#this is not a romantic thing this about a family friend who had to leave the country because the new zealand immigration system is broken

[soscarlett1twas]

Been thinking about Andrew and Luca.

There’s something so special to me about these two men — outwardly, very different people, but they’re just so alike internally: both having a pretty isolated upbringing with little to no friends, then being thrust into college life and discovering love… and that’s where we see a rift. The outcome of that relationship diverts the course of their emotional journeys. That is, until they meet eachother.

Luca found success where Andrew did not. Luca’s college relationship landed him a fiancé, while Andrew’s was the first in a long chain of loneliness. Isaac left him, then his brother did, and all Andrew had was the choice to either drown in his feelings, or drown in work. He chose work. And that pivoted them to meet, as without Andrew’s drive, he never would have become the young professor Luca TA’d for. He built himself wax wings to soar; but we all know the end of that myth.

Luca, meanwhile, was with the love of his life. Someone who supported him relentlessly for simply being him. It’s pretty clear they have a set-in-stone happily ever after, for as much as even I don’t believe in them. But what’s interesting about this is that Luca is the abandoner. He left his family back in the US. He is happy without them, but he is also not the person who stayed. And we know he was going to — he admits to having planned returning to the States after uni. But he didn’t, because he found love. Love he figured was worth (physically) leaving his family and life for.

Sound familiar? Takes a similar bent to a certain twin’s, doesn’t it.

So it’s those choices which force them to meet. Andrew’s delve into work and Luca’s “running away.” Luca is initially terrified of Andrew while Andrew just sees Luca as his new TA. Both completely fair POVs.

That works for like a week, then Andrew and Darling’s scandal breaks. (An affair which I will say only happened because of Andrew’s crippling loneliness. Andrew wouldn’t have broken his morals so deeply if it weren’t for that fact he literally had nobody else, so desperate for some form of love that he turned to a damn student.) Darling, in the heat of their argument, pins some blame on Luca, accusing Andrew of having a fling with Luca. It’s ludicrous, and I doubt even Darling actually believed that, but it strikes a nerve with Andrew.

Something similar happens with Luca and Babe later. While it’s not as severe an accusation, Babe is jealous of the blooming friendship between our dear Marston and Pearce. Luca assures them that there is nothing going on because literally nothing is, except for the fact that both of their listeners have only observed these two lacking in something, which can be described in a lump sum as friendship.

It’s a rare moment of almost… misunderstanding? For the listeners? Luca and Andrew are both made better by their listeners. ‘Better’ in little, esoteric ways — parallel to the nature of love itself, because is love if not for the little things? — but better nonetheless. So I think to see that little spark of fulfillment in your partner fueled by another person was a moment of yes, misunderstanding.

Because they do begin to fulfill eachother.

Luca calls Andrew more of a ‘big brother’ than anything else. Andrew is the family Luca left behind. And Luca is Andrew’s friend, a role once taken by the people who left him, and it is not a job that can be taken up by a partner — romantic and platonic love are not the same, after all.

This all comes to a head when Andrew and Luca have their talk. The details are a little obscure, but from what I’ve picked up, it seems they spoke about engagement. Luca’s proposal to Babe, specifically.

This is the climax of two things: first, the building of a friendship between two people who spent their lives pretty devoid of that and two, their crossroads. Luca wants to have his family again, only this time, with the person he loves more than anything. Andrew is going steady with Darling and is in the position to have a heart-to-heart with someone who is coming to him as a friend, as a brother, even if Luca never fully expressed that to Andrew.

And it works out. Even if hidden in the vibrant hues of an Icarian crash and burn from Andrew (him losing his job), there are still strokes of bliss. Babe says yes. Luca and Andrew’s friendship grows. Darling and Andrew living peacefully, above all else, together.

Luca and Andrew aren’t even amazing friends, but still, they’re parallels and foils all at once.

They are eachothers closure and openings to a new life. They are brief moments, those passing friends who you see only so often, but still the shifting in a current. Because you don’t need some big, romantic love affair to be changed — you don’t even need a really good friend, you just need a friend.

Somebody.

And I think that’s neat.

[woozivrse]

um hi here are little bits of wips :3 all of them are like, kinda abandoned rn but i'm trying!!

popular! seungkwan x introvert! reader

digging through his bag, seungkwan pulled out a jacket for you. “here, wear it. if you're going to be here to keep me company then you will do it warm!”

“but won’t you be cold once you’re out of practice?” you held the jacket in your hands.

how svt cuddle, hoshi!

hoshi loves loves LOVES nuzzling into you. doesn't matter where, the neck? nuzzle. the top of the head? nuzzle. he also likes laying on top of you, he treats you as a personal pillow at all times, though it's usually just his head on you so he doesn't hurt you.

summer camp! (i don't actually have any ideas for this, so send some in if you have any!) it's all of svt but im considering making it a series where all the boys have an individual fic?

you looked fondly on the clearing, recalling so many memories from your childhood. soon, the campers from the city would be pouring into the field, excited–or maybe, just a little peeved that they had to be separated from their family and friends– for the start of the summer.

wonwoo x implied aromantic! reader! (this is pretty self indulgent tbh. also, not all aromantic ppl never end up in relationships! it's a spectrum)

books and other hobbies occupied your attention. it's not like you never noticed cute people, you had eyes of course, but you chalked it up to just aesthetic attraction and not romantic. and when your college literature class first began, you assumed it was the same thing. jeon wonwoo was, objectively, really cute.

girl group stan! seungkwan x boy group stan! reader— smau! (heavily HEAVILY wip. don't expect this anytime soon)

reader: “WHAT DID YOU SAY ABOUT [IDOL] HUH???”

seungkwan: “JIHYOS BETTER. JEALOUSY IS A DISEASE GET BETTER SOON😘”

legally blonde au! elle! dk x emmett! reader, based more on the musical than the movie!

“sorry! i- that came out wrong. i don't mean to judge but, for a girl? who doesn't even like you?”

“it's love!” he argued. “i love her and she loves me,”

“...you sound insane, you know,”

“i know…” he sighed, holding his head in his hands, “just, we dated for years before this, we were together since senior year of high school!”

college au! both reader and dk are leads of the same musical! dk x reader (yes this is also legally blonde based PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE I WAS IN A PHASE) (also, HEAVYYYY WIP. NOT CURRENTLY BEING WORKED ON)

soulmate au! no one rn actually x reader! (this is the final boss of all my wips i started this back in october of last year so we'll find out if it makes it out of the trenches)

he grabbed your wrist, your compasses calming down at the touch.

“found you,” he grinned, eyes bright and breathless.

and that's it! feel free to come talk to me about your favs, maybe they'll make it out of the trenches<3

[always-a-mad-comet]

God I miss her so much she's so great

[anotheruntitledsong]

i did like the hidden palace but (SPOILER if anyone hasn't read it?) i'm genuinely so annoyed at how Arbeely is handled like... I wish i could be sad but i'm just fucking irritated. I was overly invested in him and that's def why but i just feel like they did him dirty

[dirt-str1der]

I literally had a dream about reading the worst fan fiction like fucking ever kiryu was just randomly a yandere and nishiki was trying his best to survive also kiryu turned into a dragon (deez nuts) halfway and let nishiki kill him for being a bad boy but he was so upset about having to kill his bro that he just lay in the corpse for a bit and thats when i decided to stop reading and i literally opened tumblr in my dream to complain about how bad it was like the writing went back and forth from being terrible to incredible and i found myself enjoying some parts and despising others. I skipped the first few chapters so i had to tab back out and read the summary like why are they in a beach resort and the summary didnt just tell me nothing but it was also double spaced between each line and very fucking irritating and while reading it i kept thinking this is extremely ooc and boring like they would not fucking say that

[svmjaeyvn]

hidden love, l.hs

synopsis: there were two things that park jongseong reiterated to you growing up.

1: he was the better, funnier, smarter, awesomer sibling and always would be, and 2: you were to never, ever, fall for any guys like his friends, literally and figuratively.

the first was a lie, one you always rolled your eyes at and the second was something 12-year-old you always agreed to without hesitation. but with time, they soon both became a fib from your lips, 14-year-old you coming to the disastrous realization that boys weren't as icky as you once thought and your older brother's best friend had the prettiest smile (when he wasn't being annoying.) as you continued to grow older, those fluttering emotions grew as well, even with him heading off to university it seemed to leave you with a sense of longing, happier than ever when he'd visit.

until you were 16 and he came home with a girl, one that was far prettier than you were able to compete with in your head and nice enough to be a saint. your hopeless, devastating one-sided crush was forced to be swallowed without much pride, though it held no avail until you dramatically decided to never speak to heeseung again. and it worked, ignoring all his calls and texts, avoiding your family home like the plague whenever your brother was home for break if he was visiting, and simply acting entirely clueless in the unfortunate circumstances that you did end up caught by him, chalking it up to dramatic teenage hormones.

once you reached the age of it being your turn to head to college, you signed up for every exchange program possible, leaving you traveling the world for three years that passed with no contact and your once-upon-a-time crush nearly forgotten. that was until you came back home, finally settling to finish uni and all of a sudden you were a kid again, fawning over your brother's best friend who didn't know how to leave you alone. this time though, heeseung didn't see you as that annoying kid who followed jay around, he saw you for you which scared him so much more with how you've grown and nothing was worse than him feeling something for his best friend's off-limits little sister.

featuring: lee heeseung, park jongseong, sim jaeyun, park sunghoon, nishimura riki, kim sunoo, yang jungwon, hanni pham, kim chaweon, yoon keeho, yoon yechan

status: writing. start: 03/30/24. end: tba.

genre: non-idol!au, college/young adult!enha, heeseung x reader, slight age gap (4 years), brothers best friend trope

content & warnings: age gap??? (slightly questionable morality but no romantic feelings or grooming since they end up with no contact for years until adulthood), cursing, drinking, all that jazz, innuendos, sexual humor, suggestive content, possible smut, forbidden relationship, sneaking around, overprotective jay, jay tries to fight heeseung cause duh, crazy exs, stalker mention, slow burn since they're both in denial, heeseung kind of toxic mentality which is forced to be fix, angst but fluffy ending (?)

a/n: based off the cdrama. watched it months ago but shit had me giggling and kicking my feet even if it's cliche. heeseung is so forbbidden older love coded i had to. im trying to make this a oneshot so well see how long it is,,,,,,, the plot will develop from when they were kids to adulthood to provide some background. once the actual romance starts heeseung will be 24 and reader will be 20 (the year will be 2025). all my drafts and writing has been about jake so im branching out (i love my man tho so he'll have his moments here). anyway! lets see how long it takes me to finish up this one

word count: 6k (as of now)

taglist: closed! (86 of you have responded omg)

[egcdeath]

off the beaten path

pairing: patrick zweig x reader

summary: what could go wrong with a non-refundable honeymoon and a broken engagement?

warnings: MATURE (mentions of sex but no sex scenes), exes to lovers, idiots to lovers angst, fluff, there was only one bed MULTIPLE times, jealousy!! (like a lot), slow burn, no use of y/n, so much use of the word fuck, a little toxicity, some facts about landmarks are inaccurate for the plot, lots of arguing and making up, miscommunication, seasickness, patrick & reader kinda have no social awareness, a lot of hotels and buses, alcohol, hurt/comfort, happy ending.

word count: 18.4k

author’s note: this was so much longer than i expected it to be, but i loved writing it so so much and i'm gonna be sad to see this pairing go! also, a special thank you to the tour website whose itinerary i used for their trip. i hope you enjoy!

JFK AIRPORT

You scrolled endlessly on your phone as you sat at your gate, trying your hardest to fight off the combination of sleepiness and anxiety that had been slowly creeping up on you for the past hour.  

You should be happy—excited to spend the next month of your life traveling throughout Europe on the trip that you had dreamt about since you were a child. Instead, you were filled with dread at the prospect of your quickly approaching trip, leaving your leg bouncing and your eyes flitting between the device in your hands and the entrance of the gate, anxiously anticipating the arrival of a man that you really really did not want to see. 

Once it was announced that first class was boarding, you quickly hopped out of your uncomfortable seat, hoping that if you boarded quick enough, you might be able to miss your unwanted companion. As you stood in line, you tried your best to be casual about your endlessly swiveling head and wondered if it was too late to simply call the whole thing off. 

Boarding had gone smoothly enough, and as you settled into your seat, you still hadn’t seen any sign of your former fiancé. For a second, a spark of hope lit up in you. Maybe you’d get to experience Europe without that pest in your ear after all. Maybe you could even arrange a friend to come fly out and be with you for a few days, or find someone to have a romantic summer fling with. 

But just as soon as your hope arrived, it departed with the sound of a familiar voice walking down the aisle and directly towards you.

“They wouldn’t let me switch my seat.”

You couldn’t believe that those were the choice of words the man you’d intended to spend the rest of your life with had decided to start with. After months of radio silence. No apologies, no awkward small talk, no sugar-coated words about your situation, just a complaint about the conditions the two of you would be in for the next eight hours. Classic Patrick. 

“That’s too bad,” you replied, already annoyed by his presence. You had underestimated how much of a challenge this trip was going to be, solely based on the speed at which your negative feelings had come to the surface. 

“Yeah, no shit,” he muttered under his own breath, putting some luggage into the overhead bin above your seats. 

“You’re the one who insisted we still go,” you argued, not wanting him to get the last word—even if his last words were meant to be a snarky comment to himself more than anything else. 

“The hotels, tours, and all the other tickets were non-refundable!” he argued right back to you. 

“So?” you shot back like a petulant child. 

“So I didn’t want to waste your money.”

“Oh, how considerate,” you scoffed sarcastically before beginning once more. “You’re rich! You don’t even have to be here!” 

“Just because my family is comfortable doesn’t mean I want to waste my money.”

You openly rolled your eyes at his words. Comfortable was the understatement of the century. “So you didn’t actually want to waste my money. You didn’t want to waste your own.”

“Why can’t it be both?” he asked, sounding exasperated by your line of thinking. You hated when he did that. You kind of hated most things he did now. Maybe you just hated him. 

“I never said it can’t be both, I just think you should stop trying to act like you’re so charitable for doing me a favor. As if our relationship wasn’t filled with me doing you favors.”

“Do you really want to be having this conversation right now?” he asked. 

“Sorry, you’re right. We have the next thirty-five days to talk about it.”

The two of you sighed in a synchronized breath at the mention of the amount of time you had to spend together. You hated that the two of you were still in rhythm after everything you’d been through. Or maybe you just hated Patrick. 

“Who plans a thirty-five day honeymoon anyway?” he huffed. 

“Us, apparently. I mean, you were all for it, what? A few months ago?”

“Only because you wanted it.

“Oh, how could I forget. The ever-charitable Patrick Zweig. Taking a month-long break from hitting balls to be with me. I’m forever in your debt,” you mocked with a dramatic hand to your forehead. “At this rate, you’re gonna send me a list of all of the nice things you’ve ever done for me. What do you want me to say? Thank you for doing the bare minimum as a boyfriend?”

“Fiancé,” he corrected you, earning a very nasty side eye from you in the process of doing so. 

You were beginning to get dirty looks from your fellow first class passengers, which temporarily shut the both of you up. It was never a good idea to piss off people on a plane. You didn’t want to end up on the no-fly list just because you couldn’t bite your tongue around your ex. 

“Remember when you said we could still be friends after this?” Patrick spoke once more after your moment of silence. 

“Of course I remember, but you stopped that from happening when you…” your voice trailed off as you made eye contact with a very displeased looking middle aged woman “Whatever. Let’s just… try to get through this flight. And try not to make any more of a scene.”

“Fine,” he replied, shrugging in your peripheral vision. 

“Fine,” you said back, not wanting him to have the last word.

“Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“That thing where you think you win every argument just because you said the last thing.”

“I’m not doing that,” you lied. “You think you know me so well.”

A familiar agitated smile broke out on his face, something that you unfortunately missed seeing. “I do know you well, though. I see right through you.”

“You actually don’t, though.”

“I do,” he insisted, the smirk creeping onto his face telling you that he knew you were actively proving his point. 

“Not really,” you dismissed and attempted to casually pull the headphones that were currently sitting on your neck up to cover your ears. You were always grateful to have noise-canceling headphones when you were traveling, but they were coming particularly in handy for you to win this argument. You tried to hide your self-satisfied smirk as you pressed play on your phone, but you could instantly tell that you were failing. 

When you looked back up, Patrick was clearly saying words to you that you weren’t able to hear. Knowing him, he was probably saying something along the lines of, “Real mature.” 

The truth was that he wanted the last word more than you did–which made it particularly rewarding when you gestured to your headphones before throwing your hands out in a shrug to indicate to him that you couldn��t hear him.

Your vacation was already off to a chaotic start. You couldn’t help but fear what the next thirty-five days would be like. 

BARCELONA, SPAIN

Despite the flight only being eight hours long, you were absolutely exhausted by the time that you checked into your hotel room. So exhausted that you failed to remember to request to switch rooms to one with two beds rather than one.

This predicament only came to the forefront of your mind once you and Patrick had already swiped into the room, suitcases lying on the floor and one king-sized mattress presented in front of you. 

“Should I go back down to the front desk?” he asked as he looked from you to the bed. 

“I’m too tired to get a new room,” you replied. You could handle one night next to your ex. You’d slept in a bed together for years. Granted, during those years you were also sleeping together, but this wasn’t all that different. 

“Fine. Don’t complain if I hog blankets, then.”

“Fine,” you replied. “Just stay on your side of the bed.”

You shucked your backpack from your shoulders and walked over to what was typically the side of the bed where you slept when the two of you had been a couple. Not wasting any time to get ready for bed, you began to take off your clothes and search for your pajamas. Once you glanced over your shoulder, you were quite displeased to find Patrick rather openly ogling at you. 

“Stop looking at me,” you demanded.

“What? It’s nothing I haven’t seen before.” He said with a smirk. 

“You’re such a creep,” you muttered, throwing on an old shirt and crawling into bed. 

As you laid in bed and texted your friends and family that you’d arrived at your hotel safely, you took a peek of your own at your former partner as he got ready for bed. He seemed to be going with his classic bedtime attire of just boxers. Bold move. 

Your eyes were momentarily stuck on his abs and enticing happy trail. You’d planned your trip during Patrick’s off season while he was training for his upcoming season, so you were pleasantly unsurprised that he was in such good shape. Your breath caught for a second as you thought about the rest of him, and you desperately tried to repress the low, fiery feeling rising in your stomach. 

“And I’m the creep?” he asked with a laugh, pulling you away from your objectification as he got into bed next to you. 

“Yeah,” you replied, as if you hadn’t just given him the same treatment he’d given you. 

“Well… like what you see?”

You scoffed at his audacity, though you did like what you saw. “I’m not fucking you. Goodnight.”

You hit the light on your nightstand and you swore you heard a quiet sound of disappointment come from Patrick. Bastard.

You turned your back to him and closed your eyes, finding that sleep took you under surprisingly easily.

When you woke up in the morning, you were greeted by a far too familiar feeling. Despite your request for Patrick to stay on his side of the bed, the slow, steady breaths being breathed into your ear and the solid wall of body behind you indicated that he had not only traveled into your space over the course of the night, but was actively spooning you. 

You were shocked to find that you didn’t necessarily mind it. Yes, you were mad at Patrick for everything that had gone down between you, and because he was such a pain in the ass, but you also hadn’t realized just how much you missed being held. Particularly, how much you missed being held by him. 

The more alert you became, the more you realized that you couldn’t really move. Despite that, you found that you didn’t really want to move. Sure, you were beginning to get uncomfortably hot, and yes, you could feel Patrick’s morning wood pressing against your ass, but none of it was particularly unpleasant. 

Part of you wondered if your trip would go differently than you expected. Regardless of how you acted towards one another, you clearly both missed each other. 

Your shrill phone alarm suddenly went off, startling Patrick awake behind you. 

“Mmm, fuck, sorry,” he sleepily slurred as he rolled away from you. You turned over to look at his tired face, eyes still lidded and speckled face looking far softer than you remembered. 

Out of the blue, he opened his eyes, catching you in the act of looking at him with barely-concealed affection. Before he could make some sort of snarky comment, he shot out of bed, adjusted his boxers, and made an urgent beeline towards the bathroom. All of which would’ve been far funnier if his actions hadn’t been disrupted by the loud message ping of his cellphone. 

You weighed out your options. You were curious about what was waiting for him on his phone, but you weren’t sure that you’d have time to properly snoop. As if the universe was listening to your thoughts, the sound of the shower began, telling you that you had all the time that you needed to do some adequate investigation. 

You wondered who was texting Patrick so early in the morning. Knowing him, it was probably his mother, checking in to make sure he made it to his destination safely. You were sure that whatever message she left would also be inquiring about you. She’d always had a bit of a soft spot for you, especially compared to some of the other people that Patrick had brought home. That, of course, was an observation shared to you from Patrick, so you couldn’t be sure how much of it was flattery compared to truth. 

Regardless, her fondness for you had carried into the end of your relationship, with her occasionally messaging or calling you to make sure that you were still doing well, and more importantly, to check in on the status of your relationship. 

Much like you and your friends, she’d been holding out hope that your relationship may repair itself. With you and Patrick being as passionate as the two of you were, you were no strangers to seemingly serious arguments that resolved themselves in a matter of days. While calling off a wedding was far more drastic than any of your other disputes had been, after being together for years, it was hard to imagine a world where the two of you weren’t a couple. 

But his call never came. You didn’t hear an apology or explanation or even an excuse from Patrick—just a suggestion of when you should pick up the items you’d left at his place.

