#things done? why waste time trying to act polite when there are other things that need to be adressed. MORE Important than manners.

[hannibal-confessions-nbc]

Hot take: Will isn’t sassy in season 1 and the first half of season 2 he’s just autistic and has no social filter so he just says some of the rudest snarkiest shit sometimes because it’s a reflex and it was the first thing he could think of

Can’t say anything about post prison Will he took his slut pills and one of the side effects is being cunty

Still tops though, he actually tops more after he took his slut pills

.

[olivsie]

Something I like about epic the musical is that it Gives it's changes to the original text an actual Purpose

( The first couple paragraphs are basically a rant regarding retellings. If you only want to hear about epic Skip to paragraph 4)

1. I am a bit annoyed by the lack of. Understanding as to why RETELLINGS aren't the most historicaly accurate things in the world. Sorry to break this to you, but that's both just how they work and I would guess how they reach success. Ancient Greece is a much different culture than our own, And most of us would be terrified to actually live back then. When you are Trying to create content That is based on ancient Greece And you want it to be successful/ At least reach a wide, and notably, MODERN audience. You're likely going to have to take some creative liberty And change a few things. Don't get me wrong, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO LIKE RETELLINGS KNOWING THAT FACT ( Me personally, I'm not the biggest fan of Miller's novels Even though I do like epic) BUT IT IS SOMETHING TO BE AWARE OF. And because of that I don't think I would ever expect a retelling to be perfectly accurate And I don't. I had interest in mythology LONG before epic the musical But I didn't actually read the Odyssey until getting into epic. I did not expect it To be just like the musical, I knew Odysseus was going to be much more of an asshole, along with other characters. The odyssey and epic are different pieces of media to me And I am not less of a mythology nerd for liking epic ( Though I will admit that sometimes I take tiny little fun facts of mythology And like to think of them in the context of epic, but that's just for fun.)

2. The Only time being a fan of retellings is wrong as if you genuinely believe they are perfectly accurate And refuse to listen to anything else ( Which has definitely happened, And mythology nerds have the right to be annoyed at that)

3. Some people only like to consume real mythology media, Others like both real mythology and retellings, Others only like to engage with retellings (I would hope they have the self-awareness to know It's not real mythology, From what I've seen some do and some don't, Unfortunately)

4. Ok. now on to what the title of this long ass rant says

I like that epic the musical Retells the story, Not only to both cater to modern audience But Also with its OWN purpose of man versus monster.

Obviously, this is not the point of the original text. Mythos Odysseus does not give a single fuck About the stuff that epic odysseus does. I don't know why the creator Decided to rewrite it this way, (If he's ever said why let me know) But I would assume he wanted to make something about the oddessy And this was simply a very creative way to Translate that for modern audience.

I like this because, yes, holy damn. It does have changes from the original text. But it's not JUST changing it. It's changing it with a purpose

It feels reminiscent of some kind of Dramatic play. the way that epic characterizes.

Polites' kind nature is Representative of the Concept of being merciful Represented in his lines such as " This life is amazing when you greet it with open arms" /"There is so much guilt inside your heart, So why not replace it?"

While in contrast you have eurylochus with more ruthlessness and cautious nature, this is Found in some of his lines such as "You rely on wit, and people die on it" /"we don't know what's ahead" / "I say we strike first. We don't have time to waste so lets raid the place-" /"Let's just cut our losses, You and I and let's run"

And then you have Odysseus, the man/monster. The first act of this Musical is his internal struggle With what He should be On that scale. And the other characters Represent this struggle in the song monster

" Is the cyclops struck with gilt when he kills, is he up in the middle of the night? Or does he end my men to avenge his friend and then Sleep knowing he has done him right?

When the witch turns men to pigs to protect her nymphs, is she going insane? Or did she learn to be colder when she got older and now she saves them the pain?

When a God comes down and makes a Fleet drown Is he scared that he's doing something wrong? Or does he keep us in check So we must respect him and now no one dares to piss him off"

He then Applies this to himself

" Does a soldier use a wooden horse to kill sleeping trojans cause he is vile? Or does he throw away his remorse and save more lives with guile?"

And this marks his turning point of deciding that Ruthlessness It's ultimately worth it if it means Getting home, as aeolus says "The end Always justifies the means"

It's in my opinion, a very creative way to go about retelling a myth. Is it accurate? Absolutely not. For example, circe (From what we know) is not protecting When she turns men into pigs, For all we know, she could just do it because Shits and giggles.

Her character and most others in epic is changed from the original. But it's not ONLY changing for the sake of apeling to the modern Western audience and being successful like Many other retellings. It is also and mainly changing for the sake of influencing the plot that Jorge Rivera herrans crafted For the sake of Retelling epic. It is creative and I enjoy it despite knowing it's not accurate.

[crookedkryptonitebeliever]

Best and Worst of Both Worlds (part 33)

Tw: mentions of rape and molestation, Evangeline's insanity

Part 34

You sighed. Looking up at the white ceiling as the smell of antiseptic stings your nose.

Your landlord came by earlier to hand you your phone charger as per Yves's request. He avoided your eyes as he asked about your general wellbeing. Perhaps he felt guilty for letting one of his tenants go through such brutality. Or maybe Yves tore him another one for failing to protect you. Quite frankly, you do not know, neither do you care.

You gave him polite but short answers. You don't feel like talking to anyone now, not even Yves. It feels like the whole world is judging you and criticizing what you could have done.

He was nice, he even charged your phone for you. It's not like you could do it yourself, hooked on all kinds of antibiotic drips and wires. Not to mention, your leg cast.

You were wondering about Evangeline's hygiene, how did you get this infected from a couple of bites and scratches? Well. Whatever it was, you're glad shes just not here.

You did blame yourself for confronting her. Because if she didn't know that there was an issue between you and her, she wouldn't have paid you a visit.

But it was hard to say what her reaction would have been when Mr. Jones confronted her about the molestation in his car.

It felt like a courtroom with no jury in your head. You have a part of yourself prosecuting your being, while the other defending it. It's noisy and exhausting. You had no idea how to quieten it down.

You turned your head to the sound of your phone.

You reached towards it and checked what has set off the notification alerts. The cable is still attached to its charging port.

You received a voicemail from a number you didn't recognize.

"Sweetheart. It's me, Montgomery. I-I'm so sorry you had to go through that. I.." You heard him choke back tears. "That was fucking disgusting of her. It was so much worse than I first thought- I'm so fucking sorry I couldn't be there to protect ya', I shouldn't have trusted- I-I-"

You were confused at the sudden breakdown. He wasn't that distressed the last time you saw him, why is he crying as if he went through it instead?

You listen to him sob in anguish.

"...I couldn't get a hold of ya' through my old number. I had to get another one. Please call me back as soon as ya' can."

The message abruptly ended there.

You blocked this number too.

Frowning, did Yves tell him your business? That seems unlikely of him, you refused to believe that he would do such a thing. Then, who else did he...

The group chat with your housemates is blowing up.

Oh. The news got ahold of your story. Well that makes sense.

Even though you weren't identified, it was clear the news segment was about your horrific assault.

Some of your housemates were complaining that Yves told them not to speak with the media. And thankfully, they didn't.

There was very limited information given to the public as it seems like Yves is trying to control what others can know. The majority of the details were given by Evangeline herself. To your relief, she was held without bail.

From what you understood, she wasted her one call in jail to speak with news outlets. She didn't call her father, her mother or a lawyer. Evangeline admitted that she raped you in such a brutal matter, not leaving a single detail unsaid.

The article anonymized all the names she dropped, but you can guess she mentioned Montgomery and Yves at some point.

It was sickening, Evangeline told them that she's masturbating in jail to the thought of you. When asked what was her reasoning behind her atrocious acts, she replied that you were her greatest reward in life. She 'deserved' you for being your 'savior'. It was unclear what she meant.

They asked if she had any remorse for what she did. Evangeline went ahead and told them her only goal is to get out of prison just to fuck you day and night. You consumed her entire thought and you have to pay for it.

Evangeline claimed that she 'loves' you. You just didn't know what was good for you and it is her mission to fix that. She also hated you for throwing her away just like everyone else. Then again, she loved how you felt against her, so you were 'forgiven'.

You didn't get it. What was wrong with her? She seems so normal and fine, yet she's still trying to induce nightmares in you even when she's held in a cell.

You read on and saw that her parents refused to comment. However, it's mentioned that Evangeline was suspected to be too mentally unsound to stand trial. They have yet to evaluate her psychology, but judging on her unhinged reaction after all this, you think she is very likely to plead insanity and be sent to a mental facility instead of prison.

The University retracted her scholarship and expelled her. She must have thought that there was nothing left to lose, that is why she went all out in the impromptu interview.

You shuddered and stopped reading, not being able to stomach the mention of Evangeline anymore.

You wiped away tears from the hilt of your palm. Suddenly yearning for some company.

What a coincidence, Yves called you. Immediately, you picked it up.

"(name)..." His voice was soft and sympathetic.

You cried. You let everything out to Yves. It was hard to form a sentence, but you tried. It came out as incoherent garbles as you choked on your own tears. Nothing you said made sense to you, it did to Yves.

He listened. Letting his own droplets roll down his cheeks too. Yves knew there isn't anything he could say now to make you feel better. You heard it all before. The apologies, the assurances, the hatred towards your perpetrator... it became meaningless to you.

It's time for you to speak instead.

He knows you just wanted someone to be there for you.

And he will stay on the line as long as you need.

Yves's tears splashed onto his papers, creating ugly stains and smudging his blue ink around. Rendering some words as unreadable.

[banishedchildofeve]

,, warning, a rant post,,, mentions of s*x work and p*rn in our society below.

A girl at my work asked me why I wasn’t agreeing with her as she and another workmate of ours discussed modern feminism. I was listening, to be polite, as there was nothing else much to do and no customers, and not saying anything. I’m usually quiet at work, but she seemed to take offence to my silence, as if I should be interjecting into the conversation to express how much I agreed with her.

I told her that I don’t believe modern feminism is always a good thing, and before I could even explain myself, she gave me a horrid look and said “right, because it’s easier to do nothing and get all that male approval, isn’t it?”

It was mean and I blinked at her, affronted and confused. Usually people let me explain when this topic comes up and I voice my opinions, if I have to, as I like to not cause conflict. Normally, I explain how I feel, very politely, about issues that feminism has brought up for women like the normalisation of abortion, contraceptives and dangerous hormone-changing pills, not marrying or even trying to find love, ‘sex work’ being seen as powerful etc etc.

I usually use my example of “girlboss” culture to help people understand how I’m not trying to be hostile or anything, but this workmate didn’t even let me and walked off to go talk to the manager who we’re all really good friends with. The other workmate I was with looked confused too and she joked about the awkwardness of what had happened, and I brushed it off but on the train home I was thinking about it again.

I was thinking about how often wives, mothers, homemakers and nuns/sisters/friars etc. are looked down on, often by feminists because they aren’t some business woman who only wears tight office-chic blazers and gets drunk every weekend and posts bikini pics. I thought about the young girls who dream of homemaking and wifehood, and the women who choose it over a career, and who are sort of viewed as pathetic or weak or ‘old fashioned.’

I’ve been told firsthand that my dream of being a mother isn’t good enough and how I “need to decide on a real career path,” or “something other than that, at least.” I’ve been made to feel small or stupid or that I’m offending all the women across all the generations who worked hard for our rights.

And this hurts, because I love women. I look up to who I consider to be the best feminine influence in all of human history, Mother Mary, daily. And I felt confused as I thought, because isn’t it all about choice?

Why is my choice less valuable than hers? Why is my choice to abstain until marriage, not drink coffee or try this pill or that drug or this drink something that I should be embarrassed about? Why is my modest mufti day outfit at school earning me stares and causing snide remarks? Why are we bringing up girls to believe that being a p**n star something empowering, something to do to “make a quick buck.”

Why are we letting young and influential girls believe that their worth comes only from their body, their aptness at reeling in boys, the size of their boobs, the way they dress and how many drinks it takes them before they’re throwing up at a house party outside on the lawn?

Why are we letting men, husbands, boyfriends believe that their wife/girlfriend/fiancé’s body is something that they can both benefit off if they just film that one video, or take that one photo? Why is it okay for a man to watch p*rn while his wife sleeps next to him?

Why is “she has an OF,” an insult, or something that takes away from her worth? Despite the fact she doesn’t feel beautiful unless a man is complimenting her body? How is this her fault? What could she have possibly done? She’s been taught that her body is all that guys care about. She believes that if she doesn’t do this act or send that photo she is wasting his time, she’s not worth his time.

It makes me sad. I hear younger girls talk in the bathroom at work while I’m in their cleaning or whatever about how this boy sexted them this, or how this other boy’s invited her over to his house on this time and how she’s been watching tutorials on how to … well, you know.

It makes me feel sick. These girls don’t know the danger they’re in. They’re being raised in an online world where it’s trendy to wear tiny shirts and post photos of your butt.

Most of the girls I overhear talk of things like this look 14-15.

This is not their fault.

They’re not to blame. It’s the world we let them indulge in. It’s a world where they’ve seen and heard and tried so much before they’re even able to legally get behind the wheel of a car and drive. Before they’ve even taken a proper exam at school.

When our frontal lobes detach, we become so ignorant to danger. Teenagers drive fast, do drugs, dance on the railings of bridges above highways and believe they’re invincible. It’s natural, sure, to an extent. But this is the time when so much can go wrong. Innocence cannot be returned.

I hate to think of how many girls will realise just how groomed and shaped they were by this toxic culture that surrounds us as a society later on and wish they hadn’t done this or that.

I want to protect these girls. I want to comfort them and keep them from these horrible, evil ideologies and that fuel harmful industries and create dirty, satantic fetishes in which people profit and people enjoy.

I want the girls who only dream of marriage and having kids to be safe and protected. I want girls who think it’s cool to smoke cigarettes and steal their parent’s booze to be safe and protected. I want the girls who dream of being billionaires and dating 40 men to be safe and protected.

Young girls are so influential and I wish there were better role models to show them that there is life and beauty and comfort and promise in the life that is ‘old fashioned’ and ‘anti-feminism.’

There is new life in Christ, always, of course. But I really wish the evil didn’t get there first.

I want to raise my own daughters in a world where it’s not okay to watch p*rn and use social media and consider sex work “empowering.”

I want girls and women to see that their worth does not come from how they look; but from within. From their heart, from their charity, from their kindness, from their humility, from their love of helping others, from the words they choose each day.

Of course this means we must make changes now, and step by step, starting with ourselves and our behaviour and headspace and habits. Changing for good can change others for good, inspire good, produce good, spread good.

Our daughters are relying on us.

Okay rant over, God bless all who read this. I hope you’re okay.

<3

(i wrote this awhile ago and just let it sit in the drafts. sorry it isn’t structured well. i was getting v emotional when i was writing this oop lol. i’m not here to have arguments, i hate arguing and it’s even worse online w literal strangers. i just am so sick of all this evil and damage being disguised as “pro women” and “feminism” and to speak out against it is to sound like a woman-hater, which is the last thing i am. the last thing a girl my age could ever be smh).

[neonlight2]

Jaehaera Targaryen (oc)

Masterlist

Warnings: smut mentions, sexism, touch of homophobia, and mentions of incest (and step-cest)

Again— it’s the Targaryens, what do you expect.

(Only the older parts of the family cause… the younger ones don’t know the difference)

What we’re their relationships like as she got older?

Viserys

First off— Absolute pushover.

Shouldn’t be a surprise with how he treats Rhaenyra. Man will literally break all tradition, with the justification of “I am king”.

Jaehaera wants to wear pants instead of dresses. Done, without a second to waste. And if she did want to wear a dress, you best believe it was the best money could buy.

His darling daughter wants to study with high scholars— only the best teachers of course. Anything she wished to know or learn she’d be taught. Books would be imported from the farthest edges of Westeros. Oh— and best believe he built her a private library. He knows how she loves her privacy, how she detested the public and fuss of events. He’d catered to her every need as she grew.

Even when he didn’t necessarily agree— like with swordsmanship. Viserys would be so freaking worried at the beginning, not wanting his little girl to get hurt. But he lets her anyway.

And even though it’s “against the rules”, Jaehaera could compete in tournaments whenever she damn well please, and he was always there to watch with pride.

There was not a price in gold that would hinder her requests. If the girl has asked him for a fucking castle bigger than king’s landing, it would have been made— and he’d put every man he could to work in order for it to be done quickly. Amazons quick delivery service would have NOTHING on this man’s will.

However, she was never extreme in that fashion. The kingdom was honestly lucky that she was far more rational and conservative with money, or else they may be in poverty.

So as she got older, matured, and got around to marrying age— all suitors of all ages came in like filthy vultures. And of course, no one was ever good enough.

He thought the same for both his daughters, the only reason why he made Rhaenyra marry was in order to secure he claim to the throne— heirs. Jaehaera on the other hand…

Jaehaera at 14/15: Father I don’t wish to marry—

Viserys: GREAT ITS SETTLED THEN

Of course if she did fall in love or wish to marry, he wouldn’t be able to say no. It’s damn near impossible. I swear to god this man would actually rather die than say no to her.

Jaehaera would DEFINITELY become more of an adviser to Viserys as she got older. She was already like his own little personal spy, so as she got older, made more connections, and was actually able to stir the pot without being harmed (because now she’d love for a bitch to try—), that relationship only grew stronger.

Most people when they watch the two together could get mental whiplash I’m not even gonna lie. One moment Jaehaera is kneeling before Viserys calling him “my king” or “your majesty”— basically going through ALL the damn formalities even though viserys has told her a thousand times she doesn’t need to— just to act like a child the next minute. Sure, if she has something political or otherwise important to tell him, Jaehaera stays more calm, professional even. But the moment the formality is over and done she like, “Hi dad! Wanna watch me dual? Oh! I learned a new trick on Shkros!”

She’d also just tell him the most random shit and facts she learns, probably rant about stories or things she’s gotten insanely fixated on. Viserys would EAT THAT SHIT UP. He could listen for hours and smile or laugh at the girl.

Oh, and Viserys literally became deaf at some point to all slander toward her, even if it came from Otto. Man would not hear of any of it.

In his mind Jaehaera did no wrong. So when anyone questioned her innocence or reputation—

“All of these are mere, petty rumors from jealousy for my daughter’s brilliance.”

“I will not hear of it, next person to say such a thing will lose their tongue.”

“Jaehaera would never, and even if she had you have no proof.”

“Who are you to question the princess? My daughter?”

To the day until she inevitably starts leaving more frequently, they would meet almost every night in the kitchens, sharing bread and milk like the day they first met.

Sadly, around the time his sickness gets really bad, she would be gone even longer. He knew why.

She had spent months before trying to heal him, and she did a better job then the scholars and maesters could ever dream. But they both knew that it was only slowly his demise. There was no cure for time, as it was fast on viserys heels.

A lot of people thought they had a falling out during this time because of her absence, but the truth of it was that they had an agreement. Jaehaera had made a promise to secure and protect their family. Not just Rhaenyra’s claim to the throne, but the state of it all.

She went to every kingdom to make alliances, or to strengthen old ones. She made deals to compact no army could penetrate them. And she would be damned if she failed.

Jaehaera had barely the idea of what love felt like before she became Viserys’ daughter. So with all her being she’d protect her home, her life, his legacy, her family.

Daemon

Two words— Teddy Bear.

He’s an absolute simp.

Would and does worship the ground she walks on.

If you thought he was insufferable when she was younger, following her around, constantly seeking her attention, giving her anything she stares at too long, and talk about protective— times that by a million.

The moment he came back and saw how she had…matured. Daemon went feral. I’m talking glaring at every person who so much as glances Jaehaera’s way that wasn’t family. He even had a small bit of beef with Sir Harwin because of how close he had become to her. It was only until she told him to back the fuck off that he calmed down.

He’d also use every excuse he could muster to be close to her. And Daemon likes to be sly, or try at least, so it would start innocent.

*walking literally anywhere, even around the castle, and he hold her hand* “Don’t want you to get lost my little wanderer.”

*Leans against her: arm around shoulders, or wrapped around her waist to rest his head in the crook of her neck.* “I’m tired.” Or if your at an event, “You soothe the throbbing in my head, love.”

Then this bitch would push his luck.

He’d slowly slip his fingers up her shirt or any bare skin he could get his hands on— and being that she didn’t normally like to wear much, he had so many places to choose from.

“My hands are cold!” *it’s literally like 100 degrees out*

He also has a weird obsession with her hair. Like he’d dimly admire it at first, wondering what it feels like. Was it was soft as feathers? Or smooth as silk?

Well one day he impulsive touched it. Of course he made it seem as if it were a normal interaction— brushing it away from her open shoulders to show off the dip in the heavenly dress she wore to some banquet he couldn’t even remember the occasion for.

All he knew was that he instantly became addicted to the feeling of the strands between his fingers.

