#things have a lasting effect on him and he values his relationships

[rexscanonwife]

Ok so rex obviously 💖💖 but I was also thinking a bit about Data again 🥺👉👈

[wordsarelife]

—style

pairing: draco malfoy x fem!reader

summary: draco and you always come back to each other, sneaking around in secret, unable to let go, even though it’s getting harder to hide and maybe you're not willing to keep the secret any longer

warnings: slight angst but ends in fluff, height difference mentioned

your back was leaning against the castle's wall, arms crossed, you quirked a brow at the boy across from you. he was spotting a similiar expression, his arms crossed like you and face in a deep frown, unmoving as you nodded for him to talk.

"i'm not gonna apologize first" you shrugged, deciding to have it like this if he wanted to be difficult.

"well, me neither" he spat, voice venomous as he looked at you unimpressed, your threat not having the least bit of effect on him. "i wouldn't even know what for"

"you were the one that came back, draco" you reminded. "we agreed that whoever came back first had to apologize"

"well, i'm not doing that"

"then i'm not kissing you" you shrugged, turning your body as if to leave, before his hand grabbed your shoulder, turning you back around in a swift motion.

before you could protest or say anything else about his sudden action, his lips were on yours, pulling you in through the feeling that evaporated in your body.

you moaned into his mouth, not even caring that he didn't apologize, as he pressed you against the wall.

draco and you came from completely different worlds. he was a proud slytherin, someone that valued social standing and reputation above everything else.

you were a gryffindor, hanging along the golden trio most of the time, but basically being friends with everyone, no matter who they were or from which family they came. you didn't mind as long as you liked them.

draco and you had hated each other from the first encounter on. arrogant as he was, he had introduced himself to harry, muttering something about the wrong kind of people (eyeing ron and you) he had chosen to spend his time with.

you rivalry reached it's peak during third year when hermione had hit him and you had caught him days later as he was trying to throw something into her cauldron during potions class. you had slapped his hand back, resulting in him breathing in whatever he had held in there and spending a week in the infirmary, throwing up hours on end.

you gained two weeks of detention from snape, but quickly decided it was worth it, considering you had saved your friend from an even worse fate.

but the real change of your relationship had begun during fourth year. you had noticed that he grew into his looks and you couldn't believe it, but his cockiness actually attracted you.

draco continued making no secret of disliking you and your friends, but you noticed his eyes linger on you longer than they had before.

it had been a week of constant fighting, hormones high and upcoming exams stressing the both of you, where one thing had led to another and you found yourselves in shared detention with professor mcgonagall who punished you to sort through and clean her classroom.

"this is all your fault" draco muttered, cloth in hand as he rubbed it along the table, that picked the water up quickly.

"sure" you nodded with a role of your eyes. the row of goblets in front of you, used for the first year classes, turning out to be a particular hard thing to clean. "as if you didn't start the fight"

"i merely concluded obvious information"

"pff" you made, sending him a glare across the room. "that's not what i would call it"

"let's hear it then, genius"

"i'd call it an uneven distribution of arrogance and stupidity" you smiled smugly as you set down another goblet in front of you.

"you take that back!" draco let go off the cloth in his hand and dashed across the room, pushing his hands to his hips and looking down on you as if to try and dare you to say more.

"no" you shook your head, rising up from your chair so you were on an even level with him.

"one last chance, l/n"

"or what? you will send daddy to straigthen me out?" you puffed air out between your lips, not even caring about his answer. "you've been using the same empty threats for years, malfoy, it's honestly gotten boring at this point."

his eyes widened, switching to collect the glimmer of your lips as a memory and before he could properly think of what he was doing, he had closed the space between you, kissing you softly.

it had taken exactly ten seconds for both of you to realize what had happened, quickly breaking apart.

"you just kissed me!" you muttered stunned, pointing an accusing finger in his direction.

"you kissed me" he shook his head, just as shocked as you, as he tried to remember what had happened exactly.

"no" you corrected firmly. "i'm not taking the blame for this mess. this is solely on you"

"you kissed back though" he concluded, with a final nod. "don't ever do that again"

"well, okay?" you shrugged "i won't as long as you don't ever kiss me again"

the tension between you was palpable, as you kept holding eye contact, no one of you moving as both of you tried to find out what the kiss would mean for your relationship, or more so lack of, moving forward.

it had been a sudden decision, maybe because you had spent all your years at school trying to one up draco malfoy, but you didn't think twice, before you pushed your mouth against his once more.

this time the kiss lasted longer and both of you had to catch your breath.

"i thought i told you to never do that again"

you nodded, before you smirked, "you said i should never kiss you back"

"yeah" he nodded, admitting that you hadn't done anything he had forbidden. "and you said i should never kiss you again"

"never is such a harsh word" you shrugged and just half a second later you were kissing once more, your hands gliding into his neck as you pressed him closer.

what began that day in the classroom accompanied you through the school years that followed. you and draco would put on a facade in front of your friends and pretend like you still couldn't stand each other, which was, to be honest, not even far from the truth considering he still constantly annoyed you. all while you would meet in secret, sneaking around the castle and hooking up with each other behind everyone's back.

apart from sleeping with each other not much changed between you. you never declared what you did to be a relationship, although both of you never met other people.

draco was the one constant through your teenage years. sometimes you would go longer without the other, but you would always come back, like a drug you couldn't stop taking even if it had the potential to destroy you in the end.

draco ended the kiss, pressing his forehead against your own. "sorry" he muttered and you furrowed your brows in surprise.

he had never apologised before, even if that was your rule. he would always suck up for a while, until you finally accepted that he was somewhat sorry, without actually saying it.

"hmm" you hummed, pressing one more kiss against his mouth, before you broke away and grabbed your bag off the floor. "we've got herbology"

draco nodded and turned around, picking up his own bag. "i'll go around the courtyard, you'll go now"

"sure" he softly grabbed your neck with his hand, bringing you close again and kissing you, more passionately than the moment allowed. you were way too flustered when he let go off you, but he just nodded for you to go. so you did.

you kept thinking about him for the rest of the day. through the whole herbology class, most of potions class and even charms, which was you favorite subject.

it hadn't been yesterday when you realized that you maybe didn't still find him as annoying as you did back when you were children. that you had maybe even grown fond of him a little, or whatever it was that you had.

and there was a stupid part of you that longed for more. for more of whatever it was.

what you had enjoyed at first, was now the part you hated most about your little arrangement. sneaking around, lying to your friends and always keeping something from them, while they viewed you as family, as someone they knew everything about.

you just wanted them to know and maybe you also wanted to know if he would stay. stay at the possibility of people finding out about you.

all that went through your head until the next day. and realistically you knew he wasn't what you wanted him to be. you knew draco well enough. he would never agree to go public, much less to even be in a relationship with you.

so it was pretty clear what you had to do.

you knew that it was the right decision in the long run. for both of you.

you met in the same hallway. you were leaning against the wall when he arrived, a distant smile on his face, that only really broke out when his eyes fell on you.

"hey" he muttered. you let him kiss you, before he stepped back, leaning across from you.

"hi" you said, testing the waters. he furrowed his brows and crossed his arms.

"what is it?" he asked unimpressed. he was used to you berating him for something he had said or done the day before. most often it was something regarding your friends and even though he never admitted it, you noticed his behaviour change, when you had been angry about something.

"nothing" you averted your eyes. you could hear him step forward, on edge, not used to the sadness in your voice.

times you had been apart came normally right after you had fought with each other. always screaming loudly, having found something to be annoyed about, before you decided not to see each other anymore, until one of you eventually came back.

"tell me" draco urged, the calmness in his voice long gone. "did something happen?" normally you would have made fun of him for his unusual care, but now you even felt sorry about it.

"i don't think we should continue to see each other" you shrugged, acting as if you didn't even care.

draco laughed, or rather puffed out air through his nose, before he shook his head. "i told you i was sorry"

"it's not about that"

"then what?" he stepped even closer. "something with you friends? i didn't even really see them yesterday"

"that's not it, draco"

there were a few seconds of silence, before he sighed loudly. "is it a guy?"

"no"

"okay, so you're just doing this? for what?" he threw his arms up, like he couldn't understand anything anymore. "you'll come back anyway"

you didn't answer anything, staring at him blankly, not having the strength to even say it out loud. without you wanting him to, he caught the uncertainty in your eyes.

"..you'll come back" he repeated, voice low. "right?"

"draco" you sighed, not knowing what to tell him.

"no, don't be like that" he shook his head and you saw that he was trying hard not to show you how much he cared. "don't act like you have to console me, don't act like you're breaking up with me"

"i'm not" you nodded. "but i'm not coming back either"

he pushed his hands into the pockets of his trousers, not even looking at you when you picked up your bag. you tried to catch his eyes, but it was to no avail. so you just walked away, not even knowing if you felt relieved or sad at the predicament that he would never be coming close to you again.

you walked through the halls of the castle and opened the door to the courtyard. the weather had turned rainy, thick clouds hanging over the towers of the castle, hiding them in the white air. the rain hit the ground mercilessly and you realized too late that it had been a stupid idea to walk across.

"you can't just do that" the voice behind you was so sudden and loud that your bag almost hit the wet ground beneath you.

draco caught up with you quickly, not caring about the rain one bit.

"what?" you asked, continuing your quick walk through the yard. but admittedly it was to no use, considering that you were already wet to the bones.

draco grabbed your shoulder, making you halt in your step and turn to look at him. "you can't just decide that" he said "it's not your decision to make"

"it's not yours either"

"why are you like that?" he ignored your previous answer. "i thought you liked this"

"i did" you nodded, seeing no reason to lie. "until i didn't"

"what does that even mean?" draco pushed his wet hair back annoyed. he wasn't able to understand you and scarily enough, that was the first time in years he failed to read what was going on with you.

"that means that we have to stop seeing each other"

"but why?"

you ignored him, moving your arm so he lost his grip on you, walking further through the wet garden. draco followed you.

"why?" he repeated, "what do you want me to do?"

"nothing, draco, it's fine"

"if this is some psychological trick, i swear to god"

"it's not, draco" your voice became louder, trying to drain out the rain that muffled it. "just forget about me"

"what if i can't?" he had stopped moving, staring at you blankly when you turned around. you had never seen him like this. so vulnerable, so honest.

"it didn't even matter" you simply said, "it was nice for a while, but it's over now"

"so you just decided that?"

"yes"

"but it wasn't just nice" he came closer, his face painfully twisted, as if to try and see your reaction to it. to get something from you. to see if it really didn't matter. "it was different. it wasn't just something"

"then what was it?" you pushed him to say more, to hear what you needed to for so long. "tell me why it was different? i thought you hated me"

"i did everything but that" he muttered and you had a hard time understanding him.

"why did you never say that before?" you asked, stray tears mixing with the rain on your face. "why are you so desperately trying to convince me of something you would've denied if i had asked you before? why didn't it matter before? why didn't you say something sooner?" your voice evolved into a scream, begging him to answer.

"why do you think i always came back?" he matched the loudness of your voice, anger blending with desperation as his blue eyes crashed into yours.

"why do you think i did?"

"i thought you knew" he shook his head, not understanding how it had come so far he had to explain it to you. "i thought i made it clear"

"thought you made what clear?" you asked, your voice louder than his, as he had grown more quiet. "that you didn't hate me? tolerated me even? that you—“

"that i fucking love you" his scream made you shut up immediately, eyes wide as you stared at him. "and maybe i should've actually said that or maybe i'm not what you want anymore—"

"what did you think would happen? did you think i would just accept it? not knowing how you really feel?"

"no" he shook his head "but i had hoped you would stay until i finally gathered up the courage to say it"

"how long?"

he sighed, looking annoyingly sweet as raindrops fell down from his hair and onto his cheeks. he looked like he was crying in an artful way. beautiful even, you thought, as you kept your eyes on his face like your life depended on it.

"mcgonagalls detention in fourth year"

"you couldn't have possibly loved me back then"

"maybe i didn't" he shrugged "but it was the first time i felt like this, when you kissed me"

"you kissed me" you corrected, but unable to stop the smile from breaking out.

"well, what do you say?"

"you want to hear it back?" you asked.

"preferably yes, but for now a sorry would do"

"for now, a hot shower would do" you rolled your eyes. "alone"

"and after that?" his voice lost a bit of it's cockiness, returning back to the insecurity it had held a few minutes before, "what then?"

you pressed his lips against his and he took the kiss with surprise, before he reciprocated it.

you pulled back, looking up at him, drenched from head to toe, but absolutely beautiful in his eyes.

"i'll come back"

[thoughtsforsoob]

delinquent bf!jake x f!reader

you two met when you were on the train, commuting to your morning lecture!

he was just standing there and minding his own business when he saw you trying to push away a much larger guy than you who kept trying to talk to you and touch you

he knew you couldn't get him away yourself so he took it upon himself to punch the guy and tell him to get lost and quit bothering you

the whole situation sent you into a panic attack and once jake was sure the guy was gone, he went over to you and assist you

he was so kind to you and even let you hug him tightly to ground youself

why was this handsome stranger being so kind to you?

your stop was nearing and you have finally calmed all the way down. you ask him how you could repay him and he only asks for you to go on a date with him

of coruse you accept and the rest is pretty much history

On that first date he took you out for dinner and for a walk around the river in your town. 

He surprises you with flowers and he pays for everything! You insist on paying for something but he simply did not allow it. He would never let you pay for anything in your relationship

Jake was very much the “i want to provide for you” type of guy but he never put up a fight when you insisted that you were going to work too to support yourself because he loved your strength and independence 

The delinquent side of his life is not something you know much about because he likes to keep it away from you

He doesn't want you to think differently of him if you were to find out how he beats the shit out of people for money and how he also sells drugs

If it weren't for this insistence that follows…you would've never found out about his ‘job’

You were leaving your job at the bookstore one evening and it was already dark

You didn't usually walk alone in the dark, jake always accompanies you or a friend but today, you had neither of those options as you were closing alone and jake was working

He offered to have a friend walk you home but you didn't know his friend much so you insisted that it would be okay

Jake did not take that for an answer at face value so he sent off one of his friends, niki, to keep and eye on you and follow you home from a distance to make sure you got there safe

Niki was following you from said distance when he noticed 3 men started to trail behind you and when he recognized who they are, he sent jake a text about coming immediately and ran up

One of the guys pulled you back by your hoodie and you gasped for breath. You were sure you’d die and that the last words you'd hear would be “your boyfriend beat the crap out of our boss. Left him in the hospital. Now you need to answer for his crime.” 

Surely your boyfriend did not do that…he was the sweetest man you'd ever known. Hell, in the first month of your relationship, he would ask for permission to hug and kiss you! Now why would he ever put his hands on anyone else, especially in that way?

Niki socks one guy in the face, effectively knocking him to the ground which resulted in him letting go of you

Now the only things you could ask yourself were 1, why did this man say that about my boyfriend and 2, why are men always coming to save me?

You recognized niki’s face from the 2 times you'd seen him in the past. You’d told Jake to bring his friends to your apartment and you cooked them dinner. They were all friendly and sweet but you still didnt know them well or too personally.

Anyways, niki starts to beat this shit out of these guys and you’re scratching your head at how tf he's doing this all by himself.

Jake swoops in and when they see him, they scoff as if they weren't beaten to a pulp and ran off

You go to hug Jake just like that first time you both met and looked up at him with your big, watery eyes, “They said you hurt their boss? What is that supposed to mean bub?” 

Jake let out a long sigh and looked down at you with his pretty eyes, “we can talk about this a bit okay?” you just nod and kiss him

You thank niki profusely and he was left red in the face, “it’s no big deal. You're Jake's girl so always expect to have us defend you as well. We care about you.” Best believe you’re red in the face too because this sweet guy just said that

You assure him that he's welcome at your apartment anytime and to call you if he ever needs anything. He agreed, letting you and jake leave to your apartment

You sit Jake down on the couch and notice, finally, his ripped t-shirt, scratched face and bloodied knuckles. 

He explains everything to you and your heart breaks when you think of him getting hurt the way he does 

Why would he hide this from you? This is a big deal and he didn't feel comfortable enough to tell you this?

Of course you question him and his choice to not tell and you and he gets a little upset at you for questioning him

He storms off from your apartment and you’re left there, crying and wishing he would come back

You don;t hear from him until 2 days later when he shows up at your doorstep, bloodied and bruised all over. He no longer had on shoes nor a shirt and his face was cut and bruised, his chest and arms covered in bruises and wounds as well. 

Wordlessly, you usher him inside and start attending to his wounds

He starts to cry and you notice when you’re patching up his knee and feel a droplet of water on your hand

He lets out a hiss from the sting of the salty tear touching the wound on his knee. 

You stop what you're doing and cup his handsome face, kissing his lip even if it was a tiny bit bloody

“I'm not mad at you, jake. Please don't think I am. I just feel sad that you couldn’t trust me enough to tell me about this. I just worry about you. What's going to happen when you’re not around hmm?” You give him a soft expression

He looks at you with his red, teary eyes. He looked so lost and upset. You felt your heart rip into a million pieces. You've never seen him so low. 

“I didn't want you to think differently of me if I told you what I did for a living. I know it's not right and i didnt want to involve you and get you into trouble. Too late for that. For fucks sake, that guy was going to kill you just because youre my girlfriend!” Jake only cries more and you hold him close. 

After patching him up and having him wash up, you bring him to your bed and hold him close to you. 

Sure, he was bigger than you but he loved being held flush to your chest. 

You whisper to him as he drifts off to sleep, “I love you no matter what. Even if you’re a little delinquent. You’re my little delinquent.”

Over time, you continue to go to school and you finally graduate! You best believe jake went all out and got you the best gift ever…an apartment overlooking the city…just like you always wanted

When you start working, he slowly starts to detach himself from the business he was into and started to look for a new job, which was not easy given his past

He found a cafe that was willing to hire him and give him a second chance and he was happy to work there! 

You start working at a high school so you have early mornings

Jake helps you by making your lunches everyday and packing you little snacks also

He packs in little notes too with i love yous and words of encouragement thrown in there are well

He never thought he'd settle down like this but he finds himself loving this life style

Once he's able to sever all ties to his past life (except for his ties with the boys because those are his best friends) he asks you to marry him

The both of you plan a small wedding with just close family and friends

He buys you a pretty dress and lets you pick a theme and decorations and everything

He wants this day to be memorable for you because he thinks you deserve the whole world

[lisired]

forever yours

pairing: haechan x (f) reader

genre/warnings: smut (lots of it), horror, graphic depictions of violence, mentions of blood, major character death, mentions of suicide, oral (m/f receiving), unprotected sex (don’t be silly, wrap your willy!), exhibitionism

summary: Thirst for exhilaration and a stupid dare brings you, your boyfriend Haechan, and your friends to the eerie camping grounds of Chimera - the name of a town rumored to be occupied by a number of vengeful, lurking spirits. But nothing is as it seems in this ghost town.

word count: 23k (see what had happened was…)

a/n: Halloween is gone but I just could not pass the opportunity to finally write a Haechan horror fic. as always, feedback is appreciated!

There was blood in your mouth. 

A tart, pungent taste followed. Your tongue ached, crying with agony. 

You pivoted around and groaned, “What the hell?” 

As it turned out, the culprit was no other than Winter. And you were less than pleased to be met with the sight of your own best friend giggling in your face. 

“You should have seen your face,” Winter teased, laughing to the point of tears. 

You only rolled your eyes. Curse her and her stupid shenanigans. October was official and Halloween was fresh in the air and given so, she would be a constant of mischief.

Fortunately for Winter, she was your best friend. If not, you would not have hesitated to give her a very large piece of your mind. 

You whined, “You made me bite my tongue.”

Your boyfriend, Haechan, snapped out of his fury-induced trance long enough to pull you close and ask wrathfully, “You’re hurt?” 

“Just a little,” you admitted with a grimace. Now, it hurt to speak. You swayed on the heels of your feet to press a placating kiss to the corner of his lips and say, “Don’t worry, baby. I’m okay.”

Apologetic, Winter frowned and told you, “I’m sorry, bestie. I’m sure Haechan will kiss it better. Seeing as you were a total of two seconds from swallowing each other’s tongues and all.”

Like she was a fly, you swatted her away and sent her off snickering incessantly. Your boyfriend was most likely turned off by now, all things considered. You were about to kiss before Winter screeched, “Bug!” and effectively gave you the scare of your life. 

You were in the middle of nowhere, after all. Chimera was a ghost town with a very tiny population and even fewer tourist attractions because anyone who valued their life would not dare explore the haunted hell town. 

Not to mention you were in the woods. You were on creepy-crawly territory. A stupid, childish dare brought you to the wicked. Last weekend, Jaehyun instigated a game of truth or dare for old times sake, and dared you all to stay a weekend at the haunted camping site. So the story goes. Neither of you were adamant believers in ghoul tales. 

At one point in his tetchiness, Haechan’s expression began to teeter between devilish and sinister, and a very gray area existed there. His dark eyes glared into the distance, although your best friend had already sauntered off in hounding of her next victim. 

Very rarely did your boyfriend wind up on the suffering end of vexation, but having his time with you interrupted would never not do the trick. 

Every time without fail. 

Nevertheless, you couldn’t blame him, but it made your heart swell with sadness. Alas, jam-packed work schedules and even less time for yourselves, your time together nowadays was limited. You came home to each other every night, but grueling days of work meant you were often sound asleep by the time he arrived. 

Sometimes, you would bring work home with you and stay up late, but Haechan would be snoring by the time you finally finished up and crawled under the sheets of your shared bed. 

This put a bit of strain on not only your relationship, but your friendships. Which was part of the reason you agreed to the stupid dare in the first place.

Obviously, it still wasn’t just the two of you, but you’d make it work. You had to. Alongside your best friend, her boyfriend, Jaehyun, was here. Like hell he would send the love of his life into haunted woods without him there to protect her. As well as Ten and Yuta. 

Your boyfriend was still displeased. A part of you was comforted by his protectiveness over you. Still, you wanted to soothe him before all hell broke loose. Bracing a hand on your boyfriend’s chest, you consoled, “Baby, I’m fine. I swear.”

Your lover was aflame, though the sweet sound of your voice made him soften. Only a little. He made sure you were flush against his body. “Promise?”

“I promise,” you replied, grinning from ear to ear. And sending his heart gravitating towards the moon. Then, you purred, “How about we go let off some of that steam in the cabin?”

Haechan smirked and you knew that you had your boyfriend back. “I like the way that sexy brain of yours thinks.”

Giggling, the two of you raced to the cabin. 

Your new home for the weekend was a tiny wooden cabin that was surprisingly very warm and comfy. There were three in total, each surrounding a campfire area. A lake was not too far off and cleared for safe swimming. And there were a couple of trails nearby. 

For an avowedly haunted campground, it was beautiful as far as you’d seen. There were vibrant wildflowers scattered everywhere and the water was crystal-fucking-clear. The sound of nature - leaves rustling in the wind and squirrels clambering up tree branches - was pleasantly therapeutic. 

Now, you were thinking about morning sex with Haechan, moans masking the sounds of birds chirping. 

The sight of you rushing to your cabin, nearly tripping over twigs in the process, was nothing short of comical. Though you found slight humor in your desperation, there was a rationale behind your every move. Above all, you couldn’t remember the last time you and your boyfriend had sex, and you were in need of a refresher. 

The kind of refresher only good dick and loving could give you.

Haechan very nearly kicked in the door. You let out a cry of surprise when he jerked it back in place with his toe and flung you against the surface, kissing you none too gently. 

You lingered there for a long while, making out in a hot, messy battle to conquer. Your chest heaved breathlessly, moans dangling from your lips in departure as you sucked each other’s tongues with pleasure. For a second, you pulled back, bringing your lips to that sweet spot on your boyfriend’s empty neck. For now. 

When he made a sharp noise and swiftly lowered you to the bed, you knew you were in for one hell of a fucking. 

It went without saying that this was going to be a far cry from a typical round of love-making. Your boyfriend was going to fuck you until every inch of the forest knew his name.

At the sight of you fumbling with his pants, Haechan chuckled and gathered your hands in his, teasing, “Slow down, baby girl.”

“Fuck me,” you heaved, as if the air had suddenly gotten thicker. Your eyes begged for him to give what you desperately craved on behalf of your body. “Hyuck, please.”

Your boyfriend gave a shake of his head, donning the most taunting smile. “Not yet,” he said, chuckling. It was nothing short of delightful to hear you beg for him, but he needed to savor you. It had been too long. “Not before I get a taste.”

Not a second later, your core throbbed, obviously excited about something now. Haechan was quick on his feet and between your thighs in the time that it took you to blink. Your panties disappeared with a yank, quickly tossed into oblivion. Your body shivered in anticipation, knowing what was to come. Haechan ate you out better than anyone to date. 

You got comfortable, laying sprawled and vulnerable. Your boyfriend was in a temporary trance, eyeing your glistening cunt with sheer admiration. You could feel the heat of his breath there, making you tingle with want all over. 

Haechan could feel himself twitching in his pants. Fuck, you were already so damn wet. Though that was nothing new. There was something about making out with your boyfriend that could arouse you like nothing else. 

Before he caved, Haechan made sure to tease, “Be careful not to scream. Your tongue will hate me.”

That made you roll your eyes, identifying your boyfriend as his usual cocky self. Though for good reason. No man had ever made you scream much like him. “Try not to make me scream. Everyone will hate us,” you quipped. 

“No can do, baby. I’m a natural.”

With a shake of your head, you shook with laughter. Granted, there was a good amount of feet between each cabin, but when at your boyfriend’s mercy, you were loud enough to wake the worlds below and above. 

Ever the tease, Haechan lifted his lips and kissed his way from your belly down to the vertex of your plush thighs. You made a noise, noticing he’d skipped between. He nibbled at the edges, rendering you impatient and weaker. You could only writhe and whimper, aware that you were being tested. Or toyed with, for that matter. 

Then, your lover went to town, having his fill of riling you up. You shuddered, eyes closing the very second his tongue muscled in your slick folds. Every muscle in your body was taut with tension. A kind of tension only concocted over time by a lack thereof to be broken loose.

There was a catch in your breath when Haechan lapped at you without holding back. He was a creature of desire, fingernails clamped harshly into your unfurled thighs. You were already moaning, already crying his name. There was no limit on him, none on pleasure when with him. You could already sense the tension dwindling in place of a different kind; the ecstatic variety. 

Though you had been inclined to watch the view, your head angled back in a soft sigh, flush against the pillows. It was a talent how effortlessly Haechan could dismantle you. More or less. The language of your body was indefinitely etched into his memory. 

“God. Oh my fucking…,” you gasped, sentence interrupted by an ensuing moan. This was only the beginning and yet already you were undone. 

Haechan tasted your arousal on the very tip of his tongue and let out an unrestrained, beast-like growl of pleasure. In your mind, it almost seemed fitting. He lapped at you like a ravenous creature. But in his mind, you were the one to blame. You always had to taste so damn sweet. 

You fisted locks of his hair in your fingers, back arching when he targeted your sensitive bundle of nerves. Your body was aflame, and you could feel the blood pumping through your veins hotly. “Don’t stop. Baby, please don’t stop,” you choked, promptly reduced to whimpers of pleasure. And cries of your lover’s name. 

A vortex of pleasure consumed you, tossing you unceremoniously around the eye. Your thighs and toes tingled, a sign that your entire body was very much awake and alert. It came to life at Haechan’s touch, turned on at the way his tongue pivoted on your clit and penetrated your tight hole. There were sparks broiling under your skin, ignited everywhere. 

Haechan slid two fingers inside your pulsing cunt and your eyes promptly rolled to the back of your skull. 

For whatever reason, he was grinning from ear to ear. This was far from his first rodeo, and after years of this relationship, he had the once-mystery of your mind and body completely unraveled. No matter how much you tried to writhe away, overstimulated by the pleasure, there was no such thing as escape.  

He liked watching you squirm as if you had anywhere to flee, bracing his palms on your naked thighs. He liked watching you involuntarily arch your back and rock your hips into his mouth with greed, your systems entering shutdown. Even more, he liked that he made so much of a mess of you that you could hardly seem to tell what you wanted anymore, but the arousal dripping from your cunt was a telltale sign of desire. 