You hated to admit it, but there was a naïve part of you that was still holding out hope that this trip would be exactly what you needed to reconcile. And maybe that naïeve part of you was less delusional than you might’ve originally thought. Surely cuddling into the morning and Patrick’s poorly hidden morning wood were signs that this vacation was already going in the right direction. Maybe being in such close proximity was exactly the push you needed to get your relationship back on track. 

After a halfhearted internal debate, you grabbed his phone from the night stand on his side of the bed. Attempting the passcode he’d been using while you were together—the digits of your birthday—you were pleased to find that the password hadn’t changed and that you were granted access into his phone. What you weren’t expecting to see was Tinder on the homepage of his cracked device. 

You paused for a moment and attempted to reason with yourself. Your former fiancé probably didn’t even use the app. He’d likely been pressured by his rebound-obsessed friends to download it, and hadn’t even opened the app since setting up his profile. Besides, you didn’t get on his phone to see what new apps he’d downloaded, you were snooping to see what his mom had to say about you. 

When you opened his messages app, your mouth promptly fell open in shock. Patrick had always been loyal to you—at least to your knowledge—while the two of you were together. Seeing him be so openly flirtatious and suggestive with an attractive woman that you hadn’t ever heard of was more than jarring. 

Your stomach churned as you scrolled through the conversation, flirty messages and images from both sides that left little to the imagination disturbing you in a way that you hadn’t ever realized was possible. 

In the midst of your distraught state, you nearly missed the background noise of the shower coming to a halt, informing you that your time snooping had come to an end. 

You set his phone back down where you’d found it and desperately tried to push down the bile in your throat that was tasting more and more like jealousy and anger by the second. 

You knew it was irrational for you to be feeling this way, considering that the two of you had been broken up for a few months. Nothing legally or morally tied the two of you together anymore, but that didn’t make you feel any less unsettled by what you’d just seen. 

It was just that… you weren’t sure you’d ever be able to fully move on from Patrick. He’d been part of your life for so long, and the way things ended had been so abrupt that it almost didn’t feel real. Even if you did move on, it was going to take you more than three months to do so. It wasn’t fair that Patrick’s name seemed to pop up every week in your therapy sessions, while he was sending pictures of himself in gray sweatpants to random hot women. 

You wanted to shrink into the mattress and never come back up. You wanted to yell at Patrick the moment he stepped out of the bathroom. You wanted to turn on your side and wail dramatically, at least until all of your big feelings felt a little smaller. 

But you were in Europe on vacation. You were on vacation, damnit, and you weren’t going to let one mildly disturbing text thread ruin your entire experience. Better yet, if Patrick was already moving on, there was no reason that you shouldn’t do the same.

You told yourself this as you rolled out of bed and dug in your suitcase, pulling out a sundress that had driven Patrick wild in the past. While you may have packed it with less than realistic expectations, your goal was far more grounded now. 

Both of you could play this game. 

You stepped out of the bathroom fully dressed after a shower of your own and instantly registered the almost cartoonish look he was giving you. You guessed that some things never changed, even when the two of you had decided to actively pursue other people. 

“The tour guide said to meet in the lobby soon, so I’m gonna head down,” you explained, not giving him a second look as you began to search for your purse. 

“The tour doesn’t start for another half hour?” he replied, sitting up from where he was laying on the bed. 

“Well I wanna socialize with the people we’re gonna be traveling through Europe with,” you said a little snappily, still a little perturbed about what you’d found on his phone earlier. You conveniently left out the fact that you wanted to scope out any potential summer flings. 

“I’ll come with you,” he insisted.

“You really don’t have to. Remember, this isn’t actually a honeymoon,” you slipped on some comfortable shoes and headed to the door. “I’ll see you around.”

You were probably being far more rude than you really needed to be, but your anger had only intensified as you showered and put on makeup. At this point, you were fully pissed—even if you didn’t have the right to be. 

You made small talk with the people you met in the lobby as they began to filter into the room, and tried your absolute best to dispel the anger that was flowing through your veins. That proved harder than you anticipated, as Patrick was one of the last people to join you all in the lobby, and for the life of you, you couldn’t stop imagining him sitting in your shared hotel room and sexting his mystery girl. 

Luckily, you couldn’t dwell on that ugly thought for too long, as your tour began soon after. Your friendly guide took your group around the city, explaining rather riveting information about the landmarks you visited and the city itself.

After being dismissed for a quick break, you found yourself sitting on a bench and chatting with a man in your group. He wasn’t really your type, but he was extremely conventionally attractive, and from the peripheral glances you caught of Patrick, you could tell that he wasn’t exactly pleased with what was going on.

While making him jealous, or annoyed, or whatever it was that he was feeling, wasn’t your expressed goal, it did feel nice to give him a taste of his own medicine. What felt less nice was glancing over and catching him typing on his phone furiously. You could only imagine whose boobs were on the other end of the line. 

Reacting out of a bit of desperation and frustration, you began to play things up. You leaned over more to show off more cleavage, laughed a little harder at jokes that weren’t all that funny, and set a scandalous hand on his arm. You were determined to have that vacation fling now, and you were going to get it by any means necessary. 

You laid it on thick for the rest of the afternoon, sitting next to him during lunch and flirting casually with him as your group walked through Park Güell. 

You wondered if he noticed you throwing glances in Patrick’s direction after every interaction. You hoped that he didn’t. 

It felt good to be getting even with Patrick—but not as good as you expected it to feel. The realization sunk in as a portion of your group visited a bar that was apparently very popular with the locals. Or at least, that’s what a very handsome man purred into your ear after sitting down next to you at the bar.

You’d been keeping an eye on Patrick as he socialized with a couple that he’d been talking to for the majority of your day, but you almost instantly lost track of him as you became consumed with this handsome stranger. 

Everything happened in a bit of a blur—one moment you’d been nursing a Marianito, and the next you were holding the hand of a man whose name you couldn’t remember as he led you to his apartment. 

By the time you’d left his apartment, you were nothing short of a mess. You were pretty sure that the only way you could’ve been more obvious about what had just happened to you was if you had the words “JUST HAD SEX” written across your forehead—and with the way the people in your hotel elevator were looking at you, you couldn’t be completely sure that those words weren’t on your face. 

You made it back to your room safely, quietly opening the door and doing your best not to make too much noise, since at this hour, Patrick was surely asleep. 

It did feel weird to be going back to his bed less than an hour after you’d been with another man, but you couldn’t necessarily say you felt bad. Patrick had started it, and you simply finished it off. If he didn’t have any issues with seeing other people, there was no reason for you to have an issue with it either. 

Your efforts to be quiet had proved themselves to be for naught, as Patrick was very clearly wide awake, sitting up in bed and already looking at you disapprovingly. 

You weren’t sure what possessed you to speak, rather than ignoring his presence and heading straight to the shower, but your mouth was open before you could stop yourself. 

“Were you just gonna wait here until I got back, like I’m a kid who just snuck out or something?” you asked in disbelief, partially annoyed because of his action, but more ashamed to have been caught in such a state. It couldn’t have been more obvious to Patrick what you’d just done, considering that he’d seen you in a similar state hundreds of times. 

“Baby, we are on a whole different, unfamiliar continent,” his tone was condescending and cold and it made you want to crawl out of your skin. “Why wouldn’t I wait to make sure you got back safely?”

“Don’t call me pet names. And I would’ve been fine. We were just at the bar,” you lied. Going to the apartment of a random man you just met probably wasn’t your brightest idea, but you made it out alive, and that was what mattered. 

“Huh. The bar?” he smirked at you in a way that screamed that he was pissed, without really having to say a word. 

“Yes, I- what does it matter to you anyway?” you hoped that the question would be enough to get you out of the situation. If you were going to argue, you at least wanted to argue after you were showered and in pajamas.

“What does it matter to me if you fucked someone else?” he asked, sounding like he was in complete disbelief. 

“Yeah, Patrick. Why does it matter if I fucked someone else? We’re not together anymore. Did you forget? I mean, it seemed pretty obvious to you when you stopped speaking to me completely a few months ago.”

“Please, enlighten me. What did I have to speak to you about?” 

“I don’t know! Maybe an ‘are you okay?’ would’ve been nice. Or something. Anything, really. We were together for six fucking years and you just dropped me like I was dirt!”

“I…” he trailed off, catching you by surprise. He almost always had a quick clever response that managed to piss you off in a way no one else ever could, so seeing him not knowing what to say next caught you off guard. “If our relationship meant that much to you, why were you all over that guy? I mean, seriously. I’ve never seen anything so desperate. You were practically rubbing yourself on him in the park like a bitch in heat.”

Contempt dripped from his words. You had never been so enraged.

“Are you joking?” you laughed out of sheer anger. “Patrick, you started it! How many Tinder girls have you seen since we broke up? And don’t you dare fucking lie to me. I saw everything you’ve been sending to Amelia. Amelia, I’m so lonely. Amelia, I’m so horny. Amelia, I love you so much,” you mocked.

“You went through my phone?” he asked in disbelief, not even bothering to address the rest of your statement. “Fuck. You’re unbelievable.”

“I’m unbelievable? How long did it even take you before we split for you to start seeing other people? I mean, knowing you, you were probably just waiting for the day we broke up to go get your dick wet.”

“That’s not true, and you know it,” for a second, he looked genuinely wounded—something you were only able to recognize after years of being in a relationship with the man. You didn’t like that you were actively hurting him, but he’d been inflicting pain on you from the moment you broke up.

“Fine,” you conceded on that front, knowing that he was right. It wasn’t completely true. If you hadn’t gone through his phone, you never would’ve guessed that he had already moved on. “But you’ve still been seeing other people.”

“We’ve been broken up for months now,” he replied, as if that was supposed to make things any better or more reasonable. 

“Then why do you care so much about me having sex with someone else? It’s fine when you do it, but suddenly it’s an issue for me?” 

Patrick’s face immediately paled. “You really fucked him?”

“Well, yeah,” you paused. “Well, not who you’re thinking of.”

“You fucked someone else?!” The hurt and disbelief buried under his words made your stomach churn. “You were flirting with that other douchebag all day, I don’t-“

“You’re acting like I’m some whore for reacting to something that you did first!” you cut him off. 

“And you’re acting like I wanted to get rid of you this whole time!” he shot back out at you. 

“Clearly you fucking did,” you hissed. 

“Fuck you,” he huffed. 

“Fuck you,” you shot right back. “I’m leaving.”

“Good,” Patrick replied with a shrug as if he didn’t care, although you were very sure that he cared. “Go run back to your little fuck buddy.”

“Yeah, maybe I will,” you replied as you gathered your items back into your suitcase. “He was better than you, by the way.”

“Yeah, I bet,” he said snarkily as he watched you pack up your items. Luckily, you didn’t have much to pack up and were already heading towards the door. 

“He had a bigger dick, too,” you said as you swung open the hotel room door, fully satisfied with a lie that you knew would bother Patrick. 

While leaving your hotel room seemed like a wonderful idea in the moment, as you went down the elevator, you started to realize that you really did not have many options for where you’d sleep that night. 

You figured your best bet was the hotel lobby. Maybe you could pretend to be someone who’d drank too much and passed out on the first floor before you made it up to your room. You sat down in a comfortable looking chair and grabbed your keycard—in case anyone asked you to verify who you were—then set a floppy hat on your head to cover your face from the bright hotel lobby lights while you attempted to sleep. 

Sleep was already going to be difficult to accomplish, thanks to the argument that you were certainly going to be ruminating on for days to come. That was only made more difficult by the uncomfortable seating and position you’d found yourself in. Somehow, you managed to fall asleep, being woken up by a hotel employee and a friend you’d made from your tour group.

“Long night, huh?” she asked you with a playful smirk. 

“Mm, something like that,” you mumbled sleepily. 

“Well, you can sleep on the coach. It just got here, so we’ll have the best pick of seats. C’mon,” she extended her hand out to you and you gladly took it, in desperate need of something grounding. 

You dozed off on the coach once you’d gotten settled, headphones securely on your ears and sunglasses covering your closed eyes. You were vaguely aware of people boarding the vehicle around you, but didn’t pay much mind to anything. Eventually, you heard the faint sound of someone taking attendance of the people on the bus, followed by the commotion of someone getting on the bus late. 

Something compelled you to open up your eyes, and when you did, you were displeased to find that Patrick was the source of all of the drama. Likely thing for him to be. He scrambled down the aisle, looking desperately for empty seats. To your own horror, you realized that the seat next to you was vacant, and perhaps the only vacant seat on the entire coach. 

As if your minds were connected, you watched Patrick face that very same dilemma as he eventually decided to sit down in the only empty seat, right next to you. 

Neither of you said anything at first, not addressing your blowout argument the previous night, or your awkward current situation. 

“You look like shit,” Patrick finally said as the bus took off. 

“Thanks,” you replied, mentally preparing yourself for a continuation of the argument you’d had just a few hours ago. It was only a matter of time before he brought up your promiscuity or started blatantly texting his Tinderella. 

But none of that ever came. In fact, he just looked a little sad. It was weird to see Patrick so openly defeated. He was always one to put on a smirk or a challenging smile when you argued, letting the façade fall once he was alone, or once the two of you finally discussed what the issue was like adults.

You weren’t sure that you liked it. You preferred annoying asshole Patrick to sad, moping Patrick. 

“You look like shit, too,” you added. “Which is crazy, since you had access to a shower and I didn’t.”

“And whose fault is that?” he asked, looking at you with the slightest hint of that devious smile. You had to fight the slightest inkling of a smile on your own face. 

You felt ridiculous knowing that your mood was still being influenced by your former partner. Even when he was insulting you. Even after he’d spent the night arguing with you. Even after you’d slept with someone else. Even after the two of you had a messy split. 

You still loved him. 

“Yours, mostly,” you shrugged and put your headphones back on. 

PARIS, FRANCE

Despite your brief conversation on the bus, you and Patrick didn’t speak to each other for the entirety of your commute. Although you clearly cared about him, it didn’t change the fact that he had upset and hurt you deeply. And even as upset as you were, you knew that you’d hurt him just as badly. 

You had a particular dread for what awaited you in France, knowing that this part of the tour was very couples-activity heavy. When you’d scheduled your trip, this aspect of the tour felt like a major selling point. The two of you always seemed to be falling more in love with each other, and having a candlelit dinner by the Eiffel Tower felt like an exciting way to kick off your marriage. 

Now, you just felt like an idiot.

The two of you did your absolute best to avoid getting paired up with each other for all of the activities that you could. You found yourself spending most of your time with a solo traveler who was close in age to you. She made a surprisingly fun companion to your cheese and wine taste test, popping cubes of fragrant cheese into your mouth and making a competition out of who could detect the most accurate notes in your wine. 

While you found luck in your first few activities, you weren’t so lucky when it came to an evening ride of the Roue de Paris. Whether it was fate or just bad luck, after the pair in front of you had dipped out of line for reasons unknown to you, you had the shocking realization that Patrick had been in between them the whole time. So much for meeting new people on the massive ferris wheel. 

You tried to look busy so he wouldn’t notice that you noticed, and did your best to think of some sort of game plan. Although you’d essentially been giving each other the silent treatment in the hours leading up to this moment, you’d caught Patrick looking at you multiple times throughout the day—something you only noticed because you’d been looking at him as well. 

After a moment, the two of you were let into an empty passenger car. Sitting across from one another, it was hard to ignore the very obvious elephants in the room, but that didn’t mean you wouldn’t try. 

At first, you simply looked out the window, not saying a single word as the ferris wheel began to move. 

“You should put that safety belt on, just in case,” Patrick commented from his side of the car, pulling his eyes away from the window to look at you. 

“I doubt anything will happen,” you shrugged. “It’s fine.”

He eyed you suspiciously for a moment, before leaning over and strapping you in anyway. Your breath caught in your throat, his simple action putting you into serious psychological pain. It wasn’t lost on you how much Patrick liked to take care of you. It was far more obvious when the two of you were dating, with him covering the bills for dates and doing your laundry for you. It had been so ironic to you at the time, how a man who could barely take care of himself always went out of his way to make sure that you were going to be okay. 

Now, his small act of kindness just made your stomach turn. But it wasn’t like you could express any of those feelings. 

“Thanks,” was all that you managed before looking out of the window once more. 

An awkward, heavy silence filled the passenger car once more as the ride began to take the two of you higher. 

“The view is so beautiful,” you commented, unable to remain silent anymore and hoping that your words were neutral enough not to stir any pots. 

“Yeah, it’s really nice,” his gaze remained fixed out the window, before he looked at you once more as if there were words on the tip of his tongue. 

“I honestly don’t know how we managed to get in line in time to see the sunset,” you continued with your boring, neutral small talk. 

“I’m glad we did. This is the perfect spot to watch it.”

“Yeah,” you agreed, continuing to look out the window instead of at the man across from you. “It’s so pretty tonight, too.”

“It is,” he agreed. 

The two of you sat in silence again, only the sound of a soft whirring filling your ears. Then suddenly, all at once, the whirring stopped—and so did your passenger car. 

“Are we stuck?” you asked, looking out nervously at the very tall height that the two of you were currently definitely stuck at. 

“We can’t be. It’ll probably start back up in a second.”

It didn’t start back up in a second. In fact, after a series of announcements in French, an announcement in English suddenly declared that it would be at least an hour before the ride could be fixed. 

At the sound of the announcement, both you and Patrick sighed aloud, still synchronized even after everything you’d been through. 

“Maybe this is a sign,” Patrick piped up. 

“What are you talking about?” you laughed at him, hoping desperately that this didn’t mean that he wanted to continue arguing with you. You genuinely did not have it in you to do so again. You also didn’t have it in you to sleep in another hotel lobby. 

“Well, I’ve been wanting to talk to you all day,” he confessed. 

“Is that why you were staring at me all day?” you teased, a weak, slightly hopeful smile creeping onto your face. 

“I was looking at you because I could feel you staring at me,” he clarified, as if he was setting the record straight. “I don’t want things to be like this between us anymore.”

“Yeah?” you asked, the pit of nerves in your stomach tightening at wherever he was going with his spiel. The anticipation of his words alone made you nauseous. 

“So I think that we should talk about last night,” he suggested. 

That was exactly what you didn’t want to hear him say. You had barely processed the argument yourself, let alone think about anything else that you had to say to Patrick that didn’t involve trying to hurt him as much as he hurt you. 

“We don’t have to. It’s fine. The past is in the past,” you dismissed. 

“It’s not fine, though. Not really,” he countered, all earnestness. You didn’t detect any harshness to his words or any blood in the water that indicated to you that he wanted to do anything more than have an honest conversation with you. “I was so out of line. I can’t- I don’t want you to think that I really believe the things I said about you.”

“Patrick, please…” you trailed off, hoping that he would understand that you didn’t really want to talk about this. Though, you were relieved to learn that he’d only said those things out of the heat of the moment. 

“No,” he stood his ground. “We need to talk about this if we ever want our relationship to improve.”

“Fine,” you gave in. “But you start, so I can collect my thoughts.”

“Of course,” he leaned forward so he could get a better look at you, and you were immediately drawn into some intense eye contact with him. “I’m sorry for acting like a dick yesterday. I shouldn’t have treated you the way I did, and I really shouldn’t have let you leave our hotel room. That was really stupid of me. I worried about you for the rest of the night and spent the morning looking for you.”

This was surprising information to you. While you did find it to be a bit of a dick move that Patrick would just let you leave like that after lecturing you about being unsafe in a new country, you hadn’t realized that he’d been late to boarding the coach because he’d been searching for you. You could only imagine the sick feeling he had as he realized he couldn’t find you anywhere. 

“I’m sorry for what I said, too. Insulting you for trying to move on was really unfair of me. I was just… hurt, I guess. When I don’t even have the right to be.”

“You do, a little. We were together for a really long time, so it’s gonna feel weird that we’re starting to see other people,” you shrugged. “That was an excellent apology, that I accept, by the way.”

“Thank you. I really got a chance to practice my apology skills with the last woman I was with,” he explained. You tried to repress the feeling of jealousy that was already bubbling up in your stomach at the mention of another woman. 

“Yeah?” you asked, hoping that he didn’t notice the brief twitch of your eye.

“Yeah. She’s super opinionated and outspoken, so we would butt heads a lot. But that was always something I really liked about her. That, and her magnificent ass.”

Finally, it occurred to you that he was talking about you. You rolled your eyes and shook your head, despite the fact that you were secretly very flattered by the way he was speaking about you. “Ew. Shut up,” you laughed. 

“Well, if you’re done objectifying me, I would love to apologize to you too.”

“All done objectifying you. For now, at least. Go ahead.”

You were a little nervous about the words that were about to come out of your mouth. You just had so much to say, and you weren’t sure that it was all going to come out correctly. 

“I’m sorry for the things I said last night. I genuinely did not mean what I said, I just got caught up in the moment. And I’m really sorry for going through your phone, because that’s seriously none of my business. It was such an unnecessary violation of trust, and I understand if you’re still pissed at me for that. And it was really ridiculous for me to overreact the way that I did over you seeing someone else, because again, it’s really not my business. I feel like I’m kinda the worst,” you confessed. 

“You’re not the worst,” he countered. 

“Fine, I guess. Maybe you just bring the worst out in me,” you joked, trying to lighten the mood slightly. 

“That sounds more accurate. We bring out the worst in each other.”

“Right. That’s why we’re such a good pair,” you paused, then corrected yourself. “Of friends.”

“Is that what we are now?”

“I never said we were good friends.”

“Frenemies?”

