#this is a long caption i probably should have made this one gif into a set

[taexual]

sleepwalking ● 20 | jjk

pairing: jungkook x fem!reader

summary: due to unfortunate circumstances, you ended up managing your ex-boyfriend’s band. you thought you’ve both made peace with it, but suddenly he’s very eager to prove to you that first love never dies.

genre: rockstar!jungkook / exes to lovers

warnings: explicit language, suggestive themes, mentions of drugs, fluff, some angst, SLOW BURN

words: 17.9k

read from the beginning ○ masterlist

chapter 20 ► so if your wings won't find you heaven, i will bring it down like an ancient bygone

The next morning arrived very quickly and not even five hours after your nightly rendezvous in the garden, you saw Jungkook again in the corridor of the hotel.

“Your room is right next to mine,” you observed with a certain surprised amusement. “Yet you thought it would be wiser to go out, find some rocks, and toss those at my window?”

Jungkook glanced at the door of his room as if he hadn’t noticed it before.

“Much more private that way,” he said with a shrug—but a mischievous grin betrayed his attempt at nonchalance. “No one suspected a thing.”

“If someone had seen you doing that, they would have probably suspected a lot more,” you said. “Compared to you just knocking on my door like a normal person.”

“I’m a romantic,” he declared, clutching his chest to emphasise his dedication to his actions, which he preferred to regard as whimsical and sweet, rather than unusual and unnecessary. “I prefer my way.”

You looked away and he wondered if he’d taken it too far. But he relaxed when he saw the corners of your lips curve into an already familiar smile as your gaze wandered from the carpeted floors to the fraying edges of the wallpaper near the entrance to the staircase.

His predilection for extravagant gestures and dramatic moves rather than simple, everyday things had been a consistent part of his personality for as long as you’ve known him. And however much you teased him about it, you still found it endearing.

Although to be fair, you found the wildflowers that he’d brought you endearing, too. Pictures that he sent you, captioned ‘us.’ The look in his eyes when he teased you about something. The way he held your hand so absentmindedly sometimes, almost forgetting about it as though your hand was a part of him.

“Should we go, then?” you asked, a little breathless. The old hotel didn’t have an elevator, and you gestured at the staircase. “Unless, of course, you’d prefer to climb into the restaurant through the window.”

Jungkook took the teasing in stride, maintaining a dignified grin. “Stairs will work, I’m sure.”

“Well, if you’re sure.”

He followed you, beaming as if he were a ten-year-old who had just held hands with a pretty girl for the first time during fifth-grade recess. He didn’t know how to contain everything he was feeling. He might have actually stopped, dropped, and rolled down the stairs like an exhilarated sack of potatoes if he’d known you were feeling the same.

“So,” you said, keeping your eyes on your feet as the two of you climbed down the narrow, creaking staircase. There were small, foggy windows scattered here and there, filtering beams of tired sunlight. “Escape from New York.”

It took Jungkook a few seconds to recognise that this was the film you’d talked about last night. His mind seemed to consider this information secondary—overshadowed, understandably, by his grandmother’s voice after she called him and the lingering memory of the scent of your hair.

“Yeah,” he said, stopping in front of the arch that led from the stairwell into the lobby. “I’m thinking the odds of catching it in cinemas are very slim, right?”

“They are,” you confirmed, stopping, too. “But it’s on Amazon like I suspected. We could watch it tomorrow if you’d like?”

A childlike excitement ignited in his eyes, but a sudden memory dimmed them.

He recalled you telling him that you had plans with Luna and Maggie tonight, and before that—his hands trembled a little at this particular memory—he recalled you saying that you had set an alarm to call your mum.

He was anxious, he realised, on your behalf.

“Tomorrow, uh—” he stammered, lost in the shadows on the staircase behind you as the two of you lingered by the archway. “T-that sounds good.”

You smiled and nodded—that was essentially all you did, but he felt the change. He felt how close you were, he felt your relaxed posture, your easy smile, your calm, confident eyes.

His gaze met yours for no more than a fleeting moment, but he felt the uncertainty in his chest lift, almost inexplicably so. Likely because, despite everything, you were here and nothing else really mattered. You’d be okay.

“You’re going out tonight, right?” he asked and you nodded. He tsk tsk-ed in response, feigning disapproval. “It's a school night. How very irresponsible.”

Your smile grew wider; he noticed it out of the corner of his eye. Something creaked with excitement on the stairs and inside his chest.

“You guys have a day off tomorrow, so I don’t have to babysit,” you bit. “The girls and I had actually been planning this since before we even arrived in Europe.”

“Okay, fair enough,” he said. “How’d you find a bar that’s open long enough on a Wednesday, though?”

“Maggie said she found a cool spot that’s not really a nightclub and not really a bar,” you explained, shrugging. “I’m not sure. We’ll give it a try.”

“Alright. That sounds cool. Let’s do our thing tomorrow,” he said, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “Is it, uh, a girls’ night, then?”

You began to walk, crossing the threshold but slowing down so he could catch up.

“Well, yeah,” you said. “Because if I invite you, then Taehyung will insist on joining, and Luna will inevitably invite him. And then you and I will end up third-wheeling those two all night, while also comforting Maggie. She’ll have one tequila shot and spend the whole night near tears because she misses Rue.”

Jungkook decided not to admit how pleased he was that in a hypothetical scenario where Luna would bring her boyfriend and Maggie would cry about her girlfriend, he was your equivalent partner. Of course, he would have made sure to keep you company so that you wouldn’t feel like anyone’s third-wheel or shoulder to cry on, but he understood the essence of your point.

“That’s alright. I’ll keep myself busy,” he said, a bit concerned about the colour of his face. He reached up, feeling his cheeks with the back of his hand. “I, uh—I hope you guys have fun. Call me if you get into trouble.”

You raised your eyebrows, recognising his way of turning your words against you.

“As if,” you retorted. “I know how to drink responsibly.”

He could remember times when the two of you were so drunk that the sense of responsibility resembled a dystopian concept rather than something people realistically possessed, but he enjoyed the smile on your face too much to bring it up. Even more than that, however, he enjoyed the fact that your smile did not falter, and you did not pull away to a more respectable distance when you entered the restaurant and reached the buffet table with dozens of other people around.

Things were good. They felt good.

You stayed at the buffet table to talk to Namjoon, and Jungkook went to find an empty table at the restaurant. But even as he walked away from you, he still couldn’t do anything about the tint on his cheeks.

He knew he was grinning like a proper maniac as he poured milk into his cereal. But then he met your eyes, and you were smiling at him from across the room, and your face looked radiant and glowing, and he was so in love with you that he didn’t care about his excitement coming off as threatening.

Just then, Minjun approached him with a concerned expression.

“Hey,” he said, sitting across from him at the empty table. “You look stupid. Did you put too much sugar in your cereal again?”

Jungkook snorted and let the spoon clatter into the bowl. “No. Just feeling good, I guess.”

“Huh.” Minjun looked over his shoulder and caught your gaze. He turned back to his friend with a knowing grin. “And, uh… your constant glances in your manager’s direction have something to do with that, I assume?”

“We’re going to watch a film tomorrow. It’s something my grandma suggested,” Jungkook announced with a grandeur that rivalled a lottery winner flaunting their newfound wealth.

It took Minjun a moment to process the whirlwind of changes in Jungkook’s life overnight. The last time he had seen him in Glasgow, Jungkook was, to put it kindly, a wreck. Now, his grandmother was calling him, and he was making plans to watch films with you.

“I’m—” Minjun stopped. He wanted to ask questions, but he did not know what to do with the expression on his face. “I feel like I’ve missed a few episodes of this TV show, but I’m very excited for you.”

Jungkook nodded eagerly—and then hesitated, his smile fading momentarily.

“It’s good, right?” he asked. “That we’re spending time together again.”

Minjun didn’t consider himself an expert in the field of relationships, even though he had some experience. However, when it came to this particular relationship, he didn’t even consider himself an amateur. You and Jungkook operated so utterly enigmatically that he wouldn’t even know where to begin guessing what the correct answer here was.

“Of course,” he affirmed nonetheless. “So, you’re… what? Friends, then?”

“Mhmm,” Jungkook replied with a mouthful of cereal.

“And, uh,” Minjun tapped his index finger on the dent in the lacquered table, “why is that?”

Jungkook swallowed first. “What do you mean wh—”

He noticed Minjun’s deadpan expression. Friendship was not the destination that his friend had imagined for the two of you.

“Fine,” he said, wiping his palms on his pants. “Well, first of all, it’s better than nothing. And—”

“Wait,” Minjun interrupted. “Why is ‘nothing’ the alternative to friendship?”

Jungkook clicked his tongue. “Because we’re complicated people with complicated problems.”

He almost expected Minjun to laugh at the oversimplified response, but his friend remained serious—he may not have known a lot, but he knew that there was a long story hidden behind these short words.

“Okay,” he said.

“Yeah. And second of all,” Jungkook continued, and Minjun wondered if he realised how much he resembled you in the way he spoke sometimes, “if we’re friends, then we can still work together, even if we don’t actually get back together. It’s just safe for us.”

“Ah.” Minjun nodded, recognising the subtle ways in which Jungkook was making this comfortable for you. “That’s the main thing, isn’t it?”

“It’s—well, I don’t know if that’s the main thing,” Jungkook said. For him, the main thing was you staying with Rated Riot. Everything else was an additional thing. “But it’s a—it’s a thing.”

“Hmm. The two of you are a far cry from friends, though,” Minjun remarked. Naturally, Jungkook was about to object, but his friend raised a hand, stopping him. “But I’m glad you two kids are working it out. That’s all I wanted to say.”

Jungkook released his breath and nodded instead of speaking.

He decided this was enough. He didn’t need anything else—neither a pat on the back nor an empty reassurance—to confirm that things were going well.

You had practically built a castle over the ruins in his chest overnight—things were going well.

After breakfast, Namjoon needed your help with the scheduling of recording rooms for the upcoming tour dates. The boys usually used the equipment they’d brought with them, but Yoongi had barricaded himself in his room—Jimin knocked on his door for fifteen minutes to drop off a croissant—so Namjoon, Hoseok, and you decided to book a studio to lure him out.

The scheduling took a while, because London and Paris, for no reason whatsoever, emerged as the two centres of musical innovation this month. Every studio in the vicinity of your accommodation had already been booked, so you were locked in your hotel room until late afternoon.

When you finally found several available spots, Luna and Maggie had already banished Taehyung from his and Luna’s suite—they had the largest one here—and you joined the girls in the bathroom to get ready for the night.

However, even though you joked and chatted with them, you couldn’t stop yourself from mentally counting down the minutes until your phone alarm rang. You’d set it for eight, hoping this would be a convenient time for your mum. You knew she wasn’t working today.

And, shortly after the three of you got ready—six minutes to eight—you left the girls to pre-game in Luna’s bathroom, and went back to your own dark room.

You felt very silly just sitting and staring at your screen, waiting. You could have called your mum early; you were ready for it anyway. But your hands were shaking, and you decided to wait.

You had already dressed and prepared for the rest of the night, but now, as you stared at your phone—two more minutes—you wondered if that had been a mistake. What if you cried? What if you didn’t even want to go anywhere anymore?

Two minutes, as it turned out, had a habit of passing slowly when you wanted them to pass, and passing very quickly when you wanted to prolong them. You pressed the line labelled ‘MUM’ on your phone and held your breath.

You were sitting on the floor—not because you wanted to fully embrace the dramatics of the situation or because the bed wasn’t good enough, but because your phone was charging next to the door, and you couldn’t reach the charger from the bed.

You had kept the light off, so the room was completely dark—now that was because you wanted to embrace the dramatics of the situation—and you hugged your knees to your chest, seemingly sinking deeper into the shadows.

Your mum picked up after the third ring. “Hello?”

“Hi, mum,” you said, and your voice shook despite your best attempts to control it.

“Hi, sweetheart,” she said. She sounded a little disoriented and confused. “Did something happen? Is everything okay?”

You moved your phone away from your head and wiped your cheek on the sleeve of your dark denim jacket. You felt nervous and fidgety.

“It’s—no, everything’s fine,” you replied. “Are you busy? H-how’s Kai?”

“I was just reading. And he’s playing with his friends, love,” your mum said softly—she always spoke as if she was in a crowded room, mindful of disturbing others. “Did you want to talk to him?”

“Oh. No—no, it’s okay,” you said, nibbling on your lower lip. “You, uh, changed your mind about grounding him?”

“Well, he’s awfully lonely,” she said almost apologetically. You figured she wouldn’t stay angry with him for long, especially if he complained about his broken leg—which you suspected he did. “He can’t walk much and he’s miserable.”

“Mhmm. Right.” You scratched under your chin. “I’ll, uh—I’ll check on him later.”

“Okay,” she said, hesitating for a moment. “How—well, how are you? Did something happen?”

The repeated question in place of small talk stung a little, but you knew you’d brought it on yourself. Jungkook had told you that she’d already tried to call you when you were sick in Manchester. And it was natural for her to assume something had happened when you called her yourself in any case. For a while now, you’d both had a tacit understanding: she’d text you if she wanted to know how you were, and only call if there was an emergency—such as your brother breaking his leg. But if you really needed her, you would be the one to call.

“No. No, I just—I wanted to talk to you,” you said. “I don’t, um—I don’t really know what to do, so I wanted to… talk to you and maybe that will be helpful. I don’t know, I’m—”

“Sweetheart, what’s going on?” Concern deepened her gentle voice. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m—no, I’m not hurt,” you said. You thought you knew what you had to talk about. But apparently, you hadn’t realised you’d have to articulate your thoughts to have this conversation. “It’s just… I wanted to ask about you and Dad.”

Your heartbeat echoed in your ears while your mum stayed silent on the other end.

“Oh,” she said after a minute. You heard shuffling in the background. You pictured her sitting up, putting her book on the coffee table in her living room, and pulling off the duvet. You pictured her reaching for the floor lamp next to the armchair and switching it on, wondering, all the while, what had happened. “What brought this on?”

You heard a cheerful cry from outside your room and glanced at the window. The stars behind it were obscured by dark clouds. You wondered how long it would take to recap the entirety of this past month for your mum.

“Jungkook and I were talking,” you started. You heard her hold her breath as you went on. “And I just—h-he made me realise that you and I have never really talked about this much.”

Her voice sounded distant. “Well, what is there to talk about?”

Your exhale turned into a half-choked scoff.

“A lot of things, mum,” you said.

She breathed out, then in, then out again in an uncomfortable attempt to keep her composure.

“Wh-what do you want me to say?” she asked.

“Well…” You tugged at the fabric of your black tights. “What was going through your mind when you decided to get back together with Dad?” You paused, sensing the implication in your question. “I’m—I don’t mean to insult you. I’m just—I want to understand your thought process. There seemed to be, um—so much at stake.”

“There was,” she replied with the precision of a teacher confirming that two times two was indeed four. “I had you and your brother. And I still went for it.”

An oppressive silence engulfed your dark room as your mother’s uncertainty made yours grow.

Often, when a marriage started to fall apart, the advice from well-meaning relatives—who, of course, knew more about the relationship than the people in it—revolved around the children. To you, the notion of “staying together for the kids” felt about as profound as a bumblebee repeatedly hitting the glass of a window. And the relationship that your parents had was so bad, so beyond any fixing, that no one even suggested they stayed together in the first place, not even for the children—actually, especially not for the children.

But because your mother had never received this advice—this cursed “do it for the kids”—she did not know how to explain herself to you right now.

“W-were you scared?” you forced yourself to ask.

“Every time,” your mum admitted. You felt a new, powerful surge of despair for this every time and all the years of repeated mistakes that it signified. “But I was still hopeful.”

“But you knew he didn’t change,” you said. “You knew he wouldn’t be a father, wouldn’t be your husband.”

“No,” she said. “I don’t think that’s something you know in the moment.”

You couldn’t tell whether she had convinced herself of this later—as a defence against all the relatives who shook their heads at her—or if this was something she believed from the very beginning.

“Mum, that’s—I don’t think I can ever understand that,” you said, your words pouring out in an uncontrollable torrent of agitation. “Not after what I saw you go through. It—I admire the love that you have. But I just—I can’t help but think it had always been obvious that you and Dad would never work.”

She was silent for another minute, and you were worried that you had really upset her. Then, finally, she spoke again—her voice gentle, warm. “You told me that much.”

“I’m—I did?”

“You were very smart, growing up,” she said. “Well, you still are.”

You felt an unwelcome lump in your throat and a tightness behind your eyes.

“I’m sorry,” you said. “I probably hurt you.”

“You didn’t, sweetheart,” she said, because she always did. “I know it seems—well, difficult to understand. But I really wanted this to work. I wanted to give it a chance. But at a certain point, you finally realise that this is it. It’s enough. That’s when trying becomes pointless—when you can see that it won’t work. But you can’t reach that point if you don’t even try.”

But how many times, you wanted to ask, to yell, how many times did you have to try to reach that point?

“To be honest with you, my thought process was very… well, foolish, perhaps,” she continued. “Looking back, I realise that my judgement was clouded by many of the good moments we shared—because, believe it or not, it wasn’t always bad for us. We were together for… well, for many years. We had some good times.”

Once again, you felt a little disheartened that she avoided mentioning a specific date. You wondered what number of years she would have given—you knew your parents had already been on and off even before they got married.

“So, he wasn’t always like this?” you questioned. “Cold, detached, dismissive? Not worthy of you?”

Your mum seemed a little taken aback by the exhibition of adjectives—none of which came close to the words you wanted to use to describe the man who was theoretically supposed to be your father, and the words your mother had actually used to describe him herself—but she only allowed herself half of a surprised gasp before she pulled herself together.

“He was a lot more than that,” she said. “Both, in a good way and a bad way. And I wanted to try. Our circumstances had changed, we were in different stages of our lives. We’ve both grown. Clouded judgment or not, I thought that, even if he couldn’t be the person I fell in love with, maybe he could still be the person I could love right now.”

“You thought he’d changed,” you concluded. “Grown for you.”

“I did think that,” she agreed. “I believe that people can change—and they do, really. People can absolutely transform. But your father, he—well, he hadn’t. But I wouldn’t have known that for sure if I hadn’t tried.”

You shook your head. “But had he ever—you—never mind. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable with my—”

“No, you’re—you have every right to ask me these things,” she cut in. “I understand your—frustration. But I really wanted this, and I-I felt like I owed it to myself to try everything. Just so I would know that I’ve tried everything. And even though it didn’t work out, I learned more—so much more—about love, about people, and about myself. So, I don’t regret trying.”

You needed a minute to grasp that she really did not sound regretful. But you could not understand that.

You and your brother ended up in the crossfire of it all, and she was the one who put you there, repeatedly. And then she waited for over a decade for you to find the courage to ask her about this because she never volunteered this information herself.

Was there really nothing to regret about this?

“I’m... I’m still learning,” your mum continued after a while. “Because there are some things that we can learn only by experiencing them, and I—well, I want those experiences. I don’t want to look back on my life and wonder what it would have been like if I had tried something that I really wanted, but it really scared me. ‘What if I didn’t run from it, even though running away was safer?’ That was what I thought.”

She had to be brave, you thought, to try and to stop trying. And you knew that she really was. But more than that, she had to stay true to herself as an individual. She had to follow her dreams, her hopes, her wishes. And she did.

Yet, for some reason, you couldn’t find your words.

“I think that,” she said after not hearing your response, “aside from all the other things we do for love, we sometimes need to go through these unsuccessful experiences to truly understand our boundaries and get to know ourselves. And to find peace, really, knowing that we’ve done all that our hearts wanted. At least, that’s how it worked for me. Your dad might have had other motives. I don’t think I will ever truly understand them, but his motives are his own. These are mine. So—well, that was my thought process. I think that’s all I can say.”

“Hmm,” you finally said—just to signal that you've heard her, and now you needed a minute.

She’d told you everything, then.

She was listening to her heart when she got back together with your dad. And listening to one’s heart was not an easy thing to do, you’ve come to know that very well.

But now you wondered if you were okay with her explanation. If you were okay knowing that she did that because she wanted to. If you were okay with her erasing everyone else from the equation and just focusing on herself.

Lately, you’ve come to believe that people were made up of various roles, some of which were put on their gravestones after their death: daughter, sister, wife, mother. They could be more than that, so much more. But they couldn’t suddenly be less.

You thought your mother might have actually been trying to be less.

She was trying, it seemed, to be on her own, void of any roles that framed her into a certain behavioural pattern—the sister, the friend, the wife, the mother—because this way, she could get back together with your dad because she owed it to herself. Because she wanted to try.

It was important to listen to yourself, of course. But her relationship with your dad affected her in every role she had, every role she tried to escape from. It hurt her. And because it hurt her, it hurt those around her, too: her children, her brother, her friends.

And still, she did it again. And again. And again.

No, you didn’t think it was possible to escape all of your roles like that. You didn’t think a person could wake up and, without any repercussions whatsoever, suddenly decide to be an individual, but not a parent. A partner, but not a sibling.

A manager, but not an ex-girlfriend.

A shuddered breath passed your lips, and you closed your eyes. You heard your mum’s even breaths on the other end.

If you weren’t so overwhelmed, you might have admitted to your mum that you understood certain parts of her explanation, but not others.

You understood why she did all the things you’d criticised for years. She did them because she knew that was what she wanted. That was what she believed and hoped for. And precisely because she did what she wanted, she did not regret trying again even though it didn’t work out. She’d listened to her heart, and her heart was now at peace.

And, yet—you were there. Despite her pride about having followed her heart, you were there.

You were the one helping her pick up the pieces for years after your dad left. You were there when she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t get up from the floor, couldn’t stop herself from crying.

You were happy that she was at peace now, happy that she did not regret it. But you did. You regretted it for her. You didn’t think you’d ever feel her peace.

That was what you didn’t understand: how she’d erased those nights, those years when you thought you went through everything she went through right with her. You didn’t understand how she didn’t regret any of it.

You could have asked her about it, but she would have probably repeated all that she’d already said. And maybe you’d never understand her because you weren’t her—you were her daughter, and you could never escape this role. You loved her and you could not feel peace for the suffering she had to endure. The suffering you tried to take away, but couldn’t.

Perhaps you were being unfair to her. But you could only judge her experiences through the lens of your own.

She made a mistake—the same one, several times. She tried to explain it to you, even tried to justify it, but ultimately, that was the way you understood it, and you could not make yourself understand it differently.

However—and it took you great effort to admit this to yourself—just because trying again was a mistake in your mother’s case, that did not necessarily mean it would be a mistake in yours, too. There was a bright side to your lack of understanding.

It certainly seemed that your mum would continue to believe her truth, and you would continue to believe yours, but now you identified a core difference between yourself and her: you could never listen to just your own heart; you had to take another heart into account.

Your heart was frightened. It did not know what to do. But you weren’t just his manager. You loved him. And you knew he loved you. You could not let your fear win.

You weren’t your mum, and you weren’t your dad. And Jungkook wasn’t one or the other, either.

You wondered if this precise moment—this clear distinction—would finally allow you to separate your experiences from your parents’.

“Sweetheart,” your mum said quietly. Your phone felt hot due to the duration of your conversation. “Did something happen that made you want to talk to me about this now? Did you and Jungkook fight?”

You were biting into the inside of your lip with so much force that you could almost taste blood.

“We did. At first,” you said. It was futile to evade her questions now, but your throat still felt scratchy. “But it’s different this time. We’re—I don’t know what we are. We’re trying. Well, he’s trying. And I—I’m scared.”

“Scared of what?”

“Well, scared that someone will get hurt if we get back together.” You tightened your arm around your calves and rested your chin on your knees. Your room had darkened even more; it was very late. “Scared that I won’t be able to keep going if we don’t. I-I don’t know how to explain it. I’m just scared of what will happen.”

“Darling, sometimes, taking the risk is the only way to know what will happen,” she said. “You have to be brave. There are always two kinds of ‘what ifs.’ One good, one bad.”

You ran your fingers through the braids in your ponytail, nearly ruining Maggie’s work.

“You always hoped for the good one,” you said.

“I did.”

“Hmm.”

“I hope for that even now,” she replied. You closed your eyes and exhaled. “I know for certain that your dad and I cannot be together, but I know that precisely because I tried. It’s terrifying, though. I know it is. But I think that a lot of times, fear is an inherent part of love. You’re afraid of losing this person, afraid of hurting them. But you choose them anyway.”

Your hands were so cold that you could feel them over your tights when you ran your nervous fingers across your calves. You watched the hotel floorboards, attempting to make sense of your thoughts.

“Well, it—that doesn’t always make sense,” you said carefully. “Choosing to be together isn’t always, uh, the right decision.”

“Sweetheart,” she said, and you could tell from her tone that she did not understand your allusion to her own relationship. “How can it be the wrong decision for you? I know you’re really calling me because you’re scared you’re hurting him.” You inhaled so sharply here that she had to pause for a moment and continue in a gentler tone. “But you won’t hurt him by being with him. You would hurt him if you pushed him away.”

Your eyes blurred with a sudden moisture that you tried to blink away. You were determined not to succumb to your emotions—not for your parents’ failed relationship, not for the relentless gap between you and your mother that one conversation could not fix, and not for the haunting what-ifs that loomed in the back of your mind.

“I don’t know what exactly happened between you two,” your mum continued. “But I do know this: Jungkook thought you didn’t love him anymore when you broke up. He was, well—broken. But he wants to try again. That was—well, it was not the case for your dad and me. So, I think your odds are very good.”

You straightened, pressing your shoulder blades against the wall.

It was only in Amsterdam that Jungkook told you he had thought you broke up with him because you didn’t love him anymore. Before that, you’d assumed he was the one who no longer cared.

Was this what he talked to your mum about? Or was she just guessing?

“Where—how do you—h-how do you know what he thought after we broke up?” you stammered.

Another silence enveloped the conversation, and you wondered what your mum needed it for.

“That’s…” she started slowly, “another thing that sets you two apart from us.”

A secret. That’s why your mum needed the silence—to figure out how to talk to you about this.

“What is it?” you asked.

It took her another moment—six and a half heartbeats to be precise—to start speaking again.

“Your dad never wrote me anything,” she said. “Not a letter, let alone a poem. Honestly, he could barely write my name on a birthday card.”

You didn’t immediately understand what she was insinuating because you were too busy screaming inside about the irony of your mum being the one who pointed out all the times when your dad did not care about her. And yet she chose him again, and again, and—

You gripped your legs tighter to focus. “How do you know that Jungkook—”

“He sent them to me.”

“What?” You let go of your legs. “What do you—what did he send you?”

“The songs,” she explained patiently. You were too overwhelmed to notice the caution in her words; she could sense your hyperventilation over the phone. “Well, the verses of the songs that he wrote about you.”

You were quiet for a minute. Then another minute. Your mum had to gently coax, “love?” to remind you that you were on a call.

Jungkook said he had talked to your mum because he needed her help. You simply could not fathom the possibility that she was helping him with his song lyrics.

“Why…” You swallowed, trying to come up with a question that wouldn’t make your stomach clench harder. “Why did he send you that?”

“Because I told him he could if he wanted to,” she said. You appreciated her even tone. It helped to slow down the rapid beating of your heart.

“But,” you said, “we were broken up.”

“That’s one side of the story,” she replied. “The other side is that you were still in love. So, while you locked yourself in your room and forbid his name from being spoken around you, he was coping in a different way.”

The air in the room felt dense. You couldn’t tell if you were getting too much oxygen or not enough. Your head was spinning, attacked by the voices in your head, all of them shouting at you in languages you did not understand.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” you asked—the question was heavy, and your voice lowered significantly.

“I asked him if I should tell you,” she explained. “He said only if you asked about him.”

Your heart was in your throat. Your arms were numb. You felt like you were running late for something very important, and you were not going to make it in time.

“I never did,” you whispered.

“No,” she said softly. “You never did. And I didn’t think it was my place to tell.”

“Well, how—what did he say?” you pressed. “Why did he send you th-the songs?”

“He texted me, asking for permission at first,” she recounted. “He wanted to know if—if the lyrics were okay, if they weren’t too obvious, if I would mind and if I thought you would mind.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him you might drop everything and move to the Arctic if you found out the songs were about you,” she said. You could hear the smile in her voice. “He said that’s why he asked me instead.”

