#this is the most tags i have in a reblog ever forgive me

[dualitysdownfall]

.

[musical-chick-13]

I hate Raúl/Sofía :)

[lucyandthepen]

sweet cream, cold brew | lmh ( m )

something about mark lee keeps you up at night, and you’re pretty sure that it isn’t the lingering smell of espresso on his shirt.

alternatively: mark is shy until he isn’t.

read the second part here!

pairing: nerd!barista!mark x reader verse: college au rating: r ( minors, do not interact! ) warnings&tags: unprotected sex, oral (f!receiving), fingering, slightly possessive/jealous dialogue, mark has a thing for tummy bulges because why not, implicitly that also means he has a big dick, a slight???? exhibitionism kink (not actually something that happens, only talked about), johnny exists in this simply to trigger something vaguely feral in mark, reader is a little bit assertive and schemes to get mark's attention, jaehyun is a nosy lil eavesdropper, i think that should be it?? word count: 26.4k

a/n: hello so this was a mess and honestly not a fic i would say showcases my best plot-wise but… what can I say apart from booty wurk mark has me in a chokehold and I needed to release some thoughts and feelings !!! please do not expect too much from the development of the story; i fear it’s quite long and choppy because my ideas were all over the place and i was wringing my hands and brain constantly and i was eager to get to the spicy parts !! this is also not beta’d/proofread, it’s currently almost 1am, and i’ve been writing this on and off for a full week with very few breaks so it honestly felt like a fever dream for me LMAO please forgive any oversights and mistakes; i’ll try to go back on them another day and fix them little by little! finally and …most importantly belated happy birthday, my beloved morkly!

p.s. this will probably be flagged as ‘mature’ by tumblr, which means there’s a high likelihood it won’t appear in tags or searches. please consider reblogging to boost the fic, if you feel so inclined!

You’ve heard tell of how caffeine has inherently addictive properties. 

The more of it you have in your lifetime, the more likely you are to experience symptoms of withdrawal whenever you try to have orange juice for breakfast in its stead. It sounds bad, actually, considering most addictive substances are, but you suppose that its benefits somehow outweigh its milder drawbacks. You’re not much of a coffee connoisseur the way some people — see: your best friends, Yeji and Jisu — are, trying one cafe after the other in pursuit of being able to nominate the winning beans of 2023 (an annual heated debate they participate in for no better reason than their own slow and useless entertainment during their six-hour long breaks), but you do know you’ve only ever experienced good things from having a cup every so often: better energy, a more focused approach to mental activities, and the ability to drive through fifty percent of a road trip without needing pop punk music blasting out of your speakers to keep yourself alert. 

The three of you are generally particular about the coffee you drink, only in different ways. While your friends have a tendency to demand only the best from any establishment — lest the staff hear fiery commentary about the flatness of the brew or the evident coarseness of the grind — you, on the other hand, are a singular individual of rather simple tastes. All you need to survive long days is a glass of vanilla sweet cream cold brew. No modifications to the sugar level or fancy new milk types are necessary; you’ll drink it as it’s served in a grande cup (or a venti, when things prove particularly grueling). 

Of course, you’re strict about other things in the experience of consumption —  like where it’s served and, more importantly, who serves it to you. 

While Yeji and Jisu have rated the Liberal Arts building’s on-campus Starbucks branch as a five with the strict label of POEO — ‘passable on emergencies only’ — branding the menu as “nothing revolutionary” and criticizing most baristas for subpar brewery, you happen to be extremely drawn to the place. Initially, you may have argued that this has to do with the fact that it’s walking distance from most of your classes, confined to the same general compound on campus, so you can always grab a quick recharger whenever needed, no matter how short the timeframe to do so is. Sometime later on, you may have found yourself asserting that the layout of the cafe, albeit small, is very convenient, considering that every table is situated next to an electrical outlet, so you’re never out of battery (important to other students for their laptops and powerpoint presentations, important to you because you have an unhealthy obsession with passing time on TikTok, scrolling past video after video of ASMR girls clicking their twenty-inch long acrylics with their crazy candyland designs), and this makes you feel at ease. 

A month ago, you finally came clean to yourself and, soon after, to your friends, and they came to understand, albeit begrudgingly and with no small amount of amusement, what made this Starbucks unbeatable in your eyes; it had one thing no other coffee shop could lay claim to.

What you know of Mark Lee is accrued from two major sources: long, surreptitious glances in the Modern World History class you share, and irritatingly brief interactions when you place your order from the other side of the counter behind which he stands, long fingers always poised to punch in your order at the speed of light. Sometimes, those encounters get cut even shorter when irate upperclassmen start prattling their orders out before you can even say anything past your own, except even this has its own consolation prize — an apologetic smile at you that seems only for you, although you’re not sure how much of this assumption is true. You’ll just believe it as you feel it. 

And what you’ve learned about Mark Lee has funneled down into two key points for you: first, he is single, a fact you were clued into when a group of his friends came to the coffee shop and sat around the table next to you. You hadn’t been eavesdropping; they’d just been pretty loud, but you’d also perked your ears the moment the one everyone seemed to call “Hyuck” — you aren’t sure if it’s his full name or a nickname, and you don’t particularly care — had leaned in for a conspiratorial whisper about having a vague master plan to set Mark up with an old high school friend’s younger sister that he was just waiting to spring on said Mark, busy slaving away on their six impossible orders near the espresso machine. 

You don’t really know what became of that plan, nor if anyone had telepathically been on your side to outright call it crazy (someone should have had a better reason than you, anyway) since the next moment, Hyuck’s voice becomes significantly louder when it orders the one named Jisung to collect the completed coffee and snacks waiting for them on the counter. However, you feel safe in the assumption that even if it had happened, no repercussions had followed, seeing as Mark still presently comes and goes from his shifts alone and in no clear hurry to meet any cute girls that are sisters of high school friends of his friends. Or, maybe you’re just ignoring what could be truth, but that’s whatever. 

Second, you’ve learned that Mark Lee should not actually be your type — at least, in theory. 

Saying you’re out of his league would be a bit juvenile, but if you had only so many words to describe the situation, you’d say so under duress. It isn’t so much that he’s beneath you in any way, but your interests and general social circles run different routes. Yours tend to be more classically patterned after constantly changing trends, and the people you interact with all seem to have similar goals; you like to call it ‘vibe networking,’ which, from experience, involves connecting with both groups and individuals that are equally aware that they will benefit in some way from any resulting acquaintanceship — whether it be by climbing the social ladder a couple of rungs or being able to call in a quick, off-the-charts favor for something very important and/or very exclusive down the road. You and your friends spend a significant amount of time in a year watching your style and image, something quite a lot of kids in the first couple of years of college tend to do, which means that while you don’t particularly like to spend your time following your grade trajectory, you do have quite a lot of pseudo-friends that all seem to offer something entertaining or helpful to you. 

Mark, on the contrast, prefers to keep his circle very close to his heart, it seems — that which acts as a receptacle for all his interests. You can tell that he likes to be up to date less with trending movies and more with comic books, a separate beast of a world that’s rather unknown to you. More than once, you’ve overheard him chat with his friends about Spider-man Issue Number Whatever-It-Is or engage in somewhat lively (sometimes rowdy, thanks to the Hyuck fellow) discussions about some webtoon you’ve come to understand is called Solo Leveling, which seems to have to do with monsters and hunters — two things you know next to nothing about. You’ve also never seen Mark holding anything remotely close to a magazine; his hands are always filled with either a freshly opened comic or a beat-up textbook. Maybe once or twice, you’ve seen him on his phone, but when you peeked over (surreptitiously, of course) on those occasions, you were met only with brightly colored panels and a singular word: BAM. 

In conclusion — you and Mark Lee live very different lives, likely never truly meant to intersect. 

And yet, you want him — not even in a way that speaks only to your curiosity, but in a manner that feels slightly delusional. More than once, you’ve found yourself having to shut your jaw close after realizing you’ve been watching him steam milk with your mouth slightly agape. Maybe it’s his side profile, which gives you a great view of the way his jaw tenses every time he puts whipped cream on someone’s frappuccino. Maybe it’s his eyes, which always seem to twinkle like he’s harboring some special secret every time someone in line asks for his recommendation on how to spice their order up. Maybe it’s his hands, steady and agile, with just the right showing of veins through the skin to tell you they’ve probably got significant strength to them too. Or maybe it’s just his mind — that thing he always manages to show off in class, working faster than lightning even when the rest of you are in your natural eight-in-the-morning stupor.

Whatever the reason for your interest, Mark Lee makes sure the Liberal Arts building’s Starbucks has you as a regular customer. 

You’re fully aware that this is the twenty-first century, which is why you could, as Yeji and Jisu have so kindly made known, simply ask him out. Under normal circumstances, you would have.

Unfortunately, in this particular area of your life, separate from all others, you’re something of a traditionalist. 

Actually, you just want to know what Mark asking you out would look like. Curiosity has fully gotten the better of you — how can it not, with how he breaks eye contact with you the moment it happens by accident in class, or with how pleasantly and shyly he smiles when you say ‘hey’ to him once you’re about to order? You’d like to see, first-hand, as a recipient of the experience itself, what he would look like taking control of a particular situation like that — something someone like him, so mild-mannered and laid-back, never really seemed to do upfront. 

You’d like to think you’ve given him clear signs. There’s a reason you always come in during his shift times, and it’s the same reason for why you have the same damn drink from the menu over and over again despite not even caring too much about coffee in the first place (something he admittedly doesn’t know and probably wouldn’t puzzle out, given how often you’re in that Starbucks, anyway). It’s that you want him to remember you.

Selfishly, it’s that you want him to think just a little bit more about you every single day. 

But if he does, Mark has never made it very clearly known; apart from taking your order in his genial customer service demeanor or letting a look of brief recognition pass his face over when you cross paths in the hallways, he’s never really shown heightened inquisitiveness about you. For all your differences, only you seem to actually care.

Frankly, that frustrates you, because if you have to think about him unhealthily, it would only be right for him to do that for your sake too. Still, you’ll shrug that hit on your pride off for as long as you can get his attention one way or another.

All you really need is for your plan to pan out as well as you think — and hope — it will. 

The thing is, you’re not even that bad at math. You’ve never really excelled at it, of course, but you wouldn’t go so far as to say you’re in dire need of help from anyone — the kind of help that feels like babysitting, at least.

However, Mark Lee doesn’t know that, and you’re not compelled to make that fact known to him when you notice that he’s leaning on the counter with his elbows, shoulders rolled forward and head bent down. He’s twirling his ballpoint in hand, wrist hovering over a worksheet, and you’re briefly distracted by the rapidly moving shadow underneath it.

His head snaps up when you gently knock on the counter, and the rest of his body follows suit, straightening as he shoves the paper away, one edge crumpling in on itself as it meets resistance in the form of the pastry display glass.

“Hey — hi, _________.” He knows your name, says it easily, and while you’d like to believe it’s because of his unprecedented interest in you, you know that it’s just because you’re always here and always having him write your name on the side of your cup. “Can I get you the usual?”

There’s no particular reason you order what you do; maybe it’s just rooted in the fact that when you first asked Mark for a recommendation, he said that the Vanilla Sweet Cream Cold Brew was pretty good, and you were inclined to believe him (while pointedly ignoring the fact that it was, at the time, a new item all of the baristas were required to push to indecisive, slightly moony-eyed customers such as yourself). Whatever the case, you found the drink generally palatable, and you were also able to score the first of many smiles that fed into your two-semester-long infatuation with him, so it was basically a win-win scenario for all. He even got to do his job by getting some rube (see: you) into trying a new product.

“Hey, Mark.” You’ve long since given up pretending that you don’t know his name and have to check the tag on his cute green apron (why is it cute? You don’t know. It’s the same, standard, Starbucks green, but Mark makes it look homely and natural, somehow). You’ve been here way too many times over the last academic year for a nonchalant, were you talking to me? approach to work, anyway. “That, plus a lemon loaf, if you don’t mind. What’ve you got there?”

His eyes follow the trail of yours over to his wrinkled worksheet. “Oh — no, sorry. It’s nothing.”

“Is it secret?” Your bottom lip juts out, and you see his Adam’s apple bob dangerously, a small telltale sign of minute nervousness before he lets out a short laugh. “Didn’t know we kept stuff from each other.”

You don’t know what makes you say that so naturally. The both of you don’t do much beyond exchanging pleasantries.

“We — uh, well, it’s just a worksheet. For Park Hyosung’s class. College algebra?”

“I’m in Kim Junghwa’s. Can I have a look? I want to know if you’re suffering just as much as I am.”

He pauses, considering your request for a moment, likely wondering if there’s any harm in it before he smooths the paper out and turns it towards you. His handwriting’s a little messy, but his solutions are extremely neat. You see, like, one erasure, max. You also don’t see anything that interests you — except the name written at the top. Still, you can see at a general glance that more than half of his answers are correct; the logic of his organization is way too elegant and his writing’s too sure to be anything else. You whistle low, and his eyebrows shoot up.

“Something wrong?”

“Pretty much the opposite. How is it that you’re doing this without breaking a sweat?”

“Oh, well — it’s not…” He doesn’t even know how to brag. Yet another item in the perpetually growing list of things you find cute about Mark Lee. “I mean, anyone… can?”

“I must not be anyone then.” You meet his quizzical look with a wry smile. “Either you guys are leaps and bounds ahead, or I’m really not going to make it through this semester.”

Another silence passes, just for a fraction of a second — short enough to be passable to others, but long enough for you to wonder if your humor code isn’t up to par with the rest of the world’s — before Mark’s chuckling lowly. His large palm comes down, covering a majority of his answers in the process.

“You’re kidding. I’m sure you’re doing just fine.”

“Mark, look at this face.” You gesture to your evidently dumbfounded, blank expression. “Does this look like the face of someone that’s doing just fine?”

You’re pleased to hear another laugh from him; you don’t know if he really finds you funny or if he’s just the type to be easily amused. You don’t want to know, anyway; assuming is better than actually finding out.

“That bad, huh?” He slides the worksheet away again, like he’s afraid his correct answers are going to offend you into leaving the cafe. Instead, his hands start working on your order, grabbing a cup and scrawling the shorthand of the drink on one of the little boxes. “Ever think about getting a tutor, maybe? If you really feel like you’re drowning, that is.”

“A tutor? I guess that depends. Are you free on weeknights?”

The marker makes a soft screeching sound as he drags it down with too much force, ruining the penmanship of your name. Mark takes a moment to stare at the mistake on the plastic before he looks at you, pointing the rim of the cup towards himself. “Sorry — am I free—?”

“You said I should get a tutor, right?”

“I thought — no, sorry, I was thinking more like one of those department-assigned tutors you can ask the faculty for, or something.”

“Oh. Are you not one of them?” You sigh, albeit a little over dramatically. Thankfully, he doesn’t really cotton onto your acting, too caught up in befuddlement at the turn of the conversation. “That’s a bummer. I was kinda hoping that if I was going to ask for help, I’d get an actual genius. You know — someone like you?”

You can tell by Mark’s expression that he’s torn between denying your compliment again and responding to your actual question; he looks both relieved and miffed when the student behind you clears her throat.

“Sorry, but— you know that there’s a line, right?”

You both apologize, Mark’s much more sincere than your own, and you step aside. His gaze follows you for a moment before it snaps back to the next customer, his voice abandoning that bemused uncertainty it had taken up with you. You don’t really mind; as far as you’re concerned, any dent in his barista persona when he talks to you is a step in the right direction.

You hang around the pick-up area, receipt in hand, watching Mark clear the line before moving to the actual stations near the kitchen area. There’s a concentration on his face that you find all the more attractive; he has a habit of chewing on his bottom lip when he’s trying to focus on getting the drizzle just right inside the cup’s cylinder.

He tends to try his best at everything, you figure. Not an unattractive quality — not by a long shot.

Mark finishes your drink first; the milk’s still only seeping, cloudy, into the coffee when he brings it over. He doesn’t even have to call your queue number, opting to meet your eye — albeit slightly nervously — instead. You reach out to hold the cup, a calculated move that allows you to brush hands against his without him being able to pull back on instinct. He doesn’t, nor does he really seem to want to, but his jaw tightens as a flush creeps along the curve of his ears.

“You really won’t help me?”

Your question’s abrupt, almost a little demanding, even if your voice is sweet. You’re not above asking this much, anyway, even if you technically want him to make the first move. The redness sinks down to his earlobes.

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t really say anything,” you tease. The cup’s on the counter now, so he can easily relinquish it to you at this point, but he still hesitates, only one hand slipping out from under the heat of your palm. He uses it to rub the back of his neck, chuckling softly, and you take this as a green light. “What time does your shift end?”

“Five-thirty. You sure you wouldn’t want someone better?”

You pull your cup slowly to yourself, and his hand, still lightly trapped by your own, follows for a few inches before he’s withdrawing, the counter between the two of you forcing the distance. A smile follows the shaking of your head, and you take a small sip of the drink before you respond simply.

“There’s no one better than you.”

Mark is a prompt kind of person; you learn this when, at five-thirty, he comes over to your table, tugging his apron off over his head. Of course, you might attribute that to his overall personality, but the fact that you spend the remaining two hours of his shift casting him glances from the left side of the coffee shop might have also been a contributing factor. The looks you give him aren’t even furtive; they’re deliberately long, so you never miss whenever he looks over to you from time to time.

He doesn’t hold eye contact for very long (he does it well enough when he’s talking to customers, but it’s not like you’re ordering another cold brew from across the room at that point), but you can read snippets of his thoughts through the fleeting gaze exchanges. He’s curious as to why you’re asking for help, now, of all times, when the semester’s more than halfway over. He’s surprised that you asked him, of all people, because he just can’t conceive of a world that isn’t within a television show where this kind of abrupt, overt request makes sense. He’s flattered that you even asked him out of the blue. He’s equal parts anxious and eager to know what’s meant to happen after his shift, once he starts fulfilling your request.

Most of all, he’s unsure if he’s reading you right — if what it feels like you’re doing is something he’s attaching too deep a meaning to. If he’s right in reading your signs.

You don’t really mind it; you like knowing that Mark somehow wears his heart on his sleeve, even if he tries to remain neutral for the sake of appearances. You also bask quietly in the fact that he’s looking at you twice as much as he ever has in the time you’ve loosely known each other. Still, his bubbling confusion and inquisitiveness seem to be interfering with the rest of his work, especially when you notice that he’s been wiping down the surface of a table two down from where you are for more than seven minutes.

In the hopes of easing whatever tension might be in his heart, you offer him a small smile, but that’s only met with his eyes immediately glazing over and inching a couple of centimeters above your forehead, where the story of Starbucks’ origins is drawn out in a faux-manga style. He pretends to find it interesting, as if he hasn’t seen it a million times from coming into this establishment day after day — you know it well enough, and you don’t even have to, considering you don’t work here — and you can’t do anything but hold back your laughter.

A small part of you says you should just give him the affirmative answer to his biggest question, but every other cell in your body says that it’s no fun if he doesn’t ascertain it for himself.

He has his school bag and textbook in tow when he approaches, taking the seat across from you. There’s a steely resolution on his face, like he’s been emotionally preparing himself for such a daunting task, but it eases up the moment you laugh lightly.

“You don’t have to act like I’m going to eat you.”

“I’m still not sure why you’re suddenly asking me to help you,” he admits. He’s also very honest, you note. Again, not an unattractive trait. “I’m not complaining. I just didn’t think you even had an opinion of me.”

“Why’s that?” You’re genuinely surprised. Mark drums his fingers on the front of his textbook, thoughtful — less for the sake of thinking what to say and more for the sake of considering how to say it. It’s clear he wants to avoid calling attention to the fact that before now, you two have had no reason to run the same track, let alone sit together and talk at a coffee shop, as if you’ve always been the best of friends.

“Genuinely just thought I was the guy who gave you your afternoon coffee every day,” he finally settles. Your eyes widen, and another laugh escapes you — a little louder this time, enough to call the attention of a couple of jumpy freshmen nearby.

“Well — let me put it this way.” You lean over slightly, cupping your chin in your palm. “Was I just the girl you made coffee for every day until now?”

There are clear cogs turning in his head; his eyes unfocus slightly as he thinks of the possibilities. His silence suddenly makes you somewhat nervous; your tone had been confident, and you’d only said that to prove a point, to push him in the right direction, but you realize that you hadn’t previously factored in the possibility that he might simply say yes — or, worse, say no just to avoid hurting your feelings.

You watch his lower lip curl in; he uses his tongue to smooth out the skin that’s slightly dried from work fatigue. You would much rather it peeked out, so you could imagine it against your own. His response is mumbled in a lower register, but you catch some key syllables — didn’t… not … stranger — pretty … you?

“Sorry?” You ask patiently, but the fact that he turns red and laughs again — something you realize is not only a trademark of his personality but also downright delicious of him to be doing — is all the answer you need to let the apprehension seep from your shoulders. “I didn’t catch that.”

Mark clears his throat. “No, I… didn’t think of you that way. I mean… you’re my classmate.”

“Sure,” your tone’s breezy, but the somewhat sloppy confirmation of interest in you makes your heart soar. He just needs more of a push. “And we’re basically friends, right?”

“Yeah.” His voice is unsure at first, like he can’t seem to wrap his head around the concept. You can tell that Mark’s notion of friendship is likely based on shared interests, of which you admittedly have none. Technically, if you were his friend, you’d spend less time just telling him the exact same order every single day and more time sitting around a table trying to learn how to play Magic: The Gathering with him. Still, he takes one long look at your grin and suddenly gains confidence in his next words, as if it somehow convinces him that the briefness of your old conversations had been a mutually agreed-upon thing and not the product of social distance between the two of you. “Yeah. We’re friends.”

“Right. Friends help friends, don’t they? I’d definitely feel more comfortable having a friend teach me than some stuffy upperclassman I don’t know.”

You see Mark’s lips move slightly, in such small movements you could have imagined it as breathing if you didn’t care too much (which you do). He mouths, to himself — friends help friends. For some reason, that boosts his conviction even further, and he nods.

“Makes sense. Well — for as long as you don’t mind me, then.”

“Mind? I asked you, so I should be saying that.”

“I’d never mind — I mean, of course I don’t mind.” He’s quick to correct himself, and you have to stop your own hand from reaching out to try to satisfy your curiosity, the desire to know just how hot his cheeks get when he blushes. “More than happy to help, actually.”

“And I’m more than happy to be here.” You beam at him, and he mirrors your smile. You don’t know what it is about the look on his face — the brightness in his eyes, or the slight lift of his eyebrows, maybe — but it gives you the impression that he might be feeling at least a fraction of what you are: the feeling of your heart lifting off a few inches from your rib cage. “Since we’re on the same page, I hope — should we get to it?”

From the moment that Mark opens his textbook to a chapter on inverted parabolas, he assumes a personality you feel you haven’t seen from him before. You realize that you really do know him in only two limited capacities — his classroom persona that seems to really only view himself and the material, focused on the board and the professor’s words (even up until the useless anecdotes) to absorb as much information as possible, and his more genial customer service form, always happy to assist in the trained, easygoing way you’ve come to meet so often.

Right now, he’s a blend of both, yet somehow neither all at once. He’s quick to catch the parabolas you draw, either wrongly or downright poorly. Despite initial hesitation, he always manages to say something; there’s already a pattern to how he does it, from his slightly awkward, “Ah, sorry, actually —” to the way his finger traces over what you’ve written, outlining the right curve. You find his interruptions so endearing that you start drawing them wrong purposefully — not enough for him to realize your schemes in their entirety, but enough to cast you a few amused glances, like he can’t imagine why you’d map out such an absurd graph. You get the feeling he wants to actually laugh at how ridiculous you’re acting, but he can’t tell if you’re seriously struggling or not, so he settles for a smile he thinks he does well in keeping to himself, but that you catch anyway. He’s patient, even when you have to rip out pages from the back of his notebook because of your ‘mistakes,’ like he’s still catering to your request for an extra pump of syrup for your coffee on sleepy days.

But there’s also that side to him that comes out when he suddenly remembers the distance between you that, before today, had felt unlikely to be closed. It peaks at odd moments, like when you’re borrowing his pen because yours is currently holding your slowly unraveling bun up, and your fingers brush against his. It surfaces abruptly when you lean in to watch what he’s drawing until he realizes how close you are, arm lightly grazing his, and his pen freezes, ink blotting on the paper for a second. It’s in those times that you can almost hear his brain churning out questions — like he’s wondering if you’re just oblivious or if you’re doing something on purpose that he can’t quite believe. Like he wants to ask you what’s on your mind, but he just doesn’t know how.

If he asked, you would reply without missing a beat. The answer, after all, is simple (him). But Mark never raises the question, only does something without fully acknowledging what he’s doing — the adjustment of his glasses on the bridge of his nose, the ruffling of his hair as though to shake off his thoughts, the clearing of his throat to normalize his tone before he explains something you’ve just asked about. There’s always that light tinge of pink to his face that makes him look even more endearing, and it fades and returns every so often for the better part of two hours.

By the time he rubs oncoming fatigue out of his eyes, the sun has already set; there are far fewer people around you at this time, and for as much as you like spending time with him and breathing in the scent of his shirt — always a tinge of Downy, barely cutting through the much more overpowering scent of espresso and sugar — your back has begun hurting from your front-heavy posture and determination to have your face as close as rationally possible to Mark’s. Still, you don’t miss out on the fact that the act of him cracking his neck to relieve tension makes your lips curl inward, trying to stifle an inappropriate noise in reaction to the view.

“I feel like I talked your ear off,” he pipes up, sounding a bit sheepish. “Sometimes it’s hard to know when to stop once you’ve gotten started. I’m just hoping I didn’t bore you to death.”

“Meanwhile, I’m here hoping you aren’t sick of my questions already.” You smile, closing your notebook and hanging the clip of your pen on the spiral. Your arms stretch up first, followed by your back, a light twist to relax your posture into normalcy again. Mark’s breathing falls quiet, like he’d been preparing to say something in response but had let it die in the back of his throat instead. You let your eyes drop, expecting to see him looking at you, as he mostly has been — on and off — since his shift ended, but his eyes are far lower than yours, the telltale redness now growing in evident splotches across his cheeks.

The hem of your shirt has ridden up; while there’s nothing outrageous about it, there’s a short expanse of skin that it reveals, for a brief moment. His eyes are slightly glossy, brow furrowed like he’s trying to find a solution to something he can’t fully understand. You’re not even sure about what he could really be looking at, or if there’s something he’s just thinking of that caught his attention while his eyes focused on a rather unfortunate spot. To test your theory, you suck in your stomach slightly alongside an inhale.

It should be objectively funny to watch Mark blink unevenly, left eye going first before his right tries to catch up, but you manage to stifle your laughter — poorly, though, because you end up coughing a little and breaking him out of his strange trance. You avert your eyes quickly enough for him to look vaguely relieved that you hadn’t caught him looking. So he thinks, at least.

“Anyway.” You feel bad that you have to tear his mind away from whatever faraway land it must be trying to burrow a hole in; the dazed expression on his face dims into hastily hidden embarrassment. You don’t want him to feel awkward, so you just busy yourself with packing up, making an unnecessary show of stuffing your notebook back into your bag as if it isn’t half-empty at this point. “I really appreciate you taking the time to help me.”

“Any time.” His first attempt is a little raspy, maybe from overuse of his voice today, so he clears his throat and tries again. A slow smile builds on your lips. “Any time, really. I’m glad that this is actually helping you; you pick things up surprisingly fast.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah. Give it a couple of weeks, and you’ll probably be ready to tackle it on your own again, I’m sure.”

He smiles reassuringly, but all you can think about is how that’s not good. You should pretend to be a little dumber next time, or this will end much too prematurely.

The next five minutes pass in silence; you don’t expect to be knee-deep in conversation anyway since, as much as you try to convince him, you aren’t actually anywhere close to being those kinds of friends yet. There’s an unspoken rule to the give and take of things, where he pauses for you to get an item off the table and push it into your bag before he does the same with his own belongings. Neither of you really intersect paths, save for the moment you both grab your phones and stand at the same time.

His jaw falls open like he’s preparing to say something, then shuts as if he’s better decided against it. You decide to take the initiative to say what you’re assuming he wants to. “Same time, same table?”

“Oh — uh, yeah, for sure.”

You want to ask him to walk out with you. You want to lace your fingers with his, tug him out, and kiss him under the green and white glow of the sign outside. You want to know if kissing his collarbone means you’ll taste a hint of coffee. You think about doing it all somehow, especially since he’s fighting back a slight smile at the promise of tomorrow.

But it just isn’t the right time.

Instead, you place a hand on his shoulder, giving it a light squeeze. The slow movement of his throat — yet another hard swallow — isn’t lost on you, and his eyes land on where the two of you connect. With a grateful smile, you bid him a soft goodbye, taking your leave first.

You don’t look back — at least, not until you’re fully in the cover of the darkness outside. On the gravel path, just out of reach of the lamplight, you chance one last glance back into the store. Mark is still rooted to the same spot, his backpack slung over one shoulder, staring at the table like he’s dissociating from what just happened — like he can’t believe the last couple of hours.

Your smile grows when you see his own, and his hand comes around to the back of his neck, rubbing it lightly like it gives him small comfort to let him know that it was real.

Baby steps, you remind yourself. You’ve already got one foot in the door, after all.

As the days trickle by, you fall into a more comfortable standing with Mark; there’s a routine to your meetings that seems to eliminate the initial and abrupt awkwardness of that first day. You come into that Starbucks at four, greet Mark, who doesn’t ever have to ask for your order, and spend the next hour and a half slowly sipping on it until the ice has thinned and watered down your drink substantially. In that time, you allow yourself to do whatever you want (as if you’ve ever done otherwise anyway), and what you usually want the most is a good view of him. You therefore use most of the minutes you have on hand to regard him from different angles — from the side when he’s frothing milk, upfront when he turns to leave cups on the pick-up counter, from the back when he’s clearing tables — interspersed with moments of checking your TikTok feed, clearing group chat messages, and sometimes re-curling your bangs with a portable iron from the school’s co-op center, a relatively new purchase you tote around these days. You do essentially anything in between to avoid acting too suspicious while he works.

Sometimes, you catch Mark’s eye too; the more your meetings increase in number over the course of a few weeks, the more deliberately he looks over at you, and the longer it lasts. You feel like you’ve made significant progress when your gazes lock and he smiles slightly, albeit a bit unsurely, instead of turning away like he used to. The other day, he’d even passed by while apologizing for how long you always waited for him — not that you ever minded, something you made a point to clarify with him before he walked away, carrying a couple of chairs from the back room with him to replace rickety ones.

That he’s able to transport them easily, as if he’s lugging a bag of apples from the grocery, does not escape your watchful eye.