“Something like that,” you said, before the familiar whirring sound of the ferris wheel began once more. 

“Huh. Who would’ve thought that the only thing the wheel needed to function was an apology to each other?”

“You’re so annoying,” you laughed and shook your head. “How are we gonna make it through the rest of this trip?”

LONDON, ENGLAND

Your final few days in France had been made far less awkward by your conversation on the ferris wheel. Deciding to fully embrace the couples activities the tour had reserved for you, the two of you were having a good time re-establishing your friendship. 

Your trip to London had gone mostly without a hitch, with your group arriving in the city in the evening and immediately checking in to your hotel. At this point, you had given up on even attempting to get separate beds. It seemed like every morning now you woke up cuddling with Patrick, but you weren’t necessarily mad at the unintentional intimacy. 

In some ways, your relationship was beginning to feel similar to how it felt before the two of you broke up. While you were sure that things wouldn’t be exactly the same—especially since you still hadn’t addressed the elephant in the room that was your breakup—it was nice to return to the comfort you’d found in your relationship with Patrick. 

Like clockwork, the morning after your arrival in London, you woke up with Patrick pressed up against your back, nose buried in your hair. As he woke up, he pressed a gentle kiss to your hairline out of what you were sure was just habit rather than genuine affection. 

“Morning,” he greeted you groggily, rolling away from your side. 

“Morning,” you replied, turning to face him. You ran a hand through his messy morning hair and looked at him fondly. It was taking far more self control than you had to not lean over and kiss him. “What time is it?” you asked, in part to distract yourself, but also because the digital clock was on his side of the bed. 

“It’s…” he trailed off as he went to read the time. “Oh shit, we’re gonna be late.”

“What?” you asked, shooting up from your relaxed position. 

“It’s 8:25,” he explained, already rolling out of bed. 

In a rush, the two of you got dressed in record time, making it down to the lobby in the five minutes that you had to make it on time. You shared a high-five in the lobby, and tried your best not to dwell on how the simple action felt far more domestic than it needed to. 

Your tour began not too long after that, getting your day off to a strong start. Your day of exploring London was by far your busiest. You were sure that you’d accumulated thousands of steps as you went between large museums, beautiful parks, and massive landmarks. By the time that you returned to your hotel room, you were pretty sure that your legs were mush. 

You returned earlier than Patrick, who had gone out to a gastropub with a group of tourists in your group that he got along well with. You took this as an opportunity to have some alone time, taking a long and steaming hot shower, frolicking around the room in a soft hotel robe, and watching a movie while you waited for your room service to arrive. 

After you’d thoroughly enjoyed your alone time, finishing off your room service and opting to scroll on your phone, the door cracked open and Patrick strolled in. 

“Looks like you made yourself right at home,” he observed. 

“I had to after today’s tour. So much walking,” you groaned. 

“It wasn’t all that bad,” he shrugged, sitting down next to you in bed. 

“Well, not all of us are professional athletes,” you laughed. “How was the pub?”

“Fun. It’d be better if you came.”

“I’m sorry, I was exhausted,” you sighed. “You could’ve stayed in with me and had a spa day.”

“We can have a spa day anywhere. We can have a spa day right now.”

“Mm, I’m all spa’d out. But the water pressure in the shower is excellent, so you should definitely check that out.”

“I will in a little bit,” he said. “Did you try out the actual spa here?”

“They were closed when I checked, which really sucks, since I was in desperate need of a massage.”

“Do you still want one?” Patrick asked. 

“Yeah. I’ll probably try to stop by when they’re open tomorrow and get one.”

“No, I mean, do you want a massage now?” he added. 

It had been a long time since Patrick had offered you a massage—or to put his hands on you in any capacity—but you remembered him being criminally talented at giving them. You also remembered his massages usually making for great foreplay that left your knees weak and your brain a pile of jelly, but that clearly wouldn’t be the case now, and you needed to get your head out of the gutter. 

“I mean, sure. That would be nice,” you tried not to sound too excited, though the prospect of a massage from him sounded very, very nice. 

While the prospect of a massage sounded nice, the actual massage was heavenly. You were sure that years of having personal trainers and physical therapists work knots out of his body had made him an expert at finding knots and kinks in your own, which was now leaving you sighing happily as he ran his hands over your back. 

You tried your best to ignore the dull, fiery feeling growing in your lower stomach that was surely a result of experiencing a type of intimacy that you hadn’t in quite some time. As you let out an involuntary soft sound at a particular knot being rubbed out of your shoulder, you wondered if this massage was affecting him nearly as much as it was affecting you.

You promptly received an answer to this question when something hard and phallic brushed up against your leg. You turned your head to glance back at Patrick, and his face immediately grew red. 

“Sorry. I can stop, if you want. It just happened because of the noises you’re making and- whatever. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

Part of you felt a little satisfied knowing that you still had that type of impact on him. It gave you a tiny glimmer of hope to know that you were still, at the least, physically attracted to one another. 

“It’s fine. I’ll shut up.”

“You don’t have to. I want this to be as relaxing as possible for you.”

“Well you’re doing a great job, if you couldn’t tell from all of the moaning and groaning on my end.”

You both somehow made it through the rest of the massage without spilling all over the bed, but as you melted into the bed, feeling every muscle in your body relaxed from your excellent massage, you couldn’t help but note the suspiciously long time Patrick was spending in the shower. And maybe it was just your imagination, but if you listened hard enough, you swore you could hear the sound of a soft chanting of your name coming from the other side of the bathroom door. 

While part of you regretted not suggesting that the two of you help each other out with your mutual problems, you were pretty sure that it was for the best. You genuinely didn’t know where the two of you stood, as far as your relationship went. Hooking up would surely further complicate an already complicated situation, since you were pretty sure that ex-fiancés didn’t typically sleep together. But then again, ex-fiancés also didn’t usually go on a honeymoon despite not being together. Your complicated feelings on the matter only further proved to you that you made the right choice by not giving in to your baser desires. 

By the time Patrick joined you in bed, you were already half asleep. Yet, even in your delirious state, you didn’t miss the way he came up behind you, pulling you into a loving embrace. It brought warmth to your chest to know that he couldn’t even wait for your automatic sleep routine to hold you, and that he felt the need to take matters into his own hands. 

You were pretty sure that exes didn’t do that either. 

AMSTERDAM, NETHERLANDS 

You didn’t know what you expected from your first ferry ride, but being face deep in a barf bag while soothing circles were rubbed into your back was certainly not it. 

Given that you weren’t a frequent rider of large vessels on bodies of water, you had no clue going into the ride that things would go so sideways so quickly for you. If anything, you thought you might have the opportunity to stare peacefully out into the water, or to force Patrick to take a few cute pictures of you. Unfortunately, you were currently doing neither of those things—and it didn’t seem like you’d be doing them any time soon. 

You heaved once more, now almost totally sure that you had nothing left to give. Patrick continued to hold your hair out of your face with one hand and use his other to comfortingly rub your back, not at all fazed by your sickness. If you weren’t currently fighting off another wave of nausea and didn’t have the taste of bile lingering in your mouth, you probably could’ve kissed the man. 

Once your brain finally told you the coast was clear, you leaned your head back and took several deep, gasping breaths of air. 

“You alright, honey?” he asked you, and you didn’t even have the strength—physical or mental—to correct his use of a pet name. 

“I could be better,” you replied, pinching the bridge of your nose as you tilted your head back. “There’s medicine for this, right?”

“Yeah. Let me go see if I can find some.”

As you fought off a war of nausea and headache that was currently beating you on all fronts, you could faintly hear the sound of Patrick asking the people around you if they had any medicine for motion sickness. He eventually returned after what felt like a lifetime, but was probably more like a few minutes, carrying a bottle of Dramamine. 

He helped you take the pill, putting it in your mouth then holding a bottle of water up to your lips to help you swallow it. The action felt oddly romantic, though it was more of a matter of practicality compared to anything else. You were clearly not in a stable enough space to get the pill down on your own, so his assistance wasn’t really anything for you to be over analyzing. 

“Look at you, keeping that down,” he teased, running his hand up and down your arm. The motion was soothing, a bit of bodily comfort amongst a plethora of other awful physical pains you were experiencing. “You’re doing great.”

His soft caresses turned into a full-blown hug, with Patrick pulling you into a tight embrace. While the action itself was rather cute—especially since it seemed to be completely impulsive on his part—it instantly brought on a new wave of nausea. 

“Pat?” you squeaked. 

“Yeah?” he asked. 

“You’re sweet. But if we stay like this, I am going to be sick all over you.”

He pulled away from you with concern, careful not to move too quickly to set off another bout of sickness. While he let go of your body, he continued to hold your hand, as if he were attempting to ground you. With how anxious he was looking, he might’ve been trying to ground himself as well. 

It was cute seeing him so worried about you. You tried your best not to read too much into it, and luckily, your slowly fading nausea was the perfect distraction from doing so. 

“Thank you for the drugs. It was fun watching you scramble all around asking people for help. You’re such a good…” you paused, not really knowing what you were or what to say. “Ex.”

Now wasn’t exactly the ideal time to have the, ‘what are we?’ conversation, but Patrick didn’t seem to mind. And if he did mind, he was doing a damn good job at hiding it. 

“Only the best for my ex.” Maybe you’d just been imaging it, but you swore you sensed a bit of hesitation on his end as he called you his ex. Admittedly, it would be significantly easier for both of you to be calling each other spouses, or even partners. But alas, you weren’t either of those things to each other anymore. 

As if you’d read each other's minds, the two of you quickly moved on from that conversation. 

After you’d arrived and gotten settled into Amsterdam, you set off to explore the city. When presented with a few options of things to do, Patrick insisted that the two of you go on a bike tour, much to your own chagrin. As much as you weren’t sure your legs could handle any more strenuous physical activity, you’d known that Patrick had wanted to take this bike tour since your trip was an actual honeymoon. Who were you to deny him of that?

As the two of you toured the very beautiful city, Patrick made sure to make a show out of his biking skills. While he was no professional cyclist, he certainly had the ego of one—which translated to him going a little too hard at times and nearly falling off of his bike more than once. 

Each time he almost fell, you found yourself also almost falling, the onset of laughter at the ridiculous man riding next to you nearly being too much to handle. Without fail, every time the two of you did your almost falling, then break into a howling laughter routine, you were given dirty looks by your fellow tour mates. Unfortunately, that only made the situation funnier to you and Patrick. 

By the time the tour had wrapped, it was clear that everyone was sick and tired of you. But at least this time, the people around you were sick of the girlish giggles Patrick pulled from you, rather than the rude words he provoked you into saying, like he’d done on the plane. 

It was refreshing to be spending time with him like this. In the time that you’d been so upset about your break up, you forgot about just how good it felt to be around Patrick when your relationship was going well. 

It was also nice to be spending some alone time with him, away from the rest of your tour group. As the two of you looked at strange knick-knacks in an antique store, you realized just how much you missed being alone with him. While it was nice that the two of you had made friends within your group, your dynamic as a duo was obviously something really special. Maybe that’s why the two of you had been together for so long. 

You spent the majority of the afternoon doubled over in laughter, playfully teasing Patrick, or being on the receiving end of subtle, gentle touches. As you really began to think about it, this day of travel had been your favorite—by a long shot. It also happened to be the day that felt most like one from a honeymoon.

Although it had already been clear to you for some time that you still had feelings for Patrick, the day you had spent together had completely sealed the deal. Once Patrick had surprised you with a beautiful bouquet of flowers over dinner, you’d only been more sure that you were sick with love for your ex.

It was a small miracle that you’d rounded out the day without confessing your feelings, particularly since you ended the evening with a movie playing on the television of your hotel room that the two of you barely paid attention to, as Patrick held you and talked about some of the things you’d missed while the two of you were separated. 

In the morning, you woke up to the soft sound of chatter, rather than your loud alarm clock or the sound of deep breaths in the shell of your ear. 

From what you could faintly make out from the words and the lack of a warm body beside you, Patrick was on the phone with his mother. You wanted to feel bad for eavesdropping, especially since you’d just had an argument with Patrick over your snooping habit just over a week ago, but it was far too difficult not to listen in. 

“I’m glad you liked the picture,” you made out from the muffled words behind the doorway. You were sure he was referencing the selfie the two of you took in front of Big Ben a few days ago. You also liked the photo a lot, with the two of you looking particularly good and particularly happy. You’d also taken a more baity photo of him kissing your cheek, specifically to send to his mother who he knew would be overjoyed to see you. While Patrick had explained the idea behind the picture as his mom simply wanting to see you, you knew the more accurate statement is that his mom wanted to see the two of you together. 

After a beat, there was a soft chuckle. “No, we’re not back together. No mom, there’s no ‘yet.’ I know. I’m an idiot, I know- aren’t you supposed to take your child’s side? Well, I don’t know if you know this, but we never ended up getting married, so no, she’s not your daughter. How could she possibly be your favorite child! We just talked about this. I’m gonna hang up. I’m serious. Alright. Love you, bye.”

When Patrick returned, you were already sitting up in bed. 

“Can you tell your mom I say hi next time?” you asked with a cheeky grin on your face, still coming off of the high that was the romantic outing you’d had the day prior. 

“I’m sure she’d love to hear that,” he replied, getting back into bed beside you. “She probably wants to hear from you more than she wants to hear from me.”

You laughed and shook your head, not bothering to argue with his words since you both knew they were pretty accurate. 

“I mean, I’m sure she’ll be inviting you to Thanksgiving and Christmas long after we’ve moved on with other people and have our own families.”

Your heart dropped to your stomach. You were sure of it. You thought you could genuinely feel the movement of your most vital organ slowly sinking into a pit of stomach acid. 

You tried not to let your smile falter, considering that Patrick was looking right at you with a sweet look of his own plastered on his face. You wondered if this was some sort of test, to gauge how you felt after a day of rekindling the love the two of you thought had burnt out. 

Or maybe, more realistically, he’d already come to accept the reality that you’d been stalling on accepting: your relationship was truly over. One fun day wouldn’t change the fact that your wedding had been called off, and that the two of you said things to each other that would alter the foundations of any solid relationship for years to come. 

Your heart was such a traitor. She refused to accept the simple fact that Patrick wanted to move on, and that your relationship was a thing of the past. Maybe, if you couldn’t convince your heart to accept that truth, you might be able to force your brain to. 

“And I’ll still be accepting that invitation, thank you very much,” you stated, trying to sound confident in your words. “In the meantime, let’s get ready before we miss this bus. You can tell me what your mom’s menu is gonna look like this year on our ride over.”

SOMEWHERE IN CENTRAL GERMANY

It was stupid for you to be torn up the way that you were over just a few simple words, but the more you thought about it, the worse you felt. 

In reality, it wasn’t just what Patrick had said to you in the hotel room. It was the fact that he’d been actively trying to move on with other people since who knew when, and the way he seemed to frequently verbally reiterate the fact that your relationship was over. By holding out hope that you might somehow be able to repair your relationship, you were being much more naïve than you even realized. 

You felt stupid. But you also felt confused, because as much as Patrick swore he was over you, and pursued other people, he was also far too comfortable acting like nothing had changed between you two. After all, he was the one flirting with you, and trying to attach himself at the hip to you as you traveled. He was the one who always managed to end up spooning you over the course of the night and woke up kissing whatever part of your body he was closest to. For god's sake, he’d just told you yesterday about how he’d searched high and low to find a bouquet of flowers that he thought you would genuinely like. And most damningly, you hadn’t forgotten the look of hurt on his face when he found out that you had slept with someone else. That wasn’t the behavior of someone who was over their partner.

To say you were receiving mixed messages was a complete understatement. You couldn’t understand how it was possible that the man who was currently leaning against you very affectionately, despite being on a cramped bus, was also totally over you and wanted to move on.

You didn’t know what you wanted to do about the situation, but you were sure that you couldn’t keep going like this. 

Your bus stopped somewhere in Germany for the evening, letting you all out to have dinner and do some light sightseeing before regrouping in the morning and heading to Prague. Somehow, that translated to going to a bar to try out German beer for you, Patrick, and a few of the friends you’d made while traveling. 

After a brief intermission of checking into your hotel room, your small group met up in the lobby, then set off to find a bar. 

Drinking while you were feeling a little upset probably wasn’t your brightest idea. The speed and volume at which you were consuming alcohol was a little concerning, but not nearly as concerning as how much Patrick was drinking. Eventually, even in your drunken state, you realized that you should probably slow down—if nothing else, to take care of him. 

But the two of you continued on, going from bar to bar, getting drunk at a level that probably would’ve been acceptable when you were younger, but was certainly going to take a major toll on you now. 

Forgetting about the repercussions of the future, you two were having a great time. Despite you being out with a group, it felt a little bit like the two of you were in your own little bubble. Nothing else in the world seemed to matter as the two of you took shots and danced together. Not the people around you, not the fact that you had to be up early the next morning to make it onto your coach, not even the fact that Patrick had implied that the two of you would move on and have families with other people only a few days ago. 

By the time that the rest of your group had called it quits, explaining that they wanted to be up and functional in time for your ride the next morning, you and Patrick were still in your own little world. It was only after you’d shared a few drunk cigarettes that the two of you decided that the fun should end, and that it was time to head back to your hotel. 

Unfortunately for you, midway through your trek back home, your drinking buddy had given up on walking, leaving you tasked with literally dragging him all the way back to your hotel. While a sober version of yourself would’ve been annoyed by the inconvenience, all you could really think about was how nice it was to have his body so close to yours.

After a tumultuous journey back, the two of you finally made it back to your hotel room. You had only been in the room for a matter of seconds before Patrick collapsed onto the bed and let out a loud sigh of relief, followed by an even louder yawn, as if he was the one who had just carried you down the road.

It was annoyingly endearing. 

You had half the mind to at least get somewhat ready before getting into bed, shedding your outermost layer of clothing before joining Patrick in bed. 

“Thank you,” he said to you once you laid down next to him. 

“Mhm,” you hummed, your head still pleasantly buzzing from the alcohol. “But I’m never doing that again.”

“Aww, why? We had so much fun,” he practically whined. “I always have so much fun when we’re together.”

“I had fun, but you’re so heavy. You’d never guess it. All those muscles,” in the midst of your complaining, you reached over to grab his bicep to demonstrate his point. 

He laughed, which made you laugh, though you didn’t exactly know what you were laughing at. Then, out of the blue, he randomly said your name in a very serious tone. 

“Can you help me with something?” he asked, sounding very genuine and giving you a look that you couldn’t quite place in your drunken state. 

“Anything,” you replied earnestly and meant it. You would probably do literally anything that he asked you to do at that moment. Move a mountain? You’d start pushing. Marry him? You’d wake up an officiant and come up with vows on the spot. Help him hide a body? You were sure you could find a shovel somewhere.

“Can you help me get my shoes off?” he lifted a foot as he spoke to demonstrate his point, a little pout on his lips. You were a little disappointed that he hadn’t asked you for anything else, but you also weren’t quite sure what it was that you wanted him to ask you for. 

You groaned playfully, a long and drawn out sound that you hoped would communicate that you were exhausted after dragging him through the city and comfortable where you were laying. Still, you leaned over and untied his shoes before gently slipping them off. When you looked back up at Patrick, his pants were newly half undone and halfway off, but it looked as if he had given up fully taking his pants off. 

“Need help with that too?” you asked, though you were already working on slipping the article of clothing off of his legs.

Though you tried to push the thought out of your mind, you couldn’t help but recall a similar night the two of you shared several years ago. Your relationship was still relatively new, but you were already very obviously in love. So in love that you’d gone out of your way to set up a surprise party to celebrate a particularly successful tennis match, decorating your apartment with photos of him with trophies and other tennis paraphernalia and inviting as many of his close friends that you could track down. Still riding the high of winning and his all-consuming adoration of you, Patrick had partied a little too hard, leaving you in charge of tucking him in at the end of the night. 

After bringing him a glass of water, the man snuggled into your sheets and slurred out a comment about how they smelled like you. You felt your cheeks warm as he continued on in a disjointed ramble, talking about how much he appreciated you and how no one had ever gone out of their way to make him feel like that before. He ended his monologue with a request for you to help him take his clothes off, and you happily obliged. It was tender and far more intimate than you’d expected, and ended in a drawn out kiss that left you giggling as you told Patrick that he tasted like Smirnoff Ice. 

Even as inebriated as you currently were, the nostalgia made you feel a little dizzy. 

By the time you’d finished helping him get his pants off, Patrick had clearly given up on getting his shirt off, too. Once again, you moved your hands up his body and helped him out with the piece of fabric. 

“Look at that. All ready for bed,” you commented, setting a hand on his bare chest. The small action made your heart soar, and you promptly decided that it was probably better for you to avoid touching him altogether. 

“My watch?” Patrick asked, lifting his wrist up to show you the accessory. 

“You can take your watch off yourself,” you replied, leaning back into bed and finally laying down. 

“Fine.”

“Night, Patty,” you said, reaching over to turn out the bedside lamp. 

“Wait,” he paused pensively, as if he was digging deep in the recesses of his mind to conjure up what he was about to say. “A kiss?”

“Patrick!” you gasped, sounding far more scandalized by the proposition than you actually were. Of course you would give him a kiss, you just weren’t sure you were ready to open up that can of worms, especially after you’d had a minor crisis at the realization that he genuinely wanted to move on.

“No goodnight kiss? C’mon. Fully commit to tucking me in,” Patrick insisted, as if it was the most logical thing ever. As if either of you had the self control to not let something as simple as a kiss spiral out of control. 