“Hmm. But that only happened once o-or... you know, twice?” you asked. “Haunting” and “Cursed”—those were the two songs he’d told you he wrote with you in mind. “Right?”

You were almost desperate for her to agree with you. To say that this was it, just these two songs. It was a lot, but you already knew about them. You’d manage to carry on.

Your mum sensed the hope in your voice. Almost unwillingly, she admitted, “at first.”

You were glad, suddenly, that you were sitting on the floor as the hotel room seemed to tremble around you. The realisation that Jungkook had been in touch with your mum, that he was writing about you this whole time—that your mum knew he was writing about you—was a little too strong.

Yoongi wasn’t far off, as it turned out. He thought it was you who looked through Jungkook’s lyrics for him. Apparently, it was your mum.

“The first time he reached out was right when Rated Riot first started making music,” your mum resumed, her words sharp against the lingering silence. “He apologised, and I didn’t think he would contact me again.”

“But he did,” you concluded, almost voiceless as your words stuck in the dryness of your throat.

“He did,” she confirmed. “I think, a lot of times, he was doing it to find out if you were seeing anyone else.”

The voices in your head were quick to latch onto this phrase – a lot of times! a lot of times! a lot of times! – and they yelled it at you from every crevice of your mind.

“Every time he wrote something new about you—a song, or a verse, or even a line that he ended up never including in any of their songs—he’d contact me and ask if it was okay,” your mum said. “But I don’t think he was only asking about the lyrics. He was also asking if I was okay with him still being in love with you. He was, it felt like, trying to see if I’d tell him to stop. To meet someone new.”

You had a pained frown on your face as you brought a hand over your forehead, wondering if what you were feeling was nausea or vertigo.

“Why didn’t you say that to him?” you asked. “To stop? It’s been four years.”

“For the same reason I didn’t say it to you.”

Your lips parted, but you could not find your voice. “W-wh—what—”

“Four years is just a raw number,” your mum said. “It does not account for the days you spent intentionally avoiding each other, remembering everything, and eventually working together. It is neither big nor small, and it is completely irrelevant compared to what you feel inside.”

It seemed to you, for an unthinkable second, that your mum had been waiting for your call about Jungkook—like she knew it would come. Jungkook had called her, and you would, too. It was inevitable.

But how much time has passed between his first call to your mum, and yours, right now? You wanted to claw at your chest until you ripped out every painful needle in your heart for all the years he waited for you, and for all the years you waited for yourself, too.

“And I’ve noticed that he also tried very hard to act like he no longer had any feelings for you when he wrote many of these songs,” your mum added with a conviction that only fuelled the intense turmoil inside of you. “He always claimed that he just needed something for his lyrics. He was just drawing inspiration from personal experience. But I don’t believe that was the entire truth. The lyrics he sent me… they’re a broken heart on paper. They’re a love confession.

“Mum—”

“He tried to tell himself that he’d moved on,” she continued, “but I could tell he hadn’t. You don’t write songs like that about someone you no longer care about.”

You were shaking your head even though she couldn’t see you. You knew your mum was a hopeless romantic, you thought her understanding of love differed from yours very much, and you desperately wanted to believe that you had a rational reason to argue with her.

But really, you were just trying to trick your heart into feeling better. Into believing that you didn’t have nearly as much of an impact on him as he continuously showed you that you did.

You couldn’t breathe.

“I haven’t heard from him in a while until just recently,” your mum said, gently breaking the silence. “Ask him about the song he’s working on now, sweetheart.”

Your heart exploded again. “He—he sent you something else?”

“A few nights ago,” she said. “He said he’s done with the lyrics; he has the demo. He wants to record it now. It’s called—hold on, the title was a mouthful.” You heard some shuffling on her end, overshadowed partially by your racing heart. “Ah, here. It’s called “The Puddle of Champagne on the Bathroom Floor.””

The force of her words made your stomach plummet as goosebumps battled the heat for precedence over your skin.

The past month rushed back to you in disordered flashes – Amsterdam. Your hotel room. Hoseok’s party. Boxes of champagne in the bathroom of Hoseok’s room. The motorcycle ride in Tilburg. The bet. The IV drip in Manchester. Jungkook’s irreparable tendency for big gestures. The pebbles he’d thrown at your window. The kiss in the garden outside the hotel.

You weren’t just his manager. You’d never been just his manager.

“I—I have to go, mum,” you managed to say, leaning against the wall in an attempt to stand up.

You didn’t actually have to go; the girls had promised to wait for you. But your whole body itched with an unrelenting restlessness, and you thought your legs would turn themselves inside out if you didn’t set them in motion right this second.

“Yeah?” she asked with traces of obvious concern in her words. “Call me later, sweetheart, okay?”

“I will,” you promised, lightheaded as you stood and bumped your thigh into the nightstand next to the bed. You unplugged your phone, letting the charger dangle, and navigated the room to the bathroom. Your fingers felt numb as you clutched your phone to your ear. “I—thank you. I love you.”

“Be brave, okay?” your mum said, sending another shiver down your spine. “I love you so much.”

You mumbled something—or may have actually opened your mouth to reply, you weren’t sure of anything anymore—as you ended the call and tossed your phone onto the bed from the doorway of the bathroom.

You needed water first—to wash your face, to drink, and to possibly drown your feelings in.

You weren’t sure, after all, if you were ready to go out with Luna and Maggie tonight. You weren’t sure if you were ready to leave your bathroom at all.

And that was how the girls discovered you twenty minutes later—perched on the counter next to the sink in your bathroom, cradling a towel on your lap as your mind vacillated between impressive emptiness and a thick fog of thoughts that refused to dissipate.

“Hey,” Luna whispered as the two girls slipped into the room. Now that they were here, you thought you could remember hearing a faint knock on the door. “What’s wrong?”

The question finally forced the racing thoughts in your head to stop.

“Nothing,” you responded, using the towel to wipe the water on your face, even though most of it had already dripped onto your black tights a long time ago. You missed the look that Luna and Maggie exchanged. “Sorry, were you—”

“Babe, you’re crying,” Maggie pointed out, carefully pulling your ponytail away from your face and over your shoulder.

You instinctively reached up to your eyes.

“I’m not, this is—it’s water.” You raised the towel as evidence. “I was washing—”

Maggie rubbed your arm patiently. “It’s water coming out of your eyes, babe.”

You glanced over at Luna, but she stood with her arms crossed over her chest and a concerned expression on her face.

We’ll be here a while, her stance was saying. But we’ll get to the bottom of it.

You looked down. “Sorry. I’m really okay.”

“I know you think that if you say you’re okay enough times, people will believe you,” Luna said firmly because her heart had dropped to her heels when Maggie threw the door open, and they found you here, completely dissociated, with a dangerous vacancy in your eyes. “But that’s not what happens. People just pretend to believe you, so you’d feel better. We know you’re not okay.”

You have started to realise that over the last few days.

So, taking an uncertain breath, you told them most of what your mum had just told you: about Jungkook’s heartbreak, and about your own. About his conversations with her, and about your self-imposed vow of silence. About his songs, and about your deliberate blindness for the lyricism, which had always been saturated with sentiments from the past seven years.

You chose not to mention the emptiness you felt after your mum had explained her reasoning for getting back together with your dad because you were worried you would not have enough water or towels to conceal your emotions.

After you finished speaking, Maggie, in her typical manner, made a profound summary of it all: “Well, shit.”

Luna nodded in agreement and tilted her head.

“But wait,” she said. “Why—why is this—but why are you crying about this?”

“I’m not,” you replied. You felt the childish defiance in your tone, but it was so intrinsic for you that you just said it and gave your friend an apologetic look.

“Right.” Luna glanced at her reflection in the mirror behind you, reminding herself that you’d sooner drown yourself in the flood of your tears than admit to crying. “Why are you trying so hard to pretend you’re not crying, then?”

You had to battle yourself a little more until you finally exhaled and leaned your back against the mirror.

“I—well—mostly because it’s just been so long. Fucking ages. And I was, you know. All this time, I was playing my little game.” You raised the pitch of your voice to imitate yourself, “oh, I’m such a great manager, I’m so insanely professional that you wouldn’t even think he’s my fucking ex-boyfriend.” You scoffed, shaking your head. Luna observed the way your hands trembled when you lifted them to your neck. “And he was—he was writing fucking songs about—a-and sending them to my mum to ask for her approval. Her permission. Her—just fucking talking to her. While I wasn’t talking to anyone. While I was acting like I lived in a magic fucking kingdom with purple ponies and rainbows, and no ex-boyfriends.”

The girls shared a look and half of a whole conversation—albeit in different languages, because when Luna opened her mouth to offer comforting words, Maggie placed her hand on your arm and shook her head.

“To be fair,” she said, “before I found out he’s your ex, I would have never suspected it.”

You raised your eyes. “You—well, see! That’s because I was—”

“No, wait, that’s—” Luna interjected, then paused to frown at Maggie. “Actually, hold on. How did you find out?”

You tightened your lips and returned your attention to Maggie. Most of the staff seemed to just know about you and Jungkook—like they knew most things—and you had obviously preferred to pretend like your relationship had never happened, so you’d never asked how they learned about it. But now you were curious.

“He told me,” Maggie stated simply, pulling away from you to straighten her dress. She kept her eyes on the ground.

“Jungkook?” Luna clarified.

Maggie nodded and looked up at you, tentative. “Yeah. A-and I’m afraid I might have mentioned it to Seokjin after that. And a few people might have overheard, and it, um—well, I think the news spread. But, in my defence, the band already knew.”

“The—” You blinked. “Well, I was the one who told the band. I thought I had to, or it wouldn’t be fair.”

“Oh.” She pondered that for a moment. “Okay. So—okay.”

“But how did you find out about it?” Luna pressed.

“Right.” Maggie bit her lip. She looked at you as she spoke. “It was a little over a year ago. We were drunk one night after a gig, and you were outside with Namjoon and Seokjin, having a smoke or whatever. And one of the roadies made a joke, something about how you three always disappear together. You know, a suggestive joke.”

You groaned. Most of the road crew was not affiliated with the company, so you hired new people for each tour. You recalled a few awful experiences with them and wondered if this would be another one.

“Yeah,” Maggie agreed with your scrunched-up nose. “That’s how I reacted, too. But the roadies kept going, because, you know, it was a joke, they didn’t realise it was hurting anybody. So, they were saying how they’ve heard that you had dated some producer from the label before. And they wondered if Namjoon could have been the guy, and Jin’s just the third wheel to kind of throw everybody off your scent.”

Your frown deepened. “Oh, my God.”

“Right,” she said again, nodding. “Well, Jungkook suddenly stood up and left. I didn’t even realise he was upset or anything, but Hoseok leaned over and asked if I could go check on him, so I went. I found him in the parking lot and asked him what was up, why was he looking so irritated or whatever. And he said he’s the guy you dated, not Namjoon. He said it with so much pride, too, kind of like it was an achievement or something.”

This was the moment when you looked down, and Maggie turned to look at Luna instead. Luna was positively glowing as she processed the new information and made mental notes.

“I think I mentioned that to him, actually,” Maggie went on, “because he later said, “it’s not an achievement if I’ve lost it.” But I was so drunk that I didn’t realise what he was talking about. I asked, “what’s ‘it’? What did you lose?” and he just stopped speaking and pulled out another cigarette.”

Something already tight seemed to tighten even more in your stomach.

Luna was the one who replied with a shake of her head and an affectionate observation: “The two of you have some productive discussions when you’re drunk.”

“Hmmm.” Maggie pulled on the skin around her nail. Her mind was focused on the events that happened later and she turned back to you, admitting, “I-I’m sorry I might have been the one who started the chain of—well, I shouldn’t have told anyone. I only meant to ask Jin if he knew about it, and it—”

“It’s okay,” you cut her off. “No one’s ever said anything to me about it.”

Maggie bit her lip again, still uneasy. “I’m—honestly, up until a few days ago when this whole mess with the bet started, I didn’t even think about that conversation with Jungkook, because—I mean, both of you seemed so normal around each other. Well, you know. He flirted with you all the time, I now realise, but he’s kind of a little shit in general, so it didn’t feel weird. And it didn’t even occur to me to think that the reason he was upset that night was because he was drunk and angry about not being with you anymore. I thought he was just irritated for no reason.”

Your eyes were fixed on the bathroom carpet—hoping, irrationally, that if you stared at it hard enough, it would absorb the fact that Maggie had witnessed Jungkook like this in the very prime of your insistence that you could remain professional and your past relationship would never be a problem. In the very prime of your hopeless attempt to run away from yourself.

“Yeah,” Luna said to her, understanding. “He does that sometimes. Gets upset randomly.”

“Yeah.” Maggie nodded. “A little moody. Comes with the job, I guess.”

Luna nodded back. “Yeah.”

This exchange finally snapped you out of your daze and you shook your head with a resigned smile. Luna’s face brightened as she leaned her hip against the counter next to you, and Maggie chuckled, pressing her shoulder against the wall on your other side.

“You know,” Luna said, turning to look at you. “I always wondered how he managed to resist for so long. I mean, you’ve been with the band for over two years now, right? And all he did was just tease you and make jokes. Like a middle-schooler, pulling the hair of his crush. But, really. How did he hold back from doing more?”

You tried, “but why—”

“I’m sure he was doing it for her,” Maggie interjected, pointing at you as though you were an inanimate object—something placed on the bathroom counter for decoration and easily picked up to discuss. “Maybe because he didn’t think she would want him back.”

“Well, what changed?” Luna questioned. “Why did he suddenly act on his feelings?”

“Well, Sid came along.”

“Ah.” Luna nodded, remembering suddenly how Jungkook told her that the bet had given him the push he needed. “That’s right.”

Your gaze ricocheted from one girl to the other. Your mind processed their conversation as if it were the plot of a series you had watched rather than something you had lived through.

“Yeah, and look, it may not have been that hard for him to hold back,” Maggie speculated. “Jungkook is the King of Bottled Emotions.”

“That’s true,” Luna agreed. “And he put all his feelings into his songs, which probably helped for the time being.”

“Yeah. That’s probably exactly it. And I think—”

“Okay!” you interjected, smacking your palms against your thighs. You didn’t think you had it in you to handle another and. “Hi? I’m here, too.”

Both girls turned to you with grins that indicated they were well aware of what they were doing.

“How are you feeling?” Luna asked.

“Confused,” you replied, wiping the corners of your eyes with your fingers. They were stained with your wet eyeshadow.

Luna raised a curious eyebrow. “Is that better than what you were feeling before, or—”

“It’s different,” you said, exhaling with a great strain. “I have to talk to him.”

Luna looked startled as she glanced at Maggie. “Uh—r-right now?”

The unexpected question made you lose what little courage you had. “I—I don’t know?”

“I saw him in the lobby earlier,” Maggie admitted slowly, very upset to find herself as the bearer of bad news tonight. “With Minjun. They, um—they left together.”

“Oh.” You looked down. “Well, that—maybe that’s good.”

Neither of your friends thought that was good as they both looked at each other in alarm. For once, they both thought the same thing, and that was a plan of how to track Jungkook down for you. They knew you well enough to fear that if you two did not talk about it right now, you never would.

“Really?” Luna asked uncertainly. “Because we can try to—”

“No, no,” you said. “Maybe I need to calm down first. Somehow.”

The girls both exhaled quietly. Calming down first implied talking to him second.

“Would, um,” Maggie said, “getting wasted help with that?”

You looked at her, a small smile on your lips. “It might.”

It started raining while the girls helped you fix your make-up, and the three of you stepped into the empty street laughing as the wind played havoc with your umbrella while you waited for the taxi. You hadn’t had time to properly pack your handbag or take any obligatory group pictures together, but you still felt significantly better.

Once you arrived at the bar, you stopped to shake off your umbrella and briefly split from the group as the girls hurried into the warm, dry building. Standing under the canopy by the entrance, you caught something out of the corner of your eye and turned to look. It was a waft of smoke from someone’s cigarette in the smoking area by the side of the building. You didn’t think much of it.

But when you tapped your umbrella against the pavement one last time, the smoker poked his head, gazing somewhere opposite from you. You looked up to see a familiar jet-black hair, styled in an overly gelled quiff, eerily similar to the hairstyle Sid wore every day.

The person did not turn to look at you, but this was enough for dread to grip your stomach, casting a terrible shadow over your uplifted mood.

You tried to rationalise that there was no logical reason for Sid to be in London. This person just couldn’t be him. Sid had showed up in Manchester, sure, but Jungkook had been certain that this was over. Even Sid couldn’t be pathetic enough to follow him all the way to London.

A group of people obstructed your view of the smoker as they tried to pass you to enter the bar. Apologising, you opened the door and finally walked inside.

The place exuded an unexpected elegance. A bar, with numerous tables scattered about, claimed half the space, while a dancefloor was partially concealed behind a row of private mahogany booths. The music was loud, but not overwhelming, and the area was dimly lit by massive chandeliers suspended above each table in every booth. Their faint light barely illuminated the drink menus strewn across the tables.

There weren’t many people here, and this seemed like a lowkey, comfortable place for the night—provided the person outside wasn’t Sid.

“No fucking way,” a voice cried from your left.

Flinching, you turned and noticed the entrance to the men’s room first, and Jude’s expectant eyes next. A chill coursed through you, rendering your legs numb.

No.

No, no, no, no—

“What are the fucking odds?” he exclaimed, grinning. You realised how odd it was for Jude to talk to you without Sid initiating the conversation, and you dreaded, suddenly, that he might come in, too. “This must be—what’s it called when—something about kissing, I think. Kissling? You know? Destiny?”

You swallowed. “Kismet.”

“That’s the one, yeah!” Jude raised his hands victoriously. He appeared to be on something; he had never looked at you for longer than two seconds when he was sober, let alone moved around so vigorously. “Hey, are you here alone?”

“I’m not,” you replied.

“Do you want to join us?” he asked. You didn’t like the plural pronoun one bit.

This had to be a nightmare, you thought. You half-expected to glance down and find yourself standing naked in the middle of the room—and then you would wake up.

Jude’s grin widened when you didn’t respond, and looked around to see if your friends were near. They were, but they seemed to be busy choosing a table.

“You know we don’t bite,” Jude reassured as if your hesitation was about potential biting rather than the insurmountable headache that Sid and Jude collectively induced just by being in the same room with you.

You managed a weak smile. “I’ll pass. You’re hanging around here, then?”

“We were just leaving,” Jude said—who was this “we,” you wondered irritably—and, most impudently, he leaned closer. “We have some molly to keep us company for the rest of the night. They call it mandy in England, did you know? You mix it with speed, and you just fucking fly. You look like you could use some.”

He chuckled and pulled back. You wondered if your reaction showed on your face; Jude did not acknowledge it.

You did not think you needed club drugs. You thought you needed pepper spray.

“Thanks,” you said. “But I’d prefer it if you just left me alone if that’s not too much trouble.”

He laughed—a disturbing echo of Sid’s cackle—and a shiver of revulsion ran down your spine. While Jude wasn’t the most pleasant person to be around, he was usually tolerable when Sid wasn’t by his side. What had he done to him?

“Alright, well, suit yourself,” Jude responded, unfazed. “If you change your mind, you know where to find us.”

You suppressed the urge to rattle off a list of locations where you would look for them—the sewers, a dumpster, a toxic waste site—and pursed your lips.

“So, you’re staying in London?” you asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied cheerily.

You nodded. “Lovely.”

He turned towards the door with his unwavering smirk, but kept glancing back at you every few seconds, seemingly hesitating. You watched his movements like one might watch the launch of a spacecraft—counting down the seconds until it’s in the air and out of your sight.

“Well, we will see you later,” he said, one hand on the handle. He lingered by the door for a good ten seconds, letting the cold air in and clearly anticipating your response.

You cleared your throat. “Not unless I have a say in that.”

He snorted. “Funny. We’ll be thinking of you.”

You did not speak. He did not move.

“Don’t both—” you started and then stopped abruptly.

Jude raised his eyebrows in the doorway. There was something about the way he looked at you, the way he lingered here while Sid smoked outside.

God, this might have been the same instinct that Minjun had to save Jude from Sid, but you sighed and managed a quiet, “Jude, um—be careful, alright?”

A myriad of colours passed on his face as he tried to comprehend your words.

“Wha—why—what do you mean?” he asked, so wide-eyed and utterly astonished that you felt uncomfortable looking at him.

“I’m just saying,” you said awkwardly. “Sid doesn’t care about what happens to you. Make sure you look after yourself. Drink water if you’re going to be tripping on something.”

He stayed frozen, almost statuesque—not blinking, seemingly not even breathing—for so long that you were starting to worry he had astral projected, leaving his corporeal form behind.

“Thank you,” he said after a full minute, with an unexpected clarity that you hadn’t heard from him earlier.

You nodded in response and he finally stepped outside, lingering as if tethered by a new string of hesitation, before finally letting the door close behind him.

When you joined your friends at the table they had picked, you interrupted their conversation about the atmosphere inside the club. Maggie was the first to notice your expression.

“Jesus,” she said. “What happened to you?”

“Jude’s here.”

Both girls looked at each other in dramatic disbelief—Maggie even gasped—and instinctively rose from their seats to crowd around you.

“What? Did you talk to him?” Luna questioned as Maggie pulled you deeper into the booth. The two of them scanned the bar as though Jude was still here, hiding somewhere.

“I—yeah,” you said. “But he left. I think I saw Sid outside.”

Their surprise morphed into complete horror. You gestured for them to sit down.

“But wait—fuck,” Luna said, standing straight. “We can go somewhere else.”

“No, I’m—if they come back, then yes,” you said. “But if they don’t, then let’s just stay here so we don’t run into them elsewhere.”

They looked around warily once more—just in case—before reluctantly settling down. Maggie took a seat next to you, while Luna sat down across the table.

This was when the girls began to fire every question they had, and you repeated the only answer you could offer.

“So, they’re in London,” Maggie said, tapping her nails against the table. “Why?”

“I have no idea,” you said.

“Does Jungkook know?”

“I have no idea.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I have no idea.”

Maggie reclined in her seat, deciding she’s had enough of this game.

“Well,” she said, “that’s great. I need a fucking drink.”

You hummed and brought your hand over the cocktail menu. Luna offered to make the first run to the bar, effectively changing the subject.

But shortly after, when she returned with a tray full of colourful, fruity drinks, you and Maggie were already back to discussing the details of your exchange with Jude—how unusual he seemed, and the awkward turn the conversation took.

“I think that’s enough of Sid and Jude,” Luna said, sitting down across from the two of you and handing out the drinks. “Different topic?”

“Oh, but hold on—while we’re on the topic of awkward conversations,” Maggie said, earning a quizzical look from you both. She ignored it. “Have you talked to that guy? That supervisor guy—you know the one.”

“Oh, Nick?” you asked, picking up your strawberry daiquiri and sliding Maggie’s tequila sunrise towards her. You accidentally nudged the cherry on the rim, causing it to fall into the drink. “Sorry—”

“It’s fine,” she said, deftly rescuing the cherry on its stem and popping it into her mouth.

“I haven’t talked to him yet,” you replied. “But I’m not working for Reconnaissance, that’s decided already.”

“Yeah?” Maggie smirked, punctuating her words with a purposefully seductive sip of her drink. “Anyone in particular help you with that decision?”

Despite her ambiguous question, you took a sip of your drink and felt yourself slowly relax. You were here with your friends. There was no harm to be done to either of you.

“Well, Jin did, actually,” you said. “We had a very productive conversation.”

“Hmm.” Maggie gave Luna a suggestive glance. “And no one else?”

You shrugged. “Yoongi and Namjoon—”

“Okay, you queen of evasion,” Maggie gave up, prompting Luna to giggle on the other side of the table as she absentmindedly stirred her Martini with the paper umbrella. “Are you getting back together with Jungkook or not? After everything that happened tonight?”

The way she said it—almost giving you options, even—was so simple that it made you wonder how much better things might have been between you and Jungkook if the two of you hadn’t been so obnoxiously determined to tiptoe around your feelings and had asked each other questions the way Maggie asked them.

“Well, my mum thinks we should get back together,” you said slowly.

“I care about what you think,” Maggie said—just like that. Luna nodded to herself, making a note to keep drinking until she, too, could start asking complicated questions in such an effortless way.

You finished your drink before speaking.

“I want to try,” you said. “But I’m—you know. I’m also scared that we’ll end up going around in circles, making the same mistakes.”

Maggie regarded you as if you’d dropped your hat in horse shit and put it straight back on.

“Babe, that’s a One Direction song,” she said.

You scoffed and looked down at your glass. “I know. My mum’s favourite, actually. But what I’m trying to say is, I’m scared.”

“Isn’t everyone?” she challenged. “But they still try.”

“They…” Your confidence waned as you realised you might have to talk about the complexities of your parents’ history once again tonight. You wanted to leave that discussion behind, so you finished simply, “they don’t have unsuccessful relationships left, right and centre to get inspiration from.”

“Excuse me?” Maggie arched her brows. “Rue and I have been together for three years—”

“Four,” Luna interjected.

“For four years,” Maggie corrected, “and we couldn’t be happier. Are we not successful?”

Feeling a bit like prey cornered by a very determined predator, you leaned against the back of the booth and cleared your throat. “Well, y-you are, but—”

“Luna and Taehyung!” Maggie continued, fired up. “They’ve been together for a whole year and—”

“Almost two, actually,” Luna said.

“Jesus!” Maggie threw her hands in the air. “I’m bad with dates, okay? Let me live.” She turned back to you as Luna grinned. Exhaling, Maggie continued in a more patient tone, “I mean, there are successful relationships around you. You just choose not to look at them.”

She was right about that, but it didn’t seem quite as simple or straightforward to you.

“Neither of you broke up and then got back together again, though,” you said.

Maggie was mid-syllable (a very frustrated “tha—”) when she realised that she couldn’t really argue. She quieted and frowned, finding her straw with her tongue and taking a long sip of her drink.

Luna took over. “Taehyung and I did, actually.”

Both you and Maggie looked up in surprise.

“What?” Maggie inquired first. “Seriously?”

“Well, it was only for two days,” Luna explained, grabbing a napkin from the dispenser on the edge of the table. “So, I’m not sure if it counts.”

“What happened?” you asked.

She dabbed her lips with the napkin, painting it a gentle shade of plum from her lipstick, and crumpled it.

“We were together for about eight or nine months at the time,” she said. “Rated Riot were on their first cross-country tour. Remember? It was a big deal, and the guys were stressed.” She paused to wait for your nod of confirmation. “We hadn’t seen each other in weeks. He called me one night and just—he said he couldn’t do this to me, that I deserved someone better, that he couldn’t—well, you know. The textbook ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ stuff.”

You and Maggie both nodded.

“How did you make up?” you asked.

“He flew in to see me on his day off and took back everything he’d said.” A faint smile played on her lips as she spoke, but she avoided looking at either of you—the story still felt a little too intimate, too raw to share. “He said he was confused and scared, that’s why he thought it’d be better to break up. But then he said he realised he was even more afraid of losing what we had, so he had to make it right.”

“I remember him flying out to see you,” you said. You remembered yelling at him, too, for leaving the tour right before a concert—but Taehyung usually only listened to Taehyung. “I didn’t know that it was because you broke up. I’m sorry.”

Luna finally looked up, waving her hand dismissively.

“Don’t be, it’s fine,” she said. “We made up. And the break-up barely lasted a few days, I didn’t even have a chance to tell you about it.”

Maggie was smiling as she reached for the brightest remaining cocktail on the table—a Cosmopolitan—and collected the empty glasses, putting them back on the tray. She handed you and Luna glasses of faint pink, peach-flavoured cocktails and settled back in her seat.

You nodded in gratitude and turned to Luna once more. “Were you scared? To take him back?”

“No. I…” she trailed off, searching for a better way to explain herself. Maggie, in the meantime, threw her head back and finished her drink. “I don’t know. I kind of—maybe it didn’t sink in that we had broken up? It was very sudden, we hadn’t seen each other in a while, and I knew his tour schedule. I knew we wouldn’t be seeing each other again anytime soon anyway. So, it didn’t feel like a break-up. I was—I think the whole time, I felt like he would come back eventually. Is that weird?”

“It’s romantic,” Maggie exhaled, resting her head on her palms on the table, a wistful haze in her eyes.

“You’re drooling, Mags,” you pointed out, grinning.

She ran her tongue over her lips, then waved her hand around lazily. “Let me.”