What you like the most is that you start to learn more about him in a way that isn’t fueled only by your expectations and, therefore, limited by your imagination. You find out that he’s from a close-knit family with a rather cushy background, and this barista job is just for interest funding and experience, in that exact order. Most of his earnings are funneled into the things he collects, which apparently isn’t limited to comic books and special edition blu-rays with director’s cut but also a rather stupendous amount of PopMart blind box figurines. Apparently, he particularly likes the Skullpanda series even if he hasn’t completed it yet; your last session together had adjourned thirty minutes earlier than usual so that he could catch a pre-rush hour inner circle train to Hongdae, where the flagship store was set to open on that day. He’d promised to show you his pulls (as long as they weren’t embarrassing dupes). You learn that he likes to listen to loud music when he studies to stimulate his mind, and he has a playlist that’s just a jumble of songs from Punk Goes Pop volumes that makes him feel empowered for some absurd reason, like he’s going against the grain. You don’t really get it, but you do like that spiced-up rendition of Ariana Grande’s Problem that he let you listen to once.

Of course, there are things that you find out not through conversation but through continued, closer observation. You notice that he likes to put on chapstick even if his lips aren’t particularly dry, but he does worry on them often, most especially when he’s thinking hard about something. He has a habit of saying honestly… at the start of every other sentence, as if he’s concerned you won’t take his word on anything, even though he’s just talking about how unnaturally hot it was at noon despite it still being spring. He has long eyelashes that you’re equal parts attracted to and jealous of, and he bites the inside of his cheek whenever he wants to pep himself up after grueling shifts. He plays beats you’re not even sure he knows he’s creating against his knee with his fingers, so enthusiastic and consistent in this habit that you want to offer your thigh instead. His shoulders always go first before he laughs, and he does this thing where he raises his hand to cover his mouth at the start of it, which is a shame, because you’d do anything to keep seeing him smile like that — or, better yet, to be the reason for it.

Then there are those things you notice he tries to hide. He always turns his face halfway to the side when he blushes, something he seems to do without fail every time you smile at him. He has to temper the intensity of his grin when you take the time to compliment him on how cool his shirt is, or how nice his hair looks today, or how smart he is, like he doesn’t want you to know how good it makes him feel even if you want him to feel good about it, around you, because of you. Sometimes he denies it for the sake of responding, and his voice always lilts on the first syllable in his refusal to accept what you say, even though he knows you won’t take it for an answer.

And after a couple more careful experiments, you notice that Mark, out of the many things he’s interested in, seems to have a particular thing for your stomach.

You don’t know if it has anything to do with him not really seeing much of it in real life in his own time or if he just has his own kind of fixation on it, but you start to cotton on by the fourth time you meet. An hour of being hunched over a table that’s not at the greatest height in relation to your neck and torso has you stiff, and you’d leaned back in your chair, arms pulling to the air, hoping your spine might feel like realigning if you exerted enough tension pressure that way. Your shirt hadn’t ridden up this time, considering it had been tucked into your jeans, and it was because of this that you’d caught a flicker of something new in his face that you hadn’t seen before.

You could have sworn it looked like disappointment.

Of course, he hides it quickly, as he does with most of his emotional candor, but it’s enough to make you suspicious — enough to make you wonder if Mark is also just keeping something to himself. Or maybe you’re just projecting your own presently secretive nature onto him. Regardless, you think it’s odd that whenever you stand up or stretch, his eyes almost immediately fall to your midriff, like he wants to challenge your clothing into a staring contest before he thinks better of it.

You don’t mind, anyway. He can look as much as he likes. Maybe when the weather’s warmer, you’ll even cater to that interest and wear a crop top. Hopefully, that’ll be the push he needs to act on human instinct and ask you out or, like… bend you over. Maybe.

You’re often plagued with these kinds of thoughts in between the ones you try to keep as family-friendly as possible — now, more so than ever.

Sometimes, it’s easier, especially when you’re caught up in talks with him; despite the fact that he doesn’t seem like much of a conversationalist when it comes to generic matters, when either he or you are enthusiastic about a particular topic, he has a tendency to get carried away. There’s nothing impure about how his eyes light up when you remember to ask him about the movie he saw with his friends over the weekend or the way he hums old Nickelodeon cartoon theme songs under his breath whenever he’s looking for a page in the textbook. It’s more of a situation where you’ll observe something and immediately run with it despite it being an objectively normal action.

Like right now, as you’re watching him turn his pen between his fingers. Now, while he’s shaking his knee in mild impatience, as if he’s trying to will the answer to the worksheets you’ve both been trying to get through for the better part of the day faster. You’d made copies of the problems your professors had assigned and exchanged them under the premise of being able to practice more intensely.

However, whereas Mark is actually focused on solving, you’re just watching him out of the corner of your eye, wondering if he’s ever been told that his fingers are fuck-worthy on a singular, unique level or if it’d feel good for you to ride the thigh he’s currently moving, jeans and all. You consider the feeling of his warm palms on your bare waist as you do it, and you end up wondering if that’s what crosses his mind whenever he sneaks glances at you, too.

You’d know the answer to all those things if he’d fucking ask you out. Maybe you could do it after all. Maybe you should, instead of relying on slowly increasing the probability over such a long period of time. Maybe if you asked nicely, Mark might pull the shades down on the storefront windows and rail you against the glass.

You’re so lost in thought that it genuinely startles you when he plops his textbook over the worksheet, rattling your eraser dangerously close to the edge of the table. You’re still clutching your heart while he rubs his eyes a little too violently.

“Can’t,” he groans, and his neck gives into the weight of his head, allowing it to loll backward. “I feel like the numbers are just melting into each other. I swear, I thought I could read words out of them.”

“Maybe we were a little too ambitious with the double worksheet agenda,” you admit, even though you’ve barely gotten past half of yours and certainly haven’t touched a single item on his. “Should we call it a day for now?”

“Yeah,” he agrees, although he still takes the time to encircle his final answers before clapping his palms to his cheeks (an act that has your mind dangerously close to wandering off inappropriately again) to wake himself up. “Woah. I didn’t even notice how dark it is already. I’d say time flies when you’re having fun, but I’m not too sure about the ‘fun’ part of it…”

You trace his gaze towards the glass; the moon’s already out, surrounded by a smattering of low-light stars. You hadn’t realized how late it had gotten, probably because your mind had been on R-18 mode for most of the afternoon. Also, the days are getting generally shorter, but that fact doesn’t make you feel as embarrassed, at least.

“You got a ride?”

The question once again shocks you out of your small trance, and you turn back to him with wide eyes. “Well — no. Wait, I didn’t know you had a car. Why’d you take the subway, then?”

“Oh — no, sorry, I… don’t.” He looks suddenly sheepish, eyes dropping to the shiny surface of the table for a moment before they snap back up, as if he’s actually actively reminding himself to look at you. “I was wondering if you wanted me to — actually, more than that, are you going home already? Not that you need to stay; it’s not that important, but…”

You try to gloss over the fact that he had just been about to initiate another huge step in the right direction (i.e. offering to walk you home) by beaming at him, maybe a little too widely, if only to mask your disappointment at the sudden shift in conversation. “I have nothing waiting at home for me but a sandwich dinner and Singles Inferno, so hit me with whatever it is.”

“Oh, cool.” His lips turn up, and the corners shake, this show of happiness once again tamped down by his own inexplicable desire to maintain a safe distance. How are you supposed to tell him you’re desperate to bridge that gap without using those exact words? “I came from the flagship store yesterday — the one in Hongdae that I told you about?” He allows the smile to widen slightly when you nod in genuine understanding. “Got the last six boxes of the collection I’ve been trying to finish.”

You whistle appreciatively. “Can I ask you for a loan on my next phone bill? You know, once I’ve upgraded to something pricier.”

“Nah — just itching to complete the set,” he laughs. You wonder if he’s been doing that more often because he knows its crippling effect on you, though you doubt he’s that sly. Again, maybe you’re just projecting too much of your own motivations onto him. “This was probably about two months of saving up combined.”

“No new Iron Man issues to look out for, then?” Your voice is warm even though it takes on a teasing tone; Mark’s hand rubs the back of his neck, and his expression is a little sheepish, but you’re happy that the times he used to go completely quiet, opting only to blush at your attempts to act more familiar with him are pretty much gone now.

“Maybe next month.” You also like that he doesn’t really treat his hobbies as secrets, neither out of shame nor snobbishness. He explains these things to you the same way he does the topics you study — with an air of contentedness, like he’s happy someone listens to him without interrupting. On your end, you have no qualms with listening to his voice for hours, wondering when he’ll stop using it to greet you when you come through the door and when he’ll start saying your name in a way that makes you feel like you’re the only one he sees whenever you’re near. It’s a win-win situation (sort of). “I was actually debating between this collection and a really rare copy of Spi— well, never mind that. I just thought — since you were asking me a bit about blind boxes last time. You know, if you wanted to. With… me.”

As much as he’s become comfortable talking to you about things that don’t involve coffee orders and school, you can’t say that you aren’t doing your fair share of the work in connecting the dots; the demand for your efforts is exponentially higher in moments like this, when you think he’s trying to ask you something but can’t seem to find less-than-eager words to avoid what he thinks might spook you.

Luckily, he augments his fragments with action; reaching into his backpack — which you notice seems to be bulkier than usual — he starts extracting small brown boxes, all with the same design; it seems, for lack of better words, aesthetically gothic, and you reach out to pick one up, turning it over and examining the print on each side with vague interest. Mark starts laying them out on top of each other until there’s a small, somewhat unstable pyramid in front of him, then shifts his attention fully to you, just as you’re putting the box in your hand atop all the rest.

“I’d love to.” You beam as he does, and there’s a wondrous relief in his eyes that tells you he’s glad you manage to catch onto his words — or lack, thereof — surprisingly well. “For as long as you don’t blame me for any bad draws.”

“The contents have already been decided by my own hand — sort of,” he chuckles. “Point is, I would never do that to you. But I won’t lie; I kind of want to rely on your luck a little more.”

“What makes you think I’d have any of that running through my system?”

“Not sure — beginner’s luck, maybe? You just kind of look like one of those kinds of people to me — like… you’re just made of good things.”

You don’t know how to take this compliment; on the one hand, it’s easily one of the sweetest things Mark has ever said to you that doesn’t involve anything with actual sugar content. On the other, you know you’re not as lucky as he makes it sound, considering you’re still striking out on getting past the borderline of friendship with him. All you can do is smile, nodding and making to move closer to him by sliding into the next seat.

It’s hard to ignore the sight of him stiffening; something like surprise mingled with both fear and interest flashes strong across his face, but you don’t do anything to acknowledge the slight change in atmosphere, choosing to settle down comfortably and clap your hands. “So. What are the rules? What can I do, and what can’t I?”

“Uh.” His throat constricts at the right moment, the syllable getting caught and causing him to clear his throat. You know that this is the nearest you’ve ever been to him, the sleeve of your shirt tickling his arm. Upon closer, albeit brief inspection, you note that he’s also rather veiny. That doesn’t do your impurity any favors. “Not… really rules, or anything like that. Just — these are the ones I’ve been looking for. Not that you can really control it, but in case you were curious about that.”

You squint intently at the scaled-down images he points out. There’s one that looks like a penguin caught in an oil spill; another that seems to be in a polar bear costume, dozing; and — “What’s… halo? Halo…bios?”

“It just means marine life,” he answers quickly, like the thought means close to nothing to him to know something that obscure. Whoever said that smart is the new sexy wasn’t joking. “Like… all things that live in the ocean, that kind of thing.”

“And you know this because?”

He pauses, looking thoughtful. “I’m not sure. I guess I must have just learned it when I was curious about what it meant some time ago. Isn’t that how we all learn things?”

You shake your head incredulously, and he smiles a little apologetically. “You never cease to amaze me.” Your nail drums against the silhouette of one with a question mark on it. “What’s this supposed to be? Can you draw your own figurine, or something?”

“No.” He’s clearly amused, but his expression’s still patronizing enough for you to not feel too bad about saying something idiotic. “It’s a secret design — a money drainer, basically. You could buy a full set of this and still not get it. Some people will open hundreds without any luck, so it’s really rare.”

“You don’t want it?”

“I try not to get too caught up in the secret thing,” he admits. “Otherwise…”

“No rare print comic books for the rest of your life, basically?”

He taps his nose, and you both share another laugh. It’s nice, you think, to have come this far — to be someone Mark can share his interests and thoughts with. You may have been stretching the word to its limit when you first punched your way into his social life and called yourself his friend, but it feels more real now, more natural to think about and say. Even if he still sometimes seems to be hyperaware of the gap between the both of you, there’s no denying, at least, that it’s been significantly reduced, and this much is a testament to that.

“Well, leave it up to me. I’ll let all of this beginner’s luck rub off on you,” you announce with overflowing albeit unfounded confidence.

You both decide to open a box each at the same time; Mark suddenly panics and asks you not to unseal the foil bag right away without looking at the card inside first, earning him one slightly alarmed look followed by a burst of laughter at his pained expression when you pretend to rip open the packaging. Comparing pulls, you identify them using the set chart — your luck doesn’t seem to be operating at full capacity yet because you can only offer him the card of one that looks like a floppy pigeon, which he responds to with a slightly apologetic grimace before saying he’s already pulled that thrice in the past. He, on the other hand, is turning the card of the polar bear over in his palm, trying not to make you feel bad for your duplicate pull by slipping it under his textbook when your eyes land on it.

The second round isn’t much better; both of you manage to pull something he’s already added to his collection, and as you’re ripping the seal to your third box, he pauses and watches you. You think it’s because he’s concerned about the obvious shit luck you’ve had thus far and wants to snatch it from you before your negative energy transfigures whatever’s inside into something he doesn’t want, and you’re just about to offer the half-opened package to him before he pushes the one on his end to you.

“No way, Mark.” Your eyes are wide, a palm up to reject it. “If that turns out to be another dupe by my hand, I’m literally going to walk into oncoming traffic.”

He has to control his amusement at your words so that it doesn’t completely shake his voice into incoherence. “I picked all of these while I was there, so if anything, you’re only riding off my bad luck. Besides, this is your first time doing this. I want you to have fun.”

“But,” your voice is pained. “Your money.”

“It’s not a big deal. With how few I need to complete them, I was definitely bound to run into more repeats than new ones.” He taps the front of the textbook — or, at least, the part of it not buried under the figurines and sealing tapes yet. “Probability mathematics.”

“I thought we already ended the study part of the day,” you grumble but concede, putting aside the one you half-opened to tear the top of his. You’re careful when you shake out the foil packaging, making sure to place it upright on the table before extracting the card. Both of your faces fall — yours more than his — when you see it’s a repeat of the polar bear.

“Almost. It would’ve been a pretty lucky pull earlier, so it’s technically not bad,” he tries to reassure you, but you childishly feel like you’ve been the sole source of his disappointment thus far. “Try the last one.”

It’s irrational, but you’re suddenly anxious about it. For some reason, you’re worried that this will topple the carefully constructed ladder you’ve propped up against Mark’s tower of social defense. Even if he’s being genial about your rotten pulls, you don’t know how much of it is just resignation to dismay on his part.

You say a small prayer, then fully rip off the seal; you don’t even take out the packaged figuring anymore. You just shimmy the card out of the box, turning it over when you notice it’s upside down.

For a moment, your shoulders deflate. It’s closest to this pastel purple figurine in the middle of the line-up, its stupid puckered lips almost taunting you. He hadn’t even mentioned it as something he’s looking for, so you almost feel like this has come to a horrible full circle. But then he grabs the box, checks the list, and looks back at your card again. He looks shell-shocked, and you’re not sure if it’s the strong air conditioning directed towards the two of you or if it’s just his hands, but the image he’s holding is shivering slightly.

You look more closely at it, and something just doesn’t feel right. Color palette aside, there are notable differences — different colored lips, a more intricate ear design, and closed eyes. It’s…

“Dream eater,” Mark’s voice is hushed, almost reverent, and very, very close to your ear. “It’s the secret one. You’re… incredible.”

“What are you talking about,” your words are just as raspy; you’re not sure if you’re actually choked up with emotion or something — over a figurine, you have to remind yourself. “You picked all of this. I just ripped open the box.”

The hush that falls over the both of you feels very concrete, weighty on your shoulders. His fingers creep towards the foil packet — the only one he actually opens because there’s no way he’s not keeping it. The shiny purple head gleams under the fluorescent, the glitter around the star and moon designs catching the light as he turns it left to right, like he’s worried it’s a fake. You can tell why people want these things so much; there’s a thrill in you that lingers, makes you feel warm and alert. It’s anticipation, despair, excitement, and triumph all in one sitting.

You’re stroking the smooth curve of the design by the ears lightly when Mark speaks up again and says the most outrageous thing.

“I want you to have it.”

“What?” You actually have to pop your ear canal in front of him with your pinky to make sure he knows how ludicrous he sounds. “This is… you said it was crazy rare.”

“Yeah. And you pulled it, with your magic. That’s like… unimaginable luck. Even more than beginner’s luck.”

“Like I said, I literally just opened the box.”

“No — you have like… the golden touch.”

“Please,” you hiss, a genuine testiness to your voice. “Do not. I was just here for the ride — the experience, and all.”

“Seriously, take it.”

“Absolutely not—”

It’s a chaotic moment of him trying to hand you the figurine and you outright rejecting it, with both your palms working hard to push it back to him. Instead of nudging the plastic back, though, you end up placing the full force of your hands against his fingers.

There’s no actual spark when you touch, but your reactions make it feel like there might as well have been; you even lock eyes in startled unison, like you can’t believe that just happened, before you pull away quickly, Mark drawing the figuring back to his torso while looking away towards the counter, where a lowerclassman is wiping down the stains. You want to scream at your warped reflection in the window. You barely initiate contact with him, but you imagine that if you ever did, you would prefer to not be saying something as abjectly negative as absolutely not while doing so.

Your mind flails in an attempt to mitigate the issue and water down the embarrassment, and clearly he’s struggling to figure it out too, because he pipes up before you can piece your thoughts together.

“No, really.” His tone is a lot milder and, consequently, a lot more persuasive this way. “You should take it. I want you to.”

“It’s not mine. This is your thing — your hobby.”

“That’s why I’m giving it to you. I swear — I want you to keep it.”

“Why?”

He lapses into silence again, but his face is much redder than earlier. His mouth opens in an attempt to say something, but he just manages to uh his way back into a state of quiet, which gives you a chance to speak instead.

“We can… share it,” you suggest. “Shared custody…. ish.”

His eyebrow cocks involuntarily, and his jaw falls again, but all he does in actual response is nod — slowly at first, then with more sureness to the act.

“Yeah. We can share it. I’d… like that.”

You’re glad that the bulk of the awkwardness has fizzled out fairly easily, and when you think about it, this feels like a pretty good course of action; you like that it’s this little link between the two of you now — something you share that no one else can touch.

Mark, you notice, is smiling as well — more to himself than towards you, it seems. His thumb grazes across the face of the figurine, slow across the lips, and you’re once again falling into a pit of nonsense by wondering when he’d do that to you.

“Thanks for staying with me, _________,” he finally says, and your heart jolts and melts all at once. “And for… doing this. For chatting with me. And giving me your luck, and all that. Great way to end the day… with you.”

You say no problem, but you instantly regret it when you realize you could have just said it didn’t have to end just yet.

“__________? Hello? Come back down to Earth?”

“Shut up,” you sigh at the guy seated across you — Seo Youngho, an upperclassman, your Gender Studies classmate, and current project partner, waves in front of your face. You shoo his hand away, which only joins his other one as he throws them in defeat above his head. “Stop moving. Be quiet. Don’t talk.”

“That’s the same thing as shut up and be quiet. What’s up with you?” He demands. “Fifteen minutes ago, you were full of ideas. Now I feel like I’m talking to a wax figure.”

You’d been engrossed in your report for the last hour and a half, and the subject matter is admittedly something you enjoy — the role of gender in Twenty-First Century Korean marketing and advertisement, a title Youngho had taken more than ten minutes to type into the Google Docs header because he was pissed off at how the numbers looked like in the fonts he chose. He’s an enthusiastic classmate and someone you’ve come to be friendly with, not only because he’s genuinely approachable but also because he has fits of nosiness and talkativeness at the strangest moments, so a chunk of your relationship is mostly based on social terrorism on his part. You like him well enough most of the time — save for the last fifteen minutes of this hour.

Because Mark had just come in for his shift fifteen minutes ago, and suddenly Youngho is much too noisy for your taste, and his head is honestly way too big to the point that it gets in the way of your opportunities to see Mark behind the counter. You even resent him for choosing a booth instead of your usual table all of a sudden, because your view of the central barista’s area is much more limited from this angle, especially since the huge espresso machine is in the of your field of vision.

You’re also (currently and abruptly) mad at Youngho because you remember that he’s the reason you’ve had to skip out on a couple of sessions with Mark. Like, it technically isn’t his fault that you have a lot of research to do for the literature review section of the paper, nor is it his fault that this is your final requirement that comprises a whopping forty percent of your grade, but like… you’ll blame him anyway. So you’re much more irritable, and you’ve definitely been missing Mark’s presence. In fact, you kind of just want to shove Youngho’s balloon head away and call Mark over to sit with you, but you’re not that much of an animal to actually do that.

Probably.

There had been inquisitiveness across Mark’s face when he’d come in; his eyes had trailed to the table at which you usually sat, surprised to find two guys hunched over a single phone there instead of the usual you, waiting for him with your eyes bright and your smile wide. You’d like to think it’s because he’s gotten as used to seeing you as you’re used to waiting to see him — like he just expects you to be there.

You hadn’t really known how to call his attention to where you were, especially since Youngho was prattling very matter-of-factly about the academic journal he’d unearthed yesterday and how he thought it would be useful in reshaping the methodology of your paper (whatever). There was a moment in which you briefly considered ordering another cup of coffee just to get in line to talk to him, but your hands were already shaking from the venti you’d had to keep yourself from passing out in front of your partner.

So you’re more than relieved when, half an hour into his shift, Mark finally steps out from behind the huge machine, a mug of water for himself in hand, and turns away from the front of the store to drink it — only for your eyes to lock as he twists his torso in your general direction.

The mug stops just inches from his lips, but you could swear he smiles at you briefly when he recognizes you, so you return the favor. Youngho’s face contorts into abject befuddlement, turning around to see what you’re grinning at.

“Oh, you poor sap,” he snorts, finally letting the puzzle pieces fall into place.

“What?” You’re still distracted even if Mark has taken a gulp of water and is now attending to a gaggle of girls still in the throes of discussing what to order.

“What what? You gonna spend the rest of the day eyefucking Mark Lee from over here? At least let me get a different table.”

“Shut up,” you repeat sullenly, coming back down to his level and finally — albeit reluctantly — meeting his eye (just because Mark isn’t looking your way). “What were you saying about the sample size?”

“That it’s much too large to be feasible, a point we closed twenty fucking minutes ago,” he says pointedly. “Is it a thing for baristas or a thing for smart guys?”

“It’s a thing for Mark Lee,” you sigh, following Youngho’s suit and shutting your laptop close. You’re at least glad he’s not annoyed that you’re delaying work for a crush, or maybe he’s also just equally lazy at this point. “You ever look at someone and think you would give it all up for a chance to hit that?”

“No, because this isn’t a porn movie, and I’m clearly not the main character in whatever’s going on in there.” He jabs at your forehead; you swat his hand away again.

“Well, I would.”

He rolls his eyes. “So do it, dumbass.” He says this so simply, like he can’t imagine why you’d be holding yourself back, which is a valid thing to feel, except it’s not really any of his business.

“Can’t.”

“Because?”

“Because it doesn’t fit into my elegant master plan. Also because I want him to ask me out. I just want that victory.”

“Oh yeah, there it is.” Youngho leans over, wiggling his fingers at your ears like he’s greeting a next-door neighbor. “Hey, delusion. Good to see you. Do you even understand how crazy it is that you’re taking a Gender Studies class while waiting for your dick-in-shining-armor like a damsel in distress?”

“Asshole,” you grumble, violently opening your laptop monitor again. “Get back on Google Drive.”

Thankfully, Youngho complies, and the next two hours pass in relative silence and productivity, with you hammering out a vague references list that he promises to format in your stead so you can ‘spend more time dreaming about Mark Lee between your legs.’ You want to strangle him, but there are far too many people in the cafe for you to get away with it. Also, aforementioned Mark Lee would only be a witness to your criminal record, and while you think there’s something romantic in killing for love, or whatever, you’re not sure it’d make the best impression on him.

“Next week’s my birthday,” Youngho announces as he stands to tug on his jacket.

“Congratulations,” you say wryly, peeking over his bulletin board torso to see Mark tugging off his apron and picking up his school bag. Your heart hammers in your chest as he looks over at you briefly, and something like embarrassment passes over his face before he busies himself with neatly folding the fabric. “Go away.”

“Usually people look uncomfortable for not knowing and then start thinking about what gifts to get the celebrant, but I always felt you were kind of a revolutionary.” He snaps his fingers right in front of your eyes, and you look up at him, a little offended. “I’m having a get-together — and by get-together, I mean it’s gonna be a rager. You should come.”

“When?”

“Next Thursday.”

“Can’t,” you chew on your lip, wondering if Mark is leaving. His movements seem particularly slow, but you wonder if he’s just taking his sweet time because he has nothing better to do. Of course, he would have something better to do if Youngho stopped fucking obscuring you from him and vice versa. “Busy. School… whatever.” Not completely untrue. Most of what you do with Mark has to do with school.

“This moony-eyed thing is just not for you, I fear.”

“Are you going to be here all day?”

“Are you? Why don’t you just fucking ask him out, you lunatic?” You can’t imagine why he sounds so exasperated. It’s not like this is his problem — or his business, for that matter. “Maybe if you did, you could fuck him and move on with your life and be an actual contributor to society’s development.”

“Has anyone ever told you how nosy you are?”

“Constantly.” He brings his palms down on the table, the thud shaking you out of another oncoming stupor. “Think about it. Maybe it’ll make you stop making that stupid face.”

“You’ve got a stupid face,” you mumble, sulking as he pinches your cheek as a goodbye before heading out of the shop.

At least you finally get to see Mark in full, glorious view — and you get to watch him come closer, although his stride is somewhat cautious.

“Hey.” Even his voice sounds unsure — almost like the way he used to sound earlier in your friendship. “I didn’t want to interrupt you and… your friend?”

“Oh. Well, you wouldn’t have been interrupting,” you inform him, completely genuine. “He was spouting a lot of nonsense.”

“You guys seemed pretty close.”

“I guess it’s a proximity thing,” you sigh, and Mark raises his eyebrows slightly in question. “We’re partners.”

“Oh.” The way he draws out the syllable is slow. “That definitely makes sense.”

The silence stretches out between the two of you again, with Mark checking his shoelaces. You almost grab your head; it hadn’t occurred to you until now how damaging missing meetings with him would be to your friendship. You feel like you’re slowly being dragged back to square one, and you want to give him an explanation.

“He’s actually… I haven’t been able to see you because I’ve been working on something with him.” you offer, trying to answer a question he didn’t even ask. “Sorry about that. I swear I’ll be back on track tomorrow.”

“No, no — I completely understand.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Thank you… for telling me, though. I— uh, appreciate that.”

“I’d love to see you tomorrow, though.” You try injecting more pep into your voice. “I’ve really been behind on my algebra. I’ve definitely been drowning without you.”

“Oh, yeah.” A small smile graces his lips, but you can’t tell if the reluctance behind it is from fatigue or something that looks oddly like sadness. “I’m down for tomorrow. Same time, same table, right?”

“Yeah, for sure.”

“Cool. See you, _________.”

You watch him turn on his heel, walking to the front door, and something like fear mingled with desperation clutches your heart. Fuck the traditional route, you think. You don’t know what it is about how he’s acting now, but it’s making you feel like he’s slipping through your fingers. All that hard work — there’s no way you’re letting him go.

“Mark, wait.”

You’re at his side, fingers curled into the sleeve of his jacket before you can figure out exactly what you want to say. You feel as surprised as he looks at your sudden liveliness in action, and his gaze trails from your clenched fist to your face slowly, like he’s trying to memorize this whole position.

Your exhale’s shaky, but even still, you try not to sound overtly self-conscious when you ask, “Do you like Chinese food?”

Something in the furrowing of his brows tells you he can’t seem to see where this conversation is headed, and that slightly bothers him. “I like it well enough. Why?”

“There’s this really good dim sum buffet near my mom’s office. We tried it before — the Xiaolongbao is awesome.”

“Hey, that sounds pretty cool. I love Xiaolongbao. I’ll definitely have to check it out then.”

You want to tear your hair out. “How about — you know, checking it out with me? Tonight? You know… together. With me.” You already fucking said that.

You’ve never seen Mark blink this rapidly; he looks like he’s trying to crunch large numbers in his head. A small part of you actually worries that he’s malfunctioning, but just when you think he’s going to glitch out completely, he clears his throat. It bothers you how uncomfortable he looks. “Tonight? Oh man… it’s my cousin’s birthday tonight. I can’t… reschedule. Well, obviously. Maybe some other… time?”

Your ‘oh, yeah’ is small, and so is the ghost of Mark’s smile. You can’t help but feel like he’s pitying you a little, although he doesn’t seem like the type, but the thought of it alone makes you want to puke. He makes no motion to move, and you think he’s extending this awkward moment out on purpose until you realize you’re still hanging onto him and he has no way of telling you to let go nicely.

Fingers unfurling from his sleeve, you take a careful step back, but when he walks away, it feels like you’ve gone much, much further away.

The worst part is that you can’t even figure out why.

Luckily, the next few times you see Mark, you manage to rebuild a rather shaky bridge back to where you had been. You even manage to strong-arm him into sharing an apple fritter one afternoon, and you know it’s a bit sad to think about it a particular, untrue way, but you can’t help but pattern what you’re doing into some kind of pseudo-date. Pathetic isn’t a word you normally associate yourself with, but you’ve been borderline desperate for progress where there seems to be none, so you take small victories where you can get them.

Unfortunately, you haven’t been able to revisit your stupid dim sum plan; sometimes, he says he has somewhere important to be, but most of the time, it’s actually your fault. No — it’s Youngho’s fault, because he keeps bothering you to finish the project. You’re aware that he can’t do it himself, but since he’s informed of your current plight, he could at least stand to be more sympathetic.

And you hate the way Mark looks every time you splutter out that you have to take a rain check for that reason; it’s not even disappointment, or something, which would be much more understandable. It’s this mysterious kind of faraway look, where his eyes glaze over a bit and he seems suddenly very lost in thought — or completely dissociated. He never strays away from his normal response of “next time, then,” but that ‘next time’ fades into the weekend and into the start of next week, and you have to spend every other evening with an annoying Seo fucking Youngho on a Google Meets call instead of eating soup dumplings loveshot style with Mark Lee.

Thursday night rolls around, and the former performs the most irritating stunt yet: blowing up your phone with so many KakaoTalk messages that it almost buzzes off the table during your session with Mark. Luckily, he seems to have learned a thing or two from his comic books, catching it before it hits the floor.

“You sure you don’t want to answer it?” He asks, gingerly handing the phone to you like he’s afraid it’s going to explode from all the pinging.

“Without the shadow of a doubt,” you sigh, flipping the screen downwards. Buzz.

“It kind of seems important. Or, like… urgent.”

“He’ll live. Unfortunately.”

Mark falls silent, fiddling with the page he’s on. He’s neatly highlighted the formulas on the page with blue ink, and his finger keeps scratching at the slightly wet paper. Buzz.

“Didn’t you say you two were partners?”