Just like magic, weeks of stress were long-forgotten. Haechan singlehandedly set you at ease and riled you up all the while. Tears of pleasure welled in your eyes and you clamped tightly around his fingers. 

You never knew pleasure of this capacity existed before your boyfriend. He brought you to a different sphere and back, took you higher than you’d ever been. Darn the world. Your boyfriend showed you the universe and made you see every star visible to your eyes. No one had ever made you feel like this. 

Which was not unbeknown to Haechan. When you began to explore your sexuality together, you detailed your past sexcapades very thoroughly to him. None as sensational as those with your boyfriend. As it turned out, they all lacked one thing in common; a partner with as much devotion to your satisfaction as your own. 

They treated pleasuring you like it was menial drudgery. Not Haechan. Even now, he was ignoring the way his cock twitched between his thighs, aching to be freed. Your pleasure was paramount and he would not rest until he made you come. 

He wanted to be the only one you needed and proved to you every single day that you were destined to be together. And you were content with that. You wondered how on earth you’d finally been lucky enough to find a guy that loved you as much as he loved himself. There was no one else for you, you knew that in your bones. Everything felt meant to be with him. 

Unshakable and intangible. You wouldn’t have it any other way. This was a boy you would die and give your soul for. 

And also wanted to suck the soul out of. 

“Haechan, please. Fuck. Please,” you whimpered meekly, without a shred of idea of what you were even begging for. 

Though Haechan knew. You were simply so predictable to him by now. He learned to recognize when you were near, all of the glaringly obvious signs, given that you were not subtle in the slightest. With you grinding into his mouth, it was no secret you were on the verge of a sweet release. 

Haechan let his fingers pull the weight and clamped his teeth into the core of your thighs, then growled, “Come on, my pretty girl. Let go for me.”

Your dear boyfriend became ruthless at light speed, devouring you whole with his tongue like he wanted to leave not even a crumb of you to remain. His fingers were double kill, strumming you to ecstasy. 

Your body submitted to his commands, because of course it did. Haechan dominated you. Even if you wanted to disobey him, it was your body’s natural choice to comply. Every inch of you was owned by your lover and he had no intention of giving it back. Not that you wanted it. You took delight in handing him the reins. 

You were unstill, shaken with orgasm. There was a sharp tingle, swelling up your spine and closing in all over. It was too much. Your pussy throbbed, kneading his fingers hotly and you gave one final cry of his name before your body caved in to destruction, instantly going limp.  

Though you were overwhelmed, you should have known Haechan was far from finished. Never one to stop at a single orgasm, your boyfriend ate you out until you physically could not take it anymore, making you shudder with unalloyed pleasure over and over and over again. 

And given how long it had been since your boyfriend’s head had been between your thighs, you weren’t necessarily complaining.

Your chest was heaving and you were clinging to whatever remained of your breath for dear life when he eased up. Your most intense orgasms were always due to a combination of your boyfriend’s relentlessness and your extreme pent-up stress or sexual frustration. 

“You screamed a lot,” Haechan said, sucking your arousal off his fingers and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. 

You fought a tiny smirk. You always loved the way he looked with your arousal coating his plush, pink lips. Instead, you rolled your eyes and retorted through ragged breath, “Fuck you.”

Haechan casted a smug grin and didn’t hesitate to scoff, “I’m sure you want to.”

Damn it. Now you were absorbed in the thought of him fucking you within an inch of your life. “Please… I can’t wait anymore,” you begged, core still aching no matter how many times he pleasured you. He made you insatiable. 

“I could never tell my pretty girl ‘no,’” Haechan crooned, inching in on you to scoop you in his sun-kissed arms. You giggled when he surprised you with a kiss. “I’ll take care of you.”

As always. 

True to his word, your wonderful boyfriend began to shred himself of his clothes. With your voluntary assistance, of course. You gaped open-mouthed at the sight of his thick cock standing at attention against his stomach, lost for words and short of breath.

Never passing up the opportunity to tease you, Haechan chaffed, “Baby, close your mouth. You’ll catch flies.”

Heat wafted over you. Your voice was small, “Haechan…,”

“Shh. I know, baby. I know,” he whispered. 

Your lover kneeled between your thighs and you spread them for him instantly. Haechan smirked at how pliant you were. He never needed to ask, because it was simply second nature for your body to bend to his every will. 

He tapped his cock against your folds, asking, “How rough do you want it?”

“Break me,” you rasped without a second thought. 

Haechan grinned, full of mischief. 

He pushed in nice and slow, never wanting to hurt you. He lowered his head and met his lips to yours, kissing you as if it would distract you from the feeling of being slowly but surely stretched open. “Open up for me,” he hissed, pulse pumping at how tightly you gripped his cock, on the border of something vice-like. 

“You’re so… so big,” you choked out, anchoring yourself in the sheets with your nails. 

“Mm. Yeah?” Haechan asked, the slyest of smiles on his lips. “But you can take it. Isn’t that right, baby?”

You bobbed your head and your mouth parted, passing a soft moan. 

Haechan thought you wrapped around his bare cock too good, too withering and tight. He was sure pleasure of this magnitude only lived between you and him, irreplicable. Even so quickly you were making short work of him, leaving him with shackled self-restraint and half a mind to destroy what was left of you. 

You forwent the condoms roughly half a year into the relationship. Which was two and a half years ago. Though you took birth control pills and had no intention of becoming pregnant any time soon, if you were to have anyone’s baby, you knew it would only be your boyfriend’s. Thoughts of carrying his baby and raising a child together in your home plagued your mind, and you smiled from ear to ear. 

Your boyfriend glanced at you through his lashes and an invisible string tugged his heart at the sight of you. “What’re you smiling about?”

“You,” you said with hesitation. “I love you. And I want to love you forever.”

“Funny thing to say to the guy that’s about to wreck you.”

You rolled your eyes. It would kill him to be serious even for a second. You added, “He’s also the love of my life.”

Haechan softened. Only a little. “I love you, too,” he whispered, touch betraying his affectionate words as his fingers found purchase at the flesh of your hips. 

A grimace painted your face as Haechan sank his nails deeper and deeper. 

From that point on, Haechan fucked you as if he loathed all there was about you, save for your body. He kept a brutal pace, seemingly fucking you fuller and fuller of his cock with every passing push. Over your soft moans, you could hear his hips meeting yours with a loud, resounding thwack, and your cunt gushing hotly. 

Upon his death-grip, your lover’s name dangled from your tongue in dangerously sharp cries, sweet as honey and thick as tar. Your fingers scouted his biceps, desperate for some kind of anchorage. Haechan let out a dangerously low growl and you immediately tightened. For as long as you’d known him, your boyfriend had always been somewhere in the gray area between sadism and masochism. 

When asked about it, he told you, “There’s no such thing as pleasure without pain, baby. A very thin line separates the two.”

As twisted as it sounded, you agreed. 

The bed and your bodies performed in league to fill the void in the cabin, the former creaking with every reverberating slap of the latter meeting together. 

You were unapologetically vocal, but Haechan too sang his praises when balls deep inside you. At first, you were pleasantly surprised by his unabashed responses. Most of the guys you’d been with prior would stifle anything above a throaty groan. But when your body talked to him, he spoke back even louder. 

Your boyfriend never hid his affection for you. You were the reason he breathed everyday and he would let his body tell you as much. 

Haechan clamped his tanned arm around your throat and you whimpered. The chokehold was tight just enough to not harm you, but still have you begging for breath. He gave you nowhere else to look but his dark eyes, gleaming darkly with lust and lust only. 

He was all you could see. More specifically his eyes. Yours were locked there, unable to glance away. The only time they were out of sight was whenever your vision was peeling off at the edges by inevitable darkness. 

Haechan cocked his head a little, observing his creation. You were coming apart at the seams, eyes widened and lips parted, trying to take in oxygen. “Hard enough for you, baby?”

“Harder,” you managed to croak.  

Your boyfriend shook his head and laughed. Though nothing surprised him anymore. You took whatever he gave you with an insatiable kind of greed, as if there was no such thing as enough where he was involved. 

Even when sated, you only kept coming back for more. 

His pace was hard and unabating. A sharp cry split your lips when he bit your neck, nibbling at the flesh as he roughly fucked you into the mattress. You were unstill, a depthless well of ecstasy. Pleasure knew no boundaries. It was too greedy. It took, consumed, and it dominated. 

Haechan was right. There was a thin line between pain and pleasure and you were somewhere in the middle, teetering in between. 

The entire room was scorching. You soaked in the sight of sweat beading at your boyfriend’s forehead and gushed hotly around his cock, limbs locked together like a cluster of vines, hot skin on even hotter skin. Haechan’s grip on your throat slackened to hear you moan clearer when his tongue laced into you instead. 

You sweltered. And were positive that you would die. What a marvelous way to die, you thought humorously. With the love of your life by your side. You would have it no other way. 

Your back arched and you rocked your hips into his, desperate for more heat and friction. Only he could give it to you. 

That was how Haechan could tell you were close and he brought his fingers to your wet sex, strumming your swollen bundle of nerves. He was almost there and he wanted you to finish together. You cried out his name, clasping his biceps. 

“Cum. You know you want to,” Haechan hummed tauntingly. 

Your legs wrapped around his hips to draw him deeper inside. There was something about being at the brink of climax that rendered your entire body weak. Every piece of you was tempted into doing whatever he desired; whatever his heart desired. You wanted to please him. More than anything, you wanted to make him proud.

Haechan clamped his hands around your throat anew and that was all it took to finish you. Your mouth opened, crying his name as you finally crossed the threshold of orgasm. The tingles returned, prickling with the warm, pumping blood through your limbs. 

You gripped his cock and he came in turn, filling you to the brim with warmth with a sweet, high-pitched moan of your name. 

Haechan glanced over at you. He never got enough of the look on your pretty face when you shuddered, still throbbing and milking his cock dry until he eventually stilled inside you. You heaved for breath and his eyes soaked in your whole body, barely fighting a smile as he noticed all of the bruises and marks leftover. 

He never wanted to hurt you, but subconsciously, there was a part of him that found twisted pleasure. It meant you were his. He owned you, but you owned him. Every inch. 

For a while, you both only laid there, smiling and laughing at each other. Then, Haechan swooped you into his arms and muttered into the crook of your neck, “Let’s get you cleaned up.” 

You beamed. “I love you.”

“I love you more,” Haechan replied, pressing the lightest of kisses to your lips. 

“No, I love you more.”

Haechan whined, “Jesus, woman. I love you more, and that’s final.”

The two of you continued to bicker as if you were teenagers in love for the very first time. It reminded you of the early stages of your relationship, stealing and prolonging time before the other had to leave by initiating an “I love you” battle. 

As the years passed, you learned to savor every moment you had together. Time became scarcer by the day. It was not to be had when you were two adults with heavy workloads. 

Your boss made it his mission to call you into work even on weekends. Before he died, at least. That was a couple of weeks ago and needless to say, you were not very disappointed. 

“Rest in hell,” you remembered your co-worker saying. To which you quipped, “No rest for the wicked.”

Haechan crawled back into bed with you after you were both all clean and the two of you fell asleep in each other’s arms. You could hardly remember the last time you had. It was always him after you or vice versa. Never together. 

This haunted campground trip would ironically prove to be a nice oasis in a busy stage of your lives, it seemed. 

A shrill scream penetrated the night and you were jolted awake. 

Haechan wiped at his tired eyes and his voice was thick with sleepiness, “Is that Winter screaming in terror, because of Jay, or was that Ten?” 

You nudged your boyfriend. “No, that’s definitely terror. The last time I heard that sound was when Winter walked in on Yuta taking a piss.”

“They all scream like girls.”

“You scream like a girl.”

Haechan whined, “Whose side are you on?” 

Laughing, you shoved the duvet off your bodies and said, “Come on. Let’s go make sure these woods aren’t actually haunted.”

“Or worse - Yuta didn’t forget to zip the bathroom door,” he quipped. 

You snickered. 

Your boyfriend caged you behind his body, insisting that he wanted you to flee in the presence of any actual danger, and he led you outside the cabin. A shroud of fog hung near the ground. The sky was darker than the last you’d seen, perpetually mistier.

Haechan sauntered over to Yuta with you in convey and asked, “What’s with all the raucous?” 

“Winter’s idea of a spooky Halloween,” Yuta said dryly, hands at his hips. 

Your eyes rose and you saw Winter pointing fingers and snickering at a dismayed Ten, hairs standing on end. You figured he must have been the latest victim of her scares. 

Ten’s chest heaved as he yelled, “You are not funny!” 

Winter stuck her tongue out, eyes gleaming with mischief. “Damn right. I’m hi-fucking-larious.”

Jaehyun walked by, chuckling, and announced with a bag of marshmallows in clutch, “Time for s’mores.” 

At the mention of s’mores, the six of you huddled together around the campfire like children at the distribution of sweet candy. Danger dissuaded none of you. Each of you were intent on treating this as a typical camping trip. Per your boyfriend’s idea, your phones were in a cardboard box in Ten and Yuta’s cabin for safekeeping, there were plenty of outdoor activities to keep you entertained, and you were going to spend the weekend bonding together. 

Chimera, as wicked as it may have been, was eerily beautiful. And its nature was on another level. 

“Calories,” Winter squealed rather fondly, clapping excitedly.

You soured the mood and said, “And cavities.”

Winter shot you a glare and had she not been on the other side of fire, she would have leapt over and nudged you in the elbow. 

Instead, your best friend replied coolly, “Don’t worry. I packed Jay and I’s toothbrushes. I sent a reminder in the group chat, so I hope you guys didn’t forget.” 

“I came extensively prepared,” Ten said, snatching a graham cracker from Jaehyun and shoving it in his mouth. Much to Winter’s amusement and Jaehyun’s chagrin. “I brought toothbrushes, books, water, ear plugs, flashlights…” 

Haechan interrupted, “Ear plugs?”

Ten scoffed, “Oh, yes. You and your girlfriend and Jaehyun and Winter are notorious for going all night. I’d rather die than hear those two getting dicked down.”

“You’re just jealous,” you snapped lightheartedly. 

Ten reached for a marshmallow and defended himself a little too swiftly, “Oh, honey. I get dicked down on the regular, but you guys have fun.”

Yuta leaned into your ear from the right and whispered, “And strapped down by you in his dreams.”

“I heard that,” Ten hissed. 

Yuta played innocent and said, “Heard what?” 

Your boyfriend heard it, too, but he only pressed a sweet kiss to the corner of your lips, rubbing it in Ten’s face. 

For his comfort, the topic changed.

The treats began to cook at long last. Haechan made you a s’more, seeing as you were a camping amateur, and you merely watched with fondness twinkling in your eyes. You were so out of your mind in love with your boyfriend that even the simplest of gestures made your heart swell with warmth. 

For the second s’more, Haechan guided you. You stuffed a marshmallow on the tip of a roasting stick and he held your hands in his as you held it over the fire. “Not too close. You don’t want it to catch on fire,” were his words, a certain concentration in his eyes tempting your heart to leap into the wavering flames. 

Ensuing was a treat of chocolatey goodness. 

Your friends were laughing and telling jokes over the campfire and somehow you became so engrossed in the conversation that you didn’t notice your third marshmallow was burning until it was too late. “I burned my marshmallow,” you announced with a frown. 

Yuta had finished up with his, but out of the kindness of his heart, offered to switch. “Have mine,” he insisted. 

“You’re too kind. Thank you,” you replied, appreciative. 

Then, you glanced over to your boyfriend, though he was still chattering with the rest of your friends. For a second, you thought it went unnoticed, but he laced his fingers through yours without a word and that was the end. 

You smiled. He was nothing like any of your past lovers. They were over-possessive and controlling, demanding your constant and undivided attention. Haechan, at worst, was a little clingy. 

He never got jealous over tiny, harmless gestures. The bar was so goddamn low, but finally having a normal guy made you prone to constant comparisons. He was totally chill when you were in the company of male friends and the only time he ever got upset was when you were hurt. 

Which was completely understandable. Instead of seeing you as an object to own, it represented his genuine respect and care for you. 

He’s the one, you thought with a stupid smile on your face. Even your parents agreed and were already calling him their son-in-law. Most people you dated prior didn’t even make it past the front lawn of their house. 

“Did you guys know that Chimera is actually named after a Greek mythical creature?” Ten asked, ever the bookworm. 

Jaehyun insincerely sneered, “Nerd.”

Ten ignored him with a roll of his eyes and continued, “In Greek mythology, the Chimera were fire-breathing creatures that appeared as a lion with a goat head on its back, and a snake for a tail.”

Haechan asked curiously, “Isn’t it also genetic mutations?”

“In biology, yes,” Ten said matter-of-factly. “It refers to organisms with several different genetic complications or DNA molecules with sequences from different organisms done by laboratories.”

“Wow. What a way to take us back to high school,” Yuta teased. 

You shook your head, intrigued. “No, no. I’m interested. Ten, continue.”

Ten flushed a little and his voice was quieter when he added, “Chimera also means a creature of the imagination. It’s something you dream of, but it’s a tantalizing, unattainable desire.”

Winter chimed in, “I’ve heard stories about Chimera. These woods particularly.”

“Me, too,” Jaehyun said. “The gruesome deaths, the questionable suicides. No wonder nobody wants to come out here, as beautiful as it is.”

You retorted, “Then, what does that make the six of us?”

They laughed. 

“I heard a girl killed herself in these very woods,” Yuta said, voice low over the crackling sound of fire. “But rumor has it she was actually slaughtered.”

“In the early nineteen-eighties. I remember,” Ten replied, slightly unnerved. 

Haechan snickered. “You weren’t even born yet.”

“I read a lot.”

That was obvious. 

Winter whispered eerily, “They say that sometimes you can still hear her footsteps dragging across the dirt, lurking in the night’s darkness.” 

Perfectly on cue, there was an eerie sound from the woods and you couldn’t convince yourself that you were the only one to hear it because each of your heads whipped around all at once. Haechan instinctively coiled an arm around you, prepared to protect you even against the soul of a girl that killed herself forty years ago if he could. 

Or maybe she really didn’t commit suicide. Maybe her killer painted her death as a suicide and now she was seeking revenge on humankind for not seizing the murderer. 

You immediately scolded yourself for being so silly. There was no such thing as ghosts or monsters. You believed in one evil and it was the human race. It’s probably just a squirrel or something, you reassured yourself. A squirrel with painfully inconvenient timing. 

Glancing between your boyfriend, Jaehyun, Ten, and Yuta, you said, “And what the hell are the four of you sitting around for? You’re the men! Go investigate.”

Ten was purely dismayed by the mere thought. “And because I’m a man I should be sacrificed to the devil? Absolutely not. This is how people die in horror movies. They go around poking their nose into places they have no business when they should be running for their lives.”

“Let’s go together,” Haechan said, throwing you all assertive glances. 

There was some reluctance, but you all begrudgingly agreed. As they say, no man left behind. Haechan still kept you flush to his chest, as did Jaehyun with Winter. He had his burly arms coiled above her hips. 

“There’s no girl in the woods,” Yuta murmured under his breath. But you heard him through the thick, strained silence. 

Jaehyun quipped, “Who knows. Maybe there’s one for you and you’ll stop showing my girlfriend your penis.”

Yuta retorted, “She’s the one that walks in on me. Maybe your girlfriend wants to see my penis.”

“Please be quiet,” Winter whined. 

Jaehyun, on a mission to be the world’s greatest boyfriend (and a few places behind, in your biased opinion), silenced himself on command and tightened his clasp below her ribs. He wasn’t all too convinced that there was a ghost in the woods, but he wanted to ease her. It was far more likely that you were all overthinking the sound of some animal minding its business. 

Your boyfriend had the exact same idea and held you even tighter. Whenever in the face of danger, his first instinct was - and would always be - to protect you. Only over his dead body would he allow harm to come your way. 

But even in his soothing embrace there was still a sinister energy that plagued you, alerting you that there was something amiss here. Fog blurred your vision and darkness wore at it, making it difficult to see clearly. 

Ten was prepared as always and turned on one of those flashlights he had mentioned earlier. He handed it to your boyfriend, the one currently leading your pack of six. 

Ever courageous, he led each of you through the night’s wilderness, your pulse thumping in your body the entire time. For whatever reason, the fear in you was unshakable. You had no clue where it emerged from, but it completely unnerved you. 

A sound of twigs snapping stunned you all and Haechan shone the light at a tree where the noise seemed to come from, just quick enough to see a squirrel scurrying up a tree trunk. As far as any of you could tell, it was the same tree the first noise sounded from. Haechan assuringly declared, “It was just a squirrel.”

Your breaths came easier. Exactly what you suspected, but it would never hurt to be one-hundred percent sure. Though even with that burden off your shoulders, unease still penetrated you. 

Jaehyun, Yuta, and your boyfriend seemed fearless, while Ten and Winter were relieved that they’d been frightened over nothing. But you were still not entirely convinced. 

Was it only you? 

The rumors and spooky stories are getting to my head. That’s all, you consoled yourself. You’re in apparently haunted woods. Woods alone are scary enough, haunted or not. And this is your first time. Fear is natural. 

Each of you turned around and headed back to the campfire you hadn’t dared strayed too far from and sensing your unease from a mile away, Haechan pressed a kiss to your cheek. “Don’t be scared, baby girl. If any monster pops out, it will have to get through me before it hurts you,” he whispered softly in your ears. 

“I don’t want you to get hurt, either,” you huffed, voice muffled as you put your head in your boyfriend’s chest. 

“Don’t worry about me,” he told you sweetly. “I’ve been told I resemble a bear. The worst-case scenario is one attacks the trashcan and I have to communicate with it to discourage it.”

“And what if it’s a wolf?” 

Haechan tightened his hold on you, purring, “Well, I’ve also been told I’m big and bad.”

You snickered. Leave it to your wonderful boyfriend to melt your worries away with his equally brilliant humor. He made you forget why you had even been so scared in the first place, all by kissing you and making you laugh. 

The six of you decided you’d had your fill of spooky stories for one night and retired to your cabins for bed. You heard more than a couple of noises from the cabin across from you - Jaehyun and Winter’s - and promptly wished you would have also had the brilliant idea of bringing some noise-cancellation headphones. 

Fortunately for you, your boyfriend was a self-proclaimed genius (and maybe once or twice you fed his ego and agreed), and had an even better idea. He fucked you so hard that you tuned out the rest of the world, unable to hear anything over both of your own moans. 

In the morning, you woke up and took your time to crawl out of bed. Haechan had worn you out and you could still feel the soreness in your thighs from the night before. Not to mention the gentle morning sex you dreamed of, moans soft over the sound of birds tweeting quietly. 

It was closer to afternoon when you finally went outside and got some sunlight. Everyone was in their own atmosphere. You ate breakfast and listened to mother nature for a while. 

There was a lake walking distance from the campground and one of the boys called out your name, boarding two three-person canoes. You recognized the voice as Jaehyun’s and he asked, “Wanna go canoeing with us?”

You mulled it over, but noticing Ten’s eyes on you was all the discouragement you needed. Each of the four boys were aboard, including your boyfriend. Ten was as dear a friend to you as the other two, but that was it. No part of you wanted to make things even more awkward and strained in the friendship than they already were. 

Though you and Haechan may not have dropped any comments, Ten’s lingering eyes were definitely not lost on either of you. Besides, being with a bunch of guys was not your idea of a vacation well-spent. You refused to leave Winter alone at a potentially haunted campground. 

For that reason, you had a feeling that Jaehyun was only asking to tease Ten, but you declined the offer nonetheless and said sweetly, “I’m good. I’ll stay and keep Winter company. You guys have some brotherly bonding time.”

The boys told you to have fun and you bid them likewise. 

You immediately scouted Winter afterwards and found her taking pictures of wildflowers. Unnoticed, you decided to slowly creep towards her, but your fun was ruined when she said without turning around, “I know you’re there. You can’t beat the master at her own game.”

You frowned.

Winter turned around, smirking at the fact that she’d caught you with your trousers down. “What’s up, bestie?”

You flopped against a blanket she’d sprawled across the ground. “Do you think Ten likes me?” you asked, fidgeting. 

“As more than a friend? Definitely,” your best friend said, coming to join you. “Jaehyun told me the boys are going canoeing. I can only hope Haechan doesn’t try to drown him.”

You knew she was only being funny, but the thought made you shiver. Of course, you knew your boyfriend well and he would never. The trust you had in each other was all needed to comfort him and to know that you were all his was more than enough. 

He could be possessive, but not over-possessive. He liked to stake his claim to you, holding you and kissing you in front of people so they knew you were his, and leaving visible marks on your neck in  your alone time for the same purpose. He never demanded your complete attention, as much as he adored being in the center. 

Tiny gestures never made him feel bitter. You had no painful memories of your boyfriend’s jealousy. The opposite, rather. He fucked you extra hard until he felt better. 

You fought a smirk. At worst, he was a little meaner than usual. But damn it did you like it when he was mean and rough. 

You defended your boyfriend and said, “My boyfriend is an angel. He doesn’t get jealous.”

“Your boyfriend is a Gemini. Duh, he gets jealous,” Winter argued teasingly, seeing dead through you. A silent understanding passed between you. She liked the jealousy sex, too. “He was so mad at me yesterday.”

“That’s because he was angry. Not jealous. You hurt me and he hates when I’m hurt.” 

“Whatever,” your best friend replied, fondling with her camera that Jaehyun bought her for her birthday this January. “Wouldn’t it be funny if I reviewed the pictures and I saw a ghost?”

You grimaced. “That’s one way to put it. For sure.”

“Okay, maybe not funny. But I don’t think these woods are haunted. I believe the stories about the suicides and murders, but evil spirits? That’s a humongous stretch.”

Never mind yesterday’s confidence. Now, you only shuddered. Though you wanted to agree, there was something about these woods that rubbed you the completely wrong way. And it wasn’t only the tales of ghosts. There was an intangible kind of fear ready to consume you. No matter how badly you wanted to, you couldn’t put your finger on where it stemmed from. 

That was unnerving to you. Only the weekend before, you were more than excited. There was no telling what traps laid waiting in Chimera, much less its woods, which made you all the more determined to unravel its mystery. 

Now, you wanted to leave the knots as tangled as they’d been discovered. 

“I guess,” you told Winter. If she thought nothing of the environment, then there was a chance you were overthinking it all. 

Winter heaved a pleased sigh. “It’s hard to imagine anyone could taint such a beautiful place with blood,” she said, gesturing around to Mother Nature’s handiwork.

 “That sounded strangely poetic,” you replied, feeling as if you were in some sort of murder mystery novel. 

Winter snickered. “As my favorite writer once said, ‘believe nothing you hear, and only one half that you see.’”

You gave your best friend a look and asked expectantly, “And what does Edgar Allan Poe have to do with anything?”

“Nothing.” Winter shrugged her shoulders. “I just found it fitting.” 

You laughed a little. In spite of its reputation, Chimera was by far one of the most beautiful places you had ever seen. Unsurprisingly, however, that alone wasn’t enough to attract tourists. When you checked the campground website, you ironically noticed they used its hauntedness as promotion to lure campers. 

Clearly, it was working. 

You found it interesting that Chimera was predominantly grass and trees. There were some signs of civilization, as you’d notice on the way to the campground, though mainly towards the center. Areas placed on the periphery of the town were especially rural. 

For instance, the woods. Wildflowers consumed your vision and you understood why Winter was at peace here. You bit your lip. You didn’t want to be a buzz kill, but asked quietly, “Do you ever get the feeling that something you fear is hiding in plain sight?”

Winter nudged you gently. “What do you mean?” 

“It’s just… I don’t know,” you exhaled frustratedly. “Something about this place keeps me on my toes.” 

“Do you think that girl was killed here?” 

You shrugged, trying to feign some semblance of nonchalance. “I think it would be easy to kill anybody here and get away with it. Think about it. There’s a lot of empty land to cover. Easier to live off the grid. You could be abducted from the mainland and no one would ever find you.”

“Okay, you’re thinking too hard,” Winter quipped with a wince. “I get why you’re scared, babe. But I also think you’re supposed to feel that way. For obvious reasons. What you need is a little distraction.”

That made you well with curiosity. “Like what?”