Chuckling, Luna passed her a napkin.

“I don’t think it’s weird, either,” you said. “But I—I guess I never felt that certainty. I didn’t think Jungkook would come back.”

“No? Not even when you found out you’d be managing his band?” Luna asked, her smile widening. “Because—listen—I distinctly remember you calling me after you got the offer to work with them, and you were all panicked, asking me if I knew who they were.”

“Oh.” You felt your own lips stretch into a smile. “I remember, too.”

In hindsight, that day had been absurd. You were offered the manager position for a band that you had never heard of, and during the first meeting with the HR representative at the label, you pretended very passionately that you were familiar with their music and the band members themselves. And the rep, in turn, pretended very passionately that he believed you.

“I don’t,” Maggie spoke up. “You didn’t tell me. What happened?”

“Well, she asked me if I knew them,” Luna recalled and you took a moment to sip your neglected drink, “and I said I’ve heard of them. I liked “Haunting,” one of their early songs.”

The mention of the song triggered the memory of Jungkook humming it to you in the bar in Oslo when he told you that he’d written it about you. This memory, in turn, brought back the conversation you’ve had with your mum. Your pulse sped up, and you finished your drink in a futile attempt to slow it down.

“So, she came over after her meeting, and I played her the music video,” Luna continued. “At that point, I didn’t know the names of anyone in the band. “Haunting” was the only song I’d heard. So, I played the video for her, and I was talking about how I thought the bassist was cute—”

“Oh, that’s right, you weren’t dating Taehyung yet!” Maggie interjected, raising her head with a sudden excitement.

Luna nodded. “Yeah. And then I noticed that she’s just kind of staring at the screen, completely in awe. I thought she liked the song, that’s why. So, I asked, “what did you think? It’s good, right?” and she just turned to me, and said in the most blank tone, “that’s Jungkook.””

Maggie’s mouth hung open as she glanced at you. “You didn’t know he was in a band? In that band?!”

You were counting the lines on the mahogany table and stayed quiet. Maggie gestured speechlessly for Luna to please, for the love of God, continue.

“I was confused, too,” Luna said. “I asked, “what do you mean? Your Jungkook?” and she just said, “yeah,” and went quiet again. Well, she also tried to insist he’s not her Jungkook, but I’m trying to give you the short version of the story. Anyway. I played the video again to check for myself. But he had long hair in it, sort of curly. He looked completely different from what I had pictured in my head based on the few things she’d told me.”

Maggie turned to you again. “And you never showed her what he looked like?!”

“I think I did,” you replied uneasily. You had met Luna shortly after your break-up with Jungkook, but you wanted to believe that your secrecy about your relationship wasn’t that bad.

It was—and Luna grinned as she shook her head.

“She didn’t,” she said, turning to Maggie again. “She made sure to delete every single picture they had together. I only saw him once, when she and I took her dog to the vet. She was explaining the dog’s weight loss to the doctor and had to find a picture for reference. The only photo she could find on such short notice was an old screenshot from Snapchat where Jungkook was the one holding the dog. But he had… like, a bowl cut back then? Not the dog, I mean. Jungkook,” she clarified, and all three of you snorted. “He looked cute, of course. But nothing like the guy in the music video, so I didn’t even think about him when I watched it.”

For some reason, hearing about this random picture hurt. It’s been so long and, obviously, you and Jungkook have been through a lot more together—some of which was far worse than an old picture you stumbled upon in your phone by accident—and still, it hurt.

It wasn’t the memory itself that was painful, but the parts of you that were still alive in it. The parts of you that deleted all the pictures, but kept the screenshots. Threw out all the dried flowers, but kept the matching jackets. Blocked all his profiles, but not his phone number.

And there was another keepsake that you couldn’t bring yourself to delete: a video from that fateful birthday party where Jungkook had drunkenly performed a Backstreet Boys song; one of your friends had recorded it on your phone. As soon as he finished the song, Jungkook—wielding a half-empty bottle—chased after you, threatening to bathe you in champagne if you didn’t delete the video right this instant.

You still had it. You still watched it sometimes.

And then, years later, he walked into your office for the first time, his stupid silver necklace catching the sunlight and blinding you as soon as you looked up—just as it would every day for months to come—and there he was. Existing in your life all over again.

And it felt, you thought in retrospect, like he had never truly left. Every absence of him that you tried to manufacture by deleting your shared pictures only served to accentuate the fact that he’d been here once upon a time, and now he wasn’t. It was like missing a tooth—like pulling it out by force—and then continuously running your tongue over the gap.

“So, how come you still had that screenshot?” Maggie asked, her question snapping your attention back to the present.

You cleared your throat in an attempt to mask the undertow of emotions threatening to surface.

“For my dog,” you said. “He looked very chunky in that picture.”

Maggie grinned. “And what did Jungkook look like?”

“He was…” you looked for an adequate word, did not find one, and finished weakly, “there.”

“Hmm, right,” Luna said, with an ambiguous smile on her face. You were afraid of what she’d say next. “My favourite part about it all, is that you chose to accept the job even after you found out Jungkook is in the band.”

“I personally think that’s beautiful,” Maggie, who found everything beautiful after two drinks, chimed in.

You wanted to disagree, to bring up the fact that this job was a great opportunity—it really was!—and that this was the only reason you’d accepted it. Consciously, at least. But the girls were determined to fully ambush you.

“What did you feel when you saw him again as his manager?” Luna asked, shuffling to the very edge of her seat.

“Nothing,” you said, already a little dizzy from the drinks and the intense attention from your friends. You remembered feeling chaos back then; messy, uncontrollable mayhem roaming in your mind. But, compared to your feelings now, it might as well have been nothing. “I knew we’d have to work together, so I—nothing.”

“Oh!” Maggie groaned. “You’re so full of shit.”

You weren’t prepared for the abrupt shift in her tone. “Wh—”

“Let me show you,” she said, forcing the clasp on her purse open to retrieve her phone.

“Show me what?” you asked, still confused and now a little concerned.

“I’ll show you!” she cried out before proceeding to mumble under her breath with intermittent shouts, “oh, how I’ll show you—like no one’s ever shown you anything! before—you won’t know what hit! you when I show you—”

“We get it, Maggie,” Luna interrupted, reaching out to touch Maggie’s wrist. “Get on with it, please.”

“I’m looking—here!” She tapped her screen. “Here, look at this.”

She pointed her phone at Luna, who looked at it and appeared ever more confused than you felt, even though you hadn’t even seen what was on it.

“What—who is that?” she asked.

“That’s her and Jungkook!” Maggie bellowed, sweeping her arm so far back to point at you that she nearly yanked out your earring. “Sitting in an empty bathtub, drinking champagne, and laughing!”

A rush of heat surged through you as Luna gasped and covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh, my God!”

You leaned across the table to grab Maggie’s phone from her.

The picture was beautiful, which was the first thing that you noticed. It was black and white with melancholic shadows swirling in the periphery. It was taken, you realised, from the corridor outside the bathroom during Hoseok’s party in Amsterdam.

Your stomach dropped once more tonight, because, of course, this was the night that Jungkook had named his latest song after.

Your skin felt wrong all of a sudden, and everything inside of you wanted to come out. You gripped Maggie’s phone tighter.

In the picture, both you and Jungkook had your backs to the camera, only visible from the shoulders up because the bathtub concealed the rest. You were holding glasses of champagne.

Jungkook’s gaze, captured in the dimly lit frame, was fixed on you. His head was turned slightly, and if it weren’t for the bright smile on his face, you might not have known it was him; the photograph was too dark. You, on the other hand, had your head thrown back in laughter and blended seamlessly into an unrecognisable silhouette.

Your heart pounded against your ribs as you looked up from your friend’s phone. “When—how did you even take this?”

“You left the door open, you idiots,” Maggie replied.

“Let me see it again,” Luna asked, taking the phone from your shaking hands. “This looks like it could be an actual film poster for an indie romantic drama.”

“Titled,” Maggie added, “When In Bath…”

The two girls snickered, cracking each other up by nodding along to the joke until they were pounding their fists into the table in laughter. You wondered if this was the alcohol.

“Alright, alright,” you interrupted. “It—it’s a great picture. But it doesn’t mean anything.”

“It means you’ve been in love with each other from the very beginning,” Maggie said, seizing the opportunity to play the role of a triumphant attorney, delivering a powerful closing statement in court. “And you can try to act like you haven’t been, like it all came as such a big shock, like you’d moved on, so, oh my God,” she gasped theatrically, “where are all these feelings coming from?!”

You groaned, but Maggie was undeterred, revelling in the dramatic momentum she had built.

“But this,” she lifted her phone as though in a poor production of The Lion King, “speaks louder than words. We know he’s loved you the whole time, your mum confirms it. But look at this. Look at how you’re leaning into him as you laugh. Look at how you’re touching his shoulder. You’ve loved him all along, too.”

Luna, definitely tipsy already, burst into energetic applause, and Maggie took a dramatic bow, her necklace clattering against the table. In her flourish, she nudged her empty cocktail glass with her shoulder, and you leaned over to catch it before it knocked your bag off the table. A few people from nearby booths turned in your direction.

“So, you see,” Maggie continued before you could ask the two of them to take it easy, “all you’re doing is just making excuses.”

“Well. Here’s another one,” you said, sliding out of the booth. “I’m going to grab us some snacks.”

The girls groaned and made various comments about how they knew this would happen—but their complaints soon transformed into a list of drinks they wanted you to bring back. You smiled, grateful for their short attention span, and diligently noted down their orders on Maggie’s phone, since you’d left yours at the hotel.

And still, even as you walked away, your heart refused to rest.

Jungkook had been right when he said that you needed to talk to your mum. Really, you did. But it wasn’t just her words, her experiences, and her arbitrary decisions that convinced you that you should have listened to the beating in your chest when he was in the room with you.

It was your friends, too—the family you had found and did not even realise it. It was their patience, their courage, their certainty, and their belief.

You felt a lot more determined to see what would happen. A lot more daring to make it happen. And a lot more convinced that it would be okay, eventually.

As soon as you reached the bar, you immediately noticed the change in atmosphere. The club, initially laid-back, had completely transformed as the clock struck midnight. Groups of young people filled the space, hanging out by the bar, dancing, or just chatting loudly at their tables. It took you a while to navigate through the lively crowd and return to your table with your order.

When you did, the girls grabbed the cocktails as if they had never seen any sort of liquor in their lives. They downed them in several big gulps, and, amused by their enthusiasm, you joined in, too.

As the glasses—and the bowls of roasted pistachios—on the tray emptied, the rest of the night blurred into swirls of clapping, laughing, spinning around on the dancefloor, meeting Mick Jagger’s doppelganger, buying drinks, swapping shoes with each other, losing your jackets somewhere around the club, having a Macarena dance battle, buying more drinks, recording yourselves singing along to an Elton John song that had no business being played in a club, starting a very successful conga line (not to an Elton John song), and stealing someone’s pink feather boa.

It was a night.

Jungkook had made plans with Minjun to distract himself from thoughts of you until tomorrow, and the two of them ended up doing very cultured things. But strolling around West End in the British drizzle wasn’t nearly as enjoyable as they had tried to convince themselves it’d be. Their enthusiasm about this excursion quickly faded, leading them to the nearest pub for a couple of drinks.

Several hours later, when they returned to the hotel, Jungkook didn’t see any light coming from under your door, indicating that you were still out with Luna and Maggie.

He wanted to text you the whole day, but he held back. Taehyung had told him to give you space; that was good advice. Jungkook only managed to follow it partly, but now that you were on proper speaking terms again, he didn’t want to ruin it by suffocating you.

He was bad at this, though.

He took a long shower and attempted to dry his hair, but the second his phone lit up with a text message, he dropped everything he was holding and executed a very intricate leap for the device—slamming his knee into the bedframe in his excitement.

Hissing in pain, he tumbled pitifully onto the carpet, turned on his back, fixed the towel around his waist, and hoisted himself with a grunt.

Droplets of water from his hair splattered on the screen as he unlocked his phone and momentarily confused the facial recognition. Cursing, he entered his passcode to check the sender and cursed once more when he saw that the text hadn’t come from you.

It was yet another message from the same unknown number, and Jungkook threw his phone back on the bed without bothering to read it.

He dried his hair first, then changed into sweats. It was then—while he was pulling his hoodie over his head—that the realisation struck him: unlike the previous texts from this same number, this one wasn’t fully capitalised.

Tentatively, he picked up his phone again and opened the one-sided conversation. He found that, throughout the evening, he’d received four messages from this number. The first contained a video attachment—the preview screen was black, and Jungkook did not want to click on it—followed by three taunting texts:

Remember this? :)

Come on, take a nice trip down memory lane with me, it’s a cute little clip

Do you think your manager would like to see this too? ❤️

He scrolled back up to the attachment and realised that his hands had begun to shake. Even though he had a feeling what he was going to see, he still clicked on the video and held his breath.

Honestly, it wasn’t as bad as he’d expected. Although to be fair, his expectations might have been unrealistic. Unless Sid had resorted to secret cameras, which was extreme even for him, Jungkook had no reason to get this panicked.

But this video was still not good.

It was filmed in a nightclub and the scenes played out in short flashes under the flickering strobe lights, illuminating the dancing bodies around the person recording it. The camera panned to Jungkook and the two people he was dancing with—both dressed in dark leather jumpsuits.

Latex, he saw then. Not leather.

The dancing itself wasn’t the worst part of the video, but Jungkook struggled to decide what was. First, his heartbeat faltered as he watched one of his dance partners pour champagne into his mouth, licking off the excess that missed his lips. Then, he nearly blacked out as the video concluded with him on top of a table—dancing alone at first, and then with his tongue down someone else’s throat, and his hands—

He had a vague recollection of what happened next and stopped the video before he could see it.

It was clear that Sid had to be the one with the voyeuristic lens. Jungkook had gone clubbing with him that night; Jude was sick and Minjun didn’t want to go.

Two things happened then, and Jungkook was vividly aware of both. First, his phone froze: despite turning the video off, it continued to play the faint melody of an old Benny Benassi remix. And then a disconcerting acceleration seized his heart as though the video itself had seeped into his bloodstream.

Instinctively, he turned his phone off and tried to breathe. The hotel room around him fell into a pleasant silence, but that only made the thumping in his chest more pronounced.

Attempting to ease his rising nausea, Jungkook tried to keep his mind clear: the video had been filmed years ago. He wasn’t sure if he was in Rated Riot yet, but he was sure that the two of you were no longer together. Another helpful fact was that, since you became his manager, you have witnessed him in far worse situations—and rescued him from them, too.

And yet, he did not want you to see this.

He wanted to grow, to extricate himself from the clutches of toxic friendships, to find and build a future with you. And this video felt like a painful regression into his past. An embarrassing leap back.

Overwhelmed with discomfort, he chose to keep his phone off for the remainder of the night, even if that meant missing a text from you.

And then, later that night—or rather, in the early hours of the next day—Jungkook was jolted awake by a violent rattle of the doorknob.

Honestly, for an unsettling, half-asleep moment, he thought this was Sid barging in.

However, as his mind gradually woke up, he felt a more realistic concern: other bands had overzealous fans breaking into their hotel rooms. No one on the staff thought that Rated Riot were on a level where they’d need extra security measures, but now he worried that was a mistake.

Just to be safe—in case this was Sid, after all—Jungkook grabbed the nearest available weapon: a lamp from his bedside table. But the cable limited his reach, forcing him to crouch and lean forward to push the handle down and open the door before jumping back into a defensive position.

He nearly dropped the lamp when the door swung open, and he saw you outside.

It was your presence, in general, that he noticed first. Then it was your outfit: the short black satin dress with thin shoulder straps and thick, black tights with a curious embroidery around your thighs. Then it was your tied-back hair. Your dark eyeshadow and glistening lip gloss. A pink feather stuck to your earring.

He didn’t have it in him to move or to return the lamp to its place.

“Oh, shit,” you said, trying to make sense of the scene before you. You propped yourself against the doorframe. “My key wasn’t turning. I thought I left my room unlocked. What are you—wait. Wait, wait.”

You closed your eyes and squeezed the bridge of your nose with your right hand. Jungkook lowered the lamp to the floor, keeping his gaze on you.

“Okay, I’m good,” you decided. “The room was spinning really fast for a second there.” You chuckled, then stopped abruptly and narrowed your eyes at him. “Am I on the right floor?”

Jungkook blinked, then scoffed at the unexpected question.

“You are,” he confirmed, but, even drunk, you recognised the peculiar look on his face—as though there was something else he was waiting for you to realise.

“Shit.” Your eyes widened. You whispered, “I am still in London, right?”

This time, he couldn’t help a small laugh as he approached you. First, he plucked the feather out of your earring. Then, he led you into his room, his arm around your shoulders.

“You are,” he assured again. “You just got the wrong room.”

You exhaled in relief. “Oh, thank fuck.”

Amused, Jungkook directed you towards the bed, which was the only comfortable piece of furniture here. You plopped down on it, bouncing slightly from the force of your energetic descent.

“Can I sit down for a second?” you asked belatedly. “Fuck these shoes. They’re not even—not even mine.”

Jungkook glanced down at your feet. There was a black platform heel with an ankle strap on your left foot, and a burgundy counterpart on your right.

He lifted his eyes back to your face, very confused. “They’re—whose shoes are they?”

“The black one is Maggie’s,” you explained, reaching for the strap, but struggling because the bed was too soft, and the room spun too much. “The other one is Luna’s. We thought it would be funny.”

He bit his lip. It wasn’t the mismatched shoes that entertained him in particular—not while he was sober, at least—but rather your sense of humour when you were drunk.

“Lucky that they’re the same height,” he observed.

“No, no, no, no. We saw that they were, that is why.” You hiccupped and it veered you away from the topic at hand. “Anyway, it’s not funny anymore. Now it hurts.”

You finally reached the strap of the black heel, but could not figure out the intricate workings of the clasp on it. Jungkook lowered himself to his knees in front of you.

“Let me help you,” he said.

You shook your head, maintaining your grip on the strap as you felt his fingertips ghost over yours.

“I can do it,” you insisted, passionate about your independence even when you could not tell what city you were in.

“I’m sure you can,” he said, gracefully pulling your hand away from the shoe. “But let me do it anyway.”

You huffed—in fervent protest or in reluctant agreement, he wasn’t sure. After another half-sigh, half-groan, you moved your hand to your lap and dropped down on your back on his bed.

He smiled softly as he unbuckled the strap and slid the black heel off. As he did, he noticed that the embroidery on your tights was a thin row of roses—and it wrapped around your thigh.

He found that very interesting and looked away immediately.

“So, anyway,” he said, fighting with the strap on the other shoe. “What happened to drinking responsibly?”

You hiccupped again. “Famous last words.”

He chuckled, lifting your leg onto his knee to get a better look at the stubborn clasp. Your contented sigh was the only indication of you being aware that one of your shoes was already off.

“I spoke to my mum,” you announced without any sort of transition or buildup.

Jungkook tightened his grip on your ankle in uncontrollable surprise, forcing you to lift your head off the bed with a puzzled look.

“Oh,” he managed, releasing his hold. “Yeah?”

Another dreamy sigh passed your lips as your thoughts clouded with memories, then cleared in a blissful, inebriated ignorance once more.

“Yeah,” you said, lowering your head again. The mattress was hard, but it felt very nice. “And then to Luna and Maggie.”

“And, uh, what did they say?” he asked, finally pulling the shoe off.

He got up to place the heels in a corner by the nightstand, so you wouldn’t trip over them when—if?—you stood up.

“A lot of things,” you replied, your words floating somewhere on the edges of consciousness, leaving Jungkook to grapple with the unpredictability of your confessions.

“Okay,” he said. “Maybe we should talk about all of that tomorrow.”

A smile started to form on your lips, but it was swiftly interrupted by a yawn. “Ye—yeah. That’d be good.”

Trying to push Sid’s messages away from resurfacing in his mind at the mention of your upcoming conversation, Jungkook observed your futile attempt to sit up. Having been there before—fairly recently—he empathised with the challenge of keeping your head up when you were drunk.

“Are you sure you want to stand?” he asked as you wriggled on your back, stretching out your hands helplessly—sort of like a tipsy turtle that had tipped over on its shell.

It was dangerous, he realised, just how completely infatuated with you he was to still find this incredibly endearing.

“I must,” you declared with an angry determination. Your anger was largely fuelled by the strain in your neck, caused by your perplexing attempts to lift your head and your legs at the same time. “This isn’t my room.”

It could be, Jungkook thought, at least for tonight.

However, the right thing to do was to guide you back to your own room.

“Come on,” he said, taking your hand and settling beside you to wrap his other arm around your shoulders. “Let’s get you to your bed, then.”

“That would be—” you began, gasping when he abruptly pulled you to your feet and the entire room decided to flip upside down. “Oh—you know what? I’m not sure I’m enjoying this spinning much.”

He looked at you in alarm. “Are you going to be sick?”

“I would prefer not to.”

Jungkook pursed his lips to restrain his amusement.

“I don’t remember the last time I saw you this drunk,” he noted.

“Pity,” you mumbled, your eyes closed. You tried to move your lips as little as possible, convinced that this would help with the dizziness. “If you remembered, maybe you could make the spinning stop.”

He tried to take a step forward with you in his arms. “Can you walk? Or I can carry you.”

You opened your eyes and took a deep breath. Dizzy or not, this was now a matter of pride.

“I have—” You peered down as if to check and the carpet by his bed seemed to wobble. “I have legs. Of course, I can walk.”

The proclamation proved short-lived as you stumbled over the edge of the carpet almost immediately. Jungkook shook his head and tightened his hold on you.

“Alright, come here.” He lowered his hands to your midriff. “Ready? One, two—”

“No, no, no,” you protested, pressing your palms firmly against his hands. He felt the cold metal of your room key against his skin; you must have slipped the keyring onto your finger after you tried to use it on his door. “Either I walk, or I crawl. No carrying. Too much spinning as it is.”

He doubted if carrying you would really make your dizziness worse, but he relented nonetheless.

“Come on, then,” he said. “Hold onto me.”

You finally agreed, leaning against him with nearly your whole strength as you attempted to set one foot in front of the other. Your limbs felt wooden and numb.

“You know—it might’ve been nice if you came with us,” you said.

Jungkook felt his heart rate pick up again. You probably felt it too, since your body was pressed into his, but he trusted that alcohol had rendered you oblivious to everything outside of yourself, so he did not worry about it.

“Yeah?” he replied. “I don’t think I could have walked home in your heels, though.”

You laughed so heartily that he had to pause in front of the door before opening it, a cautious—and almost possessive—instinct to shield this moment from prying ears.

“No, no. I meant because it would have been nice,” you clarified meaningfully.

His smile was warm when he looked at you. “Yeah, you said that.”

Dazed, you turned your head to meet his gaze, inadvertently granting him an opportunity to lift you over the threshold as your attention on your feet wavered. “I did?”

“Mmhmm.” He continued to look at you—while holding you so close that you were starting to question how many drinks you’ve really had tonight—as he removed the keyring from your finger. You looked down, confused. You’d forgotten you were clutching your keys in your palm. “So why did you want me to come? Did you miss me that much?”

“Hmm,” you lifted your eyes and poked his cheek in a rare moment of bold affection, “I’m not drunk enough.”

He smiled again. Holding you to him—his grip around your waist was tenacious; not even the slippery satin of your dress posed a challenge—he managed to unlock your door and open it. He wondered if you remembered that your room was three steps away from his.

“Okay,” he said, walking you to your bed in complete darkness with impressive skill. Neither of you bumped into anything or tripped. “Let’s get you into bed until you’re not drunk at all. How does that sound?”

A nod was all you could muster.

Your eyes were barely open when you felt him gently lower you on the bed. Your body, of course, succumbed to gravity with a great eagerness and you dropped onto your back with a grunt the second he let go of you. You felt a sharp corner digging into your side and exhaled in relief when you realised that was your phone. This must have been where you had left it.

Face buried into the pillows, you mumbled, ��ffank-oo.”

He deciphered that as an expression of gratitude and carefully rolled you onto your back by pulling the duvet from underneath you. You were still in your dress, but he didn’t dare to go as far as helping you change. You looked half-asleep anyway.

“I’m right there if you need me, okay?” he said, untangling the dark grey duvet and throwing it over you in one swift motion. “Behind the wall.”

Peering at him with half-closed eyes, you turned onto your side.

“I’ll knock,” you said as he tucked the duvet around you in a manner that felt almost familiar, almost routine.

“You do that,” he replied. “Goodn—”

“I think Sid’s in London.”

Your words sucked the air out of the room and locked his breath in his throat.

This sudden lack of filter—or any warning on your face that you were about to say something completely shocking—unnerved him. He had forgotten what a rollercoaster your intoxication could be.

“What?” he blurted out and shook his head. “No. No, that can’t be true.”

You shrugged one of your shoulders against the pillow. Your eyes were still closed.

“I talked to Jude,” you said. “And he said he wasn’t there alone.”

Jungkook turned a few shades paler—a few more and he might have become completely transparent.

“You talked to Jude?” he repeated. “A-about what?”

“Nothing much,” you said. Irony flashed briefly across your features when you opened your eyes. “Just if I’d like to do ecstasy with them. They mix it with speed. And then they fly.”

The surprise on Jungkook’s face was loud. He could not fathom that Jude—of all people—would invite you—of all people!—to do this with them, when you never even drank sparkling water if Sid was in the room.

“Ecstasy?” he repeated.

“MDMA,” you clarified helpfully.

“No—I know what—he—what did you say?”

Your gaze met his for a moment, and the look on your face suddenly appeared very sober.

“I obviously agreed,” you said, “and a beautiful pink unicorn took me back to the hotel.”

He gave you a look and you closed your eyes again, smirking.

“I told him no,” you said. “Or something to that effect.”

Jungkook finally exhaled.

“Okay,” he murmured, glancing at the door of your room. “That—that’s good. I-I’ll take care of it.”

Your eyes flew open, alarm creeping onto your tired expression.

“No,” you said—the steel in your tone made him turn back to you. “Don’t—leave them be.”

“But they’re—”

He stopped when you reached out from under the duvet to put your hand over his outstretched wrist. He hadn’t even realised he was gesticulating—too lost in his sudden panic—but your touch grounded him right away.

“I don’t care,” you reiterated, your words slightly slurred but very firm, a bit like you were talking in your sleep—saving him in the midst of a nightmare that you didn’t realise you were having. “I don’t want you near them.”

“Okay,” he said easily. And again, “okay.”

You watched him for another few seconds, silently witnessing the storm of thoughts behind his eyes. But your own heavy eyelids soon overpowered the few semi-sober areas of your brain.

As you settled back against your pillow and let go of his hand, Jungkook grew even more aware of the texts—and the video—that Sid had sent him.

“Go to sleep,” you mumbled as if sensing his apprehension.

“I will,” he said. Your lips parted as you breathed slowly and he could tell that you’ve told him all that you could manage tonight.

“Thank you for helping me,” you added quietly.

“No problem. That’s what friends do, right?”

You snickered softly and a hazy memory of all that you did as friends rose to the surface of your drunken, tired mind.

“Hmmm.” You buried your face in the pillow, whispering wearily, “I want to kiss you. But I’m so drunk.”

Oh, he realised, breathless. So, that wasn’t all that you could manage to tell him tonight, after all.

Inhaling sharply, he sat down on the edge of your bed because he didn’t trust his legs anymore.

Your intoxication, he thought, should have come with a warning: not suitable for young children and those with faint hearts.

“You—you are,” he said. “You’re really drunk.”

“Tomorrow,” you promised.

Jungkook realised that merely sitting might not be enough to prevent his head from floating away from his body as he gripped your mattress tighter.

“Oh,” he said.

A hint of concern flickered in your drunken mind, and you lifted your heavy head. “Okay?”

“Ye—okay. Of course,” he said, rising to his feet so you wouldn’t strain to look at him. The room seemed to sway, and he wondered if your intoxication was contagious. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

His next actions were reflexive as he leaned down to press a soft kiss on your forehead before drawing the duvet up to your chest. You hummed in content and Jungkook had to turn away, frightened by his own elated expression in the reflection of your hotel room window.