“Yes. Also unfortunately.” Youngho is actually a great person, but you kind of hate how Mark’s paying more attention to his texts than to you right now. “What did you get for number ten?” Buzz.

“A hundred and twe— are you really just going to let it keep ringing like that? What if he’s… I don’t know. In trouble? Like, he needs you?”

You smack your phone on its back, hoping that the punishment reaches Youngho because he absolutely is in trouble — only with you. “He’s just making a racket because it’s his birthday and he probably wants a bunch of people to trash his parents’ house, or something.”

“Sounds like fun.” The dubious tone in Mark’s voice indicates that his idea of fun definitely isn’t that. Buzz.

“Not really, but I assume he’ll only pipe down if he manages to get his way.”

“He must really want you there.”

There it is again — that weird, distant expression that makes you feel like he’s trying to free himself from the tethers of the earth. You close your textbook in defeat; it wasn’t even like you got the answer to number ten correct anyway. Buzz.

“He just wants everyone there, I bet. But I probably should show up so he shuts up.”

“Oh — yeah, okay. We’ll call it a day, then?” He’s avoiding your eye as he starts packing his things, which is actually impressive because you have practically nothing but your book to keep in comparison to his pencils and protractor, so you just stare, willing him to look at you.

You want to know what’s going on in his head. You want to know what’s going on in his heart — what he thinks of you, why he seems warm one second then almost like a stranger the next. You want to know if he knows you like him and if him not doing anything even if he knows is a sign that he doesn’t like you back. You want to know if he’d let you kiss him, if he’d kiss you first, if you can meet not because of sweet cream cold brews or algebra but because you just want to be together.

You just don’t know how to ask. For as much as you like him, for as much as you want him, you haven’t figured out the most basic part of this — if you mean anything more than a two hour talk to him at all.

“Mark.” This feels awfully like the dim sum conversation, only somehow ten times more disastrous. “Come with me.”

“Sorry?” The appalled look on his face makes you squirm in your seat.

“I don’t really want to go, but maybe if we go together… we can just hang out a bit and leave once it’s boring… I think it’d be fun,” you explain lamely, deciding at the last second to drop the with you that had originally come with your sentiment.

“I don’t think your… partner will like someone uninvited showing up.”

“I’m inviting you.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not how it works.”

“You’d be, like, my saving grace or something — my excuse to scram. We’ll say we came right from a study session; we only popped in halfway through for the sake of greeting him a happy birthday. Then we can just go. We can say — uh, we’ve got more work to do.” You’re practically begging him at this point, and you don’t even get why. You just don’t want him to leave looking the way he does — confused and a little detached. You want the Mark that had smiled at you while giving you your coffee — the one that had kindly pointed out an arithmetic mistake in the most gentle way possible. You want to open blind boxes with him, whine about your rotten luck, and part ways with his warmth still against your coat sleeve.

You don’t know what comes over you then, but you pluck up the courage and initiative to slip your hand in his. He stiffens a little, but you don’t care; your fingers squeeze his in urging.

Something in his expression breaks — cracks first, then falls away, before he’s nodding, still looking vaguely thoughtful.

“If you think it’ll help you, then… okay.”

The bus ride to Youngho’s neighborhood is uneventful because it’s quiet. You stand close to Mark at all times, but you barely touch, save for the times your knuckles accidentally brush his when you lurch forward slightly as the vehicle comes to a dangerously abrupt stop. He doesn’t ask anything about the party or the company that’ll populate it, which is just as well, because you don’t have a clue.

You know it’s the right house because the door’s wide open and there’s music coming from inside; you can’t make out much more than the deep bass pumping through the concrete, but you’re pretty sure it’s making your heart jump in your chest even more than it already is. There are quite a few people you vaguely recognize on the lawn, and even more that you absolutely don’t; a good number of them glance at you and Mark as you step through the threshold then look away, probably deciding you’re of no real consequence or harm to their moods.

Youngho’s easily spottable because of his massive height; he towers over the rest of his guests, and the red plastic cup in his hand calls even more attention because he’s lifted it over everyone else’s heads. You throw Mark an apologetic glance that he responds to with a short nod before you dive into the crowd alone, trying to weave your way to where you’d last seen Youngho.

“Bro, finally!” Youngho greets you, pretty much shouting over the music. “Where’s the gift? Did you leave it on the table?”

“Happy birthday, Youngho. Do you know how close you were to being blocked?”

“I see you brought mister espresso with you,” he ignores your comment completely, nodding to Mark. When you turn back to see him, you notice he’s squishing his arms closer to his sides, trying to minimize the space he takes up. “So what? Y’all get to hook up already?”

“No. I brought him here because we were in the middle of something and someone,” you stop, offering him a pointed look that’s also ignored. “Wouldn’t stop texting.”

“Cockblock,” the guy next to Youngho, who you now realize has been eavesdropping, singsongs. “Oh, sorry. You looked angry when you stomped through the crowd, so I wanted the juicy details. Name’s Jaehyun.”

You take the hand he offers you briefly, introducing yourself. When you say your name, realization dawns on his face, and he jabs his forefinger at you.

“Oh, dude. You’re that girl — the Starbucks Showstopper.”

“The what?”

“That’s what his friends call you.” He scratches his ear, seemingly racking his brain for more information. “I’m with Mark and a couple of his friends — Lee Donghyuck and Na Jaemin — in College Algebra.”

You completely gloss over the fact that you’ve finally found out the real government identity of the mysterious figure named ‘Hyuck.’ “They… talk about me?”

“From time to time. Not really. Once or twice. Donghyuck only calls you that because Mark apparently keeps blowing them off to hang out with you.”

“How do you know this?”

“I have ears. It’s not hard when they talk like no one’s around.”

You shush Youngho’s exclamation of and you’re saying I’m nosy?, your heart hammering hard in your ears, practically drowning out the music. “What… what else did they talk about?”

“Not sure. Something about not seeing you that often these days. Jaemin teasing Mark about getting dropped now that you don’t need his help anymore. Donghyuck piling on and saying you’ve got a boyfriend.”

“What?”

“Don’t shoot the messenger.” Jaehyun still inches away from you when your voice rises in pitch and decibel. Some people around you start, then move away as well, as if scared you’re going to incinerate them. “They were just teasing him that you probably ditched him after you started dating someone. Your partner in some project, or what.”

“Oh gross.” The realization hits you like a speeding truck. Youngho’s expression is affronted.

“First of all, you bitch. Second of all, as if I would date someone who didn’t even buy me a gift. Or want to come. Or yelled at me after coming. Wow — now that I think about it, you’re terrible, _________.”

“Oh, shit; that someone was you?” The only person that isn’t tense in this conversation is Jaehyun, who laughs point blank at Youngho’s sour face. “I think they were offering to put you into one of their Death Note notebooks. Sucks for you, hotshot.”

“What a smudge on my good name,” Youngho sighs mournfully. “On my special day, too.”

“I desperately need you two to be quiet for one second. I have to — where’s Mark?”

Even when you stand on your tiptoes, you’re not nearly as tall as the two of them; it’s Youngho, with his freakish height, who manages to spot Mark by the bowl of nachos, looking as though he’s trying to decide if they’re safe for consumption. You hardly excuse yourself; actually, all you say is a distracted “later” that dismisses Jaehyun’s cooing that something’s going down and you should clue him into all the mess later as a thank you. Your appreciation of his sudden and somewhat short-lived presence in your life is still up in the air.

Mark’s busy making a sour face at the sip of punch he’d just taken; he only straightens up when you’re right in front of him, putting his cup down next to the nachos. “Hey. Did you get to find… um…”

“That’s not important.” Your hand bunches the fabric of his jacket in a death grip, something he barely has time to register, let alone question, before you’re tugging him through the throng of people. You want somewhere quiet, somewhere private, and you initially consider the lawn, except you know it’s strewn with cups and has stragglers debating whether to go home or not. You can’t risk any of them being expert eavesdroppers like Jaehyun, so you make a beeline for the stairs instead.

“We’re not leaving yet?” He has to shout over the music, but there’s no resistance in his stride; he follows you up and waits patiently, although a little perplexed, as you check the doors on the second floor. Two are locked, one is a bathroom, and the other is a messy, musk aftershave-scented place you can only presume is Youngho’s room. Talking in front of a sink and a toilet doesn’t feel like it’ll be very productive, so you just drag Mark into the bedroom, kicking aside the crumpled shirt on the floor — which you could’ve sworn you’d seen Youngho wear for class yesterday. “_________, what’s going on?”

“Mark Lee,” you burst out, ignoring the fact that his eyes widen slightly at your tone. “What’s your fucking deal?”

You don’t think you’ve ever sworn in front of him before; that much is evident when he continues to gawk silently, unable to find words to respond to your question. Or maybe it’s just the volume and force with which you demand an answer. The problem is that you don’t even know what kind of reply you want. A small part of you nags that this is uncalled for, especially at this level, with you practically caging him into an unknown room. In fact, even now, you’re still embarrassed at your behavior, wondering if you’ve gone too far and stepped over a line between you.

But the source of all your frustrations is, in fact, that line — one so strangely drawn, clear at some points and almost invisible at others. Sometimes, he seems simply content with the barest minimum of friendship: talking to you, helping you, politely laughing at your (terrible) jokes. But there are also times he blushes too hard for it to not mean anything, times that he makes you feel like you could mean a little something more to him too.

Yet, from there, he wavers, stepping back so as not to get entangled in something you don’t understand — like when he grows distant every time you mention Youngho to him. You don’t understand why he would unless he echoed, even just a little, the longing in you. But you also don’t get why he stays and builds more walls around himself, like he’s determined to ignore all the other signs — like he doesn’t want to know if it’s really true and will just accept the assumption that it is. You hate not knowing where you stand with him, and while you could easily ask, you know you don’t want to.

And for a long time, you’ve convinced yourself that it’s because you want to see Mark step out of his comfort zone and initiate something, but the ugly truth is staring at you: it’s simply just that you can’t stand the idea of seeing him come to the conclusion that you can’t be anything more to him than someone he makes a sweet cream cold brew for every so often.

There’s a moment of tense silence between you two, where you’re just staring at each other — him, perplexed, and you, agitated — and the only sound that passes is the faint but unmistakable voice of Youngho going who has the cake cutting knife? from somewhere down below. You try not to get caught up in the fact that Mark still looks cute when he’s dumbfounded.

“Sorry?”

“What,” you repeat pointedly. “Is your deal? Why have you been acting so weirdly around me these days? I thought — I thought we were… getting closer. I thought… we…”

You’ve confirmed it now; you’re the epitome of cowardliness. You can’t even say I thought we liked each other — because you know that you do, but you still can’t honestly, assuredly tell if he does. Maybe you just read too deeply into the smallest things — smiles before he asks for your order, glances at you when he thinks you’re not looking, sharing the dream eater figurine — to fuel your own emotions without really checking the depth of his.

“I thought we were cool,” you reroute your words, and they come out flat and lame. “But just when I think you’re warming up to me, you suddenly pull away. Like… you’re afraid of me. Or you don’t like me. I don’t know.”

“It’s not — I don’t — I’m not afraid of you,” he stumbles over his words, and even in the darkness of this space, you see his face turn bright red, very quickly. His feet shuffle, not because he’s lost his balance but because he seems to want to get rid of a sudden restlessness. “I do like you. We are — we were getting — we’re close. We — we’re friends. You said that, and we are.”

“Is it only because I say we are that you agree?”

“What? No, I—” His hand passes over his face, slowing at the curve of his chin. “I really like being friends with you. I like being around you.”

“Then why do you act so weird these days? Like — you’ll be fine one moment, then you’ll back off, like you suddenly remembered you don’t want to be around me.”

“It’s not like that. I’m — I don’t get…” He takes a deep inhale, recalibrating himself for a moment before his voice comes out again, less strained this time. “I just don’t want you to feel uncomfortable around me.”

“How could I?” There’s something more than confusion coloring your voice; there’s hurt, too, and he looks as surprised as you feel at hearing it. “I wanted to be your friend. I was the one that asked you to hang out. I was the one who wanted you to talk to me, to help me, to go to a goddamn dim sum place with me. Why would I feel uncomfortable? Or are you just using this as some roundabout way to say you feel uncomfortable?”

Mark falls silent, and you don’t know why this speaks volumes all of a sudden. His eyes are trained to the tips of his sneakers, which are rising in soft bumps every few seconds; he’s curling his toes inside them. You feel like you’ve gotten the worst answer possible, and something grows cold in your chest.

“You feel uncomfortable around me.” You rehash, but it’s no longer a question. “You don’t know how to get rid of me.”

“No, it’s not that.”

“You think I’m only using you.”

“No.”

“Then what?” Your voice breaks, no longer out of anger, but a desperate sadness. The moment your eyes feel hot and prickly, you decide you want to end the conversation. It’s embarrassing, you think, for someone like Mark Lee — whom you like, who only ever sees you as a friend — to see you get choked up at a fucking birthday party at someone else’s house.

A beat later, you’re mumbling a half-hearted forget it, and you detest overdramatics, but you hate the idea of being in a room with someone who’ll never return your feelings even more right now; you push past him, already on the thought of calling a cab home instead of taking the bus so that no half-drunk businessmen coming from their company dinners see you crying.

But something warm wraps around your wrist, then closes over your hand, and you’re unable to move, Mark’s palm pressed against the back of yours. When you look back, you notice he’s still not looking at you, but his ears are practically on fire with how red they are, and you feel his fingers tighten slightly, tremble slightly against yours.

“It’s not that. I didn’t ever want you to think — I heard about you two. That you were dating someone. Seo Youngho.”

“What does that matter?” Your words come out a little more bitterly than you expect, and you have to remind yourself to reel it in. “That doesn’t explain your discomfort.”

“I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable,” he repeats, still evidently careful in choosing his words. “Because you wanted to be friends.”

“I don’t understand,” you state bluntly. In the back of your mind, you note that Mark’s grip keeps tightening and loosening, unsure of whether to keep holding on or let go. But there’s something else, too — the soft graze of skin against yours, his thumb gliding over your knuckles.

“That was all you said you wanted to be, right?” He waits for a response, but when you don’t give him one, he lets out a shaky breath and continues. “You kept saying — we were friends. You wanted us to be close like that. I just wanted to respect it, even if…”

“Respect what?”

“That you didn’t want… anything else.”

The music downstairs is a bit tamer now; you hear the door opening and closing every so often, signaling guests leaving here and there, but there are still enough footsteps downstairs for you to know that there’s a crowd Youngho hasn’t gotten rid of and therefore has to attend to. That much is good; you’d get slapped with a homicide charge if he came up here all of a sudden.

“You were jealous.”

Mark’s fingers pinch the bridge of his nose for a moment. “I tried to stop. I don’t have a lot of practice with — well, I didn’t know how to approach the situation. I thought I was still acting normally; I didn’t think… I didn’t want you to feel weird and stop hanging out with me just because… I couldn’t fix it.”

“Your friends are assholes,” you mumble, and he finally meets your eye, equal parts startled and amused. “We aren’t. Weren’t. We never were dating.”

“Even without that, I thought… it was a bit embarrassing. Liking someone like you — someone as pretty as you, as nice as you — I thought it would make you feel weird. Then you’d start avoiding me too. Or, worse, you’d keep doing it just because… you… felt bad for me.”

You don’t know what you find more ridiculous — that you hadn’t seen figured it out or that you could have avoided all of this if you’d just been a little more honest with him too. Mark’s hand starts loosening around yours, a little too much, and you turn your palm and grip his hand before he can escape. He stiffens again, just like earlier, but you now understand better why he does.

“I just wanted to keep hanging out with you as much as I could. I thought… It’d be fine, just spending time with you, and I’d be able to like you for a while, on my own, then…” He looks a little pained. “Then just let you go. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry you couldn’t let go?” You sigh softly, your palm guiding his until they connect, face to face, and you can finally lace your fingers into his. There’s no resistance, but his hand trembles slightly in yours still. “If there’s anything you should be apologizing for, it’s that you ever thought of doing it.”

Something clears in the air, lightens in his expression, and he chuckles, albeit a little shyly still. “It’s because I never thought someone like you would like someone like me.”

“I like you.” And it feels right to say it now, not at all out of the blue, never in fear of an answer he’s already given. “I like you when you smile at me every time you ask for my order. I like that you never get impatient when I’m getting my answers wrong. I like seeing you excited when you talk about a new series you’re looking forward to — something new you really want to collect. When you blush, when you laugh loudly, when you spin your pen in your hand — I like you in all those times.”

“Even when I’m jealous?”

“Especially when you are.” Your free hand comes up to cup his jaw, and you’re reminded of the fact that you’ve wanted to feel the strength of the angle under your palm for ages now. It’s not at all a disappointment, and your heart flutters irregularly in knowing you could’ve done this a long time ago, but it doesn’t matter because you’re doing it now, and fuck if Mark Lee doesn’t look good this close to you. “So be jealous — because now, you know you can be.”

Kissing him is better than you imagined, and you’ve imagined a little too much to be embarrassed at this point; there’s a heat to his lips that matches the one across his face, an upturn to them that makes you smile too. The setting’s not at all an expected one, but you’ll take it, not because it’s dark or because it’s private but because Mark’s in here with you, and you would have kissed him in a brightly lit football field full of people for as long as he’d let you.

You’d like to think he’s flushed for a reason other than shyness when you pull away, even if his laugh is quiet and breathy. In fact, when you murmur not enough, he’s the one that closes the gap this time, offering freely what you ask for with such little eloquence. The natural trepidation in his mouth relaxes, gives way to a curiosity that keeps you locked for so long that you forget you need to breathe, much more intent on finding out if Mark’s tongue tastes as good as you’ve imagined for so long.

It doesn’t; it tastes even better.

It’s still not enough, not by a long shot, but you have to resurface before you pass out like this, and even he looks a little dazed when you pull away — not in a bad way, with a grin on his face that you can only classify as endearingly goofy: slightly lopsided and a little shy, but with an unmistakable air of satisfaction.

“Months,” he mumbles, his lips still dangerously close to yours. Your eyebrows rise in questioning, and he laughs in that infectious way that makes you want to join in without even knowing what the punchline is. “I’ve been thinking of kissing you for months.”

And you do share the laughter this time, not out of amusement but of a happiness that spills without restraint. “But you’re suddenly holding back now?”

“Just letting myself bask in the moment, I guess. Letting it sink in so I remember everything.”

The two of you stand there quietly, still trying to fully parse the progression of events, and a small part of your mind registers that Mark’s thumb is still drawing circles on your skin. It’s also not enough — this touch, this closeness. You know now that he’s been thinking of you for months, and it reminds you that you spent that time dreaming of him too. And you remember you’ve always wanted to be even more familiar with him, and suddenly the desire is overwhelming; he’s right here, and you don’t ever want him out of your grasp again.

“Where are you going?” He’s only curious for the sake of it; there’s no alarm in the question because you keep your fingers tightly woven in his, tugging him along as you walk past him to the door. He’s still staring in wonder after the lock clicks shut. “What’s… happening now?”

“You waited months to kiss me, right?” He nods in response at your question. “I’ve been waiting just as long to have you too.”

His mouth falls open, but he doesn’t manage to say anything; his jaw tightens just as quickly when he feels your free hand trail down his chest, feather-light and asking for a green light. Your index finger stops just above his navel and draws back slowly, but not before you feel the shiver that runs down his torso.

“We don’t have to if you don’t want to,” you murmur, giving his hand a little squeeze. “But I just want you to know — I want to. I want you.”

A thoughtfulness settles on his face, and his eyes graze over yours, trying to read your seriousness. You don’t know how honest you look, but your words hold enough truth in them. A silence stretches over the next minute, but to you, it feels like an eternity, and you lose the test of patience somewhat, smiling softly at him.

“You don’t want to?”

“I—” His tongue peeks out, running over his bottom lip. “I do. It’s not that I don’t want to, but…”

“You seem worried.”

A hesitant nod. “I’ve never — well, no, I have, but not — with someone like you.”

“What’s someone like me?” You laugh airily.

“Someone pretty like you — I don’t know. Someone who seems to know exactly what they want. Someone who seems like… they could do better than me.”

“Mark.” You can’t keep the incredulity out of your voice. “I do know exactly what I want. I want you. The rest — I don’t care about. As long as it’s you, I want it.”

He cracks a smile, half of relief, half of disbelief. You don’t miss his hand coming up to press, warm, against your waist. “For real?”

Your fingers curl into the front of his shirt — an anchor to bring you closer, until the tips of your noses are brushing. “For real.”

The third time you kiss is slow, almost careful; there’s lingering worry in the line of his mouth that your lips try to ease until his slightly part under the movements of yours. You feel the tension leave his form in waves — first in his shoulders, then in his arms, until you’re able to press yourself closer and feel the slight give of his frame against your smaller one. He’s radiating an immense amount of body heat that’s pricking your skin and keeping you alert, and you’re hyperaware of the smallest things — the weak tremble in his mouth, the slight roughness of his teeth under your tongue, the ridges of his palate above it.

He tastes nothing like what he smells, you learn. Instead of the air of earthy coffee stuck to clean linen, you inhale a combination of spearmint and mild saltiness that’s made slightly sharper by the lingering splash of alcohol from his accidental sip of punch earlier. You decide then and there that this disparity is important to you; it makes you feel like you’re the only one who can have this experience — that everyone else can know his scent, but now, only you can know what Mark Lee tastes like.

You have to keep your wits about you to avoid this addictive stimulation of your senses; you let go of his hand only to lock your fingers around his neck, and there’s a show of trust in how he lets you lead him backwards, until his knees are hitting the edge of the unmade bed. The kiss breaks as he’s forced to settle on the mattress, and he looks up at you in what can only be described as a quiet kind of awe. He doesn’t complain when you place your hands, heavy, on his shoulders, using his sturdy form to keep you stable as you move to straddle his lap.

“I feel like,” his voice is hoarse as he speaks up. “We should have picked a different location. Someone… could walk in.”

“I locked the door,” you remind him, a light reassurance in your voice. He doesn’t say anything immediately, but it’s clear there are cogs turning in his head, and you think it’s unfair that he’s thinking way too hard about something else that isn’t you, right now, in this position. In a bid to rectify this, your face presses into the side of his neck, breathing in that familiar scent and leaving a light kiss on his skin right after. Your lips mark the moment he swallows hard at the contact. “Besides, would you really be that unhappy if someone did?”

His hands tighten against your waist, prompting you to leave another kiss against his collarbone. “What — what do you mean?”

“You wouldn’t like it if someone — say, Youngho — walked in to see me on your lap like this?”

The silence that follows your words is tense, and you can tell that Mark’s breathing has become shallower. Again, you can feel his throat constricting slightly, and you can’t help but laugh breathily as you nip at his skin, just under his Adam’s apple. He’s surprisingly easy to tease, you realize — quick to turn speechless and prone to hanging onto your words.

To say that you wouldn’t want to use that to your advantage would be a downright lie.

“Tell me,” you urge, your tone deceptively gentle. “You wouldn’t want him to see you kissing me like this? To see me wrapped around you, begging for more, saying your name over and over? You don’t want him to watch you take me — so he knows you’re the only one that can?”

A strangled groan punctuates your words, but it comes from him; his fingers dig hard into your side with barely constructed restraint. “What do you want from me, _________?”

“I want to know if kissing me was the only thing you wanted for months.”

You pull your head away, nudging his chin with the tip of your nose. Another groan escapes him, and his head tilts back slightly, almost like he’s praying. But when his gaze comes down to meet yours at your level again, you see a firm resolution in his eyes that stirs your heart — which takes off the moment he shakes his head, slowly but surely.

“Then,” you whisper. “What do you want from me?”

He doesn’t say so much as shows; he takes from you your breath, steals another kiss that’s now firmer and more openly demanding. Suddenly, his mouth can’t seem to stay still, trapping your lower lip in between his, drawing out your taste until it mixes with his against his teeth. You feel your head growing light again, and you’re pleasantly surprised that it’s suddenly become difficult to keep up with his lips, asking more from you without restraint. A hum of need sounds in the back of his throat, vaguely dissatisfied, and he’s telling you wordlessly that it isn’t enough right before he attaches his lips to the base of your neck, just above your collar. You think he’s just about to return the favor, but a laugh leaves you when you realize he’s taken it a step further, his teeth grazing your skin lightly, soft nips signaling how eager he is to sink his teeth in with only his slowly weakening self-control stopping him from doing it. Mark’s breathing is slightly labored when he pulls his lips away, warm breath fanning over your chest.

“It’s crazy — and stupid,” he croaks out, voice slightly raspy. “But I want it, and I don’t.”

“What do you mean?” Your fingers drag into his hair, combing it upward messily from his nape. He leans in for a quick kiss that’s somewhat misplaced, landing on the corner of your mouth instead of squarely atop it.

“I want them — him to see us. To see me with you, kissing you — fucking you, too. I want everyone to know we’re like this.”

You’ve never heard Mark say anything so forwardly before; a sweet, warm flush builds in your face, pleased at how comfortably he manages to say it — pleased that he’s saying it to you. “Then what’s the problem?”

“I don’t want him to see you.” There’s a bluntness to his words, but hiding behind them is an undertone of pleading — a serious request. “I don’t want him to see how pretty you look. I don’t want him to see you when you’re bare, or how you look when I’m inside you. I don’t want him to see—”

His voice wavers and dies, and you wonder if he’s embarrassed, but when you read his expression, you see an unyielding longing. A smile tugs at your lips, and your hand comes around to cup his chin, thumb extending upwards to drag his lower lip down.

“You don’t want him to see what’s only yours.”

He swallows hard again, but he doesn’t wait long to nod. Understanding passes between the both of you, silently but completely, and Mark presses his face to your throat, feeling the hum resonate as he places another long, firm kiss there.

“You’re mine,” he whispers, in a way that almost feels like he wants to convince himself of something impossible to believe. He doesn’t even wait for your affirmation, prefers to read it in the way you shiver lightly once his lips travel further down. His kisses trail past the collar of your shirt, and his hands are unabashed in how they seek skin, pushing the fabric upward so he can settle the palms of his hands, warm against your waist. Oddly, they don’t travel upwards; they only brush against the dip, down slightly over the upward rise of your hips, then upwards again, almost soothingly. It’s almost like he wants his mouth to meet them, but he stops halfway, sidetracked by the curve of your breasts.

He barely pulls away, only does for a moment, enough to meet your eyes.

“You’re only mine,” he repeats, his voice softer now. You realize he’s still waiting for some confirmation, and when you do, you’re quick to give it to him — quick to erase any doubt.

“I’m yours,” you affirm in the same tone, in the same careful volume. “Only yours, Mark.”

Whatever else he wanted to ask for, he knows you’ve given assent; that much is clear when he buries his face between your tits, inhaling your scent. You briefly wonder if he might feel just as intoxicated around you as you do around him, if your pleasant dizziness in being this close to him, in tasting and smelling him is something he experiences too, but you don’t get much time to dwell on it the moment you feel his lips part, a slight wetness seeping through the fabric. He’s kissing your chest, teeth grazing just above the cup of your bra, nipping without any real objective other than to feel the pad’s slight resistance to his mouth.

You almost miss what he says as he shifts his head, lips brushing over the curve of your breast — another breathless ‘mine’ that isn’t ever punctuated; his lips still stay parted, mouthing at the cloth, like he’s desperate to feel what’s underneath through it. There’s pressure where his tongue presses flush against the shape of your tit, tightness whenever he chooses to nip, attempting to take the flesh and all that’s between you and him between his teeth.

Not enough, you think, even when a whimper of need bubbles out of you; you want to be closer, your thighs pressing against the sides of his. You’re close in almost every way, but you still inch yourself further forward, enough to feel the taut hardness in his jeans. Your hips settle right there, letting fabric ride against fabric as you center yourself.

No sooner do you press yourself flush against him do you gasp; the light sting sends a jolt up your spine when his teeth close around your nipple through your bra, and when you look down at him, you see the corners of his mouth pulled up in evident satisfaction. He’s quick to atone, his tongue dragging your shirt slightly upwards in his attempt to soothe, and for some reason, the push of fabric and the barely-there feeling of motion leaves you tingling.

“Mark.” Your voice comes out in a whine, but in the haze you’re in, you don’t really have a clear idea of what you’re asking for. All you know is that you want more of him, and for as much as he’s already given you in kisses and words, you aren’t even halfway down the list of everything else you wish you could demand from him. You say the only thing that comes to mind — the only thing that really encompasses what you feel. “Mark, I want you. I want more of you.”

His hands on your waist are replaced by the significant tightness of his arms, locked around your torso; you don’t even have the time to take in your awe at the fact that he can easily carry you, turn you over until you’re on your back, until he’s already eased one knee between your legs.

The way he looks down at you is a mixture of hesitation and desire, but the former’s erased when you reach out for him, murmuring another ‘more’ so you can pull him in. With one palm pressed against the mattress, he lets his free hand graze against your side again, bolder in its movements, and his fingers trace a path up to your breast, squeezing the soft flesh through layers. Your back arches upwards in response, eager for more contact, for touch that’s almost there but not quite, and he smiles when you make a noise of frustration from his fingers tweaking the soft nub of your nipple.

“Mark, please—”

“Would you really let him see you like this?” His thumb’s still idly grazing over your breast, following the rise and fall of its curve. You swallow hard, trying to keep your voice level despite the growing want that threatens to break through it. “Would you really let him watch you… get fucked?”

You shake your head, and his brow furrows.

“I’d let him watch you fuck me,” you correct him, and the confusion in his face gives way to pure satisfaction the moment you make this nuance clear. “It has to be only you.”

His grip tightens briefly against your breast again, and he leans down, pressing a surprisingly chaste and brief kiss to your lips.

“Then I’ll unlock the door next time and give him a show.”

You don’t know if it’s what he says or what he does after — his hands bunching your shirt upward until the hem’s just below your neckline — that makes your breath hitch, but you decide it doesn’t matter when you realize you’d much rather be focusing on the journey his lips take, slick against your stomach as he presses languid kisses down to your navel. His fingers hook into the waistband of your jeans, the weight naturally pulling them down, and you see his muscles tighten for a moment as he stops himself from tugging them off completely.

Mark’s mouth is unparalleled in its attentiveness, seemingly intent on making sure he’s covered every inch of your stomach in warm kisses, but you only realize he’s somehow stalling when he starts the cycle again, his nails digging into the taut elastic of your jeans as though to remind himself to curb his desire.

You take the initiative instead, raising your hips slightly to signal your want, acutely aware of the fact that you brush lightly against his thigh when you do so. His eyes lift first, followed by the rest of his face, and he’s watching you quietly. You might have thought he was unsure of what to do all of a sudden again, but his knee pressing closer, an unmistakable pressure against you, is enough to tell you that he’s only curious to know what else you’ll do.

The second time you grind against his thigh, his hands catch your hips, keeping them aloft just long enough for him to tug the band of your jeans downward; he peels them off you with surprising ease, returning to the same position between your legs, hands still firm on your waist. With that done, he only has the thin garter of your panties left to curl his fingers into, bunching it into his fists when you roll your hips up one more time. You manage a shaky noise when you feel the stark difference — the roughness of the denim against you, the stick and drag of flimsy cloth. Mark lets out a low but unmistakable hiss.

