#this has actually been breaking me for the past several minutes

[pemberlaey]

nobody does chapter titles like charles dickens

[zephyrchama]

Living together in a big house with one (main) (shared) bathroom means that mornings can be tough.

When you first arrived at the House of Lamentation, it was hard to fit in. It was really hard to get into the bathroom in the mornings and fight six demons for use of the sink. If more than two others were in there at the same time, they practically formed a living wall that blocked you out, forcing you to wake up extremely early or risk being late for school.

That got better over time though. You gradually managed to fit into the house's morning routine.

---

Lucifer has his morning routine down to an exact science. Usually he's fully dressed and has his hair brushed before leaving the bedroom. He might be running on pure muscle memory though - one time you handed him a warm washcloth for his face and he just stared at it in confusion for several seconds with a furrowed brow. He has no problems getting it himself, but this break in routine gave him pause. It took Lucifer a moment to realize what it was and to thank you.

If you get the chance to eat breakfast together, Lucifer likes to ask about your day. "What do you have planned? Remember, we have that meeting at five. Did you prepare for the ancient hex exam?" He might slide a bit of his food onto your plate before he goes, a way of returning the pleasant energy boost you always provide for him.

---

Mammon can hustle. Which means that Mammon can get up early if it benefits him in some way. A part time job, an early bird discount, a chance to slip past Lucifer's defenses and borrow some cash.

That doesn't mean it's easy. Waking up takes some serious effort. Mammon will stumble into the bathroom to do his business first thing in the morning, yawning with his eyes half closed and tugging up whatever pants he just tossed on for modesty.

The tsundere part of his brain takes a few minutes to kick in if he's just woken up. If he spots you, Mammon will demand a good morning hug and wrap his arms around you, deaf to your cries of "Mammon! Go wash your hands before you touch me!"

---

Leviathan is always groaning in the morning. He's probably not aware of it. He's probably muttering complaints but is too tired to actually speak the words properly. His blankets are always a tangled mess, wrapped unevenly around his feet and contorted around his body, but Leviathan can easily Houdini his way out of them when it's time to get up. If there's no event or livestream to wake up early for, he'll sleep in for as long as he can before starting the day with a nice shower.

He finds warm running water to feel so pleasant and you can often find Leviathan spacing out next to the faucet. He'll greet you with a sleepy "ah, morning," and accidentally splash you in an attempt to wave his hand. The embarrassment and slight panic from getting you a towel to dry off with is usually enough to properly wake him up, and he sheepishly exits the bathroom and guards the door until you've finished changing into dry clothes.

---

Satan can hardly even put his shirt on properly when fully awake.

The man's a sleepy mess when he tries to get dressed in the morning. He'll stay up all night to finish a book he's invested in, then stumble out of his room "ready to go" when it's time for breakfast. His pants are unzipped and the button is coming undone. He's only got one sleeve on and it's on the wrong arm, or the buttons on his shirt are all misaligned and half have been skipped over.

He doesn't protest anymore when you tidy him up. Some mornings he'll doze off while you straighten his tie and fall forward into you, then try to play it off as a hug. Satan doesn't want to let go though, you feel so much warmer on a chilly morning.

---

Asmodeus is a rare morning riser. Too much sleep is bad for the skin, he claims. If he has trouble getting up, he'll either go soak in his private tub for energy or seek you out.

"You have to hear what happened last night," he'll say, strolling into your room while there's still ten minutes left on your alarm. He sits on the edge of your bed, and if you try falling back asleep he pulls you up into a sitting position. "Listen to this, you won't believe it!"

Asmodeus isn't afraid to get touchy if it means you'll wake up faster and he gets your attention. He'll sit you in his lap, or press you against his side, or run his hands down your face and squish your cheeks with a mischievous smile.

When the main bathroom is too crowded to use you're free to borrow his, with the caveat he gets to style you for the day and you might be late when he gets overzealous.

---

Beelzebub can also be found awake in the mornings. The quiet hours before everyone else wakes up are best for stretching, taking jogs, and grabbing a pre-breakfast appetizer. He'll get spooked if he hears footsteps approach the kitchen and slam the fridge door shut in a hurry, but all is well when he sees you enter the room instead of Lucifer.

Beelzebub is a big guy who takes up a lot of space. When you run into each other in the bathroom and are rushing to get ready, it's easy to bump into him. On days he's still pretty tired, he might not even notice you bonk your head against his arm. That's fine though - you don't want him to notice you until he's brushed his teeth. After all, Beelzebub's morning breath is a potent magical weapon.

If you need the bathroom sink while he occupies it, Beelzebub is kind enough to nudge you in front of him (once you've confirmed his mouth is minty fresh). You both get to use the mirror this way, and you can both see each other's smiling faces.

---

Belphegor is the king of oversleeping. The powers of you and his twin combined are hardly enough on some days, but mostly the responsibility of waking him falls to you. You quickly learned it's best to wake him from behind his head, if you can manage to maneuver your way into a suitable spot to do so. Anywhere his limbs can easily grab you will result in being pulled into bed. He's like a sleeping kraken.

You suspect that Belphegor wakes up easier than he lets on, but he feigns ignorance. He insists he was totally fast asleep when you struggled to physically drag him down the hallway towards the bathroom, wrapping your arms tightly around his torso with all your strength. And when he clung on to your waist and nuzzled his head into your stomach. And when Beel came to help free you from Belphegor's clutches, but he rolled you under him and muttered "mine now."

Definitely fast asleep, doesn't remember a single thing.

[damienkarras73]

An essay on Furiosa, the politics of the Wasteland, Arthurian literature and realistic vs. formalistic CGI

Mad Max: Fury Road absolutely enraptured me when it came out nearly a decade ago, and I will cop to seeing it four times at the theatre. For me (and many others who saw the light of George Miller) it set new standards for action filmmaking, storytelling and worldbuilding, and I could pop in its Blu Ray at any time and never get tired of it. Perhaps not surprisingly, I was deeply apprehensive about the announced prequel for Fury Road's actual main character, Furiosa, even if Miller was still writing and directing. We didn't need backstory for Furiosa—hell, Fury Road is told in such a way that NOTHING in it requires explicit backstory. And since it focuses on the Yung Furiosa, it meant Charlize Theron couldn't return with another career-defining performance. Plus, look at all that CGI in the trailer, it can't be as good as Fury Road.

Turns out I was silly to doubt George Miller, M.D., A.O., writer and director of Babe: Pig in the City and Happy Feet One & Two.

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is excellent, and I needn't have worried about it not being as good as Fury Road because it is not remotely trying to be Fury Road. Fury Road is a lean, mean machine with no fat on it, nothing extraneous, operating with constant forward momentum and only occasionally letting up to let you breathe a little; Furiosa is a classical epic, sprawling in scope, scale and structure, and more than happy to let the audience simmer in a quiet, almost painfully still moment. If its opening spoken word sequence by that Gandalf of the Wastes himself, the First History Man, didn't already clue you in, it unfolds like something out of myth, a tale told over and over again and whose possible embellishments are called attention to in the dialogue itself. Where Fury Road scratched the action nerd itch in my head like you wouldn't believe, Furiosa was the equivalent of Miller giving the undulating folds of my English major brain a deep tissue massage. That's great! I, for one, love when sequels/prequels endeavour to be fundamentally different movies from what they're succeeding/preceding, operating in different modes, formats and even genres, and more filmmakers should aim for it when building on an existing series.

This movie has been on my mind so much in the past week that I've ended up dedicating several cognitive processes to keeping track of all of the different ponderings it's spawned. Thankfully, Furiosa is divided into chapters (fun fact: putting chapter cards in your movie is a quick way to my heart), so it only seems fitting that I break up all of these cascading thoughts accordingly.

1. The Pole of Inaccessibility

Furiosa herself actually isn't the protagonist for the first chapter of her own movie, instead occupying the role of a (very crafty and resourceful) damsel in distress for those initial 30-40 minutes. The real hero of the opening act, which plays out like a game of cat and mouse, is Furiosa's mother Mary Jabassa, who rides out into the wasteland first on horseback and then astride a motorcycle to track down the band of raiders that has stolen away her daughter. Mary's brought to life by Miller and Nico Lathouris' economical writing and a magnetic performance by newcomer Charlee Fraser, who radiates so much screen presence in such relatively little time and with one of those instant "who is SHE??" faces. She doesn't have many lines, but who needs them when Fraser can convey volumes about Mary with just a flash of her eyes or the effortless way she swaps out one of her motorcycle's wheels for another. To be quite candid, I'm not sure of the last time I fell in love with a character so quickly.

You notice a neat aesthetic contrast between mother and daughter in retrospect: Mary Jabassa darts into the desert barefoot, clad in a simple yet elegant dress, her wolf cut immaculate, only briefly disguising herself with the ugly armour of a raider she just sniped, and when she attacks it's almost with grace, like some Greek goddess set loose in the post-apocalyptic Aussie outback with just her wits and a bolt-action rifle; we track Furiosa's growth over the years by how much of her initially conventional beauty she has shed, quite literally in one case (hair buzzed, severed arm augmented with a chunky mechanical prosthesis, smeared in grease and dirt from head to toe, growling her lines at a lower octave), and by how she loses her mother's graceful approach to movement and violence, eventually carrying herself like a blunt instrument. Yet I have zero doubt the former raised the latter, both angels of different feathers but with the same steel and resolve. Of fucking course this woman is Furiosa's mother, and in the short time we know her we quickly understand exactly why Furiosa has the drive and morals she does without needing to resort to didactic exposition.

Anyway, I was tearing up by the end of the first chapter. Great start!

2. Lessons from the Wasteland

Most movies—most stories, really—don't actually tell the entire narrative from A to Z. Perhaps the real meat of the thing is found from H to T, and A-G or U-Z are unnecessary for conveying the key narrative and themes. So many prequels fail by insisting on telling the A-G part of the story, explaining how the hero earned a certain nickname or met their memorable sidekick—but if that stuff was actually interesting, they likely would have included it in the original work. The greatest thing a prequel can actually do is recontextualize, putting iconic characters or moments in a new light, allowing you to appreciate them from a different angle. All of season 2 of Fargo serves to explain why Molly Solverson's dad is appropriately wary when Lorne Malvo enters his diner for a SINGLE SCENE in the show's first season. David's arc from the Alien prequels Prometheus and Covenant—polarizing as those entries are—adds another layer to why Ash is so protective of the creature in the first movie. Andor gives you a sense of what it's like for a normal, non-Jedi person to live under the boot of the Empire and why so many of them would join up with the Rebel Alliance—or why they would desire to wear that boot, or even just crave the chance to lick it.

Furiosa is one of those rare great prequels because it makes us take a step back and consider the established world with a little more nuance, even if it's still all so absurd. In Fury Road, Immortan Joe is an awesome, endlessly quotable villain, completely irredeemable, and basically a cartoon. He works perfectly as the antagonist of that breakneck, Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote-ass movie, but if you step outside of its adrenaline-pumping narrative for even a moment you risk questioning why nobody in the Citadel or its surrounding settlements has risen up against him before. Hell, why would Furiosa even work for him to begin with? But then you see Dementus and company tear-assing around the wasteland, seizing settlements and running them into the ground, and you realize Joe and his consortium offer something that Dementus reasonably can't: stability—granted, an unwavering, unchangeable stability weighted in favour of Joe's own brutal caste system, but stability nonetheless. It really makes you wonder, how badly does a guy have to suck to make IMMORTAN JOE of all people look like a sane, competent and reasonable ruler by comparison?!?

…and then they open the door to the vault where he keeps his wives, and in a flash you're reminded just how awful Joe is and why Furiosa will risk her life to help some of these women flee from him years later. This new context enriches Joe and makes it more believable that he could maintain power for so long, but it doesn't make him any less of a monster, and it says a lot about Furiosa's hate for Dementus that she could grit her teeth and work for this sick old tyrant.

3. The Stowaway

Here's another wild bit of trivia about this movie: you don't actually see top-billed actress Anya Taylor-Joy pop up on screen until roughly halfway through, once Furiosa is in her late teens/early twenties. Up until this point she's been played by Alyla Browne, who through the use of some seamless and honestly really impressive CGI has been given Anya's distinctive bug eyes [complimentary]. It's one of those bold choices that really works because Miller commits to it so hard, though it does make me wish Browne's name was up on the poster next to Taylor-Joy's.

Speaking of CGI, I should talk about what seems to be a sticking point for quite a few people: if there's been one consistent criticism of Furiosa so far, it's that it doesn't look nearly as practical or grounded as Fury Road, with more obvious greenscreen and compositing, and what previously would've been physical stunt performers and pyrotechnics have been replaced with their digital equivalents for many shots. Simply put, it doesn't look as real! For a lot of people, that practicality was one of Fury Road's primary draws, so I won't try to quibble if they're let down by Furiosa's overt artificiality, but to be honest I'm actually quite fine with it. It helps that this visual discrepancy doesn't sneak up on you but is incredibly apparent right from the aerial zoom-down into Australia in the very first scene, so I didn't feel misled or duped.

Fury Road never asks you to suspend your disbelief because it all looks so believable; Furiosa jovially prods you to suspend that disbelief from the get-go and tune into it on a different wavelength. It's a classical epic, and like the classical epics of the 1950s and 60s it has a lot of actors standing in front of what clearly are matte paintings. It feels right! We're not watching fact, we're watching myth. I'm willing to concede there might be a little bit of post-hoc rationalization on my part because I simply love this movie so much, but I'm not holding the effects in Furiosa to the same standard as those in Fury Road because I simply don't believe Miller and his crew are attempting to replicate that approach. Without the extensive CGI, we don't get that impressive long, panning take where a stranded Furiosa scans the empty, dust-and-sun-scoured wasteland (75% Sergio Leone, 25% Andrei Tarkovsky), or the Octoboss and his parasailing goons. For the sake of intellectual exercise I did try imagining them filming the Octoboss/war rig sequence with the same immersive practical approach they used for Fury Road's stunts, however I just kept picturing dead stunt performers, so perhaps the tradeoff was worth it!

4. Homeward

Around the same time we meet the Taylor-Joy-pilled Furiosa in Chapter 3, we're introduced to Praetorian Jack, the chief driver for the convoys running between the Citadel and its allied settlements. Jack's played by Tom Burke, who pulled off a very good Orson Welles in Mank! and who I should really check out in The Souvenir one of these days. He's also a cool dude! Here are some facts about Praetorian Jack:

He's decked out in road leathers with a pauldron stitched to one shoulder

He's stoic and wary, but still more or less personable and can carry on a conversation

Professes to a certain cynicism, to quote Special Agent Albert Rosenfield, but ultimately has a capacity for kindness and will do the right thing

Shoots a gun real good

Can drive like nobody's business

So in other words, Jack is Mad Max. But also, no, he clearly isn't! He looks and dresses like Mad Max (particularly Mel Gibson's) and does a lot of the same things "Mad" Max Rockatansky does, but he's also very explicitly a distinct character. It's a choice that seems inexplicable and perhaps even lazy on its face, except this is a George Miller movie, so of course this parallel is extremely purposeful. Miller has gone on record saying he avoids any kind of strict chronology or continuity for his Mad Max movies, compared to the rigid canons for Star Trek and Star Wars, and bless him for doing so. It's more fun viewing each Mad Max entry as a new revision or elaboration on a story being told again and again generations after the fall, mutating in style, structure and focus with every iteration, becoming less grounded as its core narrative is passed from elder to youth, community to community, genre to genre, until it becomes myth. (At least, my English major brain thinks it's more fun.) In fact there's actually something Arthurian to it, where at first King Arthur was mentioned in several Welsh legends before Geoffrey of Monmouth crafted an actual narrative around him, then Chrétien de Troyes added elements like Lancelot and infused the stories with more romance, and then with Le Morte d'Arthur Thomas Malory whipped the whole cycle together into one volume, which T.H. White would chop and screw and deconstruct with The Once and Future King centuries later.

All this to say: maybe Praetorian Jack looks and sounds and acts like Max because he sorta kinda basically is, being just one of many men driving back and forth across the wasteland, lending a hand on occasion, who'll be conflated into a single, legendary "Mad Max" at some point down the line in a different History Man's retelling of Furiosa's odyssey. Sometimes that Max rips across the desert in his V8 Interceptor, other times driving a big rig. Perhaps there's a dog tagging along and/or a scraggly and at first aggravating ally played by Bruce Spence or Nicholas Hoult. Usually he has a shotgun. But so long as you aren't trying to kill him, he'll help you out.

5. Beyond Vengeance

The Mad Max movies have incredibly iconic villains—Immortan Joe! Toecutter! the Lord Humongous!—but they are exactly that, capital V Villains devoid of humanizing qualities who you can't wait to watch bad things happen to. Furiosa appears to continue this trend by giving us a villain who in fact has a mustache long enough that he could reasonably twirl it if he so wanted, but ironically Dementus ends up being the most layered antagonist in the entire series, even moreso than the late Tina Turner's comparatively benevolent Aunty Entity from Beyond Thunderdome. And because he's played by Chris Hemsworth, whose comedic delivery rivals his stupidly handsome looks, you lock in every time he's on screen.

Something so fascinating about Dementus is that, for a main antagonist, he's NOT all-powerful, and in fact quite the opposite: he's more conman than warlord, looking for the next hustle, the next gullible crowd he can preach to and dupe—though never for long. For all his bluster, at every turn he finds himself in way over his head and writing cheques he can't cash, and this self-induced Sisyphean torment makes him riveting to watch. You're tempted to pity Dementus but it's also quite difficult to spare sympathy for someone who's so quick to channel their rage and hurt and ego into thoughtless, burn-it-all-down destruction. When you're not laughing at him, you're hating his guts, and it's indisputably the best work of Chris Hemsworth's career.

It's in this final chapter that everything naturally comes to a head: Furiosa's final evolution into the character we meet at the start of Fury Road, the predictable toppling of Dementus' precariously built house of cards, and the mythmaking that has been teased since the very first scene becoming diagetic text, the last of which allows the movie to thoroughly explore the themes of vengeance it's been building to. A brief war begins, is summarized and is over in the span of roughly a minute, and on its face it's a baffling narrative choice that most other filmmakers would have botched. But our man Miller's smart enough to recognize that the result of this war is the most foregone of conclusions if you've been paying even the slightest bit of attention, so he effectively brushes past it to get to the emotional heart of the climax and an incredible "Oh shit!" payoff that cements Miller as one of mainstream cinema's greatest sickos.

Fury Road remains the greatest Mad Max film, but Furiosa might be the best thing George Miller has ever made. If not his magnum opus, it does at least feel like his dissertation, and it makes me wish Warner Bros. puts enough trust in him despite Furiosa's poor box office performance that he's able to make The Wasteland. Absolutely ridiculous that a man just short of his 80th birthday was able to pull this off, and with it I feel confident calling him one of my favourite directors.

[starkidmunson]

damned if i do (give a damn what people say)

It seems Steve Harrington is back off the market

The latest news on the pop star’s love life comes mere weeks after word of a fallout with longtime beau, journalist Nancy Wheeler. While neither party has confirmed the rumors, many of Harrington’s closest friends have hinted at the end of the relationship in interviews and on social media.

One thing everyone failed to mention, however, is that Harrington appears to have moved on and is now dating Corroded Coffin front-man, Eddie Munson.

The two have been friends for years, tracing as far back as the early 2010s, though it’s difficult to put a pin in exactly when they met. Neither are particularly vocal about their personal lives and often change the subject when the other comes up in an interview; a diversion tactic they’ve been playing for years.

Still, the alleged new couple has been spotted around some of Harrington’s favorite Manhattan hot spots several times over the past week.

The rockstar has a bit of an edgier vibe than Harrington’s usual flings; more outspoken and unpredictable than the ‘type’ Steve has typically shown an interest in; at least publicly.

Only time will tell if “Steddie” (so dubbed by the fans in support of the relationship) is true… and if they’ll last.

_____

“I can’t believe they think I’m dating Eddie,” Steve grumbled into the pillow on the floor of his hotel room. With a huff, he turned his head and looked off to the wall on the far side of the room. “I mean, it’s crazy that I can’t go out to dinner with anyone besides you and not be on a date.”

Robin leveled her foot to the center of his back, before shifting her weight onto it, then grinned in satisfaction as Steve groaned and his back popped loudly in several places. “It’s not like it’s that surprising. The tabloids went feral over you and Nancy breaking up after they were convinced you guys were already secretly married.” She shifted her weight back off him, dropping to sit cross-legged beside Steve. “Plus, it’s not that much of a stretch.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Steve asked, pushing himself up until he was sitting with his back against the wall, leg stretched out against Robin’s.

“It means you two have never looked at each other the way friends do. It makes sense that they’re picking that up.” Robin shrugged, brushing off her comment like it wasn’t shattering part of Steve’s bubble.

“We look at each other totally normally!”

The look Robin leveled Steve with had him pushing himself up off the floor and making his way toward the bathroom.

“I don’t have time for this right now, I need to start getting ready, but we don’t do anything normal friends wouldn’t because that’s what we are, Robin!”

“Are you trying to convince yourself of that, or me?” Robin asked and sighed heavily when Steve slammed the bathroom door closed in response.

It was only about five minutes before there was a familiar knock at the door; three in quick succession, followed by two after a short pause.

“I think we need to talk, sweetheart,” was understandable, despite being muffled by the door, before Steve was racing out of the bathroom to beat Robin to undoing the locks and letting Eddie in. “Why didn’t you tell me we’re dating?” Eddie asked through a pout, leaned against the doorframe.

Steve rolled his eyes and moved out of the way, letting Eddie follow him inside, before pointing at Robin. “See! Very much not dating!”

“Well,” Eddie started, teasingly, only to get hit in the face with a pillow from Steve’s bed. “I’m kidding, Steve. It’s not even a bad thing. I mean, they’re actually being really fucking cool about you being bisexual.”

“Being out as bi doesn’t mean that every person, regardless of their gender, is automatically my love interest just because I breathed near them.” Steve snapped, obviously frustrated despite Eddie’s attempts to ease the situation.

“Hey. Don’t get mean. You know what’s not what Eddie meant.” Robin responded. Steve looked back and forth between the two of them for a long moment, before he collapsed, face first, onto his mattress with a loud groan.

“C’mon, there’s no need to meltdown over this. If you want me to, I can post something about catching up with old friends to try to make it go away.” Eddie offered, gently, sitting down on the opposite side of the bed from Steve.

It took a long beat, but Steve eventually lifted his head from his pillows and shrugged. “I don’t want to make you do anything like that. It’s fine. It’ll all work out in the end. I'm just having a weird day, I guess.”

Eddie raised an eyebrow, and when Steve didn’t elaborate, he turned his head to Robin, who shrugged.

“Nancy texted him this morning asking to not talk about her at shows and he’s been in a sour mood about it since.”

“Robin!” Steve groaned, pressing his face back into his pillow miserably.

“Have you been, though?” Eddie asked, confused. “Talking about her, I mean? I thought I was doing a decent job at getting the highlights and I have no memory of you dropping anything profound about you and Nance on any crowds.”

“Not directly,” Steve spoke into his pillow, before turning his head and staring at the wall as he answered. “I made a few comments about my songs. How to get someone back. How to gaslight someone into thinking you love them before letting everything go at the drop of a hat for one of your best friends.”

A silence settled over the room for a moment, before Eddie burst into giggles, which set Robin off. Eventually Steve joined in, turning his attention to the two of them with a heavy sigh.

“I guess I was an asshole about it, huh?”

“I think it’s justifiable.” Eddie offered, to which Robin nodded in agreement as she started toying with Steve’s hair. “If you feel like you’re going to say something about Nancy, you could always say something to me instead. Really confuse the shit out of everyone.” He teased, but Steve beamed.

“Wait, that’s actually a great idea.”

Robin looked apprehensive, holding her hands in the air. “Steve, you remember you just freaked out about this, right? And now you’re going to play into it? Publicly?”

“It’ll be fun. I’m not gonna say anything directly about Eddie. But just. References. And then we can watch the fans lose their shit on TikTok later.” Steve reasoned with a grin, and Eddie smiled back at him.

“I promise to spend the entire show dancing my ass off and singing along. For the bit.” Eddie said, his hand over his heart.

“You do that anyway, you’re just usually backstage.” Robin pointed out, and Eddie rolled his eyes.

“Well, obviously, I have to join you and Dustin in the family tent tonight. Duh.”

“Yes!” Steve agreed with a laugh. “This is going to be so much fun!”

“You’re both psychotic.”

_____

“Indianapolis, you're making me feel awfully special tonight.” Steve bit at his lip as he looked around Lucas Oil Stadium to thousands of people screaming back at him. “This is as close to a hometown show as I really get these days, so thank you for always making sure to remind me how special of a place home is.”

The music started to pick up again, but Steve kept talking. “I kind of spent the last few years coasting by without anyone paying too much attention, but now that I’m back on the road, everyone’s suddenly deeply invested in my life, and it's strange to be back so close to somewhere I called home for so long, in the same position I was in five years ago.” He ran his fingers through his hair, before huffing out a laugh.