They’d be talking underneath the trees of the gardens and he’d randomly start petting her head. At first Jaehaera would tense up because of the foreign feeling, but after a few seconds and Daemon asking her permission, she’d let him to it again. Oh he’d be jumping for joy in his brain.

Especially loving it when her eyes would flutter shut when he’d start to scratch her scalp and massage her temples.

And however wholesome this man could be at sometimes, he’s mind would definitely wander. He’d start to wonder what it’s be like if she were underneath him, hair and body sprawled out for him to play with. To make her feel good.

Or perhaps if she were to ride him and as she leaned forward, her hair would drape around them, all while tickling his thighs, arms and face. Oh how pretty she would look.

Oh and don’t get him started about how hard he gets when she pulls her hair into a ponytail or high braid. All he could think about was taking her from behind, pulling on her hair so that her back would be flush with his chest.

God she drove him crazy.

So the infamous Prince, know for being I’ll tempered and cruel, would be siting with the girl in her free time, taking turns braiding each others chair.

What he doesn’t know is that she’s not as oblivious as he thinks. It wasn’t hard to notice how he’d have to shift in he seat around her, or the growing bulge in his pants as she laid her head in his lap— letting out shameless moans as he kneaded her scalp.

Jaehaera just thought in rather fun to tease him, and to make him think she was totally innocent in her acts.

But besides the obvious sexual tension— Dameon would respect Jaehaera a lot. Of course he’d still be hot headed, crazy, and rebellious. It was his nature. And it also happened to be hers in some cases.

It was almost like putting two delinquents in the same room with some gunpowder a few matches.

The only difference was that she was more rational when it came to future consequences. She actually looked ahead. Dameon… not so much. He’d rather jump into battle or war, only depending on himself and his sword “dark sister”.

But.. if he had to, the person who’d he’d listen to was Jaehaera. And that’s because in his eyes, she was always right.

And that was not to be disputed.

Rhaenyra

She’s spoiled. We all know that. So she’s definitely get more possessive of Jaehaera.

When she married Laenor, it was hard because she longed for intimacy that he could not give her. But she was content with him because she thought she had at least evaded being married to an imbecile.

So even though it was unheard of, Rhaenyra still insisted on sharing a bed with her almost every night. Both girls were always close, and comfortable with each other physically. Rhaenyra had been the second person to bless her with gentle affection through touch. One might say that other than herself, Jaehaera trusted Rhaenyra with her body the most.

They would cling to each other in the night, bodies intertwined, grazing each other carefully, or tenderly squeezing flesh. All of it was natural to them. And to Jaehaera it was all she’d ever known when it came to the pair. It was only after their incident at the brothel that caused a shift in their behavior.

Rhaenyra had only heard of what had happened with Jaehaera because of her fathers reprimanding. It was light compared to what she faced, but she still felt something brewing in her stomach. She couldn’t quite place the emotion, it resting somewhere in between jealousy and curiosity. And it scared her.

Soon she found herself growing paranoid and angered at everyone Jaehaera looked at fondly. Especially a particular maid of hers…

Soon Rhaenyra would lie awake at night, Jaehaera sleeping soundly beside her, and she’s let her mind wander to what she thought the girl may have been doing with other women.

Soon she’d been touching herself at the thought of it being her who received such attention from Jaehaera.

And later as she noticed Daemon’s actions toward them both she couldn’t help but dwell on the thought of having them both. Even after Daemon married Laena. She’s simply add her to the equation too; she knew how much Jaehaera fancied her.

However, as the drift between her and Alicent grew even larger— especially after the whole air Criston cole situation— she became more worried that Jaehaera would leave her.

She had no reason to worry, I mean Jaehaera absolutely adore the girl. She would do practically anything for her. And the two princesses were almost attached at the hip at some point.

Yet as Jaehaera began to venture farther out, her time away from home increasing every voyage, Rhaenyra would make sure to claim whatever time Jaehaera had to spare when she had returned.

Of course, she didn’t mind sharing this time with other people she loved: Viserys, Daemon, Laenor, Sir Harwin.

Jaehaera knew. Anyone could tell that her children were not sired by Laenor, but Jaehaera knew that they were his kids.

And that’s because she walked in on them fucking once.

To this day she’d tease Rhaenyra about it, occasionally praising her for how quiet she could be with such a large prick inside her.

(She would also confirm to anyone that asks that Sir Harwin is hung— because let’s be honest he is.)

And after Rhaenyra had Jace, she’s notice that happened to grab even more of Jaehaera’s attention. More of her protection. Jaehaera would visit more frequently, ask if she was being properly taken care of, if anyone had disrespected her, and constantly hovering around her and Jace when she was at home.

As much as Rhaenyra loved Sir Harwin, she couldn’t deny that Jaehaera was a huge reason for her having more children. For the more she had, she more of Jaehaera she got.

Alicent

Obsessed and paranoid.Gonna be real— we all saw this coming.

Alicent would definitely be giving yandere, but she would never tell Jaehaera when she could or could not leave. (Like shed be able to in the first place.)

At first, when they’re in their later teens, Alicent really just wants to keep Jaehaera in her life. So she sees Rhaenyra as a threat, because they’re at all odds.  She gets extremely worried whenever Jaehaera starts to pull away because of her marrying Viserys, and a little scared. Alicent really didn’t like lying to her, but she was as equally as scared of her father’s backlash. So when Jaehaera started to catch on with the whole scheme, Alicent didn’t know what to do or think.

Jaehaera was never actually cruel to her in anyway. In fact, the rather opposite. She’d still join her for tea or visit her whenever Rhaenyra was busy with her duties. But there was always a nagging feeling in the back of her mind that made her need validation.

“You’re not mad at me are you Princess?”

Glancing up intently at her, Jaehaera would answer, “No, Ali. I just hate your father insists on hurts those I care for.”

Hitching her breath, there was a small flutter in the pit of her stomach. Jaehaera made it sound as if she were included in the category. That sent Alicent’s heart on fire.

“And don’t think of defending him darling,” Jaehaera snipped, standing up to grab ahold of her chin. “It’ll just make me hate him more.”

Would definitely become paranoid later on as Rhaenyra has kids because well… Jaehaera increasingly becomes more attached to her as she does. Not that Alicent’s children don’t get enough attention as is. Jaehaera spoils every single one of them. But Alicent doesn’t see it like that, so what does she do? Talks shit.

She’ll start sneaking in comments or rumors of Rhaenyra’s children’s the obvious hair color difference, and other features. How they’re “growing in to very clad, dark handsome boys” and how she “adores their curly brown hair”.

Then, on top of it all is— she thinks she’s getting away with it at first because Jaehaera will laugh occasionally and say something back. Soon she becomes unaware of the warning stares being sent her way. Her growing audacity eventually leads to a more intense reaction after she questions their birthright.

“I’m not sure if they would be given the thrown that easily.” She’d say calmly with a soft smile while pouring Jaehaera a drink.

She’s hear the princess hum and ask, “Why’s that?”

“Oh you know, their features are rathe strange for a Targaryen. Some might question if they are truly—,”

Alicent would be cut off quickly, and the bottle of wine would have slipped through her hands from shock and broke into pieces by their feet if it weren’t for Jaehaera’s quick hand. With one hand setting the bottle aside, the other held Alicent’s jaw firm, making it so she couldn’t talk, yet it would not leave a bruise on her skin.

Jaehaera’s were practically predatory as they glared into Alicent’s. And as she leaned closer to the woman’s face, Alicent couldn’t help but gasp at the proximity.

“Don’t start acting like your father Ali. It doesn’t suit you.” Jaehaera would whisper firmly, pulling away only to keep a burning gaze. “And if you ever say something like that again around me, I promise you, I will kill him.”

After her hand leaves her mouth, Alicent would rub the tender skin, weak in the knees and almost desperate for it to return. “Why?” She’s ask in a whisper.

Tilting her head to the side, Jaehaera’s expression softened and she caressed her cheek. “Because he would have killed something I care for. And I cannot allow that.”

Otto

He’s a petty bitch.

Would not know what the fuck to do when it comes to Jaehaera.

Would also try really hard to spread rumors about her under the kings radar. Probably called her a homophobic slur at some point and made a backhand comment about her being a woman. We all know it’s true.

He’s well aware that she hates him after Alicent marries Viserys. Would for sure get tortured by Daemons antics even more because of Jaehaera’s permission.

Honestly he’s just fucked, so he’s constantly trying to find a way to keep himself in the good graces of the king, so Jaehaera won’t kill him.

Also another reason why he’d push Aegon to succeed the thrown— also also another reason why the greens pull this shit while she’s gone on her voyages and travels. He knows he wouldn’t be able to get away with it otherwise.

Sir Criston

Another petty bitch.

Jaehaera finds him annoying after a while. She gave him a little sympathy at first because of the whole Rhaenyra brothel incident, but she’d always choose Rhaenyra.

Lightens up around Alicent because she likes her. But she’ll roast the shit out of him at any time. Unprovoked.

And if he really pisses her off best believe she’s threaten him (and let Daemon loose).

“I gave you the position in the kings guard, I could easily take it away. Even if it hurt Ali’s feelings for a while. She could never stay mad at me. She’d forget you in a heartbeat.”

Sir Harwin

Homies Fr

These two would just make a bunch of dirty jokes, cursing like sailors, and spar.

Canon that they would call each other bad worms as pet names:

“Good morning my little bitch how are you?”- Jaehaera greeting him in the mornings for training.

“Hey arsehole! You owe me one!” - Harwin after covering up for her to go sneak off with a lady/lord and/or when he’d lie about seeing Daemon first in the nighttime competitions.

Causal greetings or hellos: “Hello there cunt!” “Ahhh there’s my favorite little shit!”

Both were definitely into each other some point but it was a fleeting crush. He fell in love with Rhaenyra, she loved him, so Jaehaera loved them and that they were happy.

Harwin along with Laenor we’re her personality wingmen and cheerleaders.

He’d cover/lie for her in a heart beat. And he has soooo much respect for her. In another life they’d probably be siblings.

Laenor

I’ll say it again for the people in the back: Laenor is Jaehaera’s cheerleader.

If they had the word bestie back then, best believe he’d be like: “GO BESTIE, GO!!!”

Ton of gay jokes, but also would comfort each other being of society and internal homophobia because people fucking suck. (I’m looking at you Otto)

Definitely have seen each other naked, probably drunk or honestly skinny dipping. Also— because they’re constantly covering for each other so they can… Y’know… they’ve probably stood guard for each other at some point. So I can definitely see Laenor or her just opening the door once as the other and whoever they’re with is mid fucking, and be like: “can you hurry up Rhaenyra (or some other person) is looking for you?”

And if Laenor ever finished quickly, Jaehaera would say: “damn took you longer than I thought, ten whole seconds, I had my money on five.”

Oh and Laenor absolutely giggles or chokes on his drink anytime someone says anything remotely disrespectful toward Jaehaera or him because he knows this person is about to die.

Rhaenys and Corlys

Definition of second parents. Basically adopt Jaehaera whenever Viserys isn’t around.

Corlys is so proud of her when she gets older and leads a battalion and or her own voyages. He would also get teary eyes whenever he sees her helping Luke learn how to navigate and captain a ship, then blame it on “salt water that splashed into his eyes”.

He LOVES being a girl dad (excluding Laenor). Prizes Laena and Jaehaera. And even low key ships them because let’s be so for real… he knows. Later he’ll make jokes that it must be in the gene’s because both his kids came out fruity.

And Rhaenys and Corlys adore the relationship between her and their kids.

Rhaenys especially. She loves how safe and natural both her children are around her. They don’t have to pretend. She swears she’s trust her with both their lives because she knows Jaehaera would always protect them and vise versa. (Also ships Laena with her, and claims all the time that Daemon is just a third party.)

[allycat75]

I don't know why, but I still hope there is time for you, Boston Dumb Fuck. I hope you deserve the consideration and kindness still offered you.

Despite what you may think, I am actually rooting for you. I think you got tangled up in something nefarious that was bigger than you thought and didn't have the proper people around you or the coping skills to get you out. But the decisions and their ensuing consequences are still your own, so let me remind you why I am here and why I will continue to push you (not that I think you are reading my posts. I am just screaming into a void):

You roped us all into this by trying to convince us you are happy in a relationship when it is obvious to almost anyone you don't like her. You maybe thought you were helping the cause by doing a bad job, but that act to save yourself came crashing down on your observant fans, hard. Because when we pointed out the many obvious inconsistencies, we were branded as crazy and jealous. Then there is the gaslighting with changing timelines, photoshopped pictures, sightings and non-sightings, poorly acted jump scares and general mindfuckery. You can't now un-invite us to the party because you don't like what we are saying about the ambiance, like a spoiled brat at her Sweet Sixteen celebration. We will defend ourselves from lies and manipulation and not accept the labels of "unhinged", "bully", "crusty old hag", "mentally unstable" or "delulu" (among others)

She is an awful person and by tying yourself to her like this you implicitly approve of her racism, antisemitism, fatshaming, arrogance, clout-chasing and entitlement, forever. That hypocrisy cannot go unnoticed considering your former stances on these subjects and your role as the face of ASP. The site may be useless and bland on its own, but politics is full of people talking out of both sides of their mouths, and you have made the platform potentially polarizing at a time when we need serious, clear discussions with no distractions

The fact that you look absolutely miserable and discuss your life as if it is not your own is more than a little unnerving. This is in no way to shame you, but rather out of a genuine concern for your safety and why you did this to yourself when you had every opportunity provided (hence, the "Dumb Fuck"). You have talent, but are wasting it on brain-dead pap because you seem afraid of depth and unearthing something blocked deep within your psyche

Show how your behavior parallels the issues of the world at large and how we accept things we shouldn't. We have kept quiet about unchecked privlege, intent vs. impact, performative activism, being child-like vs. childish, ageism, greed, mental illness and wellness, the power and weaponry of sexuality, toxic masculinity and misogyny, generational wealth, integrity, alternative facts and emotional truths, misinformation and disinformation, value placed on hard work, attributes of healthy relationships, preciousness of time, and the effects we have on our fellow mortals, all of which has got us to now, on the brink of societal destruction. And we see this epitomized in the microcosm of your shitshow

And I don't care if this is just how it is done in Hollywood. It shouldn't be- it's dumb, dangerous, unethical and doesn't work. Movies used to not have sound and Harvey the Hutt used to be a free and powerful man. Things evolve!

So please do better and until you do, I will be supporting you and calling you out on your shit. It's called tough love, and it may not be for everyone, but it is the tactic I am using for now. Anyone who disagrees has every right to block and/or ignore me. The only one I wish to debate any of this with is the BDF himself, and he ain't listening.

[wirewitchviolet]

It kind of hurts to think about just how stupid nazis are, and they need to be picked on about it more often.

It's late, I'm procrastinating about going to bed, and some nazi just wandered into a Discord server I'm in and started rambling in the most breathtakingly brainless way. He's not having any sort of conversation with anyone or saying anything relevant to the purpose of the channel, just... random stupid gibberish, mostly nazi coded, but mixed in with other stuff that's just... stupid. He's rambling about people clutching pearls over "the sexism and AI" in some banner ad that's just like, one of those generic corporate art deals with a bunch of random people smiling, and then he starts rambling about spiders and viruses that "shut computers down from epilepsy" and you can just see everyone else in the server having this mental debate over whether to just start shouting "what the hell are you even talking about you deluded weirdo? Do you even know what any of these words you're using mean?" or try to be more polite and diplomatic, or just pretend this loser isn't there.

Personally I'm biting my tongue because I have this strong urge to just kinda pin this creep to the wall and start interrogating him about why he's wasting his time watching youtube videos from other braindead losers and trying to parrot the incoherent garbage that comes out of their mouths, and how he expected people were going to react to this drivel, but I know this particular crowd wouldn't appreciate such an active effort to try and restart this piece of garbage's critical thinking skills.

For real though, it's one thing to internalize all the really really stupid propaganda and invent strawmen to try to argue with and all that, but even without the incoherent mutterings about feminism, this guy's making a first impression on a crowd of strangers that his brain doesn't function, he's not going to shut up, and he's just going to keep throwing out incomprehensible word salad until people stop paying attention or kick him out. How is that your gameplan in life? What sort of setting is that going to work in as a means of integrating with some sort of community?

This isn't the only recent example I've seen of this either. Someone was just telling me the other day how the whole nazi culture war sphere wasted like a week or two moaning and rending their garments because they got the idea in their head that in TMNT: Mutant Mayhem (which is really great, and you should see it), they "made Splinter gay." And like... they didn't. They didn't do anything that would ever give anyone that sort of impression. They actually made him rather emphatically heterosexual, and there's this whole bit about him wishing he could find a date. But... some braindead nazi got this idea in his head, somehow, and ranted about it because it was the best dumb culture war thing he could think of to ramble about, and then all the rest started parroting this idiot and shouting about how much they hate this movie that clearly not a one of them has actually watched, or read a review of, or seen a trailer for, or read a vague wikipedia summary on. They're just all making complete clowns of themselves for like a straight month. It's really just beyond pathetic seeing this stuff.

And like... I dunno. Obviously some of these people are so far gone there's nothing to be done for it but justified self-defense measures, but when these idiot children are first dipping a toe in the water, someone really needs to just pull them aside and ask them why the hell they think it's a good idea to take advise from the dumbest most reviled losers on the planet and start acting in a way that's obviously going to leave them completely and utterly shunned and ridiculed by basically every single person on the planet, you know?

[monty-glasses-roxy]

💚

Freddy and Roxy

💚 (Green heart) for a "these guys fucking hate each other" ship!

Oh boy now this is a fun one

Freddy and Roxy hating each other would be really entertaining actually. You could bring in some of that bratty nature that's apparently in the new books for Freddy and it could really thrive here.

Number one reason Freddy would hate Roxy though? She keeps breaking the rules. Constantly. She swears, she lets kids do a few things they shouldn't (nothing genuinely dangerous she's not that crazy just dumb fun stuff), she rips staffbots apart for fun and stress relief, she's a health and safety nightmare and that's before you bring in her fascination with fire. She drives him up the fucking wall with her stunts because at some point someone is going to get hurt! And why is she hanging around with a kid in Fazerblast when she should be at the Raceway?! What's her problem and why won't she do her fucking job?!

Number one reason for Roxy to hate Freddy? He's a stick in the mud. He keeps trying to further restrict what she can do in order to stop her from doing her own thing. He only really seems to talk to her when she's done something wrong or he has a few 'pointers' for her. She literally doesn't care. He lecture's her and even if she does care, she doesn't have the attention span to listen to his whole spiel and just kinda nods along absently till he's done. As far as she's concerned, all he does is waste her time with rules and regulations she already knows about because of some self righteous need to be leading her down the right path or whatever.

That's probably their main and most obvious start to hating each other. Other things for Freddy's side of things could be that he just finds Roxy's attitude annoying and frustrating to deal with, he could have a problem with her very prominent dog problems, he could be angry that she broke the rules and learned how to repair everyone which is a serious offence on the rule book, and if you really want to bring the brattiness into this? It pisses him off that a bad influence like her could possibly be considered as or more popular than him. Like, how is this wannabe allowed on stage with him when she can't even handle a five minute timeout without ripping her room to shreds and rampaging through the staffbot population? What's her fucking deal? Her snarky and rude comments just really fucking grate on him okay she pisses him off so hard.

For Roxy's side of things, she gets really annoyed when Freddy doesn't pay any attention to her when she tells him to piss off. Sometimes she just wants to be on her own for a bit of peace and quiet and this fucking prick of a bear has a special talent for showing up right at those times to lecture her about something and frustrate the living daylights out of her. And his clearly forced politeness grinds on her gears so much, she really wants to see him snap. Like, she really wants to see him just drop the act for five minutes and act like a normal fucking person but nah all she has literally ever gotten from him is the customer service smile and it annoys the shit out of her. He just doesn't take the hint when she outright tells him she wants some space, he actively seems to look down on her whenever she does something different, and he doesn't seem to appreciate a damn good thing she does. When he does tell her she's done a good job, it's so stunted that it feels like she's being praised by a janky typewriter. At this point, she admits she does a few things just to piss him off. If he's got a problem with her, he should damn well say it to her instead of trying to pretend he cares and trying to enforce rules on her.

What would make this more entertaining is if Freddy saw himself as the leader of the animatronics and when Roxy got put into the band, he felt like she threatened that a lot with her big personality and her bad habit of undermining his authority. Everyone talking about a power struggle between Monty and Freddy, how about a power struggle between Freddy and Roxy, huh? Roxy doesn't really care who leads, she just won't sit by while Freddy tries to boss her and everyone else around. Monty shares the sentiment and is now following her example and making Freddy even more mad. He's the leader man!! He is!! Not Roxy!! Why is everyone listening more to her than him??

Sucks to be Freddy, huh? Roxy just out here doing her thing and suddenly there's this guy trying to pressure her into 'setting a good example'. Freddy minding his own business and suddenly there's a wolf in the band that he feels is coming after the top spot.