“I can’t believe—” his idea is cut short by the movement of your hips again, and his grip tightens, knuckles pressing into your skin. “Can’t believe you’re here. I can’t believe we’re doing this.”

“What am I supposed to do,” you breathe out, the sound momentarily getting stuck in your throat. “So that you know it’s real?”

His fingers relax their hold, palms now pressed against your thighs; they travel between your hips and your knees, a soothing and thoughtful motion. “God — I don’t know. I just want — I just want you so badly. Like… I’m going to go crazy if I don’t have you now.”

You lean up, your weight resting on your elbow, and your other hand reaches out; Mark meets you halfway, bending just a little lower to press his cheek against your palm. There’s something intimate, something so giving about the way he turns his face to your fingers, pressing a fluttering kiss just under your thumb. The tips of your fingers trace the shape of his lips, even when they pucker again under your digits.

“Take me,” you murmur quietly. “Right now — from now on, every part of me is all for you.”

His exhale is shaky, but his fingers have a sureness to them; they slip under your thighs, cradling the backs of your knees, and lifting until they’re folded over your chest. You don’t even have the time to wonder if you should feel exposed all of a sudden; his breath warms the inside of your thigh as he presses his lips there — not a kiss, just a touch as he speaks.

“I want to taste you,” he mumbles, partly distracted with the act of inhaling the mild scent off of your skin. “Every inch of you — I want to know just how sweet you are.”

He lets his hold on your thighs relax, letting them fall apart; he busies his hands with your panties instead, hooking a finger into the strip of cloth just covering you. It’s clear you’re both aware that the fabric sticks light to your skin, poorly masking your wetness, and interest mingled with hunger flashes across his face as he pulls it aside.

“You’re so pretty,” he says, sounding like it’s a comment more for himself than anything else. His gaze flickers to you for a moment before it moves back to your pussy. “The prettiest fucking girl in the world.”

The pressure of his thumb between your folds causes you to forget what you wanted to say, and you know Mark had been nervous, but you realize that it doesn’t mean he’s supremely inexperienced by any means; there’s a quiet, understated confidence in the way he rubs slow, thorough circles, moving upward towards your clit. Your face, your neck, your whole torso feels flushed, but you power through the instinct to tilt your head back so that you can keep watching him — the minute changes in his expression, the slowly building strength in his touch.

“I want to taste you,” he repeats, looking up at you. “I want to know what you taste like when you cum against my mouth.”

You’re not sure if you’re gawking because you can hardly believe Mark Lee — your eternally blushing, mild mannered campus crush — had said all those words strung together into such a lewd sentence, but you’re sure as hell not going to deny him. Your hand travels down your torso, and he watches, curious at first, then awestruck when your index and forefinger settle against either side of your folds, pulling them apart in offering.

His eyes end up transfixed on your pussy again, observing how your fingers ease your folds further apart the more he massages his thumb against your slit. His mouth is slightly agape, intent on drinking in the sight, unaware that you’re trying to memorize this view of him too — Mark Lee, touching you, wanting you, eager to take you fully.

“I’ve always wanted to see what it’d look like with your face between my legs,” you say in a hushed tone, but he catches it anyway, briefly looking up at you again. “I’ve always wanted to know what your tongue would feel like against my pussy.”

Your index finger bumps against the tip of his thumb, and he stops its motions, allowing you to move his digit down until the pad of it hovers just in front of your tiny hole. You can see one cheek tucked between his teeth, bitten to muffle the groan you wish you’d heard louder.

“Won’t you show me?”

You think you hear him rasp out a ‘fuck yes’ before he bends down, pressing his half-open mouth against your pussy. The squeal of delight that leaves you is half-strangled as his thumb curls, hooking into your entrance. It starts a shallow, distracted motion, with his attention funneled much more clearly into keeping his tongue working. Flush against your slit, it drags up, and he releases a guttural noise at your taste, lips pursing slightly on the way back down — like he can’t stand not trapping every drop of wetness with his mouth.

The intensity of his tongue, the idle thrusting of his thumb — you’re not sure what you want to focus on more, and the result is you whimpering incoherently at the starkly contrasting combination of the two. Mark moves his mouth like he’s never tasted anything as good in his life; the sounds between your thighs are wet, sloppy — almost embarrassingly so — but you don’t have the presence of mind to dwell on that because Mark Lee is eating you out and that’s really all that you can think of.

The tip of his tongue suddenly flicks upwards; you keen, long and low, when it starts to circle your clit in that same intense, circular movement his thumb had gotten you used to. Your sensitivity skyrockets, and you’re completely unable to control the upward bucking of your hips, but Mark stays supremely unperturbed, his free arm winding under your thigh to keep the both of you steady. Your noises are growing embarrassingly loud, and you realize just how needy you’ve become when you vaguely notice that there’s a pattern in what you’re saying — his name, over and over again.

“Did you do that too?” He asks softly, his words slightly muffled against you. “Say my name, I mean — when you thought of me.”

“God, yes.” Your voice comes out strained, teetering on the edge of slurring. “So many times — every single fucking time.”

“Promise me something.” He lifts his head, and you see a fieriness in his gaze.

You nod — at this rate, whatever he’d ask you to do, you would without question. “Anything.”

His thumb presses in deeper, up to his knuckle and you reflexively tighten around his digit, but he keeps it anchored there, pushing down against your walls. He drinks in your gasp, the widening of your eyes, the way you chew on your lip with a singular kind of contentment on his face.

“Promise me — from now on, you’ll make sure I’m always there to hear it.”

The only kind of assent you’re able to make is a moan as he dives down again, mouth buried in your warmth, his nose pressed tight against your clit. His tongue moves in strong strokes, broad swipes that push your folds apart further, and his thumb, while not moving, increases in pressure to the point that you feel a heaviness adding to the growing pleasure. Your hands fly down, seeking some kind of sense and reason, and you thread your fingers into his hair, grip tightening as your climax builds in stride.

“Mark, I’m—” close, you want to say, embarrassingly so, but the moment he hears his name, his lips attach to your clit, and there’s suddenly so much more pressure as he sucks, almost like he’s desperate to draw out your orgasm. He chooses this of all time to start moving his thumb again, and this time, his movements are anything but slow and idle; they’re filled with the intent to drive you over the edge. “Fuck me, oh my god—”

“I want to,” he murmurs, pausing for just a moment to drag the tip of his tongue around the nub. “God, I want to. Let me see you cum first; let me taste how sweet you are.”

His thumb stops, buries deep into your pussy, and you’re not sure why this, of all things, is what pushes you beyond control; you’re only half-sure you say his name when your orgasm hits, the rest of your consciousness much too clouded by pleasure. He doesn’t stop, revels in the way you squirm under him as he hums low and keeps his tongue working against your clit. His licks become longer, more thorough as you come down from your high, your cries softening into whimpers as his tongue both attempts to clean you up and makes you messier in the process. His arm is still curled around your thigh, keeping you from inching away from him, even if instinct and stimulation are telling you to.

You’re barely lucid when you sit up, and Mark inches back, somewhat startled; you grab the front of his shirt, and the sight of his mouth, slick and glistening from your wetness, only makes you more curious to know what you taste like on him. You find out how tangy it is, how rich the two of you are together on his lips, and you’re able to fully appreciate the skill of the mouth that kisses you deeply, leaving traces of you against your tongue and teeth.

“Please — fuck me.” It’s the only thing you can say at this rate, only half-coherent and still trembling with desire, but Mark doesn’t seem to care that you’re stuttering over such a simple request. His thumb wipes traces of saliva off the corner of your mouth, kisses it clean for good measure, then straightens up, his hands working at his belt. You almost miss the fact that his hands are shaking slightly as he undoes the buckle and tugs it out from the loops.

You want to help — it’s the least you can do, after all, and your fingers push the button of his jeans out through the hole, his hands working in tandem to tug the zipper down. However, your movements falter when you hear a noise from just outside the room — the sound of the doorknob being jangled, the thud of a body gently hitting the door, as though worried it’s stuck. You glance up at Mark, ready to reassure him, but he either hadn’t heard or doesn’t care because he’s too busy stepping out from the pool of denim at his ankles, and you get completely sidetracked by the bulge straining against his boxers.

You almost ignore Youngho’s voice grumbling ‘Jesus Christ, now of all times? from behind the door, but you leverage it instead.

“Should we let him in?” You ask, tone innocent despite the evident deviousness in your words. It pays off, though; Mark’s cock twitches unmistakably under thin fabric, and he actually looks like he’s considering it. “You’re just about to fuck me, after all. Weren’t we going to — what did you say? Put on a show?”

He worries on his bottom lip, like he’s unsure if you’re serious, but in the end, he shakes his head, reaching out to smooth your hair away from your face and ushering you to lay back down. The lips that meet your forehead are gentle, almost apologetic.

“Not now,” he murmurs against your skin. “Right now, you’re all mine.”

You laugh lightly, nodding, and he chuckles too, but the sound of it slowly dies down when your finger hooks into the garter of his boxers. You can feel his breathing hitch as you tug it down, the elastic catching when it meets the shape of his cock, but you don’t make any move to free it just yet — for some reason, you want to see him do it.

“Show me.”

He complies without hesitation, one hand dragging the elastic down over his thighs, the other curling around the base of his length, and your face flushes as satisfaction works through your system at the bare sight of him.

Mark Lee is big — not monstrously so, but enough for you to make a pleased noise as your hand joins his, fingers barely wrapping around his girth. You give his shaft a gentle squeeze, and his exhale stutters, watching you stroke him, long and thorough in your movements. Your palm swipes over the tip, leaking precum, allowing it to slick up your hand enough to keep your movements smooth. You’re fixated on the tension in his lips, the throb of his cock against your palm, and the way his gaze never leaves your face, like a small, amazed part of him still can’t believe what you’re doing, even if you’re both half-naked already.

“I want to suck you off,” you plead, grip tightening slightly. He grits his teeth, stifling another groan, but he shakes his head clearly enough for you to slow your movements in mild surprise.

“Can’t — not now. I need to be in you so badly.” His breathing’s sharp and heavy, like he’s trying to keep himself in check. “You don’t even know — how long I’ve wanted to feel you.”

Your hold relaxes, and you let him maneuver you, his renewed hold on your hips dragging you closer to the edge of the bed. In this position, he can spread your thighs further, and you angle yourself optimally — enough for him to get a full view of your pussy, wet and still aching from your last orgasm.

“You don’t know how badly I’ve wanted to know how tight you are,” he continues, and there’s a faraway look in his eyes that makes you think he might be entrenched in fantasy. “How much I would have killed to see you — have you like this. I’m not gonna be able to wait anymore.”

His fingers dig into your sides, thumbs stroking your stomach in a weak pattern. The underside of his shaft presses against your folds, still half obscured by your panties, in a way that’s heavy enough to make you mewl, your hips reacting before your mind can, and he hisses softly as he feels his length glide along your slit before you relax your stance again.

“I can’t wait,” he reiterates, a breaking in his voice that sounds almost tortured. You don’t want him to either, want to see him buried to the hilt inside you, and you raise your hips again in need. “I want you so much it’s driving me crazy.”

“Then take me.”

And you’re not sure if it’s a demand or a plea, but he no longer stops himself; his hand fists his cock a few times, coating the slick of precum along his length before he lines the tip up with your entrance. His other hand’s flush against the inside of your thigh, a light pressure ensuring he always has enough space to fit himself between your legs — enough space to bottom out completely.

Mark’s considerate in his pace — maybe he knows he’s big, or maybe he’s just naturally careful, but he allows you the time to adjust to the stretch. Your nails almost puncture holes into the sheets, your grip so tight you wonder if it’s just to brace yourself or to hang onto the last threads of your sanity. He’s only halfway in, but you’re pushing fullness already, and he stops when his cock meets slight resistance, looking up at you in concern.

“You’re not—?”

“It doesn’t hurt,” you reassure him softly, and it’s true; the adjustment brings about slight discomfort, but it’s almost nothing to you — not compared to how much more you want. “Give me everything; I want all of you inside me.”

He pauses still, trying to read your expression for any lies, but when he can’t find any, he nods, his jaw tensing as he presses both palms against your thighs, keeping you open as much as possible to accommodate him. He doesn’t even stop when you whimper, feeling a tightening twitch in your pussy that also causes him to groan, until inch by inch, you’ve taken him, his hips flush against yours.

He doesn’t move — not yet, his eyes trained to where you’re connected like he’s once again unable to believe what he’s doing. You hear him mumble something to himself that you want to hear too; you squirm slightly, and he hisses through his teeth, looking up at you and finding the questioning in your face. He offers you a small smile, albeit somewhat strained.

“You’re tighter than I thought.”

“You’re bigger than I thought,” you hum, and neither of you is really to blame; the tight fit, the slight breathlessness it leaves you with, is perfect, you think — just what the both of you need. “Did you often think about fucking me?”

“Probably just as often as you’re making it sound like you thought about having me fuck you, I think.”

“Don’t get cocky,” you warn, but there’s no real heat in your voice.

“I won’t. But it makes me feel good — knowing you wanted me just as bad.”

“I still do.” Your gaze is lazy, a little hazy, even if you’re anticipating so much. Even just the feeling of Mark, throbbing inside you, is already slowly building the pleasure in your stomach again; you wonder if you could cum like this, given enough time, given enough patience. “I’m still waiting for you to fuck me. God, Mark— please.”

He chuckles good-naturedly, but even that’s drowned out by the long moan that leaves you once he draws his hips back; your body’s mildly shocked into a new adjustment, feeling a sudden emptiness that’s quickly mitigated by him filling you back up again. The pace is slow, almost torturous, although you know he isn’t doing it to get a rise out of you. He wants to ease you into speed, careful to help you adjust fully; his restraint in his movements is all the more evident on his face, in the furrowing of his brow and the determination in his gaze. Even with that, he can’t help what he says, so intent on controlling everything else he does that he lets his words spill out over your noises.

“Pretty,” he grunts out, and when your walls twitch around him, he accidentally thrusts sharper — just enough for you to whimper a little more loudly, and he has to reel his strength back again. “God, you’re beautiful. I should’ve told you sooner how much I wanted you. All those times I had to imagine you wrapped around me like this, wondering how much tighter you’d get once you came on my cock. All those times you drove me crazy while I was alone, when I could have been in you— I could have found out how good you felt. How pretty you’d look under me. And you’re still even prettier, even better than I ever dreamed.”

There’s an erratic melody of moans under his words, spilling from your mouth, and the fact that he riles himself up enough to increase his speed slightly doesn’t escape you. He’s a little less careful now, seemingly entranced by the view he gets, watching his shaft disappear into you only to come out glistening, and a part of you hates the idea of snapping out of his reverie, but the majority of your thoughts now lean towards wondering how much more you can get him to break free of his own self-imposed restrictions.

“I wanted to ask you so many times.” His eyes snap up, coming back into focus as he takes in the sight of you, flushed, hair tousled, gaze darkened. “Almost every day — I sat there, thinking about how all I could do was go home and fuck myself, frustrated you weren’t doing it for me. I should have taken you home with me right then and there — should have let you watch me touch myself thinking of you, should have let you touch me into cumming on your fingers.”

His breathing staggers as he leans in, eager to see you clearer, to hear your words, slowly becoming airier as they come out. For a moment, his gaze falls, torn between watching him move into you and meeting your eyes, but he ultimately chooses the latter once you speak up again, your tone even more hushed than before — like it’s meant to be a secret between just you and him.

“But there were times I wanted you even more than that, to the point that I almost felt like I couldn’t wait.” His eyes widen slightly, a few precious seconds of wondering if he understands what you mean, right before you confirm what he thinks. “I thought about making a move right then — I should have kissed you. I should have asked you.”

“Asked me what?” His voice is gruff with the effort to keep himself in check despite the fact that it’s clear to the both of you that it won’t last.

Your lazy smile’s illusionary; it hides the triumph swelling in your chest at knowing that he asked exactly what you hoped him to.

“I should have asked you to fuck me in front of everyone there.”

“God,” his eyes squeeze shut, his grip tightening. “Please. I can’t—”

“I should have bent over for you there, begged you to stretch me out right after our session,” you continue, bordering on merciless. “Mark, you don’t know — how badly I wanted to be on your lap, your cock in me, with everyone watching. How much I wanted you to fold me over that table, have people watch you pound me, have them listen to how good you make me feel. No one would ever even wonder; everyone would know I’m yours.”

You pause, allowing his eyes to fly open once again, and there’s a pleading in them that’s begging for release. Your eyes soften along with your voice, but you’re this far gone; you should at least see it through.

“And everyone would know you’re mine too.”

“Fuck,” he growls, and his hips stutter before new resolve fills him, his hips driving into you with the force of a strength you didn’t even know he had in him; your thighs tremble at the intensity, at the renewed impact, and feeling him drive his cock deeper into you has you crying out somewhere between a moan and a sob. “Fuck, _________. If I had known you’d thought about me like that — God.”

It’s your turn to shut your eyes for a while, allowing yourself to focus on his movements, breaching your tightness even faster now. You feel his hands skim up your sides again, fingers digging into the fabric of your bra and pulling them down until your bare tits are cupped in his hands. You shiver as his thumbs pass over your nipples, toying them into firm nubs.

“One day,” he hums out, his voice giving way to a slight hoarseness again. “I’ll do it. I’ll fuck you in front of him — in front of Youngho, in front of everyone. I’ll let them wonder how tight you are, how fucking warm you are, and I’ll let them leave knowing no one can know but me.”

It’ll never happen, you both know, but something about agreeing to something so absurd is what has your body almost shaking in longing, and it’s what causes him to press in deeper, folding your legs closer to your torso. Your hands do what little they can to help, keeping your thighs apart so as not to obstruct his view. You can tell it’s somehow not enough, not really all of what he wants when his brow furrows, and he shifts his weight, pushing into you at a new angle.

The stark difference has you gasping before you can control it. Immediately, Mark stops, and you’re already shaking your head before you even hear him say anything, presuming he’s paused out of concern. But before you can say you’re fine, his hushed voice cuts through the silence.

“Do that again.”

“What?”

“Do it again,” he mumbles, sounding distant. “Breathe in. Suck in your stomach.”

You’re not one to complain at such a simple request, albeit a little odd, so you comply, inhaling enough to tighten your torso. You’re surprised when you feel his cock twitch inside you, and you blow out the air alongside your question. “Mark, what are you—”

“I can see it,” he says in utter disbelief. “When you’re like this, I can — I can see my cock inside you. Just a bit.”

Your eyes follow his gaze, fixed just below your navel. From this angle, without any movement, you can’t see a thing, but you assume he’s not one to abandon fucking you so intently without good reason, so you press your palm against your stomach, just above your pelvis. Nothing really feels significantly out of place — up until the point when Mark draws his hips back again, and you feel the backward slide of his cock.

Your throat tightens, and you don’t really understand the feeling that spreads in you — a unique kind of arousal, knowing how deep he is inside you and how you’re taking all of him in despite the fit, because of the fit. Your hand falls away, allowing Mark’s to take its place, and he exerts just a little more pressure against your stomach in an attempt to get the most out of the experience when he thrusts back in. He groans, feeling the bulge push back up, and he quickly picks up the same pace, renewed in intensity so he can experience the rapid rise and fall he creates under his palm.

The faster he goes, the harder he presses, and you’re not sure if he knows it, but the onslaught of friction is what’s making you whine and squirm even more; you’re trapped, in the best way possible, in his hold, your hands back to clinging to the backs of your knees like a lifeline. Pressure from the outside builds on the slowly growing pressure inside, a knot in your pelvis that’s coiling so tightly you feel like you can’t breathe. If Mark notices how close you are, he doesn’t make it known; he’s busy feeling the outline of his cock against your stomach, and when he looks up at you again, his eyes are hazy.

“I would fuck you every single day, every single hour if I could feel this every time,” he whispers in a way that’s almost reverent. “Let me — I want to keep seeing you like this. I want to feel how deep I am inside you, too. Let me fuck you all the time.”

You nod, and your first attempt to say something is just another choked sob. When you do manage to get something out, it’s broken in tearful stutters. “M-Mark, I’m s— I’m so close… I’m — fuck—”

“Do it.” It’s not a harsh command but an urging made on short breath; through your misty vision, you see tension in Mark’s face and shoulders, like he’s bracing himself for something too. You barely register the ping in the back of your mind, too focused on the way he’s pressing his palm harder on your stomach, the way his hips quicken their pace — he’s close too. “Let me feel you — want to feel you cum all over my cock.”

You inhale, not to speak but to let out a loud whimper; your teeth dig into your lower lip as you try to stifle the moans that threaten to follow, but in the end, you whine out his name. Your thighs threaten to close, trembling as you finally reach your climax, an impossible explosion of pleasure, and you have to squeeze your eyes shut so that you don’t get dizzy from the stars that burst around your vision.

“Fuck.” Mark’s voice is strained, his one hand still firm against your stomach, the other sliding against the inside of your thigh. “You get even tighter — you feel even better when you cum.”

“Mark,” you hiccup, unable to do anything but flutter around him as he pistons harder into you. You don’t even know what you’re asking for when you say ‘please,’ but he somehow seems to, and you trust that your body’s saying something you can’t fully detect in this state, with your mind floating in the aftermath of ecstasy.

“I know,” his tone is soothing in contrast to the intensity of his thrusts. “I’ve got you. Just a little more — where do you want—?”

You blink slowly, his words sinking in at too leisurely a pace; his hips stutter dangerously before you’re able to respond. You barely even do that, your hand gently brushing over the one against your stomach, but he catches onto the meaning quickly enough.

You’ve never heard your name said in such a beautiful way; hearing him moaning it lowly is enough to make you whine again, and that noise is drawn out when he shifts and slips out of you fully. Your brain’s fuzzy, but your senses are at least sharp enough to drink in the perfect sight of him cumming — the way he leans his head back, jaw taut and eyes shut, as he pumps his cock and the heat of his release against your skin, pooling against your stomach once he finally cums. You see a shiver run through him, and then he’s still for a while in this position, the both of you basking in the afterglow of your highs.

You’re still weak and sensitive when Mark finally comes back down, a lucidity you don’t have right now coming back into his gaze. All you can do is smile when he leans in, catching your lips in another kiss — one that’s surprisingly soft and slow in comparison to everything else, but still leaves you breathless when he pulls away.

“Let me clean you up,” he murmurs, and you hum in agreement, your body limp as you watch him move off the bed and pull a handful of tissues from a box on the desk on the opposite wall. Even his hands are gentle when he scoops you up, shifting you until your head can lean against the pillows. They carry a scent you’re not used to, and your nose scrunches, rejecting the change, but that’s quickly overpowered by Mark’s familiar coffee-and-linen one when he presses next to you, careful as he wipes his cum off your stomach and thoroughly cleans between your thighs. From somewhere down below, you still hear hushed voices, and the front door slams shut again. People are still in the middle of leaving, but you know Youngho will likely run out of guests soon, and this makes you feel like the timing’s suddenly become urgent.

“I want to date you properly,” you start, slightly slurred but unmistakably blunt. Mark’s gaze snaps to yours, slightly amused, as he balls the tissues up in his fist. “You never asked me, so I’m asking you.”

He looks perplexed. “I just never thought you wanted me to, so I didn’t try.”

You reach up, locking your fingers into his hair and using your grip to pull him down. Your kiss is a little demanding, with a tinge of excess frustration, and he pulls away laughing lightly.

“Do you still think I don’t want you to?”

Mark hums thoughtfully. “I think you made a lot of things clear tonight. On my end, I was happy enough to be near you.” He smiles down at you, and in the faint light, you can see the flush slowly return to his cheeks. “Having you like this — dating you… there’s no way I’d say no.”

Your shoulders relax, satisfied with his answer, and you beam up at him — an act he easily returns, breathtaking and endearing all at once.

Moments later, you feel his arm wind around your waist; he allows you to lean into his side, his other hand crossing over his lap to stroke your thigh. His face turns, pressing a kiss to your hair, and you feel his lips move, hear the quick rush of a whisper. You tilt your head, eyes slightly wide in questioning. “What was that?”

He shakes his head at first, trying to pass it off as nothing. But when it’s clear your curiosity won’t abate, he chuckles softly, his hand gently cupping your chin so that you can only look at him. His thumb strokes your bottom lip gently, as if trying to coax the same words out of your mouth before he murmurs them to you one more time — and this time, he sounds fully convinced of them.

“You’re all mine.”

[makoodles]

ミ tìtunu

part one | part two | part three (nsfw) | part four (nsfw

🍓pairing: tsu'tey x human fem reader

🍓word count: 9k words (oops)

🍓warnings: alien courting rituals, misunderstandings, accidental sexy touching

yoooo i was not expecting people to like this ahhahahaha but thank you all so much for all your lovely excited comments! they've been so fun to read and honestly pushed me into writing this faster! pls forgive me if i forgot to tag you (i tried to include everyone that asked) 🍓 masterlist

reblogs are always enormously appreciated!

Tsu’tey is beginning to wonder if he had received some irreparable damage to his head in the fall from the sky that had nearly killed him all those months ago. It’s the only explanation for what’s gone so terribly wrong with him.

After his failed first attempt at courting, you don’t come back to the village for a few days. It’s probably a good thing, Tsu’tey tries to convince himself; he needs to decide what it is he truly wants, and how far he’s willing to go to get it. But even though he tries to use the time to himself productively, he finds himself on edge and impatient.

His foul mood is clear to the whole village to see, and so it’s only a matter of time before someone confronts him about it. 

It’s just his luck that the person who approaches him about it is Jakesully.

“So,” The new Olo’eyktan drawls as he sidles up to where Tsu’tey is watching a group of young warriors training with their longbows, “Word has it that you’ve chosen a mate.”

They may be brothers in arms and tentative friends, but that doesn’t mean that Tsu’tey is pleased to have him poking around his business. His ears flatten back in a wordless warning to back off, but Jakesully pays no heed to it.

The bastard is grinning, as though this is the most entertained he’s been in weeks. “Word has it that your chosen mate is human.”

“Do not speak on matters you do not understand.” Tsu’tey bares his teeth in a move that is bold at best, considering he is speaking to his clan chief.

But Jakesully just laughs, his stupid shoulders straightening. He has become so confident since becoming one of the people, and Tsu’tey envies him for it. He was sure of himself just like Jakesully once, but now it seems like all he does is doubt himself.

“Relax, brother.” Jakesully says casually, leaning on one leg as he follows Tsu’tey’s gaze out towards the young warriors. “You are too tense. How could she want someone so grumpy?”

Tsu’tey turns to him then, his tail coiled in a tense loop as he glares. “She is a demon.”

Jakesully just rolls his eyes. It's a gesture so human that it’s almost jarring. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that he is alien, just like you.

“Everyone sees the way you look at her.” Jakesully says, raising a brow at him. “It’s a different kind of scowl than you give everyone else.”

Tsu’tey doesn’t think that he scowls that much. He tries to force the frown off his face as he turns to look at Jakesully head on.

“It does not matter what you think you see,” He bites out, frustrated and on-edge with embarrassment. “She is tawtute. Sky demon. She does not see, cannot connect with the People or with Eywa.”

Jakesully is nodding, but he still has that infuriating smirk curling around his mouth that suggests he understands Tsu’tey’s feelings better than Tsu’tey himself does.

“That hasn’t stopped you so far, has it?” He points out with a faux-innocent tone that is utterly unconvincing. “I mean, you certainly seem happier to show her around and explain things to her than you ever were with me.”

“That is because she listens, Jakesully.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Jakesully waves this away as if it’s inconsequential, before his expression shifts. 

The next look he levels at Tsu’tey is uncomfortably sober. 

“Look. I know that you’ve been having a hard time since...” He trails off, and his eyes dart down towards the harsh, ugly scars that cover Tsu’tey’s torso from where the brutal human weapons called bullets had nearly torn him apart. “Look, who cares what anyone else thinks? The People are still wary of the humans left over, but they’re looking to you as an example on how they should act. You could set a precedent here.”

Tsu’tey clenches his jaw as he stares out at the warriors. Instead of answering, he shouts out to one of the younglings near the edge of their makeshift firing range. “Netu’li, keep your elbows up.”

Netu’li fixes his posture, and the next arrow he looses hits home in a perfect bullseye. Tsu’tey nods in satisfaction.

Jakesully is still staring at the side of his face, and Tsu’tey realises that there is no way for him to escape this conversation. He takes a breath, and tries to ignore the resentful embarrassment coiling in his belly.

“She did not accept my advances.” He mutters, his ears flattened against his skull.

Irritatingly, Jakesully doesn’t seem bothered by this in the slightest. 

“Oh yeah?” He drawls. “Hm. Well, I never thought you’d give up so easily. I’m surprised.”

Tsu’tey flicks a quick glance his way. What a ridiculous, painfully transparent attempt at goading him into admitting the interest he’s been trying to deny. The worst part is that it might actually be working.

“I did not say I was giving up.” Tsu’tey says sharply, well aware that he’s playing right into Jakesully’s hands right now. “I am just… I am thinking.”

Jakesully raises his stupid eyebrows, but Tsu’tey is studiously avoiding looking at him now. This whole situation was mortifying enough when it was all going unsaid; now that it’s being discussed, Tsu’tey feels like climbing inside of a yomioang plant and never coming out. 

“Well,” Jakesully sounds smug, which should be a warning in itself, “You’d better do some thinking quickly, because I believe that’s her coming now.”

Tsu’tey straightens quickly, and tosses a look over his shoulder. Sure enough, your familiar figure is standing awkwardly by the treeline. It seems as though you’re reluctant to step further into the village; you’re fidgeting with your fingers, eyes darting around until they finally find him.

Something in his lower belly leaps, and he finds himself taking a sharp inhale through his nose at the sight of you. It’s been days since he’s last seen you, and he had been beginning to wonder if you would ever seek him out again. The sight of you here is a ridiculous sort of relief, one that he doesn’t even want to fully think about. Even better is the fact that you look alright, you look healthy. It doesn’t seem as though he’s done lasting damage to you with the meat.

You smile at him, and even from across the village he feels his heart thump against his ribcage. Perhaps you don’t hate him after all.

Aware of your eyes on him, Tsu’tey hefts his longbow from his back and shoots an arrow. It flies straight through the target, and hits it with a heavy, satisfying thump.

Jakesully just laughs. “Wow. Impressive.”

“Be silent.” Tsu’tey grumbles, his tail coiled tightly around his leg. He is anxious in a way that is entirely unbefitting of a warrior, and he resents you for being the cause of it. “I do not wish to speak to her.”

“Oh, come on!” Jakesully tilts his head back, shaking his head as though Tsu’tey is nothing but a child. “I thought we just talked through this!”

Tsu’tey ignores him. He can feel your gaze on his back like a weight, and though he stands straight and tall he cannot bring himself to turn around and meet your eyes. It’s all too much – even from across the camp your presence needles at him, and he hasn’t even decided on what he’s going to do just yet.

Jakesully’s eyes on the side of Tsu’tey’s face don’t help very much either. “Where’s all your confidence from the other night gone, when you practically declared what you wanted in front of the whole clan?”