Over the years, you had been the one taking care of him—almost all the time. He couldn’t even remember a lot of the times when you found him, completely wasted, and helped him get back to his hotel room. Or to the bedroom in his family’s house. But even though the details of those nights were blurred in his memory, he remembered every morning – when he woke up tucked in his bed, and the faint scent of your apple shampoo still lingered in his room.

He wondered, as he paused in the doorway, turning to look at you over his shoulder, if you’d remember much from this night.

For a minute, he watched the gentle rhythm of your chest rising and falling as you drifted into sleep, and he was alive with the realisation that the two of you finally had something that he thought you’d lost forever.

You had tomorrow.

chapter title credits: sleep token, “euclid”

prev ○ next

[rewh0re]

2:55 AM

Ft. Itoshi Sae

Got this idea and i just had to write it because why not. Anyways. Reblogs + feedbacks are highly appreciated!!

It's late. It's way past midnight and you both should be sleeping instead of sitting on the sofa with your heads in your hands trying to figure out how to get out of the problem at hand. You tried your best to sleep but the persistent buzzing of your phone due to the incoming notifications left you sleepless.

"I thought we were careful enough," you took your phone in your hand, opening Instagram only to be spammed by notifications that said you were tagged in several photos and comments by random accounts. There were also thousands of follow requests from said accounts.

"We were careful. They just get their way every single time," Sae had talked to his manager a few hours ago about how a picture of the both of you had taken the internet by storm.

You were out for a date with Sae after his recent victory. The picture was taken after the date when Sae had kissed you under the street light beside an empty park or at least what you thought was an empty park. When you first saw the picture trending, the fans did not yet know who you were, you were still an unknown person who seemed to be Sae's significant other. Within a few hours however, they had found out your name and your account and since then you were on the receiving side of several hate comments and a few supportive ones.

'Sae can do better.'

'They aren't all that.'

'ugh Sae, leave them and date me.'

And other such comments were plaguing the picture. You got several such DMs too that honestly made you feel a bit down and you weren't feeling your best after seeing these.

But along with these there were also a few supportive comments that asked the people to leave you both alone and show you some respect and that it was Sae's choice who he dated and if he was happy it was enough. These comments made you smile. People could be bitter as well as sweet, you concluded.

"What's wrong with the people commenting all of this bullshit? Don't they have anything better to do in life?" Sae's eyes narrowed as he scanned through the various comments and captions.

"This was bound to be the result once our relationship was made public. I'm not complaining, some people can be weird about their idols getting into a relationship," you sighed as you silenced your phone and kept it on the coffee table. This was definitely not good for your mental health as you already thought about Sae finding someone better, probably some pretty fan of his. These thoughts plagued you at night.

"Don't you dare think about me leaving you or something. Don't you let these petty jobless people make you think that you're anything less than perfect for me," Sae held your hand as he seemed to catch on your troubling thoughts. He somehow always knew what was going on with you. Somehow he could read you like an open book. His eyes told you how much he loved you and how important your presence was in his life.

"I'll try Sae. That's the only thing I can do right now. Anyways, these will die down with time. We should sleep now. It's late," you kissed his cheek as you got up from the sofa and headed towards your bedroom.

You stopped midway through, as you noticed your boyfriend was not following you. Instead, he was still on the sofa and it looked like he was deep in his thoughts.

"Aren't you coming? Let them be, as I said it'll die down--"

"I'm gonna make it public first thing in the morning," he turned around to look at you, a serious look in his eyes.

"Sae..people already know, there's no need to--"

"No no, I'm gonna confirm it in the morning. It's been long enough. I'm not doing this for the media either, I'm doing this because I cannot keep loving you in private any longer. I'm tired of always being so on guard with you when we go out," he interrupted you yet again as he closed the distance between you both, now standing in front of you with your face in his hands.

"Sae.." you started but you honestly did not know what to say.

"Are you okay with that?" He looked deep into your eyes as if he was searching for your answer in them.

"Okay," you let out a little laughter as you pecked his lips and broke away from him. "But for now, please, please come to bed."

And true to his words, the next morning you were tagged on Sae's official Instagram post which was a picture of you kissing his cheek as a small, barely there smile was plastered on Sae's face. You smiled a little at the post, not caring about the incessant buzzing of your phone.

'I love you a bit too much' read the caption.

[ggukkiedae]

my international legality 🦊💜

weverse 221213, 11:20pm

yoonmj goes live real quick for her birthday

italics are spoken in english

not proofread, i'm recovering from finals and those two ot7 photos from today 😭 but just wanted a little birthday snippet for my girl

the live starts with her smiling and checking herself in the camera

"give me a minute, guys, then i'll start"

she hums an unfamiliar tune for a few minutes before she puts on a smile

"hi, guys! long time no see on weverse, huh?"

bestie you've been on here constantly

"i know" she laughs "i meant on live. i know i said i was on hiatus until i graduate, but i thought it would be nice to come on here and celebrate my birthday with you guys, even just for a bit"

she silently reads through the comments, greeting hi to a few different comments in different languages

a small shake of the camera made her let out a small laugh while she hit someone off camera

why are you in a car?

"well, i'm on the way home because i spent the day with the tannies. kookie oppa is driving, and jiminie oppa is holding the camera for me. we're gonna have a midnight dinner at my place. maybe i should play midnight rain"

she turns the camera to the two sides, showing off a driving jungkook and a wrapped up jimin.

"you are not playing a sentimental song when we should be celebrating," jungkook gave her a quick look before turning back to the road

"i believe our aegi deserves a happy greeting song," jimin coos before starting to sing. "even if she is now considered an adult all over the world."

jimin and jungkook started singing happy birthday, both going extra and making riffs while she just laughed and covered her face in amusement. they finished one round of the happy birthday song in korean then one in english then again in korean

jungkook held up a finger in front of her, which she blew. he quickly folded it over, imitating a candle going out

you look tired. are you okay?

"i'm fine," she smiled, "finals just ended, and today was quite emotionally draining. for now, i'm on break and get to watch my friends perform"

she sat back a little, probably remembering the different stages she's watched from home recently rather than from in the venue like she was used to in the past how many years

how was txt in manila?

"how did you guys know i was there?"

jimin laughed off camera. yoonmi looked over at something, probably jimin showing her something on his phone. she chuckled and shook her head while grabbing the phone from him and showing it on camera"

"remind me to put this on my instagram story"

there were four photos. first was a selfie she was taking while seri and beomgyu squished their cheeks to hers. second was one of her laughing at yeonjun who had her in a headlock. third was her doing a "chic model" pose with the soobin and the maknaes. fourth was a decent photo of all seven of them, the last photo being them with the banners from the manila concert. the caption read "happy birthday to the most supportive sunbae who flew to her hometown for our last stop on tour. txt's honorary 7th member, happy birthday!"

"you guys should have tweeted this and tagged the bangtan account," she laughed, "but thank you. i love you guys. as for the concert, it was amazing, of course. txt are amazing performers, and they've grown so much. i honestly can't wait to see the distances they'll reach with how talented they are. and, before you ask, i have an nda that keeps me from spoiling anything about their comeback"

"apparently that doesn't work for bangtan content," jungkook snorted.

she leans back with a sheepish smile on her face "i'm not technically under an nda for bangtan things, they just trust me"

"more like they trust us to keep you from spoiling," jungkook shot back playfully

"yeah, yeah, don't start, it's my birthday"

do you have a birthday wish?

"i got part of what i wanted," she smiled. "i spent the day with the tannies, and i'm about to have a midnight dinner with the oppas, my brother, and his family. i just kinda wish i could see channie oppa and our family. my boyfriend... i really want to see mark oppa, too, but we haven't seen each other recently because we've both been busy"

her fingers lightly tugged at her hair while she spoke

"it's just been kinda... bittersweet? yeah today's been strange, but i'm glad i get to spend time with people i love. you guys included, of course!"

she laughs to herself "gosh, i've gotten so bad at lives"

a hand reaches into frame, stopping her own from tugging her hair. she smiles down and squeezes at it, smiling at the side jimin was sitting on in thanks for comforting her

yoongi marry me

she bursts into giggles while jimin and jungkook are just laughing. it takes a good few minutes for them to calm down before she speaks

"i'll be sure to pass the message on"

the members' greetings for you were so cute!

you really are still bangtan's baby

she looks up at jungkook and jimin "yeah, it was pretty sweet. i just didn't think they were doing anything specific these past few weeks when they kept telling me to pose certain ways with them. how they came up with recreating our first photos together, i don't know. i cried, but when do i not cry?"

jungkook's voice cut in "you should have seen her, it was like someone played the saddest video on earth"

there was a smack and jungkook crying out in pain. yoonmi laughed while some bickering played out in front of her of jimin telling jungkook to stop picking on yoonmi while jungkook justified that that's how their friendship works

"this is what i deal with on a daily basis" she pretended to roll her eyes "this is my reality, guys"

if you had the chance to teleport and pause time today for as long as you want and choose who to unfreeze with you, what would you do?

"i'd visit channie oppa and my family," she smiles to herself, "i'd ask for a lazy day with them because i know channie oppa needs to rest. then probably hang out with mark oppa. finally, i'd have all the tannie oppas with me for a nice meal. all of them. and maybe we could talk about old memories for a bit before we move on with our lives again."

"that actually sounds really nice," jimin noted. jungkook hummed in agreement.

she zoned out for a bit before a notification from her phone popped up. she read it and smiled.

"the bighit 01s are coming over for midnight dinner, too," she smiled before looking up. "we're getting pretty close, i think, so i might have to end this live here. thanks for the birthday greetings, luvs. i appreciate you all! see you when my hiatus is over, i'll be freshly graduated with some new things in store for you"

with that, she began waving at the live, moving the camera forward so if caught jimin in shot as well. he waved, too. "bye, army! take care!"

there was a shout goodbye from jungkook, making jimin and yoonmi laugh. she moves closer to the camera, crossing her eyes slightly before laughing and moving back

"thanks for spending this international legality car party with me. sorry i didn't prepare much. love you, army! see you when i see you!"

-end-

taglist: @sunflower-0180 @seaoffangirling @yourwonderbelle @1-800-enhypennabi @kamiiyou @strwberrydinosaur @uraveragefangirlsposts @caratinylyfe @1-800-minji @one16core @kimhyejin3108 @chansols @akshverse @toriluvsfics @billboard-singer @stopeatread (taglist/s open! just drop an ask or a dm <3)

[thundermoon69]

"I'm sure it meant nothing "

Cat said too me as I was still staring at the status beck had uploaded earlier this morning with a girl name Alyssa vhagan who's happens too be a famous model and had a famous daddy

I rolled my eye's "if it was nothing then why he caption 'the world's most beautiful girl love you glad we gotten too hang out today.'

Now see normally I don't mind beck hanging out with other girl's I'm not your jealous type the thing that gotten me piss of was the captain he put on it.

How can he love this girl?

What was so amazing about her?

Expect that she's a model

and have a rich daddy?

Him and I have been together for a year and never once have he told me he love me. But like we both said we would do it when the times right witch I didn't care.

But after that post it started something in me what if the girls at the school were saying were true

That he just felt pitty for me

That I wasn't Good enough for him?

Ughh this is why I don't fall in love cause then it ruins everything why did that damn Canadian man

Have too melt my heart.

"Y/n!" Tori yelled I jump out of my thoughts and look at her

"What?" I snapped "look he probably known her for a while"

I shurg " I don't care if he wants that he can have that" I said getting up walking out the door but then bump into the one person I didn't wanna see

Beck

I rolled my eyes

"Hey, I was um gonna knock."

I scoft rolling my eye's "why don't you knock on Alyssa Vaughn's door"

He sighs and I stare at him so he knew I was mad.

"Look her and I are just friend's "

"And you say I love you too your friend's? "

"Y/n" he says but I cut him off

" I never hear you say I love you too any of your friends for as long as we known each other.

But if you wanna be around that then fine by me down bring me down when your doing it."

"Can you calm down for a second let me explain."

"What'd is there too explain beck?"

We were still standing outside my house and I'm sure everyone could hear so I sighed softly and walked around back and he fellow we sat on the long chair by the tree.

" if this is your way of breaking up with me. Then it's a lame move oliver." I only said his last name when I was piss mad and that was me still.

"Y/n I'm not breaking up with you, what in the world makes you think that?"

I held up my phone shown him the picture

" I don't love her the way I love you."

I scoft "Yeah... say that when I'm not mad at you"

"Your stubborn as hell you know that" I shurg

"Maybe I should hate you again..... it was easier that way."

Hopefully he didn't hear the last part but I know he did cause he tense up a bit.

But I wasn't even gonna lie yeah back before we started being friends and then dating shit was alot easier I didn't have too show my feelings worry about being jealous cause he was there no matter what

But now over a year my feelings been harder too control cause of this man who stands before me

This man who I love unconditional is making me scare at it all too fast and somehow though I found out that I am a jealous person

"Y/n I mean it I do love you, your the most important thing in my life.

I don't wanna go back with us hating each other I hated that. I fought too hard too get too you I'm not about too lose you too some sob girl."

I smirked he lift my head up and looked at me "I love you "

"I love you" I said sincerely he smiled and kiss me with passion I kiss back the same

Warping my arms around him he bites my lips

I let out a low moan he chuckles under the kiss

"Awe look they made up" I herd tori from the window I groan annoyed 'way too ruin a moment sis' I though in my head beck had me close too him

I turn andlook toris way "Yeah now leave"

I said she looks at me confused "I live here too you know"

"So leave "

"Right, I ruin the moment "

I nodded and wave her off she headed back inside I turn towards beck who've just look at me He nudge me

"Amit it"

I raised my eyes "amit what?"

"That you were actually jealous? "

I scoft "me jealous please you could've done better then that wrench "

"Oh you were jealous and you know it.".

"Fine ok I was jealous happy." I said with a pout he chuckles and kiss me softly I kiss back and pull away

"But just for future reference you don't got nothing too get jealous of if anything I should be the one jealous. "

I raised my eyes "how come?"

"Cause she likes girls not guys"

My face went hot red from being embarrassed I Barry my head against his chest this time he laugh

"See next time let me explain."

I nodded "yeah...... I-" He cut me of by smashing his lips on mines and our lips moved in sync

[raainy-daze]

Can you do headcanons of how the rottmnt(and the 2012 turtles if you really wanna) turtles would react to their gender neutral s/o getting mutated by the ozzsquitos into a raven/crow mutate

(Remember you don't gotta do it if you don't wanna)

Thank you and good night 😘

turtles react to s/o mutated into a corvid

rottmnt turtles (non poly) x gn!mutant!reader

summary: so as it turns out, oozesquitoes kind of suck. their stings hurt a lot more than you’d think, not to mention you’d suddenly sprouted feathers. maybe you should find the turtles.

word count: 544

a/n: thank you so much for requesting!! i have searched more random corvid facts over the last however long it took me to write this than i ever have in my life and i lowkey forgot english at several points. hope you like this!

◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤

Raph . . .

“okay, okay, this is fine, (y/n)’s a mutant - OH MY GOD (Y/N)’S A MUTANT”

he’s not as much worried about you being a mutant as he is how you react to being a mutant

eventually, however, the dust’ll settle and you’ll get more used to your new form

after everyone adjusts, raph finds that he really admires your feathers

they’re just so pretty and smooth??

if you let him, sometimes he’ll just pet your feathers really gently

he thinks you’re really pretty / handsome / whatever term you prefer in general

he always did, of course

it’s just that the crow form really fits somehow?

after you get mutated, he seems to make extra sure you don’t get caught up in anything else

he has three little brothers he needs to worry about, he does not need more stress

long story short he’s overprotective

•°. *࿐

Leo . . .

most humans don’t want to be mutants.

leo is very aware of this.

so when you come into the lair covered in feathers going “hey so y’all are never going to guess what happened”

that was. something.

as long as you don’t mind, he doesn’t either

if you do, though, he will absolutely (attempt) to punch draxum the next time they cross paths

he gets you shiny things

it doesn’t matter if the shiny instinct actually transferred to you, he’ll just see a particularly shiny button and go “ha (y/n)”

oh and you better be braced for the dumbest bird jokes you’ve ever heard

or, worse yet, bird based pick up lines

probably sends you the average crow lifespan off google captioned “</3 you will be missed”

•°. *࿐

Donnie . . .

donnie’s google search history got really bizarre really quickly

“my partner is a mutant”

“help my partner got mutated”

“what to do when a radioactive mosquito turns your partner into a bird”

now knows several corvid facts and will tell you all of them! (threat)

“hey (y/n), did you know that crows have funerals?”

for some reason, he can’t for the life of him figure out whether you’re technically a crow or a raven, and it drives him nuts

this will not stop him from nitpicking anyone who calls you one or the other

if you do want to go back to being human someday, he’ll be researching a potential remedy in his free time

you’re the only one allowed near his experiments when they’re in progress

this has always been true but now he has the excuse “corvids are some of the smartest animals on earth”

•°. *࿐

Mikey . . .

it takes mikey a little bit to process that you’re actually a mutant

just because it never occurred to him anyone could get mutated

he never considered the possibility until it actually happened

he kind of just stood there for about ten seconds. blank faced. no thoughts.

similar to leo, he gives you shiny things

but no no no

not just shiny things

he makes you a shiny BRACELET

it clinks together a lot, and probably has a couple jingle bells on there, so it’s incredibly impractical

but it’s made with love

if you ever feel down about missing your human life, he does his damn best to cheer you up

he will bring you your favorite pizza and give you hugs until you feel better

[exotictragedy]

hmmm…🤔 

[bratshaws]

goodness gracious 43. brb x oc

THIS FIC IS 18+ ONLY! MINORS PLS DNI!

a/n: I need jesus this one got filthy real fast pl s dont hate me!!!!

check out the fic's playlist made by the sweet @wiipes !!

pairing: plus size!oc x rooster

warnings: SMUT GOOD LORD SMUT, JESUS ALMIGHTY!!!!!!!!!!!!

chapters:

1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9/10/11/12/13/14/15/16/17/18/19/20/21/22/23/24/25/26/27/28/29/30/31/32/33/34/35/36/37/38/39/40/41/42

(pls let me know if you want to be added to the taglist!!)

taglist: @mirandastuckinthe80s @roosterschanelslut @wiipes @lcahwriter @shrimping-for-all @gretagerwigsmuse @frenchtoastix

@lizzie-rdj @fanboyluvr @atarmychick007 @comebacktoearthpls

@peachiicherries @mak-32 @lizziespidiepridie @roosterswifey @ollyoxenfrees @piceous21 @sqrlgrl22 @hofficoffi @lexhalstead3 

@lorilane33 @legendarydreamersharkparty @luckyladycreator2 @emilybradshaw @j-6o @louisahale @leobabbyyy @kulicny 

-

Bradley and Beatrice noticed that neither of them could ever be part of Californian high society, neither of them would know how to act…because from where they were seated they could see every single rich person that ever walked on planet Earth on the ground below and around them. They were currently staring at a group of influencer-esque women who walked in wearing so much shine on their bodies it made both of them squint at how bright they were.

They were wearing sunglasses inside a restaurant at nighttime. She was sure not a single one of them had eye issues that forced them to wear those and when they seated the first thing they did was talk bad to the poor waiter who came to their table. “Oh, I hate when people treat waiters like shit.” Beatrice sneers, glaring down at the group of women “What’s stopping them from spitting on their food?”

“True.” he says, frowning his eyebrows when one of them pulls out her phone “She’s probably already writing a bad review.” Beatrice looks at him with a smile, “Complaining that they didn’t get the food before they got in, that’s outrageous. How dare the waiter not know what they want? Ugh.”

“Will probably post a picture of the empty plate too, with the caption ‘look what they brought me! Nothing!’” Beatrice covers her mouth to hold back her laughter while Rooster snorts, dropping his head and trying to hide his smirk with a hand, the couple paying attention to see if anyone else saw them laughing. “Honestly,” she giggles “I could never be someone like that, you know? Filthy rich and treating people like ass. I mean, my aunt is rich and she’s nothing like that.”

Bradley laughs remembering his surprise when he found out that her aunt owned the whole area where the wedding was taking place, “I think it’s fair to say your aunt is a good example of what people should be, she seems to be such a nice lady too.” he says with a grin, “Some people are just shitty.”

“They are.” Bea agrees, sipping her water before looking around the upper floor where the other people were currently having dinner, “I don’t think people should flaunt what they have so much, I think that just shows they are insecure and need validation from others.” she says while looking at a man who was being fed by a woman, while another rubbed his chest and hair, her nose curling in disgust, “...we really are outcasts in this place, huh?”

Rooster chuckles quietly, supporting himself on his crossed arms on top of the table, “Oh yeah.” he looks back to where the man was seated and huffs out a laugh, “But I wouldn’t want to do this with anyone else. Not only because you are my girlfriend and I love you, but because you get it. Plus,” he leans closer to her from across the table, smirking, “Isn’t it fun to be the outcast in situations like these?”

As someone who used to be called an outcast, and used to hate it before embracing it the best she could, Beatrice nods with a little smile “It is, I won’t lie.” 

It doesn’t take long for their dinner to arrive, which was already a feast by itself. Each of them had one main dish, a ramen bowl and steamed buns as a side snack and it all smelled so good. Neither of them waited too long, since they were both starving and dug into the food, politely of course. Sometimes they’d look down at the group of women who still seemed to be treating the waiter like shit, and she tried to hold back her laugh at Bradley’s less than kind commentary, “Brad,” she tries to chastise him, but a laugh breaks her sentence, “We can’t keep looking at them, just because they are being shitty people.” but her eyes immediately dropped to the group of women that were now being talked by the manager from below.

Now the two of them were really interested, even slowing their chewing to pay attention to what was being said. “I think they are going to get kicked out.” Rooster smirks, to which Beatrice gasps softly, trying to hide her amusement without much success. They watched the group of women, whose voices were getting louder and one of them even pulled out her phone to the manager’s face, immediately lowered their voice the second a female security guard made her way over to them.

They followed as the group of women were quietly led out of the bar, no longer wanting to fight anyone else and with one of them apparently crying as she was taken out of the restaurant. Beatrice and Rooster looked at each other with their mouths open, trying to not laugh too loud at what just happened, “Coming here was already worth it.” he finally says, bringing the water to his lips in hopes it’d cover his chuckle, while his girlfriend did the same, her shoulders shaking with quiet laughing.

“Are we evil people?” she asks after setting the glass down, “For laughing at others’ demise?”

“I mean, no? I don’t think so, they were being rude to the waiter and pretty much the whole staff. That’s just karma, babe.” he says with a shrug “Plus, it’s always a treat to make fun of rich people.”

Beatrice couldn’t help but smile, albeit still a bit guilty, but agreeing with his words by tilting her head in a nod. They didn’t order wine, mostly because Bradley was driving them and they didn’t want to be stopped and also because they had her aunt’s gift somewhere inside his apartment. When she went to her house to grab the jumpsuit she remembered that the wedding thank you gift was saved up in her fridge.

So she picked it up and decided that they could drink it together later, since she was no longer taking medication and it’d be safe for them to enjoy it! Just something they could do together. 

Much like everytime, they didn’t see the time go by, they kept watching the people around them and sometimes couldn’t hold back the laugh and commentary of the lives of rich and luxurious lives of the folk there. Their dinner was lovely, their night was very lovely and Beatrice couldn’t help but lean back on her seat with a pleased smile after drinking what was left of her water.

The change in position made her cleavage pop out a lot more than before, the pale flesh on display for his hungry eyes to see, not bothering to hide his eyes as they immediately dropped to the plunge between her breasts. He still had some water left, sipping it slowly and letting his eyes wander all over her figure with complete admiration, licking his lips once he’s done, “You just look so fucking good.” he murmurs, watching the red flush spread down her chest as he spoke, “I think every outfit you own is just meant to make me lose my mind isn’t it?”

Beatrice chuckles softly, humming happily as she runs her hands through her hair and tosses it to the side so it leaves part of her neck bare, “Well, it is one of it’s uses.” she explains innocently, her face still burning a bright red, running the pad of her index finger on her empty glass’ rim, “I can’t say it’s not welcome.”

“Mmhm.” is all that he says while keeping his eyes on her still, “I can’t say I don’t like looking.” and he does, a whole lot, he especially likes how her chest expands in a deep breath and that pushes her breasts forward. “I think this is the part where I say it’s time for us to go.” she blinks at him, adjusting herself on the seat to stand up, “Because I think you remember what I promised you once you got better, right?”

I’m going to eat you up once you heal.

Beatrice bit her lower lip hard, trying to hold back her smile but nodded, not being able to contain her excitement as she held his hand and the two walked down the steps towards the restaurant’s exit. She noticed how the people looked their way, especially how some women seemed to be so focused on Bradley and honestly, she couldn’t blame them. If she saw a man like that walking by she’d look too, stepping closer to him while squeezing his hand with a little smile.

The atmosphere once they get inside the car is so dense and thick it could be cut with a knife, Beatrice trying the best she could to remain calm and not remember how they actually had sex in the backseat of his car a few weeks ago…well now she couldn’t stop thinking about it. She tries so hard to keep her eyes on the road and not on how the pants he wore were thigh and clung to his muscular thighs and especially avoided dragging her eyes higher, twirling her finger on the thin strap of her purse in hopes she’d distract herself.

“You know,” he begins, the atmosphere still as thick as before, “Maybe I could just park somewhere dark, empty and quiet…and revive what happened a few weeks ago.” oh he’s awful “Because I can’t enter the car without remembering it.”

Beatrice coughed softly, “Yeah,I um, haven’t forgotten it either.” it was probably one of the sexiest and boldest things she had ever done…she wanted to do something bold again, but not tonight. No, she had to plan a little bit more, make sure everything was going to go well too. “B-But you don’t have to, we can go to your apartment…and revive the very first time.”

Rooster’s jaw clenched alongside his hands on the steering wheel cover, his tongue running on his lower lip as he stepped on the gas, “We’ll get there in ten minutes.” he announces, flitting his eyes to her for a second, running through the length of her thick thighs and up to her chest then focusing back on driving.

He was wrong, they actually got there in six minutes. As soon as he parked the Bronco and both walked into the elevator, he slammed her against the elevator’s cold walls and kissed her deeply. Beatrice’s purse fell to her feet as her arms wrapped around his neck, dragging her nails up his scalp and getting a breathy moan out of him. They both knew the elevator had cameras, but honestly neither of them cared,Beatrice just whimpered into his mouth when he picked her up and held her against the metal walls, digging his fingers on her buttcheeks. His mouth left a wet trail of kiss down her jawline to her throat, where he proceeded to devour her skin like it was the dinner they shared hours before, “Brad…” she whispers, moving her hips to meet his own in hopes to get some friction as the elevator slowly went up.

Rooster drags his lips to her ear, his hot breath hitting the soft cartilage as he speaks, “I’m going to fuck you right in this elevator,” he growls, trying to unbuckle his belt one handed while the other hand keeps her up, “Going to fuck you so right, baby.”

A full blown shudder erupts all over her body at the idea alone, groaning at her choice of outfit since it’d mean she’d have to shimmy it all the way down her legs instead of just pulling it up if it was a dress. She tries to tell him between feverish kisses what she wants to do, but between his mouth and the pinging of the elevator going up the floors, she’s a bit distracted. 

When the elevator stops and her barely open eyes turn to look at the number, she furrowed her eyebrows a bit seeing they arrived at his floor, “Brad…” she tries calling him, but he’s busy dragging his teeth down her throat, finally able to unbuckle his belt but not pull it out. The doors appeared to open in slow motion, Beatrice becoming even more alert than before, “Brad!” she whisper shouts, tapping his shoulder in hopes he looks up.

His lips drag up to her jawline, “Yeah, baby, you like that don’t you–” he stops, they both do when the door opens revealing the person on the other side. There’s a short old lady there, with dyed red hair that’s curled up in an updo, wearing a red cardigan and a flower patterned dress, squinting her eyes towards the two. 

The lady keeps on squinting, “Bradley? Is that you, dear?” she reaches down towards her black purse on the crook of her elbow and Bradley hurriedly lets Beatrice back down, muttering a ‘jesus christ’ to himself as he gives his back to the door and buckles his belt back up.  The old lady puts on the huge tortoiseshell glasses, the lens making her eyes double in size as she blinks up at them just in time for Bradley to turn back around and partially hide behind Beatrice, “Oh!It is you! Hello, my dear!How are you?”

