.” you say pressing your hands to his chest.

“whatever you need.” he says stopping abruptly. you nod signaling for him to continue and you even hold on and let him bottom out.

“god you’re so big, i feel so full.”

“you’re doing amazing baby.” he says kissing you sweetly on the lips trying to distract you from the sensation you felt between your legs. he retracts his hips slowly and carefully not wanting to hurt you before pushing back in at the same speed, gritting your teeth, trying to find pleasure in this sensation.

“you okay?” he asks.

“yeah i’m okay.” you reply and he continues, the discomfort finally beginning to subside.

“you feel so good around me y/n, so fucking good.” he smiles kissing you passionately. this thrust into you changed everything, pleasure washed over your body quickly, pushing a moan out of your throat.

“there it is, that’s my girl.” he smiles, thrusting a little faster and deeper.

“fuck jamie, that feels so good.” you say wrapping your arms around the back of his neck as his chain hung in your face, hair covering his. he continues his paces, brushing your sweet spot with every thrust, tightening around him.

“you gonna come for me baby?” he asks and you nod quickly, releasing the built up pressure that had built in your abdomen.

“fuck.” you say, the sensation making your legs shake.

“fuck i’m getting close.” he says, his thrusts getting sloppier and pulling out spurting his warm seed onto your stomach. quickly, he runs into the bathroom so wet a rag and wipe your stomach clean before throwing the rag in the hamper and going back into the bathroom, shutting the door behind him.

“jamie?” you ask. no answer. the feeling of regret beginning to rise in your chest. you grab your crewneck and underwear off the floor and, prepare to leave the room and lock yourself away.

“jamie?” you say again, tears threatening to form in your eyes.

“sorry i had to pee and then i had to answer an email i forgot abo- why do you have those?” he stops mid explanation.

“oh i uh, i figured you weren’t gonna come back out so i was just gonna go back to my room. i’ll hopefully have a place soon so i can get out of your hair.” you reply, scratching your head wondering why you even did this, “i’ll just go ahead and leave now.” you say starting to stand up and he stops you.

“woah woah no stop, did you really think i was gonna just dip after that?” he asks stepping in front of you, grabbing onto your arms.

“well….. kind of.”

“no baby, you’ve got it all wrong, come here.” he says climbing back into bed pulling you to his chest instantly.

“what do i have wrong?” you ask, placing your chin on his chest.

“do you honestly think i just had sex with you so you’d lose your virginity and stop being embarrassed by it?” he asks rubbing your back softly.

“that’s kinda what i assumed once you shut the bathroom.”

“well that’s not what happened and i’m so sorry i did that, i couldn’t have picked a worse time to remember i had an email to answer, anyways, the truth is that i like you, and i have for a long time. you’re beautiful, funny and smart. you’re you and i literally cannot get enough of it.” he says smiling locking eyes with you.

“wow, you like me?”

“yes i do, a fucking lot. i had sex with you because i wanted to and it felt so special being your first. guess i couldn’t pass up the chance.” he chuckles.

“it was amazing jamie, i don’t think i could’ve asked for a better first.” you reply, smiling from ear to ear.

“of course my love, you were so amazing, it seemed so natural to you.” he pauses, “also i want you to stay.”

“stay? what do you mean?”

“like i don’t want you to find an apartment for yourself, please just stay, i love having you here.”

“jamie you don’t have to-“

“i’m offering, it will save you a lot of money and i love your company. please stay.”

“okay i will if you want me to. i just don’t want to inhibit your space.” you say picking at your nails

“you won’t be don’t worry. and besides, we may sleep together eventually if we really truly to give us a chance, but you still have your own room when you need space.” he says.

“i- did you mean like share a bed with you?”

“i mean eventually if you want to share we could, no pressure at all.”

“well i guess we could give this a go couldn’t we.” you nod, sitting up on his lap looking down at him.

“if you’d like to give it a go, i would also like that… quite a lot actually.” he laughs and you lean down to kiss him.

“is that you asking me out?”

“more so asking you to be my girlfriend.”

“wow popped the question so soon.” you teased.

“i know we’ve only had like this night but having you around has made me so crazy about you.” he says scooting back to sit up a bit, keeping you on his lap, placing his hands on your waist.

“hey i’m joking babe, i would love to be your spontaneous girlfriend jamie.” you laugh, smiling widely.

“thank god.” he says, his arms wrapping around you and kissing you passionately. the rest of your night was filled with the pleasures of exploring your romantic connection. you talked, you cuddled, you started a new tv show, you fucked, you made out. you used one night to make up for all the time you spent living together, unknowingly pining for each others affection. eventually, the two of you fell asleep entangled in each other, completely obsessed with one another. you woke up the next morning to jamie pressing a kiss to your cheek.

“good morning my love.” he says talking into your cheek before kissing your it a few more times.

“good morning jamie.” you laugh opening your eyes to face him, allowing yourself to get lost in his gorgeous eyes.

“i slept so good.” he giggles.

“oh yeah, best sleep ever.” you giggle wrapping your arms around him and kissing him on the lips.

-