Tsu’tey’s tail lashes restlessly. That had been a moment of pure madness. “It was rash of me.”

Jakesully just makes a face. “Whatever. Look, if the People could accept a skxawng like me as Olo’eyktan, why wouldn’t they accept your interest in a human mate? They respect you; they’ll respect your choices.”

It’s a reasonable point, but Tsu’tey remains stubbornly silent. It rankles, the way that Jakesully is trying to insert himself into his business. Tsu’tey’s thoughts and feelings about you are confused and conflicted, but they’re private. The way Jakesully speaks about you as though he knows you makes Tsu’tey’s skin prickle.

“I must think on it.” Tsu’tey says at last. It’s a weak response, but he just wants to buy himself some time.

Perhaps Jakesully is right. Tsu’tey has always been strong-willed and stubborn, and has always known exactly what he wanted. Now though, he's floundering. Now he doesn’t know what he wants, and he’s casting about desperately in the hopes that someone will advise him on what to do. After having his life and expectations so soundly upended, he just wants to make his clan proud. He wants their approval, but Jakesully is right – when has he ever given up on anything just because it posed a challenge?

“Fine.” Jakesully says, jarring Tsu’tey from his thoughts. He had nearly forgotten the Olo’eyktan was still there, and it’s unnerving to realise that he’s being watched with a smug sort of smirk. “I’ll keep her company for today, then. Considering you need your space.”

Tsu’tey’s jaw clenches hard but he does not protest. He can’t, not after making such a big deal out of not wishing to speak to you today. His pride is hurt, and all he can do is double-down on his position. Besides, Jakesully is mated to Neytiri, and Tsu’tey knows that he would rather die than stray from her.

That doesn’t stop him from turning his head as Jakesully leaves his side, watching with sharp eyes as the Olo’eyktan approaches you. Even from this distance, he can see the little smile on your face through your mask as you tilt your head up towards him. The sight of it causes something to curdle in his low belly. 

That should be him on the receiving end of your sweet little smile. It’s a selfish thought, but one that he can’t quite shake off. The sense of possessiveness surprises even him, and he watches with narrowed eyes as Jakesully leans down to say something to you.

When Jakesully’s stupid five-fingered hand touches upon your shoulder to lead you away to somewhere else within the camp, Tsu’tey feels his tail whip around his ankles in aggravation. 

I will try again, He thinks wildly as he turns back around to stare unseeingly at the practicing warriors in front of him. And this time I will not fail to impress.

Now that Tsu’tey has reached the decision to court you (officially), there is much to be prepared. He has never been one to take half-measures, and initiating a courtship is certainly no exception. You may not be Na’vi, but he will court you with all the respect and courtesy as he would if you were one of the People. 

Part of him wonders if his decision is written across his face somehow, because the People of the village seem to know. When he begins searching for materials to make an official courting gift for you, he begins getting help from unexpected places. 

Some of the children have started leaving pieces of twine and plant fibre in his treehut, and he is pleased to find that it is of good enough quality to begin weaving immediately. The old woman, A’nayla, who is the best at carving beads in the whole village, slaps his hands away impatiently when he attempts to pick out a number of beads for your gift. She directs him instead to some of her shiniest and most vibrant beads, and refuses to make any trades. A gift, she had insisted, her old face crinkling in a knowing smile as she had waved him away.

He feels supported, even more so when Neytiri visits him in his treehut one evening after dinner. It has been a few days since you visited the encampment, but Tsu’tey is determined to have everything in good order before he approaches you in earnest. 

When Neytiri enters the small hut he had built in the trees when they first settled in this encampment, she takes a moment to peer around with a neutral expression.

Tsu’tey has been sitting on the woven mat in the middle of the room, but he looks up and waits for his old friend to speak.

“My Jake has told me about your intentions with the tawtute.” She says after a long moment, stepping forward and sinking down to sit in front of him with her legs crossed. “Many people speak of it in the village.”

Tsu’tey’s ear twitches at that, embarrassed, but he just focuses back on his weaving. There’s no point denying it; he does not plan on hiding it for much longer, anyway.

“Yes.” He says simply. “My first attempt was… not successful.”

Neytiri hums. He thinks he can hear an undercurrent of amusement. “Yes. I saw.”

His ears flatten in earnest at that. He had hoped that no one had witnessed that particular humiliation, but that’s no matter. People will soon forget, and he will soon have you distracted with his second (and surely more successful) attempt. 

Her eyes fall on the half-finished woven piece in his hands, and she eyes it carefully. “That is too big. She is small, remember.”

“Of course I remember.” He snaps, before raising the half-finished jewelry to his face and squinting at it. “You think it will not fit?”

“Give me.” Neytiri demands, and stretches out her hand. 

Tsu’tey passes it without complaint. They have known each other since birth, certainly long enough to forgo any passing formalities and niceties. He trusts Neytiri with his life, his best-friend and once-potential-mate, and he finds himself waiting with his tail curled protectively beside him as he awaits her judgment; not only on his half-finished gift, but also on his choice of a mate.

“This decision I have made,” He says suddenly. “To court the sky demon. It is madness, isn’t it?”

“Yes.” Neytiri speaks with hardly a hesitation, though she doesn’t raise her eyes from his weaving. She starts picking out a loop where he had made a mistake, and begins reweaving it with deft fingers. “But I will not be the one to judge you for that.”

“And Mo’at?”

“She thinks you are a skxawng.” Neytiri says easily, “But she loves you like a son.” The next look she darts at him is quick and sharp out of the corner of her eye. “Out of everyone in the village, your heart was the most firmly closed against the Sky People. Does that not make it all the more meaningful, that you have chosen a sky person as your mate?”

Tsu’tey is silent. He used to think that he knew exactly how his life was going to work out; he would be Olo’eyktan, he would mate with his first love Sylwanin, they would be happy and prosperous and strong together. But that future evaporated like mist before his eyes; not all at once, but gradually, until he could barely see the vapours. His reality is very different now; he clings almost desperately to the idea of you. There have been many people that Tsu’tey has not been strong enough to protect, but you are so small and soft – you need protecting more than anyone he’s ever known, and he’s determined not to let you down.

“She will accept,” Tsu’tey murmurs, before casting an uncertain glance in Neytiri’s direction. “Do you think so?”

“I see her look at you.” Neytiri murmurs back, her mouth curving. “She will accept.”

That brings a rush of relief so sudden and unexpected that Tsu’tey feels it like a physical blow. He keeps his head bowed in the hopes that it will not be so obvious, and hums absently as though he’s only half listening. It’s not enough to convince Neytiri, but he hopes that it works to recoup at least some of his pride.

“You have redecorated.” Neytiri comments, though her eyes stay focused on fixing the small section of the necklace that Tsu’tey had messed up. “Your kelku is inviting.”

That pleases Tsu’tey, and he sits up straighter. Decorating has never been a strong suit of his, and it presented more of a challenge than he had initially anticipated to decorate in such a way that it would appeal to a human. He knows you are very interested in the plants of his planet, considering the amount of time you spend studying them, so he has effectively cushioned the rough wooden walls and floors with softer wide leaves. From the ceiling hangs intense blue eanean flowers and hippophae leaves, lending a soft phosphorescent glow to the small space.

“Humans are weak,” Tsu’tey grunts. “Soft bones, fragile skin. She needs soft surroundings, too.”

Neytiri hums her agreement, before finally lifting her head. In her hands, the knot in the half-finished necklace has been unpicked and resolved. She hands it back, and Tsu’tey takes it cautiously into his hands before peering carefully at her work. Her hands are far more practiced in the art of weaving than his; she has done a wonderful job.

“Thank you.” He says quietly. He is appreciative on several levels; for her weaving, for her company, for her support.

She seems to pick up on what he isn’t saying, as usual. “You should approach her again soon. My Jake says that she is sad – she thinks she has upset you, and that you are angry with her.”

Tsu’tey raises his head sharply at that. He’s not sure if he’s more displeased at the idea that you are upset or the fact that you have apparently been confiding in Jakesully. It is difficult to push past the feeling that you should be confiding in him, that he should be the person offering you comfort. But how could you approach him when he was part of the problem?

“I will find her tomorrow.” He decides. The thought of him losing his chance is sickening – he can’t afford to wait until everything is perfectly prepared. He will just have to do his best with what he’s got so far.

Neytiri grins at him, her lips peeling back of her teeth in a way that is both joyful and intimidating.

“Sìltsan tìtaron.” She says, and Tsu’tey finds himself grinning back without conscious thought.

It is a customary saying in their tribe, used for both chasing prey and courting mates. Good hunting.

When the next day dawns, Tsu’tey curses himself for feeling nervous.

The last time he felt this way was the night before his iknimaya, when he was a fledgling warrior. Even then, he was so confident, his ego inflated by the simple fact that he had never experienced a loss before. 

This time is different. He finds himself anxious in a way that he is utterly unused to experiencing, and it makes him bare his teeth in frustration as he bounds down from his treehut into the village properly. It is already a hive of activity, and the familiar buzz of conversation and laughter eases some of the tension out of his shoulders. 

He will take this slow, he’s already decided. Slow and careful. 

The thought of you refusing him is something that he can’t bring himself to consider; he needs to show you that he is strong, that he is thoughtful and caring, that he can provide for you and keep you safe and make you happy. He has to convince you that there is no one who can care for you better than he can. 

Finding you is easy enough; the human scientists that have remained on the planet follow a routine, and you are no different. Besides, as some of the children in the village tell him, you have been lingering close to the village for days now. Ostensibly you are studying the plantlife, but Tsu’tey knows that you have likely been waiting to catch a glimpse of him. The realisation has a hollow feeling of guilt gnawing at his stomach, but he tries to push it aside – he will apologise soon.

He finds you in the forest, only a little while outside of the village. You are not alone; as is standard procedure, you are accompanied by three other scientists and a dreamwalker. 

Norm is as awkward as ever in his Avatar state, discussing whatever he is reading from his demon technology with wide eager eyes. Tsu’tey is familiar with Norm now, mostly against his will – Jakesully is fond of the scientist, and he has been invited to take part in village life on several occasions. Tsu’tey will begrudgingly admit that the dreamwalker is respectful of Na’vi life and culture and he has come to accept his presence both on his planet and around his people, but seeing him around you is making him fidgety.

One of the scientists is armed (and the sight of the gun makes his skin itch from the memory of bullets tearing flesh) and Norm is at least Na’vi-sized, but that is the extent of the protection they have brought. Tsu’tey’s fingers twitch. It is not enough. You are so small and fragile, entirely unsuited for his world. Don’t you know that? Don’t you know how dangerous it is to be out here like this with so little to protect you?

You’re so preoccupied with the helicoradian you’re studying that you don’t seem to notice anything else around you. Your head is bowed, your eyes bright and shiny with interest as you inspect the orange pigment dusting the leaves. 

The dappled light that filters through the trees casts shadowy patterns across your face in a way that is nearly mesmerising, and he ends up staring at you for a longer moment than he had originally intended. You are strange-looking and alien to him, and yet his fingers itch with the desire to touch you.

Tsu’tey leaps from the branch he had been watching you from, and lands neatly on the balls of his feet. His movements are nearly soundless, and none of the humans raise their heads. They don’t seem to sense his appearance at all.

His brow furrows in dissatisfaction. Anything could creep up on you, and you would not see it coming until it was too late.

He reaches out one leg and steps purposely on a twig. The snap is resounding, and the man with the gun whirls around and hoists the weapon higher, aiming at Tsu’tey’s chest.

He just bares his teeth in warning.

“No!” You yelp, throwing your hands up as soon as you realise what’s happening. “Don’t shoot him!”

Despite the situation, he’s sure that he looks quite smug. It feels good to experience you standing up for him, even if he doesn’t really need it – he could knock this puny little gun-toting tawtute into the dirt with a single backhand if he wished, though he refrains. He’s trying to be on his best behaviour.

“Fuck!” The little man yells, clearly spooked. “What does he want?”

That makes you falter, and you look up at him with uncertainty. It seems like you’re waiting for an explanation as well. All of the scientists are silent are apprehensive, eyeing him cautiously as they wait to see what he’s going to do. Their eyes linger around the knife strapped to his waist and the longbow strung over his shoulders.

Norm is looking at him with raised eyebrows, his ears perked up. Judging by his expression, Tsu’tey assumes that Norm has guessed exactly what he’s doing here.

“I wish to speak with you,” He tells you in Na’vi – he knows that some of the other scientists will be able to interpret his words, but it brings an illusion of privacy all the same.

You blink, but hesitate. When you don’t agree immediately, Tsu’tey feels his ears pin back. Your uncertainty is surely a bad sign for him – has he misjudged how upset you were?

He turns to the other humans and narrows his eyes at them. “Leave.”

They burst into motion satisfyingly quickly. The moron with the gun looks as though he is about to start arguing, but Norm hooks the long fingers of his demon body into the back of his collar and tugs him away. For once, the scientist is not being a nuisance.

You’re still standing there, turning to stare in apparent bewilderment at your comrades, who are practically fleeing. “What-”

“Come.” Tsu’tey says. Now that it’s just the two of you, he loses some of the edge in his voice.

 When he turns away and begins to lead you into the forest, you follow after him without complaint. Out of the corner of his eye, Tsu’tey can see you twisting your hands nervously. Your clear anxiety has him frowning – he wants you to be comfortable with him, not on edge.

Once he’s determined that you’re both far enough away from the other humans that they could not hear you, he turns to you. You’re already looking at him, fingers twisting as you bite at your lip.

 Calm and steady, Tsu’tey thinks to himself. Just apologise for ignoring her.

Apologising does not come easy to him, but he rolls his shoulder and takes a breath before opening his mouth.

“I’m sorry!” You blurt before he can make even a sound.

That throws him, and he ends up staring at you with his mouth ajar for a long moment like an absolute moron. Why are you apologising? This isn’t how this was supposed to go.

“I didn’t mean to get sick,” You continue, a little desperately, “I really did appreciate your hunting, it was very impressive and the meat was very nice, I swear I didn’t mean to come across as ungrateful-”

Oh no, are those tears he sees shining in your eyes? 

Tsu’tey feels as though he’s been frozen in place. He knows that his face is stuck in a confused scowl, but he can’t soften his expression no matter how hard he tries. Panic starts to curdle in his stomach. He may be a seasoned warrior, fearless in the face of fearsome opponents, but he finds himself at a total loss in this situation.

You just keep going – his silence seems to be making you even more upset. “I never meant to offend you, and I’m so, so sorry if I have. I never meant to make you angry-”

Finally, Tsu’tey manages to find his voice. “I am not angry.”

Even he has to admit that he doesn’t sound particularly convincing, but he’s never been an eloquent person. How does he explain that he’s not angry at you, he’s frustrated with himself? Right now, with you staring up at him with your eyelashes all wet and clumped together as your lower lip trembles, he feels like kicking his own ass.

He needs to make his move now, he realises wildly. Be conciliatory, he thinks. Let her know you are interested.

His voice sticks in his throat, but he manages to push the words out. They come out slightly strangled, but semi-confident all the same.

“Would you like to come fishing?”

You hesitate, and Tsu’tey feels his heart seize in his chest – you’re not going to turn him down, are you?

“Would I-” You begin, face crumpling. “What?”

Despite all the similarities in your bodies and faces, Tsu’tey finds himself floundering when it comes to reading your expressions. Is that disappointment? Confusion? Anger? It’s so difficult to tell with your tiny blunt ears and lack of a tail.

“Fishing.” He repeats. His own tail lashes restlessly, the only part of his body that moves at all. “Come and watch me fish.”

It doesn’t come out quite as smoothly as he had planned in his head the night before, sounding a little more like an order than an invitation, but Tsu’tey thinks it’s a victory just to get the words out at all.

You look a little lost, but you nod all the same. Your tears are blinked away, your expression smoothing a little. Is Tsu’tey imagining it, or do you look hopeful?

“I- alright.” You swallow, and your hands reach up to tug at your hair in what appears to be a compulsive sort of movement. “Yes. Fishing. Right.”

Tsu’tey barely stifles his reaction. A success. He can’t stop his ears from pricking up, but otherwise he tries to appear neutral – he doesn’t want to scare you off. 

“Come then.”

Just like before, you follow him readily through the jungle. He is careful to keep his back to you – it is a display of trust, to show off his conviction that you will do him no harm. It is mostly symbolic in your case, considering that you are unlikely to cause him any real harm even if you wanted to, but he is determined to carry out these courting rituals correctly even if the rest of this courtship is unconventional. 

His ears are pricked the whole time for signs of danger or any other signs of life approaching, and to ensure that you are close behind as the two of you make your way towards the river winding towards the Omaticaya stronghold.

“You don’t have a fishing rod.” You say when you both finally reach the river.

Tsu’tey has no idea what you’re talking about, but it sounds as though you’re doubting his ability to fish. 

He frowns, turning to squint at you – is this a challenge? Do you require him to prove his prowess right away? Displays of physical prowess and skill are part of the courting process, but he had thought that he had already done that with the hunt you had witnessed. But then again, the meat from the prey of that particular hunt had made you sick – perhaps you had decided not to count that hunt as an official courting display. 

You stare back at him, looking perfectly innocent, if a little confused.

Fine. Tsu’tey straightens his back, and pulls his bow from his back. If it’s a display of prowess that you want, that’s what you’ll get.

In one smooth movement, he draws, nocks, and looses an arrow. It lands true, hitting home in the sleek, smooth body of a large fish that has just darted out from behind a stone lodged in the riverbank. 

You let out a startled sort of sound, but lean forward quickly as Tsu’tey strides into the water and reaches for his catch. He had been planning on drawing this fishing display out a little longer, but it seems that you’re a demanding little thing. He doesn’t mind that; if anything, it will make satisfying you all the more exciting.

He retrieves his catch and holds it up for you to see. The fish is a large one, and it glints in the sweet sunshine that streams through the canopy of trees above you. It is a catch to be proud of, but he is careful not to be too pleased with himself until you react.

You laugh at the sight of the smooth glinting silver surface of his catch, clapping your hands together.

“Oh!” You call out, and you sound delighted. “Amazing! You make it look so easy!”

The praise sends a pleasant warmth effusing through his chest, and he feels a slow, hesitant grin begin to spread across his face.

“I am good at providing.” He tells you earnestly, stepping forward. He snaps off the long shaft of the arrow before proffering the fish towards you for your inspection.

You glance down, still smiling, but you don’t look particularly closely at his catch. That dulls some of his satisfaction – he glances down at the fish himself, wondering if there was something about it you found lacking.

“I know.” You murmur, tilting your head as you gaze up at him with lidded eyes. “You’re strong.”

His ears twitch like a child’s, and he nods, pleased. Hearing those words coming from the person he has chosen as a prospective mate fills him with a type of excitement that he has never experienced before. As a tawtute, you cannot connect with Eywa or with the People; but in this moment, Tsu’tey feels as though you see him anyway. 

He swallows, and sets his catch aside in the pouch at his waist. He feels flustered in a way that is entirely unlike him, and he has to push his reactions down deep. He doesn’t want you to think of him as a silly little youngling – he wants you to see that he has taken this decision to court you seriously.

Time for the next step.

“We are close to an area where the Tsahìk gathers her herbs for medicine,” He says, clearing his throat as he turns to look at you with wide, earnest eyes. “I have offered to collect some for her. Would you like to help?”

Plants have always fascinated you – he knows that the original reason that you came to his planet was to study the wildlife and the flora. He waits, hoping that he’s right in thinking that this is something you will enjoy.

Your strange, sweet little face brightens. “Really?”

Tsu’tey nods, relieved by your reaction. “You would like this?”

“Yes!” You breathe. For the first time since he had approached you, you relax in earnest and Tsu’tey finds himself mirroring you. 

He reaches out and cups your elbow as he helps you step over a log, and he doesn’t miss the little shiver and quick glance that you send towards his hand where it’s wrapped around your arm. It seems like you’re just as taken with the size difference between you as he is, and his lips begin to curl in excitement at the realisation. 

This is good, He thinks, biting at the inside of his cheek. He is very slow to remove his hand, and you make no move to shake him off. Very good.

Tsu’tey does not want to speak too soon, but he feels as though his courting attempts are going very well indeed.

You had loved gathering the medicinal herbs with him, even more than he had hoped – you had badgered him with questions, curious about the names of the plants and their properties and their appearances, and you had bounded along at his side with a bright grin the whole time. It had pleased him greatly to experience your interest in the ways of the Omaticaya and the life of his planet; it was proof that you could be taught, that you were willing to learn.

And most thrillingly of all, you were receptive to his advances. Over the next couple of days, he continues with his cautious attempts at approaching you with little gestures.

When he gives you flowers and pretty leaves, you take them with brilliant, near-blinding smiles. Every time he shows off by flexing or practicing wrestling with the other warriors, you watch with interested eyes and tiny smiles. Whenever he tentatively touches you, small brushes to your shoulders or hands or waist, you never flinch away – on several occasions, you lean into him. 

He tries not to let it go to his head, but it’s difficult. Since he’s started to admit his urges and his attraction to you, he swears it’s gotten worse. It feels like all he thinks about is you. He’s distracted during training, during his duties, during meals. He thinks about your reactions to his offerings, to your smiles, your scent, your voice. It really does feel like an illness, but it’s one he’s beginning to come to terms with if it means having you close by.

It’s beginning to get more difficult to keep his hands to himself. Traditionally, at this point in a courtship it would be acceptable for a courting pair to exchange flirtatious touches and other little intimacies, but Tsu’tey is aware that this is not exactly a conventional courtship. 

He’s trying to be careful, to avoid spooking you or making you uncomfortable or uneasy, but it’s beginning to wear on him. Though he’s getting bolder with his little touches, it’s not enough to quench the skin-hunger growing in him.

But no matter. The courtship is going well, and moving at a good pace. The next step is one of the most important ones. 

His carefully woven courtship necklace has been completed. It is customary to present a potential mate with a statement piece of jewelry, and Tsu’tey has spent several late nights fussing over the finishing touches. He recognises on some level that he’s stalling; it’s not in his nature to be nervous, but he’s beginning to grow nearly obsessive about getting the necklace as perfect as possible. It has been crafted to fit you exactly, with fibres and beads selected by him personally based on what he thinks you would like and what he thinks would suit your features. 

The finished product is eye-catching, and Tsu’tey feels nearly delirious at the thought of it decorating your neck. 

He crushes any semblance of nerves as best as he can, just like he might have done before a big hunt.

Of course you will accept his mating advances. Why wouldn't you? He is a strong warrior, a protector, desired by a great number of women. He could likely pick any woman he wanted out of the available women in the clan, and they would be honoured. Why would you be any different? You may be difficult to read at times, but he has laid his intentions out loud and clear and you have not shied away. You would accept him. 

His mating necklace for you feels like it’s weighing him down as he steps through the village. It’s tucked safely into the pouch at his waist, though his hand keeps drifting to his hip to check that it’s still there. He’s not unaware of the looks he gets as he makes his way towards the edge of the encampment, but he ignores them. No doubt many of his people have guessed at what he’s up to, but he can’t give them his attention right now; he’s too focused on you, now that he spots you sitting next to one of the large pxiut trees.

Your head is bowed over your silly little notebook, lost entirely in your own world. Tsu’tey’s steps slow as he approaches you, taking the opportunity to drink in the sight of you while you’re unaware of his gaze.

His eyes track over the curves of your strange features, the slope of your alien nose, the arch of your neck. Your features may be exotic, but he’s finally beginning to admit to himself what he’s been trying to deny for a while now – you’re attractive to him.

He likes your weird little face, your odd five-fingered hands, your thick silly accent when you speak his language. He likes that you are so much smaller than him, he likes that you are soft. 

He appreciates that you are patient with him, too. He knows he can be gruff and surly, and most people find him off-putting or intimidating, especially when they don’t know him. But you – you’re so calm and sweet, and you never seem to care when he’s stoically silent beside you. Most of the time when he’s around you, most of his brain-power goes into trying to keep his hands to himself, and he doesn’t have much intellectual power left to attempt conversation. He’s content with simply listening to you about whatever it is you wish to talk about, occasionally chiming in to ask a question or just to hum gently to show you he’s listening.

As he watches, you shift where you’re sitting and reach up to scratch absently at your neck. Beneath your odd human garments, your skin is glowing lightly with a thin sheen of sweat. Tsu’tey finds his eyes tracking over your exposed skin like a moron, and he clenches his jaw as he pulls himself together.

You're a warrior, you're a warrior, you’re a warrior, he chants in his head. He would not be cowed or intimidated by a tiny human.

You raise your head as he approaches, and a smile unfolds across your face. Your expression is bright, full of pure innocent happiness just to see him. He wavers, and nearly turns right back around.

“Hey, big guy.” You call out, setting your notebook aside as you beam at him. 

You’re waiting for him to join you, he realises. He jolts forward, his previously confident stride turning a little jerky under your sharp eyes.

“Hello, little demon.” He murmurs, keeping his voice low and level.

You bite at your lip, still watching him with that little smile on your face. He watches you back just as closely, even as he sinks down to sit next with you. Your smile melts into a little look of surprise; usually, when he comes to you it’s so he can invite you somewhere else, either to show you something or to give you something. Joining you as you just sit is new for both of you.

For a moment, you’re both quiet. It seems like you’re waiting on him to speak, but he stays silent. He’s trying to compose himself, to appear cool and calm as he reaches his hand towards the woven bag slung around his waist.

Finally, he says, “I have something for you.”

It comes out impressively calm and level. While he’s not a man prone to nerves or to doubting himself, this is entirely new territory for him. When your expression brightens into a look of excitement, he feels a new little seed of confidence build in his chest. You’re anticipating his gift, you want it. 

When he slips his hand into his bag, you sit up onto your knees so that you can watch him. Over the last few weeks, you’ve gotten used to receiving little flowers, plants, beads, or little carved figures. You accept each one with your usual brilliant, sweet smile; the thought of how you may smile at him when he gives you the necklace makes Tsu’tey’s tail flick eagerly.

He pulls it carefully out and hands it to you. As you take it your fingers brush his, and he twitches slightly as he stares at how small your hands are next to his.

“Oh,” You breathe, lifting up the necklace to eye level so you can get a good look at it. “I… Really? For me?”

“Yes.” He says simply, his eyes sharp and alert as they drink in every minute flicker that crosses your face. What are you thinking? 

“It…” You begin, and then pause. Tsu’tey is just beginning to feel like crawling out of his skin when you slowly continue. “Tsu’tey, it’s beautiful.”

You so rarely say his name, choosing instead to call him variations of big guy, and he feels a near physical jolt run down his spine at the sound of it in your mouth. He wants to hear you say it again.

He just hums, still watching your face. You are examining the necklace intently, fingering the beads and the weavework, and he feels his pride inflate the longer you inspect his work. You are giving real, earnest thought to his offering rather than simply making your decision rashly. He respects this, and revels under the careful consideration you’re giving his proposal. 

“You like it?” He murmurs. His voice comes out rougher than he had intended, and you jerk your head up to look at him.

Like this, your faces are very close together. Tsu’tey had leaned closer unconsciously as you were examining the necklace, and he makes no attempt to back off. Likewise, you make no attempt to retreat either, blinking up at him from behind the odd clear surface of your bubble-like mask.

“Yes,” You whisper, a shy, cautious smile beginning to bloom across your face. “Did you make this yourself?”

Tsu’tey just huffs. What sort of fool wouldn’t make their mating offering themselves?

 “Of course.”

“Oh.” You bite at your lip. You seem to be trying to suppress your smile, though he can’t imagine why. He wants to see it, now more than ever.

You are certainly not racing to give him an answer. Your fingers trace over the beads, taking your time to admire the craftsmanship. Your obvious appreciation is certainly inflating his ego, but the longer you go without giving him a firm answer, the more agitated he gets. He hides it as best as he can, aiming to appear cool and unflappable. He is a warrior – he doesn’t want you to think of him as someone who is easily ruffled.

When you finally turn to look up at him, your eyes are shining. He can’t help but sit up a little straighter, watching you very carefully as he awaits your decision.

You proffer the necklace back to him, and Tsu’tey feels his stomach positively plummet. He truly hadn’t considered what he would do if you refused him.

“Will you help me put it on?” You ask, a little shyly.

The relief nearly bowls him over. Tsu’tey swears his stomach jolts so violently that he nearly makes a truly undignified sound. You are not refusing him – you wish for assistance. 

“Yes.” He says lowly and seriously, taking the necklace back. 

You beam again, then turn your back to him and bow your head to give him access to your neck. Tsu’tey’s heart thumps dully in his chest at the display of trust and vulnerability, though he keeps his face carefully still.

As he reaches out and slips the necklace around your neck, he gives in to his weakness and allows his fingers to drift over your shoulder. Your skin is so soft, your frame lacking the lean hard musculature that is so common among his own people, and he allows himself a moment to admire the feeling of you beneath his hands before finally beginning to tie the two ends of the necklace together.

He can feel you breathing carefully beneath his hands, the steady rise and fall of your chest matching the thumping rhythm of his own heart. The blood is rushing through his ears as his knuckles brush over one of the knobs of your spine at the base of your neck and you shiver in response.  

Success, his instincts are screaming at him. Success.

When he finally pulls his hands back, you turn to look at him through your eyelashes behind your breathing mask. The corner of his mouth twitches as he eyes the way the necklace sits above your collarbones; a perfect fit.

It probably goes without saying that you have accepted his advances, but the customs of the Sky People are odd and he wants to make certain.

“You accept, then?” He asks, reaching out and settling his fingers over the woven fibres of the necklace. You’re small under his hand – his fingers reach one of your shoulders and his palm reaches the other, dwarfing you. 

Your head tilts, a little frown creasing your brow, before you smile and nod. “Of course I accept it. It’s very lovely. I’m honoured. I didn’t know that you made your own jewelry.”

The last piece of mating jewelry he had crafted had been a bracelet for Sylwanin. It’s not something that he wants to think about right now, so he shrugs roughly.

“I do not, usually. This is different.”

“Oh.” You say, a little breathlessly.

Tsu’tey’s tail twitches recklessly. It’s time for the next step.

“I would take you to my hut.” He begins cautiously, watching your face. “It is finished now. I have made it comfortable.”

You blink, and take a careful breath. He wonders what you’re thinking. 

“I would like that.” You say quietly, your eyes drifting towards his tail, which is twitching as he awaits your answer.

Triumph soars in his chest, and a slow smile begins to spread over his face. This feels better than any hunt, any accolade, any success he has previously enjoyed. This one is his and his alone – you see him, you want to be his just as he wants to be yours.

You appear to get flustered, and look down at his twitching tail in an apparent effort to distract yourself. You watch the movement, your own lips beginning to curve, before you reach out to touch it.

Tsu’tey goes entirely still, his eyes flaring wider in surprise. He doesn’t pull away, watching intently as your fingers trail over the thin, sensitive skin of his tail. It is bold of you, so bold it nearly steals his breath away. 

“You’re like a cat.” You say, and laugh.

Tsu’tey has no idea what that means, and just continues to stare at you. You’re still holding his tail in your warm, soft hand. The fact that he isn’t pulling away seems to embolden you even more, before you start to bite your lip as you look up at him. 