“But you guys, you've always been there. Unwavering in a way I will never be able to express my gratitude for.” he paused to glance around the crowd again, grinning as they cheered. “Not many people can say the same, you know?”

“Where is he going with this?” Dustin asked, leaning close to Robin, who shrugged, trying not to have a visible reaction. There were always cameras on them in public like this. Any reaction would be taken out of context and exaggerated.

“Did you see the tabloid rumors about Eddie and Steve?” She replied, and couldn’t help but smile as Dustin’s head whipped back forward to Steve.

“I mean, there’s Robbie, the kids I used to babysit. And, uh…” he trailed off, which Eddie took as his cue to move to the front of the family tent. “Maybe someone else. This one's for you.” Steve said, leaving the “you” ambiguous enough to be open for interpretation.

Eddie, hamming it up, made a heart with his hands, before immediately starting to headbang along to the love song next in the setlist.

_____

In a surprising twist, Dustin managed to wait until the security team had moved them out of the crowd and behind the stage with the crew nearly two hours later before his outburst.

“What the fuck?!” He asked as soon as the were away from the crowd. “Why are you two playing into this? It’s just going to get more headlines and attention on the two of you, which neither of you usually like!”

“But it’s different if it’s on our terms.” Eddie responded, not even looking up from his phone as he answered Dustin.

“Is it, though? Is it really on your terms if it’s not even true?” Dustin sounded exasperated, and while Robin could relate, she was planning on sitting this one out until Eddie shoved his phone into her face.

“It’s already on TikTok. 4 videos in.” He said with a grin as Robin watched Eddie make a hand heart toward the stage before his hair started flopping all over as he sang along. The clip was captioned “steddie is real!!!”

“So you’re proud you’re deceiving fans?” She asked, which made Eddie’s grin fall.

“Don't be so dramatic,” Steve called as he approached from the stage exit. He was covered in sweat and still in his performance clothes, holding a half empty water bottle. “It’s all in good fun. They never need to know if it was real or not.”

“I think you’re downplaying this by a lot. What happens the next time one of you is seen out on a date?” Dustin pressed, and continued despite the way Steve rolled his eyes. “I mean it, an honest to god date. People are going to lose their minds, trying to figure out what broke up Steve and Eddie, when you were never even together in the first place! They’ll turn you against each other, they always do. And if you weren’t dating, isn’t that just as bad of a look?”

“Woah. Henderson. Chill. It’ll be fine, man. You’re WAY overthinking this.” Eddie said, before he grinned at Steve. “Could you see my hand heart from the stage?”

“I could. Did you catch the wink I sent your way at the end of the song?”

“I did, nice touch! I patted my hand over my heart, so maybe that’ll end up on social, too.”

“I’m going to throw myself into the White River.” Dustin groans loudly, to a round of laughs and elbow nudges.

_____

Steve could pinpoint the exact moment things finally felt out of hand two weeks later.

He was getting ready for the show that will wrap up his first weekend at his “home away from home” in 5 years when Eddie texted him about being late to that night’s show.

It shouldn’t have mattered.

Eddie had missed the last two shows in Chicago

It shouldn’t matter.

Eddie’d been there, religiously, at the 4 shows before Chicago on the tour, and 6 others before that when his band wasn’t playing their own concerts. Steve even made 3 trips of his own to Corroded Coffin shows, around his own obligations.

But it still made him frown at his phone for a moment too long. Long enough Robin caught him.

“More headlines about Steddie?” She asked, slipping the phone from his hands before he could stop her. When she read over the message, though, her expression softened. “Oh, Steve, I’m sorry.”

“It’s no big deal.” Steve rushed out, snatching his phone back and shoving it into his pocket. “It’s fine. I’m not upset, there’s no reason to feel sorry. Besides, he just said he’ll be late, he didn’t say he isn’t coming.”

“Would you be upset if he wasn’t coming, then?” Robin asked. Steve glared daggers at her, and sighed when she held her hands in the air, feigning innocence.

“I don’t know.” He mumbled, honestly.

___

The intro tape was just about to start as Steve was making his usual trek toward his starting point, when he heard someone running and calling his name from behind him, rather than out in the crowd. He paused and turned, to see Eddie rushing toward him.

“I’m so sorry, I just wanted you to see that I made it before you went on!” He was out of breath, his hair more wild from running than usual, and Steve…

Well, frankly, Steve was tired of pretending like Eddie wasn’t the hottest person he’d ever seen.

So Steve met Eddie halfway, threw his arms around his neck and pressed their lips together in a move Eddie seemed to have anticipated because he wasted no time returning the favor.

It was only Steve’s cue music that had him breaking away, biting at his lip and grinning at Eddie, who grinned back at him, before using the hands he’d placed on Steve’s waist at some point in the interaction to turn Steve toward the stage.

“Go, before you miss the start of your own show, superstar. I’ll still be here after.” Eddie said.

“Promise?” Steve called over his shoulder as he made his way toward the stage’s catwalk.

“Cross my heart, big boy.” Eddie drew an x over his heart for dramatic effect, then laughed and ran his fingers through his hair as he watched Steve run to make it to his place on time.

[chocosvt]

HER | teaser.

✧✎ synopsis: wonwoo, a heartbroken and burnt out writer nearing the end of his math degree, wants nothing to do with the seemingly perfect, intimidating girl who has everyone under her thumb. you. unfortunately, his literary talent has got him shoved him between a rock and a hard place when you want to write a book and require his expertise. you two are the furthest from compatible. wonwoo can’t see this going well. at all.

pairing: wonwoo x fem!reader teaser word count: 1.4k actual word count: 140k (yes, u read that correctly) genres/tropes: writer!wonwoo, university!au, plug!vernon + boyfriend!mingyu as prominent side characters, SLOWBURN (i am not fucking around this is my slowest burn yet), relationship drama, soul searching, strong angst/hurt (i’m coming for the jugular), comfort, romance, smut, a smoothie of every emotion on earth.

(!) warnings for the full fic: drug use (weed, coke, ecstasy), wonwoo has anxiety + anxiety attacks + fairly dark thoughts, prescribed medication, gambling, intense language, infidelity, throwing up.

✧✎ a/n: as i descend to one knee and cup my hands together at your mercy, i offer a tidbit to the wonwoo fic i have finally completed after two years (lol). i know i ALWAYS say this, but i truly wasn't expecting the fic to be THIS FUCKING LONG! thankfully, i planned it well and although i lost momentum countless times (nervously side eyes the approximate & several 5 month breaks i took in between), my dedication to seeing the characters through & "completing" their growth was smth that i could not leave behind!

not having posted a fic for two years is prob a little much :0 so hopefully the length of this makes up for it (?) usually my writing is just teehee silly little romance agonizing slowburn surface level dilemmas of the self BUT THIS ONE HAS A LITTLE KICK!

so read it if you want! don't read it if you don't want!

hearts & flowers, xoxoxo (me :*)

UPDATE: read the first part here!

—MARCH 19TH.

“I have a relatively big favour to ask of you.”

 No. Wonwoo didn’t want anything to do with favours.

The fact that Seokmin had actively picked out his presence in the coffee shop like he was some shiny contortion of plastic had actually offended Wonwoo. He came here for two things: to not be bothered, which his friend knew, and to work on the book he was halfway through typing and had been halfway through typing for the past six months. Call it writer’s block, or an inspiration drought, or an absolutely depressing lack of drive—it had been hanging over the writer with an annoying persistence and it seemed that no number of lemony scones or cold coffees were going to make it vanish.

“Uh, Wonwoo?”

“Sorry… what?” He forced his gaze to shift from the blank page on his laptop to Seokmin’s apologetic, softly expressional face, slightly flushed from his time outdoors in the chilled March weather.

“I was just wondering if you’d be up for a favour—a pretty big one—and I know this is your special creativity spot, but she’s been like, breathing down my neck about it and I can’t put it off again.”

“Whose been breathing down your neck?”

At first, Seokmin didn’t say a word, or even make a sound. His lips twitched for a moment, but then he pressed them together and his chest visibly sucked in with a breath. God, Wonwoo hated the suspense and he hated Seokmin for interrupting him when he had been so stupidly close to putting a sentence down that he probably would have back-spaced in frustration a minute later.  

“Y’know…” he trailed off, “Her.”

Her.

No, not her, you.

But most people—if not everyone—referred to you by an alias that had seemed to stick so well the majority believed it actually was your name. When people said her they meant Her, and so in a confusing mess of finger-pointing they really meant you. Come to think of it, Wonwoo had no idea where the nickname even came from or who gave it to you or what it even meant.

And he was perfectly fine with never knowing.

“What?” Wonwoo deadpanned. “What on earth could she want to do with me? She doesn’t even know me.” He slid down in his chair, fingers pulling at his circle-lensed glasses so they tilted uncomfortably across his nose bridge. “Or, is this a joke?”

“Oh—no! Absolutely not!” His friend was insistent on proclaiming, vigorously shaking his head. “I’m being serious.”

“Why don’t I believe you then?”

“Okay, well, if you let me explain everything, it’ll all make sense. I said I know someone who writes really well—”

“Meaning me?”

“Yes, meaning you. And the only reason that was even brought up is because she wants to write a book.”

Wonwoo couldn’t help it. He laughed—a very short, disbelieving laugh that flashed a transient smile to his face as he readjusted his crooked glasses. You were the last person he would ever envision wanting to write a book. He then navigated the trackpad on his laptop, deciding to close the document simply titled, 01, that harboured the fleet of pages to his own current work in progress.

“Yeah,” Wonwoo disregarded, “sounds like bullshit.”

“I’m telling you the truth!” Seokmin exclaimed, gripping onto the metal back of the café chair like he was squeezing someone’s taunt shoulders. “She won’t tell me about what, okay? Just that she’s been thinking the idea for a while now. It’s not like I didn’t try to get details. But she refused—said the only person who can know is whoever’s going to help her. Look, y’have to understand, she was pestering me about it nonstop. And you’re my only writer friend!”

“Well, you’re about to have none.” He answered, reaching for his coffee cup but stopping it just short of his lips. “How serious is she about this, anyway?” Wonwoo sighed. “Do you know how much fucking time you need to dedicate to writing a book?”

He stomached a slow, somewhat grimacing sip as he tasted the coffee’s coldness, meanwhile Seokmin swallowed heavily, and at last pulled out the chair he’d been white-knuckling to take a seat.

“Yes, I’m aware it takes time. I know that. And she is serious or else I wouldn’t be here, bothering you. She takes everything seriously.” The boy began unbuttoning his sleek black jacket. “Really, who knows what’ll happen? Maybe you’ll meet her once and she’ll decide she can’t stand you, and then you’re off the hook for life.”

“Yeah, well have you ever considered what might happen if I can’t stand her? Are my feelings even being considered? Minutely?”

“Minutely, they are being considered.”

“Liar.”

It wasn’t that Wonwoo disliked you.

In actuality, you scared him more than anything. But to be associated with you was to be drawn into your life and caught like a firefly in a glass jelly jar. The proof was right in front of him—to Wonwoo’s eyes, Seokmin was basically your little mailman that scrambled around in hectic nature to do your bidding, because most tasks apparently weren’t worth the time or effort.

“I can’t believe you’re trying to rope me into this. You know I can hardly write my own shit, right?” Wonwoo said bitterly, wishing it was the opposite, “my mind is a desolate, blank canvas of fuck-all and if she thinks I’m writing it then she needs a reality check.”

“No, no—of course you won’t write it!” Seokmin reassured him with his big, opalescent smile. “Really, you’re just giving tips, maybe guiding her process, helping with the planning… you know, this could be facilitated so much easier if you spoke to Her yourself!”

“So, my nightmare?” Wonwoo huffed, shaking his leg.

In an instant, Seokmin had whipped out his phone, tapping around the screen quickly using his thin pointer finger.

“I’m just going to pull up her schedule. It’s always pretty packed, but more into the summer break, it thins out a little. “

Wonwoo exhaled, staring off into the warm, afternoon sunlight that hailed in through the windows, striking all the shimmering flecks and pieces of dust afloat in the café air. When he breathed in again, he could smell the luxurious coffees brewing in their rich and distinctive notes. It was such a beautiful day—still chilly as the snow outdoors began to thaw—but pleasant nonetheless.

“This is such a fucking waste.”

And Wonwoo spent it being miserable.

“No, it’ll be useful. Trust.” Seokmin chirped.

“You’re trying to dip me in your optimism gloss again.”

His friend smiled affectionately, tilting his head.

“This will be good. You’ve been a hermit since I’ve known you.”

“Yeah,” Wonwoo scoffed, “so you think it’s a good idea to shove me with the person I relate to least on the entire planet?”

“Really? The least? So, what you’re saying is, you relate more to serial killers? Or animal abusers? Or like, literal fasc—”

“Stop.”

“You want to do this. I can see it in your eyes. I’ll set you up.”

A part of Wonwoo knew there might be no wriggling out of the situation, especially with Seokmin sitting across from him, characteristically eager and brightly pushy as always, like a goddamn salesman. For now, it could be easier to let himself get cuffed.

“Can I at least have some time to think it over?”

“Uh… well… the thing is… the thing with that is—”

“You’ve cornered me?”

“I wouldn’t word it like that.”

“… Okay.” Wonwoo removed his glasses, shoved his knuckles tender but deep into his eye sockets, massaging through flashes of white as he came to accept a fate he didn’t know even existed in his astrology. “Just, I don’t know—fuck—schedule me in wherever.”

“Ha! It doesn’t exactly work like that.”

“I really don’t give a damn how it works, Seokmin.”

“Right,” his friend laughed nervously, “I promise that I’ll get back to you pronto. Sorry for the disturbance. And, uh, good luck.”

 “With what part?” Wonwoo grumbled, fixing his spectacles back on to clarify Seokmin’s sympathetic face, the light bouncing off his head of brassy hair like a disco ball. “My incapability to write a goddamn thing or the fact I have to help your perfectionist friend who’s probably going to chew me up and spit me out?”

 “Both parts.” Seokmin grinned. “It can only go up from here.”

✧✎ a/n: tada!

this is the introductory scene! i think i've read it so many times that i could probably recite it from memory at this point ;_; anyway! as i mentioned, i know that it's been a hot minute since i last uploaded any scenarios. but one way or another this monster is getting posted! i did NOT have this lurking on my poor tired macbook causing it to overheat and sputter and spew FOR NOTHING!!

i swear that i don't plan for my works to get this goddamn long. before i hardly planned at all. maybe now i plan too much? i guess i have yet to find a happy medium!! but again, i do hope the size of the fic makes up for all that missed time :_( life has been ruff. but this fic was there as a handy distraction mechanism (when i prob should have been facing reality fhwejfhwk) so i guess it's been a double-edged sword!

also just want to preface that the reader goes by an alias throughout the fic. i'm not sure if this is like... a very huge or popular concept nowadays? so if it hits your reading ear a bit weird at first i apologize! but i swear it has purpose!! *chekhovs rule* *winkwink*

ANYWAY! no more rambling!

i'm pondering the idea of adding a taglist for those who are interested, just as i did with honey boy :3 so if that tickles ur fancy then feel free to each out!

BUT PLZ HEED THE FOLLOWING:

the fic in its entirety will be split across 6 parts

the word count of each part ranges from 22-24k!

i do not YET have a set posting schedule, simply bc i am unsure of how long it will take ppl to get through each part

(so that would be smth i'd have to gauge afterward)

REVISIT THE WARNINGS!!

i will not be flagging mature/nsfw/triggering scenes throughout the fic as the fic itself already has a heavy nature to it

so pls read the warnings!

if there's any additional questions i encourage u to swing by :3

*deep breath*

THANK YOU!!!!!

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for being kind and civil with people who drive me insane?

So this is something that happens all the time and it's a pattern so to save your time, I'll only mention the one incident which that I got called out for several times, it's starting to make me think I might be TA.

I (34F) work in a grocery store. Maddy (???F) works in the security department and is in charge for looking through our grocery to ensure we didn't steal anything (our workplace is uncomfortably strict about this since many employees have stole in the past) She is very rude, I never liked her. She makes me so uncomfortable a lot because she yells all the time. At everyone. She never realized how offensive she is.

Anyway, sometimes I'd walk past her after my shift forgetting that I'm carrying grocery bags etc and she'd yell at me to get back there. It's always embarrassing because anyone who witnesses that would most likely assume I'm a shoplifter because of the way she's yelling. She yells about other stuff too mind you, don't think I always forget the fact I'm carrying grocery. They don't allow us to bring our bags inside and we have to keep them in our locker (according to her, I never heard this elsewhere). She yells at me if I try to take my purse with me if I'm in a hurry. She says it's ~the rules~ and we need to follow them but like, she the only security staff who's this strict about it. The others don't even bother to check our groceries because they trust we don't shoplift and it's actually stupid because we could still shoplift anyway and hide the items in our pockets and they don't perform a body check anyway (they used to in the past but were legally required to stop because of Covid).

How do I deal with her though? Every time she'd yell, I reply to her very calmly and attempt small talk to absorb her anger. For example, if she's angry about my grocery, I'd show them to her and ask stuff like "what is you favorite brand of milk/bread/egg etc etc"

She does engage but it never made her actually stop and think about her behaviors for a single second. I have always stopped to chat with her whenever I can and she always speaks calmly when I do, but returns to yelling when I "break the rules" as she says.

But here's the thing. My patience is limited. I'm like a battery, if you keep charging me, I'll eventually explode. I planned remaining civil with Maddy forever, but enough is enough and I accidentally lashed out. I lashed out on her ONCE only, I yelled much louder than she did, for 30 minutes, lecturing her about work etiquette. She was so surprised and taken aback. She told me "where did this all come from?" Like she didn't see it coming? She seriously mistook my patience and tolerance of her behaviors for friendliness. And that was the last time we talked, I reported her to HR the next day because I don't think she'll ever get the memo, and that's when I learned thst so many employees have complained about her already but they can't fire her because she an outsource and has strong connections in her company, management has already talked to her numerous times but she just doesn't listen, so don't call me TA for not communicating, it doesn't work with her.

My friend Gloria (28F) and many others including our manager (F30s) told me I should've not been chatting with her, I should just ignore her and disengage. They think the fact I'm talking kindly to her will just make her assume she isn't doing anything wrong and encourage her to keep behaving like that, and that she'd think I want to be friends??? None of that is my intention. I just want to be civil to her to indirectly get her to realize her behaviors weren't acceptable. I'm setting a good example for her, to learn from me how she should treat people and soften her heart.

I was called TA because they said I didn't have to be civil with her if I knew I might eventually lash out (but lashing out isn't something I planned??), and I should've just avoided her and set boundaries. Gloria told me it's an AH move to go out of my way to interact to someone I despise when ignoring them is an option and that makes me two faced and makes the people around me wonder if I truly like them or I'm basically tolerating them, but this wouldn't happen if I they weren't rude in the first place?

BTW a similar thing eventually happened with Gloria because her attitude sucked with me and I lashed out eventually because enough is enough, she said she should've known not to trust me because of how I treated Maddy and I shouldn't have befriended her if I "hated" her so much. AITA?

[comic-sans-chan]

Fic I'll never write where Dukat decides the biennial Cardassian Festival of Whatever the Fuck (it is never actually specified) should be hosted on Deep Space Nine as a way of bridging the gap between the Cardassian and Bajoran peoples. Sisko and Kira are both Ehhhh about it, but Dukat is obnoxiously persistent until finally the Bajoran government and Federation higher ups are like “K”, on the condition that no Cardassian military (or Order) personnel be allowed. All security for the event will be handled by Odo and Starfleet. Dukat is suspiciously cool with this, which puts everyone on alert, but soon Cardassian vendors and decorators start showing up and they turn out to be pretty chill people, so they let it happen.

While the preparations for the festival are underway, another operation has started. A motherfucker from Garak's past is doing typical motherfucker things on the station. One of these things is scouting Garak's quarters, learning the layout, tracking Garak's routine. It becomes clear very quickly that the rapidly increasing number of Cardassians on DS9 is putting Garak on edge, though, because he seems to be fiddling more with his security protocols, so the motherfucker realizes they need to make their move and they need to make it fast.

They succeed. Sort of. With the circumstances as they are, they had to get a little... creative, but it should do the trick.

By early next morning, every PADD, screen, and computer system on the station is streaming seventy-two different poems on a constant loop. Love poems. Ardent, anguished, often utterly indecent love poems, all with the central theme of being about one Doctor Julian Bashir.

Quark is one of the first to notice the problem, being the type of asshole who opens early despite this only increasing his bottom line by a fraction of a fraction. At first, he's furious that his systems have been tampered with, but after reading a few lines of what his normal menu and advertisements have been replaced with, he's laughing, and by the end of the third poem, he's on the floor.

"Odo!" he shouts, banging on the bastard's door twenty minutes later. "Odo, open up! We've got a problem!"

Odo slinks under the door and slips up between it and Quark's pounding fist with a glare. "Quark! I'm not on duty for another hour. What could possibly be so urgent?"

Quark's sharp little rat teeth are splitting his face clean in half as he holds up the PADD. "Take a look."

Odo scrolls through a couple poems, then squints and scrolls through several more. "Erotic love poetry? I didn't peg you for the type."

"To like erotica? Hoo, I thought you paid better attention than that, Constable."

Odo returns the PADD with a dry expression. "To read."

"Oh, you're hilarious." He taps Odo's chest with the PADD. "The whole station is filled with this stuff. My bar, the Replimat, the Celestial Cafe, the promenade. Someone's either desperate to make a statement, or we've been sabatoged."

Dramatic sci-fi music swells and we get a close-up of Odo’s eerily hairless face and nasal cavity.

The next few hours are dedicated to trying and failing to seize back the servers and briefing the bridge staff on the situation.

"Are we sure these are all about Doctor Bashir?" Sisko's voice booms across Ops. He's on his second cup of coffee and a pile of useless PADDs lay beside him.

Julian has remained stoic throughout the discussion and he remains so now, avoiding eye contact with anyone who's smiling a little too wide. Like Jadzia. "Oh, definitely," she says. "He's mentioned by name in three of them, and several others make a point of highlighting the subject's 'golden sand dune skin', 'aristocratic' features, and 'voice that never stops singing.' Sounds like Julian to me."

A few snickers break out, but Sisko is taking the matter seriously. Thank fuck, Julian thinks. It actually looks like it's giving him a headache, which would make two of them if Julian was capable of having headaches. The captain's rubbing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. "And the source..."

"There's a clear data trail back to Garak's quarters. Whoever did this, they wanted us to know where it came from," Kira reports. A muscle jumps in Julian's cheek.

"I tracked Garak down for his statement on the issue," Odo says, gruff, "and he told me he had nothing to do with the virus. In fact, he denied ever having laid eyes on the poems in his life. He's claiming he's been framed." He rolls his eyes.

"Okay," Jadzia says, "we all agree he's lying, right?"

"But which part..."

"Oh, they're Garak's. I've read enough Lloja of Prim to be familiar with traditional Kardasi meter and syntax, and that isn't even going into all the parallels drawn between our doctor and Prime. Sand, heat, rainforests. Bit of Romulan imagery in there, too, if I'm not mistaken. A lot of flowers and vines. Wasn't Garak a gardener?"

"I see no reason why anyone would want to embarass themselves like this," O'Brien cuts in before Jadzia can make it worse. "Even if he is trying to distract us or something, this seems counterproductive in the long term. Everyone’s watching him now, not just us. The rumor mill is running rampant. Not exactly a spy’s MO."

"He did blow up his shop once."

"Because someone was trying to kill him," Julian pipes up for the first time, looking concerned. "Do you think this might be another cry for help?"

"Oh, it's a cry for something," Jadzia quips, and Julian shuts the fuck up.

"Dax," Sisko snaps, like the good benevolent Wormhole Alien Jesus he is, and Dax shuts the fuck up, too. Sisko gives them all the stink eye. "Constable, you're nearly as familiar with Garak as the doctor is," he says, and holds a hand up before any jokes can be made. "What do you think?"

"I don't think he's behind this, sir. None of the pieces add up, and he seemed genuinely agitated when I spoke to him, in his way. At present, I believe he is as much a victim here as the rest of us."

Sisko sighs. "All right. Do we have any idea who is behind this?"

The room is silent for a time, before Odo reluctantly answers for everyone, "Not yet, sir."

"Find out," Sisko demands, "and Chief, get these damn poems off of my reports. Dismissed."

Julian is out of the room before anyone else has stood up.

The rest of the day is spent ducking in and out of his office, only treating those who ask for him by name and keeping all conversations strictly professional. Any mentions of poetry, the festival, Cardassians, or Garak are firmly sidelined, and on a couple occasions, rewarded with a none-too-gentle hypo. He skips lunch altogether and extends his shift by two hours to avoid the dinner rush.

By the time he's leaving the Infirmary, it's late. Unfortunately for him, not late enough that the halls aren't still speckled with observers to his personal soap opera. With the Festival of Frank’s Hot Dogs less than a week away, DS9 is becoming increasingly crowded with tourists, mostly Cardassian, but a surprising amount Bajoran, too–apparently this festival was a rare bright point during the Occupation, when their oppressors were not only lenient with them for once, but generous with food and drink and freedoms. It doesn't hurt that the only Cardassians on board are civilian rather than military, so the atmosphere is rather more colorful, courteous and conversational rather than cold, dark and aggressive. It would make Julian smile if he wasn't so busy being gawked at.