“Fine,” you sighed before pressing a gentle peck to his forehead, figuring that was the safest place to do so. A forehead kiss was about as platonic as it got with you.  “Sweet dreams.”

“Thank you,” he said, rather sweetly as his eyes shut. “Love you.”

Those words instantly gave you pause, causing you to suddenly feel very alert and very sober.

“Sorry, what did you just say?”

“I said I love you?” Patrick repeated, looking at you with confusion. “What?”

“Nothing,” though it was very much not nothing. In fact, if his confession was true, it would change everything. “Go to bed.”

“Wait, what?” Patrick grabbed your arm, looking very worried in the low light of the room. “You’re mad. You’re mad that I love you?”

You didn’t even know how you were supposed to react to that admission. While it had been exactly what you’d been dying to hear from him for months, it only further complicated your already very complicated situation.

“I’m not mad, I’m… I’m just tired. Let’s go to sleep, okay?”

Your explanation seemed to placate Patrick enough to let it go and go to sleep. He shuffled around to get comfortable behind you, before pulling you in to hold you as he’d done for the entirety of the trip. Except, tonight, it didn’t feel quite right. The mixture of his frequent rejections of you, paired with his casual confession that he still loved you made your head spin. 

The following morning, you woke up with a pounding in your head and a gross taste in your mouth—only one of which, you could fully attribute to the drinking you’d done last night. You clumsily reached for your phone, and found yourself pleasantly surprised to find an announcement about the delay of the next bus you would be getting on. 

You got out of bed with a grunt, your entire body aching with the reminder of having to drag Patrick through the city last night. Somehow, the sore muscles didn’t hurt nearly as much compared to the memory of being told that Patrick still loved you. 

You slowly paced back and forth around your hotel room, desperately trying to organize your racing thoughts. Did Patrick actually mean what he said last night? Or had been caught up in the heat of the moment? If anything, the latter seemed more likely, since he’d been very obviously trying to distance himself from you. But had he really been distancing himself from you, or just talking about distancing himself from you? If his care for you on the ferry had been any indication of how he really felt about you, it was possible that his drunken words were more honest than you were trying to convince yourself that they were. 

Finally, you decided to stop annoying the person staying in the room under you with your increasingly frantic pacing, and to go outside to walk. Some fresh air would be good for you anyway. 

“Where’re you going?” a muffled voice, heavy with sleep asked. You paused the tying of your shoes to look over at the bed, where Patrick was currently squinting at you.  

“I’m just going for a walk,” you told him. “Go back to sleep. The coach is coming late.”

“Wait for me. I’ll come with you.”

That was probably the last thing you needed or wanted. After all, the whole purpose of your walk was to help you sort out your thoughts about Patrick. To say he wasn’t a welcome addition to your trip was an understatement.

“Okay,” you said anyway, against your better judgment. It seemed like you hadn’t been using much of your judgment at all on this trip. What was one more poor decision on top of a series of poor decisions?

You watched him get ready from where you were sitting, quietly impressed with his ability to get up and be functional despite surely being just as hungover—if not more—than you. He also seemed wholly unaffected by the conversation you’d had last night, which was something that you certainly couldn’t say for yourself. 

With sunglasses perched on your nose and the weight of your entire relationship placed on your shoulders, the two of you headed out into the city, walking on the same sidewalks that you’d practically carried Patrick down the previous night. 

“Last night was fun,” Patrick commented, making small talk with you as you began to head down the street. 

“Some parts,” you agreed, hoping that he’d recall you grunting as you lugged him down the street, rather than your shock when he told you that he still loved you. 

“I honestly don’t remember most of the night,” Patrick said with a chuckle that almost sounded a little forced. You couldn’t be sure if he was being honest or searching for a cop out for the things he’d told you before you went to sleep, but you weren’t sure that it really mattered.

“Unfortunately, I do,” you replied. 

“Oh no. I hope I wasn’t too much of a pain.”

“You were like, slightly above average in terms of being a pain. Nothing I’m not used to.” You figured that maybe you could banter your way out of this situation. Perhaps if you just pretended that everything was okay, things would magically become okay.

But that didn’t feel alright. In fact, it wasn’t alright. If you ever wanted to improve your relationship with Patrick, you had to stop beating around the bush with him. You were both adults. You’d been together for years, yet you felt like you wasted far too much time not being straightforward with your thoughts and feelings. If there was going to be a next time for the two of you, you wanted things to be different. 

“You did say something kinda interesting last night, though.” While it had been easy to talk up a big game in your head, you immediately regretted the words that came out of your mouth. Regardless, it was too late for you to back out. 

Patrick laughed nervously before asking, “what?”

“You just… you kinda told me you still have feelings for me, or whatever. I just think, maybe we should talk about it. Or at least talk about us.”

The man next to you paled at your words. Your regret for bringing the topic up immediately grew exponentially. 

“I don’t think there’s anything to talk about,” Patrick said, though he was lying through his teeth and both of you knew it. You wanted to approach this topic with civility and an open mind, but his blatant lie was making that a rather difficult task.

“Are you kidding? We’ve been tip-toeing around it this entire trip.”

“We’re broken up. You called off our wedding. I don’t think it gets any more straightforward than that,” he dismissed with a gross simplification of the state of your relationship.

“That’s not what I’m talking about, and you know it. And even if it was, all I said was that I didn't think I was ready to get married. You put the final nail in the coffin when you told me you fell out of love with me. But I don’t know how I’m supposed to interpret you not being in love with me anymore when you still act the way that you act with me.”

You could tell the direction this conversation was going, your discussion quickly veering into argument territory as Patrick began to invade your space as he always did when you argued. 

“And how exactly do I act with you?” he challenged, though you were sure he knew exactly what you were talking about.  

“Do you want me to give you a list or something?” you asked, his anger becoming contagious.

“Sure, why not,” he said drily. 

“Fine. Let’s start with the cuddling, then. Please enlighten me, do you know any exes who spoon regularly? I mean, I certainly don’t. I don’t even touch my friends like that. So I don’t know what that really makes us. Or maybe how jealous you got when you saw me with someone else. I really can’t think of any sort of platonic explanation for that, and trust me, I’ve tried. And while we’re at it, I guess I should mention those showers. I respect the hell out of your faith in the thickness of these hotel walls, but I actually can hear you moaning my name while you’re in there. I’m honestly a little flattered, but I’m mostly confused.”

“Like you’re not doing the same,” Patrick scoffed. You knew him well enough to recognize that he was masking his true feelings with hostility, and though you wanted to engage in an actual conversation with him, you weren’t sure you would be able to take the high road in this conversation.

“Sure, but I’m not the one in denial of what’s going on here!”

“I’m not in denial. Have you ever considered that maybe I want to move on?”

“Do you, though?” you asked, pausing on the sidewalk.

“Clearly, I do,” he stopped right along with you, now really getting in your face.

“Clearly,” you repeated with a laugh. “Maybe you should start acting like it.”

“Maybe you should stop clinging to the past.”

His piercing gaze was unwavering as he waited to read your reaction. You knew how he liked to play this game, looking for an indication of any sort of weakness from you. You refused to give him that, though his words cut deep. 

“Okay,” you said calmly, though you were very much not feeling calm on the inside. “Well, thanks for letting me know how you really feel. Or how you think you feel. I don’t really know anymore. And I don’t think you know either.”

PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC

If you had known that telling Patrick that he drunkenly confessed to loving you would’ve broken the already very delicate relationship the two of you had built back up, you never would’ve said anything at all. As it turned out, having some of Patrick was better than not having him at all.

The contempt he now felt for you had become so strong that he didn’t even seem to be able to look at you. He sat next to a different person on the bus to Prague, not even sparing you a glance. When you arrived at the hotel, he made it a point to ask for separate rooms—something the two of you hadn’t done the entirety of your trip. As your tour began, he seemed to make a strong effort to separate himself from you, standing in the back of your group when you were in the front and vice versa. 

Usually, even after your worst arguments, you’d been able to find the time to talk out your feelings, but now it seemed like Patrick couldn’t even find it in himself to give you that.

You wanted to be mad at Patrick too. You were mad at him. But you missed him more than you were angry with him, and you yearned to be with him, no matter how crazy his constant antics drove you. 

Part of you felt frustrated that your relationship had become so cyclical since your breakup. You weren’t sure you could handle another cycle of fighting to the point of real anger, then making up with your relationship still a little more strained than it was in the past. You just wanted Patrick. Why did things have to be any more complicated than that? 

You desperately clung on to any bits of hope that your relationship might persist, coming out of this argument altered, but still existing. You snuck peeks at Patrick while you toured a beautiful castle and tried to bite your tongue until you stopped thinking of how badly you wanted to grab him and joke about his home looking like that castle. You wondered if he wanted to put your initials on a lock and put it on a bridge as much as you did. You wished you could ask him if he missed the warm body in bed beside him the way you did. 

But every time you looked at him, he was pointedly not looking at you. As your group paused on the bridge to allow couples the time to make their own locks, Patrick didn’t even spare a glance in your direction. You were sure that even if he did miss you in bed, or wherever else, he would never tell you about it. 

You didn’t want it to be over—but you couldn’t keep clinging to hope that it wasn’t. 

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

Getting to view the breathtaking scenery of the Swiss Alps as you sat on a cable car had been a dream of yours for years. What wasn’t included in that dream was dodging the glare of your ex-fiancé as the two of you sat in silence on that very gondola. 

Unluckily for the two of you, you were stuck together for the afternoon. Private skiing lessons in the Swiss Alps sounded like a great, even romantic, idea while you were planning the trip, but it was far from romantic now. 

The two of you stood on opposite sides of your instructor, the tension between you so thick that in the midst of his safety spiel, he paused to ask if everything was okay between you. After a stilted reply of yes, your instructor looked at you both skeptically before carrying on. 

Seeing as Patrick was an athlete who spent his childhood school breaks in Aspen, he was pretty decent at skiing already. Far better than you, a novice who was moving a little bit like a giraffe standing on its feet for the first time. 

While it wasn’t your first time skiing—that had been on a family vacation you’d tagged along on with the Zweigs—you certainly were not experienced enough to be keeping up with Patrick, who had the experience and the ego to give even your instructor a run for his money. 

It was entertaining to watch him in his element, his competitive side coming out despite the fact there was no competition anywhere to be found. He was significantly faster than you wherever you went, and skied with a confidence that you doubted you would ever be able to exhibit. In the past, this behavior may have been slightly endearing to you, but right now, it was mostly a little annoying. 

You and your instructor stood above Patrick, watching him effortlessly glide down the mountain in front of you. If you weren’t so agitated, you might actually have been impressed. As if your instructor was actively reading your mind, he leaned over to say something to you. 

“I think he’s trying to impress you,” he said quietly, though the subject of your conversation was an entire slope away. 

You nearly choked on your own saliva at the observation. “No way.”

“What do you mean no way?” he laughed. “Trust me, I’ve been doing this for years, and I’ve seen it all. Couples, crushes, friends, coworkers. I know posturing when I see it.”

“Trust me, he could care less.”

He looked at you with a doubting squint.  “Why don’t we go down there and ask him?”

“Absolutely not,” you laughed. The thought of asking Patrick anything after the interactions you’d had seemed absolutely ridiculous. At this point, you wouldn’t even ask him what time it was. 

“Sorry. Let me rephrase that. That was me telling you that it’s time for you to go down the slope.”

You looked downhill at where you needed to go, noting that it was far steeper than what you’d been practicing on leading up to this point. You had been looking for an excuse to stall going down it, but now that your instructor had said something about that, you couldn’t not go.

After taking a deep breath, you began to go down. Gaining a bit of speed, you also found yourself growing slightly more confident, closing your eyes and feeling the cold air press against your body. While you were enjoying your speed at first, it was quickly growing out of hand, and you began to panic as you realized just how fast you were going. Desperately trying to pull your skis into a V shape to slow down, you were horrified at the realization that you were far too late, and actively heading towards a cluster of trees. You didn’t know what to do other than to accept your fate, and everything had happened so fast anyway that you found yourself tumbling into a tree, a searing pain on your ankle and tailbone as you laid out on the rocky ground.

Everything felt like it was moving slowly and quickly at the same time. One second, you were alone in the snow, and the next, Patrick and your ski instructor were hovering over you, goggles on their foreheads as they looked at you with concern.

“Are you okay?” you were finally able to make out once the slight ringing in your ears had ceased. 

“Did you see how hard she crashed? Of course she isn’t fucking okay,” Patrick’s voice huffed, though slightly muffled from your helmet covering your ears.

“My ankle,” you said, as if that gave them enough context. You wondered if they could see the tears beginning to pool under your goggles. The pair looked at your limb, though with your snowsuit covering it, they really couldn’t see much. 

“Can you walk?” your instructor asked you. 

“I haven’t tried, but I’m gonna go with no.”

“We’re gonna have someone check you out. Don’t worry, they’ll be here soon,” your ski instructor told you. You blinked a few times and mustered all the strength you could to nod. 

The longer you sat, the more you began to realize how badly everything hurt. From your head down to your surely swollen ankle, you weren’t feeling too hot. You closed your eyes, suddenly feeling very exhausted. Maybe a quick little nap was exactly what you needed to feel a little better.

“Hey, don’t do that. You hit your head pretty hard when you fell, so you might have a concussion.”

“I don’t, I’m just tired,” you explained, though you didn’t know for a fact that it was true. In fact, with the pounding in your head, you more likely than not had a mild concussion. 

“Well, you kinda have to stay awake,” Patrick told you, though he surely knew it was easier said than done. You were surprised when you felt his gloved hand take yours and squeezed your hand softly. “Hey, why don’t you tell us a story?” he suggested, clearly just trying to keep you awake.

“Do you wanna hear the story about how he proposed to me?” you asked the instructor. You weren’t sure why that was the first thing to pop into your head, but it was a long enough story to keep you awake until help arrived. You wished your goggles were slightly less tinted, so you could at least see the scandalized expression Patrick was probably making. You loved when you made him react like that, since the roles were usually reversed. 

“Well, yeah. Of course,” your instructor responded with a hint of a laugh. “You guys are engaged?” he directed towards Patrick.

“This is our honeymoon,” you replied before Patrick had an opportunity to respond. You wished you could see the confused look that your instructor was surely making.

“So what happened?”

“When he proposed?” you asked to clarify. 

“...Sure.”

“Well, for a little context, Patrick here is a professional tennis player. He’s really good too. So given my athletic ability, as you got to see today, I never really played with him. Like, he would always ask me to just play a fun, quick little round and I would always tell him no. Mostly because I knew he would crush me. I did play a little bit back in the day, but I was nowhere near his level. I mostly preferred to be on the sideline while we dated. I mean, I came to every single one of his games. I’m pretty sure my office introduced remote work to us because of me, since I was traveling all the time to see him.

“Anyway, one day, after a day of buttering me up, and I mean, he was really laying it on thick. I don’t know how I didn’t think something was up,” you laughed as you recalled the day, how Patrick had scheduled a nail appointment for you, then wined and dined you during a very romantic midday picnic. “But he asked me to play a little bit of tennis with him. I think I just thought he spent the day buttering me up so that I would play tennis with him, not that I would agree to marry him, but I digress. 

“We get to the tennis court and Patrick’s nervous like I’ve never seen him. He was a little jittery all day, but this was a different beast. Looking back, I really don’t understand why. He should’ve known I was going to say yes. Anyway, we’re playing, and somehow I win, even though I’m extremely rusty and have absolutely awful form. Obviously I knew Patrick threw the match for me, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t gonna gloat at him. 

“So I’m doing my victory spiel and I walk over to his side of the court, where he’s digging in his bag. He’s so quiet, which should’ve been a sign that something was up, and I’m thinking he’s about to pull out more tennis balls and tell me we’re doing a rematch, so he can really crush me. Instead, he pulls out a box and gets down on one knee. He gives me a speech about how he didn’t care if he never won another game of tennis in his life, because as long as we were together, he was a winner. It was really sweet. Obviously I said yes.”

You finally looked over at Patrick, though you couldn’t perfectly read his expression through the darkened lens of your goggles. You wondered if he felt any of the same feelings that were currently simmering in your own chest. Though, you didn’t get to stew too long, as help arrived just as your story came to a close. 

You were taken to an infirmary and given a series of tests, some to see the state of your head and other to see how the rest of your body was doing. Surprisingly, you made it out without too much serious damage. Your ankle was sprained, but nothing that would make it take too long to heal. You had a concussion, which surprised you, given your ability to recall so many details earlier in the day, but it was a very mild one. At least you’d made it back into your hotel in one piece. 

You really just wanted to relax for the rest of the evening, and you had plans to do exactly that, when there was suddenly a soft rapping at your door. 

You got up, and with help from the crutches you were provided, you hobbled to the door and opened it. On the other side was Patrick, who you were both surprised and unsurprised to see. 

“Hey. I got your room number from the front desk,” Patrick told you. “Do you mind if I come in?”

“Sure, but I’m probably going to sleep soon,” with some effort, you sidestepped the doorway to let him in.

“Do you need anything? Want anything?” he asked as he made himself at home in your room, evaluating what you already had. 

“I’m good, I think.”

“How’re you feeling? They wouldn’t let me see you at the infirmary.”

“I’ve been better,” you shrugged, sitting down on the foot of your bed to take some pressure off of your aching ankle. 

“I bet. Are you icing that?” he asked, gesturing to your most obvious injury. 

“I haven’t been able to make it out to the ice machine,” you confessed, though the doctor had suggested ice for the inflammation. 

“Let me go grab some for you,” he said before disappearing out into the hallway. Once he left, you laid back in bed, letting out a sigh of relief at how much better being flat felt. 

You’d be lying if you said you didn’t like being taken care of this way. It seemed like no matter how bad things got between the two of you, you would always care for one another in some capacity. You wondered what had gone through Patrick’s mind when he saw you hurt yourself. You wondered if that changed anything in the way he felt about you. 

He knocked on the door once more to tell you he was back, though the door was already unlocked. 

“If there’s anything else you need, I mean anything at all, just call me. I’m just down the hall from you,” he told you as he bagged up the ice he retrieved. 

He sat down on the foot of the bed, where you’d previously been sitting, and tenderly set the bag of ice on your ankle, clearly not wanting to hurt you any more than you were already hurt. He looked at you a little sadly before standing back up, not wanting to linger in your presence too long. 

“I’ll let you get some sleep,” he explained, already turning to head towards the door. 

“Thanks, Patrick,” you paused, looking for any other words you had for him. “Good night.”

“Night.”

SOMEWHERE IN ITALY

The next few days in Switzerland had been extremely boring. Due to doctor’s orders, you mainly stayed in bed, avoiding screens by reading books, and looking out the window to view the mountains that you were currently missing. 

Although you had to miss a lot of the fun your tour was going on, like a cheese and chocolate tour, you somehow still received an anonymous delivery of cheeses and chocolates—though, you were pretty sure you knew who was responsible for that. 

Patrick didn’t seem like he wanted to overstep any boundaries, which you respected, though you really could’ve used some company whose ear you could talk off. Hell, you’d even take another nasty argument over the resounding silence of your room. 

Luckily for you, by the time your group was traveling once again, you were starting to feel slightly better, concussion and ankle-wise. Though, your head was starting to hurt from listening to a person at the front of the bus go on about how much they needed the bus to pull over somewhere. 

After a period of incessant complaining from someone on your bus, the vehicle finally came to a stop at a small rest stop in the middle of the Italian countryside. 

Not willing to pass up an opportunity to stretch your legs, you got off at the stop, briefly stopping inside the building to look at what they had to offer before stepping behind the building, watching the wind blow through the overgrown weeds. 

Your attempt at enjoying the quiet, idyllic countryside was disturbed when you were joined by a smoking companion. 

“I’ve been meaning to talk to you,” he said. 

Before you could stop it, a sad smile appeared on your face. The two of you hadn’t spoken since your brief conversation in your hotel room, despite the mystery snack deliveries and the promise of coming if you called.

“I’ve been worried about you,” he said plainly.

“There’s nothing to worry about,” you dismissed. 

“You’ve spent the last few days all alone in a room with a concussion.”

“It’s mild.”

“You fucked up your ankle.”

“It’s healing. It’s not all that bad.”

“Well, I’ve been worried anyway,” he passed you his partially smoked cigarette and you took a drag from it, though you were sure that was one of the things you shouldn’t be doing with a concussion. 

“Thanks, I guess.” you said. “So is this just a wellness check, or…?”

“No, well, yes. Obviously I was worried about you physically, but I also was wondering about how you were in general.”

It was strange to see him clumsily mince his words, given how bold he usually was.

“Oh? What changed between here and Germany?”

“What changed? What changed was that I watched you almost die.”

You laughed aloud at his over dramatization of the event. “Patrick, I did not almost die.”

“How would I have known that? I just saw you flying downhill out of control and crashing and it terrified me. I couldn’t imagine a world without you in it.”

You weren’t sure how you were supposed to interpret his words, especially after the wild ride you’d been on throughout the trip. You weren’t sure you could handle another emotional bait and switch. 

“Pat, maybe we should talk about this later. The bus is probably taking off soon.”

“No,” he stopped you with a hand on your arm, calling you back with a desperation you hadn’t seen in him in a long time. “I don’t want to waste another second without you.”

“Okay,” you said, though you weren’t sure that you should buy into it yet. “Go ahead, then.”

“I can’t keep pretending that I don’t want you or don’t want to be with you,” he confessed, which genuinely took you by surprise. With the way he’d been dodging your attempts at building a connection, you certainly didn’t think he’d tell you something like that. 