Tsu’tey takes a soft, quiet breath – do you even know what you’re doing to him right now? Desire is beginning to pool, dark and hot, in his belly as your fingers stroke absently over the thin skin of his tail, your liquid eyes gazing up at him with that shy, enigmatic little smile playing over your face.

Slow and steady, he tells himself firmly, fighting to stay composed. He doesn’t want to scare you away by moving too quickly, but your soft warm hands and sweet little smiles are making it terribly difficult. He wants to touch you back, but he doesn’t want to startle you.

“Sorry,” You murmur, apparently growing self-conscious. You begin to pull back. “I didn’t mean to-”

“You may touch me.” He interrupts before you pull too far back. He has been intimate with women before, but this moment with you feels infinitely more intimate and illicit than anything he has experienced before. 

You watch him in return, eyes bright. Is he imagining the excitement on your face, mirroring his own feelings?

Slowly, you trace up his tail. His skin shivers under your touch, but he doesn’t pull away. In fact, he leans in a little closer as your fingers move from his tail to his chest, tracing over the lighter stripes on his skin. It feels as though your touch is leaving trails of heat in its wake, and he fights to keep his breathing steady and even as your eyes follow the path of your fingers.

His own fingers twitch, but he keeps his hands to himself. He wants to give this to you, to allow you the opportunity to be in charge of this moment. You’ve always been curious, and watching you exploring his own body only stokes his desire – but he holds back. He will be patient, and he will take this slow. He wants to do this whole thing right.

Your fingers trail down over the defined muscles of his abdomen, and he flexes entirely on instinct. You must like what you see, because your smile turns bashful as you trace your way around his waist.

He’s so preoccupied with watching your face that he doesn’t watch where your hands go next. It means that he is taken entirely by surprise when he feels your delicate, small fingers wrap around his kuru.

His back goes ramrod straight, his eyes flaring wide in shock. It was an innocent touch, only wrapping around the protective braid curiously, but the sheer fact that his prospective mate, wearing the mating gift he had made, holds the most intimate and sacred part of him in their hands has his toes curling into the dirt where you sit. 

A jolt of pure, liquid elation jolts down his spine. No partner of his has ever touched his kuru – it was saved specifically for a mate. And though you may not be capable of making tsaheylu with him, the sheer sensation of you holding this sacred part of him nearly makes his vision white out.

“Oh!” He hears your voice say as though from a distance. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to overstep-!”

He’s sure his pupils are blown wide, his ears alert and hot. He wants to reassure you that your overstep is most welcome, but it feels as though his brain has half-melted.

“Tsu’tey?”

He comes back to himself, though his thoughts are still scattered. As he regains some of his awareness, he realises that his desire is beginning to grow obvious beneath his loincloth. 

Fuck. He was meant to be taking it slow! He couldn’t invite you to his hut and then grow so visibly aroused in front of you; it was not honourable, and he did not want you to feel pressured.

He lurches backwards, nearly sprawling in the dirt. It’s a graceless movement, ungainly and unlike him, but then again all of this is entirely outside of his realm of experience. 

You’re staring at him with wide eyes and an open mouth, your hand still raised in midair.

“I have to go.” He says sharply, pushing himself to his feet. It’s all he can think to do to preserve both of your dignities before he ruins his careful courtship plans with his own reckless desires.

“But-” You start, your face crumpling. “Am I still invited-”

“I must go,” He repeats, hastily angling himself so that you can’t see his front. 

He takes several firm steps away before hesitating, then turns back to look at you. “Tomorrow. You may come back tomorrow.”

You still look utterly bewildered, but Tsu’tey hurries away all the same. As he goes, he adjusts his tewng as surreptitiously as possible. 

Despite his tactical retreat, he feels more optimistic than he has in a long time. As he approaches the village he feels a feral triumphant grin begin to grow over his face. That likely could have gone smoother at the end, but overall he finds himself feeling impossibly pleased with himself. 

He has succeeded at his attempt at courting a human, and he has done so without Jakesully’s help. You have accepted all his gifts, you agreed to come and see his hut, and judging by the way you had groped at his tail and his kuru, physical attraction certainly wouldn’t be a problem for either of you.

 It has left him excited for tomorrow, and yearning for more of your soft little hands against his skin.

[runningfrom2am]

leveling the playing field IX

summary: with nowhere else to go after getting caught cheating to help lucy gray, you both make some desperately stupid decisions.

pairing: coriolanus snow x fem!reader

wc: 2.6k

tags/warnings: capitol brat!reader, maybe slightly ooc coryo, idk i tried my best. do they love each other or hate each other? who knows (we do, kind of). implications and mentions of abuse, so read with caution!! also a little bit of swearing but that's neither here nor there

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a/n: here we are!! 'season' two!! thanks so much for reading it and I'm SO so glad lots of people seem to love it :) if you do, please reblog it or leave your thoughts in the replies or in my inbox! i love hearing from you and talking about it so don't be a stranger !

without further adieu,, enter buzzcut coryo <3

next part

Coriolanus's stomach twisted as he could hear your screams from the hall, even though by then he was all the way on the other side of the school. He thought that was unsettling, only for them to abruptly stop just before he left. The silence that followed was so much worse. He didn't get any sleep, sitting on the roof in Grandma'ams rose garden with Tigris all night, wondering if you were dead.

He was just sick about it, even as he left the following morning, so early that the sun was yet to rise. It was a long, painful ride, and he spent the entire thing certain that you were dead. It was his fault, he had only wanted you to come with him, so he wouldn't be alone, but now he truly is alone and he won't even have you to write to back home. Regardless, he would try.

Rather than sit with the idea that it might even be pointless for him to live another day, especially with this unflattering haircut and a uniform that challenged the discomfort of the academy one, he decided to write to you on a paper he had found bunched between the train seats to ease his mind.

Y/N/N,

I hope you're reading this. I hope this gets back to you at home and finds you safe and sound, and you're sitting over your desk with a textbook open getting ready for university in the fall. That's not what's happening though, is it? You're probably dead. I probably killed you. If you are reading this in your room, or your library, or over my shoulder as I write this because you are only alive in what's left of your spirit, I hope you know that I am sorry. I did it because I wanted you with me, because in the moment I was so sure you'd be better off with me in the districts than you would be at home with your father. I think I was wrong. But I still miss you. You meant more to me than I ever told you. I guess, more than I ever told myself either until these last few weeks.

I think I heard them kill you after I left you with the Dean. If they did, boy, did you go out fighting. I always knew you would. I can't stop writing in case I never get to speak to you again. But again, maybe you're not dead, right?

Please tell me you're not dead.

Yours,

Always yours, your Coryo

He smoothes out the wrinkled sheet as he writes, hand shaking through most of it. He doesn't know if he should even bother sending it, or if he should just fold it up and throw it out the window in hopes that the message will find its way to your ghost. No, he has to send it. Otherwise he'll definitely never know, at least not for twenty years, and he couldn't bear that.

The wind hits the trees into the windows of the train as it rolls along the tracks, demanding that the branches be heard against the glass. It reminds him of you. Then again, what doesn't these days? Maybe it was just you letting him know you had read his letter, and that you forgive him. That would give him a semblance of peace for the rest of the ride.

When you woke up, it was impossible to tell what time it was. You only knew that it was dark, and your bedroom door was locked from the outside when you got up and carefully tried to open it only to be blocked by the mechanism.

"I have half the mind to agree with you on the Avox thing." You hear your dad sigh, his voice echoing from his study just down the hall. Your eyes widen and you try the knob again. Yep, still locked. "But we could always send her to Nine or Ten as a nurse. She's not staying here, that's certain."

"I don't want to push your decision, here, but she was saying she would tell everyone. She knows more than we thought, more details." Highbottom was here too, great.

"No, that's impossible. What did she say?"

"She knows we're selling, likely that you're storing it all here somewhere, and she knows it's enough to be treason. I don't know what else she knows, but it's risky business ever letting her out of that room again. The procedure might be our best option, here." You've heard enough, quickly making for your window instead. It's locked as well, but draping your old uniform over the lever gives you enough freedom to crush it with a particularly heavy, hardcover textbook without making much noise.

You change quickly, grabbing a few essentials that you could fit into your book bag, then climb out the window and slide down the back porch column before making as quiet of an escape as possible. Adrenaline carried you a few blocks away, but now, you were unsure what to do. You couldn't return, and you couldn't be seen, and you had a tragic shortage of friends at the moment. You find your feet carrying you toward the building you know Coriolanus lives in.

You're not particularly excited to see him, but with no other options, you're sure you can find it in yourself to be forgiving just this once. You could go to Sejanus's family home, but it's not far enough away, and you're not sure what his father would say. He'd probably call your dad in a second and it would all be for naught- you couldn't risk it. So, Coryo's it was.

You enter the building, walking straight for the elevator. He was in the penthouse, so you just have to hit the very top button and figure it out from there. You've never been to his home before, but he's talked about it plenty. Enough that you could find your way there, at least.

You groan when you quickly realize the elevator doesn't work, looking over at the stairs. It's a tall building, so you've got a long way to go. You wonder how he does this every day as you climb up set after set of stairs, taking note of how the walls are basically crumbling around you.

You knew he didn't have money, that he couldn't eat, but you didn't think he lived like this. No wonder he was so thin, and no wonder he still had any muscle left on his body. It was these damn stairs. That couldn't be it though, that wouldn't explain how his shoulders just seemed to go on for miles- maybe he had some kind of workout routine you never knew about.

You're drawn from your thoughts when you reach the top of the last staircase, hesitating to open the industrial looking door in front of you. Just beyond that was the front door to the Snow penthouse, and now that you're here, you're not sure what to do. Do you knock? You don't even know what time it is.

You sit by the door, deciding to think it over for a bit. It doesn't take you long to fall asleep leaning up against the wall where it meets the dusty floor.

Waking up, you're met with a gasp. "Y/N?" You blink open your eyes, seeing Tigris crouched in front of you, forehead creased with worry. "Are you okay? What are you doing here?"

"Tigris, hello." You mumble, gathering yourself to stand up as she helps you. "I, uh, I didn't know where to go, so..."

"Okay, okay. Come in for a second." She nods, holding your shoulder as she guides you back into the apartment. You squint at the sunrise through the large bay windows, she must have been on her way to work. "Can I get you anything? Some tea? You must be freezing..." She says, immediately shuffling into the kitchen.

"No, no. It's fine. Thank you, though." You insist, trying not to stare at the state the apartment has fallen into.

"Okay, well, please, take a seat. Tell me what's going on."

You nod slightly and move to sit down at their dining table where she joins you, reaching out for your hand which you gratefully take. "Did Coriolanus leave already?" You ask and she nods, giving you a sad smile.

"I must admit, I'm relieved to see you." She says, taking you by surprise. "Coryo thought you were dead. He was just so torn up about it, he said it was his fault but he wouldn't tell me why. I was expecting to see your passing in the papers this morning."

"Well, my days are numbered." You sigh, looking out the window again. The view was stunning. Maybe you would prefer a penthouse to your own large, empty feeling home. "My father and Dean Highbottom were discussing turning me into an Avox as a pity punishment, and I don't doubt that my father would rather bury me than have that on his name. I didn't stick around to hear their decision."

Tigris listens intently, squeezing your cold hands between her own. "And now, I don't know what to do. I had nowhere to go, I'm so sorry to intrude-"

"No, my goodness, please. You are always welcome here." She assured you. "But... what will you do?"

"I have to leave." You nod to yourself. "I have to leave and I can't come back, can I?"

"One day I'm sure it will be safe for you to return." She says, notably trying to put a positive spin on it. "I'll tell you what-" She stands quickly, going over to a hall closet and pulling out a large fur coat. "Take this, it can hide you and keep you warm. Take the next train to Twelve, that's where Coryo went." She places the coat in your lap. "He'll be ecstatic to have you and see that you're well."

You nod, standing up and pulling it on in a hurry. It was a beautiful coat, you could tell it was real fur. This must have belonged to one of their mothers. "Thank you, Tigris."

"There's another train headed there in about twenty minutes, if you rush you can make it. I had to check the schedule last night for him. Don't buy a ticket, just climb in a transport car from the opposite side, not the platform." She instructs you hurriedly,

You dig in your bag as you both head for the door, pulling out a handful of money and rifling through it to give some to her. You'll need some, but she will too.

"Here, Tigris. Take this." You say as she holds the door for you, and she instantly is shaking her head.

"No, no. I couldn't." She smiles awkwardly, waving a hand at you. "You'll need it more than I do, Coryo will be sending us cheques."

You smile at her understandingly, holding it out to her again. "If not for your help, then for this lovely jacket. Please take it. I insist."

Tigris sighs, taking it from your hand before pulling you into a hug which you gladly return. "Tell him we love him, okay?"

"He knows," You say, chin resting on her shoulder. "But I will."

It was dark again when your train reached its final stop, and you were curled up under the coat trying to sleep. You scramble to get up, having to bolt from the train before anyone came to unload the car.

Unfortunately, you didn't get the privilege of having a place to stay when you arrived, so once you're out of sight of the train, the best you can do is wander.

You don't have to wander long before you hear music. You didn't realize people were happy here, so the sounds of laughter and shouting and dancing coming from inside what looked to be an abandoned building made you tilt your head at the idea. Maybe you would just sit outside, around the side of the building where you won't be seen and you can listen.

You don't even get the chance to sit before you hear the singing start. It's Lucy Gray. You mentally scold yourself for not thinking of her sooner as you stand again quickly, finding yourself quite lightheaded. You must be hungry. Maybe there will be some food inside, or maybe you can find talk to Lucy Gray and maybe she'll let you stay with her. Just until you get yourself situated here.

Clutching your new coat tightly around yourself you walk in after attempting to dust off and salvage your clothes. Your favourite skirt and shoes took quite a beating throughout the day, and you're disappointed, to say the least. Hopefully Lucy Gray has a washing machine, but you doubt it. Did these people even know what a washing machine is? By the look of everyone in the room, the answer was a definite no.

Sure enough, Lucy Gray was on stage, singing her heart out. You had never seen her smile so wide, of course, and the kids surrounding her onstage were just as talented as she was at all their instruments. You've never seen live music like this before, only classical or opera where everyone sat quietly and listened until the end. This environment was entirely new to you.

Not wanting to interrupt, you wait until Lucy Gray steps offstage and her spot is replaced with a little blonde girl who couldn't have been older than ten.

"Give it up for the amazing Lucy Gray Baird!" The girl shouts into the mic, gesturing to your friend before more music started to play. "She'll be back, she's just taking a little break, but until then, you lot are stuck listenin' to me."

This is your chance. You push through the crowd and step into the hall you saw Lucy Gray go down. "Lucy Gray?" You call out hopefully, watching your step as to not roll a heel. In hindsight, these shoes were not ideal for the journey you took, but your options were limited by a time crunch.

"Lucy Gray?" You ask again, turning a corner and peeling into a large open room. It's a few moments before your eyes land on her, and she turns to face you having heard you walk in.

"Oh my days, I thought I recognized that voice!" She smiles, opening her arms and running up to you. "Y/N, my word, what are you doin' here?" Her excitement fades quickly into concern as she drops her arms from around you.

"Long story..." You chuckle nervously, pulling at your coat again as she nods for you to continue. "We got caught, for the compact. And the snakes, somehow. Coriolanus put our handkerchiefs that you used in the tank so they wouldn't attack you, I guess. I didn't know. Then they pulled us out of class the next day, he told them it was me, so then I put up a fight and they sedated me. When I woke up I was at home and they were talking about having my tongue cut out and turning me into one of those servants but I'm sure my dad would rather have me dead. So," You sigh, trying to summarize it as quickly as possible. "I ran."

Lucy Gray shook her head, mouth agape in shock at all the information she just took in. "Okay, wait... So they were going to kill you?"

You nod.

"But that teacher of yours seemed so nice."

"Sorry?"

"Yeah, he gave me some money and escorted me into the train himself."

You scoff, shaking your head. "He's never liked either of us, but that's only because I have dirt on him. I don't know what Coryo did."

"Well," Lucy Gray sighs, rubbing your shoulders gently. "I'm glad you're here. That you're safe."

"You too." You smile. "Can I just say, too, we were so proud of you. We were so lucky to be your mentors."

"I count myself the lucky one." She grins. "Let's move on, shall we? On the up and up."

"Yes, sounds lovely." You grin at her.

"Can I get you some water? Liquor? What do you need?" She asks, turning at that and going over to a bench in the middle that had a few water bottles.

"I would love some water." You breathe out, joining her and sitting down as she hands one to you.

"Lucy Gray, could I ask you for a really big favour?" You say after taking your first sip.

"Please." She nods.

"Can I stay with you?"

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[jamiewintons]

Good Enough To Eat (OPLA!Vinsmoke Sanji/F!Reader)

Summary: You and your boyfriend Sanji end up spending some time alone in the kitchen of Baratie.

Tags/Warnings: Smut (18+ ONLY), public/semi public sex, praise kink, ‘good girl’ kink, oral sex (f!receiving), fingering.

A/N: Hey guys! My first non-Mat fic in literal years! This wasn’t meant to end up so long (not that 1400 words is that long) but I got a bit carried away. It’s really just all vibes. Please know that I’ve never seen the One Piece anime or read the manga, so this is based purely on the live action series. Hope you enjoy!! Reblogs and comments are very much appreciated :)

Word Count: 1402

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~~~

"You look good enough to eat, darling," Sanji told you as he ran his hands up and down your legs, giving you that easy, confident smile that always made your heart melt. The feeling of his strong, talented hands against the sensitive skin of your inner thighs made you shudder, and Sanji’s smile only grew as he sensed your arousal.

You were seated on the counter in the kitchen of Baratie, with Sanji kneeling on the floor between your legs. You knew that the two of you shouldn’t have been doing this here — you couldn’t count the amount of times that you got told off by Zeff for making out in the pantry, and you weren’t exactly looking for a repeat of that — but once Sanji kissed you and ever so gently pushed you against the counter, your bodies pressed together and his hands holding your hips, you knew that there was no way you were going to say no.

And now here you were, a complete flustered mess, although Sanji had barely even touched you yet. He was just like that; he could drive you insane with desire with just a simple touch, or even a look, and the worst part was, he knew what he did to you. Sanji laughed quietly as he felt your body quiver while his lips brushed against the sensitive skin of your inner thigh. "Oh, darling, you’re so needy," he teased, closing his eyes as he savoured the feeling of your soft skin against his lips. At a snail’s pace he moved further up your leg, until he was mere inches away from the place you needed him most. "Just relax and let me take care of you."

"Please," you sighed, and Sanji laughed once again, though this time it sounded more like a mere exhalation. "Sanji… please."

"Patience," he told you, before moving to your other thigh and repeating the same routine of peppering kisses all over it until you were whimpering beneath his ministrations. "Let me worship your beautiful body the way you deserve."

You closed your eyes, your entire body tingling as your arousal grew to levels you never knew you were even capable of feeling. Though you couldn’t see them, you just knew that beneath your dress your panties were already completely soaked through. You wanted Sanji to just get to the point and give you what you needed already, but you knew that he was right, and that the anticipation, the build-up would ensure the end result was even more wonderful. Just like with food, Sanji would tell you.

When you felt Sanji’s hands slip beneath the hem of your dress, that was when your eyes shot back open. He slowly pushed it up, revealing your cotton panties. "You’re absolutely soaked for me, darling." Even if you weren’t looking at him, you’d be able to tell that he was smirking by the tone in his voice - a mix of smugness and reverence. He brought his thumb to the front of your panties, gently teasing the wet patch on the fabric and making you whimper. "So sensitive, sweetheart. You must be really worked up."

"Well, you have been at this for at least an hour," you complained, trying to sound firm but your voice came out shaky and desperate. Sanji pressed a little harder, and you let out another soft noise.

"It’s not been quite that long, but I’ll forgive you. I’m sure you’re having a hard time concentrating," Sanji said with a self-satisfied grin, before hooking his fingers into the waist of your panties and slowly pulling them down your legs. Without the pesky fabric in the way, your arousal was even more obvious, and Sanji’s eyes lit up as he saw the physical proof of how much he affected you. "Remember when I said you looked good enough to eat?"

With that, Sanji pulled you a little closer to the edge of the counter you were perched on. He leaned in and ran his tongue between your swollen lower lips, a slow lick from your entrance up to your aching clit that made your entire body shudder. The sound that came out of your mouth was somewhere between a moan and a sigh of relief, and it made Sanji let out yet another breathless laugh.

He focused on your clit, alternating between quick licks with the tip of his tongue and slow, languid strokes using the entire organ. Your fingers came to rest on top of Sanji’s head as he pleasured you, threading through the soft blond strands and tugging lightly. This only encouraged him to double down his efforts, following your moans and whimpers to find the best way to please you.

"You taste incredible, darling. Better than anything I’ve ever tasted," Sanji whispered, his words sounding like warm honey, as he pulled his mouth away from your pussy. But he wasn’t idle for long, because only a few seconds later he grabbed your legs and put them over his shoulders before diving back in to eat you out with even more enthusiasm.

"O-oh fuck, Sanji… feels so good," you gasped out, your thighs shaking as Sanji vigorously devoured you like he was a starved man and you were the first food he’d encountered in weeks. You’d never felt as good in your life as you did with Sanji, he was as much of a talented lover as he was a chef, and you thanked your lucky stars every day that you got to be with him.

"That’s it, good girl," Sanji praised gently, those simple words making your pleasure intensify and your hips buck against his face. You then felt his fingers teasing at your entrance, and let out a gasp as he pushed two inside your fluttering walls. "Just sit back and let me take care of you."

Your breathing was getting heavier, you quiet moans becoming louder and more desperate as Sanji worked magic on you with his tongue and fingers. He crooked his digits to stimulate your g-spot, and you knew that it wouldn’t be long until you fell apart for him. "S-Sanji, I’m… I’m close…"

Sanji would have known that you were on the brink, even if you hadn’t said anything, but fuck, did he love to hear you say it. To hear your voice so desperate for him, all because of him. Honestly, it turned him on more than anything possible could. His cock throbbed within his trousers with the thought of being inside of you again, but right now was about you, not about him, and he wanted to give you everything that you needed.

When he felt your pussy beginning to tighten around his fingers, he looked up at you, seeing your beautiful face contorted in pleasure. But more than anything, he wanted to see your eyes, to see how they widened as he brought you to complete ecstasy. "Look at me, darling. I want you to look at me when I make you cum," he told you in a tone that was both gentle and firm, one that you couldn’t help but listen to.

When you looked down at Sanji’s face, the sight of his blue-green eyes darkened with lust — along with how he massaged your sweet spot with his fingers and sucked on your swollen clit — was enough to push you over the edge into an earth shattering orgasm. You cried out his name, your hips bucking and your velvety walls contracting around his fingers. Sanji guided you through your high, not stopping until you went completely limp, and he made sure he was standing to catch you when you did.

"You did so well for me, darling," he praised, one of his hands threading though your hair as he pressed gentle kisses to your flushed face. Once he was sure you could keep yourself upright, he took the fingers of his other hand — the one that he had been using to pleasure you — into his mouth, licking off your essence and moaning as if he had just eaten a delicious meal. "Let’s go back to my room, sweetheart. I’m not quite finished enjoying you tonight."

You allowed Sanji to lead you out of the kitchen and towards his bedroom, his hand firmly held in yours, feeling your heart fluttering with excitement. You already knew that you were going to struggle to walk tomorrow, and you couldn’t wait.

[strawhatkia]

lip gloss, lil mama.

INCLUDES ! sero hanta, katsuki bakugo, mirio togata, hitoshi shinsou and hawks x black!reader

GENRE ! fluff

SYNOPSIS ! only after you apply lip gloss, do they wanna kiss from you or, the boys actively mess up your lip gloss !

WARNINGS ! before the war arc, highschoolers are still in highschool, cursing, def self-indulgent on shinsou's part, lemme know if i missed anything!

WORD COUNT ! 1.4k+

A/N ! this is an old request from my deleted account but it's a favorite of mine 🤍 original request look like this -> ”head cannons of Y/N applying a coat of lip gloss on in her room or with her friends and suddenly Bakugo, Shinsou, Hawks, Sero, and Mirio barging in like “My lip gloss senses are tingling” and Y/N’s like “Aht Aht! I just put this coat on, stay back!” She’s just struggling to keep these fools from kissing her and ruining her lip gloss. It don’t matter if she running, struggling, or dodging they kisses (they ruin it with kisses anyways smh)”

MAIN MASTERLIST | BNHA MASTERLIST | TAGLIST

reblogs and comments are welcomed and loved !!

— ☾⋆⁺₊🕸✧ SERO HANTA !

this mofo is the most annoying lil tease ever

the minute you pull out your lip gloss, all of sudden you have his undivided attention

let’s say you were at your desk and he was on the bed on his phone, not paying you any mind

you check to see if he is watching you and luckily he isn’t so you proceed to put it on

and if I know black women as well as I think I do, considering I am one you put a good amount of that bitch; lips all shiny and shit dripping diamonds 

but halfway through, you look up and this motherfucker is staring right back at you

he done sat all the way up, resting on his knees and waiting on you to finish 

he has the audacity to smile when you make eye contact annoying lil shit, even to start giggle when you glare back at him 

he’s the type to let you finish, put the cap on, put the lip gloss away and then swoop in and fuck it all up 

i can not tell you how angry i am right now

“what? got something to say, baby?” “nigga, fuck you.” 

It’s war that you never win unless you know for sure that he is unaware

newsflash: that shit never happens either

you don't even have the option of running unless you ready to be taped to the floor

all he gotta do is whip some out and boom! ya ass is grass!

as soon as you put the lip gloss down, he casually walks over, grabs your cheeks and smashes his lips straight into yours before calmly going to sit back down

lil fucker doesn’t even bother wiping it off for a while either

“thanks for sharing, my love.” fuck this nigga bro

but it’s not like you can argue as much, his kisses are so sweet and if you ever wanted a kiss, just put on some lip gloss; win-win when intentional

plus, all the shawties want this man (can't blame them) so lowkey the lip gloss smears let them bitches know he not single !

— ☾⋆⁺₊🌟🫨✧ MIRIO TOGATA !

as soon as he knows that your about to put some on- he’s there, boi can sense it through the walls and shit

he just knows and now that he does, he will stop at nothing to get to you 

even if you successfully get far away to put it on and have it on for a couple of minutes, the second you are in his line of sight it’s over 

running away is like an unfair game of tag, that bitch cheats

his quirk makes it so easy to get to you and the lil gremlin is so fucking fast (although class 1-a praises your ability to get as far as you did) 

“sunshine~ !” “aht, go play with tamaki or some shit! i just put this on!” “no can do, sunshine!” 

once he’s got you in a pretty tight hold, he grabs your face and messily kisses you and wipes the extra lip gloss off

He then nuzzles into your neck and places kisses there, asking for forgiveness 

“Aww come on, sunshine! You know I can’t resist and plus you can just put more on later!” mirio, lemme go before i slap up upside the head. i can't stand you.” “that’s why you’re sitting in my lap!” “LET ME GO-”

he’s a big ole ball of happiness and just laughs at your frustration, knowing that you can’t stay mad forever (brat knows you love him too much)  

— ☾⋆⁺₊🪶🪽✧ KEIGO TAMAKI / HAWKS !

he comes out of no where and he knows what you doing, shawty

and when he does, one by one, little feathers start filtering into the room, circling around you 

little by little, you start to see the feathers around the vanity you're sitting at

one look in the mirror and you see him standing by the doorway with that sly as smirk ouu i could smack him

“…keigo tamaki.” “yes, dove?” “ you betta get yo feathers outta here, boy” “aw but i think they like you~”

cornball ass nigga 

ofc he doesn't move from his position and neither do his feathers- and don't bother trying to drag it out either, he's been a hero for too long to not know the waiting game

once you’re finished, the feathers stop circling around and just stop in the air, waiting for yo ass to move.

you can try to look for a way out but you not succeeding, them feathers are acting like a barrier, moving when you move and the one controlling them is cheesing like an idiot 

“keigo, baby, come on. i just put this on.” “yeah well, you can just put more on later- i'll even buy you more.” “...bird brain.” “i love you too~”

fortunately, he’s much more neater than the others but that just means he’s taking everything with him when he moves away

and ofc you can't move until all the feathers back off, one wrong move and they will swarm you honey (im telling you the one controlling them don't know how to fucking act)

when the feathers are gone, is when you finally get some hits in

“GOD DAMN IT, KEIGO! THAT’S THE FOURTH TIME TODAY, NIGGA!!” “aww come on, dove! it’s fun to tease you like this!”

he’s laughing so loudly and having such a good time that you pipe down and admit defeat for the fourth time that day (he's beautiful when he's happy so just let it go stink) 

— ☾⋆⁺₊🧨💢✧ KATSUKI BAKUGO !

THIS NIGGA BRO

HE DOESNT EVEN LET YOU PUT IT ON PROPERLY BEFORE HE SWOOPS IN MESSES IT UP

it’s absolutely futile to run from him, he’ll get way too excited and start chasing you down like some animal

“whatcha got there, huh?” “AHT! go on somewhere, bakugo! go mind yo business!” 

he just loves fucking with you and making you angry, it's his favorite past time

it's just you two running all through the dorms, jumping over tables and couches, ducking between people, screaming at the top of your lungs, causing chaos and giving iida a heart attack

once Bakugo has caught you because he will and throws you over his shoulder like a bag of fucking potatoes wit his rude ass, he treks all the back to his dorm and proceeds to literally smash his lips into yours 

after he's done with his short tyranny, he just play-fights you as you try to hit him, smiling like he won the lottery  

“WHY THE FUCK DO YOU ALWAYS DO THIS!” “STOP YELLING, DUMBASS!! IT’S NOT THE END OF WORLD AND PLUS YOU GOT MORE!!” “THAT IS NOT THE POINT, NIGGA!!” 

after a while he kinda forces cuddles upon you until you not angry anymore and it's hard to be when he starts rubbing ya back and sides, pulling you into his chest

do not get it twisted. he does it on purpose b/c he knows that it's real soothing- damn near his tactic every time he does this doesn't stop it from feeling good tho

eventually and as planned, it ends in y'all taking a nap after running around the dorm god knows how many times

“bakugo, i’m still upset witchu nigga.” “no you’re not, now go to sleep”

— ☾⋆⁺₊🐈‍⬛🌀✧ HITOSHI SHINSOU !

ouuuu new contender !

he is the most excited you have ever seen him

the moment you even pull out the lil clear tube of gloss, he's right behind you waiting with a small smile

anyone looking from afar would think it's just a bf looking at his gf reapplying her lip gloss vv lovingly...little do they know

that man is waiting behind you with a damn vengeance and best believe you not even getting far this is time i remind you who his teacher is: AIZAWA !!