"I don't see it," one Cardassian man grumbles and Julian's accursed augmented ears pick up. "He's even smoother than a Bajoran."

"Oh, yeah," his companion replies, "just think of how easily he'd slide around."

"Tanett!"

"Oh, hush, Grandpa. You're just xenophobic. He's cute."

"Well, you be careful who hears you say that. That Garak fellow is in the Order, you know. Ears everywhere. You don't want to know what things a man like that is capable of."

"Wasn't he exiled? Hardly intimidating now. Apparently all he's capable of anymore is whimpering over an alien like a pakrela."

Julian covers his ears and walks faster.

But that just brings him within range of a cluster of Bajorans. "Oh, there's the doctor now," one is saying, up on the balcony. 

"The one the Cardassian tailor wrote about?"

"That poor fool. He thought they were friends, but here this whole time it was perverse. I can only imagine how much that hurts."

"Happened to my friend once. He thought a glinn was being kind because he was having a crisis of conscience and wanted to help him escape. No, he just wanted to–"

He could go to his quarters, but a flash of memory - Garak's bright eyes at the end of his bed, his figure encased in shadow - sends him in the opposite direction. Before long, he finds himself on an oft-unused Observation deck, since it offers no view of the wormhole or either Bajor or Cardassia's suns. It's blessedly empty, as usual, and Julian settles on a bench and stares into the dark nothingness of space for a long time.

At some point, he finds that his hand has retrieved the PADD from his medical bag, and the screen is lit up automatically with the first poem.

He reads well into the night.

—

The next morning finds Garak with a tall glass of rokassa juice and two eggs, staring intensely into a mysteriously operational PADD at the far end of Quark's bar. Quark pops out of his backroom like a jack-in-the-box.

"Ha! Well, if it isn't the man of the hour himself, gracing my fine establishment so soon after nearly destroying it. Do you know I've had to have menus printed, like we're in the dark ages? Do you have any idea how extensive my menu is? I ought to sue you for damages." He catches a glimpse of the PADD's screen and its decidedly unpoetic contents. "Hey, you fixed it? How?"

"It was just a simple virus. Viruses can be purged," Garak says without looking up. He barely seems aware of Quark's existence.

When no other words are forthcoming, Quark huffs. "Well, can you purge it from the rest of the station, then?"

"I gave the program to the Chief last night."

"And he didn't immediately come here to fix my bar? I'll have to file a complaint.”

Garak offers no reply. Just continues to stare into his PADD.

There are other customers he could be seeing to, but Quark can't pass up this golden opportunity. He's known Garak a long time and known of him even longer, and now that he has the guy's guts all neatly lined up on several dozen isolinear rods, he's never felt closer to the man. He makes a point of knowing things about his customers, but before yesterday, the most he knew about Garak was that he was an assassin, a tailor, a mean, weepy drunk, and friends with Bashir, Odo, and a smattering of other shopkeepers. That was it. But now...

He leans over the counter, closer to Garak's unblinking face. "You know," he says, with a smile rising slow on his cheeks, "if it's humans you like, I have a couple holosuite programs that might be just what you need."

Garak's gaze ascends as if on a motor, smooth and mechanical.

Good. He’s considering the bait. Now he just has to get him to bite. "All completely customizable. Skin, eyes, hair. You like long legs, they've got long legs. Scrawny, they're scrawny. Whatever you want. Although if you're really hung up on the one face, that can also be arranged. For the right price." When Garak just looks at him, Quark switches tactics. "Or maybe it's the uniform that does it for you? I've got 'em, but I'd suggest something out of my lingerie databases. I've still got some little Cardassian numbers filed away that I think even a man with your discerning tastes could appreciate. Just imagine, Doctor Bashir in a–"

He doesn't see the hand coming until it's already crushing his windpipe. Quark claws at it for several long, desperate moments while Garak continues to look.

Leeta scuttling over and yanking him away is what ultimately puts a stop to it, and it's while Quark is gasping in dramatic bursts of air that Leeta says in a rush, "Garak, please! Whatever he said, he didn't mean it!"

"Oh, I meant it," Quark coughs out with a high, strangled laugh, "he just didn't like it."

"Whatever conclusions you've drawn in the last twenty-six hours, allow me to dispel them," Garak says primly, as if he hadn't almost committed murder in broad daylight. "I am not a xenophile and I do not have feelings for Doctor Bashir. There are no less than two-hundred Cardassians currently aboard the station, and I assure you, none of them like me. Those poems were obviously planted."

Oh, but Quark is a little pissed now, unwise as that is. "Please, Garak," he says, "who has time to write that many poems about Julian just to mess with you? Two or three, maybe, but over seventy? If you're going to lie, at least don't insult our intelligence."

Garak's eyes flash and Quark ducks behind Leeta, repentant. Leeta sighs. "Garak, what's so bad about loving Julian?" she asks softly. "I thought the poems were really touching. It’s sweet how much you care for him."

But he's already staring into his PADD again. "I'm sorry, Miss Leeta, but I am a bit busy. Perhaps we can discuss my hypothetical feelings for your paramour another time."

"Julian and I have never been serious," she tries to assure him, but he's engrossed again, or at least pretending to be. Her and Quark share a look and leave him to it. Lesson learned.

"Let the bastard be pent up and miserable, then," Quark grumbles from the other end of the bar as he pours Table 3's drinks. A prickle on his neck has him looking up and there Garak's eyes are again, piercing, and Quark rushes off to deliver the drinks.

The three young Cardassians there are much more friendly. One has their nose stuck in one of the useless poetry PADDs while the other two smile at Quark while he sets out their orders.

"Three Raktajinos, extra bitter," Quark says, and is thanked. Polite. One even praises the drink's exoticness. Klingon coffee, exotic. Heh. "Your food will be out in a few."

Before he can finish turning, though, a hand is touching his arm. "What is the title of this anthology you include at every table?" the young man asks.

"Oh, that's not..." He sighs. "It's new. I can't remember."

"Find out for us, please," he says. "Works like these can be hard to come by on Prime and we make it our business to collect them. Whoever this author is, they're very unique."

"If these aren't banned on Prime already, they will be soon," his friend comments with a giggle.

"No doubt."

"'In my desolation, I am as weeds: Cut my roots and Let the waters take me, To drown and bloom anew, in You,'" the one with her nose in the PADD reads aloud, and shivers. "They'd burn the whole Central Archive down just for this one. It's so explicit."

"Let me see that," the boy demands, as the other one is already surging over to read over the girl's shoulder. Watching them fight over the PADD has Quark thinking back to the isolinear rods in his safe, and he hums thoughtfully, glancing over his shoulder.

Garak isn't looking.

—

Glinn Halon Duvur. Former underling of Gul Dukat. Out of uniform, vacationing on Deep Space Nine with his wife and nine children. Spends his days gambling while his kids play unsupervised in the holosuites and his wife visits old friends. 

Beloved uncle sent to trial by the Obsidian Order in 2356 and executed that same day for crimes of attempted sabotage against Cardassia.

Garak watches the man wander down the promenade sans his proud lineage, jingling a fat little bag of gold-pressed latinum and yet-unconverted leks. He wanders out of range, so Garak switches to the next camera and there that unfortunate face is again. He drums his fingers on the desk. It won't be long now.

An alert rings in his ear and he almost initiates the shockfield on impulse, but the flash of smooth, brown skin on a monitor stays his hand. The knocking comes, and that haunting voice calls out, "Garak! Are you there?"

Garak rests his head next to the surveillance screens.

Predictably, the doctor tries to input his override, but the door remains shut. There's a long pause.

"Garak..." Julian sounds irate. Garak hums. "Did you deprogram my override code? Nevermind how illegal that is, that's dangerous! What if you're injured? Or fall ill?"

He says this just after attempting to abuse his station privileges for personal reasons. Infuriating hypocrite.

"Oh, my barging in at random, odd hours is no less than you deserve, Garak," Julian says as if in response to Garak's thoughts. "You set that precedent in our relationship yourself."

Terrible man.

"Fine. I'll give you some more time, since you want it so badly, but I'll be back and when I am, that override had better work. If it doesn’t, I promise there will be hell to pay, my friend."

Beautiful man.

"Goodbye, Mr. Garak."

Goodbye, Doctor.

Glinn Duvur dies two hours later of alcohol poisoning while his wife is in bed with Gul Rilimn's wife.

—

“I just can’t believe it,” Kira is bitching. Jadzia smiles and sips her drink, looking out over the Replimat balcony at all the happy brunchgoers. “A Cardassian writing poetry about something that isn’t conquest or the wonders of dictatorial rule or, at best, the pride of the traditional family nobly bowing and scraping. I’ve never seen it.”

“It would certainly seem to run counter to Cardassian values.”

“And about Julian!” she shrieks in her inside voice, slapping her hands down on the table. “Garak the spy, writing love poetry about Julian. Going on and on about his–his...”

“Ass?” Jadzia offers.

“Eyes. His eyes! Ohhh, I knew he wanted to have sex with him, everyone knew that, but to write about his eyes like... like that? It’s practically Bajoran.”

“That’s true.”

Kira stops long enough in her tirade to eye her, and presses her lips into a thin line. “How are you so calm about this?”

Jadzia takes another sip. “I’m just fascinated,” she says. “I’ll admit, I’ve been looking at this more through Tobin’s eyes than my own. Have I ever told you that he met Lloja of Prim during his exile?” 

“He did not.”

“He did, and Lloja flirted with him outrageously. It was embarrassing, looking back. Of course, nothing ever came of it, because Tobin was always hopelessly blind to those sorts of things even without the language barrier, but his children liked to joke that many of Lloja’s poems were about him.”

Kira’s jaw is hanging. “Were they?”

Jadzia grins and shrugs. Kira laughs.

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Perhaps,” Jadzia allows, “but I do wonder... Being able to call nervous, asexual Tobin the lover of Lloja of Prim would have been quite the notch in my belt. Think of the stories I could have told! And now here Julian is with the opportunity. I know it’s not the same, I mean, it’s Garak. But, you have to admit, to write about him like that...”

“He must really love him,” Kira finishes for her, stumped. “I just can’t wrap my head around it.”

“I didn’t see it, either,” Jadzia confesses. “I was still wrestling with the idea that they were actually friends. I thought their association was strictly professional and all the books and flirting were just a front.” She cradles her head in her hands suddenly and sighs. “Ugh, but those poems. The poems are so good! Kira...”

“I know,” she moans. “They’re heart-wrenching. Which one are you on now?”

“Thirty-nine. I came back home, but I came back gone.”

“Ouch.”

“I know.”

A shout from below interrupts them and they both shoot out of their seats. Below, a Cardassian man has just had a beam fall on top of him. Jadzia and Kira bound down the stairs to him, Jadzia already slapping a hand on her comm badge. 

“Dax to Infirmary, a man has just been crushed, possibly impaled. Send a medical team to Replimat and be ready for emergency beam out.”

“Acknowledged, we’re on our way,” Girani says, but already Kira is looking up at Jadzia helplessly, the man’s wrist laying limp between her hands.

“He’s gone.”

“Shit!” Jadzia hunches over, hands on her knees. “That’s the third one today. Are Cardassians always this accident prone? No wonder you won the war.”

“No,” Kira says. “They’re not. You don’t think...”

“I don’t know,” Jadzia says grimly, and looks around at the crowd that’s formed. All Cardassian, all terrified. “But we need to find out.”

—

A Cardassian is sitting at the bar. This isn’t an unusual sight now, with the Festival of 90s Funk and Beyond coming up, but seeing one so young and looking so hunted is odd. Quark approaches him casually.

“What’ll you have?”

The Cardassian’s eyes dart. “Uh...” He leans over suddenly, cups both hands over his mouth, and whispers, “E. G. Special.”

Christ, these kids are going to kill him. “Coming right up,” he says in a normal person voice, and reaches under the bar for a glass. A little drink-mixing magic later, a beautiful fizzy blue drink is sitting between them, with an isolinear rod tucked neatly in the straw.

The Cardassian takes the drink between both hands excitedly, and Quark snaps his fingers in front of him. “Oh! Right,” the kid stutters, and all but launches the latinum at Quark’s face. “Thank you!” And off he goes, out of the bar with the glass still tight in his grasp.

“Idiot,” Quark mutters to himself, crouching carefully down to pick the latinum up off the floor without dirtying his expensive pants. “You’re supposed to take the straw, not the entire glass. That’s it, I’m switching to plastic. These little rebel brats don’t deserve my ni—Oh, hello, Constable! I didn’t see you there. What can I get you?”

Odo looks as unimpressed as ever. “That’s a funny question since last I checked, I don’t drink.”

“Ah, right, because you’re a liquid. How could I forget. You know, one of these days, I ought to serve you up with a little umbrella, see how people like it. I’d bet you taste bitter.” Odo harrumphs, and Quark makes himself busy with wiping down the counter. “Well, out with it then. What nefarious scheme am I up to now? I love to hear your little stories.”

Four isolinear rods drop onto the counter, right where Quark was just cleaning. “Hey now,” he says, throwing a performative glare at the changeling. “Careful. If you shatter glass in my bar, you’re cleaning it up.”

“I just had the most interesting conversation with the Tokal family,” Odo says, steamrolling right over him. “It seems their four darling children had somehow come into some questionable reading material. They tried searching for it in the Central Archives and yet, despite it being clearly Cardassian in origin, they could not find it. And I don’t need to tell you that when a piece of Cardassian reading material isn’t in the Central Archives...”

Quark, from his plastered position on the floor, stares up into Odo’s face directly horizontal to his and smiles. “What?”

“It’s illegal,” Odo sneers, stretching his body even further over the bar and nearly sending Quark starfishing. 

“Okay! Odo! I get it! But what does that have to do with me?”

“Quark!”

“Okay, okay! Whatever it is you think I’ve done, I’ll stop! I’ll stop, okay?”

“I know you’re going to stop, because I am going to confiscate every copy of Garak’s poetry that you have absconded with and destroy them.”

Quark gasps. “Book burning? In this day and age?”

“Garak did not give his permission for you to sell his work! He didn’t even want anyone to see it in the first place! Those poems were stolen. Now, I expect a list of every person you sold a copy to and a full and complete refund to be issued by tomorrow morning. Do I make myself clear?”

Quark glowers. “You’ve made yourself something, all right.”

“Quark...”

“Okay! All right. Consider it done.”

-

Turora Lumok. Obsidian Order operative and old colleague. Usually in deep cover in the Organian sectre, but has abandoned post to explore the space station. Barren, unattached. Cold. A model agent, if you ignore her unfortunate habit of going rogue and eliminating civilians on a whim. 

Recruited into the Order by Enabran Tain’s former right hand, Euluk Bucun, who was assassinated by Elim Garak in 2341 under orders from Enabran Tain for suspicions of treason. Turora Lumok disciplined shortly afterward by Elim Garak for complaining that she had wanted to be the one to kill that bitch.

Garak watches as the woman pretends to touch up her makeup while scouting for cameras. “Oh, Lumok, you always were woefully obvious. Have you been expecting me? I wonder why.”

Satisfied with the positions of the cameras, she puts away her mirror and strolls out of sight.

Garak shakes his head. “Fool. You forget how long I’ve lived on this wretched station. I don’t need to see you every second to know where you are.”

But then, the smell of antiseptic. Starfleet issue soap. Herbal shampoo, unique, robust. Gels. Oils. Sweat. 

He’s near.

Forcing calmness with a deep, measured breath, he takes off his eyepiece and slips it into his sleeve. He pays for the food he barely ate. He stands. He turns.

And is promptly thrust into the dark, deep woods of Julian Bashir’s eyes. “There you are, Garak! I’ve been looking all over for you,” the doctor says as if it’s just a regular day on Deep Space Nine. His hot, mammalian body caging him tightly in place against the table betrays the ruse. “Who was it you were talking to?”

Garak tries to step around him. Julian steps with him. “Oh, only ever myself. Forgive me, but you’ve caught me just on my way out. I have a strict appointment at 2.”

There’s Julian’s hand now. On his shoulder. Garak is calm. This is normal. “Well, why don’t I walk you there then.”

“My dear Doctor, I couldn’t rob you of your meal. Clearly you’ve just walked in.”

“Actually, I’ve found I’m craving something a bit different now.”

Garak makes to step around Julian again, and still Julian’s steps match his. It’s like they’re dancing. He doesn’t let this deter him. He’s not sure he’s capable of letting anything deter him now, with his heart trying to pound out of his throat. He keeps stepping doggedly forward, and Julian keeps mirroring, still with that damned hand burning through his tunic. “Well, you only have so much time before you must return to the infirmary, I know. Do not allow me to delay you in securing a table at a different locale.”

“Oh, but you’ve already delayed me so long. What’s a few more minutes?” A peek of teeth, a hint of warning. “Though I will admit... I’m not sure how much longer I can wait.”

“Then don’t.” Finally, Garak manages to elbow past this madness and shoot out of the restaurant. The station is so crowded these days, it’s short work to get lost in it. In a sea of ridges and black hair, Garak slips his eyepiece back on and lets the wave take him. 

“Garak!”

Oh, for the Union’s sake—

He does not run. He does not stumble. He walks normally and not desperately, keeping his eye on both the path to the turbolift and Lumok. She’s down the corridor now, pretending to check her makeup again like an imbecile. Just a few paces more. Almost there...

“Garak, you’re the best dressed one here! You are not difficult to spot, you ridiculous dandy! Oh, no offense, Ma’am. Lovely scarf. Excuse me.”

There.

In the reflection of the mirror, Garak makes eye contact with the rogue and taps in the correct sequence on the device sewed into the seam of his pants just as the turbolift doors close behind him.

Like that, Turora Lumok is beamed into space and dies instantly, without a soul to mourn her, and Elim Garak walks back to his quarters with a hand over his mouth and a warmth on his shoulder, without a soul to mourn him, either.

—-

The Festival of Fierce and Fantastic Frogs is two days away and already it is being protested.

Outside Quark’s Bar is a growing army of dissident children with voice amplifiers and holoprojectors shouting to the stars that if they don’t get their porn back, they’ll tear it all down. Signs are projected in the air with essays cycling through them that look to be several pages each, a small holographic fire barely reaching ankle-height is lighting up the length of the promenade, and – perhaps most disturbingly – a comically inaccurate approximation of Odo is rotating at the center of the group, fitted in the typical regalia of the Cardassian military and holding a Klingon bat’leth. It is certainly... something.

“They’re Cardassians,” Quark is saying as he pours out some root beers. “They’ve probably never seen a protest in their lives, they don’t know what they’re doing. The Union puts an end to things like this pretty fast on the surface.”

“Heh,” Jadzia says, “what happens on DS9, stays on DS9.”

“Where’d you hear that?” Kira asks.

“It’s something Julian likes to say. Basically, they figure they can get away with speaking their minds here.”

Kira drums her fingers on the bar, staring into the flailing protestors thoughtfully. 

Right then, Odo arrives back on the scene. It looks like he’s trying to get through, respectfully, but the protestors are not making it easy. Jadzia and Kira come to his rescue just as about fifteen Cardassians start forming a blockade around him.

“I walked around as you do, investigating the endless stars,” one young woman is yelling at him while he stands there with big helpless baby eyes, “and in my net, during the night, I woke up naked, the only thing caught, a fish trapped inside the wind!” 

“I don’t know what that means,” Odo says consolingly.

“Clearly!”

“Okay, okay, let him through!” Kira wiggles her way between the crowd and Odo, snatching him by the arm like a fish with a hook. “He’s not your enemy here, he was just upholding your laws!”

“The Cardassian government has no jurisdiction on a Bajoran station!”

“He made his choices!”

“Beautiful Julian would be ashamed of you! Repent! Repent!”

Kira and Jadzia manage to reel him most of the way through the protesters and he shapeshifts the rest of the journey. The protestors try to follow, but Quark bustles over to stop them. “No, no demonstrations inside! Remember who your allies are,” he says, and they all cow back. “Thank you.”

Odo ripples his form a couple times to make sure everything’s back in the right place and harrumphs. “Allies, Quark?”

“Yes, allies. It’s terrible what you’ve done to them. You can’t police art, Odo–-this is culture we're talking about here, the very bedrock of society.”

“And I’m sure this virtuous attitude of yours has nothing to do with the incredible profit you made and lost at the expense of our mutual friend.”

“Oh, I did him a favor.” Quark uncaps another bottle of Kanar and gestures back to the entrance, with its swarm of frothing Cardassian children. “Look, he’s got fans!”

“How has Garak been handling all this?” Kira asks Odo, sharing a look with Jadzia. “I haven’t heard a peep out of him since he gave us that antivirus program.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Didn’t you have breakfast with him yesterday?”

“Hmmm, that would have been routine. Except he didn’t show. When I made it back to my office, I found a message from him apologizing, telling me he’s so busy with orders he’s lost all track of time.”

“How has he been getting commissions?” Jadzia asks. “His shop’s been closed all week.”

Odo rolls his eyes. “Oh, I’m sure the reality is he’s simply avoiding the issue. Dr. Bashir has informed me he’s been treating him like ‘the black plague’ as well.” 

“Julian’s one to talk. He practically pole-vaulted over a vedek the other day to get away from me.” 

“Speak of the devil,” Quark says, looking towards the door, and everyone turns just as the commotion starts–or, more accurately, the commotion abruptly stops. 

The protestors have all gone quiet, in apparent awe as they part around Julian like the red sea around Moses. He’s smiling stupidly as he stands in the center of them, nodding at something a Cardassian man is exclaiming. It’s an incredibly awkward scene, and Quark starts choking at some of the things his ears are picking up. “They’ve deified him,” he tells them, and Jadzia bursts into giggles at the idea, but Quark isn’t joking. “Really. He might as well be one of the prophets to them. You read the poems. You know.”

Ugh. Kira wrinkles her nose in disgust. The worst kind of blasphemy–horny blasphemy. “What is he even doing here?” she asks. 

“Getting his head inflated,” Jadzia says dryly, because now that Quark has mentioned it, it’s pretty clear from the shit-eating grin on Julian’s face that that’s exactly what’s happening. 

“Poor Garak.” Quark says it absentmindedly, but the comment gets several eyes turned on him. He’s shaking his head as he watches the scene unfold. “First, he falls for a human… humiliating… but then that love becomes public knowledge and several young beautiful Cardassians decide that he’s onto something, and now that human is going to get more action in a week than he’s seen his entire life. I’ve witnessed the rise and fall of more than a few star-crossed romances, but this might just be the saddest.”

“Julian wouldn’t have an orgy the same week the whole station found out Garak’s in love with him,” Jadzia says, insulted on his behalf.

Quark hefts a tray up onto his shoulder. “He just did,” he says as he leaves to go do his job, and Jadzia whips her head around to see Julian escorting two attractive Cardassians away from the protest. Her jaw drops.

“Bastard,” Kira spits, surprising everyone, herself most of all. Those poems must’ve affected her more than she realized.

Odo clears his throat unnecessarily. “I’m no expert on the behavior of solids, but it seems to me that neither party is handling this situation well.”

“I’ll tell you how the pakrela should be handling this,” an older Cardassian sitting at the far end of the bar cuts in, with a twitch to him that makes it clear he’s more than a few deep. “He should be settling his assets, because he doesn’t have long now. Whatever his human is doing is the least of his worries. Ha. Hehe. Being a traitor wasn’t enough for him. No, now he’s gone and corrupted the next generation with his degeneracy. Exile was too soft a punishment. Uh-huh.”

Kira opens her mouth to tell him to fuck off, but Odo touches her shoulder. “You speak as if you know him,” he notes mildly, because of course, the exact reason for Garak’s exile isn’t public record. It’s barely even private record. The Order doesn’t work that way–or didn’t, as it stands. It is interesting that this man is acting like he has classified information despite being a civilian. 

But then, sometimes day drinkers just like to spout speculation as fact.

The man looks into his glass and laughs at his reflection. “Who doesn’t know Garak these days? But that’s temporary. He’ll be forgotten soon enough, just like the Order.” He finishes his drink and gets up. He insincerely mutters some friendly Cardassian farewell and starts to walk past them, but Kira can’t let it go.

“Excuse me, but what’s your name, sir? You’ve been so informative.”

He looks at her for a long moment. “I don’t know,” he says, and elbows past the protesters.

—

“Solt Mebol, left behind a widow and child six years ago when he was tragically killed in a transporter accident. In reality, he accepted an undercover mission which required him to fake his death and have his bond dissolved. A significant sacrifice. Certainly not one many Cardassians could have made.”

The Cardassian stares at Garak sitting on his couch. Turning, he tries to exit his temporary quarters, but the door won’t open.

Garak tuts. “Oh, you know better than that, Mebol.” He taps his disruptor with his forefinger, resting harmlessly against his knee. “The festival isn��t for another couple days, yet here you are. Catching up with old friends before the festivities, I assume? Only I haven’t found you in anyone’s company but your own. You must be lonely. Please, let me alleviate your loneliness for a while.”