The second the boys were back from canoeing you and your best friend made a beeline to boyfriends, as if you couldn’t wait another. Winter had insisted only moments ago that good dick was all the distraction you needed and as badly as you wanted to make a spiteful argument, you had none to offer. 

But you also wanted to simply talk to Haechan for a while. Not only was he a lover, but a friend wrapped into one. Your boyfriend had a natural ability to abate your fears, but he was also someone that would listen to them and help you wrap your head around them.

You fought a snicker at how badly that made him sound like a therapist. After this trip, you had a feeling you might’ve needed one. 

Haechan sensed there was something off even from the other side of the lake and coiled an arm around below your ribs as soon as he got a chance, asking, “What’s wrong?”

Your eyes flickered. “How’d you know?”

“Gut feeling,” Haechan said with a shrug. “I know when my baby’s suffering. Talk to me.” 

Your heart promptly ricocheted against your ribcage. You glanced around. Jaehyun and Winter had already snuck off to their cabin for some loving while Yuta and Ten were chattering about whatever, but you still were in need of some privacy. 

You slithered into his arms and murmured, “I wanna be alone. With you.”

“There’s a nice little two-mile trail over here. Takes you around and back from over that way. We could shortcut it and be back in about thirty minutes or take the long way and come back in about sixty.”

“Let’s do it,” you said, gesturing for him to lead the way. 

Going deeper into the forbidden woods was not your idea of resolving your fears, but the marvelous landscape gave you little room for complaints. Plus, being there with your boyfriend was almost romantic. 

There was something about all this beauty that made you fear what was cloaked beneath. 

Haechan was very patient with you and for a while you both walked in silence, absorbing your surroundings until he said, “Ready to tell me what’s on your mind?”

“I don’t know what it is, really. But this place gives me the creeps and I can’t explain why. It just does.” 

“It’s not just the reputation, is it?” Haechan asked, seeing right through you. 

It was almost scary how perfectly Haechan could piece you together. Nobody had you more figured out than he did. “You read me so well,” you murmured. 

Haechan chuckled. “I call it the fear of the unknown. You don’t know what’s out there, so anything could be out there. The shit we fear is often the same shit we can’t control, and that’s why it scares us.”

“Does the unknown scare you?” 

“No,” Haechan said, but draped an arm over you as a reminder you weren’t alone. “I like unpredictability. Anything could happen. But I understand why it terrifies some people.”

You teased, “Then, what are you afraid of?”

Your boyfriend’s tone and response in general was a hell of a lot more sober than you were expecting, “Stagnation and routine. I hate being confined to patterns. You already know that, though.”

That you did. Haechan mentioned he was considering switching jobs solely because he wanted more flexibility in life. The pay was nice and so was the insurance and paid vacations, but something had to give. 

You supported him wholeheartedly, of course. Haechan never minded change and would have no problem adjusting, plus only having weekends (and scarce vacations) to each other was a ginormous test of your patience. He wanted more out of life. If he couldn’t spend it with you, then he saw little point. 

“Is that all?” you pressed. He was brave, but not fearless. The reminder was very warm to you. And strangely comforting. 

Haechan said without hesitation, “And losing you because of them.”

Damn it. Now, your heart was racing. It was no question how your boyfriend managed to sweep you off your feet. He was full of endless charm and sincerity. There was a kind of passion to him about you that was undeniable and never questionable. 

You abandoned your self-restraint at the campground and rose off the heels of your shoes, meeting your lips to his. He had to be out of his goddamn mind if he thought he would lose you any time soon. There was no way in hell you would be capable of replacing him. In a world without your boyfriend, you would rather die lonely. 

There was also something about learning your boyfriend’s fears that took the edge off your own. Maybe whatever they were rooted in was much simpler. This place spooked you because of the reputation attached. That was all. 

And now that you were making out with your boyfriend, his heavy hands on your hips, you really couldn’t have given less of a damn about these woods. 

He had the same idea and pulled you over by a tree. For a second, you clung onto your mind long enough to wonder what in the hell you were doing. Then, you lost it just as quickly. There was nothing but trees and plants out here. And maybe a couple of animals that would soon be traumatized. With the coast clear, you were welcome to be as reckless as you liked. 

Haechan instructed, “Knees.” 

You wasted absolutely no time in scrambling to your knees, what was left of your mind too warped to give a damn about the twigs crunching beneath your kneecaps. As always, you wanted to pleasure him and make him proud. Whatever the price may have been, you’d gladly pay it. No matter the sacrifice. 

Your boyfriend was amused, though not at all surprised when you hurriedly reached for his pants, tugging them down before he got the chance to give the order. You wanted to taste that big dick down your throat. 

There was something about Haechan’s size that made your mouth water and gape, ripe and ready, though also left you clenching around nothing at all. Obviously, you’d seen it a number of times before, but the element of surprise was a constant, non-changing factor. Damn it, you would never get tired of his cock. 

Haechan noticed the dazed look in your eyes and smirked. He tapped his cock against your lips and said, “Do you got it, or do you want me to fuck your throat?” 

“I’m going to suck the soul out of you,” you said with an unwavering kind of confidence. 

Haechan gave a snicker. He fisted your hair behind your head and you swiftly got to work, wasting not another second to swirl your tongue around the base of his cock. You liked riling him up, liked taking your time to draw him between your lips and you knew your boyfriend liked it, too. No matter how much he bitched and whined.

“Fuck,” Haechan whined when your tongue teased the tip. He was hard as bricks, which took pretty much nothing to happen whenever you were involved. 

You took his noises with delight, doing your best to ignore the tireless thumping between your plush thighs. As a distraction, you finally drew him inside your mouth, steadily swallowing him inch by damn inch as a measure to prevent yourself from gagging. Your cheeks were hollowed, breath entering through your nose. 

Haechan’s grip on your hair tightened as he hissed, a telltale sign you were doing something very right. Your mouth was so unfathomably darn warm around his size that he was beginning to lose his mind, but to be frank, he lost it the very same day he met you. 

A part of him used to hope that you would give it back, but insanity was a close friend of his now. Or maybe it was the dormant monster living eternally inside him, roused by you for whatever reason. And it was ravenously hungry. 

A kind of greed came over and dominated you, possessing you to suck him like you genuinely intended to suck the soul out of him. As many times as you’d done it before, there could only be so much of his soul still there, though not pleasure. Pleasure was forever and always. “Just like that,” Haechan moaned, basking in the heat of your tongue pressed to his cock. 

His praises only spurred you on. There was nothing you liked more than knowing how good you could make your boyfriend feel. Between the two of you lay a ride-or-die bond that nobody else would ever fathom. Even you somehow couldn’t comprehend how or why he drove you so crazy. You only knew you would do unspeakable things to please your boyfriend and sucking him off in the woods was far from the most bizarre thing on the list of shit you were willing to do. 

You made eye contact with a traumatized rabbit for a whole second and it was all you could do to keep yourself from laughing and spoiling the mood. You gripped the base of Haechan’s cock, sucking him and stroking him all the while. 

None of this should’ve had you dripping the way it did, but you could feel yourself only getting even wetter. You gagged a couple of times (with his size, it was inevitable) but never stopped, a sting of tears in your eyes forming out of twisted pleasure. 

Haechan liked looking down and seeing you on your knees way too much, his dick in your mouth and your tear-stained face glancing back up at him. Fuck, you knew what it did to him when you looked at him like that. 

Like a pretty little thing warped completely by him. 

“I’m gonna cum,” Haechan said, tugging your hair. You hissed, but as he once said, there was no pleasure without pain. Nowhere did you say you didn’t get a thrill out of the sting. “Shit, baby. Are you gonna take it?”

You bobbed your head, humming around him and having a laugh smothered when he promptly made a noise of pleasure. He always wanted to last longer, but you made short work of him. A weakness if he knew one. 

Noting that he was close to his peak, you pulled out all the stops to bring him to sweet release as quickly as possible. You loved witnessing your boyfriend disentangle, loved when he was running on empty without an inch of self-control. Haechan was at his worst here, rutting against your mouth to meet your pace with a roughness that never ceased to make you gag. 

He was fucking your throat nice and hard, pulling your hair to use as he so pleased until the pleasure became so great that he couldn’t hold back anymore, a wave of warm cum painting your tongue. He never stopped fucking your mouth until his orgasm passed completely, high-pitched moans making you pulse rapidly. You swallowed as much as you could, not wanting to dirty your clothes and leave evidence of your lewd behavior. 

Haechan pulled out eventually, chest undulating as he recovered from his orgasm, though he never forgot to ask, “You good?”

You nodded, wiping saliva from your mouth with the back of your hand. 

“I hope you’re ready to get fucked,” Haechan said, helping you to your feet. Which made you snicker. If fucking in the woods was crazy, you were both out of your goddamn mind in love. 

You moaned when Haechan kissed you again and you grabbed his cock in your palms, stroking him hard anew all the while. The longer you waited, the less you could ignore the fire igniting between your thighs that ached to be taken care of. 

Haechan shoved you against the tree after a while and didn’t bother to slide your panties down, only slipping them to the side, courtesy of your skirt. Your palms dug into rough bark and he instead cuffed your wrists in his own hand, tightening them at your backside. He steered his cock to your entrance with the other, your arousal making it all too easy to skid right inside. 

Your moans were instantaneous. Haechan stroked deeper and deeper until every inch was utterly nested inside your sweet cunt, his cock disappearing inside. He took pleasure in stretching you open, because even after fucking you time and time again, your cunt never seemed to get any less tight. He always had to coax his way inside, no matter how wet you were. 

“Haechan,” you stammered, mouth hanging wide open with moans of his name. 

As much as he liked hearing you moan his name, Haechan clamped his palm over your mouth, smothering your sounds while still keeping your arms locked behind your back. 

Though you and your boyfriend had admittedly had sex in a number of places, some debatably strange, the middle of the haunted woods undoubtedly took the cake. The view was nice. You had to admit that it was somewhat romantic being fucked by your boyfriend against a tree while staring at an array of vibrant plants and pretty skies. And being out in the open aroused you a little more than it should have. 

Your body shuddered when he released your wrists to cup a palmful of your breasts, slipping his hand beneath your shirt and his finger kneading your nipple. “You’re so beautiful like this,” Haechan exhaled. Even now, he sometimes struggled to comprehend that he could call someone as beautiful as you were his, but he would be damned if he let anyone snatch away his girl. 

You listened contentedly to the sound of Haechan’s low groans of pleasure and sticks being crumbled beneath your toes as he pounded into you roughly, your fingernails finding purchase in the tree’s gnarled surface. All you could do was whimper, rooted in place and left to take all he gave you. 

Haechan hit a deep spot and you cried into his palm, a weakness making your head spin with dizziness. He simply had a power over you, goddamn it. Your body could never get enough, a depthless well of lust and arousal in the face of your boyfriend. 

As if he could hear whatever your muffled voice said in the crook of his palm, Haechan’s pace quickened, fucking you tirelessly with a passion that could never be sated. You wallowed in the sound of his hips slamming into yours with a sharp, wet slap. There was no denying what was happening if anyone made the unfortunate mistake of walking by.

Fortunately, your only company were harmless animals and possibly a couple of wandering ghosts. 

The harder you were fucked, the harder it was to stand on your own. Haechan took and took from your body but left a crushing kind of pleasure that rendered you weak and another indescribable feeling, smothering you with the unknown sensation. But instead of fear, it aroused a dangerous curiosity within you. 

“So good for me,” Haechan moaned, draping his lips over your already mark-stained neck. Your entire body was nearly coated in dark bruises ensuing after a long session of fucking and sucking and love-making. “You always gotta feel so damn good.”

His palm slacked on your mouth and you whimpered, “Baby, too much.”

Haechan slowed himself for a second and asked, “Do you want me to stop?”

You shook your head and ironically whimpered at his slower pace. God, no. You wanted Haechan to fuck you numb. 

He snickered and picked back up his quickened rhythm. “That’s my girl,” he praised, pressing a kiss to the side of your neck. “Take it for me, baby.”

Never had your body ever felt so stimulated and alive, every muscle taut with pleasure. It was a lot, but you took it like a champ, loving the way your boyfriend’s thick girth filled you up, hard and stiff. Fire set you ablaze, heat igniting at the vortex of your thighs and shooting through you like a bundle of fireworks. You were smothered by heat, scorching all over. 

Your bodies were on autopilot, sweat beading at the surface of your skin and making your clothes adhere. You were sticky with sweat and arousal and eventually bits of Haechan’s cum, the part you were most excited for. The thought of your boyfriend emptying his balls into you alone was more than enough to make your walls clamp around his cock, wanting to literally milk him dry. You moaned in anticipation. 

“Want you to cum,” you whimpered, body thumped forward with every heavy thrust inside you. “Baby, please. I wanna make you cum.”

Haechan bit his lip when he heard you beg. Why did you have to be so damn sexy? It was the perfect way to bring him over the edge. “Gotta take care of my girl first, baby,” he whispered sweetly in your ear. 

As soon as those words escaped his mouth, you finally noticed how close you were, body under pressure and ready to snap. You could hardly even stand upright on your own, knees very liable to giving in (and more sore than you could notice over numbing pleasure). You were prepared to be broken beyond reclaim. 

“Baby, I…”

“I know,” Haechan shushed you with a sweet peck to your cheek. “I’ve got you, baby. I’m right here. Let go.”

That was all you needed to hear before you couldn’t fight release anymore and it toppled over, draping over you in totality. You came so hard that tears began to well from your eyes, your hands desperately clinging to the tree bark, bruises ready to form all over. Haechan brought his palm back over your mouth quick enough to smother a prolonged, sated scream. 

He whispered praises in your ear even your body slackened, limp against the tree but still letting him use you as needed. You were trembling with anticipation, restless as you waited for him to fill you to the brim. “Baby, please,” you begged. “Fill me up. Fill me up...,”

Haechan developed a ruthless pace now, absorbed in your desperate chants and the way your pussy pulsed around his cock, endeavoring to trigger his climax. He was tangled in the heat of you, dangerously close and gripping your hips so harshly you whined, “Fuck,” into his palm. 

Soon enough, listening to the sound of your sweet voice and muffled cries got the best of him and Haechan’s hips stilled inside, cock twitching with orgasm and promptly releasing hotly inside you. He gave a long hiss while you sighed pleasantly, satisfied at long last. 

Your boyfriend cleaned you up while you rested against the tree, feeling lightheaded. He ensured your skirt was in place and brushed off tiny specks of dirt that had clung to your knees. Haechan, as always, was restless, but you were still trying to catch your breath from the hell of a nut that he had only now given you. 

And you could feel his release still warm between your thighs, caught in your panties. 

You were as fucked out as you looked and he wallowed in the darkly arousing sight of you, evidence of what happened etched across your face no matter the length you went to hide. 

Haechan fought a sly grin and asked, “Ready?” 

You nodded. But when you went to walk, you reeled. Tomorrow was Sunday and that morning you would be kissing these woods goodbye, but you had a feeling your boyfriend would leave you too sore to work come Monday. 

Not that you were complaining. You could only wonder if that was part of his master plan. 

“Disgusting,” Winter sneered lightheartedly when she noticed you limping back to the campground. 

You rolled your eyes. “Oh, please. I’m sure you and Jaehyun gave the boys a lot to raise hell about while we were gone.” 

Jaehyun, directly beside his girlfriend, pulled her into his arms and said, “Hey, it’s not my baby’s fault she’s loud.”

Winter hummed in agreement. “Right. It’s his.”

“Who’s disgusting now,” you remarked with a playful grimace. 

Haechan - for once in his entire life - was silent, too focused on helping you to a shower. He only chuckled a little and ushered you away to take good care of you.

You felt a hell of a lot more refreshed once you cleaned up and had a change of clothes, though ironically energetic. When in need of a nap, Haechan  fucking the shit out of you plus a nice bath usually did the trick (although the bathroom luxuries were limited outdoors), but somehow you were given a burst of energy. 

Though not too long ago you were spooked by what lay in hiding in these woods, there was now a rain cloud of dread and sadness hanging over you when you realized this trip would be ending all too soon. You were having way too much fun in the company of your friends and boyfriend. The last thing you wanted was for it to end.

This place was growing on you. And now that it had, it was almost time to leave. The goddamn irony. 

You stepped outside. Jaehyun and your boyfriend were firing up the grill and Yuta was talking to a squirrel (you would rather not ask), meanwhile Winter was strangely nowhere to be seen. But Ten was at the empty campfire, spectacles sitting on the bridge of his nose as he flipped pages of a rather thick novel. 

You chuckled. It was almost endearing. Some things never changed. 

Your contemplative face was on. The conversation would have to be had one way or another. That much you knew. Your options were clear, though dull. Either address the elephant in the room, or create a rift in your relationship with willful ignorance. 

So, you hauled ass right over to that campfire. 

Ten was startled by your sudden presence and given the circumstances, he was prepared to give someone an earful over the unannounced interruption, but swiftly silenced himself when he noticed it was you who’d come to his side. 

You winced when you noticed his jumpy reaction. “Sorry. Did I scare you?” 

“No,” Ten lied and put his book face down. “What’s up?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to talk.”

That kindled his interest. “Oh?”

“Yeah,” you replied nonchalantly. “What are you reading?”

“This book about the cycle of darkness and light. It’s in German. It’s about how the light replenishes what the darkness steals, but the darkness will always undo it again regardless.”

That genuinely piqued your curiosity. “Sounds deep.”

“Oh, yes. There are plenty of figurative details about hope and hiding your quote-unquote darkness to other people. The author likens human beings to the moon. We all have a dark side, but other people only see the lit part of us,” Ten said, and you beamed at his enthusiasm. “The part we want them to see.”

You leaned over to notice the novel was indeed in German. And impressed that he could comprehend it nonetheless. “Do you have a hidden dark side?”

“‘We are so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others, that in the end, we become disguised to ourselves.’”

“François de La Rochefoucauld,” you replied, recognizing the quote. 

Ten stared at you, wide-eyed. “You know?” 

You nodded with a smile. “He also said, ‘true love is like ghosts, which everybody talks about and few have seen.’”

Ten went dangerously silent and you knew you’d struck a sore spot, but you weren’t done applying pressure. 

You continued, “You’re a really good friend, Ten. And a great guy.”

“Don’t.” 

You cocked your head. “Don’t do what?” 

“Don’t be nice! Don’t be you,” Ten whispered frustratedly, standing to his feet. Which you did suit. “Do you know you’re the only person in this world who’s never laughed at me?”

It was your turn to be quiet now. Tension had a heavy hand clamped over your mouth. 

“You’ve never mocked me. Never made fun of me. The only time you’ve made me feel less than someone else is when you and Haechan got together. Even then, none of it was your fault.”

Grabbing his hand, you crooned, “I’m sorry.” 

That only exasperated Ten even more and he swatted your hand away, though careful not to hurt you, and hurriedly scooped his things into his arms. “Just stop. Don’t let me down gently. You’ll only make it harder on me.”

Ten stormed off before you could get another word in and you merely stood there, riveted in place. You glanced around and were relieved that nobody seemed to notice, but a sour sensation broiled in your gut as you wondered if you’d only rubbed salt in all the wrong wounds. 

For fuck’s sake. Maybe it would have been a better idea to wait until you’d left the campground. At least then you wouldn’t have potentially ruined his whole trip. 

Jaehyun passed out hotdogs as they were coming off the grill and everyone gathered together for an early dinner, but Ten was still nowhere to be seen. Yuta came to their shared cabin and offered him food, but he denied it, sulking all alone. 

“I mean, shit. What did you do to him?” Yuta asked you once he returned. 

You gave him a hard glare and ignored the question. “You guys should be nicer to Ten. He’s a little sensitive right now,” you scolded, then turned to face your boyfriend who was sitting directly next to you. “You, too.”

Haechan threw his hands up. “Yes, ma’am.”

You gave a prolonged exhale. It was no secret Ten had a mean crush on you, though you had denied it for as long as possible. Now that you’d confronted the issue at hand, it blew up in your face. For that reason, there was another unsettling feeling coming alive in the pit of your stomach, making your skin crawl. 

But this time, you knew why. Ironically, you couldn’t tell if that was worse. 

Nothing else was seemingly out of place and the evening carried on as usual, but you were definitely on edge. The shorter days meant an earlier sunset and by the time the sky dimmed pitch-black, most of the others had retreated to their respective cabins, in favor of escaping the approaching threat of bloodthirsty mosquitoes. 

Except for you and your boyfriend, who approached you carrying two glasses of champagne and handing you one.

You accepted the glass and gave him a look. “And what are we celebrating?”

“Making it through the weekend. Alive,” Haechan joked, taking a seat next to you. 

“Mm. You know what champagne does to me.”

He nodded, like that was the whole point. “Yeah. I expect your hands to be all over me in five minutes tops.”

You snickered and sipped from your glass quietly. Haechan placed a cool hand on your thigh, a stark contrast from the raging heat of the campfire crackling merely inches away from you. The sensation was very welcome. 

There was no one around save for you, your boyfriend, and a large number of still trees. Haechan was usually full of conversation, but he was too preoccupied in drawing circles on your bare thighs, caught in how much he loved them. You smiled slyly. The feeling was mutual. Your boyfriend had some thick ass thighs.

Then, your thoughts were dark, and you frowned at the reminder of the terrible dread reeling like a vortex in your belly. “Ten likes me.”

“No offense, baby. But I think you were the last person to figure that out.”

You frowned. “I think I always knew, but I didn’t want to accept it. Because I value the friendship him and I have and I didn’t want that bond to be broken. I still can’t really believe he has feelings for me.”

“I don’t see what’s so surprising,” Haechan said, glancing up from your thighs to look you plain in the eye. “You’re a likable person, babe. I say the guy has taste. Too bad you’re already mine.”

Your lover more or less played compassionate, but you could tell he didn’t actually feel too bad about the situation. Or much of anything for that matter. Funnily enough, that kindled a kind of uncertainty in you. “Doesn’t it make you angry?” you asked curiously, threading your fingers through his bright head of hair.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Why would it? I already know you’re all mine,” Haechan reasoned. “I don’t need any affirmation because I know I own your mind, body, and soul. It’s like I have you under a spell.”

Maybe the champagne had you under a spell, because you swore he looked even better than normal, skin glimmering courtesy of the crackling fire. You could see an identical inferno irate in his pretty brown eyes, blood-hungry and spiraling alarmingly out of control. You knew damn well you were playing with fire, but for whatever reason, you were dangerously in love with the burn. 

Your lover’s lips attacked you and you submitted to his touch, within the firing line of danger. Your hands found his body promptly, desperate for warmth, and Haechan smirked because he had predicted as much. 

He could never scare you. The more you uncovered about him, the deeper you fell into some depthless pile of doom. 

Haechan coiled one arm around your backside while the other skirted between your thighs, grabbing a feel of your clothed arousal. You moaned, already getting wetter. “You do realize this is our third time today alone?” 

“What can I say? I’m addicted to you,” Haechan said, kneading between your thighs and watching your lips fall with a pleased exhale. 

You kept touching and sucking each other until Haechan inevitably got a little too riled up hearing your sweet moans and gently pressed you against the thick log, a blanket already draped above. Strangely, time seemed to move slower, like the whole world was frozen over and there was no one else there. Nobody to interrupt your reckless fun. 

A tinge of heat blossomed inside your chest, rapidly spreading elsewhere when your boyfriend plucked your shirt and bra and started to kiss his way down your breasts. You clasped your palms on his shoulders, soft little sighs still doing a number on him as he nibbled at your flesh, cock growing harder. 

Just thinking about all the many times Haechan fucked you into oblivion had you in a drunken stupor and you begged demurely, “Please, baby.” There was nothing you weren’t willing to do if it meant he would stop drawing out the inevitable, no matter how good his kisses were. 

Haechan swore loudly and shoved a hand down your shorts, breaking the barriers and feeling your arousal coating his fingers. Did you always have to be so impatient and wet? Your head tipped back with a moan, body arching against his touch. 

You whimpered in surprise when Haechan brought you to a stand to sweep the blanket over the grassy ground and again when he pulled you to the surface, grabbing your shorts by the band and promptly tossing them aside. Haechan made sure you were far away enough from the fire not to be a safety hazard, but close enough for light and warmth. 

Not that you need very much of the latter. Your boyfriend touching you kindled sparks in your body hot enough to make you sweat all over. 

Your boyfriend hungrily stripped you both of your underwear and then lined his hard cock at your entrance, slippery with your own slick. In your mind, an eternity seemed to pass before he winded inside, and you clung tightly to your breath before you lost it forever. 

Haechan leaned below all the while, leaving a trail of sweet kisses up your stomach. You moaned loudly, arching into his touch, somehow feeling an elated sense of pleasure. You were blatantly more aware of his cock pressed deeply into your vice-like cunt, and your legs locked around his hips, pulling him even deeper. 

There was something new. Drunk sex with your boyfriend was always fun, but it wasn’t this. It was sloppier. It was teeth accidentally clashing and giggling into each other’s mouths. 

None of that was happening. Instead, every sensation was a million times more unrestrained and for a second you wondered if you were making it all up in your head or if your boyfriend was simply that good at pleasuring you. 

The thought disappeared as quickly as it had come, because you were too distracted by Haechan’s warm breath on your neck, tickling the flesh as he whispered a bunch of sweet nothings into your ear, full aware that it would bring you over the edge. You felt like a mad woman, unsure of anything and everything except for how perfect it felt to be in your boyfriend’s arms. 

“You feel so good,” Haechan moaned into your ear, and if you hadn’t already spiraled out of control, you sure as hell had now. 

“Fuck. God, Haechan,” you whimpered, too overwhelmed. How in the hell could he feel so good? Every inch of you was sensitive, but every sensation was heightened. “I fucking love this.”

You were half-tempted to pinch yourself to determine if you were lucid dreaming, but then Haechan dug his sharp nails into your hips and you instantly knew there was no denying you were very awake. 

Haechan poorly stifled a snicker and watched the bounce of your breasts as he stroked deeper and deeper. A wavering orange hue casted over your body and highlighted the irrefutable evidence of pleasure on your pretty face, courtesy of the campfire. 

Lord have mercy, you were beautiful. Nothing made him prouder than being able to call you his girl. No woman before you had ever left him so love-struck, so downright in love. You made him crazy in a way that he would never fathom, but what he did know was that he was in over his head and not even death could part you. 

A thought crossed your mind and incited a lustful greed within you, and you grabbed Haechan’s bicep, whimpering, “Haechan, stop.” 

That pulled him out of his little pleasure-induced stupor and Haechan ground to a halt, quickly scanning your face for any sign of discomfort he might’ve missed in his trance. Needless to say, he came short of answers.

“I wanna be on top,” you explained, making him pull out and lay beneath you now. “Just sit back and relax.”

Haechan submitted to you because for fuck’s sake, he was out of his mind in love with you, and whatever you wanted he would give you. You could cry for the moon and he would steal it for you. No questions asked. 

You switched positions to straddle his body, reaching for his cock and steering him to your entrance. Haechan moaned when he was fitted back inside, and your hands slipped to his chest as you eyed him, having the perfect view of his face tensing with pleasure of all kinds. 

Had you not been interrupted by a moan, you would have giggled. Your fingers pranced around his sensitive nipples and Haechan called out your name, palms seeking anchorage at your ass. You were both obviously driving each other insane, in a war to see who could take the other off their hinges. 

Haechan watched you bounce on his cock and it was the most beautiful sight in the world to him. Your mouth parted with blissful sighs and soft moans, your bodies an amalgam of sticky coats of sweat and hotness. 

“I love you,” Haechan blurted through ragged breath, but goddamn was it true. 

“I love you, too,” you moaned in the midst of fucking yourself on a very hard dick.  And trying not to lose what was left of you. “Shit. Holy fuck.” 

Haechan involuntarily thrusted up to meet your motions, matching your quick tempo. You could feel and hear the blood pumping rhythmically in your head, your pulse thudding. Each of your breaths were quick, like you could hardly breathe through the thick tension of pent-up love and desire between you. 

You simply couldn’t stop, couldn’t get enough of the feeling. You couldn’t fathom why it was so goddamn good. Even Haechan had to notice you were riding him harder than usual, chasing satisfaction with a craving that could never be satiated. You felt like an animal, wondering what it was that made him feel even better than you thought possible. 