"toshi?" "...yes, pretty?" "i swear if you mess up my gloss, we gon have some problems." "what are you talking about? i would never do such a thing." liar.

the moment your compact mirror closes shut is the exact same moment he wraps his arm around your waist and pulls you in close

and he does the whole works: arm around your waist, that hand rubbing your lower back, one hand holding your face as his thumb rubs against the top of your cheekbone while gently getting you to look up at him you guys im being very self indulgent with this

he's just so soft and so so so cute when his lil smirk that when he does kiss you, he doesn't take all of it off, just a lil bit !

he chuckles when he backs away, using his thumb to wipe away any that might have smeared

AND THEN PROCEEDS TO WALK AWAY

"...i hope aizawa whoop yo ass during training today." "ouch, that hurts pretty. it's too bad i'd do it again as long as i get to kiss you." fuck this nigga bro

©STRAWHATKIA ━ all rights reserved. all content published on this blog belongs to starsoir. please refrain from copying, stealing, profiting off my works, or using my works for asmr related work. i don’t allow my works to be used or adapted in any way without my permission.

reblogs and comments are welcomed and loved, so leave some please ! i will respond ! 🤍

wanna read more ??

boyfriend. | f. | katsuki bakugo

taglist : @mypimpademia @sevvnt

[msbigredmachine]

💖Beginners' Guide to MsBigRedMachine's Fanfics💖

Thank you once again to two of my faves @southerngirl41 and @harmshake for the tags!

Intro: I'm Ada! I write fanfiction mainly for Roman Reigns, but I expanded to Jey Uso and now I've added his twin Jimmy, lol. Also have a Samoa Joe fic lurking somewhere.

Pairings: As you'll see in my masterlist, ALL my OCs are Black women. Dark skin, light skin, caramel, slim, big...all beautiful Black baddies. Also, being Nigerian, I aim to incorporate more Nigerian names in my fics too. Sorry, I don't do slash of any kind. I've been asked before and it's just not my thing.

Warnings: Smut, angst, drama, more smut. No one under the age of 18 should read my stuff or interact with me on it, or you'll be outed without hesitation.

So where to start reading...?

---

My first fic: My first-ever one was actually an RVD fic called Shattered Rose that I never finished, when white women were my OCs. I know wayyyy better now😬

My longest fic: My first baby, Into The Deep End. March 6, 2024 will make it ten years since I first published it on another platform. I worked so hard on it as a stress reliever when I was studying for my Masters, and to know that it still gets so much love on all the sites I've posted it on truly warms my heart. Targets is my second-longest, I really enjoyed that one too.

My shortest fic: Definitely Wait For You. Marian tagged me in a "Seven Sentence" challenge and this was the result. I'm terrible with <1000 word fics and it was truly a challenge, lol.

My most popular fic: So, there's three answers. Overall, Into The Deep End for sure. But for my one-shots, I still get messages and quotes about Power Couple (Roman/OC) and On Sight (Jey Uso/OC) to this day.

My personal fave fic: Lol this answer changes all the time. They're all my babies, I really can't choose. Each time I re-read one, I fall in love with it.

---

💖About me💖

30+, a qualified lawyer/attorney by profession. I've been writing all sorts of stuff since I was a child. There's something about putting your imagination down on paper that is so liberating and I really enjoy it. Maybe one day I will have the courage to actually publish something.

I've been posting my fics on tumblr for years now. I'm truly happy to have met such great authors along the way, and I appreciate all the likes, reblogs and especially the amazing comments and feedback. Forgive me for all my late responses, work and Nigeria's WAT time zone messes me up lol.

Thank you all again, and enjoy!

Click here if you're not yet on my tag list and you want to be added.

---

Again, tagging everyone: @jxtina-86 @wrestlingprincess80 @southerngirl41 @alyyaanna @squishyguishy @jstarr86 @murrylove @thewarlordsworld @mzv11 @cozyaliensuperstar7 @nayys-world @hunnidmilly @cyberdejos2 @papireigns-05 @niknakbucks92 @captainwithoutmakingitlove @sovereigngoth @aisharmi @kennedi0818 @alichesmi @thesamoanqueen @herwickedlittlesins @harmshake @fame-ass-ers@questionable-behaviour @tribalchiefreigns @2-muchsauce @thatbxtchsblog @raya-hunter01 @marchi36753 @lovelysuccess @christinabae @wooahmiri @thatonecarebear @tabletheofhead @rheaanddamianfan @vebner37 @hanley1577 @princessesareforsuckers @-naturally @joannasteez @bbygirlky18 @lilucey @theninthwonder @melaninsugababy @chocovibesonly @msbluehaz3 @scarlettnoir01 @heerah34 @empressdede @tbmotw @darkangelchronicles @visionarymode @marasdeathnote @aintnorainbows @meggylynnloves @shantinextdoor @harlemblipster @trc-punzel @afterdarkprincess @nbanenefrmdao @sassginaswanmills @purplehairgawdess @holisticcoach @girlwhogaf @royalkay23 @heyitsnajabrinee @stoner2k @reci1996 @catxo @iamimanim @lookmais @ts1mp0ne @shonny09 @lizzyd1ish @gomussy @m3llowww @skyesthebomb @final1miya

[redzie02]

okay so I have an idea for an angsty Hongjoong fic. (poorly written) feel free to use this and if u do, tag me!! So I can support and reblog and give u a lil kiss on the forehead<3 add smut to it or not idc as long as he’s on his knees and begging for forgiveness,,, i was half asleep when I wrote this btw masterlist

Hear me out. For the past month, Hongjoong has been drowning himself in work. Work seems to be the only thing he cares about, he’s rarely ever home. And he definitely hasn’t made any time for you:(. It doesn’t help that you’ve maybe had the worst month of your life and no one to talk to about it. Your mental health has been spiraling and it’s only gotten worse since Hongjoong’s lack of attention in the relationship.

I guess one day you’ve finally had enough and blow up on him or decide to give him the silent treatment all day. I mean, it works, Hongjoong FINALLY notices something might be wrong after 3 whole weeks.

When you guys get home after dinner with the group, he asks, “what’s wrong?” You don’t reply, completely ignoring him and heading straight to the bathroom to shower. He follows you, a little frustrated and confused, and he watches as you undress and step into the shower acting as if he wasn’t there.

Hongjoong watches in silence, dread and anxiety growing in him. While scrubbing your body, you don’t realize Hongjoong undressed, preparing to get into the shower with you. He was determined to get you to talk.

The sound of the shower door sliding open startles you a bit but you roll your eyes when you see Hongjoong step in. You’re tired. You’ve been tired for weeks so your voice comes out monotonous and low, “Please get out, Hongjoong. I don’t want to yell at you.” Your back facing him.

You take a few more deep breaths, his hands still on your shoulders. He tilts his head to get a better look at your face. Your eyes are closed, squeezed shut actually. He tilts your head up with his fingers, this is the most intimate you guys have been in a while, you realize. The realization only makes your stomach hurt. “Please, please talk to me.”

You’re defiant, you don’t look in his eyes. If this wasn’t as serious as it was, he’d say you were acting like a brat and fix your brattish ways.

You slowly open your eyes, looking at his face but not exactly making eye contact. “You haven’t done anything, Hongjoong. That’s the problem.” He really is an idiot because his brows furrow like he has no clue what you’re talking about. You let out a frustrated sigh and continue. “When was the last time we were this close, hm? Or had an actual conversation? You’re never home and I never know what you’re doing.”

“I-“

“Do you know how embarrassing it is to pretend I know about whatever is going on with you when Seonghwa or San talk about it? To find out about your upcoming projects from your friends, but not you? How is it that I hear more from them than the actual person I live with? Hm? Do you even know what’s been going on in my life? No, you haven’t even cared to ask, Hongjoong.”

Hongjoong stood with his lips parted, processing everything. Guilt clawed at him because he knew you were right. He’d been ignoring the love of his life because he prioritized his career over you. Something he never thought he’d do. He’d been ignoring his own health as well, meals left unfinished and surviving on just a few hours of sleep a night. He had lost weight, the bags under his eyes were darker than ever, not that he noticed.

Of course you worried about him, that’s all you ever do, but he never stuck around long enough to address your concerns.

He blinked, putting a hand on your cheek. “I-baby, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize-“

“No, I’m not accepting your apology until you actually show me. I don’t just want words.” He nods and opens his mouth to speak, but you interrupt him, wanting to get everything out in the open in fear of not getting the chance to do so in the future. You sigh. “I-I feel like I haven’t been myself lately and I wish I had you here to talk to. You always make me feel better but I don’t know…I don’t know if something’s changed or if it’s me…if you want something or someone else-“

“No, no y/n. I’m sorry- about everything. I’ve been so wrapped up in work that I haven’t been taking care of you the way I should. I’m sorry that I made you feel as if I didn’t want you. I promise, I love you with everything that I am and everything that I have. I know it’s my fault and I hate that I made you feel anything less than loved. Things will change- I will be better and I swear on it, okay?”

You nod. “You haven’t been taking care of yourself either, Joong.”

And um I guess you wash each other up, taking your time, then head back to the bedroom. You lay down and stare at each other, caressing each other. You guys catch up. Hongjoong tells you every little detail about stuff he’s been working on and you tell him about all the stress from work you’ve been through and your deteriorating mental health :). Of course he shows you with his actions just how sorry he is- in more ways than one. Maybe this is where one would insert smut.

But yeah, this post is rough, if anyone would like to use this as inspo or expand on it and make it better, feel free to and tag me ;)!!

[queengiuliettafirstlady]

Lovely dreams

Lovely dreams

Fandom: Ikemen Villains

Pairing:  Elbert Greetia x Alfons Sylvatica

Tag: Angst Mention of past trauma Hurt Comfort Minor presence of self deprecation Fluff           

Word Count : 2.867

Author’s Note: A chance encounter and words that should reamin hidden are revelaed when the sun goes down and the darkness awake feelings until then hidden in one’s heart, emotions that could change destiny forever, like it happened to two friends whose relationship many moon ago nurtured a love unlike any other that only need a bit of courage to be discovered leading to an unexpected happines like no one of the two ever imagined. 🥰

Side Note: One line of spoiler from Elbert’s route, Alfons’ route, Alfons’fate, Roger and Elbert’s past records and their relationship with Alfons.

The spoiler is not evident, you will understand it if you have read one of the stories listed above but if you haven’t you won’t certainly have your fun spoiled at reading them when they will come out in the english version of the game and thus you can read this story safely if you are interested in the pairing. 🤗

Special thanks to @fang-and-feather for being my beta reader for the story and helping me out. 🤗

Tag list

@kissmetwicekissmedeadly @aquagirl1978 @violettduchess

@nightghoul381 @william-rex @writingwhimsey @lichtluv

@fang-and-feather @moonstruckmelancholic @stellaepluviae

@wistfulwanderingone @rjthirsty @ike-garden2024

@jollibeeshappiness @starzyquee @maeko-kun @rkmaru

You can find me on AO3 as QueenJuliet 😊

Thank you for everyone who will like, reblog, or comment please be gentle with me english is not my first language so please do not leave rude comments I apologise for eventual errors I hope you will like it 😊

United Kingdom, In the countryside near London, in a mansion near the coast.

The lively voice of two boys was all it could be heard in the room, it was by no way the proper behaviour between an attendant and his lord but neither of them minded because Alfons, that the name of the little lord’s attendant, would have done pretty much anything to make Elbert, his master, smile.                                     

Countless attempt to which that night signed another fruitless one as Alfons’ struggles to place a smile on Elbert’s lips and make him forget all about his demons were all in vain, the sweet illusions he so readily showed other people through his ability never lasted on him making the young servant even more determined to make the happiness he would have gave his lord real, for once, as nothing has ever been for him.

“The prince and the princess married and they lived happily ever after.”

“Were they really happy?”

The hint of doubt in his lord’s words made Alfons hear throb in sympathy for him, a painful truth he should have never been aware of.

“Yes, so very happy especially because you see their palace was filled to the brim with shiny objects.”

Calloused fingers trailed over the golden decorations hand painted on the shiny scarlet cover of the book he was reading from, smiling like old accomplices as he leaned over Elbert looking up at him with childlike wonder in his sea blue eyes, sparkling in the dim light of the room.

“They were beautiful?”

“Oh yes, the most beautiful in all the Kingdom.”

“I want them too.”

Neat fingers grabbed the blankets raising them until only his eyes were visible, a childish habit Alfons hadn’t the heart to reprimand him for, instead his rough fingers cradled though his blonde locks brushing briefly over his cheeks only to boop his nose as he looked intensely at him.

“I am sure you will acquire them all.”

“So they will forgive me … and then … everyone will be happy right?”

His light blue eyes filled with tears Alfons saw through, unable to stay still he slid his thumb on Elbert’s cheek in a vain attempt to cheer him up, his skin so soft and smooth under his calloused finger and yet something told him his heart to be covered in scars so deep it would have been quite a trial to touch it unharmed like a rose with its thorns, beautiful but engulfed in pain just like he was in Alfons’ eyes.

“Of course they will.”

A bitter smile curled the valet’s lips as he tucked the blanket around his little lord, paying attention to not leave any side uncovered and yet at his monotone voice his usual composure faltered making the duvet slip through his fingers as he widened his grey eyes looking up at him.

“Are you happy here … Alfio?”

A piercing pain pinned through his heart making him unable to move like one of those butterfly specimen his master loved so much doing, his own heart throbbing for the kindness he saw reflected in those innocent eyes that should have never been stained so much with tears, his lord’s heart far too sensitive to not be scarred by such memories.

“I am, Elbie.”

Short digits stretched around his tiny mouth covering a yawn, soon followed by his blonde head drowsily laying against the pillow looking up at his loyal attendant as he bent over him from his place on the bed.

“Good night Lord Elbert.”

Alfons had just brushed the gentlest of kisses on his hair when suddenly bony pale fingers gripped his wrist, a look of terror he rarely saw in his azure eyes as he looked back at him.

“Please stay.”

A plea the attendant found himself unable to answer, he knew of his scars, no one would have remained sane in his shoes, not even himself, for it he can’t ignore his lord’s pleas, spurring by the fear at the prospect to be swallowed whole by his own demons.

The valet’s composure faltered for once, in doubt about what to do he decided to ask, lest to appear like another of the ones that sought to take advantage of him.

“Is that really what you want, Elbie?”

“Yes … unless you don’t want to.” Shyness lingering in his smile as he looked at him, reminding him of a stray cat, confused but very affectionate.

“What reason do I have to refuse?”

What reason indeed he had except his fear to get too attached to a boy that had already made his way in his heart, making him unable to forget or leave him even if it was maybe the wisest thing to do, but the truth was that his foolish heart didn’t give him the luxury to walk away from a person that so clearly needed him.

“I don’t know.”

The way Elbert’s fingers tortured the hem of the sheets didn’t fly unnoticed to his grey eyes, a candour in his answer Alfons didn’t know how to react to, and so he followed his lord’s wishes sliding under the covers with him, letting his master cling to him like he was a plush, if that was enough to comfort him and make him happy, even if for a little while, then so be it.                                                                                  Alfons would have said and done anything to make him feel better to see that gentle smile he liked so much curl Elbert’s rosy lips.

“Sweet dreams Elbie.”

“Sleep tight Alfio … and thank you.”

Thanks as if he deserved any, he was only taking advantage of a warm house, food every day and comforts he never ever dreamed of having all that because of his little master naivete.

Alfons felt sick to his stomach at the thought he was fooling that poor young boy that clearly had seen enough to have his smile erased from his lips and nightmares enough to plague him for a lifetime. 

The minimum he could do was help Elbert forget and be, even if for a far too fleeting instant, happy like he deserved to be.

A murmur rolled down from Alfons lips, betraying a secret he was determined to hold close to his heart, affection misplaced for someone so wicked like him could have never ever been worthy of such a pure, beautiful person like his lord was.

“I love you Elbert.”

Alfons was sure he couldn't hear him and yet the gentle way Elbert snuggled to his chest smiling put his heart at ease, for once at least Alfons’ got to be loved and cherished as he never was, and that for tonight was enough to make him drift asleep amidst the velvety duvets of the bed, an unusual comfort he never knew he needed nor believed he could have ever afford nor be worthy of … unreachable exactly like his love.

United Kingdom, London, In an overstuffed room in Crown Castle.

Ever since moving to the castle Alfons hoped with all his might that the hellish nightmares that plagued Elbert’s sleepless nights would have become a memory of the past … foolish to to think that such a kind heart like his lord possessed would have not been scarred for life from the trials and tribulations he had to go through all alone before in a twist of events Alfons didn’t get to live with him, able to ease his pain not with his ability but with efforts, something he wasn’t used to and probably wouldn’t have done for anyone else but Elbert, the only one capable to have entered in his heart so delicately Alfons didn’t noticed until it started beating out of control for him, the sign of a love that should have never been but that against all odds it was.

That night one of the many Alfons did his best to ease his lord’s sufferings … but in vain, a pain unbearable was for him to see Elbert crumble down before his eyes for a sin he hadn’t committed, and so he did the only thing he was capable of … he wrapped his arms around his master’s back, holding him tight to his chest as he rubbed his beautiful face on his muscular chest.

“It is my fault … Everyone was unhappy because of me. It is … all … my fault.”

Each word punctuated by heavy sobs as Elbert clenched to him, Alfons’ fingers tightened in his platinum locks shoving him even better against his chest, every tear soaking through his shirt a sharp dagger in his heart.

-What could he say to him?

-What could he do to make him smile?

Alfons racked his brain for an answer but no matter what he drew blank and so he kept shut, his sturdy fingers rubbed circles on Elbert’s back letting him unwind every emotion brimming over from his sensitive heart, closer to crack at each sigh as his bony fingers clawed the back of his valet’s shirt enough to leave crinkles and faint red signs on his scarred skin but he didn’t mind, Alfons sucked in a breath when his short clean nails scraped over an old whipped wound of his, but even if it hurt he didn’t pull away.

Because in all truth if this was enough to put his master’s mind and heart at ease, or sort of, there was nothing he wouldn’t have endured for, like all the times that caring nothing for his own safety he had saved his little lord’s life from the reckless bets they used to do.

“It wasn’t your fault.”

Unable to stay still any longer words he always thought tumbled off Alfons’ tongue, silver eyes set ablaze with something aking passion met his light blue ones, still reddish and misty with tears, Elbert’s pale skin was coloured by a faint pink on his cheeks caused by the way he harshly rubbed his face on his old friend’s sturdier chest.

“I am happy because of you.”

A look of incredulity glimmered in the muddy like water of his sea blue eyes almost as he was clearly seeing his attendant for the first time since that evening.

“Are you?”

His voice groggy and hoarse from all the shriek of agony that had left his lips as he clung to his friend, seeking solace in his strong arms.

“I could never lie to you Lord …”

A long fingers pressed with more grace than he would have ever had on his lips.

“Elbert.” He let out a cough before speaking again.

“Address me by my name.”

“Is this alright … my lord?”

“It’s an order, Alfons.”

Resolve as the attendant never saw before shone in his master’s eyes looking every inch the prince he always was to him.

“As you wish.”

With a soft sigh Elbert placed his head on Alfons shoulder, his fingers mindlessly caressing his muscular chest smiling at the feeling of his old friend’s lips placing a gentle kiss on his forehead, enough to relax him as he drifted off to sleep.

Morpheus was though not so merciful to his attendant, dreams so vivid he wished were real waltzed in his mind as he held the object of his love between his arms, his one and only treasure in the whole world, the only gift he received and was ready to give up anything else for.

A forlorn smile curled Alfons’ lips as he watched his prince sleep, for once peaceful until a grimace flashed on his pretty features easily brushed off by the gentle kiss he left on his forehead, tucking his blonde locks damp with sweat away from his gorgeous visage, Elbert’s rosy lips curled in a smile as he felt his friend’s fingers brush on his cheeks, the young lord relaxed against his ever loyal attendant chest as he adjusted the blankets around him, shielding him from the cold outside with the warmth of his muscular body.

It was the crack of dawn when Alfons woke up, the slice of light filtering through the closed door keyhole bothering him to the point he draped his fingers over his eyes, grateful for the velvet blue curtains covering the windows, letting his digits slide off only when he felt his prince stir between his arms.

A fond smile curled Alfons lips as he looked down at Elbert, admiring the way his eyelids fluttered open, his voice groggy from disuse was the best melody in the whole world for the valet’s ears enough to make his heart jump mirthfully in his chest.

“Alfio.”

“It’s still early Elbie, you can sleep a little longer.”

A gentle smile on his rosy lips he nuzzled back into Alfons’ chest, purring at the way his muscular arms tightened around him, mindless of the conflict going on in Alfons’ heart, Elbert snuggled to his side, like he used to do when they were little and he was scared of storms, during those long cold nights he spent cuddling close to his old friend’s chest like he was doing right now.

Alfon’s raven curls swayed around his head as he slumped it down on the pillow wrapping one arm around Elbert’s lithe frame holding him close, in his own way hoping to protect him from his demons and shield him from any thing that may have wounded him further, admiring the way his graceful hand squeezed his own.

In his heart, a prayer he knew was destined to remain unanswered.

-If just one grants me this wish … please don’t let him forget me.

A tear rolled down Alfon’s cheek promptly drowned by the soft pillowcase as he squeezed his little prince tightly in his chest taking relief in his warmth, pleasure, as ephemeral as it could be, from the light smile curling his gracious lips.

He needed him.

He loved him.

For the present time he remembered him and for Alfons that was all that he could ask for.

At least for once someone cared for him enough to seek solace in his arms and not out of personal gain to take advantage of him but to offer Alfons all the kindness his beautiful heart had even though Elbert never had any returned to himself.

Similar and yet so different it was impossible to see a more weird pairing than them.

The valet let out a heavy sigh as he brushed his fingers on his unruly curls, his voice a longing murmur rolling slowly from his tongue straight from his aching heart swollen with affection.

“I love you Elbert.”

He knew his precious prince wouldn’t hear him and a part of him was relieved after all he never wished Elbert’s precious affection to be wasted on the likes of him … and yet a part of him felt elated and panicked alike when he met his light blue eyes shining with affection focused on him.

“I love you too Alfons.”

Alfons’ heart beat wildly in his chest, he knew he should have pushed him away, he knew he should have not got attached … and yet the bright smile Elbert offered him was all he could ever ask for and more, enough to make him accept, for once, the love only a kind person like his lord could have ever had for such a lewd, lascivious man like him.

“I know of our curse and fates.”

Of course he did, Roger had to tell him that after all, that gossiper he was, hate melted with affection making the Alfons’ relationship with the former doctor even more complicated than he would have liked to admit.

“Please allow us to spend time together as much as we can.”

Alfons was about reply to push him away as he should have done from the start but was strangely unable to … because in truth he found himself weak in front of Elbert’s sapphire eyes looking up at him like this, so trusting and full of affection the valet couldn’t do anything but accept his master feelings, unable to resist the siren’s song Elbert sweet voice was to his ear, unable to look away from his gorgeous eyes entrancing him as nothing ever did, unbearable even the idea to turn down his love and wound any further the very object of his everlasting affection.

“I need you.”

Elbert’s words made the last of his resistance crumble down, melting like snow in spring, with open arms Alfons welcomed the greedy lips of his lord as he kissed him, inexperienced even clumsy but so very sweet and full of love, bending to his greed the valet embraced all his master had to give, giving in to that same feeling that so long and so deep had took root in his heart, Alfons’ expert lips kissed him back, swallowing his prince’s groans as his calloused fingers tightened on his sculpted hips pulling them closer together.

Reluctantly but breathless they pulled away only to kiss again and again, spending all night showing off their love to one another, only to cuddle side by side in the messed up duvets of the bed as they welcomed the sun rising above the horizon with a smile.

[nessinborderland]

V-E-N-U-S (02)

Pairing: Rafe x plus size!Reader

Genre: smut, dark-ish fic

Word Count: 6 ,2k

Warnings ⚠️ Mildly Dubious Consent, Enemies to Lovers, more like Enemies to Enemies That Fuck tbh, Rafe Cameron Being an Asshole, mentions of bullying, Vaginal Sex, Oral Sex, Vaginal Fingering, Rough Sex, Mentions of death of a parent, Drinking, Drug Use, Rafe needs therapy asap, fatphobia, Other Additional Tags to Be Added

Summary: The nickname he had given you in 8th grade was supposed to be ironic. In Rafe’s defense, he used to be a pretty stupid and cruel fourteen-year-old, as most kids that age are. So yeah, nicknaming the fat and nerdy chick Venus – like the goddess of sex and beauty – had been pretty hilarious in young Rafe's opinion.

What he would've never guessed was how much that name would fit you now as a grown woman.

Notes: This chapter ended up being an over 10k words beast, so I had to split it in two lol. Enjoy 💖 and please reblog and leave me a comment if you like, I would love to know what are your thoughts on this ff.

AO3 | Masterlist | Part 1

Leaving that room after you fucked Rafe Cameron had felt a lot like your ‘walk of shame’ debut. It was like a beam of light shone down on you, following you as you rushed down the stairs into the foyer and out of the house. You could feel the stares of partygoers – at least the ones sober enough to realize what had transpired between you – and the whispers and giggles as you passed by them couldn’t be ignored.

You cursed Rafe for the hundredth time that night – knowing how gossip went around the island, it would be common knowledge by the next day’s afternoon that something had happened between you and the Kook Prince.

Something you had instantly come to regret.

It had all been your fault.

Your first mistake was thinking that teasing Rafe Cameron would be a good idea. The furtive looks, the coy smiles, the light seducing – it had all been part of your plan. You wanted to watch him squirm, to have him pay in some way for all he had done to you in high school. He would never apologize, and you would never forgive him, but having at least some power over him would be enough.

Or so you thought.

Nothing was supposed to come out of it besides the blond’s frustration and the sweet taste of revenge on your tongue as you rejected his advances again and again. You wanted to make him mad with want and, in a way, you suppose you had succeeded.

You just never expected to fall for your own game.

You couldn’t deny it though; sex with Rafe had been amazing. You were no sex goddess by any means – despite your nickname – but you knew for a fact that none of the guys you had sex with before could ever compare to the dick that had quite possibly ruined your sex life.

The intensity in his eyes when he had fucked you hard and deep, the way his big hands had smoothed over your curves, the way he had filled you up and touched that magical spot just right, how he had kissed you… it was like you could still feel it all, from your trembling legs to your still racing heart.

A flush of heat crept up your chest and cheeks at the memories, making you open up your light jacket despite the chilly night air.

Your legs felt like jelly, your hair was a tangled mess, your skin was no doubt starting to bruise from his love bites, and you knew for a fact that you would be sore the next morning. The wet mess between your folds was hard to ignore, and you would have to say goodbye to your cute – but now ruined – bikini bottom as soon as you got home.

You shook your head at your own stupidity; why the hell had you let him get inside you without a condom on? You knew better than that! Thank God you were on the pill, though. That was one less thing for you to worry about.

You moaned in discomfort as you sat on the curb right in front of the house, refusing to look back despite the heavy feeling of being watched.

Fucking perv.

When he asked you to see him again, the look in his eyes made you wonder how much longer you would regret this little adventure. You weren’t even that drunk, to begin with, so what demon had possessed you to do something as foolish as getting in bed with Rafe Cameron?

A text notification made your phone vibrate, and you opened it to read your cousin’s text.

‘omw. u ok?’ it read. You texted him back a thumbs-up emoji, already knowing he would probably ask you several questions when he finally arrived.

John B had called and texted a few times after Rafe had taken your phone from you, asking what was going on and if you were okay, with – obviously – no response. But your baby cousin wasn’t one to dramatically worry over you, and you were glad for that. His last text had been a simple ‘call me back when you can’ followed by ‘or I’ll send the rescue team’.

Thankfully for you, you were done with Rafe before John B worried too much, and you were sending him a text asking him to come get you as soon as you were dressed and with your phone back in your possession.

You bit the nail on your thumb as you wondered how your cousin would react to the exciting news of your rendezvous with Rafe Cameron.

In one word: badly. After everything the blond had done to him, his friends, and Sarah – done to you – there was no doubt in your mind that John B would go berserk over it. Not to mention JJ, you thought with a grimace. That boy would gladly try to kill Rafe with his bare hands any day of the week if he could get away with it; but after hearing about this?

Absolute chaos.

And that was why you sincerely hoped that the rumors of tonight’s activities never reached their ears. Wishful thinking, you were well aware. You and Rafe just tended to draw too much attention when you were in the same vicinity, for some reason, and even your family knew you didn’t get along. The downside of always fighting him in public, you suppose.

Like on cue, a honk and a flash of light broke you out of your thoughts, and you stood up as the Twinkie rolled down the street till it stopped right by the house, your cousin in the driver’s seat waving at you with a tight smile on his lips.

“Thanks for picking me up, Bibi,” you said in greeting as you opened the door and sat on the passenger seat, reclining against the leather seat with a wince that your cousin thankfully didn’t seem to notice.

The van was empty besides the two of you. Good, you thought as you glanced back at the house – where music and loud voices could be heard even from outside, the party still going strong despite being almost three in the morning. You didn’t think you would be able to face Sarah Cameron right now; or any of the others, for that matter.

“No problem,” John B said as he started driving away. “Why didn’t you answer my calls, though? Got worried when that guy took your phone.”

“Sorry,” you said with a grimace, hoping he would just accept your apology without asking further questions. “I just got busy talking and didn’t notice your calls. You know I can’t shut up if someone brings up my favorite series.”

He hummed, not sounding totally convinced. It made you nervous just a little. “As long as you’re okay…” He sent you a side glance. “A Kook party, though? Thought you didn’t do those, with the chance of running into him and all that…”

“Oh, you know me, just trying to broaden my horizons and find out how the one percent lives.” You snorted, set on ignoring his last sentence. “And they live pretty damn well. Heated pools, bathrooms bigger than my bedroom, and, not surprisingly, a whole lot of coke. Not gonna lie, might do just like you and get me a Kook. Is Sarah looking for another sugar baby?”

John B chuckled at your words, lightly punching you in the arm.

“Ha ha ha, Sarah is not my sugar mommy.”

“Of course, keep telling yourself that,” you laughed, playfully pulling at the collar of his shirt. “But I know good clothes when I see them, and I also know you can’t afford them, so…”

“Fine, this was a gift, okay?” He swatted your hand away, and his expression slowly returned to one of mild worry. “So, nothing happened, right? Was it a fun party? You do look like you had a good time…”

You couldn’t help but notice that it sounded more like a question than a statement, and you wondered if he could notice you had fucked his nemesis not even fifteen minutes ago. You shook the thoughts away; he couldn’t possibly know already and, hopefully, he never would.

You looked at him with a raised brow.

“Is this your attempt at an interrogation, cuz?”

He scoffed, but his ears started turning red. “Of course not, I’m just asking.”

“If you really want to know, yes, Rafe was there, and yes, he was an asshole the whole time. But I can’t resist a good fight where he’s involved, so what was I supposed to do? Leave?” You scoffed like it was a ridiculous option. “Someone got to slap that smug smirk off his face, and it might as well be me.”

“Damn right,” he laughed, the sound sounding forced. Then his brow furrowed, and his smile dropped. “Hmm… was he the guy that took your phone, by any chance?”

You froze, meeting his eye through the rearview mirrors.

“What?” you asked with an awkward chuckle. “What makes you say that?”

“Well, I was with Sarah when you called and she could swear it was her brother on the phone,” he clarified with a shrug. Then he hesitated, unsure of what to say before adding, “So, was he?”

“Yeah,” you confessed in a nonchalant tone. “He was just messing with me, though, nothing out of the ordinary for him.”