The Cardassian sighs at the closed door. “Solt, is it?”

“I can tell you the names of your wife and child as well, if you’d like, and the city they live in. Do you know your wife never rebonded? Unusual behavior for a Romulan. Quite dangerous, as I understand it.”

Solt steps carefully into the small living space and sits in the chair opposite Garak, with the coffee table between them. “As one of the last living members of the Order, I don’t suppose you would consider letting me go?”

Garak smiles pleasantly. “I would be delighted.”

“Would you? I had a deal with Central Command and they’ve been good to me so far. You, however, have been known to…” He eyes the disruptor casually turned in his direction.

“Yes, I imagine I must be something of a mystery these days to my people. I have been… squirrely, is what I suppose a human would say, and I must as well now that I’ve been painted with their brush. Oh, it is an incredible sin, I know. That I should enjoy the company of an attractive alien while in exile.”

Solt snorts. “You expect me to believe those poems were the natural result of a fling?”

“I don’t expect you to believe anything you do not wish to. I only say that it’s convenient that I should be seen as even more traitorous just as a swarm of Cardassians should enter the station.”

“What’s convenient is that you’re still alive. You have friends in high places willing to go to bat for you, in spite of everything you’ve done. It’s a disgrace. You are a selfish disloyal anarchist and no one is holding you accountable, because you just happened to be good at your job once and everyone likes the idea of having you as a potential weapon should the need for one arise. Until then, they’re content to keep you in a cabinet collecting dust and sentiment. You can wave that disruptor all you want, but we both know you make a poor operative now. You’re in love.” 

Garak is still smiling, but Solt can see the signs of a grimace. Dusty, indeed. Too passionate. Too human. “I’m hardly so foolish. You know better than I the dangers of such things in our line of work. You’re little better than a puppet now that you’ve had a whiff of the truth, Mebol.”

“You’re right.” Solt attempts to raise one eye ridge, despite it being unfit for such maneuvers, and leans forward towards that disruptor. “Pull my strings, then, and let’s test that grip Bashir has on yours.”

—

Kira crashes into Garak’s quarters and kickflips past all his booby traps like Indiana Jones’ hotter cousin.

“What the fuck, Richard?” is basically what she says, only it’s in character, so it’s more like, “What the fuck, Garak!”

Garak spins around in his maniacal villain chair with a look of surprise. “How did you get in here, Major?” Miles bustles his way in after her with his impractically enormous toolkit, and Garak lets out an, “Ah,” then, sedately, “I suppose Dr. Bashir filed a complaint about my tampering with the door codes. Of course, there’s a perfectly logical explanation. You see, it–”

“This isn’t about door codes, Garak,” Kira yells. “What I want to know is why our best suspect for the sudden influx of murders on the station was just found drowned in his own toilet!”

“Oh my,” Garak says. “What an unfortunate end.”

“Don’t play dumb. Not now. We know what you’re capable of, but we’re good people and we didn’t want to accuse a victim until we had exhausted the rest of our line-up. Only, interestingly enough, they’re all dead, so now…” she marches over with the fury of the Prophets on her heels and stands imposingly over him, her teeth clenched, “here we are.”

“That is interesting.” He runs a hand down a roll of fabric in his lap, smoothing it. “I suppose you must have some of that ironclad evidence that the Federation so treasures.”

Kira glares at him.

Garak feigns looking around. “Oh, but I can’t help but notice the good Constable isn’t here with you. What could that mean? Surely not that you broke into my quarters without due cause or a hint of warning–at your own word, not even to fix my glitching door. For all you knew, I could have been in here writing one of my vaunted Bashir epics.”

Kira’s hands are in fists now. “The evidence we have would be more than enough to have your face plastered on every viewscreen in Cardassia and you know it.”

“The Federation and Bajoran legal processes do seem a tad inefficient in moments like these, don’t they?”

“Okay,” Miles cuts in, because he has Turbo PTSD and is not in the mood for a flare up. “I think I'll just wait in the hallway, then. Holler if you need me. Good luck, Major.”

Kira and Garak spend a few moments watching him waddle out of the room and then go back to staring each other down. 

“Look, you ass,” Kira starts, “we couldn’t link every victim to the Cardassian government or some third-party organization, but we were able to link enough of them to recognize that these aren’t just random nobodies having ‘accidents.’ Someone was able to break into your computer and embarrass you and you don’t like that so you’re pitching a fit. I can’t have Odo arrest you – yet – but I can tell you to cut it out. This vigilantism isn’t helping–”

That gets a reaction. “Vigilantism!”

“Well, what would you call it?”

“Self-defense.”

“They attacked you?”

“Possibly.”

“Goddamn you, Garak! Just… don’t do this anymore, okay?”

Garak looks at her with innocent astonishment, like he’s still bewildered by her totally plausible accusations. “Well. You have my word, I suppose,” he says, bemused.

—

Gul Skrain Dukat. Blessed with a wife, seven children, two sets of living parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents, minus one father. Habitually cheats with lower ranked military officials, slaves, and barely legal adults, unbenownst to his family. Father was interrogated by Elim Garak and executed by the Union over live broadcast in the year 2350 for the crime of being a piece of shit. 

Elim Garak was shortly thereafter levied with an amateurish execution attempt by Gul Dukat. It failed.

The second attempt will succeed, but at a great cost.

The Festival of Filthy Fucking Foot Fetishists has officially begun, but Garak is struggling to feel any enthusiasm. He is surrounded by his people. The station has been dimmed by 15% to better suit Cardassian eyes and misting stations have been set up in limited locations. Extinct and invented flowers crafted by Cardassian and Bajoran artisans decorate the banisters and doorways. A wash of blue, green, and sparkling gold lights up every direction. There is the smell of freshly prepared Cardassian sweets on the air, a gentle warmth suffuses the atmosphere, and children are laughing on the promenade. It’s the first time the station has felt not just tolerable, but nearly pleasant, in years. 

But then, Garak has never felt particularly welcome among his people. As a child, he was an orphan generously cared for by service workers and sponsored by a government official, and as an adult, he was a member of the Order, which granted him more fear and loathing than it did admiration and respect. Companionship, in its truest form, was a rare thing to come by and not something he was encouraged to come by at all.

Perhaps that is why Dr. Bashir blindsided him. 

In any case, Garak is delicately balanced on the line between proper misery and numbness. He gave up imbibing around the same time that he gave up the implant—or rather, the implant gave up on him—but he’s on his third cup now, wandering through the festivities with no particular direction in mind. The exact spot of this last operation isn’t important, only the timing.

He finishes his drink while a group play a spirited game of cold moba in front of him. It shouldn't be long now.

All the nearby screens suddenly flicker from the event schedule to Dukat’s sharp grin and Garak hums. There we are. He knew the bitch wouldn’t be able to resist showing his face.

“Welcome everyone to the biennial Festival of–” a baby wails, “generously hosted here on Deep Space Nine by Bajor and the Federation, and of course organized by our own prodigous Detapa Council. Ah, that wormhole… quite the view, isn’t it?”

Garak looks around for another food stall that serves alcohol. 

There aren’t any stalls in his immediate vicinity, but there is a young Cardassian couple marching towards him while making dogged eye contact. 

Oh no. 

Garak starts to make a break for it. Not too fast, it won’t do to cause a stir, but there are a number of very good reasons for him to stay far away from any Cardassians who might recognize him right now. Especially if the source of that recognition is those damn poems he was too stupid and sentimental to destroy.

Before he can make it more than a few steps, however, he looks up to see another few Cardassians working their way towards him, also making eye contact.

No, no, no.

He makes to move towards the stairs then, only for his eyes to land squarely on him. 

Him, wearing the silky green outfit he lovingly crafted for him a few months ago. Him, shining in the festival lights, casting him in an even more arresting shade of gold than usual. Him, looking determined and coming straight towards him.

Oh, fuck no.

“Garak,” Julian calls out, likely reading the panic on his face and stance and soul.

“Today, I am not a Gul, though,” Dukat is saying. “I am but a humble representative of the Cardassian Union in its totality, and as such, I would like to thank Colonel Kira Nerys and Captain Benjamin Sisko for their hand in this week’s festivities. They have been nothing if not accommodating these last few weeks while our coordinators ran rampant through their halls.”

He should have accounted for the possibility of this. Thinking of Julian had become excruciating as of late, but that was no excuse. Whatever interaction Julian had been hoping to have with him couldn’t be allowed, not now, and not only for the sake of Garak’s traitorous, disgusting feelings. Even if it would give the sweet man closure, it would not be worth his life. 

“Now, it may be a bit unorthodox, but I thought it would be only fitting if the first Reenactment was carried out by our benevolent hosts, and the Lakarian City Acting Troupe were all too happy to take them under their wing.”

More eyes are turning towards the screen now, the laughing and playing and sloshing of cups quieting down. Julian is nearly with him, his approach halted only by the gathering crowd, and Garak can only pretend to be interested in Dukat’s speech while he racks his brain desperately for a solution. Any solution. Anything.

“I trust that the history of Cardassia is in capable hands.”

The screen flickers again and changes to a shot of one of Quark’s holodecks, where a lone Bajoran man stands in a beam of red light.

A hand grabs Garak roughly by the arm, and he nearly cries with relief when he sees that it’s Lumok.

Well, Lumok with the face and attire of a Bajoran, but that ever-present spark of unchecked malice in her eye is quite unmistakable to someone who worked with her for over a decade. 

“Surprised, you ugly old regnar?” she asks under the actor’s impassioned opening monologue.

He sucks in a breath as the sharp edge of something presses into his back. “Impossible. They found your body caught on one of the station’s spires.”

“A simple bait and switch,” she purrs, pressing the weapon closer, slicing through his tunic. A pity. This was one of his nicer ones. “You’ve gotten sloppy.”

He manufactures a smile. “A knife, then? A favorite of yours, I recall, but terribly messy for such a public venue. Not to mention if your aim is even an inch off, I’ll be in and out of the infirmary within the day, as if nothing at all had happened.”

“Don’t lecture me,” she growls. “You can’t do that anymore. You’re not anyone to anyone. Your master is dead, and what did you do the second you were off leash for the first time in your life? You went and choked yourself on the first Starfleet sotl you could find. You’re pathetic.”

It took incredible effort to keep his eyes from rolling to the back of his skull. “Oh, just stab me already.”

“I’m not going to stab you. I’ve done a bit of outsourcing, in fact.” She slid the knife from his lower back to his side and looped her arm through his, pinning him in place with a wide smile. “All I had to do was suggest to my new friend that you were infiltrating the Federation. That you were poisoning them against Bajor from the inside, uniting Cardassia and Starfleet in a secret alliance under the guise of wooing the CMO. No, no, you won’t be killed by one of your peers. Your death will be at the hands of a perfect stranger. A pointless death for a pointless man.” She leans in and whispers into his aural ridge, “It always was so easy to make people hate you.”

The next few seconds are a flurry of chaos. One second he’s watching as Human, Bajoran and Cardassian actors alike are all holding hands and reciting ancient poetry and the next he’s on the floor with a searing weight bearing down on him from calf to shoulder. There are screams and footfalls coming from all directions and Odo’s voice is immediately discernible shouting over the commotion. His back is on fire, he can’t breathe, and there’s a slash in his side, but he doesn’t miss the thump of Lumok’s body a few feet away, dead before she hits the ground.

“Garak? Garak?” the weight on him is speaking frantically, pawing at his head and shoulders. The weight shifts and the hands flip him onto his back. Those same hands pat him down, blazing a path down his chest and his stomach and his sides, stopping at the superficial gash near his rib, and Garak knows who this is before he even opens his eyes.

“Garak,” Julian sighs with relief. Garak was meant to be dead by phaser blast right now, but instead Julian Bashir is smiling down at him like he’s important, kneeling beside him, his hands on him, branding him with their incredible heat. It shouldn’t be possible. No one could be that fast. 

“Doctor,” he manages on a wheeze. One of his ribs might be broken, actually.

“Dukat,” Sisko growls from the monitor in billowing robes and a long flowing wig, surrounded by flowers.

—

“Explain,” Sisko commands.

Having decided that showing weakness right now can only help his case, Garak is sitting hunched to the side, holding his reeling head in one hand. It’s through a hiss that he replies, “A woman named Turora Lumok was responsible for sabotaging the station with those poems forged with my data signature. The Bajoran woman who was just assassinated–she was no Bajoran, but rather one of the last remaining members of the Obsidian Order. She was hired by Dukat to kill me during the festival under the guise of a hate crime. No doubt because of her indomitable reputation, I’m sure. A number of Cardassian casualties these past several days were at her hands.”

Sisko walks to the viewport to stare out into the stars for a moment, processing this. “All his talk of friendship between Bajor and Cardassia…” he trails off, the ghost of a sneer on his lips as he turns back around. “His goal was just the opposite. He wanted to destroy any hope of cooperation.”

“And get me out of the way in the process,” Garak grumbles. 

Sisko hums and wanders over to Garak’s side, looking down at him thoughtfully. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to tell me who assassinated Ms. Lumok?”

Garak stares at the floor through his fingers, his eyes glazed.

“Or who your informant is on Dukat’s involvement?”

“Captain,” Garak mutters, not looking up, “I have sat here concussed after an attempt on my life and shared with you everything that I know, and here you have not even told me who the tailor of your magnificent robe is.” He tugs half-heartedly at a strip of embroidery on the fabric. “I must admit, I am feeling a touch betrayed you didn’t come to me.”

Sisko flicks his eyes up to Julian, who has been standing in the corner with his hands behind his back. “Very well, Mr. Garak. I release you into Dr. Bashir’s care for now, but I expect to continue this conversation soon.” He massages his forehead. “Once I figure out what to do about this damned festival.”

Julian comes over to help Garak out of his chair, but Garak snaps upright and to the door before he can touch him. Sisko takes the opportunity to lean into Julian’s face and whisper, “Get more information out of him.” The doctor nods.

Julian isn’t angry when he steps out of Sisko’s office and sees that Garak is walking in the exact opposite direction of the infirmary, but he is disappointed. 

“Mr. Garak,” he says urgently once he’s caught up to the idiot.

Mr. Garak interrupts him in the same tone, “Now, now, my dear doctor, we both know I have a dermal regenerator in my quarters, so we need not extend–”

“And I think we both know this is about much more than a few bumps and bruises. I’m afraid the time for beating around the bush passed quite a while ago.”

“You’re right, Doctor,” Garak says, coming to an abrupt stop and rounding on him with wild eyes. “There is an urgent matter we must discuss.” Julian’s eyebrows raise, and Garak nods severely. “Oh, yes, let us not ‘beat around the bush.’ We should talk about how you threw yourself directly into the line of a lethal phaser blast on the one in a millionth chance that you might save my life. The cost of such an action being almost certainly your own life, and yet, here you stand, and here I stand. Will wonders never cease.” Julian opens his mouth, but Garak raises a finger. “Nevermind that I was in the middle of an altercation with a very dangerous, very volatile woman who would not have hesitated for a second to dispose of you. She had a nasty habit of that. Now I knew that you were naive, Doctor, Doctor! I knew that! What I did not know – what I never could have guessed after all these years – was that you are an idiot.” 

Julian stares back into Garak’s hissing face, unimpressed. Garak feels a wave of deja-vu and does not like it. It has no place here. And yet, Julian takes in a breath and smiles, raising his shoulders. “All right, Garak. If it’s really so important to you, we can talk about your suicide attempt.”

“What?” Garak bites out.

“You were going to let yourself get shot, yes?”

“I was n–” Garak starts to lie, disgusted, but is stopped by Julian stepping entirely too close. He stumbles back a step, then another when Julian attempts to crowd him again, and the familiarity of the routine has him shutting his eyes, rueful. They’re dancing again. It’s humiliating, the things this man makes him do, how effortlessly he can gain the upperhand. Most of the time without even having to lift a finger.

“You figured out Dukat’s plan and arranged for Lumok to die if she succeeded, but you expected her to. You didn’t expect to be saved,” the doctor tells his blank, unresponsive face. His eyes are still closed, his hands tense at his sides, but he knows Julian’s stepped closer again by the heat of his livid breath. “Tell me I’m wrong.”

“Very well. I didn’t figure it out. I was informed.”

“So, the captain was right.” He sounds bored, but Garak seizes his chance. His eyes open in a sudden burst of animation.

“Yes, I had an informant. I believe the major was familiar with him, a fellow by the name of Damoc who was recently presumed dead? Though I knew him far better as Mebol. We first met on Romulus, you see. In the event of my death, he had strict instructions to reveal Dukat’s plot in my stead and protect my remaining assets. In return, he was to receive some valuable coordinates, which by now he will have long accessed. I suppose he’s already booked passage off of the station, if he hasn’t already gone.” 

“Quick to abandon you,” Julian says, completely off-script. Garak’s carefully measured breathing stutters.

“Surely Captain Sisko would like to have a word with him.”

“I’m sure.”

“Doctor…” Garak says, lost. “There isn’t time to was–”

Suddenly there are two hands slamming into his chest like they’re iron forks and he’s a slab of meat, rocketing him back into the nearest wall with a loud thud. Garak gasps at the strength of it, astounded, but all his attention is quickly monopolized by Julian’s snarling words.

“Stop trying to distract me, Garak! Stop racing away before I can even properly get into the room, stop begging off lunch, stop ignoring my comms, and stop acting like your bloody life is over just because it was found out that you have feelings for me!” 

“I–I don’t–”

“Lke hell you don’t! Thirty-seven.”

Garak blinks several times. “What?”

“Thirty-seven. That’s how many direct references to our literary discussions are in your poems. All chronologically concordant with the dates of those discussions, and six of which from that classic Earth album I recommended to you a year ago that you swore up and down sounded like a pack of voles had been crammed into a bucket and shaken around. I knew you were having me on. You love Mitski, and you love me.”

Garak’s face shutters. 

Finally, Julian takes a step back. His hands remain on his chest, pinning him in place, but he allows him some oxygen. Exactly twenty seconds pass like this, before the doctor becomes impatient and huffs, “You can’t possibly have nothing to say.”

“What would you have me say, Doctor?”

“I would like you to admit it.”

“Why?”

“Because I’ve heard it from friends and coworkers and strangers and every tourist on this damn station, it feels like, but I haven’t heard it from you.”

Garak is silent for a long time. Finally, he quietly asks, “You would further humiliate me this way? Knowing what you do? My dear friend…” He, carefully, with only the gentlest of pressure, puts a hand over one of Julian’s. “Please. You’ve read everything I could possibly have to say. What more could there be?”

Julian’s hands are unforgiving, but his eyes soften at the simple lowering of the curtain. It’s not the direct confession he was looking for, the I love you completely, traitorously, ruinously that his poems professed and a deep, broken part of Julian desperately wants to hear, but it is, it is. For Garak, this is as explicit as it gets, and Julian can feel his heart trying to catch in his throat.

“Garak,” he starts to say.

Garak isn’t scowling anymore. His eyes are shining as he looks away and sucks in an aggrieved breath. “Oh, please, let us skip this excruciating precursor. I have no intention of remaining on this station.”

Julian goes unnervingly still. “Excuse me?”

“I will need time to pack up my shop and settle my lease, but then I promise, you will never suffer the consequences of my unfortunate… condition again.” When Julian only stares at him with mounting alarm in his lovely eyes, Garak grimaces. “You must know I had no intention of pursuing you.” At least, not after the implant had been shut off and he’d realized what horrors he’d stumbled into with the doctor while under its influence, and by then, it was already too late. He was too weak to stop speaking to him, but he was not a complete monster. “I wouldn’t have. My writing was never about nurturing the emotions, only managing them.” A bit of a lie, but only a bit. He does love to languish and he never could resist a good innuendo. Their friendship had been infinitely precious to him, though, and he couldn’t bear the slow death it would undergo now that everyone knew the truth.

The worsening rumors that would spread. The suffering of Julian’s reputation, career, and love life with the Cardassian spy’s drastic affections hanging over everyone’s heads. The danger it would place them both in, the damage it had already done. The way Julian would know every time Garak flirted now, it was never idle. It had never been and could never be. 

It would be a torture hitherto unthinkable. Better to sever the limb before it could rot.

Still, Julian is silent. The pressure on his chest is more a suggestion than a command now.

“Doctor, I…” he swallows back anymore hideous truths. “I apologize. Your rage is understandable, but I swear to you, I have every intention of righting this wrong.”

“Oh,” Julian says then, softly, as if he isn’t speaking to Garak at all,  “you don’t know.”

“Doctor?”

He makes a bizarre human gesture, skimming the heel of his hand off his forehead. “My God! Of course. I thought it was pride, or shame, or paranoia. Anything and everything but this, but of course you would be this ridiculous. Well. That’s an easy enough problem to solve.”

“Doctor–?!”

The hands on his chest are gone. Instead, they’re seizing him by the head and pulling him up to connect his mouth to Julian’s.

Oh.

If Julian’s touch was a brand before, this is lava running down his throat, into his stomach and down, down, down to eat through the twenty inch thick duranium floor. Slow, thorough, and final in its devastation. A transformation that cannot be persuaded. He grapples with it, hands scrambling stupidly over and across his doctor’s shoulders. Whether it’s to pull him closer or push him away, he doesn’t know. He’s too busy being brutally altered to give it much thought.

His hands settle for burying themselves in his hair at some point. When doesn’t matter. Time holds no power here. It happens, and then he knows how soft Julian Bashir’s hair feels, and there is no going back.

The loss of control becomes alarming enough that he finally manages to pry himself away, gulping in desperate, anxious breaths of frigid station air. It works. The fire and the madness that followed it calms down and he manages the strength to push Julian back, but the wet smack of their lips disconnecting will echo in his dreams for the foreseeable future, as will the dizzy grin on Julian’s face inches from his own. There’s a hand on his ass keeping him from tumbling through the hole in the floor and a couple unlucky passersby gawking at the gruesome scene and Garak is a different creature entirely, incandescent and strange, forged anew in the curious fires of mutual attachment. 

He feels insane.

“Doctor, you cannot truly be this naive.” 

Julian looks anything but naive right then. He can’t focus on that, though. He needs to focus on the fact he was nearly assassinated; the fact that the kindest man alive nearly died with him out of some misguided terran idea that all lives are of equal value and importance.

And yet, Julian is leaning in to kiss him again, so Garak puts a hand on his chest and says, “You know what I am.”

Julian’s expression turns complicated and it’s clear he understands. Garak’s roiling emotions can’t settle on being relieved or horrified. How to go on after this? After knowing intimately what he almost had, with the smoke of it still thick in his eyes and his throat and his heart?

A gentle hand on his jaw brings him back to the moment, where Julian’s eyes are serious. “I know,” he murmurs.

Garak sucks in a wet breath.

“The question is,” Julian continues, even quieter, “do you know what I am?”

His head is spinning. “Doctor?”

Julian just smiles sadly, and it's clear that there are some long conversations in their future. But for now… “About that dermal regenerator in your quarters,” Julian begins, and Garak is relieved to find out that whatever stupid, lovely thing he’s become can still appreciate an innuendo.

—

Not long after, in the middle of telling Sisko all about Mebol over Julian’s comm badge while its owner watches expectantly in a state of teasing half-dress, he’s horrified to find that whatever thing he’s become is also rather eager to please.

—

A couple days later, the two of them are picking from a generous cut of flaming taspar in the Replimat.

Or, Garak is picking, anyway. Julian is stuffing his face. Ordinarily, this would mildly scandalize him, but the fact it’s taspar, one of the most traditional delicacies of his homeworld, being shoveled enthusiastically into that pretty face makes it so he can feel only hope.

Rather than giving into that inadvisable feeling, he takes a dainty sip of his tea and tries to look nonsuspect. Cardassians from all sides and angles are staring.

“About Miss Leeta…” Garak begins.

Julian wipes his face with the side of his hand. Disgusting, but oddly compelling. “What about her?” 

“When will you be breaking the news to her?”

“Oh.” Julian smiles, bemused. “She knows.”

A tightness in his chest dispels slightly. “Does she?” he says faintly.

“She’s the one who first brought it up. We performed the Rite of Separation days ago. She said it was great timing, what with the festival and all. We didn’t even have to leave the station.”

“So you were together then.”

“Well, in a sense. We weren’t in love, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Garak takes another sip, lowering his eyes. “I wasn’t worried. Only concerned for the young lady’s feelings.”

Julian’s face is incandescent. A Cardassian to his far left is openly gaping. “Of course, of course.” He leans suddenly over the table then, moving a hand forward to rest on his knee. “So, should I take this line of questioning as an indicator that you’re open to a relationship with me?”

Garak shifts a little in his seat, moving his knee further under the table and its shadows, but otherwise doesn’t pull away. “It would be unwise,” he says quietly, without actually saying no.

The hand squeezes. “It isn’t as if people won’t assume anyway.”

“Rumors can be dispelled. Redirected. Altered.” He reaches forward to take a small saucière and pours a bright red sauce over a couple groatcakes. “There would be no coming back from a confirmation.”