“Then why have you been pretending?” you asked, hoping that your somewhat harsh words didn’t betray your genuine curiosity behind his behavior. 

“I don’t know,” he said. It was a terrible, unsatisfying answer. One that didn’t explain a single reason behind his behavior. “I guess I just can’t wrap my head around the idea that anyone would want to keep me around long-term.”

You looked at him with shock in your eyes, your mouth slightly agape at the confession. You couldn’t imagine Patrick, overconfident, bold, and self-assured, who you’d been dating for years, not feeling secure in your relationship–to the point where he’d been actively trying to push you away out of anticipating how you’d feel about him.

“When you told me you weren’t ready to be with me, it just confirmed everything I’d been worried about—that one day you would wake up next to me and realize that I wasn’t the guy you wanted. I guess it just happened sooner than I anticipated.”

You almost couldn’t believe what you were hearing. “If you felt like that, then why’d you tell me you weren’t in love with me anymore?”

“I thought if you were gonna leave me anyway, I might as well beat you to the punch.”

You were giving it your all to keep it together at this point, feeling slightly vindicated to know that Patrick was lying about no longer loving you, but mostly devastated that your whole relationship had been uprooted over an assumption that Patrick had made about you. 

“I… I don’t even know what to say,” you looked out into the grass, then back at Patrick. “I wish you’d stop assuming that you know what I want all the time.”

“Hey you two, last call for the coach,” your tour guide suddenly interrupted, looking very obviously annoyed that the two of you were holding the bus up. 

“Sorry. We’ll head back now,” you apologized to the guide. “We’ll continue this conversation later?” you directed towards Patrick. 

“Yeah,” he agreed. 

VENICE, ITALY

Putting a hold on your conversation probably wasn’t the wisest idea you’d ever had, considering that your next few days in Italy were set to be your busiest this far. 

Between gondola rides on different boats and exploring historic palaces, the two of you didn’t have much time to stop and have as serious of a talk as you wanted to have. Even if you did somehow manage to pick up where you’d left off, there were so many people around you that it didn’t even feel worth it. 

Luckily for you, your hotel had a private beach attached to it, and as you spent your evening by the beach, watching the sun go down, you were pleased to find that you were joined by familiar company. 

At first, Patrick didn’t say anything as he sat down on the same chair next to you. The two of you enjoyed the serene sunset and privacy that the beach afforded you in silence, though you were sure that things wouldn’t stay that way for long. 

“I love you, you know?” he finally piped up, breaking the silence with a very bold declaration. 

You looked at him calmly, though you weren’t feeling very calm on the inside. You’d been waiting to hear those words from him from the moment that the two of you broke up. You weren’t sure how you were supposed to react to it now, though the confession was better late than never. 

“I love you too. I never stopped,” you told him simply, as if the realization that you were stuck on him hadn’t been haunting you for months now.

“I never did, either. It was cruel of me to ever tell you that I did.”

You nodded in agreement, wondering if Patrick would ever understand the full extent of the damage his words had done to you. “It was, but I understand where you were coming from. If I had known that you didn’t think I was going to stick around, I would’ve gone about what I did differently,” you began to explain. “I think it came across as me not wanting to marry you at all. Of course I wanted to marry you. There was just so much else going on in my life then that the timing didn’t feel right.”

“But the timing might be right someday?” Patrick asked, a hopeful lilt in his voice. 

“The timing will be right someday. Maybe sooner than either of us know,” you shot him a wink, then broke into a grin as he pulled you into a firm, loving embrace. 

ATHENS, GREECE 

The rest of your time in Italy mainly consisted of making up for lost time, with the two of you partaking in far more PDA than what was ever necessary and thoroughly documenting your time abroad together as a couple. 

Thanks to your injury, you were slightly slower than the rest of your group. But that certainly didn’t stop Patrick from lagging along with you, letting you lean on him for support when you needed it and pausing to sit and take breaks with you whenever you noticed that walking was taking too much of a toll on you.

It was nice to be back with him, to not have to feel stupid for feeling what you felt or feel the pressure of knowing that you should probably be trying to move on. The only unfortunate part was how little time the two of you had left on vacation, with you heading home after spending a few days in Athens. If only the two of you had been upfront about your feelings earlier, then you could’ve been having as great of a time as you were having now during your entire trip. 

The two of you briefly floated the idea of having somewhat of a shotgun wedding, but scrapped it after realizing that you would prefer to have your family and friends there to celebrate with you. After all, many of them had been on the emotional rollercoaster that was your relationship right along with you. 

For the time being, the two of you were perfectly content with being together, and knowing that neither of you had any intentions of leaving. 

Somehow, that made your last few days of vacation feel infinitely better. 

ATHENS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

You scrolled endlessly on your phone, sending out a few messages to friends and family to let them know that you were heading back home. While you typically felt a few nerves before boarding a plane anywhere, you couldn’t help but feel a renewed sense of excitement, both at the thought of being able to go back home and sleep in your own bed, and at the potential your newly reformed relationship had. 

Your scrolling was interrupted by Patrick’s presence, carrying a coffee and a breakfast sandwich in his hands with a slightly goofy look on his face. 

“Sorry for taking so long. I think everyone and their mother wanted coffee today,” he explained as he sat down, passing you your items as he got comfortable next to you. 

“No worries. I’m just glad you were running late to grab us breakfast, instead of trying to switch our seats like last time.”

The two of you shared a laugh before Patrick said, “That feels like a lifetime ago.”

“It basically was,” you dismissed. 

Once it was announced that your group was boarding, the two of you stood up quickly, attempting to gather your bearings before getting on the plane. 

“‘Till next time, Europe,” you bid the country goodbye as the two of you made your way to the line. 

“Should we come back to Europe? I was thinking our next honeymoon should be somewhere else. Maybe Bali.”

“Oooh, Bali sounds nice. I think anywhere warm and with a beach is good,” you explained, though you really didn’t care where you went, as long as Patrick was there by your side.

[a-hazbin-reader]

A Alastor x wife!reader where reader has been wanting a family and finally by some miracle she discovers she's pregnant

Just a thought 🫠

You are not even the third person to ask for this and we're all already delusional here soooooo-

Alastor X Reader Headcanons

✅️Romantic

❌️Platonic

TW: Sadness, Reader has baby fever and spreads it to her husband unintentionally, A little angst, Implied baby making 😉

Description: 👆⬆️

Alastor would do anything for his wife, spare no expense for her happiness and it shows

You two have talked previously about your obvious desire for a family with him

He would be willing to give that to you even though he's admittedly not the biggest fan of the idea

Part of him is scared of being a father but he won't ever admit that

You two both knew that sinners couldn't reproduce, and it crushed you that the opportunity was taken from you

You were still happy to have your husband and your found family at the hotel

You just still had that desire to have a baby, your husband's baby to be exact

Alastor hates seeing you so hurt over this, he wants to fix things for you, but this is out of his control

He couldn't give you a baby no matter how hard he tried, and that makes him feel helpless, which makes him angry

Sometimes the longing for a baby and the despair of knowing you can't have one gets to be too much for you and you unintentionally draw into yourself

Not amount of hugging or soothing words from your husband can console you, no matter how hard you cling to him and seek his comfort

You're just so sad sometimes

Which leads to Alastor being frosty and agitated with the others around the hotel, upset that he can't just fix it

He would give you the biggest family if he could, whatever he could do to make you feel whole

It's not like you two are neglecting each other or growing apart, there's just this heavy feeling hanging between you two

Everyone knows something is up with you two, but nobody is brave enough to ask, except maybe Vaggie, but she's respecting your privacy as a couple

Of course, it's Charlie who tries to get to the bottom of things for the two of you, everyone is just worried you two are fighting

So when you finally relent and tell her the truth, she's relieved that you and Alastor only want to have a baby-

YOU AND ALASTOR WANT TO HAVE A BABY!?

Sinners can't reproduce so you're just riding out your baby fever until it's manageable again

But no sinner has had a friend in the Morningstar family before

Not even a day later Alastor is greeted by Lucifer while you're out with Charlie and the others

"Hey man, heard you wanted me to get your wife pregnant! Lucky for you, I happen to have a thing for married women~"

When you come back home you're surprised to see Lucifer and your husband talking amicably, both turning their heads towards you immediately

"Ah! Would you look at the time? I should really get going, things to do, ducks to make-what?"

Lucifer gives you an unexpected side hug on his way out, hand resting momentarily on your stomach before leaving

You rub where he touched, surprised by the sudden warmth that lingers there

Your husband is looking at you strangely too but kisses you in greeting before you can even question it

Alastor acts rather clingy the rest of the day, following you around, asking you how you're feeling, giving affection more freely

You can't deny that you're loving the attention and soaking up every bit of it, the warmth in your stomach having spread throughout your entire body now

If Alastor's sudden neediness is anything to go by, he's feeling the same as you are

How either of you manage to wait until everyone has gone to bed to indulge in each other is beyond you

The entire night is a blur but when you wake up the entire bed has nearly been torn apart

Feathers are all over the place, the blankets have all been kicked away or shredded, the bed frame is clawed and cracked

You would almost feel embarrassed, but when you look at your handiwork on your husband, you can't help but feel proud

Things mostly go back to normal after that, except Lucifer visits more often and seems to pay special attention to you

You feel like everyone is watching you lately and you don't know why, you're never alone anymore, your husband especially is very hovery

But it ends up working out in your favor because one day you wake up, overwhelmed by the urge to vomit, your husband holding back your hair

And it keeps happening for days on end, and you start gaining weight without explanation, and your cravings are suddenly intense and-

Your husband is looking a little too pleased with himself, rubbing your back soothingly as you poke at your mysteriously changing body in the mirror

"You did this to me somehow, didn't you!"

"Why honey, why would I need to babytrap you when we're already married?"

"Because you-what?"

It takes a few moments to register what he said, all the strange things in the last few months clicking into place

"You got me pregnant..?"

He actually starts to look a little embarrassed, suddenly unsure if he really did the right thing after all-

When did he end up on the bed?

Is definitely sure in his decision later when he exits the bedroom, fixing his hair and clothes while he leaves you sleeping in bed

Luckily, the hotel has a lot of people who are willing to help out with your pregnancy because Alastor is worried he's actually in over his head

Your mood swings are more like mood hurricanes and sometimes he needs help knowing the right things to say

"Y/N, don't worry about not fitting into your own clothes, this is uh...just an opportunity to get new ones!"

"T-Thanks Vaggie..."

The cravings start to get fucking weird, Alastor genuinely repulsed by some of the things you're asking him for

"Darling, I can get you fresh meat as bloody as you want but do you really need to eat it with cake and ice cream?"

"Don't you love me..?"

He'll be back in 10 minutes

The bigger you get, the more sore and tired you are, constantly needing help around the hotel as you waddle around

"Thanks for helping me, Husk...I was getting really tired."

"Charlie, is it alright if I sit in that chair? My back is killing me.."

Alastor is scared with how vulnerable you are like this so he sticks close to you but silently appreciates the help from everyone

Even the other overlords come to see your miracle pregnancy, which doesn't help with Alastor's paranoia over how defenseless you are right now

They just want to see

As if Carmilla or Rosie would let anything happen to you anyways, Rosie loves the crap out of you and Carmilla wouldn't hurt an expecting mother

Rosie is constantly visiting and bringing baby gifts, so many that they're starting to pile up around the hotel

"Oh darling, you're practically glowing! Alastor! Have you told Y/N how radiant she is with her pregnancy?"

She wants to be Aunty Rosie so bad

Alastor genuinely admires the changes in your body, feeling pride in the thought that he did this to you

"With a little help from the big boss of-"

"You haven't left already?"

"I want to talk to my god child~ Can you stop hogging Y/N's belly for five minutes?"

"Your what now?

Alastor rubs your belly a lot, baffled by the idea that his spawn is in there and how happily you carry it

How you're so proud to be having his kid is beyond him, he knows what a wretched man he is and you still love him, take pride in him

The first time he feels the baby kick, he's a little unnerved but then you guide his hand back, smiling at him in a way that makes his heart ache for you

"Our baby wants to say hi to you..."

Okay, now his heart is melting, give your husband a kiss right now

Starts kissing and talking to your belly more after that, talking to the baby about anything and everything as if you're not even there

"Now your mother, you have no idea how lucky she is to have me as her husband~"

Confides in you late one night, about his fear of being a father and failing you and the baby

Not him having tears pinpricking in the corners of his eyes as you kiss him and reassure him

He doesn't particularly care about the gender of his child, just that you and the little spawn are okay

But if the baby is a girl, then he would like her to have his mother's name, that's all he would ask really

If the baby is a boy then he'll let you pick the name out as long as it's something fancy sounding

Does all the work when it comes to the nursery and baby proofing but has no idea what that actually entails, so you'll have to help him out

He's so proud to show you the finished look

The closer it gets to your due date, the more out of sorts and anxious he is but he tries to put on a brave face for you

He makes sure you never have to lift a finger, doing everything he can to make you comfortable and spending all his free time with you

Carmilla and her daughters all volunteer to assist in the labor, Zestial coming for the sake of tagging along

Alastor is in genuine anguish when you actually go into labor, the sound of you in pain and him being helpless to help is torture for him

Refuses to leave your side the entire time, blocking out everything else but you and encouraging you as best he can

Focuses so hard on taking care of you that he hardly notices that you've finished, surprised when Carmilla suddenly puts not one but two babies in your arms

You're visibly exhausted but seem to gain a renewed energy at the sight of your babies, looking at them in wonder before giving Alastor a tearful smile

"A boy and a girl, a miracle on top of already being miracle babies. Congratulations, Alastor."

Carmilla pats him on the shoulder before leaving, pulling Zestial and her daughters along with her

Alastor doesn't even register what she said, still dumbfounded at the sight of you cooing at two squirming infants

TWINS!? Lucifer, you sneaky son of a bi-

"Do you want to hold them, Alastor?"

"I would love nothing more, my dear..."

He definitely doesn't immediately fall in love when his babies cling to him like they'll never let go, holding his fingers in their unbelievably tiny hands

A LITTLE TREAT FOR ALL OF YOU WHO WERE BEGGING FOR THIS

[mead-iocre]

Call Me ‘Love’ | Leah Williamson x Reader

There’s a new viral trend on TikTok. 

It’s pretty simple. Not a dance trend or a catchy song to lip-sync to.

All you have to do is film your partner’s reaction to you calling them by their real name. It often makes for some funny reactions from the partners who found themselves falling victim to this trend.

Perhaps for some couples, this wouldn’t elicit much of a reaction, but you knew your girlfriend well enough to anticipate that her reaction would likely make it worth trying the trend.

Outside of your families, friends and teammates, Leah was what most people would probably describe as…professional. She had captained her national team into winning the euros not too long ago, and as a result, the increase in media attention and scrutiny made her more conscious of the kind of person she portrayed herself to be in front of the media. 

On the pitch she was every bit a captain— a true leader. She’s has determination, grit, and a competitive drive that can pull the team together until the final whistle. Leah was very vocal on the pitch and unafraid to call out the referees for bad calls. She’ll get right up to their faces and stand her ground. Fans often joke online that they can hear her shouting from the stands. 

To add to that, she was a damn good player too. Leah is a crucial player to her team for both club and country. She’s fluid on the pitch, and her confidence in her skills is reflected in the way she plays. She’ll make risky but clean tackles, she can whip a wicked long ball, and she can score the odd goal when the opportunity lands on her head. Her confidence and skills can often leave people unnerved or in awe– depending on who you ask. 

It doesn’t help that while your girlfriend has a pretty face, she can also look quite intimidating at times. Furrowed eyebrows, lips pressed together in a tight line, and blue eyes darker than usual— all this combined is what you lovingly refer to as her classic “Captain Williamson face”.

The increased media attention has made the defender slightly more closed off during captain duties. Gone was the goofy, smart-mouth girl who was more than happy to yap at the cameras during media day. Nowadays, she may come across as slightly aloof and distant at times 

but that was only for the cameras. 

With you, Leah was still the same girl you fell in love with. The girl with a wicked sense of humour and a dirty mouth that went along with it. When she was around familiar company, the girl often made the most outrageous remarks— with jokes and quips that should not be repeated around those who can’t understand her sense of humour. 

Another surprising thing about the Arsenal defender and England captain— she can get pretty clingy. Physical affection is one of your girlfriend’s love languages and you are always more than happy to indulge her whenever. Your mornings together start with kisses, and your day ends with kisses. The blonde always needs to be touching you at all times whenever you are around— a hand on the hip, an arm over your shoulder, or a head on your lap. The intimidating captain they see on the pitch is definitely not the same girl that whines whenever you accidentally forget to give her a kiss before she leaves for training. 

Even though she might try and deny it, your girlfriend was a romantic. She loved planning dates, wearing matching clothes, and the cheesy nicknames.

And that’s why you were so excited to try out this new TikTok trend on her. 

——————————————

You situate your phone on the dinning table, fiddling around to make sure it is slightly hidden from view. You have it leaning against a vase which holds a charming bunch of tulips that the blonde had bought for you the other day. The back camera of your phone is pointed towards where your girlfriend usually sits during meals right across from you. The other decorative vase is what will hide your phone from the blonde, but is deliberately placed at an angle so your phone’s camera can still capture her reaction.

You glance at it one more time, making sure the record button is on. 

“Did you want extra parmesan on yours, baby?” You hear your girlfriend shout from the kitchen. 

“Yes, please!” 

You hear a “coming right up, madam!” before you hear the sound of a drawer being pulled open and then shut.

She’s probably grabbed the cheese grater. 

Soon the smell of savoury aromas reach you. You detect the earthy fragrance of garlic first. Then it’s the smell of onions sautéd in olive oil, mingling with the sweet aroma of ripe tomatoes. The scent of freshly chopped herbs— probably basil and oregano— adds a refreshing note in the air, while the unmistakable aroma of Parmesan cheese grating fills the air with a hint of nuttiness. It’s a familiar and comforting aroma simply because it’s the smell of the one and only dish that your girlfriend can successfully cook without setting the kitchen on fire. Not a moment later, Leah appears with a plate on each hand and a grin on her pretty face. 

And a smudge of red pasta sauce on her shirt. 

Mean, scary captain, my ass. 

Dressed in an oversized white T-shirt with the sleeves rolled up, grey Nike sweatpants, and her favourite fuzzy house slippers; your girlfriend is the least intimidating person in the world right now. 

She walks the short distance to your spot at the dinning table, placing a plate down in front of you. You eye the dish in front of you— the only recipe perfected by your girlfriend. The blonde can’t make scrambled eggs right— they will either be too soggy or practically burnt— but she can make the dish that has become a comfort food of sorts since you started dating her. 

You hear a throat clear from beside you.  Leah is still standing, her other hand still holding her own plate. “Doesn’t the chef get a kiss?” 

“Uhh— I don’t think my girlfriend would like that” You grin up at her. With her blonde hair tied in a loose low bun, she looks a lot more relaxed then when she first came home earlier after training.

“Baby, give me a kiss before I burn my fingers off from holding this hot plate” 

You roll your eyes playfully, before squealing at the ticklish poke given to your side. 

“Oi! Don’t act like it’s a chore to give your girlfriend a kiss when she rightfully deserves it”

You stand up from your seat slightly, reaching up to grab the side of the blonde’s neck to pull her closer and press a sweet kiss to her lips. “Thank you for dinner, chef” 

The smile that spreads across Leah’s face is one you would like to bottle up and keep close forever. 

“Pleasure is all mine, madam” And then her lips meet yours again, this time with a lingering bite on your lower lip just before she pulls back. 

You almost forget about the video.

Once the defender was seated in her own chair, you both dug into your dinner. 

“…how is it?” It’s sometimes still striking to you that England’s fierce defender is the same shy girl in front of you, just waiting for you to compliment her on her cooking. 

“That’s bloody delicious that!” You raise a hand up for a high-five and your girlfriend’s palm meets yours in a satisfying smack. Before she call pull her hand away, you grab hold of it, giving it a loud kiss. The bashful giggle that comes out from the blonde almost makes you regret the prank you were about to pull on her. 

Almost. 

You decided to let the blonde get a few bites of her dinner, not wanting to start too early otherwise she will figure out that something was up. But now it was time. 

You bring your napkin up to wipe at your mouth to disguise the grin that was already growing on your face, mentally prepping yourself one last time. You swallow your last forkful of pasta and clear your throat to get your girlfriend’s attention. Immediately, in the middle of scoping of bite of pasta into her mouth, the blonde looks up and all her attention is on you.

“Do we still have more parmesan, Leah?” 

The look she gave you was almost comical. Her mouth immediately drops into a small frown and her eyebrows furrow, a wrinkle appearing on her forehead. You itch to remind her not to frown but you cannot break character now. 

She swallows her mouthful, a frown still present on her face. “What?” 

“I said I want more parmesan—“ 

The arsenal defender picks up her napkin, wiping at her mouth, before balling it in her fist and dropping it by her plate. You nearly smile at the sight. Leah is the type to always neatly fold her napkin– an endearing habit you have grown to mirror over the past couple of months of dating her. She is clearly annoyed. “Excuse me?”

“Sorry— can I pleaseee have more Parmesan, Leah” 

She narrows her eyes at you from across the table. “Don’t do that” 

“Do what?“ 

“Don’t call me Leah. You never do that” 

“Yes I do” 

“Only when you’re mad at me” That was true. You only ever called Leah by her first name when you were mad or annoyed at her. It was usually the first telltale sign that you were about to start an argument. You loved that she knew you so well and mentally reminded yourself to reward her for that later. 