Every insignificant detail was zeroed in on. Did he always have those little scratches on him? And had you been the reason? Your eyes fell up his neck and down his torso and you bit your lip smugly, noticing all the marks you’d left behind.  

“Baby, I’m so close,” you whimpered, rocking harder. 

“Come on, baby. You’re so beautiful,” Haechan groaned, close and throttled by the tension. You were closing in on him, wrapping around him so tightly and driving him to climax. 

The muscles in your thighs tightened and slackened, and you bounced to the rhythm of the pulsing between your legs. Haechan reached for your hand and laced his fingers through yours, wanting to be thoroughly connected with you through every moment of your orgasm. 

He uncontrollably rambled some more praises in your ears about how good you felt and how beautiful you were, and you couldn’t stop yourself from coming, teeth clamping into your bottom lip to stifle a loud cry and way too immersed in pleasure to notice the pain. Your throbbing cunt and smothered cries prompted Haechan and he released inside, still fucking you back until he rested with a long exhale. 

Your body went limp, crashing at his side. Looking at the sky, you could see stars, but when you closed them, they were still there. 

Haechan immediately started to kiss you and you kissed back, tasting ecstasy on his lips. Your boyfriend cradled your body, whispering, “You did so good. I’m so proud of you.”

You remembered giving a soft little sigh of pleasure and Haechan taking the liberty of redressing you.

Everything after that was a blur. 

When you woke up, the sky was still perpetually dark, but you were in bed. You turned to your side and came to the eerie conclusion that you were very alone. Haechan was nowhere to be found. 

Maybe he’s just using the restroom, you reasoned. Yeah, okay. That happened. For your comfort, you decided to wait up until he returned. 

Half an hour later, Haechan was still a no-show. That was when you began to suspect there was something far more sinister at hand than a visit to the bathroom. You crawled from under the sheets and slipped on your shoes, determined to investigate the matter yourself. 

There was a pounding in your chest. Where could Haechan have disappeared to for thirty minutes in the middle of the night?

Except for anywhere. He could be anywhere in these goddamn woods and you would never find even a trace of him. A cool dread plagued your body and you wrapped your arms around yourself, praying your boyfriend was somewhere safe. You had a strange gut feeling that something heinous had happened and it was all around you, suffocating. 

You crept outdoors and oddly enough, noticed Yuta seated at the campfire. You remembered making love to Haechan there, because the memory was still fresh. For some reason, it felt like moments yet days ago altogether. 

Why was it still lit at this hour? More significantly, what was Yuta doing there so late? 

“Yuta?” you called out. 

No reply. He was stiff as a boulder. You approached him stealthily, wanting to believe he was only playing an evil trick on you. 

When you could finally get a front view of him, you cried out in a blend of surprise and terror. 

Nothing could have prepared you for the gruesome sight of Yuta’s lifeless body. You shrieked and screamed until your voice could barely muster a murmur. For a good while, you only stood there, muscles stiff with shock. Tears silently began to drip as they gathered at your eyelashes. 

You forced your eyes away from Yuta. His face had been burned so badly that you could hardly recognize him. The skin was disfigured with marks, wrinkly and apparently rotten. You noticed the purple lines around his wrists and his slashed throat and hoped he hadn’t been burned alive. 

You refused to look at him, refused to touch him. You cowered away, repulsed by the consuming stench of blood clogging your senses. Feeling nauseous, you turned over and knocked over two near-full wine glasses in your wake, bending your knees. It made you want to throw up. 

This could not be happening. You rubbed your eyes, like there was a chance sleep and your tears were making you delirious. A bitter taste parched your tongue as you prayed this was only a ghastly dream. You would not accept this as reality. You didn’t want to believe Yuta was - completely and irrevocably  - gone.

But regardless of how hard you tried, your body scorned you, refusing to wake up.

This was a living nightmare. 

For some strange reason, there was a canoe approaching the shoreline and you made a beeline for the lake, too blinded by your need for answers to pause and ask yourself why there was somebody paddling at this hour.

“Haechan?” you called out shakily. 

Nothing. Where could he have gone? The night was far too dark for you to piece together who was on the canoe. Which was unnerving.

Dread hit you tenfold when it dawned on you that Haechan could have been anywhere, slain and blood-splattered like how you discovered Yuta. 

Tears made your eyes burn. There was no way in hell your boyfriend was dead. But none of that explained what happened to Yuta. And were the rest of your friends okay?

Why did nobody hear you scream? 

The growing questions only made you tremble with mystification. You couldn’t for the life of you comprehend why anybody would want to do something so unspeakable to Yuta. He had been nothing but an incredible friend to you for years and a wonder to everyone he met. 

Anger briefly numbered you to your fear. Yuta didn’t deserve to die. Not in such a cold-hearted, brutal manner. Nobody did. The look on his face when you found his body was permanently etched into your memory. He had been burned beyond recognition. The damage was irreversible. Even if he somehow survived the burns, there was no way to undo the distortion. 

Your heart had never been so heavy. There was a possibility the wound to his neck killed him, but there was also a fair chance it only damaged him enough to render him unheard. 

What if Yuta tried to scream, but nobody heard him, either? 

You should have known coming to this haunted city was a fatal mistake. The rumors of people slaughtered in Chimera should have been more than enough to dissuade you, but you each were too goddamn stubborn.

Look what that had gotten you. A dead friend, a missing boyfriend, and an uncertain status on the rest of your number. 

The uncertainty about the rest of your friends only made you even sadder. Had they somehow slept through Yuta’s death, too? Or were they victims to a similar fate? 

No. That couldn’t be the case. Because if it was, then why had you been left untouched?

Surely, there were no goddamn miracles in this godforsaken place. 

You wracked your brain trying to remember what happened. For some reason, everything was fuzzy and disoriented. You recalled the whole day up to a point. Haechan and you fooled around in bed until you finally roused. Then, you had breakfast. The boys went canoeing. You went to annoy Winter with your paranoia.

The boys came back and you went on a hike with Haechan only to fool around some more. Then, you returned, took a shower, the boys fired up the grill and you had a conversation with Ten. He froze you out and stormed into his cabin for the night.

Everyone ate dinner without him, they eventually left, and you spent the night fooling around with Haechan under the moonlight. 

Then, everything else went black. You didn’t remember getting into bed with Haechan, but you assumed he carried you there. Your eyes got too heavy after orgasm and you seemingly passed out. 

That was strange. And maybe too much of a coincidence. But Haechan would never do anything to hurt you. Would he? 

Don’t be silly, you chided. Haechan loves you and he’s fucking missing right now. Instead of questioning him, you should be trying to find him before it’s too late. 

You didn’t even let yourself wonder if it already was too late. Haechan was not dead. Anyone could leave you, but not him. Not the boy who promised you forever and then some. 

Haechan was the common denominator, but Ten was the missing piece. You hadn’t seen him since you tried to turn him down gently and there was no telling if he ever came out the cabin since. He may have been in his feelings, but no anger could prompt him to do this. You were certain. 

You were certain about all of them. But if not them, then who did that leave? A ghost? 

Your heart raced quicker than ever before as you bolted to the lake, and you halted dead in your tracks when your feet landed right at its murky edge. The sky was still too dark for you to make out the body on the canoe. You squinted, but you couldn’t even see a body at all. 

Tall, thick trees covered the border of the lake. Moonlight filtered through some of the branches, though unfortunately, it didn’t come close to illuminating the canoe. You glanced at the water and saw a pair of eyes staring back at you. 

And they weren’t your own. 

For a minute, you couldn’t move. You went stiffly rigid, attempting to convince your brain that this was only a figment of your delirious imagination. But the wide pair of eyes didn’t move. They didn’t even blink. 

Fear flooded back into your body, bleeding thickly out of you, and you lurched back with an eldritch scream. Everything happened so damn quickly. Your back hit the trunk of a tree and the branches rattled. A body plummeted violently into the cool water, but you didn’t register the splash, veins pumping icy dread instead of warm blood. 

You didn’t investigate, slumping against the tree and pulling your knees to your bosom. You cried hot tears, because you recognized those eyes. They were the same ones you always caught staring at you. They were the same ones that looked at you with hurt and heartbreak the last time you’d seen them. 

Now, they looked at you with lifelessness. And they unmistakably belonged to Ten. 

“I’m sorry,” you cried, as if he could hear you. “I should have left it alone. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I didn’t mean to make things worse.” 

There was no word to describe the depth and darkness of the feeling that plagued you now. You shuddered, an imagined nipping wind numbing you beyond the surface and to the very fucking core. It was brutal and ruthless. 

Every inch of your body was bitter with pain. You were so dizzy with shock and consternation that you couldn’t even stand. Your head ached from crying so damn much. 

You felt like you had done this to Ten. He was even harder to move on from. Your last memories were anything but happy and you could only picture the ache and longing absorbing his features, the hurt crushing the impact of his voice. 

Nothing made sense to you. Ten fell for your gentleness, but resented you for letting him down gently. You wanted to understand him. You wanted to make things better, but you failed and now you would have to live with that mistake forever. Because it was too late to undo. 

“I thought I was doing the right thing,” you croaked quietly, voice absent. “Now, I’ll never be able to. Please forgive me.”

Every breath you took was pained. You could barely speak without your voice cracking. There was no welcoming feeling. Especially not the self-loathing that swallowed you whole and throttled you. Everything you felt was cold and lingering, dark and unfurling. 

You must have spent an eternity sitting there sobbing your heart out, mourning your dead friend, because you only stood to your feet when you heard the sound of something meeting the shoreline. 

 The canoe. You had forgotten all about the damn thing and frowned when you saw nobody. You walked over and had your blood already not been icy, it would have run cold. 

Jaehyun laid sprawled across the canoe, completely soaked, like he had toppled over into the lake. 

“Jay,” you gasped, shocked. This whole time you had been calling out for a dead body. He was ghostly pale, hair stuck to his skin. 

You made the decision to reach over, careful not to rock the canoe too much in case you tripped over, and felt for a pulse. Even a weak one. Anything that proved he wasn’t gone. 

Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. Jaehyun was ruthlessly still. His body was like ice and in your head, a temperature of a negative degree. You accidentally left a bloody print on his arm, recouping your hand when you begrudgingly accepted he was no longer breathing and there was no chance of him ever doing so again, and crept back over to the shore. 

Just when you thought you had no more tears left to cry, they fell again, mocking you. You could dimly see your reflection, your tear-stained face a complete mess. 

That was the third dead body. With each one, you loss more and more faith that any of your friends were okay. 

But there was still Haechan and Winter. 

That made you confused. Jaehyun would never leave Winter by herself. Especially not in the middle of the night in dark, haunted woods. How in the hell did he get on a canoe by himself? 

The whole reason Jaehyun even came on this trip was to protect her in case this place turned out to actually be haunted. Was Winter okay? Jaehyun would never let anyone harm her, if there was anything he could do. They would have to get through him before they got to her. 

Maybe they did get through him. 

Rage warmed you and gave you life again. Whoever did this would pay. You would find them and seek sweet revenge. But first, you needed to confirm whether or not your boyfriend and your best friend were alive. 

Now that you thought about it, Haechan would never leave you alone, either. It simply wasn’t in his nature and didn’t make sense. Not even a little bit. 

When presented with a perceived danger, Haechan’s first instinct was to grab you and keep you sheltered in his arms. When you were frightened for your life, Haechan never failed to soothe you, promising you he would go through hell and back to keep you safe. 

That wouldn’t change all of the sudden. He was no coward. Now, your heart hurt, wondering if he had given himself up to protect you too. 

You turned around and made a beeline for Winter and Jaehyun’s cabin. You needed to find her. You needed to know she was okay. Together, you could get the hell out of here, but not before you found your boyfriend also. 

The campground was the same as you’d left, still as lifeless as before with Yuta’s corpse by the campfire, and you weren’t too sure how that made you feel. You darted to the right, immediately charging straight towards your best friend’s cabin. 

There were no lights on. The only source of light was the campfire burning in the center. It gave you hope that Winter may have been sleeping peacefully, oblivious to all that happened. 

But unlike you, Winter was a light sleeper. Wouldn’t she have noticed Jaehyun crawling out of bed or something? 

You frowned. You didn’t know what happened. Jaehyun could have sensed danger outside and went to investigate. He could have kissed her forehead and urged her to go to sleep. 

You shook your head and slowly opened the door, ignorant of the blood print you’d left on the knob, pulse speeding at the eerie sound of it pushing open. The darkness made you wary. You couldn’t even be sure if she was on the bed. 

For assistance, you turned on the light, and breathed a little in relief when you noticed a figure slumped under the sheets. But why was her head below the comforter? Winter never slept like that. Something about it being too hot and too hard to breathe. 

The relief you felt was short-lived. Dread returned and you inhaled and exhaled deeply. A part of you didn’t want to know if your best friend was dead or not. But she was too still. Like she wasn’t even breathing under the covers. 

You plucked the cover off her face and trembled. There was fresh blood on her chin, rolling down her lips. And a fork in her left hand. And you had a sneaking suspicion that you knew why. 

Gently, you opened her mouth, and when you saw that a piece of her tongue was no longer there you had a painful moment of realization. 

Your heart broke. It didn’t split down the middle, but broke into millions of pieces. Winter was dead. But you knew damn well Haechan was still out there somewhere, good and well. 

You grabbed Winter’s lifeless body in your arms and cried into her shoulder, oddly comforted by the fact her body was still warm. Everything made sense now. This was all your fault. 

Nothing was a coincidence. Winter frightened you and made you bite your tongue. Then, you found her with a fork in her hand, a piece of her tongue removed. Yuta gave you his marshmallow when you burned yours. Then, you found him with his face burned without a lick of mercy. 

Ten always stared at you. He was always watching. He looked at you with a kind of adoration in his eyes. You found him staring into his own reflection, body slumped on a tree. 

And Jaehyun offered to take you on a canoe ride with the guys. You found him sprawled across that very same canoe. 

“I did this to you,” you sobbed, grabbing her hand. You bristled when you noticed blood on her fingernails, knowing it wasn’t her. Winter fought to protect her damn self. 

And you knew who attacked her. 

You were so overwhelmed. You had never felt this many emotions at once before. Especially not this intensely. You were wounded and betrayed. Angry and regretful. Frightened and loathing. 

For a moment, you only cried in Winter’s warmth, holding her hand and blaming yourself for everything. You begged her to wake up. You begged her to smile and tap your arm, screaming, “Just kidding!” 

This had to be a prank. This had to be some cruel joke that you were the butt of, a trick at your expense. You wanted everyone to open the door one by one and laugh at you for falling for such a stupid scheme, but you knew in your heart it wasn’t true. 

You saw the very real marks on Yuta’s face. You saw the lifelessness in Ten’s eyes. You felt Jaehyun’s non-existent pulse. Even now, you could feel the warmth slowly leaving Winter’s body. 

Eventually you pulled away, wiping your eyes with the back of your hand. You saw the blood on the sheets and frowned. That hadn’t been there before. Only then did you notice the blood dampening your clothes. 

How long had that been there? Was it from one of the bodies? 

No, because I only touched Jaehyun. And he clearly drowned, you thought. But pushed the thought of Jaehyun’s drenched body out of your head as quickly as it came. 

There were more pressing matters at hand. You needed to get the hell out of here. And you needed to do so alive. Someone had to be the bearer of bad news. Someone had to tell your friends’ parents that their worst nightmare had come true. 

You found the courage to leave your best friend there and crept outside the cabin. Your phone was in Ten’s and Yuta’s. Goddamn it. 

The sight of Haechan emerging from the woods made you grind to a halt. You were scared for your goddamn life. You had no idea what your chances of survival were, but you got it now. Why you had been spared from your friend’s fate. 

The Haechan you loved was not the man staring at you from afar. The Haechan you’d come to know was not the man approaching you. He was somebody else. Somebody you were not familiar with and did not know how to handle. 

Adrenaline thumped in your head. You had a choice. You could flee or you could fight. 

For now, you decided to play dumb. 

“Baby,” you called out, colliding into his cold arms. “Everybody’s dead! Are you okay? What happened to you?”

Haechan stared at you unrecognizably. You knew you were looking danger dead in the eye. There was no warmth in him, no life. He had blood stains on his clothes and scratches on his face. 

From Winter, you bristled inwardly. You banished the thought, knowing your cover would be blown the longer you thought about how he had preyed down your friends. 

Haechan coiled an arm around you and said simply, “It’s not my blood.” 

“Not your blood?” you repeated slowly, pulling yourself away. “Then, whose blood is it?” 

Your boyfriend only smiled. “I think you know the answer to that, sweetheart,” he said sweetly, but you knew only venom was inside him. 

You wanted to scream. There was no deceiving him. You could tell he already knew. Haechan read you like an open book and you knew he would never not have you all figured out. 

Giving up deception, you cried, “Why?” 

“Because you’re mine,” he explained with a gentleness to his tone, approaching you despite picking up on how adamant you were on keeping him at arm’s length. “Don’t you see? Everybody wants to keep us apart. We can be alone now.” 

“Haechan, nobody was keeping us apart,” you said, unable to justify his actions. 

“Yes, they were,” Haechan argued. “Like the old geezer at your job. He worked you too much and paid you too little. I was doing you a favor.” 

You paused as you processed his words. He was talking about your boss. The same boss that mysteriously died a couple of weeks back. You put the pieces together. 

You gasped, “You killed him?”

Haechan scoffed. “Don’t give me that look. I know you hated the guy. I remember the smile on your face when you told me your boss was dead.” 

“Yuta, Ten, Winter, and Jaehyun weren’t keeping us away from each other,” you hissed, using rage as your fuel and hatred as your anchor. “They did nothing to us.” 

“They were nuisances. You spent too much time with them. You’re better off without them anyway, baby. Winter hurt you and laughed in your face. I mean, what kind of best friend does that? Of course, I had to eliminate the bigger threat before I got to her.” 

The bigger threat was Jaehyun. He would go to the ends of the earth for Winter and you could tell from the moment he was introduced to you. You gave him the golden stamp of approval for a reason. 

Jaehyun would protect Winter until he had nothing left to give. You had no idea how Haechan took him down, but at this point, you didn’t want to know. It made you well with pain. You hoped they met again in the afterlife and in the next one with a much kinder fate.  

Haechan continued, “Yuta was too comfortable. I didn’t like how he talked to you. He always got too close, leaning into you and shit. I had enough. And Ten definitely wanted to take you away from me. I know you saw how he looked at you.” 

The pressure in your heart was building. You couldn’t breathe. You needed a pulse. The whole world was upside down. “You said… you said it didn’t make you angry. You told me that you didn’t care about those kinds of things. I thought you were different.” 

“Don’t you dare compare me to them,” Haechan chided, stepping closer. You stumbled and he caught you in his heavy arms, not letting up even when you tried to swat him away. “I love you better than your exes ever did. They didn’t care for you, baby. They could never love you like I do. Nobody can.”

Struggling in his arms, you screamed in his face, “My exes didn’t kill all my fucking friends!” 

Haechan started to laugh. You gaped at him and his audacity. There was no kind of levity in this situation and yet he was humored. You knew now that your boyfriend was a goddamn psychopath. 

You managed to slip away from him by grace of his distractedness and barked, “What the hell is so funny?” 

Haechan explained through bursts of laughter, “Do you think I could have killed four people by myself? We did this together, baby. Just look at yourself.” 

You reluctantly did as told. That was when the blood on your clothes finally made sense and you started to feel dirtier than ever. Was your friends’ blood on your hands? That would explain the blood on Winter’s sheets. 

Unable to endure the pain, you dropped to your knees, losing the strength to stand. The blood was everywhere. It stained your palms. Now, conscious of its presence, you were hyper aware that you were covered in your friends blood and the feeling was akin to being dipped in acid. 

How could you have only now noticed? You were too frenzied searching for your friends, searching for a spark of life in this desolate city. 

You clung to denial, chanting through sobs, “No. No, no, no.”

“Shh,” Haechan sang, pulling you into his embrace gently. He had stopped laughing, but this was a man incapable of empathy. No matter how convincing he was. “We’re finally alone, sweetie. No one to steal you from me.”

You hated yourself for not loathing the way his body felt around yours. There was a big part of you that wanted to go back to a couple of hours ago, when you thought it was only him and you in this world, and you had no idea the traumatic experience you’d have only hours later. 

That made the world stop. You found peace for a split second before hell peeled the corners of your vision again. Your head rose up, and you looked Haechan in his empty, dark eyes. 

Had you imagined the spark there? No. You had to look deeper. There was a fire there, a web of temptation, desire, and viciousness. That was what you saw in him. It was passion, but you had mistaken it for a different kind. 

“Haechan?” you called out. 

Your boyfriend said pleasantly, “Yes, my dear?” 

“Did you put something in my champagne?”

“Yes.” 

At least he was honest. For once. 

“You spiked my drink,” you began, voice cracking. “Because you knew I would never agree to your sick ways in my right mind.” 

To your dismay, Haechan didn’t deny the accusation, only giving you a sickening smile and stroking your hair gently. Like your whole world wasn’t upside down now. He,  like this was some kind of joke, merely said, “Ahchoo.”

You bristled with a vicious wrath. Haechan was out of his goddamn mind. He didn’t give a single fuck about what he had done and frankly, you’d had enough of trying to converse. You needed to get out of here immediately and seek help. There was no way you would play along with his twisted delusion. 

A chimera. 

Your heart stopped when you once again came to the brutal realization that your phone was trapped in Yuta and Ten’s cabin. You knew Haechan would never let you get away with a phone call. If you could even make one. In the middle of nowhere, there was no such thing as Wi-Fi or service. 

Plus you were surrounded by acres of trees and water. Where the hell would you go? The main road would be too damn obvious even if you somehow managed to get there. And without a car, you were positively out of luck. 

Haechan’s tone was saccharine, but there was only poison in his voice as he leaned into your ear and warned, “Whatever you’re thinking; don’t you fucking dare.”

You glared Haechan dead in the eyes, adrenaline coming over you, and you gave him a smack across the face. 

Then, you leapt up and bolted into the woods. Haechan only laughed when you slapped him, but you didn’t turn around, and you damn sure didn’t stop. Fucking psycho, you sneered. 

You vanished into the thick trees, now grateful for the darkness, though time was running scarce. Daylight would be approaching soon. Shock made you lose track of time. There was no telling how long you’d spent losing what remained of your sanity.

You were a livewire, blood pumping in your ears. The sound of twigs snapping behind you made you hyper aware of Haechan’s manhunt and you knew he wasn’t far behind, but you never gave up. Your legs ached from the lack of oxygen, but your white flag was still lowered. You would never give him the satisfaction of surrender until you knew you’d done all possible to save yourself. 

Your lover called out from somewhere behind you, “You can run, baby - I love a chase - but you can’t hide.” 

The rage blindsided you. He was the epitome of a nightmare dressed like a daydream. How could you not have noticed? This was the man you spent every spare second of your day with. How could you not have seen him for the creature he truly was beneath the surface? 

Haechan liked the hunt. There was still a chipperness to his tone even as he followed the noise of your feet scurrying through those dark, wicked woods. He was evil. He was a monster. But you knew now that the villains of this godforsaken town were not ghosts or spirits - they were the very people you trusted with your life. 

Tears blurred your vision and shock made the world swivel. You refused to be another rumor. You refused to be reduced to another campfire story. You would fight for your life up until your very last exhale.

“Where do you plan on going, darling?” Haechan asked, tone welling with concern. “There’s nothing or no one out here for miles. You’ll die out here before you find someone to save you.”

You slammed into a tree and swore louder than you would’ve liked, knowing Haechan was hot on your trail because you could hear him chiding you for being so clumsy. 

“But you didn’t die out there,” said your therapist. 

You bobbed your head. “I got back up and I ran,” you told her, shuddering as you were forced to place yourself back in what was easily the worst day of your goddamn life. “He was so close. I ran into the daylight. I was in those woods for days. I had nothing. No food, no water.” 

“You had resolve,” the therapist corrected. “Because of that, you’re here to tell the story.”

You nodded a little, because you only barely survived. You genuinely thought you would die that night. If not by Haechan himself, then eventually hunger or dehydration.

“Why does this always happen to me?” you cried. “Every time I fall for someone, they treat me like a possession. But I never thought it would go this far. How come I didn’t realize until it was too late? I even…their blood is on my hands.” 

The therapist stopped you right there. “He took advantage of your trust and adulterated your champagne without your knowledge to make you easier to manipulate. You said it yourself. He knew you would never agree in your right mind.”

None of her consolation helped. Half a year had passed since the most traumatic event of your life. The wound still felt fresh. You could still hear your friends’ voices and see their faces following you everywhere. 

And knowing that their blood was on your hands made things even worse. You could hardly live with yourself. None of this would have happened if you would have never met Haechan, if you would have never given him the time of day. They would still be here, living their lives. 

It wasn’t fair that only you and that monster survived that day. You despised yourself for giving him access, but you loathed him for what he took from you. 

For what he took from them.  

She asked, “Have the nightmares stopped?” 

The nightmares started a little after that weekend and hadn’t ceased since. They would return to you every single night as you slept, more or less the same as before. You would be running for dear life as Haechan hunted you down. The setting was never the same. Some nights, he would chase you through a labyrinth of trees. Others, through a never-ending hallway. No matter the setting, he would hunt you until he finally caught you and leapt over you.

But only once he uttered the same four words in your ear would you wake, “You’re all mine now.”

They were simple, but they never failed to creep the living hell out of you. 

You shuddered. “No. But they’ve become less frequent.”

“And why do you think that is?” 

You shrugged. “I don’t know. It happened after I started spending time with this guy.”

That piqued her interest. “New boyfriend?”

“Not really,” you replied, the mere thought making you tremble. “I’m talking to this guy - Mark. He’s really sweet and I do like him, but I told him I’m not ready for a relationship. Frankly, I’m not sure if I ever will be again. But we still spend time, because I like his company.”

“That is a completely normal response after being exposed to a traumatic event. It may cause you to be emotionally distant, self-protective, and wary of others intentions. It is a difficult part of the process of healing and learning how to navigate through life as you did before.”

Though you already knew the answer, you asked, “Will my life ever be the same?” 

“Not likely,” the therapist told you honestly. “This is a new beginning for you. You’ll be learning to shed your old skin and adapt.”

You frowned. 

The therapist concluded the session not much later and you went home. Therapy was new for you. Ironically enough, it was never your idea. Instead of pressuring you into explaining what the hell happened to you, Mark suggested you tried therapy. 

To think of the boy sitting at home waiting for you was bittersweet. You sincerely enjoyed spending time with Mark, but you simply couldn’t bring yourself to be vulnerable with him. Like the therapist said, you were being self-protective and wary of his intentions. No matter how hard you tried, you knew you would never be able to trust the same way again.

It made you feel as if you were keeping Mark’s heart chained away. Mark was gentle and the one to suggest you take things slowly, but a godawful feeling plagued you whenever reminded he was waiting for the girl he always wanted. And there was a chance you could never be that girl. 

You wondered what he saw in you. What he saw in a girl so broken that she couldn’t bring herself to love anyone. Did he want to take advantage of your vulnerability? Was he the same kind of evil as the ones before him? 

Love was a wager, but you had no more of yourself to give. 

As you stepped inside your car, you monitored everything around you and likely quadruple-checked the backseat. Ever since that fateful day, you were hyper aware of your surroundings. You may have escaped Haechan, but that didn’t mean he would never come back to stake his claim to you.

You drove, obsessively checking your rear-view mirror. Nobody was following you, but you could never be too safe. You were more wary than usual today. There was something in the air. 

Or maybe you were just extremely paranoid. That was more plausible. 

You hated driving through town. There was a song on the radio and it reminded you of Winter, because she would burst out singing whenever it came on. Jaehyun would be sure to duet with her. You changed the station. 

Then, you passed by a bookstore. That was where you met Ten. You remembered the very second your hands touched the same novel, fingers brushing against each other’s, and the glare you both exchanged then said loud and clear that neither of you would be backing down. But when he learned you had a copy of a book he’d been tirelessly hunting for, he let you have it and you promised to swap later. 

Unbeknownst to you, Ten freaked the hell out that night when it hit him that he had unintentionally scored a very pretty girl’s number. 