He doesn’t want to be rude, but he also doesn’t think he can keep a façade of calmness much longer, “Hi, Mrs. Whitmore.” he replies, “I’m doing…fine…”

“Oh, and who’s this lovely girl?” she follows the two with her head as they walk out, Bradley still hiding himself the best he could behind Bea, “Is she your lady friend?”

“Yes, she’s my girlfriend. Beatrice.”

“H-Hello.”

“Oh!Beatrice! What a beautiful name! It’s Italian isn’t it? My first husband was Italian, my Sal, what a good man he was.” Mrs.Whitmore says with a little smile, using her cane to hold the elevator doors open, “She’s a gorgeous lady, Bradley. My my, and look at those hips!Oh I had hips like that in my day.” Beatrice just blushes looking down at her legs, squeaking a bit when the old lady taps them with the end of her cane, “Great for child bearing!I’ll tell you that much! HAH!” she laughs tossing her head back while the brunette only blushes harder, inhaling sharply and looking back at Bradley with an exasperated expression, he just stares right back and shrugs, “Oh, but don’t mind me, don’t mind me.”

They watch Mrs.Whitmore slowly make her way to the elevator, “I’m late for poker night!” Bradley steps out from behind Beatrice when he notices she’s having more difficulty than normal, ignoring his own predicament to stay behind her until she gets inside, “Oh, I’m fine! I’m fine!” she flaps her hand before eventually accepting his help so she could push herself forward, “Thank you, dear. Here,” she reaches inside her bag to pull out a few strawberry hard candies, “For you and your lady friend.” 

“Thank you, Mrs.Whitmore.” 

“What a sweet boy you are,” she coos, patting his cheek before pressing the button, “But I’ve got to go! I need to beat Wilma again! HAH! Good night you two! Bye-bye!” Bradley steps back so the doors close, the little lady disappearing from their view. Beatrice looks up at Rooster who had the hard candies in the middle of his palm, her shocked face turning into a smile, then a soft laugh makes its way out of her lips.

“I never see her leave her apartment.” he says quietly, “When she does she almost catches us, thank God she needs glasses.” he shoves the hard candies inside his back pocket, meeting Beatrice’s gaze and not being able to hold back his own laughter as the adrenaline of the situation comes to pass, rubbing his eyes with his fingertips, “Ah, damn it, come on.” he keeps on chuckling, grabbing her hand as they walk to his door.

Beatrice waits by his side, looking back at the elevator then at him with a smile on her face, “She seems like a sweet lady.” she says, following him inside the apartment, Jolene’s constant tail thumping greeting them, but she doesn’t move away from the couch. He tosses his keys to the coffee table, running his hands through his hair with a soft groan, interlacing his hands behind his head trying to calm himself down, “She likes you.”

“I helped her with her plumbing a few times.” he explains, dropping his arms to his sides so he could remove his suit jacket, “She always gives me these,” the hard candies are also tossed down the coffee table, Jolene stretching her neck to sniff it curiously but quickly losing interest “Or those old mint hard candies too. It depends what’s closer. She’s a nice lady, but she still thinks Reagan is president and she makes sure to say she hates him.”

The brunette chuckles softly, dropping her purse on the coffee table alongside his key, toeing out her shoes before looking up seeing him rub his face from crown to chin, “You okay?’

“My elderly neighbor almost caught us fucking in an elevator.” Beatrice laughs again, trying to hold back her amusement, “So I’m a bit shocked, you know? Just,” he makes a face, holding up his fingers in a pinch gesture, “Just a bit.”

Beatrice smiles, stepping closer to him to hug his middle, propping her chin on his chest to look up at his face. Bradley huffs a soft laugh, his cheeks flushed just the tidiest bit, “You are just so cute, aren’t you?” she says, lifting a hand to caress the side of his face, “Not only you are a gentleman but you also help old ladies in need? You are just so dreamy, Brad.”

He avoids her gaze for a second, his cheeks flushing darker but he smirks, “I have my moments.” he says, leaning down to brush their lips together, “I can be a gentleman or a villain depending on the situation.” 

“Oh,” she smiles against his mouth, “Like the big bad wolf you said you were?” his eyes are on her the second she says it, pupils blown wide and lips still curved up in a smirk, kissing her sweetly as she slides her arms around his neck, bringing him closer so her chest is pressed against his. He hums against her mouth, his large hands cupping her ass as he walks them backwards to his bedroom, turning the lights off on the living room.

She giggles against his mouth when he kicks his door closed and locks it for good measure, even though Jolene would never walk in, turning them around so he’d sit on the bed and she’d be on his lap, with his hands still cupping her buttcheeks through the dark green fabric. “I did say I’d eat you up, I promised it, in fact.”

“You did.” she whispers cupping his face in her hands to kiss him one more time, “Are you?’

“Am I? Oh, baby, you know I never go back on my word.” he purrs, dropping his eyes to her chest “Now, how do I get this out of you without ripping it? I’d hate to never see this again.” This question is followed by him running his hands up and down the curve of her waist, Beatrice smiling even more at him before she tugs the end of the long sleeves, which in turn pulls down the top that touched her shoulders. Inch by inch more skin was revealed, his eyes following the falling fabric with his lips parted until it reached her cleavage.

“I’ll have to stand up.” she says, “To get it all off.”

Rooster makes a noise of complaint, watching as she stood to her feet to pull the jumpsuit all the way down, but his hands held her, “Wait,” she snaps her head up towards him in surprise, “Can I?” his voice sounds so hoarse when he asks, his eyes going from her face to her partially covered body. Beatrice’s sharp intake of breath is so quiet that if the room wasn’t so silent he wouldn’t be able to hear it, but she nods with the softest ‘okay’ leaving her lips. 

He grabs her by the hips so she steps between his legs, the sleeves were now hanging by the sides of her bust, the only parts still covered were just half of her breasts and lower body. Since it was such a stretchy material, all he had to do was tug gently and watch it fall to her feet. Now she only had her panties on, this pair was black with white stripes on the sides.

She loved how big his hands were and how much…ground, they covered whenever he grabbed her. Beatrice squeaked in surprise when he tugs her closer to press an open mouthed kiss to her tummy, her stomach immediately dropping with nerves, “B-Brad,” his mouth goes up, he’s slowly rising to his feet as well until his kisses touched between her breasts and stop right under her jawline, “You,” she tries to speak, but it’s hard when he’s pressing those types of kisses on her neck, “You are still d-dressed…”

Rooster pulls back, looking down at his yellow floral shirt and dark pants, gently turning her around so she lies on the bed instead. He keeps eye contact while pulling his shirt from the back, breaking it for a quick second as the fabric blocks his vision, tossing it somewhere in his room. He couldn’t help but smirk at how she was paying attention with her upper body burning a bright red, her eyes dropping to his belt, following it when he pulled the leather strip from the belt loops.

 “Baby,” he begins, snapping Beatrice out of her trance only to chuckle when her green eyes immediately go back to his pants that were now sliding down his legs. “Looking at me like that,” he tuts, kicking his pants off as he’s left only with black briefs ,”Like I’m stripping for you.”

That immediately made an idea pop in her head, but she shoved it back in the confines of her mind for now. “Weren’t you?”

“No, that’s for a special occasion.” he purrs, lowering himself between her legs so their chests are touching,  his lips already trailing up and down her jawline, “You know? I’m also not dressed accordingly. I need glittery underwear or something of the sort.”

“You don’t need all that-” the end of her sentence ends up with a sharp intake of breath when his mouth drops down to her neck once more, using his strength to push both of them towards the center of his bed so he could have more space to maneuver. He just chuckles, meeting her eyes while he drops kiss after kiss down towards her chest, the soft wet smacking sounds of those plush lips on her skin were making Beatrice turn even redder. 

Rooster keeps on going until he reaches the beginning of her ribs, trailing his lips back so they are making their way over the curve of her breast. Beatrice whimpers softly, these weeks have been so hard that every tiny touch of his was making her body feel like it’s on fire. She can’t hold back her moan when his lips wrap around her breast, teeth and tongue caressing her nipple while one of his hands pinches and touches its twin. 

Beatrice’s quiet moan when she tosses her head back seems so much louder, her eyes fluttering shut while her hips move up, trying to get some release. He pulls back from her breast, repeating the process to the other one and earning an even louder moan from his girlfriend. God, he missed this. As much as he enjoyed just holding her, sleeping next to her, there was nothing better than hearing her moaning whenever they were together.

Once her breasts are loved enough, he even gives them another love bite, he trails his mouth down to her underwear. He feels her stomach contract when he reaches it, almost trying to shy it away from him but Rooster isn’t fazed, he presses even more kisses to the soft flesh and hears her gentle, shaky whimper coming from above. When his lips touch the elastic of her underwear, he drags his big hands up her thighs to hook his middle and index fingers against the fabric, tugging it downwards.

Beatrice lifts her hips so he can remove them easily, holding back a groan when a thin string of fluid breaks when he pulls it down her legs, balling it and tossing it off the bed. “Oh this is a beautiful sight.” he coos, parting her legs so he sees her glistening center staring right back at him, “I missed it a lot.”

Once he’s done talking, he wastes no time in adjusting himself on the bed so he’s millimeters away from where he desires with his mouth watering. Beatrice has no warning, her eyes widening when she feels his mouth on her, her mouth parting in a moan as her hands fist the pillows behind her head.

Beatrice’s moans start quiet at first, soft ‘hmms’ and ‘oohs’ that sound like music to his ears, her hands not touching his hair just yet. He knows when she’ll get like that, he’s done this enough times to know every little thing that will turn her into a quivering mess. His movements were also slow as well, just languid strokes of his tongue as his hands caressed her thighs from knee to hip, sometimes opening his eyes to check how she was reacting. 

He doesn’t waste much time when he sees her head tilted back against the pillows, deepening his strokes and smiling at the sudden yelp that goes past her lips. Atta girl, he thought, time to get louder. Beatrice blinked her eyes hard, hands no longer holding the pillows, this time they were clenching the sheets with her chest heaving out with deep surprised breaths “B-Brad…” she said with her voice shaking, “G-God…oh my God…”

He spreads her legs even more, holding one of them on his shoulder while the other is tucked underneath his bicep, exposing her in ways that makes the blush on her skin turn so dark he thinks she’s covered in red paint. He moves a bit faster, his hand caressing her leg until he reaches her mound, thumb sliding down just enough to press against her clit and making a jolt dart all over her body. Her moans are sharper now, louder and one of her hands makes its way towards his hair, fingers combing through the sandy strands.

 “B-Brad!! Ah!!” Beatrice doesn’t know what to do, so she grips the sheets so hard she’s sure they’ll rip any minute now. She feels the pressure building, her moans rising in volume and mixing with whispers of his name, her legs twitching as she tries to close them but he’s still holding them apart. She won’t be able to hold herself back much longer, it’s getting harder for her to focus on anything but his mouth.

The pressure turns too great in a matter of seconds, her body immediately going taut as a bowstring as her back arches. Her eyes clench as her orgasm hits her with full force, almost punching the moan out of her with how much force it came out of her throat, hips rising and falling as she rides off her high. His lips are still on her even after she comes, Beatrice whimpers at how sensitive she is, hips still jumping and her heart slamming against her ribcage, “Brad…” she calls weakly, caressing his hair and trying to hold back another moan that dares to leave her throat, trying to push his head away when she feels it’s too much.

He does lift his head, after pressing a kiss on the junction of her thigh and pelvis. He doesn’t hide when he wipes his jaw with a hand, licking the curve between his thumb and index finger to get every little morsel that was left, “You still taste fucking delicious.” he growls, trailing his lips back over the same path as before, finishing against her lips with a pleased groan, “I missed this. Are you okay?”

Beatrice’s unfocused gaze meets his eyes, her eyebrows arch as she blinks up at him with confusion, “...’m fine…” she replies, “Missed it too…” She's still shivering a little bit, so he waits a few minutes for them to continue. He could wait, he waited two weeks and a half for this. While she calms down, he reaches to his side table, opening the drawer and grabbing the tin foil packet from the inside, looking back to check on Beatrice to find her already staring at him.

“Hey.”

She smiles sweetly, “Hi…” her arms reach towards him and he wastes no time in climbing on top of her, kissing her one more time and swallowing her happy moan, “You really,” she was still trying to regain her breathing, “Took the breath out of me.”

“Do you need more time?”

“No.”

“You sure?”

“I’m so sure.” she smiles, draping her arms around his neck, “I’m okay, it’s just been a while and I forgot how good you are with your mouth.” he sounds offended by it, even giving her a confused look, “Not forget, just…it slipped my mind.”

“Yeah?” he smirks, ripping the packet open, looking away from her for a second so he could roll the condom on, meeting her eyes again once he’s done, “I should remind you then.” she nods eagerly, “Since it slipped your mind.”

Beatrice just giggles, her oversensitive core twitches when he lies on top of her, his own mouth curling up in a smirk as his hands disappear between them so he could push into her. He drops his forehead to hers, both of their mouths opening in breathless moans as he hilts, keeping himself still for a few seconds while her legs wrap around his waist, smiling in relief when no pain darts from her foot.

She opens her eyes to meet his, their pupils blown wide that only rings of their eye color are visible, her hands coming up to cup his cheeks and caress his cheekbones adoringly, “I love you.” she whispers, gasping quietly when he starts to move.

“I love you too, gorgeous.” he replies with a strained voice, turning his head to kiss the inside of her wrist, before he looks back down at her. Her cheeks and chest still flushed that lovely shade of red, shining with a thin sheen of sweat that made her look downright delectable. Bradley’s lips drop to her own, swallowing her moaning as his hips move, almost being able to taste it in his tongue. 

Beatrice whimpers, moving her own hips to meet his thrusts,her hands dropping from his neck to his upper back. The dips and valleys of muscle only made her heat up even more, her nails dragging down his golden skin, stopping on the dimples right above his butt. Bea breaks the kiss to moan at a specific thrust, and Rooster drops his head to the curve of her shoulder, biting the warm flesh and tasting the sweat on her skin.

She gasps out his name, hugging his neck tighter, “Brad…p-please…” she was still a bit sensitive from before but she didn’t care, “F-Faster…”

Oh he loved when she got vocal. She was so quiet at the beginning and she was still nervous sometimes, but whenever she talked it really made his whole body vibrate with excitement, “Faster? You want me to go faster?” she nods with another moan breaking past her lips when he speeds his movements just enough to make her breasts bounce, “Is this fast enough?”

She just stared at him through her half-lidded eyes, her lips curving into a word that simply broke as a moan darted out of her, tossing her head back when his hips got even faster, “Maybe,” he says through heavy breathing, “This would be faster, yeah? Is it, gorgeous?”

Beatrice moaned louder, “Braaad!!” she furrowed her eyebrows while panting heavily, clenching her eyes shut, her arms wrapped back around his neck as she felt the pressure building again. Her legs were clenched so tight against his waist she felt she’d have a cramp soon, hopefully it was a false alarm because that wouldn’t be sexy at all. So instead of worrying about that, she tried to focus on the sound of his deep breathing and moaning, her own soft gasping and the sound of their skins slapping together in a frenzied cacophony of bodies.

Beatrice knew she wouldn’t last long, just a little bit more, one of her hands dropping from his neck to slide down her body until she reached her clit. She rubbed the little bundle of nerves for a few seconds, her breathing getting louder, whispers of his name going past her lips, “Brad..” she whines, still moving her hips to meet his, looking into his eyes and feeling like she’s falling into those brown irises the longer she stares.

Bradley isn’t too far behind, but he doesn’t want to look anywhere but at her. When he hears her breathing hitch and her nails dig on the back of his neck, he just watches her back arch and a long moan rip past her lips, her channel fluttering around him. “Jesus, you are so fucking hot.” he growls, rushing after his own release and enjoying how she yelped in surprise at his hips pistoning against hers, holding onto his shoulders for dear life.

Beatrice however, is very surprised when she feels the pressure already building again in just a matter of minutes. Her eyes widen, not being able to hold it back and having a third orgasm that’s so intense her eyes roll back and she can’t even moan loud enough, just gasps out a loud breath while her hands clench at nothing. Her ears ring, her vision is blurry but she hears when he groans loudly against her neck, the vibration of his voice on her skin seeming to shake her whole body.

Once her vision is clear again, she sees the ceiling of his bedroom and the curve of Rooster’s back as he lies panting on top of her, Beatrice smiles tiredly as her head tilts to look down at him. Bradley’s breathing was shaky, his eyes fluttering open to meet her loving gaze, “Hi,” she says, running a hand on his wet cheek, “Are you okay?”

He takes a while to reply, lifting his eyebrows with amusement as his eyes close, “I…” he chuckles while licking his lips, “Whew, I think it slipped my mind too, you know?” they laugh quietly, like it’s a secret only the two of them should know. He lifts his hand to touch the curve of her cheek, following his fingers until they touch her chin, “...you still look so pretty, no matter what, huh?”

“I look like a mess.” “A sexy mess, that just,” he leans up to peck her lips, “Took the air out of me.” he hovers above her head with a little smile “I’m going to draw a bath for us, I think we deserve it.” his breath hitches and she gasps when he pulls out, but Beatrice smiles while slowly pushing herself to a sitting position watching him disappear into the bathroom. It takes her a few seconds, but she stretches her arms over her head and then follows him, groaning happily.

[romanoffsbish]

Chapter 35: All I Ever Wanted

Chapter 34 | Masterlist | Chapter 36 | Words: 5,804

TW: 18+ Smut mid chapter, labeled with a 🥵/ended with a 😇

Reader tops!!

— - —1.5 Year Time Jump— - —

— October 2012 / Present—

I'm currently sitting in bed, leaning against the headboard with a sleeping Morgan on my chest, and an almost sleeping Natasha leaning with her head on my shoulder. We'd just returned to the compound from the park as we had been having a picnic to celebrate Morgan's second birthday. Tony and Pepper had a party for her last month, but Fury had sent us on a last minute mission of sorts, so we'd had no choice but to miss it, I was absolutely devastated.

I'd felt like a failure missing it, as if I'd somehow become my dad, but Tony reminded me that what we do in the field keeps Morgan safe enough to have a birthday. He also reminded me that she'd never know the difference in date as it's only her second birthday.

"Detka, everything okay? You feel kinda tense..." Natasha sleepily mumbles to me.

I lean over and place a kiss to her temple in reassurance, then squeeze her thigh lightly.

"Yeah, I'm just still a little sad that we missed her big party, what if she had been looking for us—well I should say you. You're her absolute favorite person, then Yelena's her second favorite, I think Wands and I are tied. However, I will say I really enjoyed our intimate day at the park so we probably actually lucked out."

"Oh, Moya lyubov', we didn't really have a choice but we made it up to her tenfold. We also got her the best gifts out of everyone ..." She states, chuckling when she acknowledges the obvious—no one else built her a treehouse, with a Disney princess theme.

"Also, she adores you—you know that right? Whenever I'm alone with her, she almost always looks around for you, mumbling 'titi y/n/n,' and boy do her eyes light up when you finally enter a room... Look at her now, she trusts you immensely, so much so that she chose to fall asleep against you. You know as well as I do, Yelena's only her favorite because she sneaks her candies and is basically a toddler herself." She continues, speaking genuinely, and nuzzles further into my side.

I hum in acknowledgment at her words, throwing my arm over her shoulder to hold her firmly against me; while continuing to run my hands up and down Morgan's back.

"I love you, little one." I coo to her sleeping form, looking down to see her subtly smiling in her sleep...

"I love you, Natty."

"I love you more, Y/N/N." She mumbles, as she places a kiss to your exposed shoulder.

"I love you most." I correct her, normally I'd receive a rebuttal, but she's clearly too exhausted after all the running at the park.

I turned the TV on with captions, not really paying much attention, as my mind drifts off to the whirlwind that was the last year and half of our lives.

— — February 2011 — —

"Natasha!!! Tony will be here any minute, she's only five months old, you don't need to baby proof the cabinets above the counters" I shout at my frantic girlfriend, as it's the first time we're watching Morgan on our own.

"Detka!! This works in the long run, because it'll keep Yelena out of our snacks!" She shouts back, making a really good point.

"Solid point, add some to the cabinet of booze!" I shout back, hearing as she laughs in response.

I'm honestly just as nervous about watching my lil' Momo, but I'm more excited than anything. Eleven months ago Tony "wanted me" dead, and now he trusts me enough with his daughter's life, I'd call that progress.

"Moya lyubov', you gonna get the door?" Natasha shouts, pulling me from my thoughts, and I move to answer it.

I open the door, to find myself greeted by a suave looking Tony, and an anxious, but equally as put together looking Pepper.

"Thank you guys so much for taking her on such short notice, this gala was so last minute. Her schedule's written in detail on a paper in the front of the diaper bag. Call us if you need anything, Happy's available if you need to go anywhere.." Pepper rambles on, nerves ever present in the CEO's voice, as she's not left Morgan for more than a few hours at a time.

"It's our pleasure." I beam, as I stare down at my sleeping niece.

"I assure you, everything will be fine." Natasha says, as she comes to step behind me at the door frame.

"She couldn't be in safer hands dear." Tony pipes up, while guiding Pepper's hand with the carseat forward.

I take Morgan, while Natasha takes the bag, and we wave the parents off.

"Take as long as you need, even maybe go out for fun, she'll be just fine." Natasha shouts after them, being 'generous.'

Yelena's staying at Kate's for the weekend, stating that 'babies crying really ruins the vibes I've created for myself.' Wanda's gone for the night, but returns tomorrow.

"Good evening lil' momo, how are we doing?" I 'question' the baby, as she sleepily smiles at me, then giggles as Natasha starts blowing raspberries in her direction.

Now that she's woken up, Natasha leans down to unbuckle her from her car seat, and lifts her up. She instinctually stretches her arms upwards, while her chubby little face contorts as she lightly grunts.

"I'm going to go throw dinner in, Wands left us a casserole." I state, kissing both my girls cheeks before leaving Natasha to have some baby time.

I had stayed in the kitchen, sitting on the counter while I waited for the twenty minute timer to fly by.

"Moya lyubov', where are you? We miss you?" Natasha whines in question, just in time for me to walk in with two bowls, and a bottle.

She smiles widely at me as she reaches for the bottle, and starts to feed Morgan. I set our bowls on the table, then lift a forkful up to my face, seeing as Nat's eyes land on me. I blow on the food, bringing it to my lips to make sure it's cooled enough, then I lift it to her.

"Detka, don't worry about me, I'll eat when she's done."

"Natty, we're a team here! You feed her, I feed you, then sneak a bite in myself. This is preparation for parenthood." I giggle out, as she reluctantly accepts the fork.

We fell into a rhythm, until Morgan glared at us, and we then realized she wanted more. I collected a jar of 'Organic Pear, Carrots and Peas,' from her bag, then started to feed it to her while Nat propped her up. I flew the spoon in her direction, while imitating airplane noises, and feeling my heart warm as she giggled. She enjoyed about half of the container before she'd clearly become bored, as she continued to spit the food out and then began to rub it into Natasha's shirt.

Natasha passes Morgan over to me, as she carries out our dishes, then goes to start the bath. Bath time is interesting to say the least, water was going everywhere as she kicked her tiny legs around.

She was babbling nonstop, while Natasha rinsed her hair, and I washed her body.

"Is that right?" I gasp, as Natasha stares back at me with a quirked brow.

"Yeah, I know, your dad can be quite the handful." I reply to her babbling, and she deadpans at me, as if she's silently agreeing.

"Really? He did that?" I giggle in question, as I lift her and placed her into Natasha's waiting arms, as she wraps her in the hooded towel and lifts her against her chest.

"I'll make sure I talk to him for you." I reassure her, as she shoots me a gummy smile over the fist in her mouth, as she's facing me over Nat's shoulder.

Natasha places her on our bed, then wraps her in a diaper; while I lotion her body, and see as a wave of tiredness washes over her.

"Oh, is my lil' Momo tired? Come to auntie Y/N/N." I coo, then begin to rock her gently in my arms.

As I rock her, Natasha returns with a four ounce bottle of breast milk, something I never expected to find in my fridge. Natasha takes to brushing her baby hairs down gently, while Morgan lazily suckles on her bottle, as everything happening is lulling her to sleep.

As soon as she's lost her latch to the battle, we can hear her lightly snoring, then we both place  kisses to her little nose before I lower her into the portable bassinet.

"Goodnight, little one"

"Goodnight dragotsennaya devushka"

I snuck off downstairs to quickly clean up, not wanting Wanda to walk in to a mess in the morning. Once I was done, I quietly went upstairs, and as I went enter the room I heard Natasha singing a whispered Russian lullaby while watching her sleep.

"Pust' vsegda budet solntse,

Pust' vsegda budet nebo,

Pust' vsegda budet mama,

Pust' vsegda budu ya!"

(May there always be sunshine

May there always be sky

May there always be a mother

May I always be!)

I peeked in to see she was sat on the bed, ready to sleep, gently stroking the baby hairs atop Morgan's head. I knew she had just been waiting for me to return, but I thought I'd stay outside a little longer, enjoying observing the sweet moment, honestly wishing for it to never end.

"Detka, are you gonna keep standing there, or you gonna come to bed so we can sleep?" She playfully questions me, while I silently curse myself for forgetting she's a trained spy.

"Sorry, I just didn't want to interrupt you two." I sheepishly reply, as I enter the room, and begin to change.

I slip on a pair of sleep shorts, then reach into the drawers to grab one of Nat's T-shirts.

"You'll never be an interruption, and even if you were I'd always welcome it." She whispers into my ear, while placing a gentle kiss to my shoulder blade, and wrapping her arms around my bare abdomen.

I lean into her unexpected touch, still lightly gripping onto the shirt in my hand, while allowing her to sway us side to side.

"Ya tak tebya lyublyu malyshka" She whispers against me while placing another gentle kiss to the back of my neck, and slipping my shirt out of my hand.

(I love you so much baby)

"I love you too, darling." I softly reply, thriving in this intimate moment.

She slips my shirt onto my body, then swiftly spins me around, with her hand remaining on my hip.

"Let's get some sleep moya lyubov,' we don't want to miss this golden opportunity." She whispers with a sweet smile on her face, as she nods towards the peacefully sleeping baby.

I grip her hand, then guide us to the bed, sighing contently as our bodies tangle up naturally.

"Goodnight, my lil' love, and my whole heart." I sleepily mumble.

"Who's who?" Natasha chuckles, shocking me as she jokes about her own height.

"It's interchangeable" I giggle out, then cuddle closer.

"Goodnight my favorite Stark, and second favorite. It's not interchangeable, and I will not be clarifying." She states, laughing quietly as I playfully pinch at her side.

The weekend flew by far too quickly for our liking, but the moment that Pepper saw us with a perfectly intact Morgan, there was an instant promise we'd be doing this again.

We just didn't realize it would be the following weekend—we didn't mind though.

— — July 2011 — — (🥵)

"Y/N! Don't move from your spot, or so help me God I will kill you myself..." Natasha whisper shouts into the comms, I can hear the desperation in her voice, while she's carefully rushing to get to me in the 'abandoned' Hydra facility we we're in.

"Natasha, you're on a lower level closer to the exit and I can literally go invisible, I should be the one coming to you."

"No!" She whisper shouts.

"Yes! Natasha, I'm coming to you! End of the damn discussion." I assert, absolutely over the stubborn woman's inability to let me be the one to protect her for once.

"Okay." She cooly replies, leaving me unaware of where she really stood on the emotional end of things.

I knew I'd be in trouble after that, I couldn't care less though, it was safer this way. While running through the halls I saw them lined with Hydra agents at the ready, confirming my suspicions. I make it to the hallway of the second floor, finally arriving to her floor.

"Natasha, I'm on the second floor, where are you."

"Third room, on the right after you leave the stairs."

Without responding, I make my way into the room, throwing a canister across the floor to distract anyone from the doors opening.

"Hey, let's go." I whisper towards my lover, extending my hand to her, and not really liking her unreadable expression.

The walk back to the quinjet was quiet, as we were focused on keeping door usage to a minimum. Once we got out we sprinted to the quinjet, and flew out of there in an instant.

"Remind me to kill Nick, his information lately has been absolutely—." I started to rant, but quickly found myself unable to. 

Natasha threw my body against the wall of the quinjet, as she slammed her lips against mine in a bruising kiss, immediately shoving her tongue into my mouth, and causing my mind to go blank.

"I thought I would be in trouble..." I pant out as she pulls back for air.