Julian’s hand falls away. “Would it be so bad?”

“I don’t know,” Garak says, splitting a cake up into three neat sections. “Would it, Doctor?”

A Bajoran couple walks past their table then, and while one purposely avoids eye contact and seems to be giving them a wide berth, the other throws a meaningful glare Julian’s way. This is the fourth judgemental or pitying look he’s received since they came in for brunch. Julian calmly returns the look, refusing to be the first to look away, until finally the man averts his eyes and Julian looks back to Garak with a stern smile. Garak inclines his head.

“Be careful, Doctor,” Garak goes on. “Rumors can ruin lives. End careers.” He scoops up a bite of his cake, dripping with red sauce, and lifts it to his mouth. “Kill,” he finishes, and eats.

At that, Julian leans back in his seat with his arms crossed tight. Garak gives him his time. It’s a relief to have finally made a dent in Julian’s lovesick, idealistic conviction–and Garak can admit, after the last few days, that it is lovesickness. Julian’s decided he loves him back and there will be no stopping him from pursuing this, but there may yet be some tempering. A small, equally stubborn, sentimental part of Garak despairs at the whole horrid affair, but the behemoth of his good sense squashes this part down with little difficulty. 

It’s this moment that a smattering of young Cardassians, accompanied by one Jadzia Dax, arrive at their table. Immediately, Garak recognizes them as the ones that nearly intercepted his meeting with Lumok and his stomach drops. Julian, on the other hand, brightens back up.

“Well, hello there,” he says warmly.

Jadzia responds first, with each elbow leaned on a Cardassian’s shoulder and a knowing sparkle in her blue eyes, “Hello to you.” The Cardassians all echo with similar greetings, some shy, others giddy.

One young woman standing at the front, with her hair in three elaborately plaited braids and little makeup, is looking at Garak with particular interest. “You’re the one who wrote the poems about Julian.”

Garak looks at the girl coolly. “Do you mean Dr. Bashir?”

She goes blue. “Oh, um. Yes. I do.” She tucks an imaginary lock of hair into her perfectly coiffed hair and lowers her head respectfully. “My apologies, Doctor.”

“Hey now,” the doctor scolds with good humor, “none of that. We’re all friends here.” 

The girl throws another searching glance Garak’s way. “Friends?”

That’s enough of that. “This is certainly quite the surprise,” Garak says genially, plastering on his most pleasant smile. “Is there something you needed? As Deep Space Nine’s resident Cardassian tailor and reputed troubadour, I’m always happy to be of service.” Julian sends him a sharp look, which he ignores. 

Jadzia is looking as foxy as she ever does, with a grin nearly to her spotted ears. “Julian asked me to bring them here,” she says too happily, and Garak has to sit back in his seat to process that. Julian scratches his neck with a guilty smile, obliviously alluring. It cannot be overstated that there are, still, eyes on them from all directions and angles.

“Garak, sir,” the Cardassian woman-child begins again, earnest, “let me start over. My name is Inia Milam. I am the President of the Ivory State Liberation Library. We collect–”

“Madam,” Garak interrupts her quietly, stunned. “This is hardly the time and place.” He blinks, still shocked stupid by her brazenness, and leans towards her, peering into her distressingly young features with beseeching desperation. “And I am hardly the audience.”

Milam doesn’t appear to process his warning at all, though. She just continues to look inquisitive. She has that gleam in her eyes that is common in Cardassian women, calculating and intelligent, but there’s something else there. Something indefinable that he’s seen hundreds of times over an interrogation table, but without the fear to staunch it. Without the hopelessness. It makes his stomach flip. “On the contrary, you are exactly the sort of person we look for.” She bows her head. “Dr. Bashir promised that if we assisted him a few days prior, he would introduce us so that I could formally welcome your book of poems into our shelves. I apologize if this comes as a surprise. I wish only to thank you for your excellent contribution, E. G., and tell you that we hope to welcome many more pieces from you in the future. I’ll be in touch. Dr. Bashir.” She nods to him, returns his gentle smile, and walks confidently away. The rest of the group mirror her, voicing similar words of polite farewell and appreciation, and leave.

Garak forces himself not to track their departure and instead picks up his fork again, as if nothing world-shattering has occurred at all. The cake is tasteless in his mouth.

Julian is concealing nothing of his thoughts, however. He’s staring openly at Garak, as if he’s a bomb and he’s trying to figure out which color wire to cut.

Ultimately, it’s Jadzia that breaks the tension. “Well,” she says, “that is some harem you’ve got there, Julian.”

“Jadzia,” Julian barks. She laughs.

“I’m teasing, I’m teasing.” Uncharacteristically, her impish smile turns regretful. “Now that that’s out of the way, I do have to bring your friend in for questioning,” she says, and that explains that. “I’m sorry, boys. I stalled Ben as long as I could.”

Garak polishes off the last of his meal and takes one last gulp of his tea to wash it down. With that done, he stands with a placid, conciliatory smile.

Julian puts a hand on his shoulder before he can take a step. “I’ll come see you after my shift.” Those lovely, dark, deep eyes search his, pinning him like a moth above his fireplace. “Okay?”

Garak inhales. “Without end,” he murmurs, waits for Julian’s eyes to light in understanding, and then aloud says, “I am at your disposal, Doctor. Good day.” With that and a firm, friendly pat on Julian’s hand, he limps away.

Jadzia rather pointedly watches him limp to the exit for a few long seconds before throwing Julian a rakish grin. “Well, well,” she says largely. Julian pretends not to notice, and Jadzia pivots on her heel after Garak.

“Before we lock you up and throw away the key, could you sign my datarod,” Julian hears Jadzia asking, and he shakes his head, unsuccessfully trying to rub away his smile.

Without end Do I think of you and so Come to me at night. For on the path of dreams at least, There's no one to disapprove! Ono no Komachi

[a-reader-and-a-writer]

Your Storm is My Storm

Fandom: Twisters, Tyler Owens, f!reader Summary: Is it possible to have trauma from an event you didn't actually experience? You never thought so, but now you are tormented nightly after witnessing Tyler's near death. Luckily, he's there to comfort you and remind you that he made it back to you, and that he's not going anywhere. Word Count: 1976 TW: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Death (but not really), Dealing with PTSD, Storm-Related Peril Notes: Huge thank you to @blue-aconite for encouraging me and reading this over, and to @mayhem24-7forever for reminding me to stop doubting myself and just write it already 💕

Divider created by me (please ask/credit before using)

You are standing in the middle of a vast grass field wearing a white cotton dress that billows wildly in the increasing wind. Across the field heading in your direction, you see an oh-so-familiar red Dodge Ram bucking and crashing over the uneven dirt. Even though you are several hundred feet away and the wind whips around with a deafening roar, you hear Tyler whooping loudly, the joyful sound as clear as day in your ears. 

Then, suddenly, you are in the backseat of the truck, watching as Boone leans back to get a better angle of Tyler with his camera. Shifting his focus away from the plain in front of him for a minute, Tyler looks at Boone and gives another rowdy shout before clicking a button on the dashboard. The truck bolts forward at a break-neck speed, heading directly for the dark swirling funnel forming in front of them. 

You try to warn them, to call out and tell them to turn around before it’s too late, but even though you can feel the screams tearing at your throat, not a sound passes from your lips. You lean forward and pull at Tyler’s arm, your fingers digging into his sleeve so deeply that you are sure you are tearing into his skin, silently pleading, begging him to stop. And yet he doesn’t react. 

Tears are streaming down your face as the truck nears the tornado and skids to a stop. The edge of the storm is licking at the front bumper. Tyler grins at Boone, giving a quick wink to the camera, and says, “Here we go!”

He reaches forward and flips a switch on the center console—and nothing happens. 

For a moment, that cocky grin stays on Tyler’s face but then the realization of what didn’t happen snaps his attention back to the switch. He jiggles it a few times but still nothing. The storm is even closer now, the entire vehicle shaking as the intensity of the winds grows.

Tyler glances at his co-pilot. “Boone…the augers aren’t going down.”

Boone lowers the camera, an instant sign that something is wrong. Though the feed is still live, the shot now only shows the steering wheel and out the windshield of the truck. Occasionally, Tyler’s hands pop into frame as he frantically tries to get the switch to work. Even from your place in the back seat, Boone and Tyler’s voices can barely be heard over the roar of the wind but their tones are panicked and tense. Nothing they are doing gets the augers to work and by this point they are too close to the storm to drive out of it. You squeeze your eyes closed, cover your ears with your hands, and curl up in your seat—you can’t watch what happens next. Not again. 

Just as the wall of wind passes over the grille of the truck and the front tires raise slightly off the ground, Tyler grabs the camera from Boone’s lap and turns it towards his face. His usually bronzed skin is pale in the growing darkness and there is a fear in his eyes that has never been there before while chasing a storm. Yelling loudly to be heard over the roar of the wind, he screams, “Baby, if you’re watching this, I love you with everything in me, and I’m so sorr—”

He is interrupted as the truck tilts backward 90 degrees and the camera slips from his hands, flying past you and smashing into the back window, cracking them both. The last thing the camera streams is the sound of Tyler and Boone’s screams.

In the blink of an eye, you are once again standing in the field far from the truck. It is now lying upside-down and, for a brief moment, you see Tyler struggling to drag himself out of the driver’s side window, one arm hanging limp and useless at his side. He raises his head, blood streaming down one side of his face, and, somehow, his eyes find yours across the distance.

Then the truck explodes and Tyler disappears into a ball of fire and smoke.

“NO!” you wail, sound finally bursting from your mouth only to be lost in the blast of the explosion. Tears stream down your face as you collapse to your hands and knees, your forehead pressing into the wet dirt. The heat from the fire washes over you and you struggle to breathe as your sobs rattle in your chest and the smoke fills your lungs but it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore.

Lifting your head, you blink through your tears and the smoke. When they clear, you see the twisted metal frame of the truck and the skeletal, charred remains of the man that you loved.

You let out a blood-curdling shriek—

“Hey, hey, baby…..” Hands grab at you, trying to hold you down as you thrash wildly. Another anguished scream rips from your lips even as you hear a voice pleading with you, “Wake up…please. Baby, it’s okay. I’m alright—we’re both alright. I promise. I’m here. Just please wake up for me.”

The voice finally breaks through the storm of emotions raging through your mind, and as you recognize it, your eyes shoot open to see a face you thought you’d never see again looming over you. “T-Tyler…” you manage to breathe, your lip quivering in disbelief as you reach up, fingers brushing against his mouth. 

He nods, pursing his lips to kiss your fingertips, some of the desperation and fear on his face melting into relief as he runs his hand over the top of your hair. “Shhh, it’s okay. You just had the dream again.”

“W-what?” 

As your eyes begin to adjust to the darkness, you see that you are lying on your bed in the apartment you shared with Tyler back in Arkansas. You aren’t in Oklahoma. There is no tornado. Tyler is alive and well. 

It had all been a dream……but the problem was, that’s only partially true. 

Last month, the auger system on Tyler’s truck had failed and Tyler and Boone were caught in the storm as the truck flipped over. However, the truck, thankfully, hadn’t exploded like in your dream. Tyler had fractured his arm and got a shallow gash on his head while Boone had broken his nose, but otherwise, the two had walked away from the incident relatively unharmed. 

However, the same couldn’t be said for you. While you hadn’t been with them in person, you had been watching the Storm Wrangler’s live feed as everything happened and that experience alone had been enough to cause these nearly nightly terrors. That moment when the camera had broken and the last thing you heard was Tyler screaming in fear and pain had been the most horrible moment of your life, one which dragged out for several hours until Tyler could reach you and confirm he was alright. And now you were being forced to relive it night after night after night. 

Alternating waves of relief, exhaustion, and despair begin to wash over you. Though you had been momentarily comforted seeing Tyler’s face, the reminder that you are caught in this seemingly neverending torture loop causes tears to once again begin streaming down your face.

After weeks of going through the same cycle of you waking up terrified only to realize what was happening, Tyler is used to this reaction. He murmurs, “Come here, baby,” before scooping you into his arms and holding you tightly against him.

You rest your head against his bare chest, but the steady beat of his heart that had once brought you such comfort and calm now only serves as a reminder that you had watched him die over and over again. It hadn’t been real, yet you felt that loss at the moment, and that pain still hung over you like a shroud even as you lay wrapped in his arms. 

“Ty, I can’t do this anymore,” you whimper, your fingers digging into his arm which only brings you back to the moment in your dream you begged him to turn the truck around. “I can't sleep and those pills the doctor gave me aren't helping. Every time I close my eyes I see you—” You break down into a sob, burying your face deeper into his chest as that horrific last image of Tyler from your dream flashes in your mind.

You can feel him taking a few, deep, shuddering breaths and it breaks your heart as you realize he’s trying to keep himself from breaking down from seeing you like this. He was the one who actually went through the near-death experience, and yet here he was comforting you every night. It wasn’t fair–to either of you–and you wonder how much more he will take before he throws in the towel, leaving you to face this on your own. Honestly, part of you is surprised he hasn’t left yet.

But he’s here tonight. And as he presses his lips to the top of your head, he whispers, “God, baby, I'm so sorry.”

Shaking your head against his chest, you cry, “It's not your fault.”

“The hell it isn't.”

You shake your head again. “You've told me not to watch your live stuff just in case something like this happened. It was my fault–”

“No,” Tyler stops you, grasping your damp cheeks between his calloused palms and tilting your head to face his. Oddly, the rough skin of his hands feels soothing, familiar, and you start to feel more grounded in the reality of the moment. For the first time tonight, you feel the dream starting to lose its hold on you. 

Rubbing his thumb softly across your cheekbone, he looks you straight in the eyes and firmly says, “No…None of this is your fault. I knew there had been problems with the augers but instead of waiting to test them, I went out anyway. What happened out there and how it's tormenting you is my fault and no one else’s. Do you understand me? You did nothing wrong.” You start to look away but he squeezes your face tighter, causing you to look back at him. “Tell me you know that.”

“I guess,” you whisper. Then, stronger, you say, “But Ty, it doesn’t matter. Whoever’s fault it was, or even if it was nobody’s fault, it doesn’t change the fact this keeps happening. And I don’t know how to live the rest of my life like this.”

“It won’t be the rest of your life. You’ll get past this, I promise,” he says, releasing your cheeks to run his hands across your shoulders and down your arms until he is holding your hands in his. Squeezing them tightly, he adds, “Eventually, every storm passes. We just have to hold on tight and don't give up until that happens.”

Your voice breaks as you ask, “...‘We’?”

“Yeah, of course ‘we’.” His eyes darken under a furrowed brow. “Wait…do you really think I’d let you go through this on your own?”

You shrug one shoulder. “It’s a lot. And it’s not your storm to weather.” 

“Baby, your storm is my storm. And I’m going to hold you so tightly during it and never let you go, whatever it takes. Then once it passes—because it will given time—I’m still going to be right there next to you for whatever comes next.” He leans forward until his forehead is leaning against yours. “You’re never getting rid of me.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

You aren’t sure how long the two of you remain like that, hand-in-hand with heads pressed together. It could have been minutes, it could have been hours. But all you know is that Tyler is with you and, at least for tonight, that’s enough.

Eventually, in the darkness together, you whisper, “Let's go to sleep.”

Tagging a few people who might be interested: @green-socks, @mayhem24-7forever, @blue-aconite, @hederasgarden, @writercole, @ryebecca, @heart-0n-fire, @nerdysuperchick, @ohtobeleah, @slightly-psycho-multifan, @sunlightmurdock

[costinblazetwice]

Video Calls and Jihyo

Male Reader X Jihyo

Genre: Smut

Words: 3.6K

A/N: A pretty tough scenario to write in total. Really had to spend some time going back and forth with this one. Some areas may seem quickly written but that’s what experience is for. Hope you enjoy 😊

You sit at your desk with your laptop in front of you, heart racing as you wait for the call to connect. As you play around with the settings suddenly on your screen pops up the face of a girl making a bizarre face as though she’s some sort of a comedian or in a circus show act. She has her face scrunched up, eyebrows turned upward comically as though in massive confusion and eyes severely squinting.

Ah, this was your girlfriend of course, Park Jihyo.

“Babe, is that beautiful face of yours really the first thing you wanted to show me in a while?” You say sarcastically, watching her break out into a huge laugh, fancying herself a comedian.

Your girlfriend was out of country as is common in her profession. Because of this for the past several weeks the two of you have been resorting to video calls to be able to see each other.

The last week has been especially busy, making this the first time you guys were able to make time for each other in almost a week.

“How are you love?” She coos, laying on top of the bed with her head resting on the bed frame.

The two of you engage in some small talk, taking the rare moment of alone time to catch up on things. Once about 20 minutes passed you finally asked the question that was on your mind.

“So… you’re alone, right? No one’s gonna interrupt?”

“All alone. Got a room in this hotel just for you,” she smirks in response, a low growl coming off in your headphones as you know she’s just as excited as you are.

You and Jihyo have sex, a lot. Whenever you two are together it’s something that just happens, whether you’re the one doing the initiating or she is.

With you two being in different countries this posed a problem. The solution was to have some time to yourselves when you video called, not making up for the actual act of course but something to still somewhat satisfy the two of you.

“Wait, let me get on the floor. Don’t want to drench the bed,” she says with a smile but you can feel the sexual tension building as she uttered that phrase. Jihyo takes her phone in hand and you watch as she put her back against the wall and squats down, propping her phone up using an item as she sits in front of the camera.

“Are you ready babe?” She asks eagerly as you nod in return, swiftly pulling your pants and boxers off revealing your growing erection, causing Jihyo to smirk at your sudden action.

“Look at you, so excited. So excited to see mommy…”

There it is. Jihyo has this dominating side to her in bed. Does it always appear? No. Sometimes she relishes in the feeling of being ravaged by you.

But there’s also this side of her that dominates, that wants to watch you beg, that tells you what to do and how you better behave. And it looks like that switch is turned on tonight.

You watch with a tight grip on your now fully erected cock as Jihyo begins to remove her shorts, revealing her panties underneath.

You two were moving quick, wanting nothing more than to be able to cum in each others presence now that you were together.

She sits in front of the camera with her knees to her chest, her black cotton panties covering her nether areas and her black hoodie covering what was likely her matching bra. “Tell mommy what you want to see,” she purrs, her hands trailing down to her ass cheeks, giving them a firm grope as you watch with your breath hitched, heat rising to your face as it takes your entire will power to not start jerking your cock.

“I want to see your pretty pink hole. Please…” you achingly beg, pre cum covering the tip of your lengths head.

“Hmm that’s my baby,” Jihyo coos with a smirk on her face, raising an eyebrow as she suddenly turns her body to the camera, ass in focus as you watch her hands pull back and slowly tug at her panties, pulling them down just slightly and stopping at her rear revealing her puckered asshole.

“Oh, fuck..” you let out a raspy groan, your erection pumped with blood as the precum increases in quantity, finding the thought of wiping it on her ass before sticking it into her tightest hole to be arousing.

Your girlfriend looks back to the camera with a knowing grin, knowing what her actions are doing to you.

“Is this the hole you wanted to see?” You hear Jihyo’s voice, looking back at you as her hands continue to stretch her asscheeks, her asshole clenching every time she stretches it.

Suddenly a finger lingers near her hole before lightly dabbing into her ass, just the tip as she wouldn’t be able to get much farther without lube. She lets out a soft sigh as she wiggles the tip of her finger at the entrance of her ass, clenching down hard on her digit.

“Aw baby, my ass feels so good. If only I had some lube,” she groans, removing her finger as her asshole continues to contract from the burning sensation.

Your breathing was hard and heart beating fast at the sight, but even as you watch her ass continuously clench tightly in need of a greater sensation, her pretty cunt is what you truly want to see.

“You’re cunt… I want to see your wet cunt,” you slowly groan, eyes locked on her cotton panty fabric that is just barely covering her slit.

“Hmm, mommy will give you what you want. You’ve been such a good boy after all,” she trailed off as her hands grab her panties once more and languidly begin to pull them down. Your breath hitches as you feel your cum might launch all over the screen of your laptop from the excitement.

Her panties slide down and you watch as the sticky wetness from her cunt clings on to the fabric, the length of her sticky arousal getting thinner and longer the more she pulls it down until it breaks, a giant damp spot at the center of her panties and her pussy glistening under the light of the room from her juices.

She tosses her panties to the side, her ass shaking in front of the camera as she spreads apart her lips letting you get the full view of her cunt lubricated with her arousal, clenching her asshole as well with her heart throbbing knowing how your gaze goes from one hole to the next, resting either way on her most private areas.

The view from her arched back on all fours reveals slender, light brown-hued lips delicately embracing the entrance of her pussy, framed by the surrounding skin. Their light brown coloring offers a subtle, natural contrast against the rest of her skin tone, outlining the delicate curves with a gentle, understated grace.

Seeing her wet lips staring at your direction and the visual of her round and plump ass brings heat to your face as your cock pulses in your hand, precum oozing from the slit at the top as you watch Jihyo rub her finger along her cunt before raising it to her mouth, licking it clean as she looks back into the camera.

Her eyes are dark and full of lust, and you can hear the slight panting coming through your headphones. Her voice is low and husky as she continues to talk.

“You like that baby?" She asks while still on all fours while looking back at you, knowing the answer but asking anyways, enjoying watching you squirm.

“You’re so fucking hot,” you groan, cock twitching as you prevent yourself from cumming with every ounce of your being, the visual of her toned arms keeping her upright, her hair covering most of the side of her face but her plump lips still visible, and her well defined back with her stout ass becoming overwhelming.

"How do you think I taste?"

"Delicious," you answer, without any hesitation. This causes Jihyo to smirk as she turns around so she now sits with her front directly visible to you, allowing you to see her cunt dripping wet, the brown folds of her lips oozing with her cum.

She begins to licks her fingers clean, the sticky substance of her arousal sticking to her tongue with each lick she takes of her digits.

You can’t take it anymore. You violently grab your cock, jerking yourself so that just in seconds your length is twitching, begging for release.

“Stop!”

The sudden yell stops you just seconds before you ejaculated, your heartbeat beginning to calm down as you were successfully able to edge yourself.

“Are you really going to cum before I even get started?” She asks with dark eyes and lips pressed into a thin, taut line, one eyebrow raised looking at you appraisingly.

“Sorry, love. You’re just so hot,” you barely breathe out, a slight sting in your cock as your shaft is slippery with precum. “I’m barely holding on,” you whisper in a moan, knowing that if you were to roughly stroke your cock this instant that you would cum, the only thing stopping you being the dominance of Jihyo looking at you through her screen.

“Aww, you want to cum so badly for me,” she coos, bringing her hand up to her mouth, sticking her tongue out and lathering her fingers with her saliva before bringing it down to her cunt, gently rubbing in circular motions.

“I wish I could be there right now, and fuck you like the the hot mess of a fuck-toy you are,” she roughly growls, eyes darkened as her gaze stays glued to yours for every word, wanting you to watch her touch herself, see how much of a dirty whore she is just for you.

She inserts a digit into her hole and begins roughly fingering herself, back against the wall with her stuffed cunt on full display. Her eyes closed and brows furrowed, mouth agape as she throws her head back absorbed in the pleasure that her fingers are bringing her. You see her wetness slowly begin to drip, touching her ass cheeks before falling to the floor beneath her.

She sighs, her breath hitching as she adds a bit of pressure, her legs shaking ever so slightly.

She looks at you, her face contorting as her pleasure grows.

You notice her fingers are now glistening with her juices, her fingers moving at a steady pace.

You lick your lips, a small whine escaping you, not able to help yourself from looking down at her fingers, her fingers that were coated in her pussy juices. Your cock twitches in response.

Her moans get louder, the sight of her face in ecstasy with her hips rocking with her hands bringing you closer to the edge. Jihyo removes her fingers from her cunt and begins tapping her index and thumb together as you see her sticky arousal stuck, lengthening each time she pulls apart and disappearing when she smacks the two together.

Her eyes flutter closed, her fingers bringing her essence up to her mouth, her tongue running over her fingers, sucking them clean.

“Oh fuck baby, I wish you could taste me, finger me so good,” she sighs.

Jihyo gets a glimpse of your cock and how it’s been standing upright for so long now. She may be dominating but she’s a kind girlfriend who doesn’t want to see you in anguish like this for too long, even if she finds the sight of your hard cock begging for release and your tense jaw with your furrowed brows to be absolutely erotic.

“Touch yourself… but you can’t cum. Just edge…” she breathes out, fingers still probing her insides.

That was all you needed to hear. Your hand harshly grabs your cock and it only takes a few jerks before you feel yourself about to cum once more as the butterflies in your stomach begin to fly freely, forcing you to immediately slow down as you remember the words of your girlfriend.

“Baby, tell me what’d you do if you were here,” she whispers, fingers out of her pussy and now softly rubbing her clit.

“I’d spit on your cunt, mixing my spit with your juices,” you groan as you watch Jihyo immediately bend her head down and harshly spit on her cunt, using her hand to mix her saliva and juices.

“I’d play with your perky tits and pinch your pretty pink nipples,” you continue, lightly stroking your cock in the process.