It was over for you when you saw the lake sitting at the side of the road. Yuta would meet you there for an afternoon jog whenever you had the spare time. Your friends would argue it was too romantic, but Yuta never gave a fuck what other people think. You were close, but he knew where you stood and Yuta would rather die than bone you. 

Tears threatened. Why couldn’t you get them out of your head? The guilt was eating you alive. You wanted your life back. But you tainted the chance of normalcy the second you caught a monster’s goddamn eye.  

As soon as you got home, you noticed another car parked in the driveway. Mark’s car. He asked if he could come over earlier to see you after your therapy session. You told him, “You know where the spare key is.” 

It was definitely frightening, but you wanted to trust Mark. He displayed no suspicious signs, no red flags. Then again, neither did Haechan. And everyone knew how that story went. 

No happy ever after. 

There was an overwhelmingly strong aroma of sauces and spices hitting you square in the nose the moment you stepped inside your house and there was a trail of roses predictably leading from the front door to the dining room. You cocked a brow. Since when did Mark learn how to cook? This was the same boy that could barely make instant noodles without burning you both alive. 

“Mark?” you called out. 

No reply. Which was odd. Mark couldn’t wait to see you. 

You hung your coat and followed the trail of rose petals as that was obviously what you were intended to do. The sound of old school romance music began to play even louder the closer you inched and you shuddered at how much it reminded you of Haechan. 

When he was bored, he would turn on the speaker and sing his heart out to you, making you laugh at how he danced and gave you a five-star performance. 

The memories used to make you smile fondly. Now, you were a well of unadulterated fear. 

Even this specific song tore you down. Haechan loved Michael Jackson more than anyone you ever knew. As far as you were concerned, Mark was more of an old school rap guy. 

You finally approached the dining room and your heart ricocheted at what you saw. There was Mark, bound to a chair with a gag in his mouth. And Haechan stood there with a twisted smile on his face as he saw you, holding a gun to Mark’s head. 

“Mark,” you gasped, knees buckling. 

You could hear Mark whimper faintly, though his voice was muffled. He looked at you with total fear in his eyes and you were more than apologetic, the self-loathing returning as you knew the innocent life of yet another person would ultimately be destroyed because of you. 

Haechan playfully whined, “What about me? I’m here, too.” 

“You fucking monster!” you screamed. 

Your now ex-boyfriend switched on a dime and pointed his gun at you, sneering, “Sit down.”

With a fatal weapon pointed to you, you quickly complied, finding a seat at the table. You noticed there were two plates there, each at the head of the table. Mark was forced to sit at the side. 

Because he had no part in this game. He was only another nuisance, as Haechan had put it in his own terms. Another obstacle to be eliminated. Tears stung your eyes.

Your ex was delighted by your submission and took his seat at the other end of the table, facing you, but he kept his gun tucked close. You couldn’t ignore the plates in front of you both. Only God knew how long he had been waiting for you. You knew he wanted you to play into the fantasy you’d obstructed six months ago, however, your ex-boyfriend was anything but deterred. 

“I’m glad you finally made it. Mark and I were waiting for you to join us,” Haechan said, as if this was some friendly gathering and not a hostage situation. “Although, he was an unexpected guest. But it’s no biggie.” 

You sat there and pleaded, “Haechan, please don’t hurt him. This has nothing to do with him. You want me? Just take me. Leave him alone.” 

Haechan’s tone was lighthearted despite the betrayed nature of his words, “Wow. You like him that much? I thought I meant something to you.”

“That was before you slaughtered our friends like a beast,” you hissed, seething. 

Haechan corrected, “More like a pack of wolves. Everything we do is a group effort, baby. We’re a team. We’re in this together. There is no you without me and no me without you.”

You met Mark’s eyes and instantly knew what he was thinking. This guy is a total psychopath. 

He could tell this was what you had been hiding and you were aware. You had never discussed your trauma with him at length and Mark never made you feel any pressure to. Now, he understood what had you so scarred. 

You called with disdain, “Donghyuck.” 

Haechan ignored you calling him by his government name and changed his tone, feigning woundedness, “I can’t believe you tried to replace me, baby. You even told him where the spare key is. Did you actually think I wouldn’t come back to take what’s mine?” 

“I’m not yours, Donghyuck,” you told him, words dripping with vitriol. “And I never will be again. You had your chance and you blew it.”

“How could you say that?” Haechan asked, eyes wide and dark with an emotion you had no intention of understanding. “After all I’ve done for you. All I’ve done for us so that we could be alone together. I love you so much.”

For a second, you were at a loss for words, then explained, “This isn’t love. This is obsession. You need help.”

Haechan furiously snapped, “I need you. And I will stop at nothing to have you.”

Your ex-boyfriend stood to his feet and you entirely expected hell to break loose, but you were thrown for a loop when Mark tackled him to the ground, somehow unraveling his ropes while Haechan was distracted by you. 

Mark screamed at you, “Run!” 

You hesitated. You didn’t want to leave Mark there alone to die. The past six months had been spent trying to recover from the blood on your hands and you couldn’t go through that torture. There was a chance you would lose another part of your sanity that you barely had as is. But Mark gave you a look and you bolted out of there. 

As soon as you slipped out the front door, you heard a gunshot echoing and trembled, but you never stopped running. Your phone was in your car. You glanced around, expecting at least some of your neighbors to be concerned by the noise, though no one came. 

Your brows furrowed. There were cars parked in most of the driveways and this was a notably safe neighborhood. How could nobody care? 

The moment you got to your car you collapsed in relief when you saw your phone and immediately tried to dial the police, but strangely, your phone had no connection. You threw your head back frustratedly and nearly screamed at the top of your lungs. 

You didn’t even want to ask what the hell was going on. Haechan had returned to resume unfinished business, and this time, he would not leave empty-handed.

Your only other option was to go find help and you felt a twinge of worry sitting in your stomach when you realized that entailed leaving Mark by himself. You had no idea what was happening  - or had happened - in that house.

Without any other options, you searched for your keys and froze when you remembered that you’d left them in the pocket of your coat. Which you had hung up inside. 

You heard the front door creaking open and exhaled in relief when you realized it was only Mark, escaping unscathed. For now. 

Mark was heaving for breath and incredulous when he noticed you only standing there. “Why haven’t you left?”

“I left my keys inside,” you explained frantically, running into his arms. “I tried to call the police, but it didn’t work. And nobody came outside after the gunshot. I think he did something.” 

Mark made a face because despite both your cars parked in the driveway, he didn’t have his keys, either. “We have to go right now. None of us were shot. He’s going to come looking for you any second now,” he said, grabbing your hand and yanking you down the street. 

You could hardly match his long strides, but adrenaline gave you a surge of strength. Between your feet and your pulse, you couldn’t decide what was quicker. Your heart was thumping so loudly you swore Mark could hear. 

The curiosity consumed you and you asked through ragged breath, “How’d you get out of the ropes?”

“Five years of summer camp in a row,” Mark explained. “I never thought learning how to untie knots would benefit me, but look at God.”

Noticing how tightly he was holding your hand only made you weaker. You hoped and prayed you would come out of this unscathed. Not only you, but Mark too. You couldn’t lose another person at the hands of your psychopathic ex-boyfriend. The guilt and self-hatred would consume you. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I didn’t mean to drag you into this,” you cried. 

“We’ll talk about this when we’re safe,” Mark told you, clearing another corner.

You heard Haechan’s smooth voice calling after you, but his tone was downright spine-chilling. He was out for blood. Mark held you closer to his chest as you both sprinted down the sidewalk, praying to god Haechan didn't know where you’d gone. 

It was downright odd. Why was no one there but you three? The weather was perfect for an afternoon walk with your dog around the neighborhood, but there was nobody. Not even someone tending to their garden or taking out the trash. And how had no one bat an eye at the piercing sound of a gunshot? 

Wondering if it was a coincidence or if there was something much more nefarious at work made your head spin. The emptiness was unnerving. You couldn’t comprehend how Haechan could have gotten the entire neighborhood to evacuate, but you had underestimated him once. You weren’t keen on doing so again.

Having Mark there to support your weight was the only thing keeping you from dropping to the ground in surrender. You were just so tired. You were tired of running, tired of mustering the strength to rouse another day only to be haunted by guilt and regret. It was close to consuming you. And there would nothing of you to remain. You were running on empty. Your body was exhausted, but your mind was worn thin. 

“Come on,” Mark said, noticing your strength dwindling. “You can do this, baby. We can get out of here.” 

Mark ground to a halt to face you and softened when he saw your eyes. He could tell this had ruined you. He would never know the girl you were before Haechan alas broke you. 

There was an uncanny resemblance between now and your nightmares. Haechan was hunting you down like an animal, hot on your heels. Only now, you had Mark to protect you. But deep inside, you knew there was nothing that could stand in Haechan’s way when he wanted something. 

Mark cradled you in his arms when you slept and kept the monsters under your bed away. But this was the real thing. He couldn’t save you. No one could.

It all just happened so fast. 

A loud snap rended the air and the very next second, Mark was crouching on the asphalt, stomach gaping with blood. He was wide-eyed, a hand cupping his stomach. 

“Mark!” you screamed. 

You dropped to your knees, crouching beside him, and tried desperately to keep the blood from leaving him all too soon. But there was so much. The sight of the deep color staining your hands only made you nauseous with deja vu. 

Mark was weak, still on the sidewalk. He couldn’t scream, but you could see the pain in his pretty eyes. It thoroughly devastated you. 

“Don’t leave me. Please, Mark,” you begged, tears stinging your eyes. But you couldn’t hear yourself speak. You couldn’t hear yourself think. You were so fixated on Mark slowly fading away beneath your fingertips that you didn’t notice the presence behind you until it was too late. 

Haechan’s voice was saccharine but his eyes were welling with ire, “He’s not going to make it, darling. There’s no one out here to help him.” 

You ignored Haechan, plagued by fear or hatred or all of the above. Watching Mark die would be too overwhelming. At least you had no recollection of your friend’s deaths. Seeing Mark take his final breaths would kill you too. “Keep your eyes open for me,” you told Mark, noticing he was going cold. “Keep them open!”

Mark was struggling, but he tried for you. You could feel the last piece of you die as he fought for his life and you sat there, unable to do anything to keep him stable. He was dying. He reached for your hand with his trembling arm and squeezed with all the strength he could muster. 

That angered Haechan and seething with rage, he coiled his arms around you, pulling you away from Mark. 

You kicked and threw your arms back, screaming at the top of your lungs, “Get your hands off me, you sick son of a bitch! You’ve taken everything from me! I fucking hate you!”

Haechan was unbothered, only cooing, “You don’t mean that, baby girl. One day you’ll understand that everything I do is out of love for you.” 

Mark was coughing up blood now and the sight was horrifying. Tears rolled down your cheeks. You were in so much pain, covered in wounds only you could see. You could only imagine what Mark was feeling now as he took his last breaths. 

Mark called out your name faintly and said with the last of his strength, “Thank you for being the best thing to ever happen to me.” 

You screamed in agony and grief when Mark’s eyes shut on you. You begged him not to leave you. Though he was only unconscious, you knew you’d seen and heard the last of him. 

Your pain was converted to anger and you thrashed in Haechan’s arms, only wanting Mark’s embrace. “Let me go,” you shouted, trying to escape. But to no avail. Your hands burned with his blood. Every inhale was agonizing. “Let go of me!”

“Shh,” Haechan whispered, swiping a trail of tears from your face. “Don’t you see? He was trying to come between us.” 

Haechan still kept you close by, but finally released you. You kneeled to the ground, too overcome by dizziness to stand. Your mind was screaming at you. Your heart was pounding. Every piece of you was so dead yet alive altogether. You could only scream, wanting to take your friend’s fate for them. 

Nobody heard you. There was nobody there. You cried and raged, but save for you, Haechan, and Mark’s lifeless body, the whole neighborhood was empty. You were alone in your pain and suffering and nobody would hear you cry. 

“Why?” you turned to Haechan and screamed, lips trembling. “Why do you keep doing this to me?”

Haechan pressed his lips to your ear and told you with no hesitation, “Because there is nothing I wouldn’t do for you.” 

Had you not already dissolved into tears, you would have. Life as you’d known it was forever gone because of this man and it had become unbearable now. There was no way you could live with yourself anymore. The guilt was overpowering. You were being self-protective, but Mark had died to protect you. Winter, Jaehyun, Yuta, and Ten had died at your expense. The feelings that plagued you now were simply too much for the human mind to handle. 

Your palms hit the ground, scuffing the asphalt. Your body was limp with defeat. There was no fight in you anymore. He had broken you. 

“You win,” you croaked, surrendering. “Whatever this game is, you fucking win. I can’t do this anymore.”

Haechan beamed, all too excited by those words. “I knew you would come around.” 

Haechan cradled you in his arms and you let him. You had no more strength or will to fight him. He had milked you dry. You only sat there unmoving, wondering where you’d gone wrong. If this could have been avoided or if Haechan destroying your life was merely inevitable.

Pain throttled you, hands clamped bruisingly around your neck. You cried and screamed until it was out of your system and your voice no longer worked. Haechan endeavored to soothe you the whole time, stroking your back. Even your tears were precious to him. He hated to make you cry, but one day you would understand why this needed to happen. 

For now, he had won. You said it yourself. There was a big grin on his face as he claimed victory. 

“There, there. It’s time to go now, babe,” Haechan cooed, lifting you into his arms. He liked that you still instinctively wrapped your arms around your neck, and he stared into your eyes, in love with the beauty within them. “You’re all mine now.”

“I’m yours,” you repeated back quietly, accepting. “All yours.”

A single tear slipped down your cheek. 

[krashlite]

Anyways my hot take abt the cheater’s arc is that all four of them were in the wrong but it was mostly Grian’s fault things went so horrendously since man was the reason why the actual Cheating part of the cheater’s arc happened (characters, obviously)

But yeah here’s how they were all wrong yes

Grian was being incredibly controlling because he didn’t trust Scar to keep them safe. Man was scared of his own damn shadow for a lot of this, but his way of ensuring his own safety was basically to tell Scar to stand in one place and not move. He pretty much disregarded the fact that Scar is a grown man capable of making his own decisions And capable of keeping himself, and the both of them, alive. The fact that they were last on green doesn’t reassure him, only confirms that he is in the right for being so controlling. He thinks his behavior kept them alive. He only loosens up once they hit their red life since at that point danger is assumed. Grian DOES NOT learn to respect Scar here, just puts his paranoia on hold for another day. His conclusion is that he was right and Scar was unreasonable

Scar was pushing back against said control since he knew it was unfounded. Again, he’s a grown man capable of making his own decisions. He has a tendency to mock people to show when they’re being ridiculous, something he does here through being purposefully careless. It’s both to point out how ridiculous Grian’s being and a way to punish him for being so obsessive. Instead of having the intended effect, Scar just pushes Grian further away. He later winds up just following everything Grian says, which doesn’t address the root of the problem here. Except he has no way of knowing what’s wrong because Grian doesn’t tell him. From his perspective, the only thing that got Grian back at his side was murder- since the only times they actually stood on equal footing was when there was a plan for a kill or when that plan went well. Scar’s conclusion here isn’t that he was unsafe, but that he was boring. So it reaffirms that he’s in the right and Grian was being unreasonable

BigB is not and never was the mistress in this situation. Had Grian never approached him, he would’ve never left Ren. He was using his Secret Soulmate as an escape from normal relationship problems he was too scared to address. BigB mainly felt overlooked because he has a quieter personality than Ren, meaning Ren wound up making most decisions for the two of them. BigB did a lot to mirror Ren and to be Ren’s other half, but didn’t give himself space to be his own person in the relationship. This is something that’s brought up in couple’s counseling and something they at least started to address before dying. BigB never intended to hurt either of them, since he did love and value both Ren and Grian- something that’s affirmed by how he talks to them after dying. BigB and Ren talk about how they stayed together until the end and B takes the time to forgive Grian for murdering both him and his soulmate

Ren was doing his best to keep Box afloat but failed to meet BigB’s needs. Since B wouldn’t communicate what was wrong, Ren kept trying to course correct in ways that inadvertently made the situation worse. Ren’s instinct is to be protective- to find an enemy to defend against. That enemy was first Pearl and then Clockduo when Bdubs inadvertently got BigB killed. He also reacted to news of B cheating by distancing himself from BigB. Which, reasonable!! Ren wasn’t obligated to save them if B was the one who left. However, this action only pushed BigB away since Ren was so quick to assume they were over. Ren has a habit of isolating himself when something’s wrong, assuming the worst of a situation when things can be fixed. It worked out between him and BigB in the end but goddamn was that rough

Anyways the four of them are very!! Very messy, I love them dearly

[air--so--sweet]

So, Aidan Gallagher was the last cast member to wrap on season 4, and he wrapped several days after everyone else which I've been presuming means we're getting some apocalypse flashbacks but I've just had another idea.

We see Lila and Five travelling to what looks like the original apocalypse, what if they see young Five in the apocalypse? I think it could be really interesting as I don't think any of the other characters fully appreciate what he went through (well, Luther appreciates what it feels like to live in total solitude). Especially when he came back looking exactly like he did when he ran away, but with an adult consciousness instead of a teenage one. It makes it very easy to forget he got stranded and had to learn how to survive in an apocalyptic wasteland as a literal child. While grieving everyone and everything he has ever known.

And I think for Lila to be the character to witness that, as someone who has quite an antagonistic, but also incredibly loving relationship with Five (I was going to say though neither would admit it, but actually I feel both of them had dropped almost all pretense of hating each other at the end of season 3. I don't know if either would verbally express love for each other but in the same way I don't know if either would verbally express love for anyone) would be incredibly affecting. Especially as, unlike his siblings, she never knew teenage Five, she has always known him as an adult who looks like a teenager. I feel like for Lila to witness firsthand the brutality Five experienced alone in the apocalypse, and to realise he was really just a child, especially now that she has a child herself...well I think it would be truly upsetting for her but also giver he a deeper understanding of Five and just how important his family is to him (and family is what Lila desires and values most in the world too).

But also, it will make her realise how similar Five's experience was to her own. Because both were caused to suffer at a young age by the Handler, Lila by having her parents murdered, Five by being left in the apocalypse for 45 years when she could have plucked him out at any point, and then exploited for her own gains with little to no care given to how it sould affect them. Five says The Handler made it so he couldn't belong anywhere, that she made him a killer; she more or less did the same thing to Lila.

Most theories I write are just 'Oh this would be cool if it happened' or 'Look at this ridiculous idea I had', but, now I've imagined it, I'll be really disappointed if we don't see Lila and Five witness younger Five in the apocalypse. Damn...

Also, while writing this it occurred to me that, if the scene where Lila is crying is in the subway, which is looks like it is, maybe she isn't crying because something happened her daughter or Diego (as most of us presumed), maybe it's related to her seeing something The Handler did in another timeline. Or maybe it's just the emotional impact of seeing The Handler in the flesh again, knowing Lila loved her and saw her as her mother, and The Handler was happy to murder Lila in cold blood when she realised she couldn't manipulate her anymore. That's bound to fuck you up. (To be be clear, because I think how I phrased this suggests we'll definitely see The Handler again, I have no idea if we will or won't but with the hopping of timelines it's a possibility.)

Or maybe Lila sees what The Handler took from her, what life would have been like if she grew up with her parents. Or again, the effect of just getting to see her parents alive and in the flesh. A train always stops in the same places, it can't just change course or route like any other vehicle. Maybe the subway allows you to move between timelines/time travel but only as an observer. You can't change or effect any events and therefore can't interact with anyone as a result. Imagine the pain of seeing your parents you thought you'd never see alive again and not bring able to interact with them in any way. Or maybe she has to witness their murder again knowing she can't do anything to stop it. It would be a really interesting parallel from their relationship in season 2 to have Five comforting Lila over the death of her parents.

[phaelimbs]

— You look back on all your previous conversations.

Reminiscing the times when he's the first to say he loves you, to say he misses you, to constantly chat you because he likes talking to you all the time as if a few minutes of your absence would kill him immediately.

You know to yourself your relationship has been rocky these past few months, arguments here and there and with you frequently telling him how you feel unloved and asking for reassurance. Maybe that was what drove him away.

Maybe that was what caused him to slowly disconnect from you, the longer you two last, the lesser the efforts become. Until now, when he barely tells you he loves you except when he's going to bed, he only says he misses you too when you say it first, he can't think of what to do on your upcoming monthsary and he doesn't try to think of one because he prefers to be at home.

Maybe it was because of the most recent fight you guys had, the worst one yet. Where he claims you need to lessen your affection because he prefers bickering and joking like friends, when all you want to do is to show him how much you value him and love him each day. Perhaps you were at fault too, because you were overly sweet to him with the reason that you wanted to eliminate any overthinking of his by reassuring him each day.

Afterwards, despite having made up with him expressing that he didn't mean it and you expressing how badly you were hurt, the effect on you stayed, and you detached yourself too, realizing you no longer bothered him with sweet nothings and affections all that much. And it led you to the present, when you slowly realize that maybe it was only you who was doing all those things.

He didn't bother you like you bother him, he didn't send you long messages expressing love like you do almost every single day, he doesn't send "I love you" everytime you were to do something for a while, or ask for calls all that much, or for you to come over because he longs for you. He responded, never initiated.

After all, he only ever says you're the only girl he loves and that he still does love you when you ask him during your nights of overthinking. He only tells you he sees you in his future when you ask. In person, you feel loved, but during the times you are apart, you feel neglected. And you are the only one who notices all these while he continues with his life.

So does he still love you truly?

[girllookingoutwindow]

This is going to be a little requested analysis of how the letters work in their relationship. But first, I need to be honest. The show lost it here. Personaly, I can't think in something more romantic that voice in off letters.

From the beginning it was clear that the letters who mattered to the plot I mean, were Pen's letters. The letters are a big part of their relationship, maybe one of the most important, because it's creates some kind of intimacy that belongs only to the characters. Even, us, we don't have the knowledge of what it's on them (with the exception of the last letter the Colin reads, because a fandom does this things)

But we don't have more knowledge about his letters. We know he talks about his travels. We know that he find his own voice writing to Pen, what is a proof of his love. Because is the softness she makes him feel what it's making him understand than being soft it's a good thing. In the letters he sends to her, he's a little more of himself, a part of him that society doesn't aloud him to be. He is enough smart to understand this, but he can't connect the dots. Being soft is something that has value. It has a meaning in his life. Because created a bond with Pen, a bond he really appreciated. Colin sees on Pen, her good qualities, and he really cares about her and actually it's gives to him the permission to feel he has value too. Because of that his value persona is connected to the way she sees him too.

  Something is between the lines I never saw  many comments. Pen answer his letters, but it's exposed to us, that he writes to her, very often. Rarely, nobody in her family notice it. They notice she writes to him and mocks her. Perhaps Pen hides them.

Maybe it's because they're assuming it's not the romantic nature, but that's opposite of what it always was.

The letters created an affectionate bond between them, so it was romantic all along. Even, if neither of them really realize. We know he keeps her letters, we don't know how many times he read them, but something tells me that more than once. Possible because he find her amusing and made him feel more close to his family, to his childhood, and his home. It's a little line there between the connection with home and Pen. Pen becomes home.

But then, the letters stopped. He says I wrote to you this summer..., we don't know how much, but it feels like more than once. It's possible he tried to justify her silence first, before he went for the conclusion 'she doesn't care about me'. He doesn't really know, why she stopped to answer him. But the effect that this creates on him it's very interesting. He lost with her letters, that part of himself that made him feel that it was okay to be soft, to be kind, to care about others. The idea that others care about him. But others, are just one, Penelope. He only cares about what she thinks, she feels and wants. It didn't matter if someone else answered him, he was lost without her, he lost himself. The part of him that she wakes on him. She actually tells him that after. So, when the letters stopped all she represented it's lost. Everything she made him feel goes away, and a part of himself does with it. He saying he miss her is not really a surprise. It was always there.

His idea of love, it's nothing less than a connection and bond that's pure. He's a romantic of nature, his hero complex comes from it. His love for her it's linked to the need of connection.     She, being LW didn't change all that, even if he didn't realize at first. I always felt it was weird that Colin didn't recognise her through LW post, because her narrative style and thoughts were there. Even when we write fiction, the way we express ourselves, the words we chose, the beat, it's all there. It was part of the plot, obviously, but a miss.

Because she writes to him with the intimacy he always desire to have. He is open to her and his  real self is in the letters he wrote to her. So, when he says 'you've a one voice' is saying I know you, I loved you there, and I do it know. Like you know me, the real me. That's the piece he needed to find, to understand, of course it was her. It was always her.

[improbable-outset]

📄 𝐈’𝐦 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐚 𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐨𝐚𝐝 𝐢𝐬 𝐠𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐥𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫

↳📄 𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐈𝐈: 𝐅𝐢𝐥𝐞 𝟎𝟎𝟒 𝐆𝐚𝐛𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐚

{{Part 1}}

Miguel O’Hara x Fem!Reader

𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐂𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 2.8k

𝐀𝐎𝟑 | 𝐌𝐲 𝐖𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐭𝐬 | 𝐒𝐩𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐞 𝐌𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

𝐓𝐖 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐂𝐖: Angst, Pre-break up argument flashbacks, both you and Miguel being pretty hostile to each other lol, pregnancy scare, established relationship with your new man that Miguel hates :(

𝐒𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: It’s been over a year since you split up, but unfortunately for Miguel, things are still taking a toll. Even after going your separate ways, you still have to see each other everyday and it was affecting his performance. Meanwhile, your dual life as a loyal lover and as Spider-Woman is putting a lingering strain on your new relationship. The ripple effect of your breakup is coming back to bite you in the ass in the most unexpected way possible.

1 year ago…

It felt like you had been going back and forth for hours but it had only been less than 30 minutes. It might be because you have been holding this grudge for so long and you were finally voicing it out to him.

Though, your argument has been going around in circles with no conclusion or resolution to be found. The room echoed with your voices along with the subtle hum of the monitors around you.

“None of this matters. It never did, it doesn’t matter what we feel and what he want,” Miguel said, back was facing you as he spoke, not fully engaged in the conversation or paying full attention to you right now. This argument seemed to serve no importance to him.

“Are you saying that our relationship means nothing to you,” you quipped.

He sighed, seemingly exhausted from hearing the same thing over and over again. “What I’m saying is…it’s a distraction that I can’t afford to have,” he glanced over at you before his gaze fell back on the monitors— reluctant to maintain eye contact with you. “You are a liability,”

“Liability?!” Your voice almost came out as a screech.

“Yes, a liability. I can’t get comfortable when the responsibility of the multiverse is on my shoulders, I can’t let my guard down…and our relationship is only getting in the way,”

“We’re supposed to make each other be the best version of ourselves, with or without the multiverse. Not be cooped up in one room all day,”

“Right, I keep forgetting that you’re incapable of understanding the magnitude of the situation. This requires undivided attention and I need to keep my head in the game. Not…this. Us,” He snapped back. The last word came out as a snarl, like it was venomous.

Us.

At one point in your relationship, hearing that word made you feel like you had a special connection you both shared.

Us.

Now the word lost its meaning and it felt heavy, like being with you felt like a chore.

“Why did you agree to this relationship if this is all you’re gonna do,”

“That was a mistake, a lapse of judgment in my part for believing this would be a good idea,”

It was hard to believe that this was the same man that opened up to you about his insecurities and leaned on you for emotional support.

He always made you feel reliable, but now given the situation you were in, it was all fickle. All those special moments were thrown back in your face.

Was it all just a rose-tinted illusion just to make you believe that he did value you and your relationship?

“You can’t just leave HQ just for one night?” You left the question hanging even if you already knew the answer. His lack of response was enough to speak volume anyways.

Your line of sight landed on one of the footage of him and Gabriella after her soccer practice. You watched as it displayed Miguel picking up Gabriella, a huge grin flashed on his face, before giving her a hug.

It was hard to believe Miguel even harbored that paternal instinct in him when all you’ve witnessed was his stoic attitude. Even if he did display his vulnerability, it was rare and those moments felt like catching smoke with your bare hands.

After a long moment of silence, you finally remarked, “I don’t think watching Gabriella’s file is healthy,”

There was a micro shift in his demeanor that was so subtle, but you still managed to pick it up. His muscles tenses like he had just been pricked by a thorn.