“You only call me “love” or “baby”. Don’t call me Leah” You nearly laugh at how she spits her own name out at the end, as if it was a cursed word. You couldn’t wait to watch the footage back. 

“But Leah is your name” 

“Not to you”

You compose yourself, wanting to drag this prank for as long as possible, and raise an eyebrow at her. “What if I want to?” 

“No you don’t.” You almost laugh at how genuinely frazzled she looks. Hair a mess, loose strands falling out from her bun and framing the sides of her face. The slight pout on her lips contrasts the stern tone she tries to take on. 

At your eyebrow raise and your lack of verbal response, her fork clatters onto her plate. She’s serious now. “Baby, what the fuck are you on about”

But you were having too much fun to stop now. “Nothing. Now will you please go grab the Parmesan, Leah” 

“No.” The defender crosses her arms across her chest, leans back and slouches in her chair. A familiar look of determination on her face, so similar to the face she makes whenever she’s marking a difficult opponent on the pitch; however this time her opponent is you. “Not until you call me what you really call me” 

“Dickhead?” 

“Oi! Don’t be crass at the table” 

You roll your eyes for extra flair. “You’re being ridiculous—“

“Me!? You’re the one addressing your own girlfriend by her government name, mate” 

You stand up from your chair, ready to walk to the kitchen and grab the damn parmesan yourself, but you are stopped by an arm around your waist pulling you into your girlfriend’s lap. You right yourself, sitting sideways with your arm over her shoulders. 

She wraps an arm around your waist with one hand gripping your thighs to steady you. You nearly break once you look up and catch sight of the pout on the defender’s face. 

“Are you mad at me?” Her tone softens. It’s the same tone she uses whenever she’s feeling particularly clingy, so different from the tone she uses when she adorns the captain’s armband on the pitch. 

“Babyyy” When you don’t reply Leah grabs your cheeks, gently squishing them together so your lips are forced into a pout. She leans up and places a smacking kiss on your pouting lips, frowning slightly when you don’t react at all. “Hey! Are you actually mad or something? Tell me what I did wrong so I can fix it” 

Determined as ever, the blonde grabs your cheeks again with a hand on your jaw and pecks your lips a few times, drawing back slightly to gauge your reaction after every peck. When you once again give her nothing, an eye roll is your only warning before you feel a sudden, but very sharp, bite to the side of your neck.

“Ouch, love!”

“Aha! I’ve got ya!” You bring a hand up to feel the stinging bite on your neck, and your fingers graze the teeth marks left by your very own girlfriend. 

“That bloody hurt!” You try to scowl at the blonde but it’s kind of hard to do when you see the big grin she’s currently sporting. You do nothing to stop your lips from curling upwards into a smile. 

“Can you please go back to calling me “love”– please” Leah pleaded, the ‘e’ whiny and prolonged. 

She’s so bloody cute. 

“Yeah. I think I’ve had my fun. Prank’s over!”

“Wha– prank?!”

You point at your phone that was still propped up against the vase, just slightly hidden from her view but now the sole focus of her attention. 

You squealed at the pinch to your waist. “Don’t ever call me Leah unless you’re mad at me. I only respond to ‘love’"

“Yeah? What about ‘Captain’?”

“Baby, you know exactly what happens when you call me ‘Captain’” You barely had time to react to her words because the next thing you know, your girlfriend has you in a fireman carry and was walking down the hallway towards your shared bedroom. You playfully attempt to wiggle out of her strong hold, and is awarded by a sharp slap to your ass to still you. 

“You know what, I think it’s time for dessert, baby”

This was supposed to be up for Valentines Day yesterday lol but I forgot to schedule it.

Even if you don't choose to celebrate Valentine's Day, I hope you had a great day yesterday. Don't forget to take advantage of the heavily discounted Valentine's Day gift sets and chocolates.

Please accept this short fic as a token of my love and appreciation for you

-- kisses (and an extra kiss because it was Valentine's Day), butter.

[ak319]

Lovesick bubbly hubby x reader

(artist: ppanae100)

You sighed as another picture popped up on your phone, sent during his so-called "study session" with friends. You’d sent him to study, and this is what he was up to. Mentally, you made a note to confiscate his phone the next time he claimed to go to a "group-study."

So, Narin Gul was indeed your husband. This young, clingy, bratty, bimbo of a man—your husband. You, a college professor. No, not his college professor. You just happened to grow up in the same neighborhood, and the moment you helped him with an essay—something he was initially too shy to ask about but did on his parents' insistence—he fell hopelessly in love. Deeply. He wanted to be yours and you to be his only.

He still couldn’t quite understand how he’d fallen for a Chemistry professor, of all people, since he hated anything related to studying. His parents had to practically beg him to pursue a degree, just for his own good after he’d all but given up on academics. In the end, he chose English, thinking it might be easier—only to now cry over novels, not because of the stories, but because he absolutely despises studying! He just wanted to be whisked away. To stay at home all day and keep himself and the house pretty.

And you, you were everything he ever dreamt of. Like his own knight, a Princess Charming. Sure, you were a bit older, and that only made it all more romantic in his mind. He, a cute and eager English Literature student in his first year, and you, a sophisticated, cold, dashing, and incredibly intelligent Chemistry professor--just the thought of it made his heart flutter. After that first interaction, he practically melted onto the floor when he returned to his room, unable to believe that you were the same (Y/N) who used to play on the streets with your friends. He, a kid at the time, would watch from the sidelines, sometimes joining in, and then you had disappeared for years to get your degree. And now you were back--thank God, you were back--and more dreamy than ever.

From that day forward, he started paying more attention to his English studies. Well, at least trying. He’d read poetry or skim through the synopsis of novels he hadn’t actually touched, hoping to impress you with a few lines memorized just for you. His bimboy brain, of course, failed to process half of it, but that didn’t stop him. He had to prove that he was more than just a pretty face, that he was your good, studious boy—even if "studying" for him meant reciting two lines of poetry and hoping they stuck.

Narin knew, deep down, that you would never accept him as your anything because of the age gap. But despite his airheaded tendencies, he had a brain--one he didn’t use often, but when he did, he was clever. So, in a move that could only come from a desperate, lovesick boy, he concocted a scenario where his honour was on THE LINE!. And, of course, it was all because of you! His genius plan? Spread the rumour that you had asked him out on a date.

That single rumor was enough to send his parents into an absolute frenzy. Both families got involved, concerned about preserving reputations and traditions. Before you knew it, you were being dragged into marriage talks, and suddenly, you had a pretty boy in your lap with plump lips and an endless supply of cheeky grins. You couldn’t help but shake your head at the absurdity of it all. Tch.

🍭"Why do I have to study?!" Narin whined, flopping dramatically onto the couch like a toddler. "I want to be a househusband! I will be a househubby! I’m not going to college! Please, Coco!" His pleading eyes were wide and desperate as if hoping you’d magically let him off the hook.

You pinched the bridge of your nose, already feeling the day’s frustration mounting. It had only been one day since the wedding--a wedding where he cried hysterically about leaving his parents’ house, despite orchestrating the entire thing himself. And now, this?

"You have to go because your parents paid for it! A degree is important. After that, you can sit in the house. Got it?"

"No, it’s not! There-" He froze, gulping as your stern gaze bore into him. His rebellious stance deflated with a huff, like a child who’d been caught sneaking cookies. "Fine..." he grumbled, crossing his arms but relenting nonetheless.

Sigh.

You were so frustrated with the way your life had turned upside down that, instead of taking time off after the wedding, you threw yourself straight back into work just to stay sane. Meanwhile, you had Narin take a few days off to stop his constant whining about everything. You needed the quiet, but what shocked you was coming home every day to a home-cooked meal that was, annoyingly, delicious. Turns out, he’s actually talented at something after all. Not to mention those adorable outfits he wears, like that Panda onesie. What an adorable little minx.

However, he’s perpetually pouty, glaring at you like a scorned child every time you leave for work. He always tries his best to make you late, his antics a cheeky mix of playful defiance and desperate need for your attention which you cave in sometimes. He hadn't stopped grumbling about not being taken on a honeymoon either, arms crossed and lips jutting out in a sulk. But he will wait, deep down, he knew you’d take him eventually. He just wouldn’t let you live in peace until you did.

His friends were apparently waiting for honeymoon pictures—how embarrassing would it be to tell them his wife was too much of a workaholic to go on one? So, of course, he told them you were saving up for something huge. Eventually, to quiet him and his friends, you took him on that honeymoon just to get it over with.

Narin always made sure to do his homework right beside you, his head often resting on the table, watching as you graded papers with that calm, focused look on your face. Did he forget to mention you looked so hot?! It was like he was in his OWN K-drama! He loved being in your presence--it was warm, comforting, and-

🍭"Narin? Narin! Stop dozing off. I want to see you writing."

He jolted upright. "Y-yes! Wait—why are you being so strict? I was just... taking a break." And there they were, those tears welling up in his eyes again. His go-to move. No, as a matter of fact he savoured your strictness. So, so much , like 'choke me already, ma'am'.

Sigh # 2

Despite his exaggerated bouts of emotion, Narin never forgot to remind everyone at college that he was a newlywed--with you as his wife, an established and respected professor. Oh, he made sure the world knew. That’s right. Go rot in jealousy, losers.

🍭"Your husband has, again...behaved very rudely in the class." Your friend, Payton who was a professor at his college called you from work. '"I mean, before that teacher went to the dean, I handled the situation.'

You glanced over at Narin, standing nearby with his arms folded, clearly shivering under your gaze. What the hell are you supposed to do with him?. You made him apologize to said teacher and now he was ranting on the way to the car.

"Not my fault! She wasn't letting me go to my hair appointment! And why weren't you picking up my phone?! Did you already find someone else?! More beautiful than ME?! ARE THEY YOUR STUDENT?!"

"You little-" You held back, controlling the urge to snap. Control, (Y/N), control. ''Get in the fucking car." You slammed the passenger door as he got in and once in, turned to him.

"You were expecting me to come and take you to a salon in the middle of my job?! And why the hell do you have an appointment in the middle of your classes in the first place?!" You knew perfectly well he made the appointment as an excuse to bunk.

"Well, forgive me, wife, for trying to look pretty for you," he muttered, looking away dramatically. Then, with a smirk, he added, "And by the way... have you got your friend spying on me here?" His cheeks flushed pink, and he giggled like a child. Possessive control freak, he thought to himself. God, that’s so blazing hot of you. Just when are you gonna collar me? That too a pretty diamond one? :(

Why is he smiling like that?

"Look, Narin, she is just doing her job—"

"Oh my God, staaahp," he interrupted with another giggle. "Just drive~. You don’t need to be so defensive about it. I know you love me so much." He pecked your cheek, likely leaving a glossy stain behind, then laughed, clearly enjoying his latest episode of theatrics.

Great, you thought. He’s at it again.

Sigh #3

Well, after that, you had to keep a close watch on him to ensure he didn’t book any more 'self-care for wifey' appointments during college days. You still wondered why he squealed and shied away whenever you demanded to check his phone. What bothered you the most was that, despite having a sharp tongue, he seemed quite naive and innocent when it came to understanding the consequences of his words and actions. This often led to clashes with his in-laws. Had his parents even bothered to teach him anything?

🍭"Good, you're ready. Let's go." You got up from the sofa as he finally emerged from the bathroom, dolled up. You were really hungry and just wanted to get to the family dinner.

"And here I was expecting you to shower me with romantic compliments... write a damn poem or something so we’d get delayed, and then YOUR family would ask why we're late so I could tell it to their faces that THEIR (Y/n) couldn't stop showering me with compliments and affection, making THEM jealous. THAT’S HOW IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE!"

"Um... you look pretty. Pretty as ever. And we’re late either way, so you still get to use that line. Come on now." You walked past him, not forgetting to--

"Hey! NO! You don’t get the 'smack my bum pass' after that lackluster compliment you threw at my face, professor." Liar, he definitely loved it.

He’s a little manipulator with the eyes that of a siren. He knows how to use #keepingyourpartnerunderyourspell tactics very well. If you get furious or don’t take his side after he acts like the spitfire he is in front of your family, then goodbye. He’s leaving with his suitcase, which is mostly empty because he knows you’ll come to bring him back home anyway, to go to his parents’. After enjoying at least half a day of tranquility , you have to bring him back before his parents call you and inform you about his hunger strike.

However, when you visit your in-laws, you’re treated like a queen, being their only daughter-in-law. Narin, although a headache sometimes, really takes care of your comfort, always standing over your head and feeding you various dishes. You just wish he would be this docile in front of your family. Perhaps one day. Your parents scold you for being so lenient with him, but what are you supposed to do? On one side, your husband won’t let you be in peace, and on the other, your family. You just use the excuse of him being young and immature every time. It hurts seeing him sad without you even realizing it.

Narin feels deeply wounded by the way your family sometimes favors you and disapproves of him, especially after how he has schemed his way into your life. Despite this, he believes their disapproval is unjust and is tormented by the idea that they want you to LEAVE HIM! Leave such a beautiful, ideal boy like him!. The fear of this happening haunts him, makes him furious, even giving him nightmares. He can't bear that. He will wilt. He won't ever let that happen!

He believes in love, just like in the fairy tales and Shakespeare’s sappy lines and knows that one day your heart will melt. He can spot the tenderness in your eyes and the way you care for him, correcting his dumb choices like saving him from sending the shared account details to an unknown number for a free couple spa day at a resort in Greece🥹🎀

🍭"Hey, Coco? Did you tell everyone that I passed my driving test?" Narin asked with a mischievous glint in his eye. It was Sunday, and he’d invited your family over for tea, or maybe he was just feeling playful and bored. He loved stirring things up a bit.

"Yes, on his first try too," you said, looking up from your laptop with a proud smile.

Narin’s cheeks turned a shade of pink at your beaming expression. "Why wouldn't I pass? You were my teacher, after all, haha. God," he turned to your mum, "Your daughter is such a scary teacher, but it was worth it. Haha!"

He got up to refill your tea and serve more snacks, catching the eye roll from your mum as he did.

HE. IS. LOVING. THIS. MARRIED. LIFE. >_<

(AN: wanna get Narin preggo- also a warm welcome to my new subs✨️)

[cashmoneyyysstuff]

chapter 1 : the loser in the seat next to you.

no quirk au, mentions of fighting and violence, the yakuza and my very little knowledge of it, privates schools..i have no experience w them, gang violence, found family trope my love, crime syndicate boss daughter! reader, badboy bodyguard! katsuki x fem reader, sunshine reader, reader cries and is shy around new ppl, hurt/BIG comfort, CHILDHOOD FRIENDS TO LUVERS TROPE MY STAR, almost polar opposites, jealous katsuki, reader has a last name but it will be explained later, original characters, izuku catches many strays i promise i lub him yall, touchy katsu touchy reader, slight romantic tension ouuuu, mentions of food n cooking, lemme know if i missed sum (might add more in future chapters !)

a/n : BIG 4K CHAPTER RAGHHH TYSM!!

katsuki cannot remember a single time prior to living with you that anybody had taken care of him.

he thinks his parents might’ve. he doesn’t care to remember them and it’s not like he could, he was a baby when they’d dropped him off in the shithole he called home for eleven years, but at the very least they’d tried to drop him off somewhere where he could’ve had another chance. where he could’ve been taken in by different people and were his circumstances different he could’ve ended up being someone else’s son with someone else’s last name.

but he’s not. and that’s the most care he’s been shown.

his caretakers, and he uses the term loosely, seemed to think that as long as he stayed alive, that as long as he had food is his belly and water to drink he was taken care of enough. and to be fair, katsuki thought that was enough for him too, cus he didn’t know anything else.

alliances and groups were always formed with ulterior motives in mind. associate yourself with someone stronger than you so you could stay on their good side, get in the stronger people’s good graces and rat out the ones lagging behind so you wouldn’t be left alone. they were always for protection but never a mutual one.

and that’s why he didn’t like being in groups, the thought of not knowing what all these other people who claim to be on your side truly think about you made katsuki nervous. trust was for losers like tadashi, some moron who always talked big shit just because he was apart of some well known group in town. only for him to get a tooth knocked out by one of his squad mates and ever since that day no one ever heard him speak again and everyone called him no tooth tadashi.

trust was for idiots, and katsuki was far from one. so he pushed people away, he kicked and stomped and broke people who thought they could use him for their own protection. because if there’s one thing he hates it's when people use him.

trust was for morons and protection was for weaklings, he didn’t need anyone to take care of him. he didn’t even know how to, but if this was it he didn’t want any part of it.

it’s about 9 am and you’re still in bed. katsuki thanks his lucky star because he’s sure if you ever caught him watching mr. nakazawa cook he’d never hear the end of it. and then he’d have to stop watching because you’d insist he wake you up at the same time as him.

he doesn’t know what’s being made but from the smell alone he can tell it’ll be delicious. he can’t see too well what’s happening, only being able to see and hear some rhythmic cutting and the sizzling of a pan.

“you could come over here if you wanna get a closer look,” katsuki jumps at the man’s voice, his eyes widen but he tentatively steps inside of the kitchen.

“how’d you know i was here ?” he asks quietly, the white haired man smiles knowingly, his eyes not leaving the pan in front of him.

"i've got really sharp senses on me." his hands aren't stopping in their motions, katsuki wonders how skilled you have to be to make two different motions with your hands, he can't do it.

"they're important when you're cooking, you gotta know which spices to use, make sure ya don't burn anythin'.." katsuki listens intently as the chef talks, eyes drifting towards the pan. karage pops and crackles, two omurices lay sizzling on another pan. one for you and one for him and katsuki feels his chest tingle, he still needs to remind himself the feeling isn't a bad one despite the burn he feels.

there are some fruits for dessert sitting on the side still uncut, katsuki recognizes your favourite sitting amongst them. "if you want, you could help me out. i'm kinda in need of a hand since 'im being overworked by the big boss." mr. nakazawa's voice cuts through katsuki's train of thought, he sighs like he's exhausted but there's a slight smile on his face.

katsuki looks towards the hallway before looking back at the older male "mr. matsumoto already left, though ?"

"it's miss yn i'm talkin' about, the kid can be a real handful. you wouldn't believe how much food she has me make !" he jests, and katsuki snorts to himself when he comments about how your stomach was a black hole, he agrees.

"so," the cook nudges katsuki slightly "wanna help me out ?"

and usually, katsuki doesn't help anybody, and if he somehow does it's not unless he can get something from it. so he doesn't understand why he nods so eagerly. he hates when people order him around, he never listens to what anyone has to say yet he carries you on his back when you ask and he listens immediately when mr. nakazawa asks him to go wash his hands first. he follows his instructions on how to cut the fruit properly and his end up looking a bit wonky, but mr. nakazawa tells him it's a start and he'll do better next time. next time..

katsuki's never had anybody take care of him, but his chest tightens and he thinks this might be it.

you wake up a little bit later, rubbing sleepily at your eyes only for them to bulge when you see him and mr. nakazawa in the kitchen. said man claps katsuki's back and proudly exclaims to you that katsuki had cut up the fruit you were eating. your favourite ones. katsuki feels his ears burn and he looks away, he doesn't understand why the older man is so happy and boasting about something he himself didn't do. he doesn't understand why you don't comment on how wonky your fruits looked compared to the one's the chef had chopped. instead you ask him if it's true, if he'd really cut these for you. so he nods because katsuki hates lying, cheeks and ears burning. you beam and continue eating, thanking him and mr. nakazawa for all their hard work as you happily munch away.

katsuki finally sits down next to you getting his own portion of food. he didn't get to help out much today, but he's determined to wake up earlier tomorrow so he can cook even more and cut up even more fruits for you. so he can learn to make them less wonky and have mr. nakazawa teach him more so you can enjoy more and more of the food he's made.

katsuki's never taken care of anyone because nobody ever cared for him. but he thinks that this might be it.

the first day katsuki ever goes to school, he decides he already hates it with a passion.

school itself isn't really hard. sure, it's his first day, but it's super easy. and most of the teachers are nice to him, even though he doesn't need them to be since he's had way worse. he just doesn't like the looks he gets. there's too many people in one class, all looking at him because he's new. he feels like some kind of zoo animal.

they're probably looking at him because of the stink eye he has and the glares he shoots at his new classmates. you'd told him once that some people might be scared of him because of his looks--and that was completely fine with him. he'd much rather stay in his comfort zone. he doesn't want people to look at him curiously, he wants the only reason people look at him to be out of weariness of him, like if they were to look away for even a second he'd pounce on them. he likes that.

you're the complete opposite though. katsuki thinks it's weird that you do such a big 180 when you see new people. your dad had told him that this would be both your first days since you'd been homeschooled until then. you cling to him the entire day and he doesn't mind it 'cus you always do, but you're quiet. you aren't chatty and bratty like you always are. you sit next to him quietly during breaks and at one point you don't come back from the bathroom and katsuki, who had been waiting for you ( he can't just run off, he is your bodyguard after all) gets tired of waiting and makes his way over to the girls bathroom, getting some strange looks but he doesn't care. only to stop dead in his tracks when he hears sniffling.

you're crying.

katsuki doesn't take care of people, he doesn't help people. because he's never been taken care of. or because he doesn't need it or maybe because he just doesn't know how to. but he knocks at your stall door, the door rattles with how hard he knocks at it while your whimpers make his skin itch. he tells you he'll beat up the person who did this no matter who they are and to hurry up and come out 'cus he's here.

you tell him that everyone keeps looking at you weirdly, that they whisper about you and that it makes you nervous and that you don't like it, that you want to go home. and katsuki who has no idea how to take care of people, who will probably get in trouble if someone were to see him in here but could care less because you're still crying and that irritates him, tells you that you just needed to point someone out, and he'd do it.