"Detka, please shut up." Natasha grumbles, then instantly slams her lips back into mine in a teeth clashing kiss, she swiftly guides my body towards the bed, then throws me backwards onto it.

My body bounces up due to the force, and I release a huff of air; I quickly prop myself up on my elbows to stare at my confusing girlfriend.

"Natty, what's going on?"

She frustratedly groans as soon as I speak, I notice her eyes are blown out, her suit is now on the floor and she's currently pulling her panties down.

I smirk, simply realizing that my actions back at the base had clearly turned her on in some way.

"How about you come sit on my face, yeah?" I husk out, and watch as she takes in a shaky breath.

"Fuck..." She groans, wasting no time in climbing atop of my fully clothed body.

She rips my suit open, dragging it off of my body in one swift motion, then slams her lips back against mine. I get the idea that I should take control, so I hold her firmly against my body. As soon as her tongue once again glides into my mouth, I flip us over. I hover my body above hers, pulling back from the kiss to see her panting and squirming beneath me.

“Stay still my darling, I got you…” I lowly husk into her ear, then I slowly drag my lips across her jaw, then plant a firm, stabilizing kiss to her lips.

I throw her wrists above her head, and hold them firmly in place. I smirk down at her as she stares back at me with lust filled eyes, and sends me an amused smirk of her own. I keep my gaze locked with hers, as I slowly trail my other hand down her body, and watch her face tense in anticipation. Once I reach where she needs me most, I firmly press my thumb to her clit and revel in the way her body jolts and at the gasp she releases at the contact. I continue to rub my thumb in circles, watching intently as her face contorts in pleasure, and she desperately whines in need of more.

I slip my fingers through her folds, groaning as her wetness all but covers my hand, then I push two fingers into her awaiting entrance. Her walls almost immediately clench around my digits, and I can’t help to revel in the sounds she’s making.

I pull my fingers out of her, listening to her pitiful whines, before thrusting back into her with an additional finger. I begin twisting my fingers around, feeling as her walls contract, and her legs begin to shake. An aggressive moan passes her lips as I curl my fingers in a come hither motion, and I quicken the pace as with every new sound she makes.

She’s close, that much I know, so I move up her body, trailing my lips across her skin leaving behind my marks, until I’m level with her. Her eyes are glazed over, lips are slightly parted, her skin was flushed and covered in a thin layer of sweat. She’d honestly never looked more gorgeous, completely vulnerable, and entrusting you with every last piece of her. I slam my lips to hers, and she meets me with fervor, as she moves her lips against mine. Moaning into my mouth, her chest rapidly rises and falls beneath me, and it’s obvious she’s clearly desperate for air.

“Let go!” I command, as I stare directly into her eyes, and pull back from the kiss with her lip between my teeth.

I slowly release her lower lip as it falls back in place with a pop. I then curl my fingers one final time, hitting her walls just right, as her body arches and she hits her with a scream of my name.

“Shit, fuck! Y/N!!!”

Her orgasm comes flooding out of her, it completely drenches my hand, and drips down onto the sheets beneath us.

“Shit, Natty, that was fucking hot.” I pant out, trying to catch my breath as well after that intense moment, as I pull back and lean back on my calves.

She groans as I remove my fingers from her sensitive core, while I straddled her hips. She then whines as she watches my drenched fingers entering my mouth. I decided to put on a little show for her, slightly parting my lips so she can watch my tongue as it swirls around and collects her arousal. I moan as her taste overwhelms my senses, making sure to get every last drop before I remove my fingers from my mouth.

As soon as I remove my fingers, she pulls me down to kiss me softly. She wraps her legs around my waist and flips me onto my back.

She crawl atop of me, and lazily kisses me, before pulling back and drops her face into the crook of my neck.

“I should yell at you on missions more often.” I laugh out, interrupting the silence that had enveloped us.

She tiredly laughs against my neck, then slightly bites into my pulse point, causing me to whimper.

“I wouldn’t get too cocky there detka, give me twenty and I’ll remind you just exactly who’s in charge.” She husks against my neck, while promising me an eventful act two…

— 😇 —

— — September 2011 — —

September 3rd, 2010–The day Natasha and I had officially affirmed our budding relationship, and apparently also the day my gorgeous niece was born.

Such a Virgo move, to steal my special day from me, and make it all about her.

“Detka, it’s okay, we can celebrate our love any other day, I mean we already do.”

“Natty, it’s my first anniversary ever, I wanted it to be special…”

“It will be, I promise! Now finish getting ready before we’re late to the party.”

I grumble, saddened that our special day has to be shared, but get ready regardless because my sweet lil girl deserves to have us at her party.

Natasha was waiting at the door of our apartment for me, Yelena and Wanda in tow.

The party is everything you’d expect from a Stark—nothing if not extremely over the top.

There’s a carnival set up at the compound, with rides placed all over, with workers stationed at games. I feel giddy at the sight, having not been able to experience such a thing in my youth. Yelena, and Wanda share the same expressions as they run off together towards the ferris wheel. Nat squeezes my hand, bringing me back to the moment, as she smiles gently at me.

“See detka, it might not be just the two of us, but it’s more than enough, plus we get all the baby snuggles.” She beams, making my heart soar at the honest love she has for my niece.

“Yeah, you’re right, it is.” I conclude, as I drag the giggling assassin towards the dunking game.

Tony had been stationed inside the game, it cost $1 to play, but the money was being raised for a charitable cause. He’d already paid for the person’s needs, this was just going straight to their pocket to make life a bit easier. Tony is honestly infuriating, so placing him inside to get dunked was the most strategic play. Natasha and I were able to dunk him countless times, leaving him gasping as we ran off to find the star of the show.

We had taken Morgan from Pepper, carrying around to play games with her. She’s one, so she was mostly interested in the lights and prizes at the games, which were open for you to play to win. Natasha had found out quickly how to cheat each game, so she won instantaneously. Morgan walked away with enough stuffies to form an army.

“Detka, look.” Natasha excitedly shrieks, lifting up a massive green dinosaur plushie and waving it in my face.

“I think she’s got enough plushies, Natty.” I giggle, as I kiss the sleepy girls cheek as she leans against my chest.

“It’s for you.” She replies, with a cute pout on her face, and I immediately kiss it away.

“Thank you baby.” I beam, unable to fight the smile taking place on my features.

She kisses me once more, before we’re interrupted as the party was set to progress.

The rest of the evening was simply magical, Morgan loved the pet farm, and more importantly the puppy that we’d purchased for her.

Natasha and I ended our night on the ferris wheel, with Yelena in tow.

“Oh my gosh, look, I can see the statue of liberty.” Yelena gasps, mostly to herself as I’m more focused on the woman next to me.

“Happy anniversary baby.” I gently announce, as I lean into her shoulder.

“Happy anniversary moya lyubov’, I know it’s only been a year, but it’s felt like we’ve already lived a lifetime together.”

“Well, with the crazy lives we live that makes sense.” I giggle.

“Well yeah, but I more meant that time doesn’t seem to exist when I’m with you. I hope that makes sense.”

“I kinda get that.”

She turns to face me, then gently links her lips to mine, and before I could move to deepen it Yelena reminds us of her presence.

“Please… I already felt like vomiting with all the sweet words, now I’m really going to be sick.” She gags out, clutching her stomach dramatically.

“You literally jumped in with us, never considering we’d use this chance to make out?” Natasha dryly questions her sister, then rolls her eyes before pulling me back in for another kiss.

The most cliche of kisses too, as the moment our lips reconnected, there were fireworks booming in the night sky.

At the end of the night, I’d realized I don’t really mind sharing a special day with Momo, she’s important to the both of us, and it’s a really cheap date.

— — January 2012 — —

“Momo, stop taking this off, it’s really cold out there.” I scold the one year old, who continues to remove her mittens.

“Detka, maybe she takes after her honorary Russian aunt?”

“Regardless, I don’t need her fingers frostbitten by the time we’re done.”

“She has to learn on her own, just let her touch, and I promise she’ll leave them on.” Natasha says, sounding absolutely reasonable, but I was still wary.

We walked up the street towards the park, pushing Morgan in her stroller, and purchasing some cocoa on the way.

Natasha had been right, after touching the snow, Morgan began to cry and it initially broke my heart. Then Natasha looked at her, and used her gloved hands to warm her tiny ones, as soon as she slipped her gloves on, they stayed put.

“Don’t you dare say it…”

“What?” She innocently questions, and I glare her way.

She falls back into a stride next to me, as we approached the park.

“Detka…”

“Hm?”

“I told you so…” She chuckles, then runs off before I could smack her, so I instead mistakenly threw a snowball at her.

Morgan laughed from her stroller, clapping as she watched us having a brutal snowball war. Natasha has me trapped between her body and the freezing snow beneath me.

“Yield!” She darkly chuckles out.

“Absolutely not.” I growl out, as my teeth were chattering.

Her gaze softened, she leaned in to kiss my red nose, then lowered to my lips. Unbeknownst to her, my hand was full of snow, so while she had distracted herself with my lips, I set my plan in motion. I lifted my hand swiftly, then shoved it down her pants. She squealed, and recoiled from my body, as she ran around trying to get the melting snow out of her pants.

“Look Momo, Titi Y/N/N won.” I laugh out, picking the baby up as a means of defense from retaliation.

“You mean you cheated.”

“Potato, Pototo… Not my fault you were distracted.”

“Actually it is, you’re very distracting.” She whines.

“My apologies darling, I’ll try to stop being so.”

“No, I much appreciate your adorable face, and perfectly kissable lips..” She says, causing me to fluster, even after all this time she still has that affect on me.

Morgan looked at us with an annoyed stare, as if our love had offended her, but we realized it was more so that she’d become bored. So, we made a tiny snowman with her, then Natasha taught her how to throw snowballs at me, so they then tag teamed me, leaving me unable to defend myself. I couldn’t risk hurling one and it hitting her—perfect revenge strategy from her side.

As we returned to our apartment, Wanda scolded us for being in the cold for too long.

“You’re such a mom.” Yelena groaned from the couch in our defense, which was a mistake as Wanda began to scold her on ‘video games’ and how they shouldn’t be an all day thing.

Natasha and I secretly slipped away, changing ourselves into warm clothes, then moving quickly to give Morgan a warm bath.

We enjoyed a delicious soup made my Wands, then cuddled up together in bed. Morgan, like always, had maneuvered her upper body onto Natasha’s abdomen, and her feet in my face.

“Why do I always get the feet.” I grumble

“Divine intervention.” She lowly laughs

I groan, but kiss her little toes anyways, before falling asleep along with the rest of them.

— — June 2012 — —

"Yelena! Why in the absolute fuck are you up so high in a tree with my niece?!" I shout in exasperation at the sight of my little niece sitting on a branch, about eight feet off the ground.

"No-no." Morgan gasps, then continues to scold me, with a perfect scowl to match.

"Sorry Momo, why the heck are you up so high in a tree with my niece?!" I repeat, replacing the 'no-no' word, and lightening my tone.

"Relax, Y/N Stark, I'd never do anything to hurt moye malen'koye solnyshko." She replies, with a seriousness lacing her tone, and a protectiveness flashing across her eyes.

(My little sunshine)

I slightly smile, finding comfort in the passing on of the nickname she uses for me.  Then I remembered my niece's mother exists...

"Yelena, if Pepper sees this she'll never leave her with us again..." I whisper shout, scared of the high strung blonde.

"That's absolutely correct!" Tony says from behind me, humor lining his tone, and causing the hairs on my neck to stand up.

"Yelena, now!" I assert, then I cut off when I see my niece floating down in a mist of red.

"Again!!" Morgan giggles, clapping in astonishment, while landing in Wanda's arms.

Wanda smiles sweetly at her, then her gaze hardens as she looks up to Yelena.

"Not fair! I wanna fly too." Yelena whines

"Krasivaya, are you ready for lunch? I made dinosaurs mac and cheese." Wanda coos, completely disregarding Yelena, who gasps at the words that have left her mouth.

I just stand there with my brother watching on, amused as can be, as we watch Yelena scramble  to get out of the tree. She eventually falls down, landing like Natasha when we're on missions.

"Such a poser!" I mockingly shout, as she glares back at me, but focuses back on Wanda's retreating form.

"I want the most T-Rex's!" She demands, while sprinting off after them, as Morgan giggles over Wanda's shoulder, clearly finding her behavior funny.

I turn to my brother, 'gently' glaring his way.

"We don't tell Pepper about this..."

He nods in immediate understanding, then we make our way inside to make sure Yelena hadn't ran off with the whole pot...

— — Present — —

Just as I'd started to doze off, with my head falling atop Natasha's I heard a loud boom. Natasha heard it as well, jumping up and going to grab her weapons.

"Friday, what's happening?" I question, unable to jump into action myself.

"It appears Thor's returned from Asgard, and he looks frantic." The AI informs us, while Natasha lowers her weapon, and places it in her thigh attachment.

She shoots me a look, and I nod as I stand up. I tried to lay Morgan down, but her grip in her sleep doesn't allow for it. I grip tightly and follow Natasha as we head downstairs

Wanda's staring at me with a worried look, and I feel my heart sink, realizing it must be serious as I notice Vision's equally troubled expression.

Thor locks his gaze on me, then immediately starts crying, and by the looks of it I can tell he's in mourning. He looks absolutely beaten down, no longer the happy go lucky golden retriever, he's honestly giving off 'Pet Semetary' vibes with the eyepatch and dirty exterior.

I then wonder if that's a real thing, seeing as how aliens really do exist, that doesn't seem as farfetched anymore.

I reach my right arm out, linking my hand with his, as I guide him to the couch. I hold Morgan's sleeping form that much closer as I feel his body trembling beside me, and the sounds of his broken sobs.

"Thor..." I begin to try and comfort him, but his mood drastically switches.

"Thanos is coming!" Thor shouts, frantically jumping up from the couch, as he paces the room.

Natasha sits down beside me, and lightly yanks Morgan and I closer.

"What the fuck is a Thanos?" Yelena questions

"Language!" I mutter, as I move to cover Morgan's unconscious ears.

"He's a menace, sees himself as a God, but he's more a demented titan. Who's apparently dead set on ridding the world of half of its population" Thor cuts in, looking far more beaten down than I'd ever seen him.

"What's his plans?" Natasha pipes up from beside me.

"He's collecting the stones, he-he showed up on Asgard, and he destroyed everything in his path. He was with these atrocious looking aliens, with impeccable fighting skills and insane powers. He killed my people—Loki... Heimdall.. They're gone. I couldn't protect my people, my one job as king and I failed them." He rambles, then drops to his knees, back to mourning once again.

The room falls silent, silent tears cascading down most of our cheeks, as his pain radiates, and all of our worst fears come to life.

"That's what I've been feeling then, the stones have been warning me..." Vision matter of factly states, cutting through the thick layer of silence that had fallen.

"So what do we do?" I defeatedly question, as I lean into Natasha's body for comfort.

"We have to destroy it." He reasons, but Wanda's face immediately drops.

"Absolutely not! There has to be another way." Wanda blurts out, tears rapidly falling down her cheeks.

"My darling, it'll be okay, my life can't be what stands between the survival of the masses."

"We don't trade lives Vision." Natasha chides, as her hold on me tightens.

"I think I know somewhere that can ensure we don't have to." Steve suddenly says, as he enters the room with Bucky, and a distraught Pepper closely enters behind him.

"Where are we headed?" I question, as I lean down to kiss Morgan's forehead, then wipe the tear off her that had fallen.

"Wakanda." Bucky says, a somber look upon his features.

"When do we leave?" Natasha questions.

"Now." Wanda, Vision, and I all say in sync, as this feeling of impending feeling of doom starts to rise in our chests.

Pepper comes to collect Morgan from me, pulling Natasha and I into a bone crushing hug. Morgan wakes up at the feeling, then takes in all of our sad faces.

"No cry. Is okay." She tiredly whispers, honestly just making us cry harder, as she reaches her tiny hands to our faces and smears our tears across our cheeks.

"Oh, lil lyubov,' you're just the sweetest. I love you." Natasha coos, then places a kiss to her palm.

"Hey, it's totally okay to cry, always remember that. Auntie Y/N/N loves you so much baby girl."

I try to hand her off, but she quickly clings to me, as her right hand holds death grip on Natasha's shirt.

"No! No wan go. I want titi Y/N/N, and Natty." She shakily cries out, clearly feeling the switch in everyone’s moods and the urgency in everyone's movements.

"It's okay Momo, we'll see you at the park next weekend, okay, now go with mama." I do my best to reassure her, as I gently peel her sobbing form from my body, and place her in Pepper's arms.

I really hope I didn't just lie to her...

Pepper sadly nods our way, and I immediately turn to throw myself into Natasha's waiting embrace, before we all disperse to prepare for battle.

Just my luck, I finally have all I ever wanted; seems like life never planned to work in my favor, the worlds likely coming to an end...

—————————————————————

Taglist:

@ali-lie @simpforflorencepugh1

The next set of chapters will probably be just as long. Prepare yourselves. 🤪

I decided to base the timeline years on ages I've determined for Tony / Y/N only, nothing more because the blip isn't even going to be canonically as long ahahah.

Everyone's their accurate age based on the MCU's birth years.

Tony's 14 years older, Y/N's going from 26 to 28 with the time jump. Probably not relevant, but my brain hyper focuses on details so if yours does too here's the 411 🤪

Y/N / NR- 28, WM- 23, YB- 24 , TS - 42

Basically, don't try to fact check a year to an event mentioned, because nothing will add up 🤪

Also, I’m a Virgo, so it’s a self dig I guess 😂😂

[selfcarecap]

Cinnamon Apple [z.c]

pairing: Zendaya x reader

summary: you and Zendaya make things official ♡

warnings: rpf, a tiny biiiit of smut but nothing explicit, probably swearing, the heteronormative society we live in lol

word count: 1.5k

-this is a repost of an old fic-

(ILOVEWOMENJUSTLOOKATHER)

The articles are harmless.

And that’s the problem for Zendaya.

She doesn’t want scandals or hate, of course, but reading through those headlines doesn’t sit right with her.

Zendaya spotted out and about with a friend

The two gal pals pictured last Friday...

Girls day: The two friends were seen enjoying a meal

She might just throw up.

Z has never been too public with her relationships, but whenever the paparazzi catch her out with a guy, the headlines are filled with assumptions about their relationship status, no matter how often they say they’re just friends.

And now with you? Not a single comment about what the looks between you two could mean, or even the slightest speculation about the nature of your relationship.

It shouldn’t bother Z, she should be grateful that you two don’t constantly have to worry about people prying.

But she’s feeling a little possessive. More than she expected she’d ever be.

Z wanted nothing more than to hold your hand immediately when you got out of the car that day and saw two cameras pointed at you and her, your eyes going wide.

But it was the first time in a situation like that, and she didn’t want you or herself to have to make a decision under pressure. So you simply walked next to each other as long as the cameras followed you, your fingers merely brushing each other’s every few steps.

She knows she’s not the reason why you haven’t made your relationship public. It’s the internet and trash magazines, as well as such a big group of fans and more so people who were not so much fans; it can be scary.

The pictures of you two came out a week ago, and for the internet, it’s like it never happened by now.

But Z has thought about them every single day and has come to the conclusion that she doesn’t like the current situation.

If it turns out you don’t want to be public, she’ll accept it in the blink of an eye. However, if you‘re okay with going public, she‘ll also do that in the blink of an eye.

Just knowing that everyone assumes she‘s single, and even worse that you‘re single, and that you two are merely friends annoys her.

All of her friends and family know. A few were surprised, but not a single person had a negative reaction. As it should be.

Now it‘s only understandable that Z wants the world to know that you‘re her baby and not her gal pal.

♡

“Babe, can you come here a sec?“

You follow Z‘s voice into the living room where she‘s sitting on the sofa.

Leaning over the back of it, you press a kiss to her neck and she smiles at you, showing you her phone.

“Can I post this?“

Z shows you a picture of you two at a cookout a while ago.

You‘re cuddled up on a cream white garden swing, Zendaya‘s arm around your neck and your face buried in her hair.

It‘s not like you‘re kissing, but it‘s such an obvious gesture of affection that there should be no doubt you two are more than friends.

If not your closeness, then the way Z‘s looking at you and your bright smile show how in love you are.

The picture is one of your favourites. Z did your hair that day, so it looked really cute and with the sun going down behind you two, it lowkey looks like a professional photo shoot, except that it was candid and taken on Snapchat by one of Z’s friends.

“Are you sure?” you ask.

“I am. But I won’t post it if you don’t want me to.”

You think about the world finally knowing that you get to call this wonderful human your girlfriend. A smile spreads across your face and Z pecks your lips.

“I like the idea,” you say, “A lot. What are you going to put as a caption?”

She shrugs, “I don’t know, I just want to let the world know you’re my baby.”

“Let them know, then,” you grin.

Z types something short and then her thumb hovers over the post-button, “Sure?”

“I‘m sure. Love you, baby.”

“Love you more.”

She posts the picture and flings her phone to the other end of the sofa, wrapping her arms around your waist, fingers brushing up against the skin under your hoodie.

You open the Instagram app on your phone, the picture Z just posted right at the top of your feed, “my cinnamon apple,” she captioned it, after the vine you two find so funny.

You’re about to look at the comments when Z swipes the phone from your hand, stuffing it between the sofa cushions, “You’re not going to read the comments!”

“I swear I was just going to comment-” Zendaya kisses your lips and you forget whatever you were going to say.

She takes your hand, dragging you to her bedroom and a few minutes later you’re both too blissed out to forget what Instagram even is.

Whatever Instagram might be, it’s just on the internet and it’s not real, it can’t harm you. What is real, is the beautiful woman next to you in bed, and you focus on nothing but her for the next few hours.

As you wake up from your pleasure-induced nap a bit later, you can smell something cooking in the kitchen and hear the sizzling from the pan.

You pull on a big hoodie and make your way to the kitchen, catching Z cooking in only a large shirt, dancing to some tune that’s humming from her phone.

Joining her in the kitchen, you hug her from behind, kissing her exposed shoulder, “D’you want me to help?”

“Nope, today I’m spoiling you, you can relax - food’s ready in maybe ten minutes.”

You give her another kiss and decide to help anyway, getting the plates and cutlery ready. Once you’re finished with setting the table, you retreat to the couch, dropping yourself down and landing on something hard. Your phone.

That’s when you remember the picture- how many million people will have seen it by now? What are their reactions?

Your heart starts racing as you fumble with your phone, going to the Instagram app.

The first thing that shows up is a story Zendaya posted and you quickly click on it.

She posted the earlier picture in her story too, captioning it with “Let me introduce you to…”

Okay, she’s making it suspenseful for her followers, but even your heart is beating out of your chest. You click to the next slide of her story, only text, “Not my friend, not my “gal pal””...

The last photo of her story is a new picture, one of you two kissing. She knew you would approve of it because it’s your phone wallpaper and also one of your favourite pictures.

It was taken in the back of a car. It was date night so you were both looking cute but you’d met some friends and decided to tag along. They were hyping you two up, wanting to take pictures to commemorate the night and saying how good you looked together, back when they didn’t even know you were together.

The pictures started innocently but for one of the last shots Z pulled you closer and suddenly you were kissing in front of her friends. Luckily the picture didn’t capture it, but you were terrified of their reaction, but a second later you heard their cheering and started smiling into the kiss - that’s when the picture was taken.

The grin on your face widens when you read what she’s written as a caption “Let me introduce you to this gorgeous human being who I’m proud to call my girlfriend, my wifey, my baby, my best friend, my everything,” with a red heart emoji at the end.

You’re so happy not a single negative comment could ruin your mood, so you check out her post and the comments underneath, only to get a feel for the general vibe - are the people supportive?

You nearly shed a tear when you’re bombarded with story reposts and positive comments - Jacob Batalon, Tom Holland both with funny and supportive comments, Laura Harrier with a heartfelt message. You see more comments by many others but just as you’re about to scroll further, Z calls you for food.

All you need to know is that she loves you, but having her massive fan base supporting you two only gives you more strength.

You make sure to tell her how much you love her during dinner, so many times, until she’ll grow bored of it (which she never does).

[soju-thebottle]

Twitter ~ A Hwi fanfiction

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ✜ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Summary: Being in a long distance relationship with a Kpop idol can be hard sometimes. Today, you miss him more than you usually do but here’s the catch, you’re waiting for him to post on Twitter as he promised you something special….

Type: Soft, kind of cliche, Genderless Y/N, Bf goal Hwi, social media au, long-distance relationship, idol life, music.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ✜ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It’s Saturday, just after noon, you’re right in the middle of the vacation and have nothing to do. You spoke with your boyfriend for a bit this morning but not that much because he had a big schedule, as usual. You understood, being in a relationship with an Idol isn’t as cool as it may seem. Hwi is the best guy but sometimes you wish that you weren’t a long distance couple that has to go through the social status of your boyfriend.

However, he told you he was going to post a pic on twitter today, “A special tweet for my special girl” or at least that’s what he said. You were waiting for it with excitement, knowing that even if Hwi’s fangirls got that one, you have like ten times more pictures of him so one more is nothing but a blessing to you. But you couldn’t stop wondering what was going to be special with that one tho.

Since he didn’t post for a long time, and that today you were quite in a bad mood, you decided to just lay on your bed, full covers on and you’d watch Hwi’s last interview. You missed him today, I mean way more than you usually did. Nostalgic of the times you actually could be in his arms, as many times as you have fingers since you two lived far away, you just couldn’t stop the spleen from hitting you hard. So you decided to send him a simple text, craving for a bit of attention.

From you: Hiii baby, today I miss you more than usual, when are you planning to post that pic? I wanna see your face 🫣

And then you waited, he probably couldn’t answer either because he’d be on his studio writing the next banger or on a set somewhere for the new comeback.

As you started to loose your hope to see an answer from him anytime soon, you received a notification. One that made your day…

Hwi posted.

You jumped on your phone, going to Twitter as fast as you could, you needed to see this picture, needed.

When you finally saw it, you started to sob, Hwi was the best at giving you hidden messages through his posts.

On the tweet, the caption said:

You must listen to this song. What an amazing day THX, I love you ❤️ . Song recommendation: All day - GIRIBOY

You knew that beside the part about the day, everything was about you and that’s why you were sobbing, Hwi always knew what to say to make you feel great.

As he said in his tweet, you took your laptop and went to Spotify in order to put the music. Music was always a way for you and Hwi to connect, beside the fact that he’s a musician, it’s also and mostly because that’s how he confessed his love for you (with the music: Sorry I love you by Stray Kids) and obviously you answered with another song (Fall in love with you by BoyWithUke) so it kinda became your thing. And you often talk through songs.

As soon as the music started you searched the lyrics on internet, you weren’t the best at Korean so it was needed.

At the time you were reading the lines :

“All day long with you, hugging each other so tightly
our ribs almost break
I want to have you soon
What should I do?”

You heard your phone ringing, it was pretty much unexpected and you weren’t in a good mood and you were honestly looking like a mess since you cried for at least two hours, so you weren’t going to answer but curiosity made you look at who was calling. If you weren’t answering, at least you should know who called, right?

When you see the Id you answered as fast as you could.

“You called? You called me, omg !”

Yes, it is Hwi, he decided to FaceTime you as soon as he saw that you liked his tweet.

“Of course I called you baby, look at you all sad and crying. Ugh, I hate to see you like that and to know that I can not hug you. Please stop crying.

-I…I..I can’t, I was just so sad and then I needed you and I thought you wouldn’t see my text and I cried and then you tweeted and i love you, I love you so so so much.

-it’s okay baby, I’m here, I love you, I’m here, I’m here look. Okay? No problems. We have the whole night baby, don’t worry, I’m here and I love you. “

You slowly stopped your sobbing, he is here, he loves you and he is on a call with you. He called you as soon as he saw your text, he really loves you.

“You’re so beautiful, ugh so bad you can’t really see your face, the mirrors will never reflect the whole beauty of your face and I’m so sad for that.

-Stop lying you dumbass. I cried, I look like a mess, my hair is ugly and my face is red and puffy and ewks ! My face is just Ewks!

-Tsk! You think I’m lying? Me? Your handsome Idol boyfriend? Lying to you? Tsk. I could never. I swear for real. Tstststs, stop trying to deny your beauty. I know you need some comfort so go put on the sweatshirt I send you last week, it should be here now is it?