Oh god that would actually be a really fun concept to throw in with a 'missing Foxy' situation. Freddy suspecting that Roxy murdered Foxy to get in the band and Roxy getting angry with him for even considering the possibility. Is Roxy after the top spot? Is she after his role as the leader? Are her anger issues making the others go along with her out of intimidation??? And oh my god can she stop with the snark she's not even funny god damn. Roxy could turn the tables on him too though. If he's accused her of killing Foxy to get into the band, she can accuse him of killing Foxy to keep his precious control over the band. It'd be an interesting concept for definite, though would need a lot of fine tuning.

A very fun concept! These two hating each other would be a fun dynamic to play around with I think!

[thoughts4all]

Day 315: Fuck George Orwell

Fuck being an adult. Fuck politics, fuck ideals, fuck power, fuck dominancy, fuck racism, fuck economics, fuck being politically correct, fuck trying to be perfect, fuck the abolition of fun.

For too long I am trying to be perfect. For trying to be act in the best interest of everyone. It is not in the best interest of everyone, but the best interest of myself. I just did not want enemies to deal with. Of course I do not mean to harm others, however I should not care so much to act without any inconvenience to others.

I wanted to keep this series of blogs clean from profanity however I believe that desire was constructed out of fear. Fear that my reputation or image might be soiled in terms of employment. I say fuck that. I have no intention to fill people with hate or inspire readers to practice hate. I want to inspire the expression of oneself. I feel restricted and trapped and want to just live. I have not done enough research on George Orwell, nor do I hate him so intently. I bought his book Animal Farm due to high regard but recently learned about the author himself. I feel deceived and sad I spent money on him so I am throwing an insult. The insult should not be taken too seriously, it is light and a genuine apology will follow if I am mistaken or cause serious misinformed harm. I just want to act genuinely instead of throwing all my emotions inside, only showing the perfect face society expects to see. I just want to be real and live life before adulthood. I want to act like a kid and a teenager. That is when we were truly happy. Without a worry in the world. We acted free without consequences. We did not have to hide behind norms. If someone believes I deceived them, they are welcome to insult me. I would like for them to act genuinely. Since I have no ill intentions, once the matter is resolved I would expect a genuine apology. If I did have ill intentions then fuck me anyways then.

Life is too short to be caught up in all this drama worldwide. What happened to play, fun and laughter? Nowadays, everyone is drawn to what next negative thing is happening in the world. Why don't we see news of kindness. Maybe that would inspire acts of kindness all around the world, if we see kindness every time we see media. Maybe that could be a cool project for me. Report on positive stories around the world.

I am always caught up with trying to fix the world. I am also caught up with trying to find a way to become an entrepreneur. I am also extremely caught up with blaming myself for wasting my time instead of taking steps towards my dreams.

However, I believe life was happiest when living like a teen (or a kid). For me and the general population perhaps. I should quite literally "do what I love" (or like for that matter). I like writing this and suddenly I have immense motivation and hope for the rest of the day, even thought the day is arriving its completion.

I was tired throughout most of the day. I kept watching youtube instead of coding. I was too tired to do anything I just wanted to chill. The action of learning to code had too large of a coefficient of static friction (My unique spin on this term). It was watching a video on web development that is slow and not very fun. There is not any problem solving. I am just listening and coping the code. So instead I will find a course that is more fun. I know I start courses way more than I finish them. However, I will do what I like. I will do what is fun.

Another note, I am fun. I think this word is good for me. Fun is good. Fun is fun. It makes life enjoyable. It is often my solution to a lot and it is often the incorrect medium for this remedy, however it is one I enjoy and believe I am good at. It is my personality with my family.

HOLY SHIT, I am (and will) losing my personality with my family. I am fostering a new one with my brother since he has changed a lot and I see him in contexts of a friend a lot, however we will still share our old personalities in our memories.

Anyways, now off to code with my new found motivation.

[jude-thedude98]

The Price You Pay for Politeness is Your Time

By Mr. PoetAll

Momma,

I wanna be kind.

I wanna be the kind

That holds doors open all the time.

Momma,

I wanna be the kind that says please and thank you all the time.

Poppa,

I wanna be the kind

That tells people

I apologize

Instead of admitting

How sorry I am all the time.

But Momma, Poppa

I can't be that kind.

Because people take my kind

For weak.

And since we in the middle of the week,

I feel the need to at least show half my cheek.

After all it ain't the first time I've been called half-ass.

So moving past that

I have to pass gas

Like moving fuel from the pump

To the car...

Wait.

Do the math.

How much is on Pump 1?

Do I even have to ask?

Fill 'er up and make that shizz. last.

People be treating me like a trash bag.

Maybe it's cuz I let em

Or may be bcuz I was GBKid

Always taking the garbage out.

You can ask, Dad.

Or ask Mom.

Till this day if I swing through

I still make sure

That if the garbage is full

I take it to the street.

Because I know the repeat.

Been the same game since I was little and weak.

But I guess the world thinks

I'm still little in a week.

So ima give em a little more of me every week.

Show em how strong I am

And how much garbage I been takin' every week.

And this ain't to throw no shade on you.

But it is to compact the truth.

Because I'm tired of the booth.

Sitting here, quiet in refuse.

I don't no longer wanna be violent

This is true.

Silence is still violence

That's true too.

So three more things and I'm done.

I had fun being disabled.

But I enable me.

This is my empowerment poem even if I gotta look at this shizz daily v

And I ain't cuss for you Momma.

That's how much respect I got for you COMMA.

Pause wait.

Hold up Dad.

I know it's time.

It's about time

That my name is signed

In the Book of Life line.

Because for too many life's I

Tried to save others

But i

Can't save no-one but myself

So time

Passes like a clock in space.

An Everlasting tick

I will not waste.

Not like the waistband

They kept me around their wasteland

Like I was the fat they needed to burn off.

Well that's cool.

Because it's high time

I sing mine, mine

Bailamos

I'm going to let The River In Heaven take me over

Mikhail Baryshnikov knows.

And don't think that I forgot about two.

Two reasons I don't want to deal with you:

Because after so many chances, you did not change

And because the only way you would is if I had change.

Money hungry,

Boy you bug me.

Your like a zit in a bug's life

You stay comin' funny.

And I try not to talk about you because then I'd be called everything but a dummy, dummy

But I can't stand the way you act.

Why you always running from me?

And oops,

When my mind slips in and out of the predators

I prey that I'd be a better bird.

Because this politeness

Is not a likeness

Of mine.

Instead I'm striking

Like lightning.

Tightening

On this grip,

I hope you feel this

Ikening.

And I ain't talking Mikening.

Cause this flow

Ain't sugar coated candy no mo'.

Nah, nah, nah!

Instead

You got to go.

And for the ones that tried or still try to play me:

Here's number 3.

Three timed three

Is nine.

Plus 3 is twelve.

Minus one decipal

Is E11even.

You were

Key word

Were

That decipal

That betrayed me.

Every time I bent over to do something for you

You broke me daily.

Left me broke,

Broke my home,

And confidence and courage broke.

So nope!

My Mother's Day and Father's Day present

Is to finally choke

Something back.

My dreams, my goals, my aspiratipns

Are on choke

Hold

Mode.

So if you float with me

Know that my politeness ain't free

Because I've been portrayed weak too long

Now it's time to be clockwise

And counter this time-song

Push the seconds past the hour

Tiking

Toking

Time

Bomb!

[electricbluebutterflies]

“ how long are you staying? “ “ for as long as you need me. “

Modern-AU early-relationship Jessica/Leto in the one cute continuity I have a lot of thoughts about and keep forgetting to write. PG-ish and also on ao3.

She’s never been good at asking for help.

If anything, that often feels like a distinct understatement. The survival skills that had helped her find her way out of a toxic environment are apparently rather maladaptive outside of it, but Jessica has felt no real inclination to learn new ones. Her trust issues worked in the past, and they give her adequate armor now, and-

Her brain doesn’t work today, on a level even she can’t just push through and ignore, and it occurs to her that she should probably develop better emergency contacts than she currently has.

A more functional person, she thinks, would not be desperate enough to reach out to someone she’s informally seeing. The exact details of the dynamic are unclear beyond how hesitant it is, how annoyingly obvious that she has baggage that needs to be handled with care, but she hasn’t screwed it up yet, and-

She’s about to, she’s pretty sure. Asking someone she hasn’t let tongue-kiss her yet to come over and help make sure she doesn’t self-destruct feels like a pretty solid way to get rid of the poor man. But she doesn’t have better ideas, and she’s fairly sure he doesn’t have anything better to do, so… what’s the worst that could happen? It’s just a polite, hopefully minimal-pressure text. Not an emergency, just a bad day, she’ll be fine if he can’t, she’ll be fine, she’ll be-

I’ll be there as soon as I can, he texts back instead, and so help her, she even believes it.

She’s not even sure what’s wrong, never a good sign when she’s in this mode – a clear flashback would be easier, would blow over faster – and she sees the wasted weekend ahead of her, the projects she won’t tackle due to lost time. Cleaning will at least get done when the fog starts to clear, she can throw herself into all of that tomorrow and be alright, but the little tiny things won’t, the embroidery project she’d meant to start into won’t, she won’t-

She doesn’t move from the couch when she hears the door open. She’s never brought anyone into her spaces, and under other circumstances she’d be nervous about it, what her sparse yet distinctive attempt at decorating might reflect about her, tiny judgments in color choices and wall art and-

“Can I say I did not expect that text?”

No malice, she processes. No implications that she’s ruined his weekend, even though she’s pretty sure she has. Nothing that should make her curl into a ball, but she still does. This was a bad idea, this was one of the worst ideas she’s ever had, she knows she’s not thinking clearly but this was still a mistake, this was still-

“Are you sure it’s just brain stuff?”

Jessica looks up and tries to glare at her partner. “Go ahead and tell me why you’re asking,” she hisses. This’ll be good. No one decent wants to tether themselves to a visible trainwreck, and she’s tried to be so careful these past few weeks, and-

“You just look… visibly not okay,” he says like those aren’t the words he wants to use but he’s trying to be tactful. “That’s not…”

“This is me not trying,” she replies. Hair loose and messy, eyes clearly tired from random crying episodes, at least she’s wearing clean clothing but certainly not anything worth seeing her in, she’s not pretty right now, she’s not-

“I do not get you.”

“Then why are you here?!”

“Because I would like to think I’m a decent person, and you apparently don’t have better options, and… you worry me. Is that what you want me to say?”

It’s not wrong, she thinks, nor is it delicate like she feared. If he sees her as more fragile than she actually is, he isn’t acting like it right now, and that’s such a strange comfort, and-

“Do you mean it?”

“Completely.”

She’s not good at any of this, and it’s been occurring to her more and more often how alone she actually is and how that may be less than ideal. The fear of it all as she starts to bloom, as she is so scared of screwing this up because she can’t imagine anyone else would be this patient with her, this strange fragile emotion that might be love but she isn’t sure she’s capable of that just yet, and she-

“How long are you staying?”

Minutes have passed and she hasn’t really moved, just stayed put and watched him take in the surroundings, and he hasn’t said anything good bad or otherwise and she’s not sure if that’s a good thing or not, and-

“As long as you need me. Whatever that looks like.”

“I’m not exactly…”

“I don’t know how to… what you want,” he says, and she is thankful for this, how open he is about being in over his head with her. “Tell me how to take care of you.”

She doesn’t know, really. It had been a fleeting idea an hour ago, the realization that she doesn’t have to be alone and stuck in her head, that she has other options now and she might as well try to wear them out, and she hadn’t expected that would go anywhere and now it has, and-

“I don’t know what I’m doing either. Is that…”

“I’m not sure if I want to drag you to a museum or curl up on that couch with you.”

“I like the second option.”

The fog is still present – she will not allow herself to think that another human presence can actually help – but just a little lighter as positions are figured out, as she lets herself be held and realizes that it’s starting to feel familiar, that their bodies fit right together and she’s the right kind of warm and-

“Is this… normal?”

“The fog?”

“If that’s what you call it, yeah?”

“This bad, every couple months. Not frequent enough for me to get it… looked into. I’ve been through things and sometimes my mind remembers and-“

“Understood.”

“I can tough it out if I have to do things. Only if I have to. Obviously today…”

“I don’t get you,” he says again, and it’s so much lighter this time. “But I want to.”

“I’m sure you planned on doing something more interesting than spending an afternoon on a really questionable couch with a useless… whatever I am to you, but-“

“What, you don’t think this is interesting?”

Jessica turns her head to glare at him, almost playful. “I’m not fun right now.”

“Look, I understand desperation, but you did ask me to take care of you and I’m not going to ignore the significance of that and-“

“You make me feel safe,” she replies. “And also extremely confused, but safe.”

He kisses the side of her head. “This is much, much more interesting than anything else I’d be doing right now.”

“What am I getting you out of this time?”

“The kind of bored alone afternoon that makes me consider getting a dog. You don’t… how do you feel about dogs?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yeah. It’s going to matter. If you want to stick around…”

This is clearly no moment to admit some of her daydreams, but she hears the hope in his voice, the idea that her feelings on things like pets might end up very significant in the long run, and she wants, she wants-

“I’m not really an animal person. If you’ll look around you, you’ll see I can barely keep a cactus alive. But I could live with a dog, if I had to.”

“So, no dog. Got it.”

“I’m not-“

“Worst case scenario, I’m just delaying here. I can wait until we figure us out. Is that okay?”

“Yeah.”

[sometimesrosy]

I’ve been following you since The 100 days and somehow never realized you answer life asks too. I’m sorry for dumping this on you but I saw anon’s ask about falling back in love with life and realized I’m kind of in the same boat. I’m 26 and completely disappointed and I feel like I’m too young to be stressing this much about life when I should be enjoying it. I’m not sure why but lately the idea that I could be an actress popped up in my mind (don’t laugh people!). Since small I have imagined myself giving interviews and walking the red carpet without an exact reason for it but acting always seemed the one that fit the most. I never did anything related to theater but where I grew up it wasn’t even encouraged. Actually I’m not sure we even have a local theater. I had a friend or two who went to acting schools and do a few productions now. If I kind of feel I’m wasting my life away NOW I’d probably feel it even more if I let go of everything and went to acting school without having ever done anything close to it. I don’t live in a country where acting is big. Of course we have our local productions (and now Chris Evans is dating a Portuguese actress!) and I’m scared I would probably just end up disappointing myself even more. I mean, it’s just a whim, I’ve never done anything related so how do I even know I’m good? People around me have no idea either. Should I try and do something about this whim?

YES!

Go for it!

Listen. No one is going to blame you for being stressed out about life. EVERYONE is stressed out about life. It is singularly the most tumultuous time, possibly, in recent history. You can make an argument for it. With all the upheaval. Personal, political, global, environmental. Please don't think you're too young to stress. That is no longer a thing, if it was ever a thing.

If you want to try acting. ABSOLUTELY do it.

I'm not an actor, so not an expert on this, although I have known a LOT of actors in my life. My sister's a hair stylist now but for years she was focused an acting.

We lived in NYC which gave her the opportunity to take acting classes and audition and do showcases and off off off (off) broadway. But even smaller places can have acting classes or community theaters. Start examining what kind of options there are for you to learn and practice with other people.

I'm sure that you get to watch a lot of great acting performances, what with our current access to videos and films. Try choosing your next watch based on the actors. Pick some great actors and study what they are doing, how they draw out emotions. Watch different productions of the same content and see the way the actors play the same role differently. Plays are good for this because it's less about the production.

Also read about acting. There are books that I know are important in the field although I am not sure which ones. You'd probably want to google that one, unless some of my followers have suggestions. Even though acting is something that needs to be done, PERFORMED, there's still a lot of thought that goes into the performance and if you learn how other actors think about their performance it might help you.

What else? Oh. You know this might feel silly or pointless, but a platform like tiktok or instagram or youtube might help you with this. I've seen little acting challenges on instagram reels where a person will take on a little snippet of a scene, reading off of someone else or off of an audio. It's not silly. It's not pointless. It's learning. It's practicing.

Anyway, it's quite possible that YOU know more about acting than I do, because it's something you have thought about while I'm like. Acting? Nah. I mean I was in one play in college and dabbled in playwriting, but it's not for me. I'd rather be behind the scenes. But ABSOLUTELY YES PLEASE GO EXPLORE BEING AN ACTOR. :)

[incorrectmahabharatquotes]

@lil-stark Hello, OP here.

I have a few things to say so I'll put them in nice numbered list for the sake of organisation of thoughts and ideas. Does that sound good?

1. What I find funny is that you're functioning on the assumption here that Hindus are any less vicious when it comes to politicising religion. Even though, I'll argue that religion is inherently political due to it's very nature of influencing how people act and behave and it's occasional use as a tool of control by certain entities. But for your sake, I'll pretend that that isn't the case and that religion is wholly and uniquely free of any sort of politics. I don't say things about other religions because of one simple reason: it's not my religion so I have no business saying things about topics I have no personal knowledge of and experience with. When you say that I should try saying stuff about Abrahamic religions, you have decided that Hindus are more accepting than the other religions.(by which, I'm assuming you meant Christianity and Islam specifically) Take one look at our inbox and you'll learn that this is so false, it's laughable. I would like to extend an invitation to you to just look at the news and tell me that Hindus are lovely and accepting people when it comes to anything about any sort of perceived offense against Hinduism. If you still hold on to your decision, then I'm sort of jealous of the powers of denial that you wield.

2. This is such a weird post to be commenting this on as compared to literally any other post of mine. Because I was just talking about two separate books that I had read that had a similar conclusion about Krishna's philosophy and ideology. There's nothing offensive in the post. Unless, of course, you believe that communism is bad and that calling someone a communist is the equivalent of a gaali(curse-word, for anyone who doesn't speak Hindi). In which case, this is a separate issue that should be addressed but I won't be doing that because better people than me have already done and you should look it up.

3. I've literally never said that I'm quirky and unique for making memes. In fact, if you spent literally any amount of time actually reading through any of the multiple times I've explained my reasoning and opinions about it. But you're a person on the internet. You didn't have the time to go through other posts because that's not how the internet works. The internet is all about reacting in split seconds. Which is fair, I'll give you that. For this read to point 4.

4. The simplest rule of the internet is don't like, don't read/interact. Why is it that you and everyone who sends us comments like this acts like I'm somehow forcing them to look at my posts? Why is it that you and others act like it's your personal duty and crusade to inform me that I'm being disrespectful or "blasphemous"? I just don't understand how hard it is for people to look at something and say to themselves "eh, I don't agree with this" and simply move on. Why waste your time and mine on this? You are never going to see my point of view even if I tried to explain myself. You've decided I'm wrong so I'm wrong. Why waste your energy on making sure that I KNOW that you think I'm wrong? Unless you wanted that dopamine rush of being right on the internet. If that is so, then, CONGRATULATIONS! YOU'VE WON AND ARE RIGHT! Enjoy your victory, buddy. I wish you the best in life.

-Mod S

(It's actually not weird and I understand the decision completely but I just wrote it that way for the meme.)

-Mod S

[bi-bard]

The Line - Peter Parker Imagine (The Amazing Spider-Man)

Title: The Line

Pairing: Peter Parker X Reader

Word Count: 1,322 words

Warning(s): fighting, mentions of slight violence

Summary: After trying to be understanding, (Y/n) draws a line and Peter has to figure out how to handle that.

Author's Note: Now... I am a DC fan. I have been for years. However... I do love Andrew Garfield. Go watch Tick... Tick... Boom! on Netflix.

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

I let out a sigh as I slammed my door.

Three dates. Three dates were suddenly canceled or ended about five minutes in because Peter had a whole city to save. To put it politely... I was pissed.

I tried to be understanding but there were only so many times that I could forgive and forget. I could not always sacrifice so much energy and never get anything back for it. It made me feel selfish, but I was starting to let myself be angry about it.

I walked over to close my blinds, so I could go to bed.

I didn't want to call Peter or read or work on anything. I had notecards covering one wall with half of a plot written out and I didn't have the energy to add to it.

As soon as my hands grabbed the curtains, Peter's head popped in front of my window. I yelled but covered my mouth quickly. He pulled the mask off his head and gave me a cheesy smile.

I pushed the window up and glared at him. I wanted to make my anger obvious. He seemed confused about all of this. It only made me more upset. With a roll of my eyes, I turned away from him and walked away from the window.

"What's wrong," he asked, climbing through my window slowly.

"You aren't stupid enough to actually ask me that question," I sighed, turning to face him and pinching the bridge of my nose.

He was still acting like he was confused. I rolled my eyes.

"Last Wednesday, a movie we both wanted to see comes out in theaters and we go," I explained. "Ten minutes in, you went to the bathroom because you ignored when I told you that you should go before... and then you never came back because you heard police sirens. On Saturday, I waited in the front area of a restaurant for two hours before you sent me a very half-assed text... without an apology, I might add-"

"You know why I-"

"I am not done," I snapped. "And tonight. You were supposed to take me out for my birthday. And you sprinted out in about twenty minutes because of an emergency. You said it should have been a fast thing, so I wasted my birthday by waiting for you again!"