"i don't care if it's everyone in school, even if it's the fuckin' principal, i'll beat up everyone who looked at you weird, okay ?" he urges. so he tells you to stop crying and that he'd take you home. you ask him why, why he'd get himself in trouble for you. even though you joked the night before that if he kept looking nasty he wouldn't be able to make any friends and he'd told you to shut up.

he tells you it's because he's your bodyguard, and katsuki wonders if this is taking care of somebody too.

so yeah, school's super easy. and the teachers aren't bad, but it made you cry, and katsuki decides he hates it with a passion.

when you get to senior year, you're not sitting next to katsuki anymore.

it's been a crazy couple of years since then, and you've gotten better at interacting with people. you've made some acquaintances, but you still cling to katsuki the most. you don't have him carry you on his back (as much) anymore but you've still kept some of your older routines. katsuki's gotten better at cutting up your fruits and cooking in general, so much so that you insist on him cooking your lunch everyday. katsuki tells you not to be stupid, that you should learn to cook on your own. but he helps you like mr. nakazawa once did for him, sure not as gently but considering his line of work he doesn't need to be. and you're learning so that's a win.

he's come a long way from weekly training sessions with your dad and your other uncles. he still isn't allowed to go out on missions that involve killing, that's one thing he is strictly forbidden from asking for. but he gets to go along with other squad member on what your uncle takashi called a règlement de compte. basically, a bunch of dumb french words to say he finds people that fucked with members of his squad or their turf—and fucks them up good.

this is what he's good at, what he's good with. he's good when there's no talking involved. when it's just flying fists and the familiar sting of his knuckles and the adrenaline pumping through him. he hates it when people underestimate him, especially because they're older than him. but he thrives off the looks of fear they give him when he ends up rocking their shit. he's undefeated and the most feared member of his squad and he feels like he's a little kid again. when whispers of him would circle and even just a glance at him made people backtrack in fear. some even called him matsumoto's mad dog, and it's something he's insanely proud of.

and of course, he's still your bodyguard.

but in school he's none of that. he's just katsuki bakugou. a boy some teachers call a delinquent who looks kinda scary. and the boy who never starts fights, but always finishes them.

and then there's you, who hangs out with him everyday. you who calls him katsu or suki and other cheesy stupid nicknames. who pulls his cheeks up to get him to smile more and look him straight in the eyes and tells him he'll get wrinkles by next year if he keeps looking nasty.

you're a sweet little thing. you help your classmates and you get along with them easily. you do good in the subjects you like and manage in the ones you don't as long as katsuki tutors you. you're funny, and you're easy to get along with and your smile absolutely lights up the room (you didn't hear that last part from him though).

on the surface, your father owns a pretty successful business. which landed you both into a private school. katsuki hates how he has to wear the same annoying uniform every day and he'd ditched his jacket not too long after getting it. you'd enjoyed it at first, but you quickly got tired of it too, although you still keep your jacket and added some cute socks to add your own personal touch to it.

from elementary, middle and high school you've always consistently sat right next to katsuki in class. he never admitted it but he really liked that. not only because you were the only person he liked tolerated at school, but also because he could pick on you and poke you with his pencil. you could whisper dumb jokes to each other and he could easily pass you crudely drawn notes of the teachers you disliked. he remembers one time you'd gotten in trouble and had to clean up the classroom as punishment after class. but you got in trouble together and you ended up messing up the classroom even worse than it was before, but you'd had a blast and you walked out of school right next to him.

but this year, you're not sitting next to him anymore. you're sitting next to some new kid.

he reminds him of one of the golden boys at his old orphanage so much that katsuki wonders if he'd ever seen him before. izuku midoriya looks like if the teacher spoke any louder while introducing him he'd piss his pants. katsuki fights the urge to scoff.

he looks unbearably plain. boring, uninteresting and every other adjective. the green haired boy looks like he'd get bullied by the janitor. like he'd fall onto the floor and apologise to the floor for being in its way.

basically, he looked like a loser.

and he's the one who sits next to you.

katsuki's been moved to a row behind and across from you, next to somebody he can't be bothered to remember the name of. on the very first day nothing happens, he watches you greet the freckled boy politely and he squeaks out something to make you laugh, it's probably stupid.

the next day, midoriya forgets his literature book, so you share yours with him. katsuki would've just told him it was too damn bad but you're not like him. your shoulders brush when you sit closer to him so you can both look. you flash him a smile and the boy flushes all the way to his ears, so stupid.

throughout the week you keep talking with midoriya. katsuki doesn't understand what's so special about a seemingly boring guy, when you've literally got a bodyguard. (it's not like the others know, but still). you keep touching him, too. you always let him borrow the notebooks he forgets and you even fixed his tie once. katsuki doesn't wear his tie, he'd stopped wearing it back in his freshman year, but he wishes you'd fix his too. it's childish and it's stupid.

on the way home, you mention how nice izuku is. he's forgotten that was the loser's name and something ugly flares up inside him when you say his name like that, all sweet and stupid and mushy. the tone you use when you want him to make you pancakes because he does them so well. he acts like he doesn't care.

katsuki doesn't sit next to you anymore, but at home it's just you and him. and when it's just you and him you have your weekly movie nights on weekends, a tradition for years now that katsuki has stopped pretending to be upset about. you and him, sharing popcorn and your finger brushing and you sleeping against his shoulder when you get tired. when you fall asleep and katsuki watches your lashes as you dream, it's just you and him.

a few weeks later, you stay behind after school. apparently izuku needs some help with maths. and you're sweet and different from katsuki who would've told him it was his loss, so you'll be home a bit later. katsuki can't control the muscles in his face in time because he makes a face, but he shrugs and turns away. (not before watching you happily skip off with the freckled loser, who mirrors your expression. he watches your lips move, and he wonders what you're talking about.)

katsuki thinks it's stupid. why does he have to listen to you ? he's your bodyguard, he's supposed to stay and keep you safe. but that smile on your face while you talk to the other guy, that would be too much for him.it irritates him to think about it. so he grips his bag tighter, clenches his teeth and walks back alone.

he can't ask you how it went when you get home because he has another score to settle with some no name gang. it irritates him, but he thinks he can blow some steam by punching someone's face in. he doesn't want to admit that he thinks about that freckled fucking loser when his fist makes contact with the bastard he had to find. because that's stupid, and katsuki is far from that.

he'd been more careless than usual tonight, so when he comes back you see the small cut on his nose. you're whining about how he should be more careful despite knowing what line of work he's been put in. it's irritating but katsuki doesn't want to admit that it doesn't bother him as much today. he wants to ask you how your little study date went, but he can't fix his lips to, he hates the way that sounds. and you're already dragging him off to your room where your medkit is. katsuki wants you to smile at him.

katsuki sits down onto your bed, your soft sheets make contact with his skin, he tries his best not to dirty them. your rooms changed some throughout the years, your interests changing along with you.

the first time you'd tried to patch katsuki up was when he was 14 and he'd gotten into a fight. he can't remember what for, but he does remember how you cried. he didn't understand why you did at the time, especially since you were angry at him too, so it confused him even more. you tussled a bit when katsuki refused you but a bandaid on him, saying he could do it by himself. then you'd screamed at him, your voice cracking and breaking, eyebrows furrowed. he can't remember what you'd said fully, too shocked by your expression. wether it was that he was too stubborn for his own good or that he could get an infection. he sat still after your babbling and you both sit quietly. you finally press the bandaid to his face and while you cleaned up his knuckles, you whispered.

"i really don't like it when you get hurt."

you know he's your bodyguard, that sometimes he just has to get hurt. 'cus he's apart of your dad's clan and they get hurt too. they got him out of the nightmare he lived in and it wouldn't be fair that he didn't get hurt as well. your bandages are a little loose because you'd never done this before, but katsuki doesn't say anything. after you'd finished he mumbled "i won't let anyone get a hit on me anymore."

i'll be more careful, i won't worry you anymore. i won't get hurt, so don't be sad.

you're eyes shine and you hug him tightly. his bandages are coming loose already, but he'll fix them later. he won't tell you, because you want to take care of him. he doesn't need it or want it. but his knuckles feel better and his chest feels warm, in the good way. he feels his arms wrap around you. you feel warm just like him, and he thinks this is it.

katsuki snaps out of his thought when your bed dips and he sees you. your eyebrows are pinched in worry.

"what happened ?" you're not looking at him, already cutting up some bandages.

"wasn't paying attention, bastard got a hit on me. won't happen again." he scoffs, you huff a light laugh. looking up at him mischievously. "thought you said nobody would get a hit on you anymore ?" you giggle, just the sound of it has his ears burning.

"shut up, told you it won't happen again." he scoffs, pushing at your arm. you shake your head affectionately, gesturing for his hand and he gives it to you (reluctantly). your skin feels softer than the sheets, katsuki has to keep his heart in check. "anything else hurt ?" you ask, katsuki grunts and you eye him.

"katsuki—"

"no. nothing hurts, m'good. drop it." it comes out rougher than he means, than he means with you. but you simply roll your eyes, already used to his moods. "if you're worried about me, you shoulda seen him." he huffs proudly. "i don't think i want to see that." you snort, katsuki rolls his eyes.

he wants to see you smile like you did before. what could that other guy have said that made you laugh so hard ? that makes you touch him and fix his tie and makes you stay behind at school with him ?

katsuki wonders if you have a crush on the loser in the seat next to you. he's your bodyguard, yet the ugly little feelings rears its head again and he can't help himself.

"how'd your date go ?"

fucking shit.

you blink, then snort "what date ? i was helping izuku out with math, i told you that." the bandaid around his knuckles tightens "don't say stupid stuff."

his chest feels just a bit lighter, but he still hasn't gotten to his goal just yet. "better be careful, next time he'll ask you for help fixing his diaper. fuckin' crybaby." katsuki barks a laugh when you slap his shoulder, holding back a smile of your own. he lifts your head up with his unoccupied hand. you grab at it to push him away "m'not done yet, stop it !" you squeal.

"no worries, i won't tell anyone," he smirks, you poke at his cheek with a smile "it's just us, princess. promise i won't ruin your image." he still calls you that princess nickname, because you're snobby, bratty and spoiled, but it's a bit more affectionate in the roughness of his voice that only you catch on to. you try not to look too affected by it with an eye roll. your hand flies away from his face when he snaps at your fingers.

"you're such an asshat." you huff, the smirk on his face makes your heart thump. "swear." he teases, you push at his arm with a chuckle.

you like hanging out with izuku, at first because he was fun to mess with and he looked cute when he got all blushy. but he actually is really interesting to talk to and he's funny when he isn't in his own head. he reminded you a little of yourself on your very first day of school. it's something you don't want to remember but he seemed so lost. you're glad you got to sit next to him.

but you do miss sitting next to katsuki.

"it's weird not sitting next to you anymore.." you're done bandaging his hands and start tackling his nose. before katsuki can respond you utter a quick "this'll hurt a bit," and press a cotton wad to his nose. he hisses at the sting and you apologise but he waves you off with a grunt.

katsuki can't stop looking at your little frown and sad little puppy dog eyes. and he can't help but want to tease you.

"yeah ? you miss me ?" your insulted expression is everything and he can't help but snicker, until you press the little wad harder against his nose. "fuck !" he hisses. he grips at your hand, pushing the cotton wad towards your face. he manages to nudge it against your cheek and you shake your head, you squirm around and he manages to land on top of you. you both don't realise, katsuki too focused on trying to get back at you.

he catches you off guard when he manages to grab your wrist, throwing them against your bed. and then you realise how close he is to you when his breath fans across your face.

"what're you mad at me for ? don't get embarrassed 'bout the truth," his laboured breaths is all your ears pick up on. you feel hot where his hands grip yours. they're a little moist, he's always been a bit sweaty around his hands but just maybe it has something to do with how if he were to lean in just a bit more your noses would touch. katsuki forgets he's your bodyguard and does so. you gasp at the contact, both your breathing gets harder.

"you fuckin' miss me," he breathes. you scowl up at him, lips slowly forming into a pout.

fuck, you look cute. and fuck, he wants to kiss you.

katsuki thinks maybe you don't have to smile at him. as long as you're looking at him, even just like this, that's more than okay for him.

"dick," you spit, you continue when you look towards your wall "what if i do ? you're my best friend."

no, he isn't. he's your bodyguard. it's the job he'd been entrusted by your father, it's why he's been agreeing to your every bratty whim for years now, 'cus it's his job and your dad trusts him and he owes the man his life. it's why he lets you take care of him and watch movies with him and sleep on him when you're tired.

but his chest feels warm, and his grip on your wrist tightens.

"you're such a baby," it's mean, but his eyes soften and his lip grazes your forehead. it's not even a kiss, barely a touch of his lips against the crown of your head. but your eyes are soft and he's sure his are too. he lets go of your wrists and presses his forehead to yours "m'still here y'know ? even if it's not next to you every class. don't go writin' me off."

you giggle, and you place your hand against his cheek. katsuki doesn't need to be taken care of and he's your bodyguard but he leans into your warmth lightly. your other hand reaches for the cotton wad that luckily landed next to your head during your little scuffle. you wipe his nose just like that. it's quiet and he doesn't rip his gaze away from yours, his eyes look gooey and melty like caramel. they're soft and warm and firey and so handsome. you finish by pressing a little bandaid to his nose and as thank you for taking care of him katsuki smooshes his nose to yours to make you laugh.

and you smile, in a way he knows the loser in the seat next to you never could make you. not because he's your bodyguard but cus he's your best friend, your katsuki who cuts up apples to look like little bunnies for you and the one that ties your shoe laces before you could even look down and notice they were untied, the one who brought you home. the one who'd been sitting next to you every day and will keep doing so for as long as he lives even if he can't at school.

katsuki remembers you telling him that the four bodyguards before him were no fun. that they didn't speak or play with you, but that he was your favourite. that he could be really nice and when you lean up to jokingly give him a get better kiss right on the tip of his nose, he scrunches it up and you giggle, and katsuki remembers that he's your favourite.

he'd told you he was the best and he intends on staying your favourite, so he stuffs his face in your neck and blows raspberries in it to make you giggle and to make you kick your legs he tickles you. he can admit that most bodyguards wouldn't do that. but he's your best friend, and he can admit you're his too.

WHEEW CHAPTER TEWW !! loved writing this i hope yall enjoy ! this chapter was softer but i promise i'll start getting more active later on !! just wanted to have a sorta soft kindaaa in verse katsu character study kinda chap if that makes sense :> hope yall look forward to more chapters ! (p.s. i was really excited to write this part so please don't think every chap is going to come out this fast lol 🩷💗!!!!)

taglist ! : @bkgpackets @erenstitanweave @flowershop1340 @kovu-bunnbunn @queenpiranhadon

[lackadaisycats]

I’m getting really curious on the whole seemingly complex situation that is Mitzi’s romantic relationships.

Cause like, we got Zib, we got Atlas, AND we got Wick!

As far as I’m understanding Zib and Mitzi was like a situationship?? Or maybe just an unofficial relationship from teens to early twenties?? Like they have history together!

But then Atlas comes in and Mitzi kinda leaves Zib for him? Like did she just lose feelings for Zib all together and now only sees him as a friend in the current timeline?

WHATS THE LOVE STORY THERE??

Was there a messy breakup type ordeal??

Then theres Wick! Who I’m unsure if Mitzi does or doesn’t have genuine feelings for!

Cause like, her husbands been dead for a year? And now she’s smooching around with Wick? I can’t tell if this is simply a tactic Mitzi’s using to keep Wick wrapped around her finger or not.

Not that she’s doing it out of malicious intent! It’s clear she feels guilty when she had to use Wick. All things will go into deeper shit if she doesn’t have Wick around! So maybe she’s playing his heart to keep him around because she is extremely dependent on him money wise?? Or does she have actual feelings too??

Girlie has three (or more) men smitten by her! But does she feel the same way in return? I’m pretty confident she did at least have real genuine feelings for Zib in the past! But did she actually love Atlas or was it a marriage of convenience? Or Wick! Is it only a tactic to keep him around as long as possible or has she also had some feelings for him that she’s now partially showing cause her husbands been dead for a year!

Her love life looks so complex! I feel like she needs a drink with how many men seem to be into her at the same time!

sorry for the slight rant and multiple questions 😭

It is indeed messy and complicated, but I can't think of many romantic relationships that don't have some chaos woven in. Even taking account of meaningful, non-romantic relationships in my own lifetime with friends or family, "It's complicated" is an apt descriptor. She and Zib had a past, yes. There were definitely feelings involved, but the structure of the relationship was uncommitted and wishy-washy. Then some things happened that caught Zib by surprise. For indicators as to how Mitzi felt about Atlas, well, take into consideration that she still speaks to his portrait. You can maybe find some clues about the nature of their relationship in things that Zib and Mordecai say in Volume 2 of the comic. As for Wick, I hope it's clear there's at least some mutual attraction there. Mitzi's got her priorities, though, and Wick is actively trying to sort out exactly what his feelings are and where he draws a line in the course of the comic. Really, details are meant to unfold gradually in the story to paint a fuller picture of the past. Things you surmise about it and conclusions you draw (even if they don't ultimately line up with canon) are likely to be far more interesting than whatever dry explanations I could provide here, though.

[lcriedlastnight]

Hi,

Ok so this is inspired by all the drama and gossip I’ve seen on Instagram recently.

Can you write something with Lando and Y/N where Lando has made it clear from the very start that he likes Y/N and wants to date her? Y/N likes him back but is hesitant to start a relationship because of his many female friends, the fact that he and his family still follow his ex-girlfriend on social media, and because he still wears the bracelet his ex-girlfriend gave him. And y/n isn’t comfortable nor is she the type of person who would date guys with so many girls around him. She doesn’t want to explicitly tell Lando her reasons (because she doesn’t want to tell him what to do and not to do) so she always gives subtle hints when he asks why she doesn’t want to date him. Lando never picks up on these hints until someone close to him points it out, and he finally realizes what Y/N has been trying to tell him. And from here you can continue however you want

anon the way this is sooo real. also the drama? idc about it but i absolutely love drama in any way so!

tw: fem!reader, swears, idk lmk if you want me to add anything.

w/c: 1.9k

ever since you had first met lando he had made it very clear that he wanted a relationship with you and that he really did like you. the boy was all over you. he was constantly offering you take you out on dates when he was in the same place as you. he always wanted to be around you, giving you a call to come over and sit in his flat with him while he deep cleaned his kitchen. lando even told all of his friends about how much he liked you. oscar was sick fed up of hearing how pretty he thought your eyes were and max had told him that if he did not shut up about how infectious your laugh was he was going to leave him to sort out the details for the quadrant video for himself.

so it was safe to say that you had no reason to doubt that lando like you. you liked him too. you did not show it in the same ways as him though, you just being a tad more on the shyer side. your mind should have been convinced that lando only had eyes for you but it felt like you were adding two and two together to get five. his actions just did not make sense to your insecure mind.

the first 'red flag' you had stumbled across- well you did not even stumble across it. your friend did. and had told you it was one hundred percent a red flag and how were you to know any different? you were not experienced in this kind of thing, due to your shyness.

you had both been out for lunch and some shopping when you had just been chatting about lando and how things were going. she had asked why you guys had not done much more than two or three basic dates and you had responded that you were a little nervous to progress with him. she had questioned this and at that point you were not totally sure why you were feeling like that which had made you feel more guilty at the time. you had told her about one little thing that was niggling at the back of your brain since you had discovered it. all of lando's loved ones still followed his ex girlfriend on basically all socials and even liked her pictures regularly, this included lando. although lando had not liked a picture since they had been dating he still followed her.

"you are having a laugh?" she gasped at your words. the way she seemed shocked had made you a little nervous. were you wrong to be worried about it? were you not worried enough about it? it was moments like these that you thought you were not cut out for romantic relationships, it was much too hard these days. you wished for simpler times when if you liked someone you just told them and then you were dating.

"is that bad?" you had asked her, worriedly.

"i mean, it's kinda a red flag. why would he want to follow her? unless he was still close with her. he must be if his family still follow her. she must've been one of those girlfriends that the whole family falls in love with too." your friend explains as thoughts. you had thought that her explanation would have made you feel better but just like that you felt your mind shift into almost sure to doubt.

you knew your friend kind of had a point with what she had said but the rational part of you, deep deep down, was telling you that all of this was just causing unnecessary doubt to grow in your mind. it reminded of you of how lando acts towards you and it settled your mind for a minute or so before you fell down the hole again. you had always believed actions spoke louder than words but what actions spoke louder in this case?

from then you had fallen down a horrible spiral of pulling apart almost everything lando did. your mind always going back to that conversation in a cafe and reminding you of what your friend told you.

lando had invited you out as he had missed you a lot and of course you had said yes because as much as you were stressing yourself out about all of this, you did like him. you were just wary, that was all. it was not your scene at all, this house party. you did not know anyone there except lando and max. max was there alone as his girlfriend was not able to make it. you three sat with each other all night and max had gotten a front row seat into seeing exactly how lando was acting around you and vice versa.

all throughout the night, girls that lando was apparently 'friends' with had come up to him and blatantly flirted with him, right in front of your face, everyone here knew that he had brought you here with him as his date. so it confused you to no end how lando just sat back and let these girls flirt with him. it was literally textbook, basic flirting. finger twirling a piece of hair around as she giggled at something he said. even though it was not really that funny. and you just had to sit back and watch because what else were you supposed to do? you did not want to tell him how to live his life. if he wanted to be 'friends' with these girls then who were you to tell him he could not be? you guys were not even dating, for gods sake! even if you were you were definitely not one of those girls who told their boyfriends that they cannot even talk to another girl, never mind be friends with one.

once the fourth girl of the hour had left you all alone lando turns to you again.