-OMG ! THAT WAS THE MAIL I GOT ?? WHY DIDN’T YOU USED YOUR REAL NAME I DIDN’T EVEN OPENED IT !!

-Ahh… Baby, you’re such a mess, I love you. Bahahah. Anyway, GO PUT ON MY SWEATSHIRT. I kinda want to see you in it.

-You do huh…”

You make a sly face, the mood changed in about 2 seconds and from crying you went to teasing. That’s how much Hwi helps you in life.

“Yay! That’s the Y/n I like, that’s the Y/n I wanna see. Go baby ! Go baby! Go!

-Shut up you stupid”

But he got you here, you’re smiling, he make you smile.

A bit of time passed, you had to put on his sweatshirt, a white one, with the olympic logo on it, you saw it in one of his interview and you remember telling him about it for almost a week. And he send it to you, it’s now on your back. It smells like him, a wood like with a touch of citrus, the bestest smell ever. His smell.

“Okay, so now that you look even more pretty, and emphasis on the pretty, with my sweatshirt on you. I planned a karaoke night, eheh!”

And that’s actually when you notice that he is in his studio, with his little lights and his Pokemon legos, that you bought together, you got a piplup, your favourite.

“Omg, no. You know so damn well that I don’t like to sing in front of you! You’re an Idol bro? I…

-Don’t call me bro, and stop trying to convince me, it won’t work. Now since All day is still playing background, by the way, happy to know that you understood my message “ he winks to you “let’s start with this one!”

And then he started to sing, he sang the all night to be honest and you joined him at less than two songs. But you will never forget how he looked at you while singing

“I love you so much so much so much I love you so much so much so much so I love you” from All day.

Since that Phone call, you decided that All day was now your song, the song of you and Hwi. And that’s how you fall asleep, still on FaceTime with Hwi still singing ballads to make you sleep, he looked at you sleeping like the stalker he was, and you were still in his hoodie, dreaming about the next time you’ll be able to see him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ✜ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I hope you liked it!!

You can request a story if you’d like !! With any tnx, skz, cravity, Enhypen and bts members you’d like or ship !!

Have a good day/ night / anything

[storiesforallfandoms]

the only one for me ~ machine gun kelly

word count: 1493

request?: yes!

“MGK Fluff ??”

description: the endless dating rumors regarding her boyfriend start to get to her

pairing: machine gun kelly x female!reader

warnings: swearing, insecurities

masterlist (one, two)

Logging onto Twitter and seeing yet another dating rumor regarding my boyfriend and some famous, beautiful female was basically a daily routine at this point. It seemed to be nothing new, but that didn’t make it hurt any less every time I saw a new post about it.

The latest rumored lady to have “stolen Colson’s heart” was Megan Fox, who had starred in Colson’s latest music video. The article I was reading stated how much chemistry Colson and Megan had on set and how it was “so obvious” that they had a secret romance happening behind the scenes.

I wasn’t hurt because I believed the rumors. I trusted Colson. I knew he’d never cheat on me, but seeing all these beautiful women and seeing his fans and media outlets commenting on how cute he would look with someone else so much prettier than me really did nothing for my confidence.

I wasn’t famous, I was just your average girl who worked an average hob and went to school on the side. Due to this, Colson and I decided to keep our relationship a secret so I wouldn’t be harassed by paparazzi and fans. I appreciated the privacy I had been getting, but it did make it hard to see all these dating rumors.

This rumor got to me in a way the others hadn’t before and I had an overwhelming urge to call Colson. He was probably asleep or preparing for the show that night, but I needed to hear his voice.

I was shocked when he answered on the third ring. “Hey babe!”

I could hear a crowd on his end of the call. “Hey! What’s all the noise?”

“We’re celebrating before I go on stage.”

“Before?” I asked, teasingly. “What are you guys celebrating?”

“The Bloody Valentine video hit a million views in less than 24 hours! None of my videos have ever done that before, so we’re celebrating.”

“Oh my God, Colson that’s amazing! Congratulations!”

Someone called out to Colson on his end. I could hear him responding, but his response was muffled as I realized the voice was a female voice.

“Is that...is that Megan?” I asked.

“Yeah! We invited her since she’s the leading lady of the video.” Another comment was made by Megan, to which Colson said to me, “She says hi!”