As you say that Jihyo leans forward and lifts her hoodie off revealing her black bra holding her tits in place, hands going behind her back as she removes the clasp on her bra revealing her volumptious breasts and hardened nipples.

Jihyo immediately pinches her nipples as her legs are spread, giving you a full view of her dampened cunt, the fleshy outer lips of her pussy covered with arousal and her swollen clit both wet and shimmering under the light of her room.

She begins fervently massaging her tits releasing open mouthed moans as you stroke your cock ever so slowly, afraid if you go too fast you may end this all by cumming. She now guides one hand of hers down to her heat, inserting a finger aggressively in her hole while the other massages her breast.

“Now honey, tell mommy what you want to see,” she softly whimpers, her stomach shivering and back arching as her eyes roll back, the carpet beneath her cunt drenched with her wetness.

You take in a deep breath, swallowing hard as there’s now just one thing you want to see, and just one thing you want to do.

“I want to see you cum.”

As soon as you say that the pace at which she’s fingering herself and massaging her tits slows down, her eyes fluttering as she brightly smiles, both curves of her lips turned upwards as she licks the wetness off her fingers, bringing both hands up to push the hair on her shoulders back.

“You’re such a good fuck-toy. Mommy would like nothing more than to cum with you,” she hushes in a raspy voice, moving her phone back as her pussy comes closer to the screen, Jihyo now laying down on the ground with her upper back lifted upwards so she can still see you, small folds building on her fit abdomen with her legs in the air. You have the complete view of her pussy, completely bare and nude, knowing how she enjoys the cool sensation of the air on her cunt when there’s no hair to block it.

“Pump yourself, cum for me,” Jihyo snarls as her hand creeps down to her cunt, roughly fingering her hole. You follow suit, grabbing your cock and harshly jerking it knowing that you don’t have much time before you cum.

Loud groans on your side of the end while heavy gasps come from her, the headphones on your ears making the sounds that much more clear and lucid. Despite the passionate scene taking place you find yourself wishing she was here in person, that you weren’t having to see this through a screen and hearing it through your headphones.

Your eyes stay on the screen in front of you as your heart thumps loudly, Jihyo’s gasps getting louder to the point where she’s loudly moaning causing a buzz in your headphones from the loud friction.

“Oh fuck, it’s coming!” She screams as you suddenly see some water-like liquid pour out of her cunt in a quick and small spurt, your eyes fixed on her leaking pussy as you take a quick gulp knowing what she was doing. She was squirting.

You remember she had done it just once before, late night when she had drunken too much liquid and you were pounding into her, stretching her tight cunt until she started rapidly gasping “babe, something’s happening.” You thought it was just her cumming so you kept going but suddenly you felt warm liquid hit your cock, causing you to pull out and have her squirt hit you directly on the chest.

But that was a while ago and it hadn’t happened since, both of you relating it to just too much to drink. So the two of you were surprised when this suddenly happened.

“Oh Y/N, fuck it’s coming again,” she screams in a high-pitched moan, the liquid squirting out once more but this time in a much larger quantity, spraying up swiftly and splashing all over her phone, the video of her becoming difficult to see due to all the liquid on her screen.

You were so captivated by the sight of your girlfriend squirting that you hadn’t even recognized that there was a massive tingling sensation growing in your body as you stroked your cock, seconds later your cum releases and shoots straight onto your laptop, covering your device in your semen as the thick scent of your cum fills the room.

You let out large breaths as you hear your girlfriend doing the same from your headphones, her video still difficult to see due to her squirt juice covering the camera.

“I wish you were here right now,” she whines, the liquid drying up slightly as you see her legs which rest on the floor slightly twitch, stomach rapidly breathing in and out as she begins to sit up. Her eyes go straight to the camera as she just realizes that her squirt had drenched it, causing her to whelp as she grabbed her hoodie thrown to the side and covered her face with it, embarrassed by the act.

You chuckle at her reaction as you see her slowly peeking from under her hoodie, a bit of her hair poking out as she whimpers, gauging your reaction.

She takes a deep breath as her hoodie slowly falls down, revealing her slightly reddened face. Her hair is a bit wet from sweat and her lips are slightly swollen from all the biting down.

“Don’t laugh,” she yells with a pout as you continue to chuckle at her reaction.

“You’re just so adorable. It’s been so long since you last squirted and you’re being too cute about it.”

While Jihyo was quite dominating in the bedroom, in the calm moments like these it was easy for you to tease her, knowing she loved it by the way a smile would creep on her face and her eyes would squint, like they are now.

“I just drank too much…” she responds sheepishly, ignoring her bra as she tosses her hoodie back on. She then grabs her panties and sees the damp wetness in the middle causing her to contemplate whether she should put them on now.

“What’s up?”

“I need to take a shower anyway. I guess I can keep them off,” your girlfriend responds, tossing her dampened panties to the side. Being nude, even regularly in front of you was no big deal to her anyway, and with her screen being through a phone all she had to do was to hold it up in her hand so only her upper body was visible.

“Good idea. Your panties are already so wet and you’re also wet down there from all that squirting that you might catch a cold if you put them on,” you say with a satisfied smile, stroking your chin as if you’ve made some great observation.

“Man you’re such a tease! You better watch it mister,” she wails, pointing to the camera with her finger as she squints her eyes trying to look intimidating but comes off as adorable instead.

“Yes mommy,” You laugh in reaction with Jihyo following suit. It’s these moments that you two cherish, the back and forth banter and laughter that can instantly cheer up the two of you. This is followed by several seconds of quietness, Jihyo ending it with a soft whisper.

“I miss you.”

You feel a sudden lump in your throat, heart sinking at the hushed voice you just barely head through your headphones.

“Soon, honey. Not much longer and we’ll be together again,” you reassure her with a bright smile. You had to stay positive for her, knowing how tough it could get for your girlfriend when she’s away from you with so many demands on her.

“I’m here for you. Always. Any time there’s something you want to talk about you could ring my number. Doesn’t matter how trivial,” you say calmly, making sure she heard every bit of what you said and understood the sincerity behind your words.

She smiles brightly in response, her signature smile with her beautiful white teeth displayed, as she puckers her lips to give you a kiss through the screen.

“You’re the best. I love you babe. It’s getting late and I have to take a shower so I should get going now.”

“Of course. Can’t wait to do this again,” you say with a smirk and she playfully winks in response.

You two say your goodbyes with her sending a flying kiss to end the call, and just like that through the laptop screen in front of you, you can see your reflection. Butt naked with precum drizzling on your thigh. Also there’s still cum all over your laptop.

Here comes your least favorite part of your nude FaceTime with Jihyo. Having to get up from your seat, grab some napkins and wipe your laptop clean and then having to spray it with a fragrance so your laptop isn’t smelling like a cum rag.

But for your beautiful, dominating, sexy, sweet girlfriend, even this is something you can endure. Although it’s still a bit messy.

[chvoswxtch]

please don't be mad

pairing: matt murdock x fem!reader

summary: matt’s run in with his ex has you questioning everything about your relationship, and he’s determined to prove himself to you.

warnings: cursing, lots of angst, fluffy ending, matty being a typical dumbass, explicit sexual content (minors dni)

word count: 7.2k

a/n: psa, I am not an elektra anti. I would happily fuck her too. this is once again purely selfish matty content I couldn’t get out of my head. a huge thank you to my darling @yourbucky084 for beta reading, helping edit & providing such helpful feedback.  also a big thank you to @pleasurebuttonwrites for helping me figure out what the fuck is behind matty’s bed for this fic lmao. I appreciate you both so much! as always, feedback is welcomed/appreciated!

[part two]

It felt like I had been staring at the wall in the darkness for hours. My body was aching, begging me to move from my current position lying on my side that I had been stubbornly stuck in for the past forty five minutes, but under absolutely no circumstances would I turn over. I would deal with my body’s stiffness tomorrow. I had tried, and failed, several times to get my brain to just shut off. I silently pleaded for the sweet blanket of unconsciousness to wash over me so that I could get a break from all the noise in my head. Tonight was the worst night to be an insomniac.

“Angel?”

I squeezed my eyes shut when I heard his low voice cut through the silence. Asshole. He knew the effect that his voice had on me, especially at that volume. I tried my hardest to get my aggravated breathing under control to a slow, steady pace. My heart was the one that wouldn’t cooperate. It was still thudding angrily against my chest. I heard a deep sigh cut through the darkness and a rustling of sheets behind me.

“Sweetheart, I know you’re not asleep.”

I felt the bed dip beside me as he turned onto his side to face my back. Despite the coldness of the bedroom, I could feel the heat radiating off his body. Normally, we’d be tangled up together. I always slept best with my head on his chest, leg slung lazily over his hips, completely wrapped up in his arms and warmth. But tonight, I wanted to be as far away from him as possible. 

“Honey, please.”

I grit my teeth and flung the covers off my body, shivering slightly as the awaiting cold nipped at my exposed skin and caused goosebumps to appear everywhere. I gripped onto my pillow and ripped it off the bed, hastily rounding the corner towards the refuge of the living room.

“Goodnight, Matthew.”

Before I had a chance to slide the door open, Matt was on his feet and in front of me in a flash. He gently wrapped his arm around my wrist to halt my movements and firmly grabbed onto my hip to hold me in place.

“Y/N…you’re not sleeping on the couch, come on.”

“Fine. You are.”

I shoved the pillow roughly against Matt’s bare chest, grabbing the handle on the door and sliding it back so hard into the track it nearly made the entire apartment shake. Matt winced at the sound, squinting his eyes and turning his head away from the door. Normally I would have felt bad about the noise considering his sensitive hearing, but tonight I didn’t really give a fuck about his comfort. He sighed deeply as he tossed the pillow onto the bed and took a step towards me.

“Sweetheart, I really don’t want to go to bed angry. Please.”

“Well maybe you should’ve thought of that earlier Matthew, before you hooked up with your ex at a fucking party and tried to lie about it.”

“Y/N that’s...that’s not what happened. I told you, we just kissed…and I explained why.”

“Right, and I’m supposed to just take your word for it? After you’ve told me how many lies tonight Matthew?”

“I didn’t-”

“You blew me and Foggy off because you said you had an ‘important meeting’ with your special ‘client’. And then you come through that door, wearing a disheveled tux, with the collar covered in red lipstick I might add, and I find out you actually went to a gala with her.”

“Because she had a lead about information that could help take down the Yakuza!”

I had been seeing violent shades of red ever since Matt walked through the front door. I was pissed when I saw that he was wearing a tux, which was not what he had left Foggy and I’s company in, but the second I spotted the lipstick on his collar, I was fucking livid. Matt must have sensed the shift in my emotions because he immediately pulled off his glasses and raised his hands up slowly in surrender, quickly spitting out an “I can explain”.

My blood only began to boil at the mention of her name. Elektra. Matt had reluctantly, and very briefly, told me about her one night when we had first started dating. The gaps that he left, Foggy unenthusiastically filled in later on. He very clearly had not been a fan of hers, and I grew to understand why.

The more I learned about her, the more my disdain grew for the way she treated Matt. The way she left him..and what she had tried to do to him..what she had tried to make him do before she disappeared. I couldn’t believe he would actually want to be around her again after everything she had put him through. She had almost ruined his life, and after that night, he said he never wanted to speak about her again. I didn’t press it. I didn’t want to upset him, and honestly I didn’t care if I ever heard her name again. All I wanted to do was make up for her faults, and show Matt how much he deserved to be loved. I promised him that I would always accept him for exactly who he was. I never once tried to change him. Not like her.

I was beyond incandescent when her name so easily rolled off his tongue. I had been seething all night since his earlier confession. I was pissed she’d had the audacity to show up after all these years just to torment him all over again. But mainly, I was outraged at Matt for letting her, and for lying to me about it. When he finally came clean about being Daredevil, he swore he would never lie again, no matter what. While anger coursed through my veins, there were hints of hurt and betrayal that made every rush sting even more.

“And that makes it all okay?”

“No, of course it doesn’t. I just..I need you to understand that’s all it was, okay? A mission. That’s it. The last thing I ever wanted was to see her again, but she had something I needed. Something that could help me actually get rid of them, for good this time. I couldn’t pass that up. They’re too dangerous.”

“Then why did you lie about it? If that’s all it was, why couldn’t you tell me the truth? Why couldn’t you tell Foggy the truth?”

Matt averted his head downwards, placing both of his hands on his hips as he stood there silently. His lips parted slightly, taking in a deep breath as if the words he was searching for would be laced within the oxygen hitting his lungs.

“I don’t know. I just..I didn’t want to start a fight. I’m sorry. Please…don’t be mad.”

That rage that had been brewing inside me ever since he walked through that door was suddenly bubbling like molten lava, and I was about to fucking erupt. I grabbed the closest thing on the nightstand and flung it directly at Matt’s head. I knew it wouldn’t actually hit him, not that I really wanted to, but I couldn’t think straight through all my fury. He dodged the vase just in time as the ceramic shattered in cataclysmic pieces against the wall, shock written evidently all over his features by my uncharacteristic outburst.

“Mad? You think I’m mad? I’m fucking furious, Matthew! There aren’t words strong enough for how I feel right now. You lied. Again. And I’m supposed to, what, just be okay with it? Just be okay with the fact that you’re dressing up and running around New York with your ex to lavish galas because it’s for the greater fucking good?”

“Sweetheart, it was just for information, okay? I swear. Look by the time we found the ledger, they already knew we were there. We snuck a floor down and pretended to be a lost drunk couple so that we didn’t get shot. It was strictly a distraction. If they had found us and figured out what we were actually doing, they would’ve killed us.”

“Well if she’s so fucking impressive, why didn’t she go by herself? She didn’t need you there, she wanted you there. And you willingly went. You could have said no.”

Matt ran a hand through his messy brown hair, clearly annoyed that I wasn’t seeing things his way, and rubbed his palm across the stubble on his right cheek. He dropped his hands to place them on his hips once again and shook his head slowly, pointing his chin in my direction.

“You’re right. I should’ve said no. I should’ve let her go alone, and I should’ve told you the truth from the beginning. I just…I really didn’t want to start a fight.”

“I’m done fighting with you, Matthew.”

I felt completely drained, like all the life had been sucked out of me steadily ever since he walked through that door. Our fight earlier was explosive, definitely the worst one we’ve ever had. One of the only ones we’ve ever had. I thought it had depleted all of my energy, but the way he kept trying to justify his actions kept fueling the fire. I was tired of being lied to. I was tired of him disregarding my feelings about this whole situation, and not even trying to understand why I felt the way I did. I was tired of feeling like I had to fight to keep my place in his life. I don’t even remember why I agreed to stay over at his place tonight. I should’ve just gone home.

“Don’t...don’t say that. Please. Your voice makes it sound like you’re giving up.”

“Maybe I am Matthew. This was a mistake. I’m going home.”

“No…no no no. Don’t say things like that, please. Look don’t…don’t go. Please, Y/N. It’s late and you’re upset and I...I don’t want you out walking the streets alone right now-”

“I don’t really care what you want right now.”

Matt quickly snatched my overnight bag out of my hands as soon as I reached for it and tossed it across the room with annoying accuracy. I futilely shoved at his chest when he grabbed onto my arms and pulled me in close, but it was no use. He was a lot stronger than I was, and on top of that I was exhausted. I didn’t have any fight left in me for tonight, and there was no escaping the cage of his embrace.

“Please let go.”

“I can’t. I can’t, sweetheart. I need you, please. Look I fucked up, okay? I know that. I fucked up and I’m so sorry. I know you’re probably sick of hearing me say that, but I am. Just...please don’t leave. I love you, Y/N. Let me..let me make it up to you. Let me show you how much I love you.”

My eyes widened as the words dripping with suggestion left his mouth. I tilted my head back and stared up at him dumbfounded, a humorless laugh leaving my lips as I managed to find a surge of strength to push as hard as I could at Matt’s chest and finally shove him backwards.

“Are you fucking joking? You have some goddamn balls, Matthew Murdock. Are you seriously asking me for sex right now? You think that’s gonna fix this?”

“I’m not asking, I’m offering. I know you need it.”

“You don’t know anything. What the hell makes you think I want anything to do with you right now? Why would I even want to kiss you, knowing all I’m going to be able to taste is her.”

Matthew Murdock was one cocky son of a bitch, and his audacity never ceased to amaze me. He clenched his jaw slightly as spite flowed from my lips, hands balling up into tight fists at his sides as he let out a controlled deep breath. His features morphed into an expression of distress as he took slow calculated steps closer towards me and inhaled, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment. His eyes were a shade darker when they opened and his tongue quickly darted out to swipe across his bottom lip as he squared his shoulders. I knew that look, and it caused a shiver to cascade down my spine. 

“Then why don’t you let me have a taste, hm? I don’t want you to taste anything else on my tongue except yourself. I don’t want to taste anything else but you.”

Matt tilted his head to the side slightly, his blank honey eyes fixated right in my direction, trying to sense anything that would give me away. He waited silently to taste the effect of his words in the air as they began to seep from my core, and feel the rise of heat that flushed across my chest and the tops of my cheeks. He waited for the anger to dissipate into desire. Matt Murdock was not a very patient man, but the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen was when it came to outsmarting his prey. He set the trap, and waited for me to fall into it. He knew I would. It had been too long, and he knew me too damn well. Matt always knew how to melt the icy barrier I hid beneath, rendering me a needy puddle in his capable hands. The twitch of his jaw and fleeting uptick of his lips let me know he had gotten exactly what he was waiting for.

“I can smell you, sweetheart. Your need...your want. It’s palpable. I can feel it in my own veins. I can practically taste you from here. It’s been what…two weeks? Two weeks since I’ve touched you. I haven’t been paying attention to you like I should have been. I haven’t been very good to you lately. I’ve been neglecting you, and I’m so sorry for that. Please...let me make up for it. Use me.”

Use me.

My mouth suddenly felt dry as it clicked in my brain exactly what he meant. Matt knew what he was doing. I was a sucker for his voice, especially when he used his “devil” voice on me, and he never hesitated to use it to his advantage. He knew it would make me crumble. It always did. He knew exactly how to get what he wanted, how to win. He masked every single one of his sinful words behind that velvet voice, and I loved it. Matt took my silence as an invitation to move even closer, his voice becoming dangerously low as he spoke.

“You don’t have to touch me. You can have my fingers, my mouth, whatever you want. I can feel how frustrated you are. I know how badly you need this. So let me help. Take it all out on me. Use me, sweetheart.”

I felt like I was being pulled in a million different directions in my head. A tiny, logical piece of my brain wanted me to smack him. It was yelling at me to not give in. To instead tell him to fuck off, get my things, and just go. The other part of my brain wanted me to just call it a night. Just let go of all the anger, try to get some sleep, and discuss the future of our relationship in the morning when we were both level headed. But both of those thoughts were completely drowned out by the ache beginning to throb uncomfortably between my thighs.

I was just as sexually frustrated as I was...well...regularly frustrated. I couldn’t remember the last time Matt had kissed me, or touched me, or even told me he loved me. He had been so busy lately, I felt like we only saw each other in passing like forgotten ships in the night. My body yearned for him. He knew it better than anyone, sometimes even better than I did. He always knew what I needed. 

My renegade eyes traveled over Matt’s exposed muscular chest as I got lost in my inner turmoil, paying extra attention to how his sweatpants and briefs hung treacherously low on his hips. I had spent so many moments mapping out every inch of his skin and every visible scar with my fingers and tongue. If I focused really hard, I could feel the tautness of his abs on my fingertips from whenever he got close to releasing in my mouth. I could hear the gravel in his voice as he whispered vivid dirty details of his plans for me into my ear. I could taste the tanginess of my own release on his lips as he kissed me after bringing me to climax with his skilled tongue.

I felt a warm rush of arousal pool between my thighs. The soft groan that exuded from Matt’s lips let me know he had noticed it. He always knew when I was wet for him. I could never hide from him. His tongue swiped along his bottom lip as he stared just above me, his fists tightening at his sides so hard his bruised knuckles were stark white. I know he wanted nothing more than to rush forward and take me, fuck it all out, and beg for forgiveness when he finally sent me over the edge...but he stayed still. Matt had always been the dominant one in our relationship, and I liked it that way. I never knew I could find so much freedom in completely giving myself over to someone. I trusted Matt. I loved when he took control. I craved being submissive to him, so much so that it would have been embarrassing if it weren’t so fucking satisfying. I didn’t know if I had it in me to be the one in control, especially not with the headspace I was in. I was desperately grasping at the frayed edges of my anger, but the way he was staring at me with those ravenous wild eyes had me letting go without a second thought.

“I..I don’t..I’m not sure if I..”

Matt reached out to gently take my hand into his, brushing his thumb over the back of my knuckles and giving it a soft squeeze. Somehow he always understood me, even when I couldn’t get the words out. He just knew. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll help you. I got you, sweetheart.”

Matt slowly sunk down onto his knees in front of me, head tilted back to keep his gaze up towards my face. I felt my breath hitch in my throat as he hooked his index fingers under the seam of my panties, pulling them down my legs carefully as he brushed his fingers tenderly along the back of my knee and the side of my calf. He turned his head slightly to place a chaste kiss to my inner thigh and I felt him smile against my skin when I let out an involuntary whine. He tapped my ankle lightly to signal for me to step out of my panties, balling them up into his hand and shoving them into the pocket of his sweatpants. 

Matt placed several more scorching kisses up the expanse of my legs and over my thighs as he slowly rose up from his knees, towering over me once he stood to his full height. He gestured his head towards the bed and began to walk backwards.

“Come here.”

I watched him in confusion as he took his place on the bed, glancing down at the spot on the floor in front of me where he had just been.

“What…what um...”

“You’re gonna ride my face.”

I nearly choked on my own spit, my eyes widening in shock as I watched Matt move to lay flat on his back on the mattress. Matt Murdock was no stranger to eating me out. Sometimes I think he enjoyed it almost as much as I did. There were times I had to practically pry him away, nearly in tears from overstimulation because he just kept going and going and going. He’d had his face buried between my thighs countless times, but never like that.

“W-What?”

“You’re gonna sit on my face, you’re gonna ride my tongue until you come, and you’re gonna keep going until you feel satisfied. If you wanna go all fucking night, we will. You don’t stop until you get what you need.”

Even though he was offering to let me take control, there was still a dominant edge to his voice that made my knees weak. Matt reached his hand out for me to take, his eyes blankly moving back and forth as he waited to sense my presence come near. I was frozen with apprehension. I wanted it, God did I want it, but I was nervous. I had seen a picture of Elektra once. We looked nothing alike, figure wise. I had a very curvy figure. I had wider hips and thick thighs, and while I knew Matt was very strong, I also knew I would die of embarrassment if I had to explain how I nearly suffocated my boyfriend from trying to ride his face for the first time.

“Don’t.”

“What?”

I blinked a few times as I stared over at Matt, taking a few cautious steps forward until I stood next to the bed. I reached out slowly to grab onto his hand and swallowed thickly when he tugged me closer, pressing a reassuring kiss to each of my knuckles.

“Don’t think so hard. Just come here and let me make you feel better, please.”

I tried to let go of all my trepidation with a deep exhale, capturing my bottom lip between my teeth as I climbed up onto the bed. I let go of Matt’s hand momentarily to pull my oversized sleep shirt over my head so that it wouldn’t get in the way. I swung my leg over Matt’s waist and straddled his chest. He quickly grabbed onto my hips and pulled me up further with impressive speed, causing me to gasp and brace my hands against the wall.

“Jesus, Matt. Slow down.”

“Sorry, I’m sorry. I just...fuck...can you get up here? Please, baby?”

I wasn’t used to Matt sounding so needy. That was usually my role. I was always the one begging for him…begging for more. Hearing how desperately he wanted to taste me sent a tidal wave of lust dripping down my thighs, and Matt growled lowly in his throat at that. His fingertips dug roughly into the soft flesh of my thighs and his hips bucked upwards slightly. I stared down at him in awe, feeling an overwhelming sense of pride and confidence from the way he was reacting. 

“Sweetheart...please...I’m begging you. Let me make you come until you can’t walk. Come on angel...be a good girl for me and come ride my face, yeah? Let me show you how much I want you. Only want you.”

Between his strained begging and the way he moved his head to get closer to where I was soaked, I couldn’t take it anymore. My pussy seemed to have a mind of its own because before I could stop myself, I was settling my knees on either side of Matt’s head and bracing my hands onto the wall to steady myself, preparing to lower myself languidly. Matt however had other plans. In an instant, Matt had a bruising iron grip on my thighs and had roughly pulled my soaking cunt down on his face. One of my hands immediately flew down to grip at his hair as I moaned loudly when I felt his tongue slip inside me. Matthew Murdock was extremely talented with his mouth, which made him an exceptional lawyer, but an even more sensational lover. 

His mouth was so warm as he ravaged me, and I felt myself already having a difficult time staying upright. Matt’s large hand came down hard against my ass and I cried out as it surged me forward, the action causing his nose to bump divinely against my clit as his tongue explored my pussy like it was the first time all over again. It took one more slap for me to get the hint and I slowly started to move my hips against his face. The muffled moan of approval that sounded beneath me only spurred me on to roll my hips back and forth delicately like an easy tide. I gripped tightly onto Matt’s hair and tugged hard which caused a groan to reverberate enticingly against my clit. 