“Don’t even think about bringing her up,” his voice came out cold and sinister, a warning to prevent you from going deeper. “You don’t know the whole story”

“I know enough,” That was enough for him to finally turn around to look at you, unleashing his inferno of fury in full glory.

“No, you don’t! You don’t know anything about her. You’ve read her reports. You’ve seen the surveillance videos. But that isn’t the whole story,”

“Maybe not but I know it’s the main reason why you’re so driven by guilt, you can barely see what’s in front of you,”

“Oh I see everything that’s in front of me. Everything that matters," he scoffed before continuing on,"I’m doing what I have to do, and here you have the gall to get upset over me not paying attention to you?”

At that moment, your mind reeled back to the night you were experiencing a panic attack because you had a pregnancy scare. You still vividly remembered the taste of bile climbing into your throat from the fear.

It didn’t help that you were alone in that situation. You were in the HQ bathroom because you thought it would be easier for Miguel to be there for you if you were in his dimension, but you were only met with disappointment when he was on another mission.

You remembered gripping onto the pregnancy test tightly, you felt the sweat from your palms while struggling to breathe. For a long while, you were reluctant to take the test, too anxious to see the results.

Thankfully, the test came out negative. The relief that followed was like cool water over your heated body. You didn’t want to imagine how things would’ve unfolded if it was positive— more importantly, you didn’t want to see Miguel’s reaction if you were pregnant with his child.

“I’m not talking about me anymore, I’m talking about a bigger picture,”

By bigger picture, you were talking about the far future and what potential it could hold. Despite being aware of the importance of keeping the Multiverse in balance, you still wanted Miguel to have a fulfilling life— one that wasn’t so heavily influenced by the Spider Society.

But that was practically impossible if he kept himself in his office. It was counterproductive when it came to healing from his grief and guilt by replaying Gabriella’s footage over and over again.

Surely this was going to take a toll soon and you didn’t want to witness him tearing himself apart and let his guilt dictate his life.

“There is no bigger picture than this. This is the picture,” He gestured at the monitors behind him. “This is where my attention should be, everything else is secondary.”

“I’m starting to feel like you’re having tunnel vision,”

“Tunnel vision?!” His voice escalated in pitch and came out harsh, like blade cutting through the mounted tension in the room. “I’m the one who sees more than you ever will!”

His words, even if they were hurtful to hear, were starting to have some weight on them and it made your arguments pale in comparison.

Everything you said seemed to be thrown right back at you in the most ruthless way and you were starting to feel like this was getting pointless.

There’s nothing you could say that could change his mind and you were beginning to accept that.

“You know what, you’re right. It’s not like you’ll ever share with me what you see,” It was time to throw in the towel, this was not going anywhere now.

“What do you mean?”

“That’s not important. But like you said, I’m a liability and in your way so I’ll see myself out,” Your turned your heels and hopped off the platform before you made your way to the exit. “This relationship was a waste of time and effort,”

It was past noon when you heard a soft knock on your door. With a frown, you swung open your door to see that it was Albie in his usual work attire.

“Hey…uhm shouldn’t you be at work?” You asked, surprise evident in your tone.

“I’m on my lunch break,” he replied, holding up a plastic bag and mirroring your smile.

“But you always have lunch in your office,” Even if you were happy to see him during work hours, this change in his routine wasn’t like him. But what added to your confusion was the newfound sparkle in his eyes as he spoke.

“I know but I wanted to see you. Plus, I went to the bodega and picked up your favourites,” It was an odd change seeing him come over to your place to eat. You knew he preferred having his lunch at work so he could maintain the professional atmosphere without any distractions.

Nevertheless, you stepped aside to let him in. You both padded to the living room and he placed the bag on the coffee table. Albie always took pride in his looks, keeping his hair well-groomed that went hand in hand with his sharp attire. The early afternoon sunlight casted over the room through the balcony doors, giving a warm glow.

You couldn’t help but pick up the slight energy in his step as he walked and the grin that was plastered on his face, despite the long hours he spent at work. You watched him take out your sandwich and handed it to you.

The familiar aroma of fresh bread and deli meat immediately overwhelmed you and reminded you how hungry you were. You took the first bite and was immediately filled with the cocktail of flavours and spices from the meat.

“You seem excited,” you pointed out before you took another bite from the sandwich. You haven’t seen him look this ecstatic since the night you confessed that you loved him back.

He rubbed his neck, trying to conceal his enthusiasm. “Heh, am I that obvious?”

You nodded. “Like reading a book. Is there something you want to share?”

He put his hands up in mocking surrender before he said “Okay, okay you got me. Yes, I do have some pretty exciting news. That’s why I came to see you,”

You arched your brow mid-chewing and listening attentively to what he had to say. His lips twitched up, enjoying the suspense of the moment.

“Do you remember how I’ve been working on that project with the major corporation for the past few months?” He asked.

You nodded, still remembering the long hours and the late night calls he got. Albie worked as a cyber security consultant for a reputable firm. He specialised in helping organisations protect their systems and data from cyber threats.

Albie was good at what he did and you can tell he took pride in his work. He would always share news about his career and keep you in the loop as much as possible.

His wide grin from earlier returned as he continued. “Well it’s still in the working progress and so far things are looking pretty promising. But once this project is completed, there’s been talk about a potential promotion. A senior consultant role,”

Your brows raise in pleasant surprise as you were taking in everything he was saying.

“That’s amazing!” You exclaimed, you found yourself leaning forward, eager to hear more.

“Thank you, babe. I’m not there yet but I’m hopeful. There are a lot of perks to this promotion like the salary increase which will give us a stability for a better future, but there’s something else too,”

“What’s that?”

“Well one of the benefit packages comes with a Health and Wellness program which include gym memberships. If I get this promotion, I thought we could maybe start hitting the gyms together after work and make it our thing,”

The moisture in your mouth instantly dried as you tried to swallow another mouthful of your sandwich. Ever since you’ve joined the Spider Society, you’ve only been using the gym back in HQ rather than in your dimension.

You still remember the day Miguel gave you a tour of the gym and how he managed to convince you to use it regularly instead of the gyms back at home because they were not catered for spider people like you.

You knew he just said that just so you would work out with him. But now, you would go there alone and you would much prefer it that way. It felt more comfortable being surrounded by people like you.

But you couldn’t tell Albie that. He wasn’t aware about your secret identity as Spidera-Woman and it should be kept that way. You managed to mask your internal conflict with an encouraging smile.

“Yeah definitely, I just need to check my schedule to see if I can make time fit.” You said, trying to sound as enthusiastic as you could and match his high spirit. You didn’t want to ruin his happiness by being doubtful, this was a huge opportunity for him.

“Great. We can even try out some of the gym fitness classes they offer too. At least then we can spend more time together.” He went on, rambling. It made your stomach flutter knowing that he really wanted to share the benefits with you. “This will be amazing,”

“Yeah…let’s not get too ahead of ourselves though. You still haven’t got the promotion yet,” you tried to reason with him before he made any unattainable plans.

Albie had the tendency to be overly hopeful about things and as much as you appreciated his enthusiasm and his support, he can go overboard without realising it.

“You’re right, speaking of which I’m gonna have to leave for 1. How’s the sandwich?”

You swallowed the mouthful before you answered, “Perfect,”

Later in the evening, you were alone again in your living room. The only source of light came from the screen in front of you, casting a soft glow that illuminated the room.

The only noise that could be heard was the TV in the background. Otherwise, the apartment was quiet enough to hear the low bliss of the traffic outside. Even if you didn’t have company for the night, it was still peaceful.

Amidst the serenity, you couldn’t help but subconsciously reminisce about the stark difference between your evenings with Albie compared to those spent with Miguel.

When he was not working a late shift, nights with Albie would be filled with tranquility and quality moments together. You would often find yourself curled up on the couch while nestled onto his chest.

A stark contrast to the time spent with Miguel, where moments together were rare occurrences. His duties as Spider-man and leader of the Spider Society left little room for personal connections. The fact that he was not from your home dimension added another layer of complexity to your relationship. You’d be lucky if he even left his own dimension just to be with you.

But, you didn’t want to mull over it and open the door to any unnecessary longing of ‘what could’ve been’ and ‘what if’s’ tonight. You had Albie now and every moment left like a treasure trove of warmth and comfort.

Your dinner that you made fresh was sitting on the coffee table in front of you, waiting to be eaten. Just as you were about to pick up your plate to start on your food, you heard a sharp whisper in your ear that sent a chill down your spine.

“Hey,”

You flinched.

That was not something you wanted to hear when you were home alone. You quickly cupped your ear instinctively before you saw a marigold hologram glitch in front of you that was followed by Lyla’s figure.

“Hey girl,” she greeted, fluttering her fingers in a wave.

“Lyla—! Jeez don’t scare me like that,” You exclaimed before signing in both relief and annoyance.

“Sorry, I didn’t want to interrupt your night with a grand entrance,” You didn’t want to admit that she already did just that. She glitched around you, disappearing and reappearing in different directions around you as she spoke. “By the way, Miguel needs you back in HQ,”

“Right now? Can’t he get someone else? I’m supposed to be on my day off,” you protested.

“Actually your days off are on Mondays and Thursdays,” she reminded you. You quickly glanced at your calendar and saw that she was right. You sighed again. So much for enjoying the evening to yourself.

“Alright…tell him I’ll be there in 10,”

“Copy that,” she saluted before she glitched away, leaving alone with the food in front of you.

You watch the steam waltz into the air from your hot meal, almost teasing you. It wouldn’t taste the same when you reheat it in the microwave. Yet, a part of you was glad that you didn’t start eating yet. Dimension traveling on a full stomach always ended in motion sickness.

You took the plate and made your way to the kitchen and covered it with a foil sheet. You then headed to your room to change into your suit and tapped on your watch, activating a colourful whirlwind portal for you to step into.

Hold onto Albie for me 🥹🤞🏼 he’s a stable man (for now)

𝐓𝐚𝐠𝐬: @femaholicc @keepitreal001 @risararelywrites @jadeloverxd @cl3stevu

@scaleniusrm @smartyren @homewreckingwreck @indecisive-capricorn @toyfortoji

Lmk if you wanna be tagged for this series (i didn’t know who to tag here so I tagged whoever commented on part 1)

Part 3…data loading ⏳

[literary-motif]

Sakuverse Characters as Paintings

So, I had thoughts on this and I wanted to share them with you a bit extensively. Feel free to let me know your opinion on this, especially if your interpretations differ from mine.

I’m by no means an expert on art and art history, so take my analysis with a grain of salt. Apologies for the (mostly) Eurocentric collection. Shoutout to this website for helping me understand art movements and some of these paintings better.

Now, let's begin.

Alex — Narcissus, Caravaggio

Italian, Baroque, painted ca. 1597-1599

The myth of Narcissus first appears in the Roman poet Ovid’s Metamorphoses. In essence, the myth runs thus: 

Narcissus, a very handsome man, rejects every person who falls in love with him and his dashing looks, which leads him to be cursed by the Gods. One day, coming by a body of water, he looks at his reflection, and falls in love with it/himself, fulfilling the Gods’ curse never to be able to have what he loves. He wastes away by the water until he turns into a Daffodil, also known as Narcissus.

A possible interpretation of this painting is that it is a Vanitas, a piece of art serving as a reminder of the briefness of life, the inevitability of death, and not to waste time on frivolous things — kind of like memento mori. Inherent to this is also the pointlessness of ambition, since everything done and wanted in life is ultimately meaningless and fated to wither away.

The light and dark colors used here in the typical baroque style have a dramatizing effect — Alex’s overall story grows more dramatic as it progresses from part four onward, although the elements of tension in his relationship with Gremlin were introduced well before that. 

Alex is one of the more dramatic characters in that it is somehow inherent to him as a person, as opposed to characters such as Xanthus, where the drama lies outside the character and focuses more on the exterior world or the circumstances they are in.

Alex is also very ambitious and aware of his talent. He knows what he wants and works hard to get it. His career goals and achieving something substantial with his art are crucial to him, which is why he is willing to leave behind Gremlin and their life together to advance his profession. 

He is willing to sacrifice everything for his work — his dream — and invests so much time and effort into it that it consumes him, erasing everything else around him. Alex knows that. He is aware of how his ambition guides him and how absorbed he is, so he tries to better himself to be more grounded in reality and live outside his hopes and dreams.

Ultimately, he gives up on that process — when he gives up on Gremlin, who is his tether to the world outside of work (“If it wasn’t for you these past couples of weeks, I would have gone mad,” part 4) — choosing instead to abandon the general life he is a part of to throw himself into photography, his career, and detach himself from everything else. 

Still, he is by no means overly selfish or unkind to others to further his ambition and get ahead in life. Alex tries his best to be considerate — despite the anxieties and passion clouding his mind. He is not nearly as arrogant and self-absorbed as Narcissus, but resembles him in his discontent of the present. Some similarities turn Alex very much into Narcissus, who — in the spirit of a Vanitas — values the ultimately meaningless and works towards the completion of a frivolous goal. 

In the end, Alex’s restlessness and always thinking ahead to things that could possibly advance his career keep him from being satisfied, especially now that he has no grounding presence around him anymore. He is unhappy in the present, which is the message and warning a Vanitas tries to convey — that time is short and every moment should be relished because this life won’t last forever.

Alex will never be content with himself as a person, where he is in life, his achievements, and the present as a whole — much like Narcissus felt himself above the present and the people around him, only to ultimately be trapped in his own vanity.

One last thing: the reflection Narcissus stares into is both ironic and very fitting for Alex as a photographer. Alex takes pictures of other people and does not like to be in front of a camera lens, which means he does not really see himself since he is too busy looking at others. The reflection in the water correlates to the artistic lens Alex views the world through. As a photographer, he tries to capture what is in front of him, but only in a superficial sense that shows the form of things, not the depth behind them.

Isaac — Wanderer above the Sea of Fog, Casper David Friedrich

German, Romanticism, painted 1818

German romanticism was, in a way, predated by the Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress) movement, stretching across the fields of the arts, including literature. One of its most known works is perhaps Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther.

Romanticism focuses on the expression of emotion and subjective experiences, which is quite the opposite of the period of enlightenment that predated it, focusing instead on rationality and tangible knowledge, turning the human mind away from superstitions and faith to think rationally for itself and reason with the world around it. The appreciation of nature and its connection to humanity was a typical element of the German romantic movement. 

Wanderer above the Sea of Fog (German: Der Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer) is perhaps one of the better known pieces of art from this period. 

The vastness of the landscape beyond creates a striking contrast to the solid and narrow man in the middle. At first, it looks like he is the center, exploring and conquering, but with the haziness and mystery the fog creates, the landscape seems to stretch into infinity, much farther than the man can grasp and even fully comprehend. It shows that, in reality, humankind is infinitesimal in the grand scale of nature and the richness of existence.

The color choice — tones of green, blue, and white — as well as the texture and soft brushstrokes of the fog create an eariness and a sense of fleetingness. The lightness of the scenery is a reminder of the transitory of life and the briefness of existence.  

The central motif of this painting is solitude. The lonely wanderer, alone in nature, alone in facing the world and existence before him — very much similar to Isaac and his solitude, relying only on himself to get through life unscathed. He is isolated by his own design, having cut off all his relations due to the dangerous nature of his work, Pickle being the exception.

He worries excessively that the people he cares about will get hurt because of him and the enemies he has made through his work. Isaac has a deep urge to protect those around him. His tragic backstory and overall stoic demeanor makes him a Byronic Hero-esque figure, suiting the general impression of pride but ultimately soul-crushing loneliness of this painting.

His story focuses, at its core, on overcoming this solitude and daring to trust and love someone again after losing every person close to him. Before this healing process, he is much like a deserted man, wandering aimlessly from one case to the next, buried in work, trying to make sense of it all.

Isaac guards the secret of the supernatural and is in contact with it due to his work. He sees and knows that reality stretches further than is commonly known, which suits the grandeur of the depicted scenery the wanderer is gazing at.

Xanthus - The Drinker, Erich Plontke

German, Modern, painted 1910 or 1914

Modernism is more like a supercategory, incorporating more specific art movements and styles lasting from the late nineteenth to the end of the twentieth century. Due to this painting and the artist being less known, I could not specify the art movement, nor even find out reliably when it was painted. As just someone, meaning no credentials and comprehensive knowledge of art, as I’ve stated before, personally, I would count this painting as belonging to the subcategory of symbolism. A few reasons. 

Firstly, it was a popular movement in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, fitting the timeframe of Plontke’s life and the possible timeframe of when he painted The Drinker. More importantly, however, it is similar in style and nature to the painting of one of the leading artists of symbolism, Arnold Böcklin, and his famous self-portrait (I’ll get to him when discussing Asirel), therefore giving the impression that The Drinker can be seen as a part of it as well.

Symbolism, as an art movement, follows romanticism, which had begun losing its emotional and expressive natures according to some contemporary artists, therefore creating the need to establish a new art movement to escape reality and the realistic depiction of things in art (remember, art, especially in romanticism, was basically the counterbalance to the rationalization of the world brought on by the enlightenment — the subjective, as opposed to the predominant objective).

Interestingly enough — but also very fitting considering the renewed need to express the individual inner feelings — symbolism does not necessarily have a defined technique or some such thing that separates it cleanly from other art movements. It branches off and evolves into many others, such as expressionism and art nouveau, due to the focus on personal expression and subsequent disregard for a unified aesthetic or technique.

The drinker has a lot of dark tones, which create a heavy atmosphere, contrasting starkly with the apparent lightness of the man’s shared company with death. The room around them is chaotic; empty bottles, a sign of the man’s overindulgence, and wilted flowers, a symbol of death, are spread over the floor. The most striking thing about the depicted scene, however, is the nearly painfully intimate and familiar relationship between death and the man. They look entirely at ease in each other's company, and the heavy atmosphere surrounding them — evoked by the dark colors and chaos around them — is elevated slightly by the calmness exuded by them and their familiarity.

The central message of The Drinker appears to be that hedonism and overindulgence — be it in alcohol (as the title of the painting suggests) or other things — is a way of familiarizing oneself with death, as a way to an early grave. 

The disarray of the room reflects Xanthus’ inner being well. His life is very much in disarray, even though he keeps an iron grip on his impulses and maintains his control almost flawlessly throughout everything. From being turned in a war he did not want to fight in, to losing connection with his family and accidentally betraying his friends because of his arrogance, to chasing after Love — he evolves from a product of circumstance to actively taking charge of his life, and to an extent also those around him. 

The darker tones relate well to Xanthus’ dark past, his crushing regrets, his darker side, and his predominant bitterness about the world. Despite or perhaps because of having lived for so long, he has little hope and optimism. He is stoic most of the time, does not indulge freely, and prides himself on being, or appearing to be in control of any given situation, and himself, including his emotions and impulses. 

A rare occurrence when Xanthus entirely loses it, to put it mildly, is caused by the emotion of Love getting to him through the bond. Their feelings of panic and fear as Audric threatens them reach Xanthus, overwhelming him to the extent that he throws himself at the locked door relentlessly to escape and save the person he loves most. Technically, they are not his emotions.

One of the most fundamental principles of stoicism is to keep an organized mind and examine oneself. Only when we know ourselves can we truly understand the world around us. Stoics are not easily overwhelmed by their emotions, not because they suppress them, but because they know themselves and have examined their mind, knowing what, why, and how things affect them. Ideally, therefore, they can keep calm in any situation, because they can rely on themselves fully and their judgment is not clouded by emotion.

Another part of stoicism that is tremendously interesting with Xanthus, is the focus on things we can control. The stoic belief is that we should only concern ourselves with the things inside of our control — things that we can influence and change — as opposed to wasting our energy worrying about those we cannot change and have no control over.

Xanthus, of course, has a lot of power, both because of his long lifespan and subsequent advantages, and his special abilities as a vampire. Everything he sets his mind to is somehow within his control because most of the time, he has the power and ability to influence it.

This, coupled with the bitterness he carries, results in a very ruthless side, which also comes due to his long life and the familiarity with death and decay it has brought him. 

Xanthus is no longer fazed by the people around him dying. He has grown used to it over the centuries, and he has been the cause of it, too. It does not have any effect on him anymore. In a way, he sits in the company of death as an equal to it, which makes him very dangerous because as opposed to the natural and passive process of dying, he has a will and is actively able to kill. Xanthus is aware of his power, and views himself as dangerous, as a threat. 

He is god-like, a force of nature almost, due to what he is, what he can do, and the high level of control he keeps of himself, not daring to indulge or lower his guard, lest he should lower himself to what is beneath him. He believes in shaping the world around him and has grown comfortable with the ever-present, familiar companion of death throughout the changing centuries. It is much like him, after all, near-eternal and inevitable.

Asirel - Self-Portrait with Fiddling Death, Arnold Böcklin

Swiss, Symbolism, painted 1872

Typical for symbolism is the recurring image of skeletons as a reminder of death and mortality — which is also the primary connecting element between this self-portrait and The Drinker. Thematically, the paintings as well as the characters fit well together or resemble each other in some way. 

Xanthus and Asirel are perhaps two sides of the same coin. Both are closely connected with the supernatural, Xanthus because he is a vampire, and Asirel due to the nature of his work. They are both connected with “darker” themes, which are the driving factor of their stories, as opposed to characters such as Isaac, where these elements are merely an added factor to a story more focused on character development. 

Böcklin is one of the leading artists of symbolism, depicting the inevitability of death through the classical image of a skeleton. In that way, the painting serves as a reminder of the fragility of human life — perhaps like a vanitas — and alludes to the briefness of life.

Mortality is specifically expressed by death looming over Böcklin’s shoulder and playing a single-string violin while laughing almost menacingly at him. It shows the shortness of life and death as the inevitable victor over all. 

Despite the stark reminder of his mortality by death literally playing the tune of the end of his life beside him, it is not exactly fear in Böcklin’s eyes but a mixture of awe, realization, and dread. His eyes stay fixed on his work — his painting — which shows his unwavering concentration and devotion to his profession despite death being inches away from him.

An added detail that I believe is interesting but which could be purely coincidental or for which my lack of comprehension of painting and colors is to blame is the color on the artist’s brush. It is a deep bluish green which does not appear anywhere else in the picture, suggesting that the real-life artist Böcklin painted himself in his self-portrait, who in turn is painting a different picture, perhaps a happier one since the color is lighter and less dramatic and bleak than those used in the self-portrait. 

Asirel works towards creating a better world as well since he has the power and influence to make his plans come true for the most part. He is ambitious in that he perfects what he does and never fails to meet his duties and responsibilities due to being unwaveringly focused on his work, unrelenting even when his life is threatened. Instead of succumbing to fear, Asirel circumnavigates the issue by seeking additional protection and continuing his work, holding fast to his ideals and plans for the future. He is much like Böcklin, who continues painting despite death looming over him. 

Due to the nature of his work and the many enemies he has made, Asirel is always close to death and danger, from which he tries to shield himself by hiring Pet and somewhat securing his safety through a strong ally. Despite his mortality, he is not outright terrified of dying and the constant threat on his life; Asirel is more concerned about it since dying at the hands of his enemies is a fate he would much rather avoid.

Andrew - The Unequal Marriage, Vasili Pukirev

Russian, Realism, painted 1863

The central point of realism is the depiction of things as they are — the ugly parts of everyday life and the societal structure of the mid-19th century — and its darker parts, stepping away from the creation of glorifying images and expressions of mostly grand scenes or events as well as the more traditional idea of beauty. 

The subject matter here, and the ugly reality of society in the 19th century depicted, is an arranged marriage between a young woman and an older man, much to her discontent and evidently against her will, as the title would suggest.

She is downcast, her red-rimmed eyes averted. The bride’s expression is one of sorrow and regret. Her evident unhappiness with the marriage taking place contrasts greatly with the beauty of her appearance. The veil on her head looks almost like a crown. Her hair is nicely arranged in locks, and the golden jewelry she wears speaks of her higher standing in society. 

The marriage the bride is being forced into parallels the academic career thrust on Andrew by his parents. He excelled at it and ultimately found peace with the prestigious position it led him towards, but it was not his decision. He felt like he did not have control of his life, despite ultimately enjoying where he ended up. 

Andrew was continuously crushed under the expectations of his parents, under the title of the ‘Golden Child’ they bestowed upon him while brushing the brother he so loved aside. He feels he missed out on life because he followed a predestined path. He was never able to make decisions on his own because he already knew what his parents expected him to do. His life was lived in service to their ideals for him.

The groom stands stiffly next to the bride, eyeing her with a sideways glance. He seems unbothered by her evident unhappiness, his mouth twisted into something resembling a self-satisfied smirk.

Before them both stands the pastor, officiating the marriage. He is bent forward, holding perhaps the bride’s ring — the symbol of her marriage and the cause of her discontent — in one hand and an open Bible in the other.

Andrew’s difficult relationship with religion is noteworthy here. He grew up evangelist catholic, witnessing his parents twisting their faith to justify their abusive behavior towards his brother and their prejudices against him. The unhappiness he ultimately feels — both at feeling like his life is not his own and being strangely isolated in life — stems from his religious upbringing, in essence. It was his parents’ faith — however twisted it was — that drove his brother away, it was their belief and opinion of him being gifted that made them watch him like a hawk, obsessed with having him live up to the expectations they had for him, and ultimately robbing him of his agency. 

In the background, a few guests are visible attending the ceremony. The feeling the painting evokes is one of suffocation. The bride is being forced into a life she does not want, and the dark colors of the background create a tightness in viewing the scene that fits the theme perfectly. Viewing the painting, it feels almost claustrophobic. 

Among the guests are two women, both looking intently at the groom. One stands between the groom and the pastor, and the other is hardly visible, only her head poking over the shoulder of the pastor at the edge of the painting. They are both seemingly dressed in wedding clothes, the flowers on both their heads similar to those worn by the bride, creating the impression that they could both be former wives of the groom, continuing to show how much life he has already lived as opposed to his young wife. 

The women in the crowd are against the wedding judging by their glares directed at the groom. With him being the object of their scorn, it is more likely that they are blaming him for the marriage and opposing him taking her as a wife — perhaps criticizing the evident age gap between them — as opposed to glaring at her, which would have been more likely if the motive for their action would have been jealousy. Thus, the women are concerned for the bride, seemingly trying to protect her and silently calling for the groom to leave her be.

Andrew did not have that kind of support against his parents' predestined path for him, nor when he eventually tore himself away from them and their expectations. Eventually, he did meet people who cared for and supported him — such as Isaac, Darling, Luca, and Claire — out of which only Darling truly helped him when he abandoned his position as a professor and started on his own career path, free from the expectations of his parents and their judging eyes. 

Behind the bride, to the right, stands a gentleman with crossed arms who also glares at the groom. His head is inclined forward, and he looks almost protective of the bride and ready to fight the groom over her like a lover would. 

Before their relationship irreparably fell apart, Andrew and his brother were inseparable. Andrew still talks of him fondly, wishing more than anything to be able to mend the rift his parents had torn between them because it had never been jealousy that alienated the twins from one another, but their parents' unfair treatment of his brother while pushing Andrew onto a pedestal so high, they no longer cared for his twin. He is the discarded child, forgotten and out of sight. 

Ultimately, Andrew’s upbringing left him isolated in life much like the bride. They are alone in a room full of people, lost despite their possible future success after elevating their status — with marriage or a flourishing career — because they walk a path they did not choose for themselves.

There is silent support for both of them in the shadows, and while it is evident that some people disapprove of the groom’s or his parent’s actions, that is still not enough to tear either of them from the path they were predestined to follow.

Zaros - The Storming of the Winter Palace, Sokolov-Skalya

Soviet, Realism, painted 1939

The story of The Noble Trials is political at its core. In essence, it is the want for reform, whose most reverent supporter is Zaros, against the continuity of a ‘working’ system, as incorporated by the Earis. 

The relation between Zaros and this particular painting is less about what is outright shown and more about its implications.

The storming of the Winter Palace was an event that took place during the October Revolution in Russia in 1917. Close to the end of what was the initial turmoil of the communist uprising — and what would later become a Civil War between Tsarists and Communists (rather Bolsheviks) after Lenin was de-facto in power — the ministers of the provisional government of the old regime had barricaded themselves in the Winter Palace in Petrograd, which is St. Petersburg today, and served as the capital of Tsarist Russia from 1712. The Bolsheviks moved the capital of Soviet Russia to Moscow in 1918. 