I couldn’t respond. I could feel tears starting to well up in my eyes and I was afraid Colson would hear my voice breaking if I spoke. Instead, I managed to squeak out a “gotta go” before hanging up.

~~~~~~

As I expected, there were articles published about the video celebration, specifically about Colson and Megan. A handful of pictures were taken outside wherever the celebration was taking place of Colson and Megan laughing as he puffed on a joint. The captions posted under this picture from numerous sites and fan pages were all the same: “look how cute Megan and Colson are!”

I had to go offline for a while because I was getting more upset than I had before.

It seemed like Colson didn’t notice as much as I did, so I never really brought the issue up. I didn’t want him to think he couldn’t be friends with women, or think of me as a jealous girlfriend or anything.

But I knew he could tell something was off. He kept trying to coax it out of me, but I wouldn’t budge. I figured he would grow tired of my refusal and would let it go. The last thing I expected was to come home from work one day and find Colson waiting for me in my apartment.

“Hey!” I said when I found him sat in my living room. “What are you doing here?”

“We have a few days before the next show, so I asked to come home before then,” he said. “I wanted to talk to you.”

The six worst words to ever hear. I felt my worry rise as I approached him and sat next to him on the couch.

“What’s on your mind lately?” he asked. “I know you keep saying it’s nothing, but I can tell it’s not nothing. I’m worried about you, babe. You know you can talk to me about anything, right?”

I looked down at my lap as I shrugged. “It’s nothing. Just work and school, I guess.”

“Is this about Megan?”

For some reason, hearing him say her name felt like I was being stabbed through the heart. I had to bite my lip to try and hold back my tears.

“When you hung up so suddenly during the video celebration, I realized something was up,” he said. “And then you started deleting your social media accounts, or making them private, and you were acting different. It all started that night. If it’s because we invited Megan to the party, I’m sorry if that upset you. There was no underlying meanings behind inviting her, it was just because she was in the video and we decided she should be at the celebration.”

“It’s not because she was there!” I finally snapped, unable to hold myself back. “I don’t care if you’re friends with Megan, or with any woman, but I do care that everyone thinks you’re dating every female who so much as breathes in your direction. And it really doesn’t help my self-esteem to see people saying how happy you look or how cute you’d look with someone who is, like, a million times prettier than me.”

“Babe, that’s not true,” he said. “I mean, I’ve seen the rumors about me and Megan, but it’s not all the women I’m friends with - ”

I laughed, humorlessly. “No, not all of them. Just Chantal and Noah and Ash and Sommer and now Megan. So no, not all of them, just most of them.”

I could see the gears turning in Colson’s head as he thought about it. Maybe he didn’t see the same stuff I did, maybe I just saw more because of how insecure it made me. But those rumors were there, and they had been nearly our entire relationship.

“I’m sorry,” he said again. “I never realized...I don’t attention to shit like that. I never thought much about the way I acted around my female friends.”

“You treat them the way you treat the boys,” I said. “I’ve seen how you are with Ash, the two of you are just friends. But people don’t believe that men and women can just be friends so when they see men and women acting as friends, they assume that means they’re dating. There’s nothing you can really do about it.”

Colson put a hand on mine and gave it a squeeze. “You don’t believe any of that shit though, right? You know it’s all media bullshit.”

I nodded. “Yeah, of course I do. I know you’d never cheat on me. I trust you so much.”

“And you can’t possibly believe that they’re any more beautiful than you are.”

I chuckled. “Okay, that one I can’t agree to considering the person you’re currently in a dating rumor with is Megan fucking Fox. I mean, have you seen her? She’s the most beautiful woman in the world!”

“Not to me she’s not.”

I looked away from him again, feeling my cheeks heat up and a small smile tugging at the corners of my lips. “You don’t mean that.”

“Of course I do.” I felt his finger gently touch my chin, lifting my head so I would look at him. “(Y/N), I hope you know you mean the world to me. You’re the most beautiful woman I have ever known, and you own my heart. You’re the only one for me and I love you more than words could ever say. I’m sorry you’ve had to witness all these stupid rumors, and I’m sorry I never noticed them so I could assure you of all of this sooner. But I mean it, you’re everything to me. I love you so much.”

The tears I had been holding back for so long finally started to fall down my cheeks. I awkwardly laughed as I tried to wipe them away, but they just kept coming. “That was so cliche.”

“You loved it, though.”

“I love you, that’s a whole different thing.”

Colson smiled and pulled me in for a kiss. Warmth filled me as my lips touched his, and it was just another reminder that he was mine. I ran my hand through his hair and leaned into him until we were both laying back on the couch.

When we finally managed to pull away from one another, Colson rested his forehead on mine. “Did you have any other plans today?”

I shook my head.

“Good, because I don’t intend on letting you leave this apartment any time soon.”

He wrapped me into a tight cuddle, and I gladly accepted these plans he had made for us.

[actually-reid]

hands

pairing: spencer reid x reader

summary: Reid’s hands are distracting okay

a/n: i wrote this in like two hours and was meant to be a blurb but i got carried away. it’s probably not proof read properly so sorry, i’m just posting this before i decide i hate it too much 

He was always fidgeting.

It could be a jogging leg or pacing but it was usually his hands, more specifically his fingers. He'd always catch my attention drumming his fingers on top of a table, rubbing a knuckle up and down his jawline or even just rubbing his palms together fingers intertwined. When I'd first joined the team it was just a character quirk, something he did that made him him. The rest of the team didn't mention it as there was no reason to, but recently it had started to become a distraction for me.

A suggestive comment was all it took. And a meme.

We're in the bullpen doing paperwork late and he's lounging on his desk chair in a position I have no idea how is comfortable. His face is puzzled with his nose scrunched. "I don't understand this meme."

"I get that Garcia is trying to educate you but she should at least attach explanations." I sigh. "Let's see it." I say, pushing my chair towards his desk which is next to mine.

"The caption clearly mentions a necklace, but there just isn't one in the picture." Reid explains, before showing me a picture of a cute couple and the joke clicks in my head.

"The joke is that she wants his hands as a necklace, Reid - that she likes being choked." I grin. It's a stupid joke but it still makes me smile to see Reid fully understand the joke. I really needed to talk to Garcia about what she was sending him.

"Oh." Is all he lets out which is pretty much what I was expecting.

"Yeah." I pat him on the shoulder before starting to head off and make some more coffee for both of us, picking up our empty mugs.

"Do you think my hands would make a good necklace?"

I'm only a few feet from his desk when he asks and the words make me nearly drop the damn mugs. Since when did Reid make jokes like that? I stop dead in my tracks before turning back around to face him slowly, my face probably a mix of confusion and amusement. I'm blinking in disbelief and intuition says that his reaction will probably be a nervous one and this'll just become something we both forget he said but that isn't what happens at all. Instead, he shrugs. Unbothered, he goes back to work.

Gobsmacked, I continue my trek to the coffee station and try to convince myself that I heard him right. I make the coffee on autopilot and that's honestly where it starts. I'm stupid enough to actually start thinking of an answer to his question.

With long fingers and prominent veins when he's stressed - I'm inclined to say yes. Although, I'd never give him the satisfaction of knowing that. At least willingly.

I don't know if after that it's my subconscious noticing things I'm looking for or if he does it more frequently just to mess with me but from then on it becomes something that can steal my focus far too easily.

I can't even tell you what brings my breaking point around. We're away on a case somewhere stuck in the police precinct. The day is hot and humid and he's wearing just a shirt and tie, his sweater vest and jacket neatly folded on his chair out of the way. I'm fanning myself with a spare case file when he starts to fold his shirt sleeves above his elbow and I realise it's probably the first time I've seen his arms properly. If I was honest with myself, I'd always thought his physique was skinny with no muscles in sight. I learnt that day that I had been kind of wrong about that, my eyes catching sight of his biceps as he stood and leant over a case file on the table in front of him. He wasn't anywhere near ripped but his arms were toned and just filled a lot more than I thought they would be.

It didn't help that it was just us in the room. I cross my legs and open a file, but the words just sit there on the page and my brain makes no effort to read them. It's too hot and he's just stood there.

"You haven't read a single word, have you?" He asks, his eyes still focused on his file.

"Nope." I say, popping the p. I don't want to give him the satisfaction of knowing he's the thing distracting me so I come up with an excuse to clear my head. "I'm going to go change, I can't think in this heat." I get up, grabbing my spare clothes out of my bag.

He looks up at me as I reenter the room and I watch him swallow hard as he takes in my new top: a cami just thick enough to hide my bra, a drastic contract to my usual blouses. His gaze switches back to the file in front of him and as I settle back down into my seat and I realise it's my turn to ask him.

"You haven't read a single word, have you?"

His posture stiffens at that. He doesn't say anything for a moment and I can practically hear his brain ticking over. I honestly think I've won this round, until his index finger starts drawing circles into the wood of the table. That's really all it takes for him to redirect my attention to his hands, his arms, him.

The worst thing is that I look up from his hands and see him looking right at me and the look on his face tells me that he knows exactly what it does to me, that he's known ever since we looked at that stupid meme. I feel a kind of annoyance in my stomach at being caught and I know that I have to wipe that stupid smug grin off of his face.

I stand so quickly, all his movement stops instantaneously and I can tell for a moment he's actually scared he's pissed me off. I storm towards him and grab his wrist and I drag him from the room. I'm not holding him particularly tightly, he could escape my grip whenever he wanted but apart from a questioning murmur of my name he makes no obvious protest.

There's a storage cupboard for stationary I spotted when we first arrived at the station and it's just big enough for the two of us. I shove him in and walk in after him before shutting the door after me. This room is certainly no solution for the heat problem and being packed in such a small space with another human being makes it feel like we're on the surface of the sun.

There's a brief moment where neither of us say or do anything. I'm trying to get the words right in my head to solve whatever tension we have but it's so hot and he's so close I can't think straight.

Which is probably why he seems to shake his head and whisper, "Screw it," before his hands dig into the roots of my hair and his lips meet mine. His mouth his hot on mine as if I wasn't already hot enough but the sensation of his hands and my bottom lip in his teeth is nearly enough to make me forget about it. My hands go to the back of his neck without hesitation and my fingers weave themselves into his curls. Experimentally, I tug lightly with one hand.

His reaction is almost feral and if I hadn't managed to swallow whatever sound he made I would have guessed it was a growl. Pleased with this information, I can't help but grin against him. However, just as I wanted to wipe the smile off of his face earlier he seems to want the same as one of his hands slides down from my hair to the front of my neck and he squeezes.

Luckily, a notification sound from Reid's and my phone simultaneously distracts him from my sharp intake of breath. We're both panting as we break apart, his forehead resting on mine as we both dig out our phones.

"I'm going to kill Morgan." He breathes and I laugh. It's a text from Morgan asking where we've disappeared to and that Prentiss and him are waiting in the conference room for us.

"What are we going to say?" I ask, carding my fingers through my hair where Reid's hands were.

"Needed a new whiteboard marker?" He suggests and I can't help but roll my eyes.

"Sure." I say sarcastically. "We totally both needed to leave to get one whiteboard marker."

"They're profilers - we're screwed anyway." He argues and I can't help but agree.

"Come on, the longer we take the more suspicious it'll be."

"Yeah, I'll join you in a minute." He says cautiously and that's when I notice he's trying to rearrange his trousers.

I mouth a silent, "Sorry!" to him before trying to cover my smile with my hand. I open the door and step outside.

"A camisole?" He questions right before I leave.

"It worked, didn't it?"

"You literally dragged me into a supply closet!" He whines.

I shrug happily with a smirk before starting to head back to the conference room. My only problem now was getting the permanent grin off my face before facing my colleagues.

[eirenical]

The Lost Tomb 2 | The Lost Tomb Explore With the Note | Dao Mu Bi Ji 2 | 重啟之極 2 | Episode 28

What strange creatures brothers are. – Jane Austen

[Do not repost. Do not remove caption. Thank you!]

Bonus:

You all know the drill, gif IDs, meta and feels behind the cut. ;D

[ID: There are three gifs above the text and one below it.  The three above the text depict a scene from Episode 28 of The Lost Tomb 2: Explore With the Note.  Xie Yuchen and his adoptive brother, Zhai Xingyao, are walking along a street at midday when they are attacked by a man on a skateboard.  Xie Yuchen catches the man’s wrist as he thrusts a knife at them, then flips him over his shoulder onto the ground.  Xie Yuchen ends up in a crouch over him on the ground, immobilizing him by the grip on his arm.  In the last gif, there is a close up of Zhai Xingyao saying, with a deadpan expression, “Looks like... you're not happy with this present,” then it shifts of a close-up of Xie Yuchen doing the “if looks could kill you’d be dead ten times over right now” glare.  Over this part of the gif is the following text: [...what was your first clue?]  This was the gifmaker’s insert and not part of the original dialogue.

Below the text is a bonus gif of that final “I can kill you with my eyes” glare from Xie Yuchen, but with the following text overlaying it in succession:

1. A-Yao, are you kidding me rn [right now]. 2. I’ve had a very long day, A-Yao. 3. Wu Xie is probably getting into trouble already, and it’s not even 10 AM. 4. Your big brother is tired, A-Yao. 5. PLEASE CUT HIM SOME SLACK.

(It should be noted that Wu Xie HAS already gotten into trouble at this point in the day.  Xiao Hua knows his best friend well.  ;D /ID]

SO.  The first thing that needs to be said here is that I love Xiao Hua A PERFECTLY NORMAL AMOUNT.  (Spoiler: I do NOT.  I love him way too much.  Way, way, WAY too much.  OTZ)  And I love his TLT2 incarnation, played by Liu Xueyi, the best of all of them.  He’s the closest to Xiao Hua’s novel self I’ve yet seen, and I love him to pieces for it.

I love how his every move is designed to be charming and graceful and poised.  How he goes out of his way to look assuming and nonthreatening, even though he’s the scariest motherfucker (tm) in just about every room he’s in.  And I love, love, LOVE the sheer coldness he exudes when he isn’t trying to be charming.

And yet there is genuine warmth in him, too.  You see it in his interactions with Huo Xiuxiu and with Wu Xie and even with A-Yao once they’re done with this little uh... dance.  ^_~  Wu Xie says the following in chapter 13 of the 2015 Chinese New Year Special (thank you again to merebear’s translations):

Xiao Hua smiled and his expression suddenly grew cold.

His change in expression was completely different from mine. When Xiao Hua lowered his lids, tilted his chin down, and then looked up again, all his micro-expressions disappeared. There wasn’t an ounce of amicability that could be seen on his body.

“My feelings are few, and whatever is left is enough for my friends. If I have to treat the enemies differently based on their genders, then living that kind of life is too difficult for me.”

Xiao Hua’s previous expression— whether severe or soothing— had a natural friendliness that lowered people’s guard and made them feel relaxed and comfortable. When this friendliness disappeared, it was like he was a completely different person. It wasn’t a fierce expression, per se, just that he stopped smiling and the corners of his eye dropped down, making people feel uncomfortable.

In fact, Xiao Hua was an extremely difficult person to get along with. He put all his good things together and gave them to a few people.

So, yeah.  All of his warmth, all of his friendliness, all of his compassion, all of his genuine ability to connect with people... is reserved for very, very few.  I wonder sometimes if that was natural inclination or if that was a by-product of his training as a child.  When you consider his intelligence and his skillset, Er Yuehong must have put him through the fucking WRINGER as a child.  He’s a skilled opera singer, an acrobat and a gymnast, a hell of a fighter (I would argue that given the kind of time that Xiaoge and Hei Xiazi have had, he could probably go toe-to-toe with them), and a terrifying strategist.

And you see SO MUCH OF THAT in this one little scene, and I love it.  ^_^

[realcube]

haikyuu!! boys dating you for a bet then falling hcs 💘

characters: oikawa, kuroo & osamu 

tw// angst to fluff, swearing, sexual references - minor dni!

OIKAWA’S AND KUROO’S ARE AGED UP !

thank you anon for this request 😚

Tōru Oikawa

everyone on the team was teasing him for getting broken up with bc he was ‘too obsessed with volleyball’

he had finally had enough and made a bet with iwaizumi, matsukawa and hanamaki that he could get a s/o quicker than any of them

they accepted ofc but that’s when oikawa learned that hanamaki was already talking to a girl he liked which meant that it was a race against time for oikawa to find someone to date

in reality, he had no interest in dating atm but he had to do this for the sake of his pride

he settled on asking you out bc you were his lab partner for chemistry and even before the bet, he was making playful flirtatious banter with you but it’s not like he had any real feelings for you which meant that breaking up with you afterwards would be simple..right?

also, asking you out would be an easy win

and it was 🤠

oikawa won the bet and regained some confidence which meant he was now free to break up with you

buuuut y’all had only just started dating so he didn’t want to break up with you before the first date so he postponed the break up until after y’all went to the movies together

then the night came - he had just came back home for your first date at the movies, he took you to see an alien invasion movie and you said you loved it

he stared at his phone which was open on IMessage, on your contact; his fingers hovered over the keypad but the words didn’t come to him the way he expected 

the more he thought about, he realised that you guys hadn’t even had your first kiss yet and he wanted to give you a sweet memory to leave you with before he inevitably dumped you so he decided to postpone the break-up again, until you guys had your first kiss 

and since his messenger was open, he invited you on a second date to the park where you had your first kiss over a shared cone of vanilla ice-cream

honestly, he had such a great time on the date that in the moment, he completely forgot about the fact he had to break-up with you so here he was again, sitting on his bed and looking down at his phone glumly as he searched his brain for the right words to say 

but when he allows his mind to wonder for too long, it always comes back to one thing

so figured that he’d hold off breaking-up with you until your first time and from there — depending on how good you are — he’ll decide whether he wants to dump you or keep you around just as a side fling

the day eventually came three months later, not that he was complaining though as he’s developed a lot more patience since he’s started dating you 

you had just came back from a date at the bowling alley and something about seeing Oikawa in bowling shoes and a partially unbuttoned shirt was enough to make you go feral so as soon as you arrived at his house, y’all went for it

in all honesty, sex with you just hit different for oikawa

it was nothing like he’s ever experienced before

like it was kind, sensual and filled with mutual praise and he truthfully never wanted it to end but once it did and he was sprawled out on the bed next you, breathing heavily with your fingers intertwined, he realised that he didn’t want to break up with anymore

the last 4 months that you guys have been dating, truthfully was the best time of his life, like he feels so happy and genuine when he’s around you, there’s no way he’d leave you now

‘I love you, (y/n).’ he hummed, turning his head to the side to look at your peaceful figure laying next him - god, you’re beautiful

‘I love you too, Tōru.’

Tetsurō Kuroo

him and bokuto had a bet to see who could fuck more ppl in a month 

the third year gym squad gc was confused but not too confused i mean this is kuroo and bokuto we’re talking about

akaashi, kenma and tsukishima were all disapproving of this idea for their own reasons

akaashi thought it was immoral while kenma and tsukishima thought it was just a ‘who can get an std first competition’

as for hinata and lev, shōyō had his bet on bokuto while lev was rooting for kuroo

kuroo was going to start his hunt for sex partners at the club tonight but he had already agreed that he’d do the business assignment with you tonight and since it was a partnered thing, he’d feel guilty if he opted out last minute 

he sat on his bed while you took a seat at his desk, working away at the project while kuroo ‘supervised’

kuroo was bummed that bokuto was probably getting laid rn while he was stuck in his room doing an assignment- WAIT

you were here with him ( •̀ ω •́ )✧ and he was like..90% sure you had the thing for him soooo

he immediately sprung up from his bed and shuffled towards you, grabbing your hips to momentarily lift you up so he could pull you away from the project and onto his lap as he sat on his bed, tracing your jaw with his finger

‘time for a break~’ he cooed in your ear, massaging your thigh with spare hand, ‘only if want though, doll.’

xdfghj OFC YOU DID

consent = given ✨

kuroo = hard

your sex = destroyed

ass = red

you = overstimulated as hell 💅

if you started during the day, expect the sun to have gone down by the time y’all were finished

he offered to take you on a date so you both could do this again sometime and you said yes

but he reassured himself that you were only a hook up- definitely nothing serious- no feelings whatsoever

so a week later, he took you on a sweet, wholesome date to a carnival and you got railed afterwards 🥰

your next few dates went in a similar way until one fateful day where you were just..tired

neither of you really wanted to smash tbh, you were just happy laying in each other’s arms 

and as time went on, you guys went on more dates where there was absolutely no sexual activities, just sweet intimacy 

and he...... liked it 

why did he like it???

you were nothing more than a sexual relief to him, right??

so why did he enjoy cuddling with you so much? shouldn’t he be fuckin you rn? but he didn’t want to...like he was lowkey vibin with you in his arm while watching modern family 

then he looked down at you in his arms, the light of the screen highlighting your features beautifully

‘i think i might actually want to marry you one day.’ he blurted out, lightly tracing the bridge of your nose with his finger

this caught you off-guard so you looked up at him, an adorable pink blush dusting your cheeks, ‘really?’ was all you could think to reply 

‘yeah.’

Osamu Miya

ofc it was a bet with atsumu ofc it was a bet with atsumu 

‘who could get the hotter s/o competition?’ and suna would decide who wins

the twins had a month to get a s/o who was hot asf

so osamu asked you out in maths bc you were the most attractive person he kinda already talks too

you said yes as you sorta kinda maybe had a lil’ thing for him

however, he didn’t even ask you out on a date

in fact, he barely even talked to you after he asked you out until the day came where suna judged which miya twin won the bet

osamu did ofc 

then he kinda forgot y’all were dating until one day you snapped him with the caption ‘???’

he was like��‘hey’

sorry i firmly believe he is the driest texter

anyway he felt bad for neglecting you for over a month so he said he’d make it up to you by taking you out to dinner

but he promised himself that dinner was only an apology and right afterwards, he’d cut you off

he was scrolling through his phone, looking for places to take you and although he wanted to just get take-out, even he knew that fast-food probably wasn’t a very romantic date idea

wait- he didn’t care about it being romantic- did he??

eventually he settled on an expensive restaurant bc getting you a take-away probably wasn’t a very good apology 

so anyway he took you out and he actually had a pretty good time ^^ 

i mean, when you coincidentally ordered the same thing off the menu as him- he kinda caught feelings

osamu would definitely realise that he fell for you faster than oikawa and kuroo

just the way his hand just feels a pull towards yours when you’re walking side-by-side is a dead giveaway

so once the date is over and he dropped you off at your house, instead of breaking up with you as he planned, he simply placed a tender kiss on your forehead and smiled, ‘we should do this again soon.’

when he saw the way your face lit up and you squealed slightly, he knew he made the right decision

[neoculturetravesty]

We met in online class - Part 4

Image taken from here. Originally had this image in mind but Tumblr won’t let me upload it. 

Pairing: Renjun x Reader Genre: College AU, romance, fluff, angst, maybe humor???? Warnings: Strong language Word Count: 4.3k

Navigation: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | You are on Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Last Part

A/N: Happy Easter to all who celebrate it!

It’s funny how quickly people form habits without really meaning to. You don’t realize you have a new favorite word till someone points out you’ve been using it so much. You don’t realize you’re addicted to caffeine till you get headaches from withdrawals. You don’t realize you can’t live without dessert till the sugar crash hits. And in the same way, Renjun didn’t realize he had gotten used to your company till he’s waiting outside your lecture hall with an almost expectant inclination to see you. 

A lot of it had to do with who you were as a person. You had pretty much infiltrated Renjun’s life, even though he still kept you at an arm’s distance. One day, he had walked into the library and found you with Jaemin, while the two of you had your heads together over a laptop and a huge gift basket in the making on the table. Jaemin wasn’t the kind of person who invited a lot of new people into his life; so he must have really trusted you because it wasn’t the last time Renjun saw the two of you together. 

But worse than Jaemin was Donghyuck. Renjun was pretty sure that since you’d asked him out, you had probably hung out more with Donghyuck than with him. Almost as if seeing Renjun was just an excuse for you to hang out with him, as you had often joked. It was as if the two of you were kindred spirits, long lost best friends who had finally found one another. Donghyuck would invite you everywhere, get up to no good with you in tow; and before Renjun knew it, the two of you were even planning parties together. Neither Donghyuck nor you needed Renjun as an excuse to hang out with one another anymore, and it amused him. A part of him wondered if Donghyuck was playing along to help his bigger cause. But his friend always looked so genuinely happy around you that any ulterior motive he might have seemed to have been forgotten. 

“Why can’t the sun always be like this?” you said as you laid on the grass using your backpack as a pillow. Your hand was reaching out over your face, your fingers wiggling as you played with shadows.

While you soaked in the sun, Renjun chose to sit under the shade of a tree, sketching away in his book, completing his assignment before his next class.

“You wouldn’t appreciate it as much if it were always like this.” Renjun replies, not looking away from his work. He much preferred paint over charcoal, but he had to admit that the scratching sounds it made against the grains of paper--coupled with the chirping of birds and gentle ruffling of leaves around him--was really relaxing. As was your company.

“Hmm. But it’s still nice to see it without fine dust couture. I like seeing it fully in the nude.” you say, a soft, funny smile on your face while your eyelashes cast shadows on your cheeks.

“Pervert.” Renjun accuses, smiling as he drew. It just makes you laugh and lay sideways to face him. You prop up your head on your hand.

“I’m the sun, Huang Renjun. Now draw me like one of your French girls.” you say in a comical voice and Renjun actually laughs without reservation. 

“Do you have any more classes?” he asks, fixing his black and gold rimmed glasses over his nose.

“Nope. I’m done for the day. Yeri’s supposed to pick me up, so I’m just waiting for her call.” you say, rolling onto your back once more, resuming your dance with the shadows.

Renjun hums a reply as he sketches, but really, he’s thinking that he hadn’t formally met Yeri. At least not yet. He had just had two very awkward run-ins with her the couple of times he had been to your apartment. Come to think of it, he hadn’t been to your place since that last time. And you had never been to his place at all. 

It wasn’t on accident, though. All of it had been by Renjun’s really convoluted design. He had met a few of your friends on campus in the passing, sure. But you were more a part of his life that he was yours. That is exactly what Renjun had planned. Lately, however, that plan seemed to be fading away into the ether. Slowly but surely dispersing from memory till it was more or less abandoned. 

Because Renjun did not realize that he had adopted you like a habit. Any time he saw a witty meme, he had to send it your way because you would text back with an equally witty reply that scratched Renjun’s intellectual itch. Any time Jisung would bring home a baguette, he would take a picture for you with a caption like ‘Francophile life going strong’. The two of you had even developed a silly game where you would look at different marketing taglines and wonder if it would still work to sell condoms. 

‘Nike. Just do it.’ Renjun had once texted.

‘That is a low hanging fruit, Huang Renjun.’ you had replied.

‘Okay, true. But how about Imax: Thing big.’ he had texted back.

‘Hmm, almost but not quite. I need something stronger.’

‘BMW: Designed for driving pleasure.’ he had actually found himself scrolling through a long list of taglines while his assignment laid forgotten.

‘Oof. Now you’ve found the sweet spot. Keep going.’ Renjun had smiled at your reply and had found himself hurriedly looking for something better.

‘Geico: So easy, a caveman could do it.’ 

‘Mmm, didn’t think you were a kinky boy, Huang Renjun. Go on…”

Renjun had actually laughed out loud, making Jisung look up at him quizzically and replied ‘1010 Wins: you give us 22 minutes, we’ll give you the world.’

‘Yessss! Right there, right there!’

Renjun hadn’t even realized he was grinning wide and standing up from his desk, a list of taglines open both on his laptop and his phone while he scrolled to find the perfect response that would make you happy. ‘Rice Krispies: Snap! Crackle! Pop!’

‘So close, so close, I am almost there!’

‘Washington Post: Democracy dies in darkness.’

‘THAT’S IT, THAT DID IT, THAT HIT THE SPOT!’

Renjun had actually belly laughed at the entire conversation. He didn’t remember the last time he had laughed this way because even Jisung was looking at him with an amused smile, asking “What’s so funny?”

So yes, Renjun had adopted you like a habit. But it wasn’t just through text. When you weren’t the one waiting for him on campus with a couple of cups of coffee in hand, he found he would go looking for you. You would spend all your free time together, just like this. He would find himself missing you on days he didn’t get to see you. He found himself disappointed when you didn’t have time for him because you and Donghyuck were on a very important mission or you had to meet your friends or you had extra work that was demanding your attention. You had just inserted yourself in his life in such a manner that Renjun didn’t even notice.

Perhaps you had nothing to do with it, but Renjun’s life had been treating him pretty well, too. Maybe he was more inspired these days, because his work was getting better and his professors were noticing. His painting instructor had held him back after class one day and offered him an internship at his studio. While it wasn’t huge, it was enough that Renjun had thrown his fist in the air in celebration as soon as he had left class. And you were the first person he texted and he was glad he did because you had texted back a freakout that made him grin like an idiot. You had come to see him as soon as your own class had ended and you had flung yourself in his arms and had jumped around excitedly before dragging him along so you could buy him an artist’s apron as a present. 

“Do you have any more classes?” you ask him as you stare at the evening sun through your fingers.

Renjun’s about to reply when he is interrupted by the sound of your phone buzzing in your pocket. You fish it out and sit up, telling Renjun “Hold on…” before answering it. “Are you here, Yeri?” 

Renjun goes back to scratching away in his pad, thinking. Maybe he should introduce himself now when Yeri comes to pick you. But what would he say? ‘Hi, I’m Y/N’s friend?’ Everyone on campus knew that the two of you weren’t exactly just friends. It was thanks to your stunt during that one online class, where he’d met you. ‘Hi, I’m Y/N’s boyfriend?’ But he wasn’t that, either. While the two of you had become pretty comfortable in each other’s company, you hadn’t really done anything, or had any serious talk about what you were. You two always found yourself tiptoeing “the line”. Actually, no. It was Renjun that tiptoed that line. After his two failed attempts to kiss you, the conversation had just not taken that turn ever again. You two hadn’t leveled up on the PDA front, either. Sure, you had cuddled into him in the back of the cab that one night, and he had half-carried you to your apartment till Yeri took you from the doorstep. But you didn’t seem to remember any of it, so it was basically back to square one. Sure, you had hugged him in joy when he had gotten the internship, but did it really count when the two of you hadn’t even held hands yet? Aside from the innuendo-filled condom tagline talk, the two of you hadn’t really done anything that would constitute as… something a couple might do.

“Okay, but how long would it take?” you’re saying into the phone, a gentle crease growing between your eyebrows. Whatever you heard back must have been distasteful because you grimace. “Okayyyy, Yeri, I’m hanging up now!” you say pointedly and groan, laying back into the grass.

Renjun chuckles “All good?”

“Yeri has brought home a ‘distraction’.” you say, making air quotes, and a face like you’ve tasted something sour. “I’m banished from my own home for the evening.”

Renjun looks up. 

He thinks about his next words carefully. “Um… what are you gonna do?”

You groan once more and say “I’m probably going to crash at Lia’s till my exile is over. So inconvenient!”

“You could come over to mine.”

Renjun didn’t know how it happened, how he found the courage to think it and then actually say it out loud, but now there’s no going back because the two of you are walking down the hallway to his place. He doesn’t know why, but his throat is a little dry and he peeks over his shoulder to see that you seem a bit nervous as well. He takes a deep breath and decides to break the tension.

“Here we are.” He says as he punches in the code. He holds the door open “Hello, MTV. Welcome to my crib.”

It works because it makes you smile. “So, this is where the magic happens.”

“Mhmm, but I hope to God my roommates have at least attempted to clean it up some, because I did text them a head’s up.”

“Lead the way, Huang Renjun.” you say and he does. He walks you into his living room where Jisung is currently sitting, playing video games. The smell of something delicious makes his head turn towards the kitchen where he finds Jaemin.

“Hey, Y/N!” he calls out then wipes his hands on a towel before coming in to give you a hug. 

“Hi, Y/N!” Jisung says without looking up.

Renjun is amused and a little confused. Perhaps you and Jaemin got even closer while he wasn’t noticing, but Jisung? When had the two of you met? By the looks of it, Jisung was comfortable enough with you that he wasn’t even minding his manners and greeting you properly. Probably because he was too busy dwindling his thumbs on his controller furiously. 

“Damn, Jisung, you’re really going at it, huh?” you say to him easily.

“Mhmm. I would’ve been doing even better if Jaemin hadn’t interrupted and kicked me out of my own room because you were coming over.”

There is a two second silence before Jisung’s audience of three begins talking at the same time.

“Jisung!” Renjun yelps, bringing his fingers to the bridge of his nose.

“Oh, no, we aren’t going to like… do anything--” you find yourself explaining at the same time, face heating up.

“Jisungieeee!” Jaemin also sings out to scold, yet he grins as he mock-chokes the boy.

“You are so dead.” Renjun gives the back of Jisung’s head a death stare.

“Nooo, our Jisungie means well, don’t you, Jisungie?” Jaemin coos while Jisung dodges his kisses.

Renjun shakes his head and places a hand to your arm to guide you along. “Let’s go.”

“I’ve made food if you crazy kids get hungry!” Jaemin calls after you and it’s the most animated he’s been in a while.

His friends being, well, his friends was probably worth it because Renjun is feeling a lot better as he brings you into his room. It had been a while since he had brought a girl over and looking about, he can tell that his mates did a good job at hastily cleaning it. 

“Damn, Huang Renjun. You’re a clean boy.” you’re saying as you look about. “I thought you’d be the artfully messy type.”

Renjun grins as he runs his fingers through his hair. “We can mess it up together if you’d like.” But Renjun mentally smacks himself in the head as soon as the words leave his mouth because you’ve looked up at him and quickly looked away, muttering something awkwardly.

“I… I didn’t mean that. I just meant with like, paint and, like…” Renjun blows air out of his mouth and then your eyes meet. Before you know it, you both are giggling at each other because the awkwardness is probably making you a bit delirious. 

Renjun watches as you take a deep breath to stop the giggles and turn to start looking around. “Oooh. Mr. Fancypants is a tea connoisseur.” you say as you run your hands over his teabag display box. 

Renjun chuckles “Do you want me to make you some?”

“Sure. Let’s have tea, Mr. Fancypants.” you take a seat on his wheelie chair and your eyes go to the artist’s apron you had bought him that is currently hanging on an easel. You give it a fond smile.

“What flavor would you like?” Renjun asks as he puts the kettle on and sets up two mugs.

“Umm… I don’t know tea. I’m a coffee drinker.” you reply, your fingers tracing over the pictures he had at his desk.

“I’ll make you a simple chamomile, then. I’ve seen you and Jaemin enabling each other’s coffee habits and I don’t approve.” he knots his eyebrows.

“Oh no, no, no. Jaemin is on a different level. I took a sip of his coffee by mistake once and my entire life flashed before my eyes. I don’t know if that boy drinks coffee or straight up cocaine.”

Renjun bites his smile because he’s still holding onto the look of disapproval. “That would explain the random spikes and falls in his energy.” he says as he pours out the water in the mugs and seeps the teabags. “Here you go.” he sets your mug on the desk and takes a seat on his bed.

You take a sip “So, which one is your bunk?”

“Top.” Renjun also wants to make an innuendo but he stops himself because the awkwardness surrounding the fact that you and him are alone in his room has only just subsided with the tea.

“Isn’t the bottom bunk more comfortable?” you muse as you drink. You seem to be enjoying your tea because you haven’t set it aside yet.

“Of course it is. It’s why Jisung has it.” he comments, cocking his eyebrow. “And I sleep here on this bed.” He pats where he’s sat.

You grin as you sip then quickly wipe your chin as some tea spills through your smile. “Where do you keep all your paintings?”

“In the studio. On that top bunk. Behind that door. At my grandma’s house.” he lists off on his fingers.

“Why behind the door? If I had your talent, I’d basically cover every bit of my wall in my art. Like the most egomaniacal artist in the world.” you fantasize, looking up at the ceiling.

Renjun chuckles. “I kinda like my space to be a bit cleaner, you know? Because I’m always around art. It kinda helps with my imagination, having a clean environment. It’s almost like a clean canvas.”

“Interesting.” you’ve said and it sounds like you genuinely mean it. “It’s still a bit sad. All the work you’ve created should have a home. It shouldn't be hidden away behind doors or on top bunks.”

“You can give some of them a home if you’d like. If you have space, I mean.” Renjun gives you a fond look. You haven’t replied but you’ve set your mug down and looked at him with a very tender look in your eyes. You stand up.

“I wanna see your bed.”

Renjun grins. “Be my guest.”

“Ooooh.” you make an excited squeal, almost like you're about to enter Dexter’s Laboratory. You plop yourself on it and bounce up and down, almost as if to check the pliability of it.

“So this is where the magic happens.” you giggle and then Renjun finds your gaze moving to a picture frame on his headboard. “Is that your grandma?”

“It is.” Renjun smiles as he watches you pick your feet up and make yourself comfortable.

“She looks exactly like you.” you say, looking back at him with an affectionate look.

“A lot of people say that. People in school used to think I’m adopted because I looked nothing like my parents.” Renjun scoots back to sit next to you.

“Are you close to your parents?” you ask gently, looking at him.

Renjun looks away. 

The two of you hadn’t had that many deep conversations. And anytime you did, he had found a way around it so that nothing was shared, nothing was learnt. 

But no one had ever asked him that… not in so many words. He finds himself shrugging and responding before he can stop himself. “Nah. They don’t even talk to me. They’ve never really cared.”

“How do you know that, Renjun?” you’re asking him in a very soft voice. The kind of voice that has Renjun sharing more than he wants.

“They pretty much abandoned me very young,” Renjun laughs ironically. “They would fight all the time, you know? Like, they really would go at each other one moment then make up the next moment. They kind of forgot they had a son.” Renjun finds himself saying while his eyes fixate on a loose thread on Jisung’s bedsheet. He realizes he’s warm and comfortable and that’s when he notices that you’ve put an arm around him.

“That must have been so hard, to go through that.” you’re speaking to him so softly and your head and your body is angled towards him, giving him all your attention while Renjun talks into the abyss. 

“They were just like… kinda dysfunctional, you know? They fought like crazy and I had to hide away so I wouldn’t hear them. And then the next day, they’d be in each other’s arms like nothing happened. They would pretend like everything was all right. Like the trauma they gave me meant nothing.”

You’re not speaking anymore, only listening. Your hand around him has started to gently stroke his arm. Your other hand softly combs through his hair.

“It was such a vicious cycle and they wouldn’t stop. I think they were kinda addicted to it. They would’ve been happy living like that with each other if it weren’t for me.” He had never shared so much with anyone. But now that he had started, it was difficult to stop.

“Renjun…” you say empathetically and pull him into you. Renjun pauses for a moment, but decides to give in. What did it matter, anyway? He rests his head on your shoulder.

“If it weren’t for my grandma, I wouldn’t even be alive, you know? She saved me from all of that and took me in. She raised me. It wasn’t even her responsibility, but she raised me.”

You are holding him to you and soothingly stroking his hair when you say “Then I think your grandma is the luckiest person in this world. Because she got to see you grow up to be such a good man.”

Renjun feels a lump in his throat grow and before he knows it, there are tears stinging in his eyes. You turn your head and press a kiss into his temple and slowly rock him. It was odd, being here like this, because Renjun realizes that this was the first time you had kissed him. But more than anything else, it was the first time someone had held him like this. 

The last time he remembered being held was probably when he was a child, and it had been his grandma. No one since had held him in their arms to listen to him, to comfort him, to love him without any conditions. No one had tried to take his pain away without wanting something in return. The thought puts more tears in his eyes and he finds himself leaning his weight into you. 

He allows you to hold him and comfort him and coo at him. You’re speaking to him gently but Renjun isn’t hearing your words. He’s only concentrating on the soothing sound of your voice and how melodic it is. He liked hearing you talk. He’s concentrating on how you’re rocking him, and how the movement is slowly lulling him. He liked how warm and soft you were and how protective your arms were. He liked the smell of chamomile on your breath. Had you enjoyed chamomile? He thought you had. Maybe you would’ve enjoyed a different flavor more. Renjun decides he should make you an Earl Grey next time; it would probably be better suited to your caffeine tastes. Maybe you wouldn’t like Earl Grey as much either, but it would be nice to discover that bit about you. He’d make you try all the flavors till he learnt which one your favorite was. 

“How come I never saw your cat?” He asks sleepily after you’ve been quiet for a while.

“Hmm?” you ask, confused.

“Your cat. Galbi. How come I didn’t see him when I came over?” Renjun can feel your smile against his temple.

“Oh. Yeri had dropped him over at the vet’s that day. Do you want to meet him?” you ask him.

“Yeah, it would be nice to meet him.” Renjun says and brings an arm up to cuddle closer into you.

“Okay. Next time you come over, you can meet him… shoulder gangster Renjun.” you’re only whispering at him now as you tease him.

“Mmm.” is the only reply Renjun can manage as he chuckles lazily. He didn’t even feel like killing Donghyuck for telling you about that because he feels so good like this, in your arms. Renjun hasn’t even noticed that you’ve laid him down till he realizes how horizontal he is.

It felt nice. Being held by someone, being protected by someone, being comforted by someone. Your hands haven’t stopped soothing him for a single moment ever since they started. Renjun hadn’t even noticed that you’d put the covers on him. Or that you were kissing the top of his head till he feels the warmth. It all felt so nice. He barely registers that your shirt is wet from his tears. All he feels are the relaxing patterns you’re drawing onto his skin. It’s the last thing he feels as he drifts off. And though you're gone in the morning, Renjun can swear this is the most sound sleep he's slept in many nights. He feels a thousand times lighter, like someone had lifted a heavy weight off of his chest and he was finally breathing fully. 

He smiles as he grabs his phone and sees your name right on the top of his notification list. He reads your message:

‘Hey, shoulder gangster. Sorry I left without telling you but you were sleeping so soundly, I didn’t want to wake you. I wanted to ask you something AND YOU CAN TOTALLY SAY NO. But my brother’s hosting a spring art festival of some sort at my parent’s house this weekend. A lot of his artist friends from his company will be there. Do you maybe wanna come with me?’

And there it was. 

Yes, it was funny how quickly people form habits without really meaning to. And in his new habit, Renjun had forgotten the real reason he was with you in the first place. 

Eyes on the fucking prize, Renjun thinks as his reality comes crashing back on him.

Copyright © 2021 NeoCultureTravesty. All rights reserved.

[kaistarus]

Mistexting Mayhem

Pairing: Nishinoya X Reader

Words: 1.6K

Summary: You accidentally send Nishinoya a text that was meant for Yachi and now he’s knows secrets you were hoping he never found out

A/N: If you think this fic is anything but crack you’re wrong lmao I’ve always wanted to write a fic with this style and Noya is great for the chaos i needed. It was fun

Masterlist

[6:40pm] idiot⚡: look y/n without adhd id be too powerful

                         i could beet god himself in handtohand combat

                         god was afraid of my raw fuckin awesomeness wen i bursted from the woom

[6:41pm] y/n: there is so much wrong with what u just said

[6:41pm] idiot⚡: i have absoltly no clue wat

[6:43pm] y/n: put those 3 brain cells to work. I believe in you

[6:43pm] idiot⚡: but theyve reached their daily quota

                          plz there so tired and overworked

You snorted, a dopey smile on your lips as you laid surrounded by textbooks and homework, swinging your feet in the air behind you. You focused intently on the cell phone in your hand doing everything you could to procrastinate the schoolwork around you.

[6:44pm] y/n: noyas so stupid

[6:44pm] yachi❤: i thought you liked him?

[6:45pm] y/n: jeez Yachi. dont come for my throat

                       i cant help that i have bad taste 🙄

[6:46pm] yachi❤: if it helps he tripped over a stray ball today

                               maybe think of that till you don’t like him??

Unfortunately, the image of Nishinoya waving to everyone then biffing it only had you smiling like a dork. How you’d gotten to a point that Nishinoya being an idiot made you swoon, you’ll never know.

You raised your eyebrow suspiciously at the new notification on Snapchat from ‘Tanaka’ and after swiping it open you nearly dropped your phone. Looking back at you was Nishinoya, his head tilted and eyebrow quirked in confusion with a gari-gari kun shoved halfway down his throat. The caption at the bottom reading ‘daaaammn look at your prince charming go 😩’.

You frowned at the picture, letting out a frustrated groan at how your heart accelerated against your ribcage. You quickly tapped out of it and reopened the messenger app.

[6:57pm] y/n: we have to kill Noya

[6:57pm] idiot⚡: we??? what kind of mission is this??? 😤

[6:58pm] y/n: i like him too much. he has to die. its for my own good

You waited impatiently for her response and almost debated doing your homework since it took longer than you felt necessary. You supposed you had suggested murder to Yachi, but still…

When you finally received a response your entire body froze.

[7:11pm] idiot⚡: U LIKE ME?!?!? 😍

                          UR KILLING ME?!?! 😢

                          IM SO CONFUSED......

                          and a lil turned on ngl👀

Your hand covered your mouth in horror as you processed what the hell you had just done. This didn’t happen to people in real life. Mistexting was stuff people made up when they created fake texts for social media to get likes. You didn’t think people actually went through this.

You opened new notifications to escape the hell that stared you straight in the face.

[7:15pm] Tanaka💪: Yo, whatd u do. Whys Noya having a panic attak

[7:16pm] y/n: I accidently texted him instead of Yachi and told him i liked him 😣

[7:16pm] Tanaka💪: O wtf thats hilarious 😂

[7:17pm] y/n: ITS NOT HILArIOUS

[7:18pm] Tanaka💪: Hes askin if its a prank. Wat do i do?

[7:19pm] y/n:I DONT KNOW SDKFHJN IM THE IDIOT WHO STSRTED IT

He stopped responding and you banged your head against your pillow anxiously.

[7:23pm] y/n: YACHI ITOLD NoYA I LKED HIM AND NOU HE NOS WAY DO JI DO!?!????! 😭😭😭

[7:23pm] idiot⚡: THIS ISNT YACHI!!!!

                           HOLY FUKC U DO LIEK ME!!!

You screamed into your pillow. Were you fucking kidding? This could not be happening.

[7:25pm] Tanaka💪: dude, twice? i cant save u now 🤪

[7:25pm] y/n: betraying me in my time of fucking need? i’ll remember this asshole

[7:26pm] Tanaka💪: so vulgar 👀

You growled at Tanaka’s uselessness and bravely peeked through one eye as you went back to your conversation with Nishinoya.

[7:24pm] idiot⚡: STOP IGNORING ME I KNO UR TEXTING RYU

[7:26pm] idiot: IM GONNA KEEP SPAMMING U TILL U ANSWE RME😤

[7:26pm] idiot⚡: 1

                          2

                          3

                          4

                          5

                           6

                           7

                           8

                           9

[7:27pm] y/n: what is this twitch chat? fuck 

[7:28pm] idiot⚡: your heeeeererererreee 🥰

[7:29pm] y/n: soooooo………..

                        clearly there has been a misunderstanding

[7:29pm] idiot⚡: oh nonono. I understand PERFETCLY. u LOVE me

                         its ok. this is a safe space. we can discuss feelings 😌

[7:31pm] y/n: there are zero feelings to discuss

[7:31pm] idiot⚡: then y did u say u like me too much so i have to die?

[7:34pm] y/n: i am filled with rage 🤬

[7:34pm] idiot⚡: rage over how much u liiike me???🥰🥰🥰

[7:36pm] y/n: definitely not

You racked your brain for some kind of reasonable sounding excuse, eventually landing on:

[7:36pm] y/n: It was autocorrect

[7:36pm] idiot⚡: HAH????? FROM?????

[7:38pm] y/n: HAH???

                       ....Nora?

[7:38pm] idiot⚡: Who TF is nora???? 😡

[7:39pm] y/n: someoe i like obviously 😏

[7:40pm] idiot⚡: so u like them but u use my name so much it autocorrected to me? 🤔

[7:44pm] y/n: OK MR DETEcTIVE WHERE TF ARE THES BRAIN CELS COMIN GFROM?

[7:45pm] idiot⚡: i pull them out for special ocasions 😌

[7:45pm] y/n: well how bout you pack those up and put em away

[7:46pm] idiot⚡: how bout two people who LIKE each other SAY something so they can DOOOOOOOO something bout IT 🙄

You began typing a frantic message about how it was none of his business until you processed the message. Then you read it over several times before letting out an audible, “what the fuck.”

[7:50pm] y/n: YOU LIKE ME

[7:50pm] idiot⚡: I FLIRT WITH U ALL THE TIME WAT DO U MEAN yOu LiKe Me!?!

                          FUCKING OBVIOSLY

[7:51pm] y/n: literally when. name one time.

[7:52pm] idiot⚡: I WALK WITH U EVERY MORNING!!!

[7:53pm] y/n: I thought that was a coincidence???

[7:54pm] idiot⚡: I BRNIG U SNACKS DURING LUNCH!!!

[7:54pm] y/n: I thought they were leftovers??

[7:55pm] idiot⚡: …....I call you cute and invite you to my games.

[7:56pm] y/n: you call everyone attractive and i thought there was like a audience quota or something........?

[7:57pm] idiot⚡: ….i cant tell who i should be upset with rn but i think its u 😑

[7:58pm] y/n: WAT WHY!?!

[8:00pm] Idiot⚡: I LIKE U+U LIKE ME=WE LIKE EACH OTHER

[8:01pm] y/n: whoa. slow down. I hate math 😣

[8:02pm] Idiot⚡: ===WE SHUD GO ON A DATE!!!

[8:02pm] y/n: HAH!? i think you started multiplying that addition problem buddy 🤨

Your cheeks were beginning to ache from how wide your dopey grin was. You couldn’t help but tease Nishinoya-it was second nature at this point-even if you now knew your feelings were mutual.

[8:04pm] idiot⚡: i suk at math but thats NOT the point

                         point iiissss i think deep down u want to hang out and cuddle and fall in love

                        maybe even..... 😏 kiiisssss

[8:04pm] y/n: WHOA WHOA WHOA

                        WARN ME BEFORE YOU GET NSFW

                        i would never premarital eye-contact. let alone k🤢ki-🤢🤢kiss🤢🤮🤮

[8:05pm] idiot⚡: well we would have socks on 🙄

[8:06pm] y/n: oh. well if there’s protection

[8:06pm] idiot⚡: Im not a maniac

[8:07pm] y/n: i suppose as long as you dont do something stoopid

                        like faceplant in public

                        that would be humiliating

[8:08pm] idiot⚡: I-

                          who told you that 😠

[8:08pm] y/n: i have spies everywhere noya

                        youre never safe

[8:09pm] Idiot⚡: kinda hot 👀

                         makin me fear for my life like that👀

[8:10pm] y/n: i hate that i like you

                        It kills me inside 

                        i feel braincels leaving with every conversation

[8:12pm] Idiot⚡: fan behavior 😏

                          so am i taking u to eat tomorow or wat?

[8:14pm] y/n: if I HAVE to 🙄

[8:14pm] Idiot⚡: No u GET to

                          I am a fucking delite 😤

[8:15pm] y/n: whatever helps you sleep at night

[8:15pm] Idiot⚡: nothing helps me sleep at night. this mind never rests

[8:16pm] y/n: thinking 24/7 and still not a smart thing comes out of that mouth 👀

[8:17pm] Idiot⚡: yas, bully me more 😫

[8:19pm] y/n: ok thats as much as i can handle for one day......

                       im gonna pretend to do homework

[8:20pm] idiot⚡: okie... good luck my sweet baby pogchamp 🥰

[8:20pm] y/n: no

[8:20pm] Idiot⚡: 😘😘😘

[8:22pm] y/n: 🙄✋

[8:23pm] Idiot⚡: oh FUCK yas 🥵 shut me UP

[8:25pm] y/n: suddenly all i feel is endless regret

[8:26pm] Idiot⚡: i have that effect on people

                          See you tomorrow 🥰🥰🥰

[8:27pm] y/n: unfortunately 😘

[8:27pm] idiot⚡: 🥵

You flung an arm over your eyes and let a small giggle bubble up from your chest. Nishinoya was probably the biggest idiot you’d ever met, but you couldn’t help that thinking of spending time with him had you kicking your feet with excitement.

You supposed you should actually get started on your homework. You reached forward when a notification popped up from Yachi, asking if her idea worked and you had stopped liking Nishinoya.

...you should probably break the news, huh?