I could feel him moving slightly around on the bed behind me and glanced over my shoulder to see him rolling his hips upwards into the air in time with my own pace. I could see the perfect outline of his impressive cock as it strained against the barrier of his sweatpants. There was already a wet patch forming which drove me even more crazy. He was really fucking enjoying this. It never failed to turn me on even further seeing how much Matt got off to getting me off.

My breaths became more jagged and struggled to be released from my chest the closer I got to the edge. I should’ve felt pathetic about being so close to coming undone so quickly, but it had been weeks. I whined loudly as I began to grind my hips down back and forth on his tongue, welcoming the burn of his facial hair rubbing roughly against my inner thighs. I had gotten so used to his touch that I felt like I was completely starving after two weeks without it. I hadn’t even bothered trying to get myself off because I knew it would be no use. I couldn’t come without Matt, not since the first night I let him touch me and make himself at home between my thighs. Nothing compared to him.

“M-Matty...oh god...please...”

Matt clamped both of his large hands down on my thighs to hold me in place, wrapping his plump lips around my swollen clit to suck on it feverishly. I could feel him moaning against my core and it only brought me closer and closer to where I wanted to be. It was so close...so fucking close. My entire body felt tense with anticipation as I waited impatiently to be tossed over the edge into pure ecstasy. It felt like a rubber band within me was being stretched impossibly thin, and I just needed it to fucking snap already. 

“Maaaatty…please please please..”

I don’t even know what I was asking for, but he knew. He always knew. Matt granted me mercy as he quickened the pace of his tongue, flickering over my clit like a flame trying to withstand the wind. He gently bit down on my sensitive nub, causing me to explode with pure bliss. I rocked my hips against his face messily as I kept my tight grip on his hair. A high pitched whine left my lips when I felt a growl rip through his chest as I finally came into his mouth. I glanced down just in time to see his eyes nearly roll into the back of his head from my taste hitting his tongue, a satisfied primal groan resonating against my core. Matt wouldn’t let me budge until he greedily lapped up every drop of nectar my body had to offer. My thighs shook aggressively as I tried to ride out one of the most powerful orgasms I’d ever had. My body felt entirely too heavy, and the only reason I hadn’t collapsed was because Matt was still holding me up. He detached his lips just for a split second, baring his teeth in menacing snarl.

“Go for another one, sweetheart. I told you…we can stay here all fucking night.”

I glanced down to see the lower half of Matt’s face completely coated in my glimmering wetness. His lips were swollen and red, a sheen of sweat glistening on his forehead, panting as he tried desperately to catch his own breath. His hair was sticking up in odd directions from my hazardous gripping and his eyes were blown open so wide, I could see the devil in them, waiting for me to unlock his chains. I whimpered as I felt his tongue teasing at my folds, trying my hardest to pull away from his eager mouth.

“I..I c-can’t..ah fuck Matty…please…let me down...please...”

Matt grabbed onto my hips and lifted me up gently, helping me onto my back on the spot right beside him. My body was still trembling with aftershocks of pleasure when I felt the warm weight of his body on top of mine. His lips left a burning trail of kisses down the column of my neck, between the valley of my breasts, and along my lower stomach. I whined when I felt his warm breath wavering against my clit.

“Shh...let me take care of you, sweetheart. I’ll do all the work. Just lay back and let me make it better.”

“Matty...please. I just want you, please.”

I hadn’t forgiven him. I was still hurt and angry, and there was so much we needed to talk about. But right now, I just needed him. I needed to feel him. I needed to feel our bodies connected together, like they belonged to one another. I needed him to tell me everything would be okay as he held my hand and made love to me. I needed to know he was still mine. 

I could feel tears pricking at the corners of my eyes as he hovered over me and I grabbed onto his face to pull him down in a searing kiss. I could feel him sigh in content and relief against my mouth, sliding his hand under my back to pull me up closer so that could press our chests together. I could feel his heartbeat thundering against my own in a perfect symphony. As I pushed at the waistband of his sweatpants, he gently grabbed onto my wrist and broke the kiss to lean his forehead against mine.

“Sweetheart, I told you…you don’t have to touch me.”

“I need to, Matty. I need it, please. I need you.”

Matt stilled at my sobbing plea and brought one of his large hands up to brush the scattered tears away with his thumb, cupping my cheek in his hand as he gazed down at me in pure concern.

“Angel, what’s wrong? Talk to me. Was it too much? Do I need to stop?”

“No...no please don’t. I just...I need you, Matty. I need you here.”

“I am here, sweetheart.”

“I need you to stay here. You can’t...you can’t just ignore me for two weeks and then run off with someone else, Matt. You can’t do that to me...especially not with her. So...if this is it, then I want-”

“Hey, no. This is not it. Don’t talk like that. Listen to me...I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’m so sorry. I’ll never do that again, I swear. You mean everything to me, alright? I’m not going anywhere, sweet girl. I’m right here. And I don’t want you to worry about her. She’s on the first flight out of New York in the morning, okay? She’s not coming back. It’s just you and me, my love. I’m right here. I love you.”

“Then show me.”

I didn’t wait for him as I braced my palms against his broad chest and pushed with all the strength I had left, rising up onto my knees as I pushed him down onto his back. I ignored his faint protests, grabbing at the waistband of his briefs and sweatpants to tug them down in one swift motion as quickly as possible. I pressed my palm hard against his chest to keep him down when he tried to sit up, climbing onto his lap and positioning myself over his impatient cock. The tip was swollen with lust and weeping with need, standing proudly at attention above his stomach, waiting for me. I didn’t take my time to slowly lower myself down like I normally did. No matter how many times Matt had been inside me, ruined me, I always had to adjust to his size. 

We both cried out in unison when I sank down completely, and his hands flew up to seize my hips. Being on top always required the most accommodation, but I loved having him like this. I could feel him everywhere. All I wanted was to be completely filled to the brim and consumed entirely by him. I winced as the sting of my walls being stretched to their limits pierced through my lower half. 

“Fuck, sweetheart. Easy easy…don’t hurt yourself. We can take it slow-fuck!”

I ignored every single one of Matt’s words as I sat up straight and began to swivel my hips in purposeful circles. It burned, God did it burn, but I wanted it. I wanted it all. I didn’t know if I believed Matt’s words. I didn’t know if the love he had for me would ever compare to what he had felt for her, what he might still feel for her. I didn’t know that I believed tonight wasn’t it for us. But all that I wanted was a reminder, that this had been real. That Matt had been real, and he had been mine. I would take the pain willingly if it meant I’d be able to feel him for the next few days. I’d happily be haunted by the ache he left between my thighs to remind myself that this was real.

Every drawn out moan of my name that rang in my ears, every breathless pant, every plea of oh my god and every praise of fuck sweetheart kept me moving even though I felt like my legs were seconds away from giving up. I threw my head back towards the heavens, hoping God would understand my prayers and what I needed through the form of Matt’s name. On my knees above him, I prayed. And I prayed and I prayed and I prayed. 

I didn’t know if the tears falling freely down my cheeks were from being pushed to my limit physically, or mentally, but I cried out when Matt sat up fully to wipe them away from my cheeks, reaching farther inside me than I ever thought possible. I whined when I felt his hand wrap delicately around my throat, his thumb and index finger holding my chin in a firm grasp as he captured my lips. 

“Shh…it’s alright sweetheart. I’m here. I’m right here. Doing so well for me, angel. Always so good to me. Let me take care of you.”

Matt brought my arms up to wrap around his neck, grabbing my hips gently to flip our bodies over and lay me down into the sanctuary of silk covered pillows. He pulled my legs tightly around his waist, locking his own hips in place against mine. One hand came up to intertwine our fingers together, squeezing my hand in reassurance as he placed his other forearm directly beside my head. Pressing our foreheads together, brushing his nose and lips against mine, Matt began to oscillate his hips at a tender speed, allowing me to feel every detailed stroke of him against my tight walls.

“My perfect girl. Can’t you feel how perfect we fit together, Y/N? Can’t you feel how perfect you are for me?”

I couldn’t handle the vulnerability in his featherlight whispers. It tugged so hard on the strings of my heart, I thought they might snap. I tried to whisper his name, respond with something coherent, but all I could manage was a needy whimper. Matt let go of my hand for just a second, slipping his own between our bodies to press down on the bulge in my lower stomach.

“You can feel me here, can’t you sweetheart?”

I grabbed onto the back of his neck urgently, digging my nails into the muscle of his upper back to anchor him in place. I tried to nod, tried to hide my face into the refuge of his neck to escape his inexorable gaze, but he wasn’t having any of that. Matt’s hand was quickly covering my throat again, his hold on my chin a little tighter this time, forcing my eyes to meet his.

“I am not going anywhere. Nothing could ever take me away from you. Not her, not Fisk, no one. Not even God himself could keep me from you.”

His caramel coated eyes were staring so hard down into mine, it knocked the breath out of me. For a second, I felt like Matt could actually see me. His stare only grew in intensity as his thrusts became more precise. 

“Listen to me, sweetheart. You are mine. And I am yours. We belong to no one else, but each other. I’m gonna marry you someday, Y/N. Someday soon. I want nothing more than for you to be my wife, my perfect girl. My angel. There’s no one else I want by my side for the rest of my life. No one else who understands me better than you do. No one else that accepts me like you do. No one else that’s as good to me as you are. I will do whatever it takes to prove that to you. I will put a ring on your finger tomorrow. I will put a baby in you tonight.”

A sharp gasp mixed with a breathless moan echoed from my lips at Matt’s words. I knew Matt wanted to get married someday, and I always hoped it would be to me. We had very briefly had a conversation about kids once. He knew that I wanted them, and said that he did too. Someday. While marriage I knew we could make work, I wasn’t sure about the kids part. I didn’t know if I could handle having a child with him when he still needed the other side of him, and I didn’t know if he would ever know when he wouldn’t need that side of him anymore. It was a tricky conversation I wasn’t ready to try and navigate. I didn’t want to risk losing Matt, and I would never ask him to give up something that was so important to him. But the conviction in his voice, the certainty of his words, made me lightheaded. Matt tilted his head to the side slightly, a sense of recognition softening his gaze as a light smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

“That what you want, sweetheart? Hm? That what you need? Taking my last name and growing our baby inside you to remind you every day that I’m yours?”

“Matty…”

“You want all of me, don’t you angel? C’mon, tell me. Tell me you want all of me.”

“I…God, Matty…want all of you, please.”

“I love you, Y/N. You love me, don’t you? C’mon baby, tell me you love me.”

“I love you, Matty. I, oh God, love you so much…”

“Say you’ll marry me. Gonna ask properly, I promise, but I need to hear you say it. Tell me, sweetheart.”

“Yes Matty…yes I’ll marry you.”

I knew Matt was listening intently to my heartbeat with every answer that spilled from me, searching for any falter in rhythm that would tell him I wasn’t telling the truth. That I was just obeying his orders. But I wasn’t lying. I meant every word. I knew that Matt knew that from the mouth splitting grin that took over his entire face.

“That’s my girl. My perfect girl. Now, tell me I can come inside. We can start our family tonight, sweetheart. C’mon, tell me you want it, and you’ll be pregnant before the sun comes up. Let me hear it, angel.”

“Please Matty, please. Please come inside me. I want our family. I want it all. Please Matty, make me yours.”

Matt tightened his grip slightly on my throat, silencing my cries of pleasure with his lips. His pace remained gentle and loving, but his thrusts were powerful and meticulous, relentlessly hitting that spot inside me that had me swimming in constellations that appeared behind my eyelids every single time. It didn’t take much longer for me to plunge from the peak of exhilaration, free falling into uninhibited gratification below that was completely and irrevocably Matt.

I felt tingles sparking throughout my extremities as my body spasmed in rolling blackouts of delectation, causing my walls to clench unforgivably around Matt’s cock. I could feel the rhythm of his hips stuttering into short, staccato bursts as he finally reached his own crescendo. The pure satisfaction entangled in the legato moans of his climax wrapped around me like a warm blanket, lulling me into a state of ease. For the first time all night, joy buzzed in my bloodstream, and I was able to silence the roaring of my insecurity.

Matt was here. Matt loved me. Matt was mine.

I hugged him as close and tightly to my chest as I could, refusing to unlock my legs from around his waist when I felt him start to pull back.

“Don’t, please. Just stay. Just wanna stay like this.”

Matt pressed a soft kiss to my forehead and allowed his lips to linger there for a moment before marking my nose, cheeks, and lips in his adoration. He nuzzled his head into my neck and I felt him inhale my scent deeply before sighing in content.

“Alright, sweetheart. We can stay like this.”

I basked in the comfortable silence for a moment, allowing my brain to process every single one of Matt’s words. I felt a childlike sense of giddiness, like when you were a kid and you knew you were getting the exact gift you wanted for Christmas. You had peeked, and spoiled it for yourself, but still felt unfiltered excitement anyway. The gift itself didn’t matter as much as the feeling of knowing that it was what you wanted and it was yours. 

Matt Murdock was my gift. The one thing I always wanted, the only thing that mattered, that was all mine.

I threaded my fingers lightly through his hair, occasionally massaging at his scalp and smiling at the hums of gratitude that vibrated against my neck. 

“Matty?”

“Hm?”

“You know I’m still on birth control, right?”

“I know, sweetheart. It doesn’t hurt to start practicing though, does it?”

I could feel his smile against my skin. If I closed my eyes, I could see it. I knew exactly which one it was. I couldn’t help but giggle at his response, tightening my arms around his back.

“Well, if that’s the case, then we’ve been practicing for over a year Matty. Sometimes several times a day.”

Matt pulled his head back just enough so that he could face me, bumping his nose against my own as a devilish grin stretched across his soft lips.

“I like to be prepared.”

[barcaracing]

you’re wearing his kit | pg8

summary: pedri and y/n go public with their relationship and it doesn't take long before the media digs up her past with another barcelona player whose name happens to be on the back of her kit in one photo

pairing: pedri x reader ft. platonic!gavi

warnings: angst, a bit of fluff first

a/n: what's uppppp!! i'm back from the dead to say that i've been obsessed with pedri lately, so here's me contributing to a better society. enjoy! and to anyone who's also in the middle of exams, good luck soldier <3

*******

"This is scary." Pedri shoots you a sideways glance. You nod, not daring to take your eyes off the phone in front of you even though the screen is still black. You sit in silence for another five minutes before footsteps come banging down the stairs. They halt abruptly at the doorway, then shuffle into the living room.

"Guys?" Fer stops behind the couch.

You hum at the same time that Pedri grunts. Like a caveman. You shoot him a funny look that goes unnoticed as his eyes remain glued to the coffee table.

Fer's head pops in between the two of you. "Not to interrupt...whatever you're doing, but why are you staring at my phone? It's not even turned on."

Pedri's head snaps to his brother. "What?"

You sit up and look at him as well. "What do you mean it's not turned on?"

Fer reaches over to grab his phone, clicking the side button several times. "It's dead. I need to charge it."

Feeling like someone just poked a hole into your chest, you deflate against the back of the couch, your head falling onto Pedri's shoulder with a breathy laughter. "So we've been staring at nothing the last 20 minutes?" You ask and Fer snorts, flinging himself into the single armchair on your left to look for a charger.

"Yes," he says, plucking the cable into his phone. "You weirdos."

Pedri's shoulder shakes with laughter. He runs a hand through his hair and lets his arm fall behind your back to pull you further into his side. "This is already getting over our heads."

"You think so?" You deadpan and let out a giggle when he nuzzles his face into the crook of your neck.

"Maybe we should just cut off all electronics for the next couple of days," Pedri mumbles into your skin and you have a feeling he's just thinking out loud. "It's only been half an hour and I'm so stressed, I thought I was going to lose all my hair."

Mortified, you look up and give his hair an experimental tug. You tug once more, but Pedri quickly wraps his hand your wrist and kisses your pulse, making you narrow your eyes at him. "Don't you dare go bald on me right after we announced to the world that we're dating. It'd look bad on me if I left you because of your shiny scalp."

Pedri moves back and raises his brows at you. "You would break up with me if I lost my hair?"

"Yes," you say without an ounce of shame. Fer lets out a snort.

"Why?" Pedri sputters. "I'd still look the same. My face wouldn't change. Honestly, I could look great bald."

You scoff although the corners of your mouth tug up. "Are you telling me you want to go bald?"

Pedri falters for a split second, but he nods. "To prove a point? Of course."

You regard him for a moment, searching his eyes for any signs that he will back down. You're not surprised to find none. He never backs down. Finally, you shrug. "Fine."

Fer perks up. "Wait, what?"

Pedri is still looking at you with absolute confidence, his gaze flickering between your eyes. A sly smirk slowly sweeps over his lips. "You sure about that, princesa?" He moves closer until you can feel his breath on your face and his voice drops. "I know how much you love holding onto it when you're—"

A pillow hits the side of his head.

"Okay!" says Fer loudly, flinging his arms around as if to swat away the rising tension. Pedri has the audacity to laugh after taking one glance at your flustered face. You smack his face with the pillow before tossing it back at his brother. He only laughs harder.

"Gross. Actually vile," Fer mumbles, glaring at the two of you before resuming to his phone. He freezes and his thumb hovers over his screen, mid-scroll.

"What's wrong?" Pedri asks, concern pushing off the laughter in his voice. "Fer?"

"I—" His brother looks up, gaze flickering to you before his fingers rapidly fly across the keyboard of his phone. Your spine straightens.

"Fer?" You can't help but sound alarmed as well. He keeps muttering to himself and the only thing you can make out are 'can't be' and 'she wouldn't.' You really need to know what's going on.

Pedri slides forward, hand settling on your knee before he kicks Fer lightly in the leg. "Hermano, what's wrong?"

You watch in high anticipation as his eyes scan the screen and it takes everything in you not to urge him to just say it. Are people saying horrible stuff online? Was it a bad idea to go public? If this is a mistake, there's no going back. You feel your heart pounding against your ribcage and Pedri notices because, of course, he does. He squeezes your leg and you send him a small smile.

His warm gaze calms you but there's wariness pulling at his eyes, so you press a gentle kiss to his shoulder. His smile grows and he pecks your cheek before looking back over to his brother, about to speak only to be cut off by the familiar ringtone slicing through the thick tension of the room. The volume makes you jump and you move to stand up, but Pedri swiftly kisses to the top of your head, telling you that he'll get it before hauling himself over the back of the couch to answer the call.

You know that both of you turned off all notifications before you made the post on Instagram, only allowing calls from close friends and family to come through.

"Gavi?" Pedri's voice drifts from the kitchen and Fer inhales sharply. You furrow your brows. His eyes find yours and you want to ask him what’s wrong, but his face is carefully devoid of emotions. His gaze feels accusatory and it honestly freaks you out.

"Fer?" You say cautiously, fingers fiddling in your lap. "What happened?"

Before he could reply, Pedri reenters the room. His voice rises as he responds to the person on the other end. He ignores your questioning look and stops in front of his brother, jabbing out his hand impatiently. Fer immediately drops his phone into his palm and your confusion multiplies as you watch your boyfriend's eyebrows draw together, chest rising. Gavi's voice can be heard faintly through the phone that is still pressed to his ear and you only realise now that it's yours. You forgot you have the same ringtone.

"Mhm," says Pedri absently while scrolling through Fer's phone, "okay, yeah." You get the impression that he's not paying attention to whatever Pablo is saying and now you're pissed because you're pretty sure you're going to die of curiosity or old age before anyone even bothers to tell you what's going on.

"I can see it—" Pedri snaps and instantly stops himself. He closes his eyes and bites his lip, his knuckles loosening around Fer's phone. "I know it's not…can you just—" He lets out a shaky breath and you can see him forcing the tension out of his shoulders.

"Look, I really don't want to hear your voice right now. So just- It's fine. No, it's fine. I know…yeah, bye," Pedri mumbles halfheartedly before tossing your phone onto your lap without sparing you much of a glance. You look down at your lock screen of Pedri and you sharing a cone of ice cream at the beach before the screen fades into black and your reflection stares back at you.

You look up at your boyfriend whose eyes are fixed on a spot on the armchair Fer is sitting on. Slowly, you stand up and step forward, hand reaching out to find Pedri's. Your fingertips grace his and that seems to shake him out of his thoughts. He moves his hand back and finally looks at you.

"Pedri?" Your voice is soft, mostly because you're afraid that speaking any louder might push him away. He looks so fragile right now. "Please tell me what's going on."

Without a word, he hands you Fer's phone. Letting your eyes linger on him a moment longer, you shift your gaze to the bold headline taking up half of the screen.

Scandal rocks FC Barcelona as New Girlfriend of Star Player Caught in Love Triangle! Shocking Photos Show Her Wearing Another Player's Kit at Games Before Going Public with Pedri!

"What?" Your eyes widen. The phone nearly slips out of your hands as you hastily scroll through the rest of the article, searching for the photos. You didn't, you thought. You would never! The photos are at the very bottom of the page and every second is absolute torture, but once the images load, your breath stutters. "What the hell?"

"Yeah," Fer scoffs and your head snaps up so fast, your neck twinges. "What the hell, Y/N?"

You make to speak but your gaze sweeps over your boyfriend who is simmering with resentment and sadness. You want to reach out, touch him, but you can tell it's gradually bleeding into anger. He's never been mad with you before. The only times you've seen him lose his temper was on the pitch. It doesn't take much to see that he's trying his absolute best to compose himself. You take a deep breath and muster a levelled gaze at his brother. "Fer, can you please give us a moment?"

"What?” He frowns. "No. Y/N, what were you thinking—"

"Out."

Fer’s mouth snaps shut as Pedri's voice cuts through the room.

"What?"

"Get out," Pedri grits through his teeth. Fer looks between you two before shaking his head with a sigh. He plucks his phone out of your hands and casts one last look at you. Once the door on the floor above clicks shut, you step in front of Pedri.

"I can explain."

He scoffs, eyes burning into yours for a brief second. Then, he's across the room as if he can't bear the thought of you near him. It stings. He keeps shaking his head and if you were in any other situation, you would've found it amusing how similar he was to his brother.

"Can you—" You watch him pace around, your patience dwindling. He keeps moving, looking anywhere but you, and it's driving you insane. Your chest tightens as you feel him work himself up, the situation slipping further and further from your fingers. "Pedro, can you just stop for one goddamn moment and let me explain."

Huffing, he finally comes to a halt on the other side of the coffee table and meets your eye. For an odd second, you feel thankful that the flimsy piece of furniture is separating you. As if it could do anything while the predator is flashing his bloody fangs. "Fine. Go on. What's the great explanation to this? Were you two dating and you just never thought to tell me?" Pedri bites out, speaking over you like you never even opened your mouth. "It's all too well then. I've found out with the rest of the world, didn't I? You know how much I love surprises. I'm flattered, really."

The sarcasm dripping off his words burn like acid and no matter how much you're shaking your head and trying to cut him off, he's not stopping until he draws blood. You know it's to match his own wound, but it doesn't make it any less painful.

"Gavi called you. Not me, his team mate and best friend. You. That's enough of an explanation, so I guess it's just all about the details now. Were you fucking Gavi before you got bored and decided I would have to do? Enlighten me, please."

Your mind is collapsing, failing to register the blunt ends of Pedri's words piercing through your skin. Tears burn in your eyes, but you are not going to cry. You won't. Not because of this.

"Where is this coming from?" You hate how hollow your voice sounds.

Pedri blinks at you. "You're not really asking me that. Do you think I don't know about the rumours? You and Gavi? How you liked him before we got together. Why it didn't work out between you, I have no idea because Gavi liked you too, you know. We used to listen to him talk about you in the dressing room before he finally introduced you to us as just his friend. And I made sure you were nothing else to him before I asked you out because he's my best friend and I didn't want to ruin anything."

"You didn't," you say, frowning. "We were never together. I've told you this before. Pablo was never my boyfriend. Nothing ever happened.”

Pedri shakes his head. "That doesn't change the fact that you had feelings for him and probably still do. You wanted to keep us a secret for months and now I see you having no problems wearing his name on your back, showing it off to the entire world before I even got to see you in my kit. My own girlfriend. Do you know how stupid I feel?"

You're not sure how it happened but Pedri is standing before you now, eyes shining bright with so much hurt. You know he won't back down. He never does. Struggling to breath, you take a step back. Your voice is thick when you speak. "This isn't fair."

"No," Pedri says, bitterly, stepping back as well. "It isn't." He exhales and looks to the side, eyebrows still drawn together. "I think you should go."

You stare at him. Swallowing the lump in your throat, you slowly nod. Fine. Sure. Whatever he wants. Who cares what you want. You feel so tired. Without a word, you grab your phone and head out the front door, letting it slam behind you.

Three days later, a girl slips Pedri her phone number and he tucks it into his pocket. The video goes viral and your phone doesn’t stop going off, so you turn it off completely. After all, the only person you actually wanted to talk to still hasn’t called.