"I was saving people-"

"Then stop setting dates with me!"

"What?"

"I am sick and tired of being let down, Peter," I tried to ignore the feeling of tears in my eyes. "Stop making promises. Please. I can't do it anymore."

"Hey, I'm sorry," Peter stepped forward and cupped the sides of my face, pulling me closer. "I'm so, so sorry."

He kept mumbling that he was sorry as he leaned over and kissed me. He pecked my lips over and over. It took me a moment to come to my senses and push him back.

"Stop," I muttered. He leaned forward again and pressed his lips to mine again. It made me angry all over again. I should him back roughly and stumble backward, "Stop!"

Peter looked down and frowned.

"I... I want you to go," I pointed to the window. When he didn't move, I shouted, "Now!"

"I'm... I'm sorry," he mumbled again before crawling out the window.

I slammed it shut and locked it behind him. Peter turned around and looked at me in shock. I just clenched my jaw and closed my curtains.

I rubbed my hands over my face and sighed.

I just needed to sleep. Let this bad night roll off... and hope that the best relationship I've ever had didn't just go completely sour.

--time skip--

I woke up the next morning, curled up around one of my pillows. My nose was pressed into the fabric. The one that Peter would lay on whenever he was here.

It brought back memories. Waking up after a nap and seeing him smile at me. Making him read to me when I didn't have the energy. Studying together where he'd relax up by my headboard and I'd sit on the other end.

I put the pillow back where it belonged and sat up. I pulled my knees up so I can rest my elbows on them. I let out a sigh.

I should call him, I thought. No, no. He messed up. Make him call you. But that might be a waste of time... which will prove that we're... over.

I looked up to my window, hoping to find something else to focus on.

There was something on the window.

I stood up and walked over. It was a heart traced on my window. A heart made of spider webs. I couldn't help it... I smiled.

I jumped when Peter dropped in front of me. He seemed shocked to see me too. I was up earlier than usual. He held up a coffee cup holder with a small grin. He brought breakfast.

I was going to open the window but froze. I didn't want to wreck his work. I touched the window lightly and looked back at him.

I shook my head.

His face turned sad.

I pointed for him to go around. He nodded.

I took the moment of privacy to clean up a little. Just to look a little less messy. I walked over to the door to let Peter in.

"Happy... late birthday," he said with a guilty smile.

I grinned awkwardly and let him in. He walked in slowly before finally putting the coffee on the table. He turned back to me.

"I'm sorry," he repeated. "I know that I let you down. I never meant to do that. I didn't think about what I was doing to you by going completely silent and leaving you on your own. I'm... I'm so sorry."

I stood there for a second.

"I can just leave this stuff here and leave-"

I wrapped him in a hug before he could continue talking.

"Am I forgiven," Peter chuckled as he hugged me back.

"I think so," I smiled as I stepped back enough to look at him. "I... umm..."

I froze right at the last moment.

"What is it," he asked. I shook my head, stepping away from him and looking down nervously. "No, no, no. We were having a moment. Don't back out of it now."

"I... I love you," I muttered.

Peter stepped forward and cupped the sides of my face. When our eyes met, he gave me a sweet smile. I felt like shying away again just so I could avoid the intensity in this moment. He was close enough that the slightest move would press our lips together.

"Guess what," he asked quietly.

I hummed in response. I was lost in his eyes and being so close seemed to make my mind fog up.

"I love you too," he said before closing the distance between us. "So. Much."

I wouldn't have the strength to pull away if I wanted to. It was such an intense and intimate moment. My entire body felt like it was heating up. It was a trance. And I was happy to be in it.

"You brought coffee," I asked, finally pulling away.

"Always have the priorities in order."

"Absolutely," I replied.

"Go sit down," Peter pushed me toward one of the chairs at the table. "I'll serve breakfast."

He must have sensed that I was uneasy.

"No, I'm not cooking," he promised. "I have food in my backpack."

"Thank God," I chuckled.

"Hey!"

"You almost burned down my kitchen-"

"I forgot to set the timer," he laughed as he tried to explain himself.

We both fell silent after a minute.

"I love you," I repeated, no hesitation this time.

"I love you too," he said.

At that moment, the entire city disappeared. It was just the two of us. And that moment of peace was perfect for me.

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

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[yyxgin]

lee felix’s guide to hating you

— ♡ FIC BANNER MADE BY THE AMAZING @chogiwow !!

pairing: lee felix x fem!reader genre: college au, tutor au ; fluff, angst, slice of life, slow burn word count: 21 k warnings: mentions of alcohol, mention of weed, swearing, bad family relationships

a/n: this story is very briefly inspired by jaemin’s drama ‘the way i hate you’ :) also this idea has been in my mind for such a long time, so i’m happy i finally managed to write it. this is also my longest fic so far, i hope it’s worth it. uhh yea enjoy <3

taglist: @feyregels​ @missskzbiased​ @hyunyin​ @koishua​ @crispy-chan​ @rindomo​ @soulssung​ @thatrandomoneinthecorner​ @90shermione​ @chogiwow​ @creatichee​ @freckledberries​ @hyunnies-stars​ 

There’s a list of things Lee Felix knew before applying for college-- and that is: 1) he really, desperately needs a degree for his grandparents to value him as an equal adult, 2) college in young adult movies seems like fun and partying and alcohol really does sound like his wettest dream, 3) he doesn’t need to work for another 4 years, which is fun and 5) he is really, horribly bad at studying.

Here’s a list of things Lee Felix, however, did not know before applying for college, and even though it’s fairly shorter, it hits you in the guts deeper, and that is: 1) studying for college means never ending chapters of insomnia and 2) he is always going to feel like the second choice for everyone. 

You see, girls don’t like Felix that much. Well, that’s a lie-- girls do go after him, tell him he’s cute and his freckles are adorable, but that’s only after they find out there’s no use in chasing after his best friend Han Jisung when he gets himself a new significant other. Boys don’t go after Felix either. Why, you may ask? Read the paragraph over again-- just change the word girls to the word boys. It’s as simple as that. He’s always the second choice, the back-up plan. It feels silly to drag his grandma into this, really, but the truth is, he’s a second choice in every aspect of his life, and that, too, includes his big (and still growing) family that treats him as something less than a human just because of the fact that his grades aren’t as good as his cousin’s are and he doesn’t have a degree in biological science, although he’s too young for that and his college years only started. It’s hard, living in his shoes.

What is Felix, however, really good at? 

Cheating.

Yeah, well, you see-- it’s not funny to be the outcast of the smart Lee family and it’s also not enetaining in the slightest to be the only single one at family gatherings (read as: weddings, because every single one of his relatives decided to fuck up their life with marriage in the past three years for some unknown reason). So Felix does what he’s the best at, and that is going by his favorite life motto: fake it ‘til you make it. 

He cheats on every single one of his exams and believe me when I tell you he’s the top of the class just because he’s the best cheater in town. Good cheating techniques equal good grades and suddenly, Felix’s life seems much brighter when he spends his sleepless nights with creating cheat sheets instead of studying and copying essays written in korean, translating them to english and submitting them as his own because no one will ever notice-- his degree is within the reach of his hand and he can already feel all the grandmas of the family clapping in joy, maybe even wiping away a stray tear on his graduation ceremony in a few years with bouquets of flowers in their hands and expensive watches in their gift bags, ready to welcome him back into the family.. 

What he doesn’t expect, though, is the cute little saying of ‘every lie has short legs’ he swears he heard sometimes in his linguistic class before, coming to life right in front of his eyes as the professor of his Biology class makes him the assigned tutor of the sweet Y/N Y/L/N, because, well, he clearly doesn’t know anything-- what’s he supposed to tutor now? 

The best cheating techniques?

The freckled boy sitting in front of you looks at you with furrowed brows and you wonder what’s the matter with him. Is there something on your face? Are you not dressed appropriately for the occasion? I mean, it’s only a tutoring session, so you didn’t put that much effort into it, but judging from the casual outfit enveloping his body, he didn’t really try to look fancy either. So what was it with him that made him stare you down as if you had horns on your head?

“Shall we start?” he asks once he’s done staring, voice sounding determined. You wonder if he sees the hints of nervousness on your face and if he notices the way you shrink in your seat in the mention of biology, but you guess he doesn’t know you that well to know that you fear the subject as much as you fear dying. 

“Yeah, sure,” you nod, scooting closer to the edge of your seat so you’re not so far away from the table. Felix-- your new biology tutor-- is sitting opposite of you and it’s quite difficult to read the text book once it’s upside down, but you don’t dare to mention it to him for a reason that’s unknown to you as well. It’s like you don’t want to overstep any invisible boundary on your first tutoring session, and telling the person that is teaching you to turn around the text book so you can actually see and learn something seems to be one of the taboos in your eyes. 

You take a quick glance at the waiter that just stopped next to your booth and smile, opening up your mouth to order yourself a meal. “Can I get you anything else?” she asks.

“No-” Felix offers her with a shy smile, but you cut him off with a voice a little higher in the octaves, not wanting your tutor coming in between you and reaching your biggest goal you’ve set for yourself.

“Actually, yes. Could I please get the chicken wings? With fries?” you ask, trying to look as innocent as you can, smiling at her in politeness. You ignore the confused look Lee Felix is offering you from the other side of the table. You mentally send him a signal to tell him to mind his own business, watching the waitress leave with a nod and a polite smile. 

“Okay, now we can start,” you nod at him and focus all your attention to the boy with sandy hair in front of you.

“O...kay?” he answers, obviously trying to bat away his rising confusion, because ordering yourself chicken wings on your tutoring session is prohibited now, apparently. “So,” he starts, sighing and scratching the back of his neck, “what do you not understand from this section?” 

You nervously chew on the bottom of your lip. Well, that’s a sweet question, you think. It would have been much sweeter and much easier to answer, though, if you understood at least a bit from the things you’re supposed to know. You went to university with the urge to prove something to yourself, but the only thing you’re proving to yourself right now is the fact that you are actually kind of useless, when it comes to biology.

“Just like the… whole thing, actually,” you nod, trying not to look as defeated as you feel and also trying not to burst out in a manic laugh as you always do when you feel slightly nervous about anything.

“Cool, cool, yeah,” he nods, taking a deep breath in, turning the textbook around and sighing, “I don’t think I can help you with that.”

“What do you mean you can’t?” you ask, confused. 

Lee Felix is the top of the grade. He is the best at biology, he is the best at chemistry, he is the best at his farmacy class. You’re sure he’ll be a fine biochemist in a few years, when his college times are over. Lee Felix is the smartest boy in your biology class and you are, coincidentally, quite the opposite on this spectrum. Which is exactly why your teacher managed to make Felix tutor you in his free time. You weren’t surprised at the fact that the blonde boy agreed to this-- he was quite the sweetheart, really. All the girls in your class fawned upon the way his freckles shined in the sunlight and the way he opened the doors for older professors. He was quite the boy you would want to introduce to your parents. Not quite the one every girl goes after, but the one that you would want to settle down with after your college years are over.

So why is he, the sweet, but also smart boy that agreed to tutor you, now telling you he can’t help you?

“It’s just.. I’m not really good at this section, I mean-”

“Felix, you’re the top of the class. Of course you’re good at this section.” you mumble, gazing deep into his eyes, trying to search for an answer.

“I-” he says and takes a sharp breath in, stopping himself in continuing his train of thought and just opting to shrug, not giving you a proper response either.

You feel like someone just punched you in the gut, and that’s when you realise-- here it is again. Another person that doesn’t believe in you-- another person that needs proving that you really can do it, you just need a little push. You can see it in his eyes that he doesn’t think you’re smart or bright enough to pass the exams, you’re not good enough to get good grades. It’s nothing new to you, but it still haunts you just the same.

“Is it because you know I can’t do it?” you bluntly ask, sighing. 

“No! No, no, I never said that-” he says, almost panicking with the way his hands fly into the air hurriedly, waving them around as if it was meant to calm you down. 

“You’re acting like it, though. I promise I’m not stupid- well, maybe I am, but-”

“You’re not stupid! It’s me! I’m the stupid one here.” he says, effectively silencing you with his words as you stare at him, dumbfounded. He’s joking, right?

“How can you be stupid when you get only the best grades? Felix, if you just don’t want to waste your time here, tell me, but don’t try to hide behind poor excuses.” you roll your eyes, feeling frustrated at the boy’s antics. Does he really think you’re that stupid that you can’t see right through his lies?

“I cheat.”

You blink a few times as if to reset your brain, gazing at him with pure confusion written in your orbs. He cheats? No. That’s a lie. A person as good at biology as Felix can’t cheat. All his exams are on 100% and he never makes any mistakes. He’s the epitome of the smart kid. The little Einstein. The prodigy. There’s no way it’s all cheating.

“No.” you shake your head in disapproval. “Don’t lie to me.”

“I’m not lying! Look, I genuinely, really want to help you. I really do. The thing is, though, I don’t know how to study. I make cheat sheets and I use them at every exam and every test, that’s why everyone thinks I’m super smart, but that is really not the case,” he shakes his head, staring into your eyes with his wide open in honesty, wanting you-- no,-- needing you to understand. “I would tutor you if I could, really, but I just don’t know how to,” he sighs finally, acting like he’s just given birth or ran a marathon, exhaustion written all over his face.

“So why did you offer to tutor me, then?” you ask.

He takes a moment for himself to collect his thoughts, before he speaks up again. “Well, I didn’t really want to get caught. You see, I would never turn my back to anyone. Really. So I thought I could at least try to learn something? So I could help you? But I failed, as always, so I’m just coming clean in front of you and you have to promise me you won’t tell anyone.”

The moment the last sentence leaves his mouth, you notice the apparent fear in his eyes, realising that he just shared an information with you that nobody really knows. It’s a secret he’s been hiding and keeping from everyone just to appear as the smartest one-- fooling everyone, including you. You feel even more stupid now, under his gaze. You feel played. You came to the tutoring, hoping to finally get a grip, when all you get is a person that is stepping all over the sandcastle of your fragile dreams, kicking every little piece of sand away with his lies. You know you shouldn’t feel so invested in this. You shouldn’t feel so hurt. But somehow, you still do. 

“So you just told me you are lying to everyone and cheating on tests and you want me to keep it a secret from everyone?” you ask in disbelief.

“Yes.” he nods, eyes hopeful. He’s been lying for the last year as if his life was depending on it and now he wants you to do the same-- keep quiet in front of everyone.

“And what do I do when the professor asks me why I’m not getting any better? Huh? Ever thought of that?” you leash out, harshly chewing on your bottom lip in nerves. “I want to pass. And I want to do it fair and square.” you get out in between your teeth.

“I didn’t… I didn’t think of that yet, but-”

“Leave.” you say, looking him sternly into his eyes.

“What do you mean, leave?”

“I don’t want to talk to you anymore. And you’re clearly not here to teach me anything, so you can just take your things and leave.” you spit out, crossing your hands over your chest.

“You leave, then,” he mutters, looking rather offended. You’re not sure why he’s the one hurt right now, but you guess that’s just how men and their egos are, there’s nothing more under his hurt eyes and shattered self-esteem.

“I ordered food, I’m not leaving.” you calmly respond. Once you say this, you’re reminded of the little quest you made for yourself. Never once did you feel silly for taking it so seriously in front of your other friends, but now, in front of Lee Felix with freckled dusted cheeks, you feel almost invisible as you realise why you even ordered the chicken wings and how you’re going to write a yelp review about them later.

Well, someone has to do it, and if not you, then who will, right? It’s the only valid way to find out who makes the best chicken wings in the town and not even your traitor-tutor is going to stop you now, when your list is only getting shorter and shorter. 

He stares at you for a few moments, dumbfounded, before he sighs and accepts his defeat. “Okay, I’ll just have to text my roommate to pick me up,” he admits.

You nod, just in time the server comes back with your food, offering her a welcoming smile. “Fine. But don’t even think of talking to me from now on. I’m not interested in more lies,” you spit at him, scowling as you take a look at the plate of chicken wings sitting in front of you in their full glory. You sense a very bad review, judging from the way the chicken wings look nothing like wings, rather full on small chickens dipped in oil, but dive in nonetheless. 

“Why do you have to be so dramatic?” he asks, voice coated in disbelief.

“Because I was scammed!” you yell out, mouth full of chicken, not caring a second about the way you might look in the boy’s eyes. Yes, you could have at least swallowed before speaking to him, but did you do it? No. No, you didn’t. 

“Oh come on-”

“Don’t even try arguing with me!” you spit at him-- quite glad that this time, it’s not literal-- and huff out in annoyance, when the door opens and a short boy with a bucket hat on steps into the bistro, the red fabric of the seats of the booths contrasting with his shoes in a way that makes you feel captivated, your eyes refusing to tear themselves away from him. 

The boy is taking quick steps to your booth and you almost choke on your chicken wings as you admire his full glory-- tanned skin and car keys in his hand, but his eyes meet the boy sitting opposite of you and that’s when everything clicks. This is not the boy of your dreams, this is Han Jisung. Your tutor’s best friend and roommate-- also known as the resident heartbreaker. You shouldn’t feel weak in your knees when you look at him, but that’s exactly what happens and you won’t feel ashamed about it. Well, not now, at least. In a few hours when you’re lying in your bed? Maybe. But I’ll tell you then.

“Yo, dude, I texted you like five minutes ago that I’m waiting for you outside, what are you still doing here?” he asks, furrowing his brows at his roommate and slowly moving his eyes to you, scanning you up and down, leaving your heart to do the stupid cartwheel you haven’t felt since, like, middle school. 

“We were in the middle of an argument, so I didn’t hear my phone ring.” Felix answers, glaring at you with spiteful eyes. You almost prepare to kill him with yours, but you focus on wiping the oil from the corner of your mouth and smiling heavenly, trying to look like a lady in front of your new visitor.

“Was Felix being absolutely unbearable again?” he asks you, surprising you with his subtle way of engaging you into the conversation.

You giggle, rolling your eyes slightly. “Yeah. You know him too well, don’t you?”

“Unfortunately,” he admits, looking defeated, when he moves his eyes to Felix, looking rather sulky on the red seat in front of you as you chat with his roommate, when Jisung’s tone of voice changes into a more worried one, speaking up again, “does she… did you…?”

“Yeah,” Felix just nods. 

Jisung sighs, sitting down next to his roommate, pushing him a little so he has more space in the booth. “What are you supposed to tutor her anyway?” he asks.

“Biology,” you mumble sooner than Felix gets the chance to speak up, motioning to the textbook still sitting at the table in front of you. 

The boy takes a look at the papers, his face changing from a focused one to a one more lighter, his eyes scanning the papers with ease. You notice his mouth moving a little as he reads the words under his breath, catching yourself from staring when you feel Felix’s eyes burning into the crown of your head, snapping you back to reality. 

“You know… maybe I could help you with that.” he says, looking like a business offering you a deal that you’re sure involves something illegal. He looks like a focused squirrel with his cheeks puffed out a little in what you sense is pride, something in his eyes glowing as you nervously chew on your bottom lip.

“Really?”

“Yeah, of course. I’m actually quite good at biology, to be honest. Well, not as much as Felix over here-” he jokes, scowling when the blonde boy punches his arm, “but I think I could tutor you a thing or two.”

“What’s the catch?” you ask, nervously watching him. Something in his composure is telling you he’ll want something in return, but you don’t know what yet. You’re quite sure you’ll sell your soul for the adorable boy in front of you if he asked you to, but it never hurts to ask beforehand, right? 

“What do you mean, what’s the catch?”

“Like… what do you want in return?” you muse out, taking a bite of a fry, noticing how soggy it feels under your teeth.

“Woah, you spend 15 minutes with Felix and you already think there’s something illegal behind everything? I’ll let you know, I’m better than that.” he scoffs. “I’m just doing it because I see how miserable you are. And I also don’t want you to tell on my buddie over here.” he adds, smiling warmly.

You take notice of the way Felix’s eyes grow twice their size and how Jisung’s knee lightly bumps into his under the table. It’s subtle, but you think that maybe this is when you fully fell for the short boy in front of you-- when he offered to save his best friend’s ass by helping out a lost girl with biology. And who are you to say no now? I mean, you need the tutoring nonetheless. Who cares if the boy tutoring you is someone else? Maybe it’s even more appealing to you this way, but you’ll never admit that out loud.

“Okay then, sure.” you nod, grinning from ear to ear, feeling satisfied.

“Great. Now, give me half the fries and we can arrange our next tutoring session,” he smiles, “oh, and I’m Han Jisung, by the way.”

He winks. 

You should be disturbed, but strangely, you’re not. You grin back at him, offering him the soggy fries you’re sure you’re going to give a really bad review in the evening, watching his composure change into a more laid-back one, engaging you in a conversation and slunging an arm around his best friend’s shoulders.

Lee Felix remains silent. He feels it once again-- he feels the loneliness of being left out. 