What would be portrayed as an epic scene, glorifying the October Revolution and mystifying it with grandeur and splendor in soviet propaganda — judging by the date of its publication much like this painting, which was retroactively made to do just that — the historical happenings were a bit less spectacular.

The tsarist ministers held out in the Winter Palace for a while, debating what to do against their slipping power, before they eventually surrendered in the face of the Bolshevik’s much greater military force and logistic superiority. The revolutionaries arrested them, ending the constitutional monarchy with a victory for communism.

The events were later adapted into a scripted ‘play.’ I say ‘play,’ because it was a reenactment inspired by the events. Of course, being Soviet Russia in 1920, it was not an authentic and historically accurate depiction, but rather a communist fantasy about the glory and grandeur of the days of the October Revolution. The Storming of the Winter Palace — by that I mean these words in that order — refers to the propaganda reenactment, less to the historical events. 

History lesson aside, I see similarities between the Communist Revolution overthrowing the Tsarist Empire and Zaros’ political ideas for the future of Serulla. There are a few reasons, not limited to the obvious reformative spirit he has in common with the revolutionaries, the idea of focusing on the benefit of the people rather than the ruling elite — nobles or bourgeoisie — and the utter chaos it plunged the empire into.

The idealistic version of communism, and by extension the October Revolution the Bolsheviks used to implement their interpretation of it, basically followed the simple principle of putting the people, that is the workers (or proletariat), first in their politics. 

The central idea of Communism is to end the ‘class struggle’ between the proletariat and bourgeoisie — that is, between workers and their employers, or the general public and the upper classes in society. Especially in the 18th to 19th century during the boom of the Industrial Revolution, worker’s rights were practically nonexistent. The broad public was suffering, toiling away while a few select people owning the means of production (that is, the machines with which the people worked to create a finished product) were amplifying their wealth on the backs of their workers.

This injustice, or the struggle between bourgeoisie and proletariat, is something communism professes to fix by creating a classless society, in which the proletariat owns the means of producing and the finished product — the country morphing into a worker’s state, so to speak.

Of course, all this is theory, and the reality of Soviet Russia and later the Soviet Union as a whole was different. The general quality of living was worse than in the West — and the state used oppression, secrecy, and propaganda to mask the fact that despite professing to be for the people — the workers, the general public, the proletariat — in truth, the proletariat of capitalist countries generally had it much better.

The central link between Zaros Atha’lin and the October Revolution — and the reason this painting is so fitting for him — is the absolute chaos it plunged the country into. What followed the October Revolution was a bloody Civil War with monarchists opposing the revolutionaries with tremendous violence on both sides in a conflict that lasted until 1922, the year the Soviet Union was founded, and brought its own set of problems and system of oppression that I won’t get into in detail. 

Zaros as a character is calm and collected most of the time. He appears at least somewhat in charge of the situation — as opposed to the Earis, who is quick to be pulled around by their emotions, specifically their frustration and anger. The problem with Zaros is less about his character, as it is with his circumstances and plans — both ultimately bound to destabilize the kingdom should he ascend to the throne alone and try to make them a reality. 

His politics for the people — the general public, so to speak — stem from his sense of injustice in the organization of society. The central problem here is that he cannot rule with their backing (he cannot rule for them) because the people have a very strenuous relationship with him. They do not like him. They do not support him as they support the popular Earis — or the Ilves family — despite the queen’s politics not meant for them. 

It is a difficult thing to change the politics of a country or kingdom so drastically top-down as Zaros suggests. His theory is nice, incorporating all the right reasons for giving the people more power and dismantling the unjust superiority of the noble families in the kingdom and their influence over politics. But Zaros — certainly a persona non grata in the eyes of basically every one of these nobles — is bound to fail in establishing his rule and keep himself on the throne. The nobles will sabotage him and undermine his authority every chance they get because they do not like him, they do not respect him, and his politics would strip power away from them while reforming the whole societal system they profit from greatly. 

He has no support or friends in high places. Wanting to implement his ideas on his own, with no backup from the ruling elite — the ‘government’ he should run — and especially lacking support from the masses who by any means should be his greatest backers and the very people he wants to do these things for, will end in disaster. The golden ideals that ultimately bring nothing but chaos and pain when implemented in reality are befitting the image of the October Revolution, the sentiment similar to the early days of Soviet Russia.

Kayson - The Kiss, Klimt

Austrian, Art Nouveau, painted 1907-1908

The focus of this composition lies in the center, on the for Klimt characteristically two-dimensional drawing of the embracing couple before a shimmering golden background. 

They are both on a flower field, the woman kneeling with bare feet and bright flowers in her hair. The man leans over her, enveloping her in a tight embrace, partly hidden by the golden robe draped over his shoulder, an ivy crown on his head.

The man’s face is obscured, hidden against the skin of the woman as he cradles her face, kissing her cheek softly as her eyes are closed in blissful contentment, one arm resting on his neck, pulling him closer to her and furthering the raw feeling of intimacy between them.

The vivid colors of the geometrical shapes add to the overarching feeling of softness. The warm gold gives the painting a certain sensuality — vulnerability shown in the love the two people share and the women’s bare feet.

Kayson is a natural caregiver. He cares so much for the people around him, always trying to help them or get them to laugh with such fond affection that the softness in this painting — the obvious care depicted between the two lovers — fits perfectly with his essence. He is warm. His actions speak of kindness and love while he works his absolute hardest to give as much of his heart to the people around him. The comfort he exudes and the affection he so openly shows work well with the overall warmth and trust expressed here.

Further, this is a little silly observation, but with the cloak draped around the man’s shoulder and the woman kneeling on the ground, allowing him to shower her in love, it looks like they are trapped under the cloak together.

Niall - Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci

Italian, Renaissance, painted 1503-1506

Perhaps the most famous painting in the world, the Mona Lisa is the portrait of a woman. She is sitting comfortably upright, her arms folded, with a small smile on her lips. The background is of a twisting scenery with mountains and a body of water. The predominant color is brown, but despite the dark tones on the canvas, the painting holds no threatening or dark atmosphere. The image is calm, the color of her clothes blending into the scenery, but making her look refined rather than gloomy. 

Niall is a serene character that matches the calm energy of the Mona Lisa. They are both quietly content and peaceful in their lives — Niall especially now that he resolved issues from his past that weighed heavily on his mind. 

The dark background of the scenery, while not threatening per se, still casts a darkness over the painting that matches the circumstances of Niall’s past life. His years in school, where he was subjected to bullying, and the long stretch of lonely years in university until he eventually moved back to his mother, practically putting a standstill on his life as he was caught in echoes of the past. 

The new relationship with SB helped him break out of it, mending the scars left by the past, and although it shaped his character permanently, now he set out on a new road of healing until the rekindled relationship and renewed trust between them led Niall to his presently content self, comfortable with his life and happy where he is — even if that happiness is still sometimes tainted by the memories of his past traumatic experiences and can never be as carefree and light as he perhaps would have wished. 

The dark colors of this painting corroborate this, making the Mona Lisa appear majestic and grave. Working against her smile and her evident contentment is an underlying seriousness that suits Niall’s character, evidence of the dark stretches of his life he walked through alone.

Dontis - Café Terrace at Night, Van Gogh

Dutch, post-impressionism, painted 1888

The subject matter of this post-impressionist painting is, as the title suggests, the café terrace on the center-left side, lit in a bright yellow light by the gas lamp above. Its numerous tables, chairs, and people give the place a bustling atmosphere. It seems brimming with life, while the cobblestone street outside, especially in the front, is empty. A few figures wander around in the background, perhaps walking towards the focal point of the painting — walking towards the light. 

Moving away from the cafe, the scenery becomes dark. The deep blues and greens on the night create a nearly mystical air while the stars twinkle above — noticeably the same yellow color used for the light of the gas lamp in their center.

The feeling of familiarity the cafe evokes, as well as the intimacy and homeliness of the bright, warm yellow contrast with the dark blue of the cobblestone street and the bleak night beyond it, empty with a crushing loneliness accompanying it that not even the gentle glimmer of the stars above can soothe. 

Dontis’ character needs a connection with people. He actively seeks them out, naturally drawn to places bustling with life to relish the connection with humanity. He needs closeness to be well, seeking out company and offering an ear to listen to their troubles and feelings without judgment. He wants to take care of his chance encounters, if only for a short while — a cafe being a perfect symbol for this brief but intimate connection.

The darkness beyond reflects his heavy past and the pain he endured, the stars shining above a reminder of the kindness he retained throughout. Dontis does not fare well alone — it is not in his nature — he seeks out people to interact with, no matter how much they might hurt him, and he still offers them all the care in his heart despite it. He needs the connection to live, just like the café, which only retains its essence of loose intimacy by various people coming and going.

It is a fast-paced environment despite its apparent homeliness, much like Dontis, who can never bind himself to one single person for long.

Jonah - Nighthawks, Hopper

American, Genre art, painted 1942

The eerie stillness and the quietness of night depicted here might seem too bleak and lonely for a character (and story) as bright and loving as Jonah. It is less about this oppressing feeling of isolation — the loneliness of being alone in a room full of people or alone in a big city — which carries a sense of particular tragedy given the fact the painting stems from a time when the Second World War raged, amplifying the heaviness of the desolate scene. 

The focus here is on a diner on what appears to be a street corner. It is painted from the perspective of a spectator on the outside, looking in, regarding the four people calmly lost in their thoughts. There is no sign of life other than those four under the bright fluorescent light of the diner, the only source of light in the entire painting. It illuminates the street outside dimly.

A noteworthy aspect of the painting is what appears to be a couple sitting by the wooden countertop. They seem to be touching, but upon closer inspection, their hands are a short distance away from each other. It makes them look close but worlds apart all the same while they reflect, perhaps lost in their thoughts. 

It is this quiet company that is reminiscent of Jonah. The couple’s intimacy while occupied by other things outside of their love for one another parallels him and Babe. Both of them are so clearly living their own lives — with Babe working at the bar and Jonah occupied by gaming — but remain close despite it, seeking each other out and making space for each other in their life. 

An example highlighting this is when Jonah visits Babe at the end of their shift, picking them up from work and walking home together, a small act of affection that speaks of their deep connection and love. So is Babe keeping him company when he games, knowing they would fall asleep after an exhausting shift but choosing to keep him company anyway simply to show that they are there. 

It is this depiction of closeness while being worlds apart — in mind or body — that suits Jonah’s character, and this feeling of being close but far away at the same time, which this painting conveys in volumes — like being isolated in a city brimming with people, alone despite the sheer intensity of life around oneself. 

Matias - The Water Lily Pond, Monet

French, Impressionism, painted 1899

Monet created numerous pieces depicting water lilies. Some paintings feature simply the surface of the water, others include the bridge shown here, from different perspectives. Here, its edges are hardly visible. The bridge overarches the edges of the painting, showing only its central part, gently twisting upwards in a slight arch. 

In true impressionist fashion — where the world is stylistically depicted with disregard to symmetry and placement of forms — the highest part of the bridge is not aligned with the center of the canvas. Instead, it can be found slightly to the right, throwing off the symmetry and giving the perspective of looking at the bridge slightly from the left. 

The river flowing beneath it is littered with water lilies, nearly covering its entire surface. The predominant colors are soft pastel greens and blues, occasionally accompanied by red, pink, or purple. 

Its overall atmosphere is peaceful. The scenery looks inviting and bright — due to the method of painting outside (en plein aire) to capture the natural light. There is a softness in the gentle reflection of the trees above in the water, the blooming lilies accompanying this gentleness, but there is a depth there as well, under the beautiful image and beneath the water’s surface. 

It is not a mindless painting of pretty scenery. The shift of perspective — the tilt to the left, the asymmetry of it — gives it more depth. It makes it look interesting beyond the beauty at its surface. The painting is engaging, and the softness adds to this feeling of intrigue.  

Matias, beyond his gentle demeanor and comforting softness, has this twist. He is intriguing. His bright soul is captivating because its depth is apparent, perhaps in the polar opposite way of a Tortured Artist. The darkness on the surface of this archetype gives way to pain and beauty and a shimmer of hope in its depth. The softness, gentleness, and brightness of Matias, immediately apparent in his character, actions, and thoughts, parts in its depths to something more serious. Not dark, exactly, nor pained or hurting as would be the case with the Tortured Artist, but instead genuine and clear in a way water in the depths of the ocean might be. 

Perhaps adding onto this analogy with water, the water lilies blooming calmly on its reflective surface could very well symbolize the beauty of the things he creates —an artist pouring his soul into his art, baring his heart to the world with it;or more specifically, a writer following the ideas in his head and bringing them to life on a page.

Luca - The Great Wave off Kanagawa, Hokusai

Japanese, Edo (Japanese art period from 1603 to 1867), painted 1831

This painting is a bit of an enigma. The beige and white colors of the background at the breaking waves make it appear soft, the deep blue of the waves nearly comforting in their beauty. In contrast to this softness and seemingly peacefulness is the actual depiction of the waves, rising high with sharp, claw-like edges over the boats on the water, mere moments before they crash over them. It looks very much like a snapshot image before a tragedy, highlighting the majestic strength of the ocean while simultaneously praising its beauty. 

The wave rising above Mount Fuji is further placed cleverly, not only highlighting the ruthlessness of the ocean with how threateningly high it reaches — making up nearly a third of the painting — but ingeniously showing its soft beauty as well in making the white droplets of water falling from the edge of the wave appear to be snow, drifting gently down on Mount Fuji in the distant background.

Luca, as soft and innocent of a character he might appear to be on the surface, has a quiet depth about him and a more serious side that becomes apparent when he shows his vulnerability. He has insecurities, and he can be decisive and brave despite how innocent he seems to be most of the time. 

In a way, the painting is Luca in reverse. The ruthlessness of the water is the central point here, whereas the gentle beauty of it is secondary. With Luca, the first thing to notice is the soft heart he wears on his sleeve, while his more somber depths merely peek through on occasion.

Elias - The Creation of Adam, Michelangelo

Italian, Renaissance, painted 1508-1512

Again, this is less about the actual religious image of putting a verse of the bible into art and more about the deeper meaning of it outside of religion. 

The fresco depicts God to the right, reaching his hand out towards Adam, lounging on a field of grass on the left. Adam, in turn, reaches out to God, their index fingers nearly touching. There is a laden tension between them, anticipation whilethe figures are forever frozen in suspension just an instant before God gives Adam the spark of life and creates mankind. 

Elias is a complex character who is ultimately motivated by his need to be part of something bigger than himself. It begins with his desire to be taken seriously by his father and the other gang members, trying to prove himself worthy of the role he is expected to fill despite not being certain about wanting that position. It is not about being head of the Wraiths but being fully part of the group of people for which he had suffered the enormous loss of his mother. The gang is important to him, and he is trying to elevate himself, shaping himself into someone worthy of it — reaching out to give his life the spark he feels has been missing since Tara died.

This search for something grand outside himself can also be seen in his fascination with the stars, figuratively reaching out to understand ‘God’s creation’ (to speak with this painting in mind) and feeling distantly connected with something far outside his reach — just like God and Adam, nearly touching but forever just shy of connecting.

Cevyk - The Course of Empire Destruction, Thomas Cole

American, Hudson River School , painted 1836

The Course of Empire is a series of five paintings, depicting the rise and fall of an imaginary city. Destruction is the fourth painting of this series, the title aptly fitting the desolate scene of the city being ransacked by enemy forces. At the same time, a tempest rages in the distance, foretelling the fall of the empire. 

The scene is as dramatic as it is chaotic. There is a bridge mere moments before collapsing in the center of the painting, although the focal point is slightly to the right, to the now headless statue of what could be supposed to be the empire’s greatest hero. Thick clouds of smoke rise from the empirical palace by the river, flames reaching up into the sky with a faint red that does not immediately attract attention, but rather subtly plays into the raging chaos depicted. 

The hazy background with its dark gray storm clouds adds an atmosphere to the picture that somehow makes it less about what is directly shown — a burning palace, a collapsing bridge, countless dead, raging war — but about the general desolation it evokes. It is not the ransacking of a city, which superficially appears to be what is directly painted onto the canvas, but the destruction of an empire. 

Cevyk is a difficult character to understand, simply because there is still much mystery surrounding him. Being a literal demon from hell, he creates an atmosphere of volatile chaos. The fall of an empire — or better yet the destruction of one — is inherent to a tremendous amount of chaos and suffering. Both are aspects Cevyk embodies, not only because he causes them, but as overarching themes of his story. 

This is only speculation, given we know little about Iqsus and even less about the (political) state of hell and the demonic houses. But Cevyk seems to be a character biding his time, following a more complex plan about breaking the status quo and kindling a reorganization, perhaps plunging hell into a Destruction-like frenzy.

Rowan — The Swing, Fragonard

French, Rococo, painted 1767

Here, we have the women on the swing as a subject matter. She is depicted in a forward motion, one foot stretched out in front of her while she flings away her slipper, aiming it at what appears to be a statue of Cupid, the Roman God of love. 

In front of her, a young gentleman lies in the bushes, perhaps having fallen over. He looks up at her, catching a glimpse under her dress in the process because of her outstretched leg. 

Behind the woman, in the background to her right, an older man is sitting in the shadows on a bench, watching her swing and holding the rope attached to her seat. He is possibly unaware of the younger man eyeing up her dress. 

It is speculated that this older man would be her husband, while the younger one is her lover. The symbolism and the general subjects of infidelity and sexual desire seem to be expressed by the man glimpsing up her dress and her flinging her shoe at Cupid while also addressing the inhibition of her marriage by the ropes attached to her swing, in essence holding her back.

The most striking aspect of the painting — despite all of its quiet genius depicting such a dramatic scene so subtly and with such airiness — is the woman’s levity. She swings unbothered by it all, letting go as she is weightless, suspended in the air with happiness, and playful as she slips off her shoe. She does not behave according to societal norms; she is not ashamed of it either. She simply enjoys herself and life outside of the expectations placed upon her, this lightness further corroborated by the hazy, gentle background of the natural scenery around her.

Rowan — as short-lived of a character as he was and as difficult it is to understand his inner workings from the limited resources available — incorporates this levity. That is not to say he is not serious — because his love and affection for Honey run deep, and he tries his best to help them while taking their worries very seriously — nor are the negative aspects of infidelity and inhibition applicable to him.  It is simply about the core element of the painting: the woman’s weightlessness, her contentment on the swing, and the generally positive outlook on life she has despite the circumstances around her.

With Rowan, it is the letting go of expectations and societal obligations that work, since it seems to be exactly what he wishes Honey to do: follow their heart and dreams while slowly weathering away the pressure their family has put on their shoulders.

[chlobliviate]

Wolfstar Microfic - Azkaban

Words: 993

@wolfstarmicrofic

TW: suicidal ideation in a hyperbolic way

🌙✨🌙✨🌙

The first night that Sirius spent at Remus’ cottage after being ordered to ‘lie low’ there wasn’t ideal. Nobody wanted to wake up their ex-boyfriend with their night terrors. Nobody sane, anyway. Sirius wasn’t entirely sure which side of that line he fell on anymore, but when he woke up to Remus holding him to his chest and reminding him where he was, he hated himself.

By the time they moved to Grimmauld Place, it was established that Remus would tell Sirius a story about their time at Hogwarts as he fell asleep. This helped Sirius to remember, but it also helped with the night terrors, which they both suspected were some kind of lingering effect of the dementors.

Remus had his own room at Grimmauld Place, and he usually retreated to it once Sirius had fallen asleep, even though they’d shared a bed for months before that. It helped him to keep things separate. Telling Sirius stories about their teenage selves was hard at times. Remembering James and Lily, remembering Peter and remembering how in love they’d been. He didn’t know how much Sirius remembered of their relationship, but as most of his positive memories were taken, he probably remembered a lot of the last few months and not much else. He mostly stuck to stories about James and Sirius, or the four of them.

“Tell me about us.” Sirius had whispered after a few weeks, as Remus got comfortable next to him. “I know you’ve been avoiding those stories.”

“I didn’t know if you’d want to hear them,” Remus said. “Or what you remember.”

“I remember shouting at you in the shack and there was blood, but I don’t remember why.” Sirius said, “That seems like an important one but I can’t get to most of it. Tell me that one?”

Remus chuckled, knowing the exact memory he meant. “Alright. So, this was about a month after Lily agreed to go out with James.”

🌙✨🌙✨🌙

“Moony!” Sirius sounded frantic as Remus struggled to open his eyes. “Can you hear me?”

“Unfortunately.” Remus groaned. Sirius was shirtless, and covered in blood. He looked up at Sirius, panicked. “The fuck did I do? Are you ok?”

“I can’t stop your shoulder from bleeding. What do I do? James has gone to get Madam Pomfrey but you’re —”

“Oh, it’s mine? Just leave it.” Remus’ eyes shut again, “I’ll sleep it off. It’ll be alright.”

“You can’t sleep off blood loss you unbelievable prick. Wake up!” Sirius shook his uninjured shoulder slightly, pressing his shirt against the wound on the other.

“Sirius.” Remus growled, “Shake me again and you’ll wish you were dealing with the wolf.”

“Sit up!” Sirius ignored him. “You can’t go back to sleep.”

“It’s fine.” Remus’ eyes closed again.

Sirius snapped, “It’s not fucking fine, Remus! Sit up and open your eyes.” Sirius wrapped his arms around Remus’ waist and hauled him into a sitting position before reapplying pressure to his shoulder. He felt Remus smile against his shoulder.

“If you wanted to wrap your arms around me, all you had to do is ask, Padfoot.” He said, and Sirius swore that Remus’ teeth grazed his shoulder. “I think all you can do is apply pressure and hope for the best. I’ve got a lot of blood.”

“Moony, I love you, but when you’re not bleeding profusely in my arms, I’m going to be so fucking angry with you. ‘I’ve got a lot of blood’ is not— No, you don’t. You have the same amount of blood as anyone else, you wanker. Sometimes it’s like you don’t value your life.”

Remus, half-conscious as he was, felt very called out. “My life doesn’t have much value, to be fair.”

Sirius inhaled sharply, “No. Because you don’t have people around you that would do anything for you. You’re not a fucking wizard. Your life has no value.” He said sarcastically.

“Didn’t mean it like that, Pads.” He mumbled. “Don’t.”

“Then how did you mean it?” He shouted. He would have walked out if he didn’t know that Remus wouldn’t be able to hold the shirt on his shoulder.

“Well, I love you too, by the way.” Sirius almost dropped the shirt as Remus’ eyes closed again. “When you have no choice but to turn into a monster once a month and repeatedly take chunks out of yourself, you can judge the way I cope with it. I’m in a lot of fucking pain and I just want to sleep. Thank you for helping, as always, I appreciate it. I’m just so tired.”

“No.” Sirius poked his cheek until his eyes opened again. He looked mutinous. “You're going to stay awake. I think I can hear them in the passage. Once you’re patched up, you can sleep.”

“You’re going to make me talk about this later aren’t you?” His eyes almost closed again, but he managed to open them and blink a few times.

“Of course I am.” Sirius could feel his heart pounding in his head.

"You could just focus on the love part, and not the hyperbolically suicidal part, if you wanted.”

“We’ll see.” Sirius tried so hard not to smile. “If you tell me again when I’m not covered in your blood, I’ll think about it.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Remus said as Madam Pomfrey burst through the door, followed by James, who took one look at Sirius and almost threw up.

🌙✨🌙✨🌙

“So when I got out of the hospital wing, I couldn’t wait, I pulled you behind a tapestry on the way to Charms and told you I loved you again. You were still pissed off, but I convinced you that I was pretty determined to stay alive.” He looked down at Sirius who was asleep. “You don’t know how much you’ve always helped with that.”

He considered going back to his room, but eventually slipped beneath Sirius’ duvet and curled up against his back, wrapping an arm around his waist.

[itoshiexx]

perfect

synopsis: rin remembers how perfect you are for him.

pairing: itoshi rin x afab!reader | words: 2.6k | warnings: established relationship, afab reader (referred to as "girl"), pet names (baby, pretty, love), fluff, smut, oral + fingering (reader receiving), unprotected vaginal sex, praising!!!, emotional sex

notes: i really wasn't gonna post this today but i'm EAGER. this is my first attempt at writing smut in english so pls be kind lol idk if this is good or like the worst shit ever. this is kind of a part 2 for this so i recommend you read it :))

masterlist

people could say itoshi rin was many things: cold, distant, a soccer star, a fan of horror, the number one. and he agreed with all of these. but he was also passionate, extremely determined and, most of all, hopelessly in love with you. and even though he was cold and distant, that was not the case when it came to your relationship. 

with you, rin showed all of that passion and determination by loving you in his own gentle way, always so full of devotion, pouring every ounce of the overflowing feelings he harbored in his chest for you only. because he did feel — and intensely, at last. that’s why he always wanted to make you feel happy, and safe, and loved. he wanted you to be confident and to value yourself just as much as he valued you.

that’s why sex with rin felt like some divine moment. 

as you stand there, dumbfounded with the proximity and his words, he takes the opportunity to close the distance between you, capturing your lips in a kiss that makes you melt in his arms almost instantly. he has this weird effect on you; one that makes you surrender all that you are to him until you become one.

“will you let me?” he murmured once you separated, sounding a little breathless. you, on the other hand, were a dizzying mess, unable to form coherent sentences with the way the air got knocked out of your lungs. 

“w-what…?” you stutter, and rin’s little smirk makes your legs shake. 

“will you let me show you how much i love you? how much i cherish you?” 

you’re pretty sure your heart stops for a few seconds before it races inside your chest like an orchestra. a tiny nod is the only answer you can muster, but rin’s not satisfied. 

“use your words, pretty.” he backs away, and, dreading any further distance, you’re quick to say “yes!” in a slightly pitched voice. rin smiles in that delicate way he only does around you, and his thumbs trace small circles on your waist as he hums, “good girl”.

you feel goosebumps as one of his hands goes up, tracing the curve of your body until it rests on your cheek, and then his mouth is on yours again, more demanding, trying to absorb all that you are willing to give. his tongue invades your mouth, and you moan when his wet muscle laces with yours in a lewd dance. your hands fly to the nape of his neck, where you tug at the black strands of hair, and the way he groans sends a shiver down your spine and spreads heat to the middle of your legs. 

but you still have a little bit of rationality left, so you gently push him apart to say, “we’re gonna miss dinner if we keep going,” even if your uneven breathing says how much you want to keep going. however, rin is also very stubborn, and, (un)fortunately, knows your body very well. 

“we can just reschedule,” he states, simply. “i think right now this is more important.”

you still try to reason, “baby, we can have sex any time…” 

“it’s not about the sex.” he frowns. “i want you to remember how precious you are.” a gentle kiss on your jaw. “i want to worship you.” another, and then one more at your neck. it’s unconscious, the way you slightly turn your head to give him more access. “i want you to feel so much more than pretty. i want you to feel beautiful.” 

if the tender nibs and the open mouthed kisses he leaves on the column of your throat aren’t enough to overwhelm you, his words sure can. there is no ounce of strength in your body to fight him anymore, so your answer comes in the form of a needy kiss, tugging at the collar of his shirt so he can be closer, because there was never such a thing as close enough. rin relishes in the way you eagerly try to devour him, more than happy to give you all of him. 

he was only ever yours to begin with.

and he makes sure you know by matching your kisses with just as much fervor, tugging at your waist until he can grind his growing need on your core, wanting you to feel just how much he desires you. it’s not a surprise he is rock hard in his pants, but this is all about you, so he can wait. he will wait until you are beneath him, writhing in pleasure to the point he’s all you can think about. 

rin is caring when slowly he pushes you to the bed, being careful not to put all his weight on you. his knee finds home in the middle of your legs, and he feels lightheaded with the way you grind against it, already desperate for some kind of friction. 

his lips go back to your neck, leaving a trail of kisses down to your collarbone. you can feel the plushness of his pink flesh softly hover over your skin, and it lights up as if something is dancing beneath it, this sort of giddy feeling that staggers you. it’s always there whenever rin touches you, though you can’t say you don’t love it. 

then, he’s sucking the mound of one of your breasts, while his hand is occupied fondling the other. it leaves a faint purple bruise on your skin, but you can’t find it in you to care — instead, you whine in approval, wishing for more of the feeling of his teeth grazing you, eager to bear his possessive marks. the stream of hickeys he leaves around your tits also makes you a little greedy, and you want to scream to make him take off your bra and give attention to your perky nipples. 

and rin is excellent at reading things. on the field, it was an admirable trait by both teammates and rivals, used as a powerful tool for his goals and more often than not leading his team to victory. in your relationship, it made you feel all warm and fuzzy, the way he was so observant to your needs and the little quirks that made you so you. in bed, it felt a lot like salvation, for he was always aware of what you wanted and needed, sometimes even before you did. 

the first flick of his tongue on your bud nearly makes you wail, and you can almost feel the smirk forming on his stupidly handsome face. “needy, aren’t you?” he coos, though it holds no bite. you are ready to retort, but any words die in your mouth when he licks again, circling your areola and gently scraping his teeth at your nipple.

he gives both your tits the attention they deserve, and by the time rin is done, your arousal is already pooling on your panties, leaving you squirming on the bed while touching every part of him you could reach. suddenly, you become conscious that he’s still dressed, so you take it as a challenge to unbutton his shirt until you can finally see his toned torso. 