"you're a wanted man tonight." you tell him, your voice tight as you tried not to be jealous. you felt stupid being jealous, was there anything to even be jealous over? lando laughs at your words and does not seem to notice your tone or even the expression clear as day on your face. you were too busy talking to lando to notice that max had notice everything you had tried to hide.

"guess i am." is all he says. it stuns you that that was all he said to you but you do not cause any drama about it. well you do not mean to. it just comes out, really. you just have to hope that he does not take it to heart.

"it's a lot of girls." it comes out like a half laugh half scoff. max thinks lando is incredibly dumb for not even noticing the reassurance you were clearly seeking right now. he set himself a metal note to slap him on the back of the head once they were alone.

lando barely even registers the words you say as he changes the subject and that is it forgotten about. you know it was not on purpose. he did not mean to just change the subject there and then when you had brought that up but it kind of did make sense and in your mind it went down as another red flag. it sat right next to the one your friend had pointed out a few weeks earlier.

you had left a little earlier than you had originally intended and as you were waving goodbye to both boys from inside the taxi, lando had ever so kindly booked and payed for you, you see max's hand come to slap the back of his friend's head. it made you laugh but you did not think too much about it. neither did lando apparently as he just hits max back ten times harder as he heads back inside.

the third and final 'red flag' came from when you were stalking instagram. you knew yourself you should not have been scrolling through the f1 gossip pages but you got curious about that curly-haired boy that took up your mind constantly. you do not have to scroll very far to get to something that upsets you. a picture of lando with a fan and a second one zoomed in on his arm, showcasing a lovely bracelet that you had seen lando wear many times. the caption? 'lando is still wearing the bracelet his ex got him!'.

you felt dumb again. you did not have to ask anyone if that was a 'red flag', you already knew. the next time you met up with lando after you had seen the instagram post you immediately noticed the piece of jewellery and it was so fucking hard to take your eyes off of it from then. somehow max had ended up on this outing too and just like always, he noticed your eyes glued to his arm. it did not take him long to put the pieces together. he knew there and then that he had to sit down and have a chat with him. as soon as he possibly could.

max had left to pop into a different shop as you and lando had waited outside together.

"so, can i ask why exactly you don't wanna date me?" lando asks bluntly, like he had been sitting on the question for a while.

you flush. "we've been on dates." you tell him, like he was not there and did not already know that.

"i know. but i get the feeling you don't wanna go further with me. it's alright if you don't but i'd like to know why?" lando asks, you can see the traces of hurt in his eyes as the mere thought of you not wanting him the same way he wanted you.

"no, i do. well i don't but i do. i like you, really like you. but i'm scared to go further with you."

lando looks at you confused, as if it was baffling to him to be scared to jump head first into something, especially when he keeps making you doubt if you were seriously even an option in his mind sometimes.

"why are you scared?" lando presses further but before you can respond max comes out with a bag in hand and asks if you can all stop for some food. the moment is gone and you are not too sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing.

after the outing was finished and max and lando were hanging out at lando's max finally decides to have the conversation with his friend. hoping that he will knock some sense into his seemingly senseless mate. lando beats him to it though.

"today while we were out, i asked her why she doesn't why doesn't wanna be with me and she said she was scared? she didn't get to tell me why." lando admits, his worry evident to his friend. max huffs at his friends obliviousness.

"she's scared because you're going around wearing shit your ex got you! doesn't help that your surrounded by girls flirting with you and you don't even shoot them down. and not getting any hints she drops? dude you're more stupid than i thought."

lando's brows rise as he lets max's words set in. he is completely shocked. he had not thought about any of this or about how it would effect you. he suddenly felt a rush of guilt wash through him. he needed to see you right now.

lando basically runs to you, leaves max at his flat and rushes over to yours. he needs to apologise as soon as he can. he needed you to know that you seriously are the one he wants the most.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

Okay so here, I think, is why I think Red, White and Royal Blue succeeds spectacularly as a romcom, and actually to me is a better-than-average take on the genre.

First, the leads have absolutely scorching chemistry. They are incredibly believable as two men absolutely infatuated with each other. They each kiss like drowning men shown water, right down to how each grabs at the other, at hair or back or neck and face.

They each have developed their character having a specific characteristic even when flirting or kissing. Henry grabs Alex's hair, for example, every single time, in a way that makes it clear he spends serious time thinking about that hair.

Fair enough, Henry.

They also do something even goddamn better.

They are friends. They are believable as two people who could actually get along long enough to fall in love.

They are allowed to become FRIENDS.

They are given time to get to know each other before they get physical. You can feel their interest in each other growing. And, to my opinion, you can tell that Henry is feeling Alex out through texts to see if the interest might be reciprocated even though he thinks it can't possibly be.

One thing that kills me about romcoms is how the leads will have witty "sexy" banter but don't seem to actually like each other. They are enemies who fall into bed but aren't really believable as lovers.

Henry and Alex are believable, because they... Well. They're impossibly silly even when tearing at each other's clothes. They have awkward moments.

They laugh.

Alex laughs in bed. He holds Henry in a way that is romantic, openly so. Henry is overcoming the conditioned hesitation and avoidance he has, his smiles and warmth and laughter come with rare vulnerability - Alex is a man who throws himself head first into life and has no such compunctions in the moment. He laughs because this is awesome and Jesus Christ, Prince Henry is too hot to be real.

They like each other, they stumble, they laugh.

But also, another reason this works so well?

The sex scene isn't scorching.

Watching the sex scene felt realistically intimate. It felt like I had walked in one real people and needed to leave. It was intense in a way that felt like something I maybe wasn't meant to see.

It was filmed so well. So much romanticism and deeply felt adoration in a simple grasping of a hand, the look in soft eyes, a hand pressed against a back. The edge of a knee just in frame. Looking up and looking down.

It felt like we walked into their room during and saw them both laid utterly bare.

Henry's look of vulnerability and nerves and pleasure, Alex looking slowly over his face to take it all in. Moving slowly, then, when everything they do before this is hurried or hidden.

It works as a romcom because you believe 100% these two men could get to like each other, fall in love, and stay that way.

You believe Henry's very real terror of rejection from the public because he already knows his family, beyond his sister, will reject him. You believe that Alex is a headstrong idealist who is sure that you can bulldoze through any wall too tall to climb.

And you believe that between the two of them, they can find a way around the wall entirely.

This movie is a master class on how a movie can get you to suspend so much disbelief if the leads sell their characters. The importance of believable chemistry.

And also... Isn't it nice to see a queer love story in a world that is, in some ways, just a few shades better than our own?

P.S. you cannot tell me Stephen Fry did not chew the goddamn scenery in circles all around everyone during his single scene. That man was having a ball.

[oopsdevil]

COD + Tropes

which trope do they fall into when it comes to you.

SIMON GHOST RILEY + FWB TO LOVERS

i have said it before but simon really struggles when it comes to relationships.

he insisted that this was a casual thing but soon realized that's not true. from the way his heart beats faster when you rarely cuddle, to his trouble sleeping wondering if maybe you were with some other bloke. his insecurities got the best of him and he would end up saying something mean out of jealousy. when he saw you took offense to it he decided in four seconds that he was not gonna lose you. he confessed his feelings (in a sentence or two) and since then he has no problem with everyone knowing you are his.

KYLE GAZ GARRICK + THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY

kyle was always a romantic. outspoken, proud romantic. you guys probably met in high school and just fell in love. you both knew you were it for each other but everyone kept insisting it was just a first love kind of thing. it was not.

circumstances brought kyle into the army and leaving you was the hardest of it all. you both also decided staying together was just gonna be painful so you broke up.

a couple years later kyle came home and got his life together as an adult. after seeing the reality of bills, rent, taxes and just life, he realized maybe he doesn't wanna do it at all without you. a call and a few tears is all it took for admitting you are still each others soulmates.

JOHN SOAP MACTAVISH + FAKE DATING

look at me in the eyes and tell me this is not HIS trope. it was simply meant to be. maybe he saw you in a bar and some guy was being too insisting for his liking, maybe johnny got sick of his family asking about a future wedding or maybe gaz told you guys you couldn't pull it off and you took the bet. doesn't matter, but it happened.

after months of intense eye contact across the room, flushed faces when realizing you were holding hands but there was no one around and holding you by your hips for group pictures, johnny felt his stomach turn when you mentioned something about going on a date with some other soldier for real.

next thing you knew he was kissing you against a bathroom door. really kissing you, not like those pecks for the public that always left you wanting more. in breathless sentences you both decided to be together like you always wanted (probably in a quick to be continued kinda way so you could keep kissing)

KÖNIG + SLOW BURN

it took him years. years.

from the moment he saw you in base he was thankful his hood could hide his red face when he developed a crush in about 15 seconds. he was also very surprised when you just talked to him.

könig kept you as a friend for years and himself busy with missions, it wasn't until you were thinking about transferring when he decided you wouldn't do it. you can't just go, right?

the only condition to staying was a very long conversation with him, where you admitted being in love with him for the longest time, and thinking maybe he felt the same way. but after that many years you needed to have him now, or just try to move on.

i don't think könig ever felt that relived. he mumbled something in german, suddenly ripping his hood off and kinda tackled you to the bed in a hug. you laughed and decided yeah, this is gonna work.

JOHN PRICE + FORCED PROXIMITY/ SECRET RELATIONSHIP

having a new secretary in his office was the last thing john needed.

he was sure it was about the fact that it was someone new in his personal space, someone who knew nothing about his routine.

it obviously had nothing to do with the fact that he looked at you longer than he looked at papers. or about your accent being so distracting to him that you had to say most things twice.

being trapped in an elevator with him was the last thing you needed.

again, its about the fact that you have so many things to do for your impatient boss (not about his cologne being intoxicating and his shoulders looking a little too big right now)

neither of you knew how it happened, but it did. and you were sure he pressed you against every inch of the elevators walls while kissing you like a mad man.

the truth is everyone else on the team knew the reason why you drove each other crazy, and john was more than grateful when the person who opened the elevator doors and saw the state of you was simon.

after fixing your clothes and an awkward apologize to simon, you talked about it.

having a secret relationship with him didn't last long, this man likes to move fast. but after the elevator incident, you were more than okay with that.

[igotanidea]

I am Robin : Damian Wayne x reader (pt 1)

Summary: Damian x fem!s/o, who has no idea he's Robin. And who is scared of Robin. And who one day happens to meet Robin...

***

They weren’t living together, and definitely not in a leaving toothbrushes at each other’s place way. But their relationship wasn't casual either. After almost a year together, given Damian’s character traits, it could never be casual.

But Y/N wasn’t the type to rush him into anything and definitely not nagging to start sharing space. It was all right if he didn’t want to stay the night too. He was committed to his family and that was okay. Considering the fact that his father was Bruce Wayne himself, the Gotham’s persona, who tended to act a little eccentric, it was completely understandable that Damian wanted to check on him more often than not.

Who knew what kind of crazy idea could possibly enter the bored mind of a rich man.

It truly was no one’s wish to find some scandalous news from the first pages of the magazines.

So yes, she was full aboard on the idea of Damian’s checking on his father and his family.

Who seemed a little weird from the very beginning either way. The first time she met them all his siblings were nice, even awfully so, but she had this crazy feeling of being watched like a prey.

If only she knew why.

But yes, it was okay, because at least she wasn’t in a relationship with Mollycoddle, who demanded care and wanted to be treated with kids’ gloves.

But sometimes, only sometimes, she was wondering if it would be like that forever.

That she would have to sleep in the bed alone, wishing for him next to her.

That she would be forced to deal with her nightmares and loneliness and after work tiredness alone.

That almost every time she asked him to stay over he would prevaricate, giving more or less vague answers.

If only she knew why.

***

He was in the middle of patrolling with Batman and the rest of the family when Barbara’s voice came through the comms.

“Robin.”

“Yes? What is it, Oracle?”

“Y/N keeps blowing off your phone.”

Oh.

Obviously Damian did not take his device with him and definitely could not check whether his girlfriend was trying to contact him.

Barbara, on the other hand, was in charge of everyone’s notifications while they were busy during night hours, just to keep up the pretences of the batfam being completely normal citizens.

“Shall I respond?” Babs muttered to the comm, mentally rolling her eyes at the fact Damian was still keeping Y/N in the dark about his other identity. He was treating this girl seriously, it was obvious and even Batman would see reason in ensuring his blood son didn’t blow up a chance at happiness. Even with a civilian. And if not, Barbara would be more than happy to throw Bruce’s own mistakes in the area right at his face. And most likely the other batkids would gladly join her in this quest. Just for funsies. And for Damian obviously.

“Don’t you dare touching my phone, Oracle!” The last thing he needed was his more or less romantic and more or less spicy conversations with Y/N to come into the light!

“Do you want me to read the text to you?”

“Don’t you dare touching-“

“Robin, why can’t you just come forward and tell her?”

“Cause that would be putting a target on her back!”

“You are putting a target on her back by keeping her in the dark!”

“This is not—” Damian tried to argue, but never finished the sentence, realising, somewhere in the half of it, that Babs was actually true. “I don’t know what to do.” He finally settled on a deep sigh.

However, before Oracle could give him any relationship advice, Batman’s voice echoed from another line, calling his accomplices to order and stopping any personal discussions.

***

Meanwhile, Y/N was standing in front of the club, unsuccessfully attempting to reach Damian.

The party she was dragged to was a surprise to one of her work friends, who broke the news about getting married. Some of the girls decided it was a perfect opportunity for unofficial celebration and the party moved from club to club in the entire Gotham district.

It was impossible to not go. Y/N would be called antisocial, unfriendly and stiff the very same night.

But then it was late and cold and dark and she found herself far from her apartment, not sure how to proceed. Obviously, walking alone was a huge mistake, considering the location, but standing like a salt pillar was starting to turn even more stupid, as the lonely and bewildered woman unmoving on an empty street was the easy target for any thug.  

And Damian was not picking up his phone or responding to texts, that started to become more and more desperate as Y/n lowered herself to almost begging for help.

When nothing came in return, with a heavy and a little broken heart she decided to try and get home by herself.

It was better than being a sitting duck and freezing to death.

***

“Robin.” The voice came through the comms again

“What do you want, Nightwing?”

“I got eyes on Y/N.”

“And why do you bore me with such unimportant details?” Damian muttered, not really paying attention to what his brother was saying. The youngest Wayne was simply too focused on his target for the night.

“Um… Robin?”

“I am busy, Nightwing.”

“Damian-“ Dick dared to say Robin’s real name, getting  a bit desperate to get his attention.

“What now?!”

“I got eyes on Y/N!”

“Wh-what? What do you mean you got eyes on Y/N? She’s supposed to be home, safe and tucked under the cover, turning over on the other side while sleeping!”

“Well, she is not. She’s walking the street with someone on her tail, clearly chasing her.”

“What street?!”

“I’m going to take action now-“

“Don’t you dare, Nightwing.” Damian’s cold voice almost bore a hole in Dick’s head through the comms. “Oracle, give me Y/N location. I’ll be the only one taking the action when it comes to her.”

***

She knew she was being followed.

The man wasn’t exactly subtle when it came to it after all.

The heavy clatter of his boots echoed through the entire empty street, in perfect sync with the accelerated beat of her heart.

Headlines from the newspapers from the entire previous year flashed through her mind.

Rape.

Murder.

Assault.

Unexplained disappearance.

Y/n started to curse herself, instinctively reaching for the pepper spray, greedily clutching her fingers on the tiny, yet effective, bottle.

Though before she could actually use it, there was a loud thump behind her and she stopped with shaking hands and eyes closing, already saying goodbye to her life.

The man sure had a gun and that was the sound she heard. She was already dead. And no one will even know. She will bleed on the street, dying alone and in pain in the dark Gotham street, no news about her till the early morning and-

“Y/N.”

She spun around immediately. Whoever was talking, be it the man who was chasing her or someone else, he knew her name.

Robin. Batman’s sidekick.

The street light colours palette Robin.

Robin, the Gotham’s vigilante.

And one of her worst fears.

***

The thug was lying on the ground, blood was everywhere, including Robin’s uniform and she couldn’t make a single movement.

The most natural thing would be to thank him for the rescue and run away before he got too focused on her, reading right through her, seeing everything she did wrong in her entire life and bringing her to justice.

But she could hardly breathe let alone form one coherent sentence.

When he took a step towards her, she took a step back, almost tripping over her own feet, but miraculously finding balance.

He stopped, looking at her with a predatory smile, tilting head, waiting for a moment to strike.

His teeth shone in the dim light of a street lamp, growing, becoming sharper and she could almost imagine them tearing at her throat like a werewolf or some other supernatural creature, causing her pain for all the bad things she did and—

“You’re safe now.”

She blinked a few times, brought back to reality by his voice that was surprisingly soft. Calm, a little cold perhaps, but gentle regardless.

There was no blood, he was not a werewolf, and she was not in danger of being torn to pieces and having her insides dragged through the entire street.

But she was still scared, and not because of the thug, but because of the vigilante himself.

***

“You’re safe now.” Robin said calmly, keeping his distance. From Damian’s perspective under the mask, it was the worst thing he ever had to do in his life. Instead of rushing to her side, taking her in his arms, and giving her comfort and reassurance he had to keep hiding his face in the shadows. Unbeknown to him, Y/N was more than grateful about this fact.

“Uh-huh…” she stuttered, making Damian want to hug her even more. She was so shaken after being chased like this. After being put in danger.

It didn’t cross his mind, that she could be scared of him.

“Do you want me to walk you home?” This was not really a question in his head, but it was important to slowly assure her she was now protected.

“Uh-huh…” she stuttered again, with wide eyes and pale face, that Damian blamed on the aftermath of terrifying events.

“Okay.”

It was hard to not reach for her hand, envelop her in warmth and walk with her to her apartment. Making her her favourite tea and cuddling on the couch (a weakness he would never admit to his family). But he had to keep his mask, literally and figuratively. Therefore, having escorted her to her building and spinning on his heel, he left her alone.

Not for long though.

***

It took him fifteen minutes to change from Robin costume into regular, civilian clothes, almost searching for a phone booth like a freaking Superman, knowing that if Jon knew it, he would never let him live through it.

Meanwhile, he finally got hold of his phone and read through the desperate messages she’s been sending him for the last hour.

“Dami, please come pick me up. I’m at the XX”

“Dami, please…”

“I don’t know why you are not responding, but if I did something to make you mad, I am sorry…”

“Dami, I need you…”

“Please, it’s cold and I’m scared…”

“Dami… 🥺”

Oh no.

As if seeing her scared after dealing with the threat was not enough, now he also got the insight of what she was feeling and thinking while walking home alone.

That he left her.

That he didn’t care.

That she was alone.

And it made him speed the pace of the changing even more.

And causing Robin to make one, teeny-tiny mistake.

***

A knock on the door made her almost jump, settling on pretending she was not at her apartment. Or that she was sleeping – whichever seemed more plausible at 3 am.

“Y/n!”

The voice seemed familiar, but it could have been just the whispers of her stressed mind, combined with a desire for the presence of that one person she so desperately needed.

“Y/N! Open up, it’s me! Damian!”

She whimpered and moved deeper into the corner of the sofa, covering her ears.

He had to change tactics.

“I know where you keep the spare key. But if you don’t open in five, I’ll kick the door without the need to get it!”

An empty threat that could have only been made by him.

Four seconds later the bolt on the door rattled and Y/N stood face to face with Damian, who had absolutely no intention to put his words into action, just getting her to open.

“Y/N.” He sent her the most comforting and reassuring smile he could muster.

“Dami…” she sobbed, diving into his arms. “why weren’t you picking up your phone? I was scared and – and this guy-”

“Hush, dear.” His hands wrapped around her, taking a few steps forward so they were now inside her apartment and not in the hallway. “You’re safe now. I’m here and no one will hurt you.”

“But why weren’t you picking up?” she repeated nuzzling into him, the mix of emotions finally finding a way out in the form of uncontrolled sobs.

“My apologies, beloved. It was never my intention to make you feel abandoned. But I’m here now.”

“Mhm…”

“You’re okay. Shall I make you your tea? It will ease your nerves after being chased on the streets like that.”

“Yes, please…” she whispered and then a thought hit her. “Dami? I- I never told you I was being chased…”

“You know, it was quite evident. It’s Gotham. It’s late and your text was pretty clear-“ His green eyes met hers in a poor attempt to cover up for the obvious fail, trying to fill in the holes in the facts and silence her questions before they even arise.

But it was too late and she was too smart for being played like that.

There was no way Damian could have simply figured out what happened solely from her messages and ragged pieces of information.

His first question, right after comforting her, should have been what happened?

And how the hell did he get into her apartment almost right after she got in?

Right after Robin escorted her here?

“Dami--?” she stuttered with wide eyes, pulling slightly back, causing a little struggle when he tried to keep her in his arms.

Causing a little too much movement.

“Y/N, listen to me, I can—hey, are you all right?”

She was not.

She was not okay, seeing the familiar and well-known domino mask that fell from Damian’s pocket onto the floor in her apartment.

“You- you are—” her stuttering mixed with paleness and terror reflected in her eyes made him travel back to the conversation they had a few months earlier. 

Oh, no…

How could he forget…?

to be continued...

Part 2