And he’s sure it won’t be the last time.

Lee Felix knows damn well how it feels to be the third wheel. He’s hung out with Jisung and his potential love interests multiple times, he’s even been on double dates with the said male, yet, he always somehow ends up being left out. So why does it still feel the same? Why does he still feel that restless feeling in his stomach, the emptiness in his chest, just like the first time? I guess you never get used to some things and emotions are one of them. No matter how much you argue that you know a feeling so well it doesn’t even surprise you anymore, it still hurts the same. That’s funny about emotions. Sometimes, they can’t even make you numb.

“Hurry up dude, the bistro closes in an hour and half!” Jisung rushes the taller male (not tall, just taller. Don’t misunderstand.) with his car keys in his hand, twirling them around his fingers in a nervous manner. Felix notices his roommate has put some effort into his outfit today, considering the lemon supreme shirt enveloping his body that he saves only for special occasions, yet, Felix doesn’t realise why he had to put it on when they’re literally just going out to eat some soggy fries in the bistro close to their house. He doesn’t ask, though. He doesn’t want the car key stuck in his forehead. He also doesn’t know why they have to rush so much, since they have an hour and half left before they close, but again, he doesn’t dare to say it out loud. 

Felix quickly puts his shoes on and rolls his eyes at his roommate. “I’m ready,” he announces.

Jisung swiftly takes a bottle of cologne from the table in their small hall (it’s so small they don’t even have a mirror in it, because there was no use in taking mirror selfies when all you can see on the picture is your phone case due to the fact that the room is too narrow for you to move further away) and sprays his body wit hit, efficiently confusing his roommate. “You wanna smell great for the waiter there? Because from what I remember, he was a stoner-”

“Oh, shut up. You never know when you’re gonna meet someone cute, am I right?” he asks, grinning from ear to ear like a cat, taking his backpack with him and opening the front door, “gotta look and smell presentable at all times.”

Felix wonders if this is why everyone always goes after his best friend. 

No, he thinks, it cannot be the cloud of cologne hanging around his body. It’s heavy and it makes Felix cough a little, but he tries to mask it, because he’s fairly sure Jisung won’t pay for his fries today if he doesn’t. And Felix is a simple man-- if he can get something for free, he will do anything to achieve it.

They arrive at the place in a few minutes and Felix can already feel his mouth watering at the thought of the salty fries and cheeseburger he’s going to get himself, joyfully skipping inside the bistro and waiting in the queue. Jisung follows him, standing next to him, efficiently covering the smell of the oil and all the good things on this earth-- read as fast food-- making Felix scowl. The boy behind the register, is, in fact, Na Jaemin-- the resident frat boy. Felix’s heard all about him from the girls staying at the dorms and to be honest, he’s quite glad he doesn’t have to live the stories of getting caught with weed at Jaemin's party on his own. That, and the fact that hot water runs in his apartment. Na Jemin might have the weed, but he surely doesn’t have that in his college dorm room. 

“Three milkshakes, two large fries, chicken wings and a cheeseburger, please.” Jisung orders, confusing Felix in one sentence. Since when is his best friend a bottomless pot for food? Is he really going to eat all of that?

“Coming right at you. Anything else?” Jaemin asks, voice considerate and polite, still turned on his customer service mode, even though Felix is sure him and Jisung have had shared a joint or two on one of his parties before.

“No, that’s all. Thanks, man,” Jisung answers, leaving with Felix right behind him. 

“Who’s gonna eat all of that? I hope you know you’re paying, and before you protest, yes, I did purposefully leave my wallet at home-” he rambles, still moving, when his train of thought is cut off by a person in his view.

You are sitting there in your full glory, smiling brightly at the boys approaching you. You’re dressed nicely, he notices-- you look like you put some effort into what you’re wearing. You don’t look that much different, but he can still see the slight changes you made to look neat. You’re glowing, Felix notices. You look excited.

“Hi, Y/N,” Jisung greets, taking a seat opposite of you. He doesn’t even give Felix an answer, he doesn’t even give him an explanation. He’s left there only to take a seat next to his roommate after collecting his thoughts, chewing on his bottom lip.

The conversation never moves his way. He is silenced. Felix wonders why he was even invited, watching the people behind the window laughing with their friends, happy to order some tasty food and have fun on this Thursday evening. He watches his friend and his classmate have fun-- well, as much fun as a tutoring session could be. You’re laughing at every single one of Jisung’s jokes and he swears Jisung’s eyes never leave your face, even when he’s explaining something to you. He wonders why Jisung didn’t tell him where they’re going. He wonders why he even had to come.

Lee Felix knows how third-wheeling feels. Yet, it still makes his little foolish heart hurt just the same every time.

You nervously chew on your bottom lip, cracking your knuckles in a habit your friends always scream at you for, waiting for your tutor-- well, he’s not really your tutor anymore-- to appear in the bistro on the other side of the town. You admire the decorations for a while, liking the way it looks modern here and the purple led lights make the whole place look aesthetic. You can already imagine multiple college kids going here and taking instagram pictures to look cool. It’s nice and you’ll definitely include it in your yelp review-- it won’t make it more stars, though, if the chicken wings don’t taste like heaven.

You tug on the sleeves on your hoodie, as if you were trying to make yourself disappear. I mean, you do feel embarrassing. You feel pathetic that it had to come down to this, but you guess desperate times call for desperate solutions. You’re not here to look put-together anymore. You’re going to show him your full glory and although you regret it a little, you still have a little spark of hope in you that Han Jisung-- the boy you, admittedly, were crashing on real hard right now, won’t find out.

Felix comes into the bistro in his full VSCO boy glory, as always. He is wearing a jean jacket and his freckled cheeks are dusted pink, you’d almost think he’s blushing all the time. He doesn’t quite fit the aesthetics of this futuristic looking bistro, you notice. The retro places you’ve been to so far fit him much more-- his sandy hair contrasted well with the yellow walls and red booths. It was starting to get a little repetitive, though, you must admit.

“Hi,” he greets you as he takes his seat, smiling at you with what you can only describe as a feeling of full uncomfort. You wonder what made him feel this way about you, but you don’t dare to think of it twice as you focus on the main quest of the day-- forcing him to teach you his ways.

“Hello,” you smile. 

Felix notices how natural you look-- it feels like now is the first time he’s seeing you in your full glory. You aren’t wearing your neat clothes for a meeting with Jisung and you’re not too casual like you were at your first ‘tutoring session’ either-- you’re just you. The way he doesn’t even see you in classes. He likes the fact that no one else than him can see you like this-- he likes the fact that Jisung is nowhere around, yet, he wonders why is that, exactly, since the two of you seemed to be hitting it off quite well so far.

Felix hasn’t been with Jisung when he last tutored you. He figured there’s no use, he’s going to get ignored all the time anyway. 

“So… what’s the matter?” he asks, folding his hands into his lap. He dares to take a quick look at you, noticing your worn-out shirt and dark circles under your eyes, worry washing over him. Did something happen? Was Jisung a jerk to you? 

“Well, I sort-of have a little problem,” you mumble out, tearing your gaze away from him. You seem shy for the first time in front of him and he wonders why. He doesn’t understand your sudden change of behaviour. This isn’t the you he’s used to. “Well, turns out, I am really stupid.” you propose, leaving Felix to gaze at you in surprise.

He chuckles. You swiftly look up at him with piercing eyes telling him to stop, and he almost does, but your face looks too adorable when it’s scrunched up like that, so he only giggles once more. “You’re not stupid.”

“I am!” you whine out, finally letting your whole shy facade fall, exposing the true you once again right in front of Felix’s eyes-- direct and fierceful. “Even Jisung’s tutoring isn’t helping and I feel so stupid with him! And I don’t want him to think that I’m stupid, even though I am, and I just… I can’t pass my exams like this, so I need your help.” you say, eyes big, looking almost pleading.

“And I am supposed to help… how? Exactly?” The confusion is written all over his face, and it almost makes you frustrated. You knew he must be smart, if his cheating has been so good he’s getting through college with straight As, but really, is he really that smart if he can’t read in between the lines?

“Help me cheat.” you quickly get out, biting down on your lower lip just as you say it, as if you were regretting it.

The silence that overtakes the two of you feels like it’s slowly going to eat you up alive, angrily biting into your skin. It feels heavy and suffocating, your palms sweating as you watch Felix blink at you with mouth agape, breathing in and out. You pray for him to make up his mind soon, or else you’re going to run out of the bistro without a yelp review, tearing the skin of your cuticles as you see him blink quickly a few times before shaking his head in disbelief, clearing his storage.

“You want me to help you cheat?” he asks for clarification, furrowing his brows at you.

“That’s correct.” you nod, chewing on the inside of your cheek. You haven’t been this nervous since you took your college entrance exams, and that shows a lot, considering you used to say that has been the most difficult experience of your life so far.

“Because Jisung…. isn’t tutoring you well enough?” he asks again, making you roll your eyes in annoyance.

“Hey, don’t put the blame on Jisung! I’m just stupid, that’s all.” you say, looking down into your lap, because his gaze suddenly feels like he’s judging you and you really don’t feel like maintaining eye contact with him when you’re under pressure.

“If you don’t stop saying that, I will kick you.”

“You wouldn’t dare-”

“I would and I will-”

“Okay, but is that a yes, then?” you look up at him with hopeful eyes, resembling a puppy just a little too much, and, well, Felix can’t just reject you now, can he?

“I.. guess…?” he says, watching your face light up in joy as you clap a few times in excitement. 

“Great! Can we start today? We have to start today! I brought my text books and papers and sharpies and-” you are cut off by Felix’s face lighting up at the sight of you, his eyes looking warm and admiring. You quickly shake away the excitement before it goes too far and you actually go to hug him or something, taking a deep breath in and out to calm yourself down.

Just in that moment, the server appears with two servings of chicken wings and two large fries, making Felix look at you in confusion. 

“I ordered you food, since I thought we’ll stick around for a while..” you mumble, seeing him eagerly nod and take one fry into his hand, biting down on it with a face full of pleasure. 

“Perfect. Just let me eat a few of these and we can get right into work, I promise,” he mutters with a mouth full of food, prompting you to take a bite yourself. It doesn’t taste the worst-- the bistro you went to after prom last year was definitely worse than this, but still, you don’t think Felix’s face quite resembles how the food tastes. He looks as if the Queen of England made it. In reality, it’s just a soggy fry. 

“Why do you always order the same thing? Aren’t you tired of eating the same thing over and over again?” he asks suddenly, examining your face with real interest. No one’s ever noticed your eating habits before, just shrugging off what you order every single time. Your little fast food experiment has been a secret so far, even though it wasn’t that hard to cover it up-- nobody really cared until now. 

You feel blush creeping on your cheeks as you shrug, feeling a little embarrassed for like the hundredth time today, when you reply to the boy in front of you. You know his secret, so it only feels valid for him to know yours. “I have this experiment… like, I try chicken wings and fries at every single bistro, restaurant and fast food chain in the town to find out which one’s the best…” you mumble, looking into your plate instead of facing him out of the ugly feeling of patheticness creeping up your back.

“Oh, that’s cool!” he exclaims, pointing his fry your direction, a response you didn’t quite expect, “Where do they have the best ones so far?” he asks, genuine interest painting his features.

“Oh,” you get out, feeling your lips unvoliteraly tug into a smile, “I don’t.. I still have a few bistros and the McDonald’s on the highway out of the city left, but I’d say the best ones so far were at Wendy’s. I didn’t quite like the chicken wings there, though, so…”

“Hmm,” he nods, deep in thought, “we just get food at where’s the closest.” he says, munching on a chicken wing. “I guess we could pay a little more attention to the food from now on, because after eating this, I’m never going to eat the food from the bistro right in front of our flat again.”

“Yeah, that bistro’s really awful. I only gave it around 2.5 stars, I think-” you say, before you realise you just spilled out another secret to him, feeling your cheeks heating up. 

“2.5 stars? What, do you write yelp reviews or something?” he asks, clearly amused by your accidental spill-out.

“And what if I do?” you defend yourself, glaring at him with fake annoyance. No man will ever make fun of you because you write yelp reviews. Not Lee Felix, even though he seems too nice to actually make fun of you because of something, not anyone. 

“That’s cool, though! Those help so much when you travel,” he says, eagerly nodding at you with big eyes and an adorable grin plastered on his face, making you feel understood and happy with just the sudden sign of acceptance. Turns out your little weird obsession isn’t as embarrassing as you thought it was. Or Lee Felix really is the sweetest guy walking on this earth. Either one is fine in your books.

You stay there for a few hours and Felix teaches you the basic cheat codes-- never meet the teacher’s eye, never finish your tests too quickly, always forcefully pick the wrong option before scribbling it out and putting in a correct one to not seem too suspicious. He even takes a piece of paper from you and scribbles down the basic cheat-sheet making structure. 

He feels good with you. He feels useful. He knows he shouldn’t be teaching you this, but really, is it really doing any harm? We all have to go through college somehow.

Yet, all evenings always end the same for Felix, with a bad feeling in his gut and a fake smile on his face hiding the true meaning behind his actions. He’ll never be the first choice and you remind him even today, after you leave the ‘tutoring session’ with a quick hug to the male, lowering your voice so only he can hear when you pay him your goodbyes.

“Don’t tell Jisung, okay?”

Of course. It’s all because you don’t want to look embarrassing in front of his best friend.

It goes all how you planned it to-- you’re sitting at your next tutoring session with two males in front of you. One of them is your supposed tutor and one of them is a boy that’s helping you pass your exams for real. You’re into one of them, even though you shouldn’t. You wonder how you even ended up in this mess. You swear you were a good student in high school, always submitting your assignments on time and making sure your tests were on 100%. It was kind of fueling your ego, in a way. You had no other plans in your life to hold on to, no dreams to dream, so you reasoned to do the only thing that you were good at-- getting good grades. You had to prove to yourself that there was a reason, a meaning behind your life. You had to prove to yourself that your existence was valid.

You watch Jisung with interest. You pray to god that he doesn’t catch you in your act, because that would surely be embarrassing. You don’t want him to find out that you’re just fine with cheating, because that meant your tutoring sessions with the male would end and there was no other reason for you to see him. You knew Han Jisung wasn’t interested in you. You were sure you’d see it on him if he was. And even then, you weren’t interested in only a short relationship without any good point. You liked Jisung, but you didn’t like his reputation. One week wasn’t long enough for you to waste your time on him and get your heart broken. You weren’t sure if he was a player, or if he just wanted to desperately find the one by trying all the possibilities, but you weren’t going to find out. 

Felix watches you with interest in his eyes-- but you don’t notice. He prays that Jisung doesn’t find out about your secret little ‘tutoring sessions’, because that would mean he wouldn’t have a reason to hang out with you anymore. And Felix really doesn’t want that to happen. For some reason, he doesn’t want you to ever frown. And he’s sure that’s exactly what would happen if Jisung cancelled.

It doesn’t click to him what’s happening inside of his little, foolish heart when he sees you smile at Jisung and his stomach fills with worry. 

It doesn’t click to him what’s happening with him when every time Jisung subtly takes your hand in his makes his insides twitch in frustration. He thinks it’s just because of the fact that he’s third-wheeling again, like all his life, and maybe that is partly true, but it’s not the whole reason behind the cloud around his head.

It clicks only when him and his roommate are back home, sitting at the dinner table with the left-overs from the new bistro you three went to, munching on the chicken wings and another pack of soggy french fries and the cola they had in their fridge.

“So… what do you think about Y/N?” Jisung asks suddenly, making Felix furrow his brows in confusion.

“What should I think? She’s smart, I guess…” he mumbles, mouth full of food, not quite grasping the full meaning of his roommate’s question. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Jisung quickly nods in approval, “she’s getting really good. I mean, you can still see she’s having some troubles when I’m tutoring her, but at least she always gets good grades on tests now,” he says, biting down on another piece of chicken wing. Felix feels a wave of pride wash over him after hearing the words-- of course you’re doing well on exams. It’s all Felix’s doing. You’re a quick learner, when it comes to cheating. 

“Yeah, she’s good,” he says. 

“Well,” Jisung suddenly starts, meaning to sound nonchalantly, but only sounding like he’s determining his biggest life secret in front of his friend instead, “I like her.”

Felix almost chokes on the piece of chicken in his mouth, trying to play it off with a small chuckle. “Oh? You do?”

“Yeah. Should I.. Should I ask her on a date or something?” he asks and Felix swears he can see his friend’s cheeks reddening a little, even though the last time he’s seen Jisung embarrassed was when he accidentally called their Math’s teacher mum in eleventh grade. 

“You don’t date, though,” Felix opposes.

“That’s not true-”

“Two weeks long relationships aren’t relationships, Jisung.” 

“Not my fault they’re never the one! It gets boring after a while, Felix, I can’t just-”

“Why are you even asking me this?” Felix suddenly cuts him off, glaring at him. He doesn’t know why he’s reacting in such a way. It’s not like it’s the first time Jisung is going to date someone for two weeks just to break their heart, it’s not the first time they’re going to run after Felix a week after just so they can still be around the one that broke their heart. This time, though, he does not want to see another heart get broken.

“Jesus, chill, man… I was just asking, since you two seem closer. Did she mention anything about me? Is she dating anyone?” Jisung asks, eyes lighting up.

Felix could be an asshole. He could tell Jisung that you’re already dating someone, he could tell him to back off and that you’re not interested. However, he does not do that. Instead, he does the quite opposite. He pushes his best friend into asking you out, he tells him he should try it, because that’s just the kind of person he is. Besides, he knows you’re into him. Maybe the smile on your face could make him forget about the fact that you’re going to get your heart broken. 

“Sure, go for it.” he shrugs, “I don’t really care anyway.”

“Fine, then-”

“I’m gonna shower.” Felix says, quickly standing up from his chair and moving to the bathroom, quickly escaping the conversation.

Only then he realises what he feeling in his gut means, only then he notices the way his sigh feels like the weight of the world is sitting on his shoulders and he can’t breathe any time you’re around Han Jisung. 

He realises he likes you. 

And clearly, you don’t like him back.

Emotions are something you never quite get used to. Even the emotion of feeling rejection, the emotion of always being behind his best friend’s shadow. Lee Felix is always just the friend. Never the love interest. This time, though, it feels even more heavy, because in a way, you seem way more special in his eyes than the people that went after him just to get with his best friend.

This time, he does not want to see another heart get broken. Because it’s your heart we’re talking about.

And to prevent his heart shattering to even more pieces, he has to do something.

He has to stop liking you.

As soon as possible.

“Y/N?” 

“Mhhm?” you ask, raising your eyes up from the cheat sheet you’re creating with Felix’s help, the grease of the fries you’re eating glistening on your chin. You’re with him in a yet another crappy bistro, trying yet another soggy fries, and even though there’s nothing special on you to a stranger’s eye, Felix’s heart can’t help but run twice the speed of light. 

“How do you stop liking someone?” he mumbles, furrowing his brows a little, deep in thought. 

“Oh, do you like someone?” you ask, and Felix momentarily lights up at the thought of you caring if he’s interested in someone, but when his eyes meet yours and he notices them glistening and lightening up in curiosity, he realises it’s just because you’re happy for him. As a good friend should be. 

“No, no,” he quickly shakes his head in disapproval, snickering to himself, “I’m just asking. Because, think, what if, hypothetically, there’s someone who is into someone else. Easy, right? But what if their best friend likes the same person? And you know you shouldn’t like them because they’re into their friend as well? What is there to do at that point?” 

You scan his face for a few seconds, thinking to yourself. “Hmm,” you start, “I guess you have to start hating them. So the feelings disappear.” you nod, satisfied with your answer.

“How’s that possible?” he asks, scoffing.

“Well, I don’t know, since it’s all hypothetical anyway,” you giggle, focusing back on your cheat sheet. Your notes are getting smaller and smaller and Felix notices the improvement in your small lettering, making your cheat sheet less noticeable. You’re learning quickly.

“Oh come on,” he whines, kicking your leg under the table, “talk to me. How can a person start hating someone? Give me a tutorial.” 

“Well, since you really need to know,” you roll your eyes, putting away the pen from your hand and resting your back against the seat of the booth, “there are a few steps you can take.”

“For example?”

“Well, you have to stop hanging out with them, first thing’s first.” you start. “Because if you don’t hang out with them, you will eventually hate the fact that they’re not near, which will, logically, make you hate them instead.”

“Is that really logical, though?” Felix asks, furrowing his brows at you. In his books, this made no sense at all, but you seemed pretty satisfied with your answer.

“Of course it is! Then, you have to find something about them that you can hate. Anything. Find even the smallest thing, and blow it up in your mind until you hate it. Easy, right?” 

“...I don’t think that’s helping at all,” he says, tone of voice unsure. 

“Of course it is! You’re just refusing that it can be true, because you think I’m stupid.” you stick out his tongue at him, focusing on your work instead.

He kicks you under the table, making you scowl. “Ow! What was that for?”