A week later, Pedri is flying to Madrid to train with the national team and the only reason you know about it is the red circle glaring at you on your kitchen calendar. How did it all fall apart so fast?

************

i have no idea what happens next or if anyone’s interested in reading a second part but if u are, let me know how you’d want this to be resolved and end bc pedri said some mean stuff here and we don’t know what the reader did or didn’t do and i honestly just never plan these things lmao stay hydrated x

[reivrze]

OH, SAY IT DITTO ♡

pairing. popular!jungwon x shy!reader

genre. highschool!au, fluff, reader has a huge crush on jungwon

word count. 0.8k

warning. none

a/n. this was inspired by the song "ditto" by new jeans :) the ending was kinda rushed lmao sorry, hope you guys enjoy ! reposts are immensely appreciated as they help my works get recommended, reblogs help the algorithms so thank you for all those who take time to repost my work ♡

exam season had come around at a rapid pace, and your free days now consisted of little solo dates at the library going over the notes you had taken in class. this morning was like every wednesday morning except your first two classes had been cancelled, and you had decided to take a little trip down to the library to occupy your free time.

as you entered the library, you greeted the woman sitting at the front desk, having been here so many times in the past few weeks that you had gotten to know several of the staff. getting closer to your usual table, you stopped suddenly seeing an unfamiliar presence sitting in your chair. trying to get a closer look, you sneaked behind the bookshelves, peeking out to see who was the mysterious person. your face flushed a bright red the minute you realized that the person was no one other than yang jungwon. the boy you had been admiring for the past ten years.

you had first met jungwon went you were eight in elementary. he had been the new kid, causing quite a stir amongst the students, his extroverted and hypersocial personality gaining him new friends almost every day. his arrival had awoken something new, he had given you your first experience of having a crush and boy did you not expect this crush to stick for as long as it had. how could you not fall in love with someone with such a boy-ish vibe and adorable smile ?

now here you are, staring at him through the bookshelves, debating on if you should just leave and come back later or try to find another seat. if you had the confidence, you would've gone sit at the same table as him, but unfortunately for you, that wasn't the case. letting your mind get stuck in this trance as you watched him read one of his textbooks, you hadn't noticed him lift his head up, his eyes catching yours amongst the books.

blinking out of your little daydream, your breath caught in your throat as you realized you were directly making eye contact with jungwon, his eyes curious as to why you were looking at him from afar. you felt a jolt of surprise course through your body, momentarily freezing you in place. caught in the act of observing him from behind the bookshelves, you could feel your cheeks burning with embarrassment. however, instead of turning away or pretending nothing happened, jungwon's expression softened into a warm smile.

breaking the spell of shyness that held you captive, jungwon motioned for you to come closer. with a mix of hesitation and excitement, you cautiously emerged from your hiding spot, making your way towards the table where he sat. as you approached, he slid his books to the side, clearing a space for you to join him.

"Hey, I noticed you peeking at me from over there," jungwon said playfully, his voice laced with genuine curiosity. "Want to sit with me? We can study together."

"Oh.. Sure" you offered him a little smile that he was quick to reciprocate. jungwon had felt comfortable enough during the time that you guys had spent together, going over the last chapter the teacher had gone over. the conversation seemed to flow with ease, you'd steal glances once in a while, not quite believing that you were actually sitting face-to-face with the boy you had dreamt about all those years.

as time passed, you found yourself really setting in the comfort of his presence, some part of you wondering if this comfort was simply rooted in jungwon's social personality or was it really that you two had easily connected. the time to go was nearing and both of you had started to pack up your belongings, your heart sank a little at the knowledge that this might be a one-time thing. just as you were getting to say goodbye and make your way to class, jungwon grabbed your wrist, turning you back around.

"Hold up- This might sound random considering this was our first interaction but I understood my lesson so much better with this one-hour study session than what I've learnt all semester and if you want, we can meet here tomorrow again after classes. you're fun to talk to and quite cute" he chuckled the last part, trying to ease any discomfort you might be feeling.

your mind went blank. you had never, in a million years, expected him to ask to meet you again. slightly overjoyed, you eagerly blurted out a yes. jungwon laughing at your surprised face at your own self. and just like that, you guys had planned your first little date, unknown to both of you that years down the line you'd still be a prominent part of each other's life.

© miyu 2023 - do not copy, translate, repost or plagiarise my work anywhere !

[blackfliesinbluesugar]

Prefacing by saying I have been a hardcore Hazbin fan since mid 2019, pre-pilot release. I am not an embittered anti.

Hazbin's pacing doesn't make me angry, it makes me sad. I think about this show setting up like a normal cartoon, letting us get to know the characters, letting us see them day-to-day and strengthening their relationships with each other and how they cope in different silly or serious situations, and I get... just, upset. This isn't a cartoon, this is a webcomic, and it's a webcomic based off some lady's twitter where she gave us a character sheet for everyone before we clicked on so the comic wouldn't have to waste time explaining it. I'm sad.

Who is this Camille lady and what do I care if she killed an angel? Her daughters? Who? I don't know either of their names and I don't care enough about her or them to check. I just met her today! If she dies, if her daughters die, what difference does it make to me? A random decent character design is gone? Ok??

What do I care if Vaggie has self esteem issues? I don't know her, I just met her! I'd care so much more about her song if I cared about her! I'm just expected to care because, hey, Hazbin had a huge fandom pre-release, so why wouldn't I care? She's had so much fanon and speculation, that practically did all the set up for me, right?

,,,nO. I still need you to do the work! I want to know who these people are before I see all their trauma laid bare, because otherwise all they are to me IS their trauma, and it's tough to get invested in that in a world this bleak with a cast this huge.

Helluva Boss did the same thing - Octavia is introduced in episode 2, and then in that same episode we get some big emotional dramatic moment with her and her father that feels like it should have capped an entire character arc. And yeah, I like Octavia, I like her design and her voice and her relationship to her family, but I sure didn't care when she cried about a conflict I only learned 2 minutes ago I was meant to be taking seriously. She gets another big arc for her issues in s2e2, and I cared a LOT MORE, because not only have I actually met her before that episode, I had the entire episode to develop on her specifically and lead up to the emotional climax! It didn't just play happy dappy with her all day and then make her break down, it was a clear progression. Same with Fizz - I enjoyed his recent episode with Blitzo, because I have had several episodes to build up both their individual characters and their relationship to each other and past tension. If that had been their first episode together, I would have again, not cared one bit.

Man.

[impishtubist]

Happy birthday, @arliedraws ! I'm so happy that our paths crossed online and then in real life 💙 I tried writing you a little ficlet based on your Sirius tramp stamp art, but uh, this happened instead.

---

The new math teacher is cool. 

He walks into class on the first day wearing a leather jacket and carrying a motorcycle helmet under one arm. His dark hair is long enough to pull back into a short ponytail, though some strands escape, and he’s got a neatly-trimmed beard and tattoos. The entire class breaks into whispers, and Harry is fascinated. 

Mr. Black is fun. He dresses and acts like a former rock star, and he makes math interesting for once. Harry can’t remember the last time he paid close attention in this class, and he diligently fills the pages of his notebook as Mr. Black takes them through each lesson.

“Excellent work, Harry,” he says one day as he passes back a test, and Harry blushes furiously. This close to Mr. Black, he can smell leather and cigarettes, and see the way the man’s eyes crinkle at the corners when he smiles.

Mr. Black holds office hours before school most days, and Harry asks Mum if she can start dropping him off early. Mum is delighted he’s taking such an interest in his studies, and agrees. 

“Your father never studied,” she says one day as they’re driving to school. “He still got top marks on everything. Drove me insane. Some of us have to actually work for our grades, and I’m happy you’re putting in the effort, sweetheart.” 

“Morning, Harry!” Mr. Black greets one day when Harry walks into the classroom. Office hours started a few minutes ago, and he’s the only one here. That won’t last long--Hermione won’t be far behind him, and several more of his classmates will come before the hour is up. Mr. Black’s office hours are always busy, which is why Harry tries to be the first one there every day. “I’ll be down in a second. Go ahead and get settled.”

Mr. Black has shed his button-up and is wearing only a thin t-shirt. He’s standing on a stepstool so he can get something down from the top shelf of one of the cabinets in the room. The t-shirt is tight, and Harry watches the muscles of his back and arm flex.

“O-okay,” he squeaks, but he stands there staring at Mr. Black until Hermione comes flying into the room a few minutes later, a dozen questions tumbling out of her at once that Mr. Black is only too happy to answer. 

***

“Harry, are you packed?” Mum calls up the stairs to him.

“Yeah, been packed for ages! Can we go now?”

“Don’t use that tone with me,” Mum says as Harry comes down the stairs, backpack slung over his shoulder. “Why are you in such a hurry to get to Dad’s, anyway? What mischief does he have planned for you two?”

“Nothing!” Harry says, which is a complete lie. He’s been texting Dad for the past couple of weeks about pranks they can pull on Dad’s awful neighbor, Severus Snape, and he can’t wait to try some of them out. 

His parents have been divorced since he was a baby; Harry doesn’t remember a time when they all lived in the same house.They don’t live far from each other, though, barely a ten-minute drive, which means that Harry can attend his school no matter which parent he stays with. He lives with Mum for a month, and then Dad, and they’ve switched off like that his whole life. Neither of his parents have remarried yet. When Harry was little, he’d wanted his mum to marry his kindergarten teacher, but then Mr. Lupin had married Mayor Shacklebolt and Harry had cried for a week about it. He’s fine with it now, though. They’ve got like five kids now, and Harry does not want any siblings. He likes having his parents to himself, thanks.

Mum pulls into Dad’s driveway, and Harry leaps out of the car and runs to the front door. He lets himself in with his key, shouting, “Dad, I’m home! Wanna go--” 

He stops short. Dad leaps up from the couch, startled, quickly disentangling himself from the man he had been sitting with and--and kissing--

It’s Mr. Black. 

“Harry!” Dad says, running his hand through his hair. “You’re, ah, you’re early--”

“Oh!” Mum had come into the house behind Harry, and she stands there with her hand over her mouth. “James, I’m so sorry, I didn’t think it would be an issue to be a little early. I didn’t realize you had, um, company. I should have called ahead.”

“It’s okay, Lils.” Dad gives them both a sheepish smile and holds out a hand to Mr. Black, pulling him up from the couch. “It’s about time we told you both, anyway. Harry, this is Sirius--”

“He’s my teacher,” Harry blurts. “Dad, you’re kissing my teacher.” 

“Er, yes, well.” Dad clears his throat. “We didn’t want to tell you until we were sure…but I’ve been seeing Sirius for a few months now, and--”

“Months?”

“I am sorry, Harry,” Mr. Black says. He’s still holding Dad’s hand. “I met your dad at the shops right before school started. I didn’t realize his son was in my class until I saw you that first day. We talked about it, and we decided it was best not to say anything to you until we knew…well, until we knew that this was something serious. No pun intended.”

He winks at Harry, fucking winks, and Harry is going to die. 

“I’m Lily,” Mum says, breaking the awkward silence, and Mr. Black lets go of Dad to shake her hand. “It’s so nice to meet you. I take it you’re Harry’s math teacher, then? He loves your class. I’ve never seen him so excited about a subject before!”

“Mum!” 

“Harry’s a great student,” Mr. Black says. “I love having him in class.” 

Harry can feel his face burning. “I’m not that special.”

“You are,” Mr. Black says, placing a warm hand on his shoulder. A strong, solid hand. Harry’s knees are going to buckle. 

“I think you’re embarrassing him, Sirius,” Dad says, and Mr. Black steps away. Harry misses his touch immediately. “But we were thinking, Harry…if it’d be alright, Sirius could spend the weekend with us. We could all get to know each other? Maybe go to the cinema, out to dinner, that kind of thing?”

Dad looks and sounds so hopeful. Harry sighs.

“Yeah, alright,” he says, and both Dad and Mr. Black beam at him. “But no funny business, okay? Your room is right next to mine, Dad.”

Dad goes bright red. “Right, no funny business. You’ve got it.” 

Mum kisses Harry on the cheek and gives him a quick hug, and then leaves. Harry’s left standing awkwardly in his dad’s living room with his dad and his teacher, who are dating. Harry grimaces inwardly. The whole time he was noticing Mr. Black’s beard and eyes and muscles, his dad was--was--

Harry stops that train of thought dead in its tracks. He does not want to go there. 

“So we’re still pranking Snape, right?” he asks loudly, more to drown out his own traitorous thoughts than anything else.

“Oh, yeah, definitely,” Dad says quickly. “Sirius even has some ideas about that.”

Mr. Black pulls a piece of paper out of his back pocket and unfolds it. It’s covered in his chicken scratch handwriting. “Where do you want to begin?”

[a-reader-and-a-writer-for-all]

Your Storm is My Storm

Fandom: Twisters, Tyler Owens, f!reader Summary: Is it possible to have trauma from an event you didn't actually experience? You never thought so, but now you are tormented nightly after witnessing Tyler's near death. Luckily, he's there to comfort you and remind you that he made it back to you, and that he's not going anywhere. Word Count: 1976 TW: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Death (but not really), Dealing with PTSD, Storm-Related Peril

You are standing in the middle of a vast grass field wearing a white cotton dress that billows wildly in the increasing wind. Across the field heading in your direction, you see an oh-so-familiar red Dodge Ram bucking and crashing over the uneven dirt. Even though you are several hundred feet away and the wind whips around with a deafening roar, you hear Tyler whooping loudly, the joyful sound as clear as day in your ears. 

Then, suddenly, you are in the backseat of the truck, watching as Boone leans back to get a better angle of Tyler with his camera. Shifting his focus away from the plain in front of him for a minute, Tyler looks at Boone and gives another rowdy shout before clicking a button on the dashboard. The truck bolts forward at a break-neck speed, heading directly for the dark swirling funnel forming in front of them. 

You try to warn them, to call out and tell them to turn around before it’s too late, but even though you can feel the screams tearing at your throat, not a sound passes from your lips. You lean forward and pull at Tyler’s arm, your fingers digging into his sleeve so deeply that you are sure you are tearing into his skin, silently pleading, begging him to stop. And yet he doesn’t react. 

Tears are streaming down your face as the truck nears the tornado and skids to a stop. The edge of the storm is licking at the front bumper. Tyler grins at Boone, giving a quick wink to the camera, and says, “Here we go!”

He reaches forward and flips a switch on the center console—and nothing happens. 

For a moment, that cocky grin stays on Tyler’s face but then the realization of what didn’t happen snaps his attention back to the switch. He jiggles it a few times but still nothing. The storm is even closer now, the entire vehicle shaking as the intensity of the winds grows.

Tyler glances at his co-pilot. “Boone…the augers aren’t going down.”

Boone lowers the camera, an instant sign that something is wrong. Though the feed is still live, the shot now only shows the steering wheel and out the windshield of the truck. Occasionally, Tyler’s hands pop into frame as he frantically tries to get the switch to work. Even from your place in the back seat, Boone and Tyler’s voices can barely be heard over the roar of the wind but their tones are panicked and tense. Nothing they are doing gets the augers to work and by this point they are too close to the storm to drive out of it. You squeeze your eyes closed, cover your ears with your hands, and curl up in your seat—you can’t watch what happens next. Not again. 

Just as the wall of wind passes over the grille of the truck and the front tires raise slightly off the ground, Tyler grabs the camera from Boone’s lap and turns it towards his face. His usually bronzed skin is pale in the growing darkness and there is a fear in his eyes that has never been there before while chasing a storm. Yelling loudly to be heard over the roar of the wind, he screams, “Baby, if you’re watching this, I love you with everything in me, and I’m so sorr—”

He is interrupted as the truck tilts backward 90 degrees and the camera slips from his hands, flying past you and smashing into the back window, cracking them both. The last thing the camera streams is the sound of Tyler and Boone’s screams.

In the blink of an eye, you are once again standing in the field far from the truck. It is now lying upside-down and, for a brief moment, you see Tyler struggling to drag himself out of the driver’s side window, one arm hanging limp and useless at his side. He raises his head, blood streaming down one side of his face, and, somehow, his eyes find yours across the distance.

Then the truck explodes and Tyler disappears into a ball of fire and smoke.

“NO!” you wail, sound finally bursting from your mouth only to be lost in the blast of the explosion. Tears stream down your face as you collapse to your hands and knees, your forehead pressing into the wet dirt. The heat from the fire washes over you and you struggle to breathe as your sobs rattle in your chest and the smoke fills your lungs but it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore.

Lifting your head, you blink through your tears and the smoke. When they clear, you see the twisted metal frame of the truck and the skeletal, charred remains of the man that you loved.

You let out a blood-curdling shriek—

“Hey, hey, baby…..” Hands grab at you, trying to hold you down as you thrash wildly. Another anguished scream rips from your lips even as you hear a voice pleading with you, “Wake up…please. Baby, it’s okay. I’m alright—we’re both alright. I promise. I’m here. Just please wake up for me.”

The voice finally breaks through the storm of emotions raging through your mind, and as you recognize it, your eyes shoot open to see a face you thought you’d never see again looming over you. “T-Tyler…” you manage to breathe, your lip quivering in disbelief as you reach up, fingers brushing against his mouth. 

He nods, pursing his lips to kiss your fingertips, some of the desperation and fear on his face melting into relief as he runs his hand over the top of your hair. “Shhh, it’s okay. You just had the dream again.”

“W-what?” 

As your eyes begin to adjust to the darkness, you see that you are lying on your bed in the apartment you shared with Tyler back in Arkansas. You aren’t in Oklahoma. There is no tornado. Tyler is alive and well. 

It had all been a dream……but the problem was, that’s only partially true. 

Last month, the auger system on Tyler’s truck had failed and Tyler and Boone were caught in the storm as the truck flipped over. However, the truck, thankfully, hadn’t exploded like in your dream. Tyler had fractured his arm and got a shallow gash on his head while Boone had broken his nose, but otherwise, the two had walked away from the incident relatively unharmed. 

However, the same couldn’t be said for you. While you hadn’t been with them in person, you had been watching the Storm Wrangler’s live feed as everything happened and that experience alone had been enough to cause these nearly nightly terrors. That moment when the camera had broken and the last thing you heard was Tyler screaming in fear and pain had been the most horrible moment of your life, one which dragged out for several hours until Tyler could reach you and confirm he was alright. And now you were being forced to relive it night after night after night. 

Alternating waves of relief, exhaustion, and despair begin to wash over you. Though you had been momentarily comforted seeing Tyler’s face, the reminder that you are caught in this seemingly neverending torture loop causes tears to once again begin streaming down your face.

After weeks of going through the same cycle of you waking up terrified only to realize what was happening, Tyler is used to this reaction. He murmurs, “Come here, baby,” before scooping you into his arms and holding you tightly against him.

You rest your head against his bare chest, but the steady beat of his heart that had once brought you such comfort and calm now only serves as a reminder that you had watched him die over and over again. It hadn’t been real, yet you felt that loss at the moment, and that pain still hung over you like a shroud even as you lay wrapped in his arms. 

“Ty, I can’t do this anymore,” you whimper, your fingers digging into his arm which only brings you back to the moment in your dream you begged him to turn the truck around. “I can't sleep and those pills the doctor gave me aren't helping. Every time I close my eyes I see you—” You break down into a sob, burying your face deeper into his chest as that horrific last image of Tyler from your dream flashes in your mind.

You can feel him taking a few, deep, shuddering breaths and it breaks your heart as you realize he’s trying to keep himself from breaking down from seeing you like this. He was the one who actually went through the near-death experience, and yet here he was comforting you every night. It wasn’t fair–to either of you–and you wonder how much more he will take before he throws in the towel, leaving you to face this on your own. Honestly, part of you is surprised he hasn’t left yet.

But he’s here tonight. And as he presses his lips to the top of your head, he whispers, “God, baby, I'm so sorry.”

Shaking your head against his chest, you cry, “It's not your fault.”

“The hell it isn't.”

You shake your head again. “You've told me not to watch your live stuff just in case something like this happened. It was my fault–”

“No,” Tyler stops you, grasping your damp cheeks between his calloused palms and tilting your head to face his. Oddly, the rough skin of his hands feels soothing, familiar, and you start to feel more grounded in the reality of the moment. For the first time tonight, you feel the dream starting to lose its hold on you. 

Rubbing his thumb softly across your cheekbone, he looks you straight in the eyes and firmly says, “No…None of this is your fault. I knew there had been problems with the augers but instead of waiting to test them, I went out anyway. What happened out there and how it's tormenting you is my fault and no one else’s. Do you understand me? You did nothing wrong.” You start to look away but he squeezes your face tighter, causing you to look back at him. “Tell me you know that.”

“I guess,” you whisper. Then, stronger, you say, “But Ty, it doesn’t matter. Whoever’s fault it was, or even if it was nobody’s fault, it doesn’t change the fact this keeps happening. And I don’t know how to live the rest of my life like this.”

“It won’t be the rest of your life. You’ll get past this, I promise,” he says, releasing your cheeks to run his hands across your shoulders and down your arms until he is holding your hands in his. Squeezing them tightly, he adds, “Eventually, every storm passes. We just have to hold on tight and don't give up until that happens.”

Your voice breaks as you ask, “...‘We’?”

“Yeah, of course ‘we’.” His eyes darken under a furrowed brow. “Wait…do you really think I’d let you go through this on your own?”

You shrug one shoulder. “It’s a lot. And it’s not your storm to weather.” 

“Baby, your storm is my storm. And I’m going to hold you so tightly during it and never let you go, whatever it takes. Then once it passes—because it will given time—I’m still going to be right there next to you for whatever comes next.” He leans forward until his forehead is leaning against yours. “You’re never getting rid of me.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

You aren’t sure how long the two of you remain like that, hand-in-hand with heads pressed together. It could have been minutes, it could have been hours. But all you know is that Tyler is with you and, at least for tonight, that’s enough.

Eventually, in the darkness together, you whisper, “Let's go to sleep.”

[faytelumos]

I'm trying to write a thing (probably only in my head, let's be realistic) and so I have some thoughts?

Sunshine x Grumpy prompts

(specifically a dommy Sunshine and a subby Grumpy, but read/swap these as you will)

Meetings

- They physically bump into each other in the street. Sunshine is trying to gather up Grumpy's stuff and straighten them out, but Grumpy is just trying to get away from Sunshine's overpowering energy.

-> Then afterwards, Grumpy is the one who keeps thinking about the encounter.

- There are no rooms left in the hotel/inn. Sunshine overhears Grumpy all but begging for any kind of room at all, and offers to share theirs.

- Every day, Grumpy walks past Sunshine dancing in a slightly inconvenient place (like a sidewalk or in front of a coffee shop). Eventually, they start watching Sunshine briefly when they come across them. Then, Sunshine makes direct eye contact and motions for them to dance, too.

-> Grumpy may not dance with them, but maybe Sunshine decides to make it their life's mission to tease out the dance moves in Grumpy's heart.

- Grumpy notices Sunshine gently handling a disliked/misunderstood animal. They instantly wonder if Sunshine would be willing to handle them (disliked and misunderstood as they are) so gently.

- People generally assume Grumpy is cruel/brutish in a fight. But when Sunshine sees them being merciful and diplomatic in the face of conflict, their heart goes all aflutter. They must not let this wonderful person slip through their fingers.

Acquaintances to Friends/Lovers

- They know each other only in passing, and Grumpy assumes Sunshine to be a total ditz. But when a fight between strangers breaks out in a tight space, Sunshine rushes into the fray to break it up. (Maybe the sight of Sunshine being strong and capable does something to Grumpy.)

-> Alternatively, it could be an emergency/crisis that Grumpy or another stranger are having (such as choking on something, a severe allergic reaction, or an illness or injury taking a sudden turn for the worse).

- They work together, and Sunshine has been making their way around the workplace day by day, doing something happy and cheerful and everything for each person. Grumpy is dreading the day it's their turn.

*Relationship Intensifies*

- Sunshine is a terrible cook. Grumpy pulls out the apron and shows them a thing or two.

- Sunshine opens up about their dark past during a quiet moment. It is remarkably (even freakishly) similar to what Grumpy went through.

- Sunshine notices that while Grumpy's actions say, "Do not perceive me," their body language screams, "I need you specifically to hold me."

- Over the past few weeks/months, Sunshine and Grumpy have been spending more and more time together. Right as Grumpy starts to feel comfortable opening up, they realize… Sunshine actually doesn't talk about themself. Practically at all.

After Dark

- Grumpy is too nervous/self-conscious to initiate, even though being with Sunshine is all they've been thinking about for the past ten minutes.

-> Sunshine miraculously notices and treats Grumpy so sweetly that Grumpy almost breaks.

->-> Or they do break, and Sunshine's happy to pick up the pieces afterwards.

- Sunshine's "I'll get a smile out of you yet!" attitude shifting into "You're mine and no one will ever hurt you" when things get hot.

- Grumpy's "I refuse to burden people with my presence" attitude becoming "Please, I need every last piece of you" when things get going.

- Grumpy and Sunshine have to switch roles a little when Sunshine drops after they're together.