“baby…” he sighs when you scrape your nails through his chest, all the way down to his perfect abs. before you can reach his pants, however, he separates from you, taking off the shirt that was bothering him. 

his hand laces with yours. “not yet.”

but you are impatient. you need him so, so bad it actually hurts. the ache in your pussy can only be solved when his cock splits you open, and for a moment, you seriously consider telepathy, but his voice in your head burns like a fresh memory. use your words, pretty. i like to hear you. 

and who are you to deny your boyfriend? 

“rinnie,” you whisper, “please.”

“hm? please what?” he arches his eyebrow, hands squeezing your hips.

you bite your lower lips, embarrassed, but answer nonetheless, “please fuck me.”

rin flashes you a bright grin that can rival the sun, and he kisses you once more as a reward, all while his hands slowly descend to your thighs, taking your panties off along the way. he feels impossibly harder when he sees the strings of your arousal on the fabric, moreso when you open your legs for him to see your quivering hole that’s just dying to be filled by him. 

“fuck, look at you…” he groans, sliding his fingers through your folds. your moans are the sweetest sound he ever heard. “so wet. so pretty. all for me, hm?” 

“yes, baby, yes… please, hah— please!” you whine, slightly desperate. he curls one finger inside of you, and you could almost cry. it feels good, so good, but it’s not enough. “m-more… need more!” 

rin is feeling generous, so he attends to your pleas by shoving three fingers at once. you wail at the pleasure of having more of him, his long digits hitting your sweet spots in ways you never could.

“taking my fingers so well, love,” he whispers in your ear. “you’re so pretty. my pretty girl.”

you shudder with the praise, clenching around his fingers and feeling closer than ever when he uses his thumb to start rubbing your clit. it doesn’t take much time to be hit with your orgasm, one that leaves your whole body trembling and gives rin one of his favorite sights. 

beautiful.

he doesn’t even let you say anything, kissing you again, prodding his tongue inside your mouth and muffling any surprised gasps by the sudden invasion. rin’s wet muscle laces with yours in a slow, sensual dance that makes both of you moan in union, the sound traveling all the way down and keeping your arousal alive. 

he keeps going until the lack of air forces you to part. you’re panting, but your eyes search for his teal ones, always a pretty shade of aquamarine that makes you crumble. when you see the hazy look on his orbs, you’re sure he will take out his cock and fuck you already, but instead he starts giving little kisses down your tummy, all the way to your inner thighs. 

“don’t tease,” you whimper. “just get inside me alread— ah!” you scream when his tongue makes contact with your sensitive clit. rin licks a long stripe along your folds that makes you quiver and shut up. 

“wanna taste you first, pretty.” his eyes find yours, “please?”

and, again, who are you to deny your boyfriend? 

especially when he says it like that. 

so you agree, and rin eagerly goes down on you, slurping through your wet pussy like that’s all he needs to survive. he prods his tongue inside you, in and out, motioning the movement his dick should be making, and you take a moment to realize he is rutting his hips on the mattress every time he does. 

then, he laps at your clit once again, twirling his tongue in circular motions that make your eyes roll back and your toes curl. you can barely contain your moans, tugging at his hair and crying out loud when his satisfied groan sends vibrations to your nerves.

his flow becomes quicker, sloppier, and the wet sounds are so lewd that you can feel your second orgasm building up in that familiar tingling feeling that sends you to the edge.

“baby, baby… ‘m cumming, ‘m gonna cum…!” you cry, gripping the bed sheets like your life depends on it. 

that’s all the incentive he needs to keep on going, sweeping his tongue on your bud until he can taste the familiar flavor of you cum and sense your thighs almost crushing his head. 

he’d die a happy man. 

your body goes limp, and you’re gasping for air like you’d just ran a marathon. rin hovers over you to appreciate the scene, and with the way his cock twitches inside his boxers, rin thinks he appreciates this — making you come undone — a little too much. he’s sure his tip is red and leaking pre. 

he gives you some time to recover by slowly unbuckling his belt, taking off his pants and throwing them somewhere on the floor. his boxers go next, and just like he thought, the spongy head of his dick is swollen and in desperate need of relief. 

he said he would wait until you were beneath him, writhing in pleasure to the point he’s all you could think about, before giving him some attention. so he doesn’t stop you from putting your hands around his girth, hissing when you pump him a few times. 

your eyes are blurry, but they look up at him with so much love and desire he could very much cum right there. god, how much he fucking loves you. it’s honestly ridiculous. 

rin lets you pull him closer and cage him with your legs behind his hips. 

“ready, baby?” he asks, as if you aren’t aching for his cock. 

“god, please— i need you. i need you inside of me,” you all but wail. 

rin thrusts into you at once, and you nearly lose your mind. 

he’s long and thick, reaching all of your swollen spots without much effort. you can feel his veins dragging along your walls, creating even more friction, unconsciously rolling your hips to get more of this feeling. rin moans in your ear, and he does it again when you squeeze him tighter. 

“always so tight f’me,” he sighs, dreamily. “god, you are perfect. you are perfection itself, baby.”

“rin, rin…!” is all you can muster to say. 

he presses you harder on the mattress, rutting into your cunt and relishing at the feeling of your velvet walls sucking him in and gripping his shaft like a vice. you’re scraping your nails along his back and shoulders, looking for grounding, but he keeps pounding the head of his cock in that one specific spot that makes you see not only stars, but whole galaxies. 

“rin, rinnie, p-please… r-righ— right there!” 

at this point you are babbling nonsense, rin being the only thing on your mind as you chase your third orgasm of the night. “fuck, pretty…” he curses, feeling the neglected coil on his lower abdomen threatening to snap. he can’t really help it, though. you feel too good. too perfect. 

and all his. 

the constant bullying of his cock on your sweetest spot, the overwhelming feelings inside you and the sweet praises given by your boyfriend on you ear make you come apart, and you scream with the devastating pleasure that seeps through your whole body, like you’re floating on cloud nine. rin hisses when your walls clench him tighter, and seeing you reach your high gets him to spill his load inside of you, finally getting his much deserved release with white hot spurts on your warm core. he fucks both of you throughout your orgasms, and when you start to feel a bit overstimulated, you wiggle him out of you, snapping him from his daze. he collapses.

the familiar weight of his body on top of yours is comforting, along with the soft tune of his breathing on the crook of your neck. you scratch his scalp lightly, your other hand patting his back oh so lovingly. he’s so happy — to have you, to feel you, to love you. 

“i hope you never doubt how beautiful and amazing you are, love,” he whispers, not daring to break the silence. 

you say nothing, embracing him tighter. your silent thank you. 

“but if you ever forget,” he continues, taking you by surprise, “i’m always here to remind you.”

© 2023 itoshiexx. do not plagarise, translate, or repost any of my work on here or other sites.

tagging @doobea and @auratux bc they voted for this

[thats-my-passion-right-there]

More tag rants!!!!!!

I finally saw the mean girls musical (the movie one) I have so many fucking thoughts oh my god

[herejusttosufferalong]

Ehhh totally understand if you don't post this because it's depressing af. I'm choosing violence today. I was awash with lovey dovey feelings for our couple after re-watching L&N interviews, re-watching B3, re-watching BTS footage. I was full to the brim with LOVE. These guys had me in a choke-hold. Actually had me reviewing and reflecting on my life and relationships, adding so much joy and self-acceptance, reflecting on my self-worth, improving my world view. Allowing me to breathe in deeply, and expand myself in ways I didn't expect it to.

BUT yesterday was a mess. For so many reasons, not just because of L&N-related content. There were some bad vibes circulating. Then I made a really poor life decision last night. I decided to do some stalking of third parties, which I don't normally do. And of course, it had to be the night where said parties were posting and I saw all things unfolding in real time. My predictions were coming true in real time. It was like the granting of a wish in reverse. And look, I'm not naive to think that these things aren't happening, but when you see it unfold in front of you, it just hits differently. These people are so. fkn. toxic. It drains the life from me. The same occurred this morning when I awoke to see a timeline of HBS. I knew about it, but seeing it, with receipts, fkn disgusted me to my core. It was a visceral reaction. All of a sudden, what looked cute and puppy dog became unsafe and ugly. My empathy dissolved. The thing that gave me the most discomfort was the possible connection to the young dancer who was in B3. It made me think such awful things. (the worst being, is he just a fuck boy who was starved during tour?).

But why, why does it have such an effect? I don't interact with these people, no real relationship. So why? I think because we have been sold a certain narrative, through B3 and the press tour, that being authentic, having depth, focusing on 'the real bones' of people is paramount. Beyond the aesthetic. 'The truth will set you free' kind of thinking, right? And here we have the literal antithesis to that. People who promote and value aesthetic over substance. People who are egocentric and appear to have a very limited worldview. People you expect more from given they sold that 'depth narrative' looking you in the eye. People who are old enough to know better. People who choose to surround themselves with younger folk so that personal growth is disallowed. People who care more about their shallow life fulfillment, their hedonistic desires, than the feelings of others whom they purport to love and care about. People who hide behind ignorance, as if that negates them from consequence. The stereotype celebrity. It's truly deflating. I expected so much more.

And my original thinking of 'oh it's ok, he needs to grow and learn from his mistakes, he needs to find himself...", well, I'm finding it more and more difficult to believe. Because why give him grace? Why is he deserving of grace? Because he acted real well? What does he add to society? What do these fked up people add to this already fked up world? You've got N literally changing a whole landscape, waving her wand and creating light in darkness, urging us to think deeply while laughing at the same time. And no, we don't all possess that kind of magic, but hell, shouldn't we all be striving to be authentic, kind, thoughtful people? Shouldn't we try to promote these things if we believe in them?

Look, in this life, people are always showing you who they really are, telling you exactly what they value, what fills them up, and it's up to us to really look and listen. I'm disappointed in myself for not properly seeing what was in front of me all this time... You can't change those who do not want to be changed. My respect and my fucks given need to be earned, and honestly, we need to reflect on our own self-respect if we are willing to fawn over or idolise someone undeserving. As always, I have hope for people, but I'm no longer holding my breath.

Please, give me that Xanax and wake me up when September ends.

#fkeverything #ohthereyouareteenangst

.

[moonlightdreamzz]

Their first time going down on you <3 — Hongjoong, Wooyoung, and San.

→ warning! 18+. pure smut

Hongjoong

Everyone else around Joong was so obsessed with sex, and while he had memories of the pleasure it gave him in the past, what you two had was so much so deeper than that. He truly valued the connection you two had, to the point that making love to you was the last thing on his mind when he was with you.

He was too busy being obsessed with your contagious laugh and listening to all of the crazy things that happened in your day, everyday. He would be lying if he said the thought of worshipping your body never crossed his mind, but it didn’t linger for long.

You two had agreed that you weren’t going to rush it. When the time was right, you both would know. Of course, that didn’t mean he hadn’t planned exactly how he wanted it to be so that when that time came, it would be a night to remember.

For weeks the tension had become more and more intense. The subtle touches, the kisses that would lead to the beginning stages of making love, but the two of you would always stop each other - chuckling nervously as you pulled away each time. Hongjoong laughed at you because you always claimed innocent, yet the way you were just kissing him told a different story. You laughed at how red he always got, his hair sticking to his forehead already and the two of you still had your clothes on. He was so flustered.

Hongjoong didn’t want to let another situation like this happen and be unprepared. It was time for operation make love to Y/N to go into full effect.

All the reservations had been made, and his two days off as well as yours had been secured. He didn’t tell you where you were going, just that it was exactly what you needed to wind down. You both knew what that included, but you and Joong had the type of relationship where you didn’t have to say most things out loud to hear them.

You arrived, and the day went as planned. All night the two of you had been lingering touches in all the right places, and you knew you were already so wet when the real thing hadn’t even happened yet. The second the two of you got back to your hotel, the sexual tension in the room was thick enough to suffocate the both of you.

You stand at the edge of the bed, feeling as if it was your first time. You suppose that was a good thing. That was only more confirmation that you truly were so in love with him. You begin to get lost in your thoughts as you step out of your heels when you feel Hongjoong behind you. His boner pokes at your ass, and your knees practically collapse at the feeling.

He, at a painfully slow place, begins to unzip your dress, allowing his breath to do the work his lips would be doing soon enough. Chills covered your entire body at the feelings of your dress becoming a pool around your ankles.

The first order of business for Joong is to taste you. Being in the heat of the moment - it was as if every hidden craving he had for you was coming out at once. He couldn’t wait to see you unravel all because of him.

It was as if his tounge had a spell casted specifically to make your pussy cry from how good it felt. His hands are on so many places on your body. First your breasts, then your stomach, and then your legs to hold them by your ears as his tounge makes itself at home on your pearl.

He was so good. So many guys licked everywhere but where it actually felt good, but he knew. You could feel how wet you were getting. You knew you were going to cum, which was rare in the position you were currently in. He was being so careful, yet he was devouring you at the same time. He couldn’t help but moan for a multitude of reasons - the first being at how sexy you were. Your body was perfectly sculpted for him, every beauty mark a gift to him. Second, the trust you clearly had in him. There is not a tense muscle in your body as the sound of him slurping up your juices filled the room. The moonlight illuminated the entire room, causing every inch of your cocoa colored body to glow. He had to stop for a moment.

“You’re so fucking beautiful.”

His mouth is covered in your juices. Your love for him is dripping from his lips, and his eyes are low as the two of you finally make eye contact. “I love you so much, baby. Your beauty is unmatched, do you know that?”

For some reason, your insecurities hit you. You want to respond back in an equally sexy way, but you can’t help but question did he really mean it? “Does it look okay? Does it taste okay?” You regret it the second you say it. This was not a moment to be insecure.

He chuckles right in your clit, refusing to break eye contact with you. “You have the prettiest pussy I have ever seen baby. And I have never had a meal so good.” He takes a lick at the opening of your vagina for good measure.

“What does it taste like?” You mutter seductively, beginning to get in your zone.

“Like mine.” Is all he can say before face planting, starting where he left off. You have tears rolling down your cheeks as he’s eating as if it’s the last thing he’ll ever have.

His fingers become his tag team partner as he can sense you getting closer to your destination. His moans are just as load as yours, just muffled because he can’t take his nose out of your pussy. He never wanted to come up for air. He wanted to taste you everyday.

He’s fingering you and making love to your clit with his tounge - your beautiful cries of pleasure being his cheerleader to keep up the good work. He can hear you shouting that you’re about to cum.

“Mhm.” Is all he can chuckle before continuing, feeling your legs shake and your cum beginning to cover his face. You’re begging him to stop, but he can’t. He had found his new home. When he finally decides to let up, the first thing he does is kiss you, placing his tounge deep into your mouth. His hand caresses your inner though gently.

“See,” he smirks, “Mine.”

Wooyoung

He was so nervous and truthfully wasn’t sure if he could please you in the way he dreamed, yet, he couldn’t fight the intense craving he had for your taste no matter how hard he tried.

It was odd for Woo, because he had never felt the desire to put his mouth down south in his past relationships, if you could even call them that. Everybody knew that idols weren’t out here making love to one another. It was typically a little playing around that either stopped there, or led to quick sex. And he would be lying if he didn’t admit that the guys always got the better end of the deal.

He felt horrible, but he had never given anyone head before. Truthfully, he barely had any real experience in the first place even with his flirtatious nature. When he did mess around with people, they never asked him to do it, and he was too busy fondling in other places. He also lacked the motivation to do it anyway if he was being honest. That was so intimate.

But he just could not shake this feeling. Every time he looked at you, he wanted to lick you from your toes to the top of your head. He wanted to be face first in your pussy. He wanted your scent to linger in his nose for the rest of his life. His confidence though - you made him so shy. Usually he was the one that made people flustered, but not with you. He couldn’t hold eye contact with you even though you two had been together for months. When you touched him, no matter how innocent it was, his dick refused to stay down. He couldn’t hold in his desires anymore no matter what he tried.

It didn’t help that lately, the two of you had been getting friskier than normal. Wooyoung always had permission to touch you wherever. This included booty rubs, slapping your ass playfully, and kissing you all over - but he never did it with sexual intent. He was just so in love with you he wanted to be in your skin all day.

The two of you were in the midst of watching a movie - well, in better words, had pressed play. Both your eyes are on the screen, but Wooyoung is not watching a damn thing on your 60 inch flat screen. He was too distracted. Your signature scent wouldn’t allow him to focus. The way your breast teased the crease of his elbow already had his dick twitching.

He can’t do this anymore. He stares at you, and you turn and face him all the the same. This is what had been happening between the two of you lately; you would lock eyes, which would would then lead the two of you into a heated make out session before you both stopped. Tonight though, he knew something more was going to happen. It was the way you were practically drooling the second he started to slowly caress your elbow.

“Baby.” He utters.

“Yes.” You spill identically, as if the word is falling out of your mouth.

“I want to—can I—I need to taste you. Can I eat you out? Please.” He practically whimpers. He connects your forehead to yours, and the second he does, you’re falling back on your sofa.

Woo doesn’t hesitate. He begins to press soft kisses all the way down your body, stopping at your pink shorts that he knew you wore just for him. He sticks his nose directly at your pearl. Now he’s the one drooling.

The two of you had never gone this far, so he doesn’t know what to expect. He gently pulls your shorts down - kissing you through your panties when he feels his face getting moist. Fuck. You were so damn wet.

He sees you cover your face In embarrassment, and he swiftly removes your hands. “Don’t be embarrassed, baby. I wanna see your beautiful eyes looking at me while I make you cum.”

He’s acting cool, calm, and collected, but in reality he’s sweating his ass off. Remember, Wooyoung has never done this before. He pulls your panties down before saying one last thing.

“Y/N…I’ve never done this before, but I’m not stopping until your cum is all over my face.”

At first taste, he’s in love. As he continues to gently lick your clit, he’s studying you. You’re quivering as his tounge makes love to you.

“A little more pressure.” You whisper, grabbing his head and doing it for him.

“Don’t let go.” He instructs. He’s falling in love with the way you tugging on his scalp feels.

He was already so obsessed with you, and this did nothing but make it so much more intense. Your tangy taste is his favorite flavor. He’s lapping everywhere, but realizes you love when he licks your clit.

You’re getting so fucking wet. Your gentle whimpers are encouraging him to keep going. He knows he’s not perfect, but he knows that he is pleasuring you.

I can’t lie, being his first time, Wooyoung is down there for awhile trying to figure out what makes you cum. You enjoy it though, because his tongue feels so damn good swirling around your clit. The sight of him so eager to make you feel good…you knew this night was going to end with more than head.

San

His entire body was raging at the sight of you and him. For the past 15 minutes, he had a front row seat to you two having so much in common, making eachother laugh so hard you could barely stand, and the subtle touches your “friend” gave you.

San wasn’t stupid. He knew the game. This guy wanted you, and he hated that he was allowing what he was seeing to infiltrate his thoughts so much, but he couldn’t help it. You were his girl. You belonged to him - every inch of you, and he knows he usually kept it light and innocent between the two of you, but it’s as if you’re begging for him to show you a side of him that would leave you speechless when you do this in front of him.

Even in this moment of irritation, he can’t be upset with you. If anything, he was oddly turned on. He had been fantasizing too much these days about coming home, stressing oozing from his head to his toes. He would see you, and immediately pick you up - devouring your pussy to calm him down and fucking you until tears were in your eyes to keep the edge off.

You didn’t know exactly what was bothering your boyfriend, but you knew jealousy was the culprit. The entire card ride home he was silent, but the right hand that was placed on your left thigh was a telling that he wasn’t angry with you. You had no idea what to expect when you walked into your apartment. Did he just need time to calm down? Maybe it wasn’t something you did? No, it had to be. He was fine before you ran into one of your co workers.

The second you walk into your home, you break the silence.

“Baby…”

He’s silent. It’s actually deafening how quiet it is in your humble abode - the only thing that could be heard if you listen close enough being the sexual tension that was coming up for air.

He was so sexy when he was like this. It was rare that you saw this side of him - the intense glare, the heavy breathing, his knee bouncing up and down uncontrollably. You just wanted to jump on his face. But, there was no need to have such a fantasy right now. The two of you, although you had been getting slightly more physical, had a long way to go before his tongue found it’s way into your hole.

You truthfully weren’t really sure how experienced San even was. You knew he wasn’t a virgin, but head? You had no idea if he had even given it to anyone before.

You walk right in between his legs, and his bouncing becomes more intense. You have no recollection of how you got in your next position. One minute you were standing in front of him, and the next you were on the floor, and you and San were making out. He’s removing his shirt, and unzipping your jeans so his fingers can find your clothed clit.

So he was jealous. You can’t help but chuckle into his mouth at the intensity of the moment. You were already pooling, and you hadn’t been in this position long. You had no idea that San could even get like this. Sure, on stage he was definitely sexy, but there was a part of you that thought that was just a persona. The way he’s leaving marks on your neck is telling you that it’s real as fuck.

“Do you know how much I love you? Huh?” San questions as he pulls your shorts down. “I love you so fucking much.” He’s kissing down your belly now, scooting down to get in position and your brain feels nauseous. Was he about to?

I’ve been wanting to do this for so long. Taste you. Feel you grinding on my face because I do this shit so good. Why do you love making me so jealous?”

You truthfully had no intentions of making him jealous, but if you were anything, you were a damn tease.

“Because I knew it would finally have you face first in my pussy.”

You didn’t know what saying that would do, but you’re glad you said it because he follows your instructions perfectly.

It’s like the world is about to end the way his licking you. You were always terrified when you got head for the first time because you had been disappointed so many times. People always talked up such a big game, just to have you rolling your eyes in annoyance, not pleasure.

But not San. This is the best head you’ve ever gotten and he had just started. Both his hands are placed on your inner thighs as he moistens your already wet pussy. You can tell he genuinely loves how you taste by the way that he sampling you.

You taste so fucking good. He never had any doubt you would, but there’s a difference between a dream and living in it. It’s so good that he has to switch the angle. He moves to a side position so that he has perfect access to your clit. He switches from licking it like a lollipop, to placing his mouth directly on it so that if someone was watching, the wouldn’t even be able to see what his tongue was doing to you. Your moans and attempt to hold him back would be the only thing to indicate how good he was making you feel in this moment.

San doesn’t hesitate to put a finger in. He knows the game. Penetration + focusing on the clit was the key to making a girl cum from head. His fingers move in a wave-like motion inside your pussy, which is soaking. His entire hand is quite literally covered in your juice. He takes it out for a second just to taste you. He slaps your ass before putting his fingers back in you.

“This is my pussy.” He sounds like he’s underwater. I mean, technically speaking, he kinda was.

“It’s your pussy, San.” He loves that you said his real name, and not baby in this moment. It made him feel so fucking official. Like he really owned you.

He eats and eats and eats, to the point where you know that you’re about to leak all over his sculpted nose. You know that’s what he wants though. You’re whimpering at this point, and he’s looking right at you the minute you open your eyes to really see the magic he’s working on your clit. You can’t help it - you begin to hump his fingers and face just like you fantasized.

There it is. The build up. San knows it too because his fingers start curling faster and his licks are slow, but filled with pressure. His tongue is swirling on your clit so perfectly it’s making you dizzy.

“Mhm.” He all he can manage. He can barely breathe but he doesn’t care.

“San—fuck!” Your body shakes at the intense orgasm you’re having right now, but he doesn’t stop. You’re pushing his head away, but he doesn’t stop. It isn’t until your shaking calms down that he finally lifts his head — a cocky look in his eye. He licks every inch of cum from your pussy, kissing you immediately after.

“You think he could eat you like that? Huh? Sexy ass.” He kisses you again. “No one will ever make you do that but me. You’re mine.”

“Where did you learn that at?” You can barely breathe, but you manage to get the sentence out.

→ authors note: happy holidays. hehehehehe 🤭🎄. i have been writing a lot of smut, but I promise my next work of art will be very fluffy! i’m not even filthy fr. i do this for y’all. 👀

[pb-dot]

This latest Adventuring Party really drove home my favorite aspect of Brennan's DMing style. He genuinely loves seeing his players succeed, even against odds he considered to be nigh insurmountable.

Let's take the Last Stand as an example. Now, Brennan made no secret out of the Last Stand encounter being very hard, and for people who do not play D&D it may even seem like he overhyped it, but from a mechanics standpoint, the CR, functionally the difficulty rating of this battle royale was sky-high. Yeah, none of the Bad Kids went down, but that is entirely thanks to a combination of excellent strategic play from the Intrepid Heroes and some choice luck.

To mention some of the game changer moves, the Scatter spell really re-defined the battlefield more favorably for the Bad Kids, the disguise self was a value proposition because it split the flying monsters, which was the greatest threat to the proctor by far, in two, functionally halving the threat to the squishy normie, not to mention dealing with the mega-mosquitos in combo with Spirit Guardians. Those little flying bastards would have been such a pain in the ass if Fig didn't bug zapper them to kingdom come. And the bless. Dear god, the Bless saved so many asses in this encounter.

This isn't to say magic was the only thing that defined the battlefield. The single-target damage dealers did some truly astounding numbers and managed their attention and abilities shockingly well. Yeah, Gorgug crit like a madman, but he also tanked like three or four non-barb PCs worth of effective HP damage without going down even once. If he had failed his saves and gotten eaten by the Purple Worm things would have gotten nasty for him, but again, the touch of luck (and bless) saw him through.

So, this is all to say that this was an encounter meant to kick the players' ass. Not an unwinnable one, evidently, but this was supposed to be a considerably worse experience even without getting into the non dice-roll exam questions. And how does Brennan react when the Intrepid Heroes put their game face all the way on, get really smart with their level 1 spell slots, and dismantle the whole thing? He's overjoyed, he's cheering for his strange adventure children, and we're cheering with him because frankly it's rad as hell.

This illustrates one nuance I feel sometimes gets glossed over about the DM-player relationship. A lot of people have talked about how Junior Year is the "Revenge of Brennan" or what have you, and I feel that kind of misses the central appeal of DMing and Brennan's style in D20 in particular. Yes, Mr Mulligan enjoys playing the heel on occasion. It's good fun to play the personification of everything going wrong and the inherent shittiness of the world, but like the wrestler heels, all that wicked charisma is meant to do one thing, and that is build up the faces, or the players in this case.

Now, the ghost of Gary Gygax may come after me for this, but I firmly believe it's not the DMs job to kill the player characters, or even to inconvenience or torment them. A good DM's job is to make it seem like they're going to kill the player characters, as to provide an environment for the players to succeed, a challenge for them to overcome. It's all one big improv exercise (or kink scene if you prefer to view it that way), where the DM derives their (near)absolute authority over the world the PCs inhabit from the shared understanding that they're going to show the players a spectacular, if not on occasion harrowing, time.

This is Brennan's biggest strength as a DM I think. He genuinely wants to make a spectacular time for his friends, and he understands that to do that he must on occasion be the monster they oppose, and on occasion he must be their breathless cheerleader. On occasion, one imagines, he must also be both.