“I told you that if you’ll make that comment again, I will kick you. So I just did right that.” he says. “Besides, your ideas are stupid. Not you. There’s a difference in that.” he smartly points out, making you roll your eyes at him.

“So, who is it that you like?”

“No one. I told you, it’s hypothetical.” he glares at you.

“Right,” you nod, sighing, “well, I’ll just stick to that, since that means Jisung doesn’t like anyone and I still have a chance.” you smile at him, obviously missing out on the way your words just punched him into the gut. Felix laughs it out, kicking you in the shin instead.

“Right. Of course you do,” he nods. He wishes he didn’t mean that.

You two remain in silence for a moment, while you get back to your work and Felix pretends he’s playing a game on his phone. You don’t notice the way his eyes scan you over, admiring you, once in a while. No one ever does. He guesses this is the perk of always being just the friend. The one people are friends with just because they want something from him. The one that gets taken advantage of. He chooses not to think about it more. Maybe if he did, he could hate you over it, if he wasn’t so used to that feeling anyway. 

“We should hang out on the weekend,” you say, taking him by surprise.

“Oh?” he mumbles out, “with Jisung?”

“No?” you furrow your brows, “look, I know I look like I’m obsessed with him, but I actually just want to hang out with you alone as friends once in a while, you know.”

“We’re hanging out now, though.”

“It’s midnight, Felix,” you point out, “and we’re working. I want to hang out with my friend, like a normal person, you know.” you shrug.

“Yeah…” he says, when your words resonate in his mind like a broken curse. ‘Don’t hang out with them.’ Don’t hang out with her. You have to hate her. He has to start hating you-- there’s no other way. And so, he turns to taking your words into consideration. He can’t meet with you if he’s not ‘tutoring’ you. There’s no way. “We’ll see. I’ll tell you if I’m free.” he smiles warmly instead, because truth be told, he’ll never tell you no to your eyes. He’s always been a bit of a coward. And he also doesn’t want you to frown. Ever.

“Great!” you smile. 

And when Felix comes home that night, at 2am in the morning when his roommate is already asleep-- not knowing of your secret meetings, he lays down in his bed and repeats your advice like a broken mantra. He can’t like you. He has to hate you.

Lee Felix’s guide to hating you: 1. Don’t hang out with her. Only meet her when it’s necessary. If you don’t meet her, you’ll start hating her absence, resulting in hating her altogether. 2. Find a small thing about her to blow up so much you start to hate it. 

That’s not difficult. He hates that you like Han Jisung. It’s a small mistake, a small flaw, but he’s ready to blow it up so much he hates you for it. He hates that he’s not the first choice. He hates that you don’t like him.

Maybe he would hate you more if you were dating his best friend for real.

Lee Felix’s guide to hating you: 1. Don’t hang out with her. 2. Find a thing to hate about her. SUCCESS! 3. Set her up with Han Jisung.

Now, this plan is bulletproof, isn’t it?

Felix unexpectedly breaks the first step of his guide only a few days later-- on a chilly friday afternoon, when his body is hurriedly skipping to the edge of the town centre only to meet with you. Just for the record, though, Felix didn’t intend to break the promise he gave to himself. He really wasn’t going to hang out with you if he didn’t specifically need to, but, well… you called Jisung to hang out. Felix’s heart almost skipped a few beats when he was added to a three-person big group chat with you and his roommate and at that point, he wasn’t going to reject an invitation to the fare in town, because he was fairly sure Jisung didn’t like rollercoasters and he wanted to see you laugh your ass off at him in front of everyone. Is it a little spiteful? Possibly. Does he care? Not that much.

Besides, it’s only one time. It will never happen again!!

He finds you with your black leather jacket on, stepping from one leg to the other, looking around like a lost puppy. Felix mentally curses at himself for not coming sooner so you wouldn’t feel so alone and awkward in the mass of people, when he realises he’s already 15 minutes late because of his afternoon class and his roommate is nowhere to be found.

“Thank god! I thought you were going to bail on me as well,” you call out when Felix is close enough, smiling at him.

“Where’s Jisung?”

“He texted me like 5 minutes ago that he can’t make it today. Something about his mum being in town? I’m not sure,” you furrow your brows, “at least you’re here now, though.”

Felix is met with the realisation that he’s left alone with you again, mentally cursing at himself. This surely does not look like a plan to hating you. It looks like a bullet-proof plan on how to fall even deeper for you, with how your stray hairs are flying around your head and you adorably scrunch up your nose and sniffle from the cold. 

“Should we go?” he forces out of himself, looking at you hopefully.

“Yeah!” you nod, striding a few steps in front of him like a happy school girl excited to go to school for the first time. Felix can’t surpass the gentle smile forming on his lips, shaking his head in disbelief. You look so cheerful and so joyful, making his heart swell with how easily you manage to make him feel so young again. 

He follows you gladly, managing to match his speed with yours, almost forgetting for a moment that he’s not on a date with you, almost forgetting about the fact that you like his best friend and the smile you’re giving him is nothing against the wide grin you offer to his roommate.

“Let’s go on that one!” you cheer, taking Felix by the hand and tugging him your way, not once giving him the opportunity of letting go as you drag him all around the fare. You remind him of his younger sister with how excited you get about the smallest things and he realises he wants to protect your heart from the world just as much as he wants to protect his little sister’s. It’s not the same feeling, though. The affection he feels for you is different. 

Felix doesn’t find it in him to tell you no whenever you tug him on another ride, even when his legs are tired and his jaw hurts from smiling. He finds himself wanting to capture your image into his brain forever, imprint the happy memory in there so he can find it and look at it whenever his heart feels lonely. For the first time in ages, he forgets about everything. He forgets that he’s just the friend, the other choice. He completely forgets that Han Jisung was supposed to be there, at his place, sitting next to you on the ferris wheel as you watch the night city under you with cold cheeks and frozen bodies.

“You must be sad that Jisung isn’t here with you right now. That would surely feel much more romantic than sitting here with me,” Felix says bitterly once the reality hits him for a second, once his heart is unsheltered for a short moment and your eyes meet.

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” you roll your eyes, “Jisung can’t be romantic. Besides, if I really wanted a date with him so badly, I wouldn’t have asked you to come with us, would I?” you smile at him, swinging your legs forward and backward, focusing your eyes somewhere into the distance again.

“Well, if you really want to go on a date with him, you can just ask him, you know?” he mumbles, playing with the dead skin on his thumb.

“So he can stand me up and go on a date with his mum again? I don’t know, Felix, is that really worth it?” you giggle, not noticing the way you’re messing with the boy’s head, not noticing the way a small spark of hope lights up somewhere in the deep pits of his stomach when you mention not wanting to ask his best friend out. 

“I don’t know, is it?”

“I’ll have to think about it.” you muse out, and the spark is gone. Of course it’s not that simple. 

Felix just nods and grins at you. The chilly air helps him hide his red cheeks when he thinks of how embarrassing his thoughts must have been in the past quick seconds. He focuses on your face, on the way your eyes crinkle up a little when you stare somewhere far into the distance and your hair flies a little with the breeze. The ferris wheel just reached the top, so he has plenty of time to keep admiring you from so close, but somehow, the moment still feels so short and he wishes he could stop the time. He wishes he could stop the time so he didn’t have to face the reality when he comes down from the ferris wheel. He wishes he didn’t have to see you fall in love with his friend, he wishes he didn’t have to act like he doesn’t care at all. 

“Thanks for helping me, by the way. I wouldn’t have passed my exams if it wasn’t for you and that… that would be really hard on me.” you get out, locking your eyes with his sincerely. He sees your eyes shining even so high above the ground, convincing him the sparkles really must be the stars, when he takes a deep breath in and responds.

“It’s no problem, I get it… I mean, it’s what you gotta do. What we gotta do, when we want to pass. And graduate,” he chuckles. 

Does he really want the degree, though? Or does he just need it to feel like he has some worth? Does he want to graduate or does he just want his parents to value him as an adult, does he really want to continue working so hard on passing or would he just be so much happier if he just dropped out. And saved himself so much stress. He should have known he was never smart enough for college.

“Yeah. I despise the smart kids in our class. I wish I were them,” you scoff, “I despise Jisung, in a way, too,” you add after a dramatic pause.

“Jisung?” Felix furrows his brows.

“Yeah,” you nod, like it’s the clearest thing in the world, “I mean, he’s smart enough to pass. He’s… he’s got his life figured out, in a way. He’s just fine. Getting all the girls and the guys, getting good grades, going on dinner dates with his mum on Fridays,” you giggle, “I mean, I want that. That sounds nice.”

Felix huffs, staring into the distance, “I guess you’re right.” He knows damn well how jealousy feels. 

“I came to college to prove to myself that my life has some worth, but I guess the only thing I prove to myself is that I can’t even pass my exams without help.” you sigh, sounding defeated.

“Hey,” he nudges you a little with his foot, “don’t say that. Life isn’t about grades, degrees and that shit. Of course you have worth and value.” 

He sees you smile in defeat, leaning your head on his shoulder. The feeling of acceptance, pure understanding washes over the two of you, when you gently speak up again. “Try to explain that to my brain.” 

He lightly giggles. “I’m trying, as you can see.”

You look up at him from his shoulder, scrunching up your nose and leaning closer to him, whispering. “It’s not working.” you laugh.

“I know it’s not easy,” he shakes his head, “I’ve been trying to tell that to my family for the past 21 years.” he slips out. Something about you makes him spill out even things he’s never told anyone before, but he finds himself not caring as you approach his eyes with pure serenity mixed with melancholy.

“Is it all because of your parents?” you ask, “the cheating, I mean.”

Felix feels his eyes giving him out, so he chooses not to look at you anymore. “I mean, I would have dropped out long ago if I didn’t have to feel so worthless around my family then. Every single one of my cousins is smart, has a degree and earns a killing. I’m just me-- living from the money I earned over summer, trying not to lose my mind with biology.”

He hears you humming next to him, your head moving as you nod in understatement. The ferris wheel is slowly reaching the bottom again and Felix finds the fact quite relieving. He doesn’t mind having deep talks with you, he just fears he might spill out something both of you don’t want to hear.

“I’m glad you came with me today, Lix.” you smile at him once the two of you reach the bottom, “wanna hear a secret?”

“Spill it out,” he dares you, grinning.

“I only invited Jisung because I thought you didn’t want to hang out with me alone.” you confess, quickly turning around in your spot as you jog a few steps in front of him, carelessly, as if you just didn’t make Felix’s heart stop and insides twitch in excitement. He prays and hopes it’s not just you giving him false hope, he wishes it’s not his mind playing tricks on him. 

“I-” 

“And now that I know you don’t mind being around me, do you wanna go to the dog cafe with me next Wednesday? You know, the one I talked about.” you turn around, flashing him a smile worth a billion dollars, taking him by surprise as his breathing hitches and he doesn’t find it in him to reject you ever again.

“Sure.”

Second step of Lee Felix’s guide to helping you: find a small thing about you he doesn’t like to blow up so much he starts hating you altogether. 

He was so sure that he found the small thing just a few days ago. He thought that the fact that you like his best friend could be enough for him to start hating you. He could sit on that thought for long enough to pick it up to the smallest pieces and over-analyse it to the point he could start hating you. 

And he tries to do just that-- he lies awake at night thinking of how every single person he’s ever been interested in slipped right between his fingers just because of Jisung’s existence. He wonders why he’s never good enough to anyone, why he always has to be the second choice even for tutoring (even though it’s not even tutoring, but we won’t talk about that anymore). He thinks of how you’re so foolish to think your relationship with Jisung is going to last, because Jisung’s feelings never stay the same for long. He over-analyses the smallest things he notices on you when you’re in Jisung’s presence until the point he’s almost sure he can do it, he can hate you for it just a little, in a way, but then, the thought flies right out of the open window as his roommate crashes into his door in the middle of the night.

He startles awake, sitting up at his bed, watching the short male going in with much difficulty, sitting on his bed without a word.

“Jisung?”

“Lixie, I fucked it all up, didn’t I?” Jisung whines, laying down on the bed next to his friend. Felix doesn’t think it’s only due to the late hours of the night that his friend’s words aren’t making any sense, but he doesn’t dare to put his finger on it until he makes sure for himself.

“What are you talking about?”

“Y/N.”

Your name coming out of his lips hits Felix like a baseball bat, hurting in all the right places, as the young male finds it in him to continue the conversation.

“What about her?”

“She asked us to hang out together. And I didn’t go. I know it wasn’t my fault, because my mum was in the town, but still, I feel so bad, because now it must look like I’m not interested in her and that I don’t care and I really don’t want that, you know?” he stummers, making Felix realise his friend talks a lot when he’s under the influence of alcohol just the same second Jisung’s breath catches in Felix’s nose, only proving his point. 

“You didn’t fuck it up, don’t worry.” he muses. And it’s true. Jisung could never truly fuck it up with anyone. Even his exes always crumble up around his feet, wanting attention even after getting their heart broken. Will it be the same with you?

“She must think I don’t like her. And that’s horrible-that’s- that’s- I like her. Very much,” he whines again, getting closer to Felix and wrapping his arms around the blonde’s torso in a wave of affection that only washes over him when he’s drunk.

“Sung-” he stutters, desperately trying to push him away, but even though Jisung doesn’t look like it, he is a strong individual when it comes to involuntary cuddling. Felix can never escape his arms.

“I think she’s special, you know? She’s like- I can’t explain it. It’s like with her, I actually want to try. I want to ask her on dates and love her and give her my heart, because you know, I never dared to give my heart to anyone. And no one’s ever made me feel truly special before…” he mutters, forcing his nose to Felix’s neck, “I’m rambling too much, aren’t I?”

“Yeah,” Felix sighs, nodding. He doesn’t battle his arms anymore. Jisung is his friend, at the end of the day. He can hold him when he needs it.

“Sorry.” he says shortly, sighing as well. The room falls into silence and Felix’s head spins again, his thoughts spiral like a tornado and the eye of the storm is you-- standing there with that stupid smile on your face and he once again realises that he needs to hate you in order to shelter his own heart, because you’re like a hurricane when it comes a to a person’s emotions.

The fact is, though, he could never hate you for liking his best friend. 

Han Jisung is too likable for his own good. His heart is too big for this world, and truth be told, he’s been sharing it with everyone for such a long time now, he deserves to find someone he’s willing to give his all to. 

He could never hate you for liking Jisung-- the boy who smiles at everyone in the halls, the boy that offered him to live in the flat his parent’s bought for him in freshman year, the boy that helps him hide his cheating secret every day. He could never hate you for liking Jisung, because he himself knows too well how much of a treasure his dear friend is. 

He gets it. He gets why people always choose Jisung over him. He could never blame you.

“Sung?”

“Hmm?”

“Ask Y/N out to the dog cafe on Wednesday. She'll love it.”

Felix could never hate you.

Step three of Felix’s bullet-proof guide to hating you is quite simple and actually the only one he completes with success. Setting you up with Jisung on a date is easier than he ever imagined, considering the fact that his roommate decided to finally take things into his own hands and call you on a date after the drunken weeping episode in Felix’s bed. 

Jisung invites you on a date to the dog café in town. The two of you go on Wednesday and although Felix feels like he just gave his roommate a piece of him, an invitation that was never meant for him in the first place, he feels at ease, because at least one part of his plan is working. He could never hate you, but at least now, it will be easier for him to ignore his growing feelings for you when you spend all your time with Jisung on dates and ice cream runs. He only has to ignore his feelings in school and at your ‘tutoring’ sessions. He wonders how long these will be a secret in front of your new boyfriend. Jisung’s not your boyfriend yet, but Felix can only imagine how short the time he isn’t is going to last. 

Felix does the stupid mistake of opening the instagram app in the evening, when he’s curled up in his bed with an embarrassingly big bowl of popcorn on his bed side table, serving him as his depression food. He sees your post show up, an adorable picture of you from the dog café, a big golden retriever in your lap as you giggle at its face. The picture is candid and looks like the kind Felix would like to keep as his lock screen if he had the chance. He’s sure his best friend took it for you not only from the fact that you went out with him tonight, but also for the fact that he’s tagged in the post’s description with a big blue heart emoji. 

He could stop staring at the picture if he really wanted, he could mute your posts and pretend you never existed to shelter his poor heart. He could do everything in his strength to cut all his ties with you. That would make it so much easier for him, wouldn’t it?

But he doesn't. And maybe he doesn’t even want to-- he’s used to the pain anyway, isn’t he? The bitterness, the feeling of being pushed away, ignored and left forgotten. 

He was supposed to be in Jisung’s place now, but that doesn’t change the simple fact that he isn’t-- maybe it was never his place to claim anyway. 

Felix stares at the picture for minutes, wondering of how things could be if you only didn’t fall for his best friend. Or if he came with you today. Who knows, maybe it wasn’t too late for him to ask you on a date. Maybe he could still change your mind. Felix likes to give up on things too quickly, though, and that is the curse that will follow him his whole life. 

Lee Felix is good at cheating. He is insanely good at it, he would also say it’s the only thing he’s ever been good at. Pretending.

It’s his time to shine again. It’s time to pretend he doesn’t like you, pretend you don’t hurt him, pretend he isn’t in love with his best friend’s crush. He’s been always the best at cheating and now it’s time to cheat his way out of liking you. 

Sounds easy, doesn’t it?

“You must be really hungry, if you’re planning to eat all of that in one setting,” Felix mumbles, watching you as you eat yet another plate of chicken wings in yet another pointless bistro in town. Felix wonders how you even know about all of these, since the one you’re both sitting in right now, in the middle of the night, looks rather lonely. It doesn’t even seem that welcoming-- it has graffiti on the walls and the seats are a little torn on the edges, but you don’t seem to care as you munch on the chicken, eyes big when you stare back at your companion.

“I eat a lot when I’m stressed,” you mutter in between your bites, mouth full. You look natural like this and Felix realises this is you in his mind-- cheeks full of food, that little wrinkle in between your brows when you look at him, eyes staring big into his like a loyal dog. This is how he knows you, in your rawest form, and this is coincidentally, also, how he likes you the most. He loves and treasures every single version of you, but your late-night meetings feel of different kind of intimacy to him that he’s sure he’s going to think of even when he’s old and his college years are dusty like an old polaroid picture.  

“Stressed?” he asks, tone of voice a little more worried than usual. Felix always worries about you. Even when you quietly take out your cheat sheet from under the table and write your answers down. He doesn’t fear being caught-- he frankly doesn’t care that much, but he knows that you are having a battle with yourself and he really doesn’t want you to feel like you lost. He didn’t know it was so easy to put someone else first when you worry for the future. 

“The finals are coming up.” you clarify, the words coming out a little bashful and smitten.

“Oh.” he nods. 

You’re both quiet for a while. It would be cheesy to say the silence was comfortable, and Felix knows, he’s seen enough teenage dramas to know these words are used in situations like this, but the truth is, there’s no other way to describe it, and he understands that now. Your determination shines through all your edges and he’s glad you’re doing what you can with the resources you have. You’re not exactly studying for your Biology finals, but it’s still as hard and as stressful as that. It can feel a little embarrassing at times, but there’s no other way around it. You have to battle your enemy, even if it means the game is not fair.

“And those chicken wings are fucking good, dude,” you mutter after a while, offering him one of the paper baskets the server brought you a few minutes ago, looking rather stoned and not interested in your presence at all.

“Don’t tell me this rotten place is winning your chicken wings and fries contest,” Felix snickers, taking a bite that, to his surprise, actually tastes the best out of the amount of fast food chains and restaurants you’ve brought him to. You should never judge a book by its cover and this bistro is clearly one of the examples.

“I have only one place left to go, so we’ll see then, but I guess it might just be the top place right now,” you muse out, a wide grin decorating your features as you glance up at Felix that watches you scribble down your notes on a mini piece of paper.

“Wanna go with me there? After the finals, of course. We can celebrate if we pass,” you point out, licking your lips in nerves, “I don’t think I’ll need these ‘tutoring sessions’ anymore then, but I still want to hang out sometime.” you say, putting air quotes around the words tutoring session, looking at him with expectations in your eyes.

“Oh, sure,” he agrees, nodding. “I have to be there when you finally declare your last yelp review.”

You only laugh at him and shake your head, eating some more as you look down into your notes again, lost in work. “I still don’t get how you can do these so fast.”

“I already know what’s the most useful. You don’t have to copy the whole textbook on there.”

“You can never know! What if I’ll need it all?” you exclaim, only making him laugh harder.

He points his eyes out of the window, watching the empty parking lot. You didn’t come in your car today, telling Felix your house is close anyway, and Felix doesn’t dare to drive his car anywhere unless he doesn’t need to. He has a little bit of a trauma since the last time he drove with his dad and he almost ran the car into a tree, getting a shower of swear words and exclamations from his dear father, so he only drives his small white Renault when he needs to go home. Which is, coincidentally, next week. 

“I really don’t want to go home next week,” he sighs.

“Your family is still onto you for the smallest shit?” you ask, tone of voice sympathetic.

“Yeah. Can’t wait to graduate so I don’t have to listen to them talking about a degree anymore,” he rolls his eyes, “I only have to find myself a partner so my grandma can shut up about me being single all the time.”

You softly laugh, making Felix look at you for a moment, his heart skipping a few beats when your eyes meet for a little more seconds than usual. “I’m sorry. You can always text me, though, if you need anyone to talk or gossip with.” you say, averting your eyes from his.

“You’d have to be on your phone 24/7, then. My mental stability comes down by 70% when I’m back home and it’s already only on 15% now,” Felix snickers.

“Oh, I don’t mind. I’ll be staying here anyway.��� you say, giggling.

“You’re not coming back home?”

“No,” you shake your head in disapproval, quickly glancing into his eyes before speaking up again, “it’s my parent’s wedding anniversary, so they’re going on a holiday. There’s no use in me coming home if I’m just going to be alone there anyway,” you shrug.

Felix hums, nodding in understatement. “That makes sense. I’m sorry you can’t meet your family on holidays, though.”

“It’s okay,” you say, “I see them often anyway. One Christmas won’t kill me. I have a whole season of Game of thrones to catch up on anyway.” you light-heartedly laugh, sounding like Felix’s favorite song. He smiles with you, shaking his head in disbelief at how positively you can always see the world, when he glances out of the window for a moment again, only to be met with a surprise. 

There are white flakes of snow falling from the sky and something in Felix wakes up-- something he’d call happiness, maybe even joy, when he quickly shoots up from his seat and calls you with excitement coating his voice, “Y/N! Y/N! Come on!”

“Come where? Felix, what are you-” 

He doesn’t let you finish as he takes you by the hand and tugs you on your feet, tugging you out of the empty bistro out into the dark parking lot, admiring the snowflakes falling onto the ground and every surface in his sight. He sees some stick into your hair, making him giggle as his outstretched hand dusts them off subconsciously, when he starts running around like a happy child, laughter coming out of his throat filling the silence.

“It’s snowing!” you exclaim, when Felix reaches your body frozen in its place again. He reminds you of a golden retriever when he jumps a little in his place, his feet happily crouching in the snow. You laugh at his antics when he starts acting like a little boy, this side of Felix being so new to you, yet you can’t help but feel your heart swell with admiration when he asks you to catch some snow into your mouth.

“Felix! That’s disgusting!” you refuse, laughing.

“Oh come on! It’s just water!” he cheers, leaning his head back and opening his mouth wide, waiting for the snow to fall into his mouth. 

“But it’s unhygienic and dirty! You have to be kidding me!” you still reject his idea, standing your ground firmly as always in your life so far, when a face of a boy looking like an angel takes you by surprise and his big eyes plead you in a way that makes you drop all your grudges and all your beliefs down, rolling your eyes when he pouts, leaning your head back as well and opening your mouth with a loud ‘aaaa’ sound to satisfy his foolish heart.

Once you both feel a snowflake hitting your tongues, you look at each other with your tongues out, laughing at how stupid the other one looks, pointing to your tongues. You shake your head. “It melted off, you stupid!”

“You did the same thing!” he bursts out laughing, bending over in the force of his emotions. You watch him with a wide grin plastered onto your face. It feels like watching a movie. You don’t think you’ll ever have a brighter memory with the boy in front of you, with his cheeks red from the snow and smile so wide it hurts both of your jaws.

You instinctively take his hands into yours, looking down on your feet as you start going around in a circle with him, going quicker and quicker as you watch your footprints in the snow mixing with his, the dry skin of his hands making you feel strange. You laugh out when your head starts spinning, looking up at him to find him already staring at you with stars in his eyes, when you wonder,

isn’t this how love is supposed to feel?

All of his life, Felix had thought that family gatherings could always either go two ways, and that is: 1) a normal, boring meet-ups where your grandma asks about how school’s going, when you’re going to finally find a partner and another one of your cousin’s announces their engagement party, or 2) the actual engagement parties-- every single family member including the senile grandma from mum’s side gets drunk and you don’t have to think about more fake reasons why you have yet to lose your virginity.

You see, Felix is wrong in a lot of things. And this was surely one of them-- it’s the December 27th and he’s sitting in his grandma’s old kitchen, the wind blowing through the cracks of her window and the sweets on the table have already melted from the heat being too high, because his aunt is always cold and they can’t compromise. That sounds fine, even usual, Felix would say, however, the fire lights up a few moments later when his head starts to hurt from all the talking and he begins to dissociate a little too much, meaning that his grandma now has to shift her attention from all of his other relatives to him, because how dare he stay quiet on a family gathering where he has nothing to add to the conversation, right?

It starts off as usual, the answers to these questions digged deep into Felix’s brain since the first year of college. He doesn’t even bat an eye when he answers the questions directed at his studies and grades, telling all of his interested relatives that he’s working hard and it’s paying off. Nobody complains or disagrees-- his grades are awesome. His degree is here soon. Felix almost thinks he’s over with when his grandma laughs at a poor joke that comes out of his mouth, but that was only a bad prediction as he moves on to questions about his love life, which are, believe me or not, much more boring and much more ego-hurting for the blonde.

“Do you have a girlfriend yet, Felix?” she asks, tone of voice sounding rather interested, but don’t believe her-- it’s only an act. She’s ready to laugh into his face when he gives her the answer she’s hoping for.

“No, not yet, grandma,” he mumbles, averting his eyes from her wrinkley face as soon as possible. He really doesn’t need to look at her any longer to know she’s silently judging him on the inside, because that’s just how his grandmother is. 

“That’s such a shame… I wonder why… You’re such a pretty young boy, aren’t you?” she mutters under her nose, tone almost whiney, “what about your roommate? Jisung, was it?”

Felix takes a deep breath in, closing his eyes for a second to calm his rising heart beat. He could have predicted questions like this coming, because the conversation always somehow diverted to his roommate even when he was at home with his family. It’s crazy, how everyone just seems to adore Jisung much more than their own family member. 

“He’s.. Yeah. He’s always with someone, you know him. Not now, though, now he’s single,” Felix nods, explaining.

“Well, I’m sure he’ll find someone soon,” she admits, “he’s such a gentleman. And so handsome as well, isn’t he?” she asks, his aunt from her right side nodding quickly at the mention of Han Jisung. 

“He always has so many people around him, he’s so charming. If only you were more like him, maybe then someone would date you as well,” his grandma says calmly, not even noticing the way her words cut deeper and deeper into Felix’s heart, kicking him and punching him like a boxing bag, “you should try to be more like him.”

Felix bites down on his lower lip, rolling his eyes. Frustration coats his voice once he speaks up, the built-up anger living inside of him like an animal kept well in its cage. He doesn’t want to let it out, because he fears what it might do once it’s free, but he still retorts to a dig addressed to his grandma, huffing in annoyance. “Should I send Jisung home instead of me next time?”

“Oh no, Felix, what are you even saying right now?” his grandma looks rather offended, eyes twice their usual size as she glares at him.

“Well, since you like him so much.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I was just saying that-”

“Leave it.” Felix says. 

The atmosphere is too heavy now, all eyes on him as if he was in a circus, watching him just moments before his breaking. He realises he no longer feels welcome in this place and maybe he never did, he just chose to ignore it by now, because that’s what he always does when a problem appears-- he chooses ignorance. Ignorance is Felix’s best friend, and although it may sound like he’s running away from his problems all the time, it’s always worked so far. He’s just protecting his heart, building walls around it. 

He doesn’t want to fight. He hates conflict. So, even though he’d like to snap, even though he’d like to leash out like an animal, he doesn’t. He steps back-- as he always does, taking the car keys from the table and escaping the house, hearing the calls of his mother after him. He doesn’t bother to say goodbye, he doesn’t even bother to look back nor take the Christmas gifts his grandma brought for everyone. 

He sits into the small white Renault he drives once a year when he comes back home, starts the engine and speeds up to the limit, driving away from all of his problems. He doesn’t want to hear their complaints, he doesn’t want to listen. It’s the best this way. He wants to ignore the words that came out of his grandma’s mouth, but he can’t find it in him as he hears them resonate in his head over and over again. 

He’s the second choice even in his own family. He’s a joke to everyone, isn’t he? Just the side character, the one that never gets the spotlight. It hurts, it hurts him so much, but he pays no attention to his blurry vision, because even though he’s fairly sure no one from his family would miss him, he doesn’t want to drive off the road and kill himself with his escape.

He parks the car in front of his and Jisung’s flat after a few hours. He’s fairly good at it, considering he never drives, and mentally puts up a middle finger to his dad in his head for screaming at him so much. He was in a much calmer headspace when he was driving with his dad than he was now, yet, he didn’t manage to drive anyone over. 

Putting his feet into the cold, empty apartment, turning the heating on and plopping down on the sofa, he once again realises how lonely it feels. Not only because of the feeling of abandonment the dark flat resonates, but also due to the fact that it truly feels like now, he’s all alone in this world. The silence screams louder than any words ever could, his ears lowly ringing without any sound in the small room, which makes him wonder if he’s truly the only one that has to spend his holidays pretty much alone. Maybe it’s his fault that he’s fucked it up with his family, who knows-- but that’s a topic for another overthinking session of his, when he decides to let it go once his eyes meet the snow silently falling down behind the window. 

The dark mixed with the white balls of fluff in the air remind him of you. Your bubbly laugh, the feeling of your skin on his when you held his hands and danced around with him in the snow. He feels a smile growing on his face, despite everything he’s heard today, his fingers involuntarily texting you to see if you’re doing anything and if you can hang out with him today. 

He meets you at the door a few minutes later, your nose runny from the cold and hands dry, smiling at you with a sense he can only describe as belonging, because he realises, maybe you feel just as lonely as him on holidays and suddenly, he no longer feels sorry for leaving.

“Why are you even here, Lix? Shouldn’t you be at home?” you ask him when you’re taking off your shoes and hanging your coat on the hanger by the door. He bites down on his lower lip to suppress a bitter chuckle. 

“Christmas got cancelled this year.” he shrugs. 

It’s not like he doesn’t trust you. You know better than anyone what his struggles are-- he asked you to keep his secrets numerous times. It’s just that now that you’re here, it’s like his soul finally feels calm and he no longer wants to whine about his grandma or his aunts anymore. It’s just you and him and the empty apartment. If he was anyone else, maybe he’d try to get into your pants. He’s just Lee Felix though, and he’s absolutely, wholeheartedly in love with you, he realises, and believe me, it kind of takes him over the edge, and so he doesn’t try anything. 

And you look at him in understatement, no other questions asked.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. It’s all a capitalistic holiday anyway,” he shrugs.

You follow him into the living room and he throws the remote control into your lap, telling you to choose a movie before he comes back with popcorn. 

“If you don’t pick anything before I’m done, we’ll just watch Venom, I don’t care,” he says, seeing you adorably scrunch up your nose at him in response. 

When he comes back and you’re waiting for him with Howl’s moving castle paused on Netflix, he can’t help but grin at you. He places the popcorn on the coffee table and notices himself staring onto your body next to his far more often than the TV and wonders if he really drove away from all of his problems or if he just drove away from one problem to another, because now, it’s getting really hard to focus on staying away from you. 

And when you shiver and curl up into his side, placing your head onto his shoulder, he can’t help but jolt at the contact, staring at you in surprise. 

“It’s cold,” you mumble, pouting.

Felix smiles. He rolls his eyes at you, even though on the inside, he finds you absolutely adorable, taking a blanket from the side of the sofa and putting it over your cold bodies, tucking you both in. You feel warm against his side, your hand resting on his chest. He wonders if you can feel his quickening heartbeat, his stiff body and the nerves rising in his heart. Everything else disappears, the fight back home long forgotten and Han Jisung left somewhere home with his own family, the weight of your body overwhelming him when you fall asleep and that’s when he stops and thinks,

isn’t this how home’s supposed to feel like?

The halls of the university building are empty as Felix stands right in front of the closed door, silently pacing around the corridors and bumping his knee up and down. He just got his final’s results and even though his soul was supposed to be at peace, he finds himself stressing over you, currently sitting in the room behind the closed door in front of him, getting your final’s results from biology back. The professor decided to split your class into two groups for the finals so you can, quote, ‘focus better when there’s less people around’ and even though you managed to cheat on your exams without any problems, he still wonders if you did well and if you passed. 

Once the voices behind the closed doors get louder and louder, he figures it’s near the end of your lecture and he can finally see you again and ask you how you did. 

The last time he talked to you without the stress of finals breathing onto your back was back on Christmas break-- more than a week ago. Ever since then, you two have been meeting in the middle of the night again, preparing for your upcoming tests. You didn’t really manage to talk a lot about anything else and even though Felix didn’t mind, he still missed your mindless rambles and weird jokes you used to crack when you weren’t stressing your mind off. 

The door opens and reveals people coming out, a few of them wearing a toothy grin on their faces as they glance on the paper in their hands, a few of them frowning as they pin their eyes to the ground. It’s not easy to differentiate the ones that passed and the ones who did not do that well and even though Felix feels sorry for them, he wonders why they just don’t cheat their way out of bad grades just how he does. It’s not that hard. It just takes a lot of practice. 

Once he finally sees your face, a big, toothy grin decorating your lips, a big stone falls off his heart, a weight lifts itself from his shoulders, because frankly, you wouldn’t look so happy if you failed, right? You’re not a total psychopath.

“How did you-” 

His words are cut off from his mouth, all air kicked out of his body once he feels you so close, the soft skin of your lips pressed up against his in a happy kiss. He’s startled, to say the least. His cheeks are reddening in the instance and he doesn’t even know if time stopped or if it’s just the rising anxiety and excitement in his chest, but he bites down the confusion and kisses you back finally, closing his eyes and bringing you close by your shoulders. The kiss is a little sloppy and messy, but he doesn’t mind-- all that’s occupying his mind right now is you, your sweet lips, your mouthy kiss, your excited hands creeping up around his neck, your bag that fell to the ground next to his feet, your exam paper marked with the big red A+ flying around the two of you when you let it fall from your grasp, your hair tickling his cheeks, you, you, you.

There’s only you. In the air he breathes, in the ground he walks on, in his hands and on his mind. You’re everywhere. Intoxicating.

You pull away from him after a while, grinning at him. It still manages to startle him a little-- how just the small gesture can light up his whole world, how your smile can make him feel like he’s the luckiest person on this earth. He sees stars in your eyes and he wonders who put them there, hoping to be the one, believing he could finally be the one, with how you look at him and hold him in your arms-

but it’s Felix’s life we’re talking about. There’s only you, you, you and maybe somewhere, far away in the distance, there could even be him, but who’s always there for sure is Han Jisung.

Han Jisung staring at the two of you from the open door, mouth agape in shock. Han Jisung with trembling hands, Han Jisung with his books clutched close to his chest as Felix’s heart drops and reality finally hits him. You were never supposed to be his to kiss. You were supposed to be Jisung’s-- his roommate’s, his best friend’s -- you fell for him long, long ago and that’s how it’s always been. 

He opens his mouth to say something, anything, to comfort his dear friend that looks like he’s heart’s being broken, but he finds no words in him to console his actions. He feels bad, he feels so, so guilty when their eyes meet, but he doesn’t manage to say anything before Jisung turns around the corner and leaves. 

The sound of Jisung’s quick steps is the only thing resonating in Felix’s mind like a bell, a signal for him that he fucked up, he did a really, really bad thing. 

His insides clutch and eyes water in the empty college corridor when he wonders,

is this how it feels to break someone’s heart?

You kick the small rocks beneath your feet, gazing into the distance. The cold in your bones makes you shudder, your eyes trailing around the neighbourhood so foreign to you, putting your hands into your pockets so you shelter your fingers from the frozen air. You think how this place looks exactly as you imagined it to-- tall apartment complex and a single big tree in front of it, the cars parked in the driveway obviously having their spot as the neighbours have lived together for a long time to know not to park anywhere else, because it’s more efficient this way. 

You’re waiting and waiting, hoping to see the one you’re waiting for soon, because you doubt your confidence will last you for any longer if you don’t talk to him now. You could lie and tell yourself it’s okay and that you’re not nervous at all, but after Jisung ran away the other day and his roommate followed him a few moments later, you feel nervousness creeping into your skin after not seeing or hearing from Felix for three days now. 

You remember him telling you that he likes to go for late-night convenience store runs every evening to get his favorite snacks. It wasn’t hard to find out where he lives-- it’s the 21st century, for god’s sake. You asked a friend of his friend and here you are, waiting  for him to appear in the door of his apartment complex, ready to talk to him about the events of this week.

Once you hear the door opening, you feel your head snap to its direction quicker than the speed of light, knees almost getting weak at the sight of Lee Felix standing there, confusion written all over his face once his eyes meet with yours. The frown forming on his face only deepens your stress as you wonder if he didn’t want to see you today, which, considering the fact that he’s been ignoring you for the past few days, might just be the case, but it still makes your heart break just a little when you hear him sigh once he makes his way over to you, the sound of his sneakers on the ground being the only thing heard in the middle of the night.

All the snow has melted-- as if all the bright things have left just in time with it, leaving you sad and cold, the clouds of your breath hitting the cold air being the only thing reminding you of the weather as you feel your body heating up in his presence. 

“Can we talk?” you ask, voice steadier than you expected it to be.

“I- I mean,” he starts, a shaky and husky voice hitting your ears, signaling that he probably hadn’t spoken to anyone for a long time now, “you’re already here, so I guess…”

You nod at him, averting your gaze quickly to the ground, when you realise you suddenly don’t know what to say. You try to search for words, yet none come out of your mouth. Your mind is blank and it seems like his presence took away all your vocabulary, but deep on the inside, you know damn well that if you don’t speak up now, you won’t have a second chance and you really have to get it now.

“Why- why…” you mutter, “why did you leave without saying anything the other day?” you ask.

The silence is overwhelming as you start to hate the sound of your own breath, opting to hold it for a few seconds as you await his response. 

“I mean, isn’t it obvious?” 

You shake your head in confusion, finally meeting his eyes again. “No.”

“Jisung… Jisung saw us. I didn’t feel like it was right,” he explains, cracking his knuckles in a nervous habit you noticed in him a long, long time ago when he first tried to teach you how to cheat in class without getting caught.

“What does he have to do with anything?”

“You two like each other.” he says bluntly, taking you off-guard.

The moment these words come out of his mouth, you realise not one, but two things. One of them is fairly new to you, the fact that Han Jisung liked you back was something you never knew you could experience, but even though you should be flattered, you realise it no longer holds a meaning in your heart. The second thing is connected to the first-- and that is, Lee Felix doesn’t know that you like him now. His foolish, silly mind convinced him you were still in love with his best friend, his confused and frustrated brain didn’t let him realise that for a long, long time now, the freckled boy in front of you has been the only one you thought about when you were falling asleep at night.

You don’t even know when it happened. You guess it just did. You wondered how it’d feel to know what exactly made you fall for Felix, what that moment was, but something inside of you is telling you that maybe, it was even more wonderful this way. Unexpected, but totally reasonable.

“Why would I be kissing you if I still liked Jisung?” you ask, the fear of directly confessing to him and getting rejected creeping up in your shadow.

“I- I don’t know-”

“Exactly.” you cut him off before he rambles and manages to find a stupid, silly reason in his head to justify his wrong expectations. You know how he is-- if he overthinks things hard enough, he’ll surely find an answer. There’s none, though, so you don’t dare to give him time to think about it and ponder on the thought for any longer.

“But that doesn’t matter now anyway,” he shrugs, putting his hands into his pockets.

You wonder what’s going on inside of his head right now. You wonder if he regrets what he’s done-- if he wants to turn back time and never let you kiss him. The nerves make you bite down harshly on your bottom lip and you only catch yourself when you feel iron in your mouth, quickly licking your own wound on the surface of your mouth and take a deep breath in. 

“Why?” you ask. 

“Why would it?” he says, eyes boring into yours.

“Because… I thought it meant something to you? I mean, it meant a lot to me, at least. That’s why I’m even here in the first place,” you chuckle airly, feeling your throat get dry.

“I’m not saying that it didn’t, I just think it had no point.”

His words feel like knives thrown into your chest, like a fire burning the pit of your stomach. You feel your legs getting weaker at his arguments, your fingers harshly tugging at the skin of your cuticles hidden in your pockets. You don’t trust your voice to sound steady this time when you speak, but you don’t care. Maybe it’s time to show your real emotions. Maybe it will change Felix’s mind.

“And why is that?”

“Because people like you don’t date people like me. You’re supposed to be in love with Jisung. You’re supposed to be dating him, he’s supposed to date you. You’re too good for me anyway.” he shrugs.

“Is this all about Jisung?” you ask, eyebrows furrowed.

You watch Felix sharply inhale in and out, averting his eyes from your figure. The distance between the two of you is unnatural, as if to singal how the two of you are slowly drifting apart. You see him fold his hands on his chest, preparing for what he’s about to say.

“It hurt him, back then. And I hate that. He loves you and I just.. I can’t do that to him, when I know  how much he cares about you.” he says.

Love is a strange thing. You hear Felix say how much Jisung loves you, but is that really true? Does Han Jisung even know you? The real you?

Does Jisung know how you look with your mouth full of fries and a greasy forehead? Does he know how you look when you’re stressed out of your mind because of finals? Does he know your favorite bistro, does he know your favorite movie? Did you cuddle up with Jisung on the couch just because you wanted to be close to him, comfort him and tell him you’re there just a few days after Christmas? 

Or does he just know the self you put up in front of him when you went to meet him? The put-together you that cares even about the sound of your own laugh, not wanting it to sound ugly in his ears? 

Han Jisung can’t love you. He doesn’t even know you.

And you never loved him-- just for the same reason. The feelings you had for him were merely a feeling of attraction, so far away from love.

But now you know how you feel about Felix, how his smile lights up the world and how his presence makes you feel understood. How even the silence with him speaks louder than a million words, how he knows you like the back of his hand and how he treats you like his closest friend. You know that what you feel when you’re with him is stronger than anything you ever have and although it used to scare you for a moment, now you’re ready to embrace it and live with it, if he lets you.

Lee Felix doesn’t tell you he loves you. Maybe you can see it in his eyes.

Why does he have to put everything above love? Why does he care about Jisung more than you? It’s breaking your heart. 

“Felix… I’m sure he’d understand. He’s a good person. I’m sure he’d want you to be happy.”

“Y/N, you don’t understand-”

“He’s a grown adult!” you yell out, the built-up emotions coming to the surface in the form of frustration, your words sunding spiteful and angry. Maybe you are furious, maybe you are full of fire right now, but it’s all because of the boy in front of you and the things he refuses to let himself enjoy.

“Why do you even care about it so much, huh? I was your fucking second choice all along anyway!” 

You look at him in shock, your eyes watering at the sight of the frown sitting on his face. Something inside of you breaks and you think it’s safe to say it was your heart, choking you up as you shake your head in disapproval. 

“Felix-” you protest, but there’s no use.

You see him turn around on his heel, opening the door to the apartment complex and leaving. It feels like you’re losing him, it feels like he’s gone forever. He turned his back on you, refusing all the love you were willing to give him, all the love you were offering to him right here, your heart in your hands.

He gave up on your love.

People in movies go out to party after a break-up to get drunk and numb their feelings. They either go to the club or go to a stupid college party, which is, coincidentally, your case today, but you’re not here to get drunk tonight. You’re not here to drown out your feelings and numb your pained soul-- you’re simply here to try to have some fun.

Your mum told you long, long ago that happiness is a choice. You could argue with her and tell her that depression and heartbreak aren’t a choice and that they, by themselves, are causing people the most sadness, but you had to give your mum a point. If you don’t choose to try, if you don’t do anything to at least try to stimulate your own brain, you can’t expect happiness to find you by itself. That’s just, sadly, not how life works, and you weren’t going to drown out in your own tears just because of Lee fucking Felix, because if you weren’t worth trying for him, he’s not worth any of your tears.

You appear on Lee Haechan’s end of the semester party. You have A+ finals to celebrate and although you would be much happier to drink to them with the one that basically helped you get through the semester, you won’t pass the chance to socialize. You worked hard and you did a good job-- you deserve a party. Alcohol truly isn’t the best for your brain, but you will just decide to call it selfcare. It’s not like you’re getting blacked-out drunk tonight anyway.

You manage to have small talk with a few people from your class. Though it’s not exactly what’s stimulating your brain, you don’t mind it. You barely know these people and you couldn’t care less, but you guess this is the downside of socialising. 

The alcohol in your veins doesn’t give you a chance to loosen up, though. You only feel your body warmer with the beer hitting your system, but your feelings still taste of salt, your brain not cooperating with your grandiose happiness plan and you think the people talking to you notice, since no one really tries to keep you in a conversation long enough when you start to absently nod at them and pay zero attention to what they’re saying. You don’t blame them, though. You’d probably do the same in their place.

Your feet move their way to the front door when you decide that maybe your mum wasn’t right, completely ready to go home and pity yourself for a few more days before coming back to life, when a familiar voice calls you from behind, making you freeze in your spot.

“Y/N, long time no see.”

Han Jisung watches you with glossy eyes, yet he tries to look nonchalant at the sight of you. It doesn’t feel like his heart is breaking when he sees you right here and there, chewing on your bottom lip, more or less, it feels numbing to his heart and his head. It’s like he expected it all from the start-- the outcome that once so surprised him. But after all this time he spent overthinking and dwelling on the memory of seeing you kissing his best friend, it made sense to him. 

“Jisung…”

He can see your eyes growing worried when you watch over him and he mentally slaps himself for not handling his emotions with more care back then. He could have spared you a lot of pain and trouble if he hadn’t reacted in such a way in the doorway of your classroom, but the truth is, Han Jisung hadn’t really known just how much a true heartbreak feels and nothing could ever prepare him for the physical pain numbing his chest. He didn’t know it could hurt so much. 

He doesn’t want to worry you. You are still his friend, after all, right? That’s all you always have been and he should have understood it from the first moment he saw you gaze at his friend so lovingly in the university halls one day. He thinks you, yourself, didn’t even recognise the emotion in you when you watched over Felix with so much care, with so many stars in his eyes and a big grin on your face. He could never compare himself to Felix.

He doesn’t want to worry you anymore, and so he decides to talk to you like a friend would. You looked like you could use a friend tonight.

“How have you been?” he asks, smiling at you. He hopes his eyes convey the emotion he feels-- how after all this time, he still feels comfortable with you and desperately needs you to do the same. He can’t lose another friend. Not to love. 

That happens every single time. Truth be told, Jisung used to have a problem with differentiating true love from platonic feelings sometimes. He used to think he falls out of love just as quickly as he falls in, but the truth is that it was never even love at all. Sometimes, it was just pure admiration. Feelings for a friend. And he managed to ruin all his friendships just because he started dating them. 

And then, he just kept searching and searching for the right one, because no one ever felt right. No one ever made him feel loved, no one ever made him feel love. It felt suffocating, but so, so addicting. He could never give up on trying to find love.

And then he met you. And it finally made sense-- it finally felt right.

“I’m… I’m fine, thanks,” you say, smiling at him with that smile that still, admittedly, made his heart race and swell with love. He’s not afraid to call the emotion by its name. It doesn’t feel wrong. He used to think he wants it to stop, but the truth is, it still feels nice. 

Love feels like loneliness sometimes. It’s a bittersweet feeling. But it’s still so, so addicting.

“Are you sure?” he asks. He knows you. He knows when something’s wrong.

He also knows your eyes have been searching for his roommate for the past few minutes of your conversation. He knows you want to meet him and avoid him all at once, love him and leave him-- it was a paradox. 

He knows his roommate way too well, though. He knows he can’t fall out of love with you. He knows, though, that he’ll never act upon it. Lee Felix has always been the sweetest person in this whole entire world-- putting the needs of others before his own. He can’t keep doing this to himself.He can’t keep doing this to you.

“I think you know the answer, Jisung. Why do you keep asking, then?” you bitterly snicker, going around him and escaping the noisy house. Jisung doesn’t know if you want to leave, if you want to escape his presence, but he can’t leave you just like that, and so he follows you outside, seeing you sitting at the doorstep, as if you were waiting for him.

“You don’t have to think of me, you know that, right?” he says once he takes a seat next to you, watching your expression change into a pained one. 

“It’s… I don’t know. It’s complicated. And Felix- he doesn’t think it’s right. I can’t force him into anything. It was his choice anyway,” you mutter. Jisung sighs heavily, the feeling your words on his chest heavy and solemn. He hates the fact that he is standing in the way of your happiness. He hates the fact that he is the problem, the invisible wall keeping you two from each other. 

“It’s simple, though.” he shrugs.

Your eyebrows furrow in confusion, a heavy sigh escaping your lips. He takes it upon himself to explain before you begin to tell him that it’s not, opting to open your eyes on his own.

“You two are in love with each other. So you should be together. Isn’t that simple?” he asks, smiling at you subtly.

You scoff and shake your head. “He gave up on us.”

“Did he, or did he just do what he felt was right?” Jisung argues. “You can’t keep hiding from each other. You can’t keep trying to ignore your feelings just because I like you. That’s not fair for either of you.”

You don’t argue with him this time. He wonders what’s going on inside of your head at the moment, with your eyebrows furrowed and your bottom lip trapped in your teeth. You look just like all the times he watched you during your tutoring sessions-- focused and lost in thought. It will feel weird to not see you in that way anymore, but he has to try.

The same way Lee Felix always tried for him.

“You’re too sweet, Han Jisung. What a shame our timing’s off.” you say, bitterness coating your voice. He looks up at you again, wondering what your words mean. “I used to like you back then, you know,” you smile.

Here it is, the strange emotion again. The emotion of almost physical pain, a hand squeezing his heart, a knife stabbed into his back. It feels like his world is crumbling down on him, because he’s stupid-- so stupid. He could have had you back then. He could have been with you all this time, only if he wasn’t late. He missed his biggest chance, the biggest opportunity, the happiest time of his life. All because he was too hesitant. 

He didn’t deserve you anyway.

“But now your timing’s right with Felix. Don’t waste that,” he says, biting through the pain.

Because the truth is, if anyone deserved love, it was his roommate. The one that refused you for him, the one that rejected you for him, the one that set him up on a date with you even though you invited him in the first place. The one who gave up on his love only so he wouldn’t hurt his friend. You could say that Jisung was too good for this world, but Lee Felix is the one that deserves the whole entire world, in his eyes.

Maybe these two were just too good of friends. Caring about the other one twice as much as about themselves. And that’s exactly why Jisung will get over this-- he’ll push you to his friend. So he could be happy, finally. 

“Jisung, I don’t know-”

“Do it,” he cuts you off, “reach out to him again. Try it. For me.”

y/n: meet me at the 8Bistro at 9 

Felix can’t believe himself when he finds his legs moving to the direction of the bistro at the edge of the town. He knows it’s the last one on your list, the one you invited him to so you could celebrate your finals in and he finds himself wondering if he could have gone here with you earlier only if the two of you didn’t share that kiss back then.

That damned kiss he couldn’t stop thinking about for the last few days-- even weeks, every time he opened his eyes in the morning and closed them when he was about to sleep. It kept following him like a curse, a thing he couldn’t escape, as if it was testing him like the snake tested Eve in paradise. Foreign fruit. 

You’re sitting there already when he arrives, fingers playing with each other as you gaze at the door in expectation. He sees your usual order already on the table, assuming you got here early, but it’s untouched as your knee bumps up and down under the table and you bite down harshly on your bottom lip.

He takes a seat, allowing himself to look at you again after such a long time. It feels like it’s been ages, yet you still look the same to him-- the same beauty that hit him when he first met you and shared his biggest secret with you.

“Why aren’t you eating? You have to finish off your list,” he mumbles awkwardly, motioning to the food at the table.

“I wanted to wait for you.” you say. Your voice is quiet, almost shy, when you speak to him. He wonders just how much he fucked up that it made you act this way. He knows it’s probably a lot, but considering he’s sitting here right now, he can still fix it.

At least he hopes so. 

“Did you.. Do you want to talk to me about something?” he asks, nervosity filling his veins as he feels his hands form a little swimming pool with just how much he’s sweating.

“Yes,” you nod, taking a deep breath in and out. He wonders if you’re just as nervous as he is. The answer is probably yes, considering your tense shoulders and restless legs, but he doesn’t comment on it as he watches you begin speaking again. “I wanted to tell you that I’m- I’m in love with you. And that it’s for real, and it’s for you and no one else,” you start, quickly wetting your lips and continuing again, “and I know you must feel like a second choice, or like you weren’t important to me at all, but that’s not true.”

“You helped me so much, really, but the more I hung out with you, the more I realised just how wonderful you are. And how your heart is so big, how you’re fun to be around…” you ramble, taking Felix by surprise with your heart-felt monologue, “and that Jisung is not the one for me, because, well, it was just.. it was just a crush. I didn’t know him. He didn’t even know me that well. Crushes… they don’t mean anything. They’re silly. But what I have with you, Felix…” you say, drifting your eyes away from him for a second,

“I know you. The real you. And you know me. You’ve seen me at my worst. You’ve seen me struggle and you know exactly how to help. You know me and I know you and the feelings I have for you are much more than a silly crush. I love you, Felix. And I don’t want to just forget about us.” you complete and Felix swears he can feel his eyes watering at your words. He chooses not to speak up, afraid of his voice breaking, afraid he’s going to embarrass himself in front of you. His emotions got the best of him and right here and now, no one else matters. 

It’s you. You that feels like home, you, the only girl he’s ever loved. You, the only girl that ever loved him back, you, who he foolishly rejected. 

You’re everywhere. In his veins, in his heart, in his foolish, stupid mind.

“Felix… I don’t want you to give up on us.” 

He looks up, seeing your sincere eyes and a look full of worry. You seem so wonderful to him, even now. You’re everything he’s ever dreamt of, a home without a roof and walls. With you, he feels at ease. He trusts you. He’s never felt this way for anyone before.

He watches you and he hears your laugh, he hears your whines when he used to tease you so much. He hears the sound of your memories when he chased you around in the snow. He hears the opening song of Howl’s moving castle, reminding him of the warmth he felt when you hugged him so close that evening.

He used to want to hate you. He should have known that could never be the case.

You’re all he needs-- all he wants. You’re everywhere he looks, in every beauty of the world and in everything that’s dear to him. 

You, you, you, you.

And so he decides-- it’s time to change his plan.

Lee Felix’s bullet-proof guide to loving you: 1) hold her hand, 2) get rid of the guilt, 3) lean in and kiss her.

“Does that mean you’re giving us a chance?” you ask, hopeful eyes glaring at him with millions of stars in them, sparkles swimming around in perfection.

“We’ll talk after you eat. You have a yelp review to write,” he laughs.

“Feli-”

Lee Felix’s bullet-proof guide to loving you: 4) shut her up by forcing french fries into her mouth.

“I love you too.”

[dudeandduchess]

Prince!Kyōjurō x Princess!F!S/O: Dry Humping (Smut, Kinktober, NSFW Scenario)

Warnings: Smut, Dry Humping, Making Out, Semi-Public Setting, Almost Getting Caught

MASTERLIST

***

“Why do I have to be the one to entertain this… prince? Duke? Whatever he is,” (Y/n) asked with a slight huff in her tone, as she stared at her handmaid through the mirror.

The other woman was busy finger combing through (Y/n)’s damp locks, taking good care to keep the strands from being pulled too much. After all, it wouldn’t put anyone in a good mood if they got their hair pulled right before an important dinner.

“The crown prince of an allied kingdom, your highness. Prince Kyōjurō.”

“Prince… Kyōjurō?” The name instantly tasted bitter on the young woman’s tongue, as it all clicked in her head that the man she had been with last night— the very man whom had abandoned her just as she was about to cum— was an actual prince; and one of her father’s esteemed guests, to boot.

A mix of irritation and anticipation bubbled within her at that realization; making the scheming wheels in her head begin to turn. Because she wanted to get even… in the best way possible.

“Have you laid out a dress for me yet? Or do I have the liberty of picking my own dress for tonight?”

But, of course, she always had the liberty of picking the dress that she wanted to wear— granted that it was not a formal event where she needed to color coordinate with her family.

So, with a smile, (Y/n) settled even further into her seat and silently looked forward to seeing her future bed partner. She was going to use him for her own pleasure, and that was a promise.

***

“I hope I haven’t kept you waiting for long, your highness,” (Y/n) announced with a smile, having cut off the footman from announcing her arrival into the dining room. She practically sashayed into the expansive space, acting the part of a gracious hostess and curtsying at the blond who’d only just risen from his seat.

Kyōjurō had to blink twice at the sight that was before him, because he was sure that it was a deliberate attempt to provoke him. (Y/n) looked breathtakingly ethereal in a tastefully sheer dress, with that seductive smile on her lips, and her eyes practically begging him to kiss her like he had the night before.

And he was so tempted to give in and do it, had he not remembered that dinner was about to be served. It wouldn’t have done well for both of them to be caught cavorting somewhere they were sure that they were being watched so scrutinizingly.

So, with a dimmed down smile, Kyōjurō gave the young woman a slight bow, before moving to help her into her seat— which was the last thing that he wanted to do at that moment. “Shall we dine, my lady?”

It was obvious that (Y/n) was a bit taken aback at the sudden turn of events, yet she tried not to let her discontent show on her face. Especially when she noticed that Kyōjurō had turned from warm to simply polite— like a pendulum swaying from one side to another.

To say that she was frustrated would have been an understatement, yet she had to just make it through to dessert— then she could get him all to herself.

All throughout dinner, no conversation aside from simple pleasantries were made; how the salad was so fresh, and how the quail was amazing, it was all drivel that served to make (Y/n) wonder more and more about why the prince’s affections had gone cold…

That was, until she noticed that he was eyeing the servants posted at the corners of the room; watching them and catering to their every beck and call. So, simply biding her time, she waited until the last course of the night was on the table before ordering everyone to leave her and the prince alone— and to close the door behind them.

Suddenly, the tension between them grew thicker; as if something had been released with the closing of the door behind the last maid.

“Might I ask what is bothering you… Kyōjurō?” The young woman asked coyly, as she took a small bite of the gelato in front of her. Her eyes flickered up to meet the blond’s gaze, holding that contact and trailing down south to admire the way that his tongue sexily took a swipe at his bottom lip.

“You are, my lady,” Kyōjurō answered softly, meeting her eyes once more and staring intently into her soul. He then swallowed thickly, before licking his bottom lip once more, “I want nothing more than to ravish you in that dress. Was it necessary for you to wear it tonight?”

A pleased smile made its way onto (Y/n)’s lips at that, now knowing that the man’s interest hasn’t fizzled out; it had been merely been leashed, since they were in the presence of others— people who could talk and bring their reputations down.

He was there mostly for business, after all, and it wouldn’t have done any good for him to be openly caught with his pants around his ankles. He had already tempted fate enough the night before, so he had to be careful going forward.

However, (Y/n) had other things in mind as she got up from her seat and skirted around the table to get to him. Her heels clacked softly against the floor, and her dress sashayed so alluringly that it took everything in him to keep his hands to himself.

“I wore it just for you, your highness,” She whispered with a saucy wink, right as she reached out to lay a hand on his right shoulder; running the tips of her fingers up and down the broad expanse, before she slid them up higher to caress up the side of his neck. “Don’t you like it?”

“I like it way too much, that’s the problem,” The blond answered in a strained tone, closing his eyes and relishing in the feel of her nails gently teasing his skin.

Just as quickly as he let his eyes fall shut however, they immediately opened up when he felt (Y/n) unceremoniously straddle his lap. She was so close that her perfume teased his senses even further, making him lean forward as his hands instinctively anchored themselves to either side of her hips.

“You’re playing with fire.”

The princess only grinned at that, as she closed the gap between their lips; moaning against her lover’s mouth when he wasted no time in snaking his tongue between her lips. “I’m playing with you, Kyōjurō.”

That caused the blond’s cock to get even harder than it already was at that point, twitching in his pants— especially when (Y/n) adjusted herself so that her clothed pussy was pressed right against his bulge.

He knew what she was going to do, and he was in no mood to cum in his pants, yet he let her do what she wanted. Simply because he wanted her too much, in any way that he could have her.

(Y/n) claimed his lips once more at that action, slowly beginning to roll and gyrate her hips against him; all in an effort to stimulate her clit. Her pleasure was dulled out compared to having had Kyōjurō’s mouth between her legs yesterday, but it still served to please her more than her own fingers had the night prior.

It was such a heady feeling, having such a powerful man moaning beneath her while she humped his cock through his pants— with his fingers gripping her hips tight, and his own hips trying to meet her thrust for thrust. And those feelings only served to spur her on even more, to the point where she threw all caution to the wind and wrapped her arms around his neck; deepening their kiss, as their movements became more frantic.

She could feel herself getting closer and closer to the precipice of release, even though this one was not near satisfying at all. In a way, it was empty and she needed more— so much more.

Yet she couldn’t will herself to stop moving, moaning into her lover’s mouth and taking the time to suck on his tongue while her fingers tangled themselves in his hair.

Kyōjurō was just about to get up from his chair and lay her out on the empty half of the dining table— anticipation bubbling so incessantly within him, that he almost didn’t catch the soft knocks on the door.

Immediately, the two of them pulled away from each other, with (Y/n) quickly getting off his lap and trying to clean up the messy state that her lipstick was in, while he straightened his shirt out and fixed his mussed up hair; making it seem that nothing lewd had transpired between them.

When, in reality, both of them were burning so hot with need for each other.

“I trust you know where my room is, Kyōjurō?” (Y/n) asked under her breath, before getting up on her feet and trying to act like he hadn’t been so close to fucking her seconds before the interruption.