“Okay, cool, cool.” He paused for a moment, then spoke again, “He hasn’t been too bad, right? We all know what he’s capable of, and sometimes I just worry he will get too far. He always had this weird little obsession with fucking with you.” Oh, you have no idea, Bibi. “You know you can tell me and the guys if he ever crosses the line, right?”

“You got nothing to worry about, B,” you eased with a pat on his arm. “We both know he can’t hurt me anymore. Besides, I can fight.”

He laughed at your words, visibly relaxing, and you let out a deep sigh as he reached for the radio, Bob Marley’s voice filling the van with the lyrics of ‘Could You Be Loved’ and finally putting an end to this conversation.

«»«»«»«»«»

Working at The Island Club was usually a bearable affair. The money could be better, but the team was good, the hours weren’t bad, and the work – although exhaustive most days – was doable. The clients – mostly Kooks and tourists – weren’t that bad either and, more importantly, tipped well.

All in all, a job was a job, and you liked this one for the most part. You had mouths to feed and bills to pay after all, so it was not like you had a choice in the matter. You needed to work if you wanted to finally get into college sometime next year. You were thankful this job even let you have enough free time to focus on writing your novel.

However, today was turning into a rather hellish shift.

The party had been almost a week ago, and you had come to realize something.

Sleeping with Rafe Cameron had been a mistake. Not just a simple one, no – but a huge fucking mistake. One that would haunt you for the rest of your life (like a part of you knew it would). You could see that now. You had never regretted a stupid decision as much as you did at that moment, trying to do your job with the devil’s gaze burning your back.

To put it simply, your night together had changed something between you, while simultaneously changing nothing at all.

Rafe had barely said a word to you all week, but his heated stare as you professionally greeted him and Topper while setting their way-too-expensive prime ham sandwiches down on the table, said plenty. It was like he was expecting you to fall into his lap if he looked at you hard enough, blue gaze following your every move as you worked.

It was driving you crazy, and he knew it.

You had seen him almost every day since that Saturday night and, without fail, the blond made sure to make you as uneasy as he could until he either left or you clocked out.

And that wasn’t even the worst part.

People knew.

You hadn’t heard any rumors yourself and – by some miracle – neither John B nor any of his friends had mentioned it in any way. But you were aware that people knew if the hushed whispers of your and Rafe’s name said in the same sentence was any indication.

Like right now, you could feel the curious glances of the familiar-looking girls you were serving virgin margaritas to alternate between you and the men you had just served, their whispered giggles a good indication of what their conversation was about.

You didn’t dare turn, but you hoped that Rafe was keeping his eyes to himself right now; the last thing you needed was to make people even more curious about the both of you.

“Hey, Venus, can I ask you something?” Claire, one of the girls, asked in a conspiratorial whisper before giggling as she exchanged a look with her sister. The brunette didn’t wait for your answer before proceeding, “Is it true that you and Rafe Cameron had like… a thing at Allan’s party? Because we’ve heard some rumors…”

“I don’t know what–”

Does that mean you don’t hate each other anymore?” the other sister interrupted, nodding in Rafe’s direction just two tables away “Oh my God, are you guys dating?”.

“How is he in bed though?”

“Did you actually–”

“Okay, look, girls,” you said in a firm tone before any of them could utter another word. “I don’t know what you heard, but I’m glad to inform you that our mutual hate for each other is still very much alive. So, if that’s all…” you sent them a tight smile and moved to walk away. “Enjoy your drinks.”

You let out a deep sigh as you made a beeline for the kitchens, urging for a break and a cold glass of water. The kitchen was hot and loud, the sound of dishwashing machines and people talking just what you needed to zone out for a bit after the lunch hour rush, and this conversation that was about to give you an anxiety attack.

This was the first time anyone had actually asked you something about it, but you doubted it would be the last. The worst of it all was the fact that you were pretty sure that Rafe and his friend had heard every bit of that awkward convo, given their proximity and the girl’s apparent difficulty with speaking quietly.

You were on your second glass of water, leaning by a counter out of the way of the kitchen staff when the unthinkable happened.

“Hey, V.”

“Hey, JJ,” You greeted the blond boy back – still deep in your thoughts – as he leaned on the counter right beside you.

And that’s when he asked the forbidden question.

“Did something happen between you and Kook Prince out there?” he asked in a curious tone. “And I don’t mean you guys fighting – you do that all the time – I mean… you know… fucking.” As if his words weren’t enough, he added an obscene gesture as he said the word, his expression serious despite the question.

Your mouth dropped open in a scandalized scowl, the glass in your hand almost slipping from your fingers as the words registered.

If he knows, John B knows, was your immediate thought.

You fully turned to face JJ, his baby-blue eyes fixing you with a probing look that also seemed just a tad bit judgmental like it was actually his business who you were or weren’t fucking. But you knew that your sex life wasn’t the problem; who, specifically, was the problem. And you couldn’t really blame him, or anyone, for that; not when the who in question was Rafe fucking Cameron.

A beat passed where neither of you said a word, and you knew then that – didn’t matter whatever you said from now on – would be annulled by your initial silence. JJ had always been too perceptive for his own good, and you weren’t helping your case by just staring at him like a fish out of water.

But you still had to give it a try and save your remaining dignity; even if that meant lying with all your might.

-Excuse me?” you asked in your most offended tone, pinning him with a raised brow and a hand on your hip. “Do you even hear yourself? Do you really think that I would ever let a Kook – especially that one–- touch me like that?”

But JJ was harder to intimidate than most boys his age, and his eyes widened as he exclaimed in a tone loud enough to attract the kitchen staff’s attention: “Holy shit, are you fucking kidding me, is that a yes?! Did you and Cameron actually–”

You hurried to press a hand against his mouth, muffling his next words.

“Don’t. You. Dare,” you threatened, carefully intonating each word. “Say another word and you’ll never get a taste of my special brownies ever again. That’s a promise, JJ, I’ll make you regret it.”

His wide eyes relaxed, his surprised gaze turning into a playful one before you felt his tongue on your palm, making you drop it from his mouth with a sound of disgust followed by a slap on his shoulder.

“Ugh, you’re unbelievable! Where the hell did you even hear that, anyway?”

“So, you know the twins right – I had this thing with Claire, doesn’t matter now – but she just asked me if I knew anything about you and Cameron and no, I fucking did not! She told me people saw you fight and lock yourselves in a room. Like, what is that all about?”

“Those are rumors, and I’m honestly quite upset that you believe them.”

“Well, I didn’t until you looked at me like that,” he said, gesturing at you. “You always get wide-eyed when you’re lying. C’mon, you know you can tell me,” his expression turned deadly serious in an instant. “Did Rafe do anything to you? Did he–”

“Oh my god, JJ, no, Rafe didn’t hurt me or anything like what you’re thinking about, chill!”

“Oi!” A voice made you jump in place, and both yours and JJ’s gaze turned to the kitchen entrance where your boss stood, staring down at both of you with a raised brow. “I don’t pay you two to gossip around, get to work!”

“Yes, Raz, sorry!” you said, sending your boss an apologetic wave before turning to the blond. “Whatever you think you heard or saw, erase it from your mind, you understand? I’m serious, JJ. You don’t have to worry, okay?”

You went back to work after that, now under the gaze of not just Rafe – who was still following you with his eyes as he sipped on his drink – but also your cousin’s best friend, who alternated his watchful eye between you and the other man. This was exactly what you needed: just one more thing for you to worry about.

JJ would without a doubt tell John B, who would inevitably – and reasonably, if you were being honest with yourself – want to have a serious talk with you about it. If that happened, you would do what you always did when people got up in your business and shut that down. You loved them for caring about you, but you were as much a damsel in distress as they were your white knights.

But that was a problem for future you. Now you had orders to take and tables to clean and, fortunately, your shift was almost over.

A glance at your watch let you know that you only had to endure another forty minutes of work before you were free to go home and get back to that chapter you had been stuck at for some time.

You worked on autopilot, mind conjuring ideas to add to the plot line of your book as you filled a tray with empty glasses and beer bottles, so unaware of your surroundings that you didn’t even notice him approach.

“Hey, Venus.”

You jumped in place, your heart skipping a beat before you looked over your shoulder at Rafe Cameron, the Kook Prince himself. He was standing a few feet behind you, in some beige shorts and a dark blue polo shirt that clung to his torso just right, arms crossed at his chest. You tried not to think about his muscular arms, knowing damn well how strong he was and how they looked and felt around your naked body.

You quickly averted your eyes to his face, hoping that he would take the faint blush on your cheeks as just a consequence of working outside in the warm weather. He was staring at you with a satisfied little smile on his lips, like scaring you had made his day.

Asshole.

“Hey,” you greeted in a cold tone.

“How’re you doing?”

You took a moment to answer, filling the tray with the last of the glasses before turning to him, the full tray expertly balanced in your hand despite its weight.

“You know what?” you said as you walked by him to make your way inside, smiling to yourself as you heard him follow you; just like you knew he would. “I was having a nice day until I saw you walk in. After that, it got kinda shitty.”

“Bitchy today, aren’t we?” he said to your back, bite in his tone.

“With you? Always.”

“Been thinking about me when you touch yourself at night? Because I have.”

You set the tray on the bar counter with a little more strength than necessary, glasses and bottles clinking dangerously as you started to discard the bottles in the trash. It was, gladly, a slow day and there were no customers inside to hear your and Rafe’s conversation. The last thing you needed was for more people to wonder what was going on between you.

“Pig,” you spat at him.

“What, you don’t think of my cock inside you?” he asked, leaning closer to you. “Of my mouth on your tits? ‘Cause I do. All the fucking time.”

“So go fuck someone and leave me alone.”

“But I want you.”

“If only I cared.” Then you added, almost as an afterthought, “By the way, I’ve been spitting on all your drinks.” You sent him your best customer smile. “If you were wondering why they tasted sweeter..”

A moment passed where you just stared each other down, Rafe clearly annoyed, if the scowl on his face and the way he was sucking on the inside of his cheek was anything to go by. You were no stranger to that expression on his handsome face.

“You can be really fucking annoying, you know that?” he said, brows furrowing as you chuckled.

“That’s rich coming from you,” you retorted in a tone that clearly indicated you were done with the conversation, your boss watching you from outside making you nervous that he would think something of you two. You couldn’t lose this job. “Now, can you leave me alone, some of us actually have to work for a living, you know?”

You could feel his anger emanating from him in waves as you walked away, but you couldn’t care less. He was like a pampered little kid being denied an extra sweet, all pouty and red-faced because mommy wouldn’t give him what he wanted.

Someone had to make him understand that he couldn’t have every little thing his dark little heart desired.

«»«»«»«»«»

“So, are you gonna tell me what actually happened or nah?”

“Oh, my fucking God JJ, I swear to Jesus Chris– You can’t be here!”

It was finally the end of your shift, and you had really thought that your workday had come to an end until you walked into the locker room followed by none other than JJ, who had looked at you throughout the day like he wanted to keep talking about it. But you didn’t want to talk about it, thank you very much. You were more than glad to forget all about it.

But it was obvious that the blond had other ideas. At least he had waited for your coworker Ana to leave the room before getting in.

“Hey, hey, relax okay – no one will know I was here – plus, you can’t blame a guy for worrying. How could I hear about this and not ask you? I hear all kinds of crazy shit about you two all the time, but this one takes the cake.”

“Okay, so you can ask, and I can blame you for being an idiot asking idiot questions,” you said as you changed out of your uniform into a non-sweaty shirt. “Just mind your damn business, it’s as simple as that.” You grimaced at your words, before adding, now in a softer tone, “You got nothing to be freaking out about, okay?”

He sat down on a bench with his back to you as you changed, foot tapping on the floor in what you knew was one of his nervous tics. It almost made you feel bad for worrying him. JJ meant well, and you knew that.

You ruffled his hair as you passed by him to watch yourself in the mirror by the sink, freeing your hair from its ponytail before massaging your scalp with a sigh of contentment.

“So, you’re telling me you’re good… right?” he asked, your eyes locking through the reflection. “All is good?

“All is good,” you repeated with a faint smile at his reflection as you passed your wrists under a cold stream of water.

“John B will freak out when he hears about this.”

“Oh, please,” you grunted, turning off the faucet and crossing your arms as you leaned against the sink. “Like he’s one to talk…”

If your cousin could date Sarah Cameron – a super sweet girl who was nothing like her brother, you would give her that – then you could fuck Rafe Cameron in what was a single occasion of drunk and horny impulsivity.

“What?”

“He won’t freak out because there’s no reason to freak out,” you said like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “And even if there was – which there isn’t – is none of your business whom I sleep with or not. I’m older than all of you, so who the hell are you to scold me like I’m some little girl?”

“I just think it’s weird, that’s all,” JJ said with a shrug. “After everything he did to you, why would you even – why would he –” he interrupted himself, shaking his head. “Nah, you know what, you’re right, it’s none of my business.”

Was that… bitterness in his eyes? It almost made you throw your hands up in the sky in frustration.

You didn’t need anyone to look at you with anger, judgment, pity, or anything resembling those emotions. You weren’t a scared little girl anymore and Rafe wasn’t the big bad wolf. Your decisions – even if you regretted them – had been your own.

“Don’t you dare look at me like that,” you grumbled in a threatening tone, finger pointed at him as you stepped closer.

JJ didn’t look the smallest bit intimidated as he looked up at you, mouth set in a straight line like he was forcing himself to not say anything else that would upset you. Then, his lips curved into a tight smile, and he stood up with a sigh.

“Well, I gotta go so…” he muttered, nodding at you as he squeezed your shoulder for a quick moment before walking towards the door. “Guess I’ll see you tomorrow then, yeah?”

“Yeah, you will,” you confirmed with a sigh, accepting the change of subject like it was some kind of truce between you. “Goodbye, JJ.”

«»«»«»«»«»

Walking home after work was like a meditation of sorts. You would put on your earphones, shutting off the world around you before pressing play on your favorite playlist, letting your thoughts wander as you walked the few miles to the home where you lived with your family.

You glanced at your old leather wristwatch, checking the time through its lightly cracked screen. It was a little past six in the afternoon, and the sun would set soon. At this hour, your brother David would probably be sitting at the kitchen table finishing his homework, while little Kevin watched cartoons in the living room and your mother finished cooking dinner, everyone waiting for your arrival so you could enjoy a meal together.

Being home with your family after a tiring day of work was both a pleasant and chaotic experience, but you loved it all the same.

You took a deep breath of the late afternoon air, the nice sea breeze filling your lungs and cooling down your sweaty skin. It made you want to go to the beach; you missed swimming. Surfing had never been your thing, but being in the ocean, moving your body in tune with the currents and the waves, made you feel a special kind of peace. Or used to, anyway. You had barely set foot in salt water since you were fifteen years old.

With a sigh, you ignored the path that led you to the beach and continued walking home.

You were more than halfway there when a strange feeling took over you. It was an all too familiar suspicion; like you were being watched. Taking the earpiece from your right ear, you listened attentively, head slightly tilted. The sound of wheels rolling on gravel and the rumble of a motor made you sure of it:

You were being followed.

With a glance over your shoulder, you saw a black truck, eyes going wide as you halted and fully turned around, recognizing the vehicle.

“So, you’re a stalker now?” you said loud and clear, hands on your hips as you stared down at the driver’s tinted window.

As you expected, the car stopped right beside you, the window sliding down with a smooth electric sound to reveal none other than Rafe Cameron.

Shocking.

“Just wanted to offer you a ride home, that’s all,” he said with a nod at the passenger seat like he was telling you to get in.

He stared at you with a look you couldn’t quite decipher, those blue eyes of his pinning you down like he was challenging you to a fight, to say something that would inevitably escalate – as all your conversations did. Which, being who he was and who you were, was most likely the right interpretation.

“Right,” you said with a pronounced eye roll. “And the best way to do that is following me like you’re some damn kidnapper. What next, should I wait for you to gag me and throw me in the trunk?”

His lips twitched at that, and he averted his eyes with a sniff before looking at you again.

“Don’t be giving me any ideas…”

He said it in a playful tone, but his narrowed gaze could be described as anything but playful. It instantly made you regret your words. It was not that you thought he would actually kidnap you but, when it came to Rafe Cameron, nothing was out of the realm of possibility.

You looked up and down the street, noticing how empty your surroundings looked with no one in sight, either on the road or on the sidewalk. There were houses ahead though, so if he tried something you would make sure to show him how piercing your high notes could be when you felt the need for them.

“Relax,” Rafe said, most likely noticing your tense shoulders and your wandering gaze. “I’m not thinking about doing any kidnapping today.” Today. “Just wanted to give you a ride, that’s all.”

“Yeah sure, like I would fall for that. What do you really want, Rafe?”

The telltale signs that showed his growing irritation manifested themselves in the flush of his cheeks and the furrowing of his blond eyebrows, which always made his blue eyes look darker and threatening. Most people feared Rafe and his temperament, but you were more than desensitized at this point.

“Haven’t I made it clear enough?” he asked in an even tone that clearly didn’t match his emotions.

“As much as I’ve made it clear that I don’t want anything else to do with you.”

You took notice as his hands tightened around the steering wheel.

“And why not?” he asked, almost indignant like he couldn’t possibly understand you and your constant refusal of his request. “I’m not asking you to marry me, just to have fun once in a while. I had a good time, you had a good time… so, what’s really stopping you from saying ‘Yes’?”

“You know what.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, please tell me it’s not–”

“Okay, shut up and listen!” You raised your hand to stop him, feeling your temper get the better of you. “This might be news to you, but you really made my life hell in high school. I was a teenage girl with no friends, going through hell, and you just came out of nowhere to make it all so much worse. Unprovoked! Do you think that’s easy for me to just forget? To throw all those years you hurt me behind my back just because – what – you suddenly realized you want to fuck me? Your feelings about me change nothing when I’ve hated you for so long.” You let out a deep sigh. “And that feeling really hasn’t diminished over the years.”

“You say you hate me, but you still fucked me,” he asked eyes narrowed as he locked under his hard gaze. “So, what does that say about you?”

“It says I make mistakes,” you retorted, shaking your head at his words. “One of my biggest regrets in life, if I’m being honest.”

Hurt flashed in his eyes, his jaw clenching as he averted his gaze, and for a moment you didn’t know if you should feel vindicated or sorrowful. It all mixed in an uncomfortable knot in your stomach.

A moment passed, and you were about to walk away when he spoke again.

“I said I was sorry, didn’t I?”

You scoffed, shaking your head at the simplicity of his words. You knew Rafe was far from stupid, but the way he was being obtuse made you wonder.

“And you think that apologizing like you’re doing changes things? After what you’ve done to me?” you bit your lip, feeling your eyes sting as an unwelcome memory resurfaced. “Do you remember what you did to me when my father died?”

Silence. Rafe said nothing, avoiding your gaze as he stared at his hands, knuckles whitening as his grip on the wheel tightened, the leather scratching under his palms.

“Do you even remember?” you pressed him on, slowly stepping towards the car until you were so close you could touch the door. “Do you remember how cruel you were? My father died, I almost died, and you still thought it was funny to tell me that I was the one who drowned him. That it was all my fault. Your stupid jokes… I almost believed it.”

“That–” He hesitated, glancing at you for a split second before looking away again. “I shouldn’t have– I know I shouldn’t have–”

“But that didn’t stop you, did it?” you asked, voice wavering as you tried not to cry; not in front of him. “You saw me going through the worst chapter in my life, and you still decided to make me miserable. Honestly… I’m not sure who hates each other more, but if your father died I wouldn’t be making jokes about it or blaming you for his death, that’s for sure. When your–” you stopped yourself before you mentioned his mother, avoiding his gaze as his brows raised. A part of you really wanted to hurt him back, but that was not a can of worms you wanted to go near.

You moved away from the car instead, sniffling as you tried to ignore the lump in your throat. You were about to walk away when Rafe called your name, a slight tremor in his voice.

“I’ll make it up to you. Let me–”

“Nah, don’t bother.” You didn’t even turn to him as you started walking away, feeling suddenly more exhausted than you had been ten minutes ago. “I’m not about to take part in your redemption arc just because you feel bad. That’s something between you, God, and a therapist.”

Without another word, you put on your earpiece, turned up the volume of your phone to the max, and pressed play, rushing to get home and forgetting that this conversation ever happened.

«»«»«»«»«»

Part 3 ->

[irisintheafterglow]

End Game #8 (volleyball captain!gojo x you)

summary: you accompany the captain at a party on the gojo estate and he can't be serious for a single second.

wc: 2.1k

cw/tags: swearing, domestic satoru, creepy old men and therefore protective satoru, no specified gender but reader is wearing a dress, passive-aggressive insults because he's never serious ever, a tiny tiny bit of angst but lots of fluff, established relationship (i never get tired of tagging this)

note: there's no volleyball game play in this, just captain!satoru being captain boyfriend!satoru. also i'm literally creating a multiverse of characters in this au cuz there's like the gojo partner but then also the geto partner and soon i wanna make the inumaki partner and yeah i could talk about this for HOURS but ANYWAY hope you enjoy

likes, reblogs, and feedback are always appreciated <3

An infuriatingly obnoxious loop of “Get up, stupid, or I’ll hit you with my car!” invades your sleep and your hand flops aimlessly to turn your phone off. 

You prop yourself on an elbow, checking the clock on the nightstand and groaning when you see the time. “Satoru,” you say softly, but you’re met with a half-asleep grunt from the other occupant of the bed. The entire right side of his face is sunk into the sheets and his arm is still draped over your torso. He’d never looked more handsome, you thought, taking in the messy strands of white hair on the pillows and his limbs entangled with yours. You pat him gently, trying to crawl out from the blankets. “We have to get up now.”

“No, we don’t,” he mutters into bed, pulling you back down beside him onto the mattress effortlessly. With his chest to your back, he sighs deeply onto your neck and you fiddle with his fingers resting near your stomach. His body tended to run warm and the room smelled so much like him that you wanted to lay in it for the rest of time. You flip to face him and aren’t surprised to see him still burrowing into the plush covers. For once, his eyes weren’t the most prominent feature of his face; now, your finger traces the sharp angles under his chin and he smirks, eyelids still shut. “Like what you see?”

“Mhmm, very pretty.” A single finger becomes the rest of your hand as you comb some loose strands from his face, only for them to fall right back onto his forehead. He hums when you continue to run your fingers over his scalp all the way down to the hair on the back of his neck. Fuck, he’s so beautiful.

“Not as pretty as you, though.” A bright blue eye finally winks open and you smile. “Good morning, gorgeous.”

“Good morning, menace,” you tease and his jaw drops in fake-offense. “Time to get dressed.” 

“But I like when you wear my stuff instead.” His gaze flicks down to your torso, covered by one of his older, softer shirts from a summer intensive camp. “Stay a little longer.  I like looking at you.”

“The last thing we need is for your parents to come looking for you and see us laying in bed together.” His eyes widen and he abruptly shoots out from under the comforter, leaving you laughing on his pillows as he searches around his closet for his formal clothes. “Would you mind getting my–”

“Already on it, sweetheart,” he calls from behind the bathroom door, slinging the garment bag over his shoulder. “You know, honestly, it’s starting to hurt a little bit when you think I can’t read your mind.” 

“Forgive me for not expecting you to be thinking of me all the time, then.” Your eyebrow arches challengingly and he hangs your dress on the top of the mirror before peeling off his shirt. To your horror, you have to stop yourself from drooling. 

“I accept your apology. And, for the record, you’re the only thing on my mind. All the time.” He shoots you your favorite lopsided grin of his and you stare at him like a love-sick idiot. Despite harboring feelings for him for the past three years and finally establishing a relationship, you still felt a level of embarrassment seeing his bare chest. It was different from when he was changing with the rest of the team; now, every inch of lean muscle honed over years and years of training was on display for you and only you. He catches you staring from your gaping silence. “You’re being a hypocrite, my love.” The patronizing note in his voice snaps you out of your adoration. 

“What do you mean?”

“You tell me to get up and then stay in bed to ogle me. It’s not fair, and a bit perverted.” He shrugs, tugging on a white button-up and black slacks. You scoff and throw a pillow at him, indignantly kicking off the blankets and making your way to unzip the garment bag. 

“Your dad is going to kill us both if we’re late and you take longer than I do to get ready. I’d say it’s fair I gave you a head start.” You blow him a kiss before slipping into the bathroom to change. 

As predicted, Satoru ended up taking longer than you did to get dressed. Though he was already in his proper attire while you were still in your lounge clothes, it took the entire time you were in the bathroom for him to decide on a tie. In the end, he forgoes the tie altogether and you self-servingly undo some of the buttons of his shirt while his eyes rake over you in your dress. It was a deep shade of purple with a generous amount of skin exposed, something he picked out with you when he first asked you to be his date. 

“Do you like it?” He asks, even though you left him speechless when you first walked out of the dressing room. He had to bend forward to rest his elbows on his knees just to keep his lungs functioning. 

“Like it? I fucking live for it,” you breathe, spinning around in front of the mirror again and again to watch the fabric billow beneath you. It was incredibly flattering on your figure as well as easy to maneuver in. You looked incredible in it, but your face falls as a realization dawns on you. “Is it too much, you know–” He doesn’t miss a beat. 

“Did I tell you that I beat my deadlift PR yesterday?” 

“Baby, what does that have to do with the dress?” His eyes flick to your shoulders and then back to your face, raising his eyebrows expectantly like a teacher waiting for an answer. “Oh.” The smile makes its way back onto your expression and you admire yourself once more, no longer worried about any snide remarks or lingering stares with the foreboding guard at your back. 

“This dress was definitely a good choice,” he whispers in your ear as his hand guides you through the crowded entryway. “But, if anyone starts to agree with me, I’m gonna send them to kingdom come.”

“You always had a flair for drama.”

“That's why you fell for me, isn’t it?” You shake your head in lighthearted exasperation. As more people continue to invade your space, Satoru is behind you like a shadow, mirroring your every movement and never straying too far. “Take a right. I don’t wanna deal with the brass.” You steer clear of the boisterously laughing group of men immediately in front of you, but it’s too late. They spotted Satoru first, making him grimace, and then they spotted you. Before they can surround you further, he’s stepped in front of you to effectively block you from the leering stares of the men twice your age. 

“If it isn’t the crown prince of Jujutsu Volleyball,” one of them, a square-faced man with nauseatingly intense eyes, remarks coldly. “Shall we expect your absence from Nationals for yet another year?” Your temper flares and you’re about ready to rip out the man’s throat, but Satoru continues to appear calm and indifferent to the insults. 

“Hmm, I wasn’t aware they were allowing retirees into the building, let alone those who’ve already picked out their tombstone. Should I have the maid mark the calendar for your Celebration of Life?” Unconsciously, your hand finds his shoulder as if to warn him against any more biting words. He was being particularly ruthless tonight and you couldn’t help but think it was because you were there, too. 

“Watch your tongue, boy. You forget I control your team.” 

“Oh, I didn’t forget.” His hand flexes, curling into a fist and then opening again. He definitely wasn’t kidding about beating his PR deadlift. “I just don’t care.” The men stiffen at the blatant dismissal. Unable to squeeze any shred of entertainment from Satoru, their attention turns to you. 

“And who’s this?”

“None of your business, that’s who,” your boyfriend states casually, but the underlying threat in his voice was evident. His fingers continue to curl and uncurl and you take hold of his wrist, rubbing your thumb into his palm. With your other hand, you snag a glass of punch from a nearby server’s tray. You knew it took everything in Satoru’s body to remain cordial, to not raise his lip in a snarl or slam the man’s head into the tile beneath your shoes. Of course, he had his own way of fighting without violence. His eyes narrow for a nanosecond before he puts on a nauseatingly fake grin of celebration. “Congratulations, by the way, on your new girlfriend.”

“What the hell do you think–”

“Maybe our respective partners can go on a daytrip sometime, seeing as they’re the same age,” he smiles maliciously and you just about choke on your drink. He’s turned to you with exaggerated concern in an instant, unable to keep the smirk from creeping onto his face as he rubs your back. The group of men are stunned and the square-faced one has turned a vibrant shade of red. Satoru, on the other hand, radiates triumphant self-satisfaction while he re-establishes his hand on your back. “Good to see you.” 

You aren’t bothered for the remainder of the evening, most likely from fear of the six-foot, lanky-legged bodyguard attached to your hip. Suguru arrives shortly after your confrontation with the higher-ups and your eyebrows hit the ceiling when you see the student council vice president on his arm. You unabashedly gawk when they enter and direct Satoru’s attention to his best friend. He looks at you in disbelief, back at Suguru, and then back at you. Several times, you accidentally step on his feet while you’re dancing in the middle of the floor. 

“Since when did Suguru have game?” You’re physically unable to wipe the expression of shock from your face. 

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Satoru whispers back over the sound of classical strings. You both crane your necks to follow the pair’s movement around the room like hawks. The vice-captain must feel your stares on the back of his head and he flips you both the bird when his date isn’t looking. Neither of you are deterred in the slightest. “At least he’s still Suguru.”

“That is not a pair that I saw coming.” 

“To be fair,” he shrugs, “neither are we.”

At 10:00, Satoru’s father announces himself at the top of the staircase in the foyer for several toasts and it takes all of your willpower not to roll your eyes. You cringe inwardly when he gestures to Satoru, whose nose scrunches in disgust at the shallow praise that was, really, all for show. There’s applause and flimsy well-wishes, but by 11:00, you’re confessing that you’re socially drained for the night and you’re back in his clothes half an hour later. 

“We’ve done a lot of stupid things, but I think that party was one of the stupidest,” he declares as he flops onto his bed next to you. You hum in tired agreement and snuggle further into his blankets.

“Stupider than putting a fake cockroach in the changing room and scaring the hell out of everyone?”

“It’s definitely up there. Kinji was truly out of his mind for that one.” You huff a quiet laugh against his chest, relishing in how easily his arms slip around you and pull you flush against his body. “You look hot as shit in that, by the way,” he murmurs into your ear. He nods to the alternate version of the team’s jersey covering your body, a muted shade of purple with black sleeves. It’s the same uniform he’d be wearing in a few days' time when you step into the bright lights of the city stadium, and the same one you hope to wear after he wins every team he plays against. 

“You’re gonna smell like my body wash during Nationals if you don’t wash this, Satoru.”

“That’s kind of the point, dear.” You snort and close your eyes while he presses kisses to your hairline.

“What, are you going to war or something? I’m gonna be right there with you the entire time.” Your mouth widens into a yawn and you struggle to keep your eyes open. 

“I hope you’re right there with me beyond that, too.” His voice is so low, it’s barely audible, but you hear it and make a promise in your heart to fulfill his wish. He was recently contacted for Olympic team tryouts, but the future after your last high school tournament was relatively a mystery. For now, you settle into his chest and inhale him again. 

“You can’t get rid of me now that you’ve got me, Satoru.”

“Promise?”

“On all the red asters I’m gonna grow in our garden.” It’s the last thing you remember saying before drifting back to sleep. 

Sure, he belonged to volleyball, but he belonged to you first.

aLSO CHECK OUT THIS GORGEOUS FUCKIGN ARTWORK FROM @mididoodles

[suzyandthefox]

Clarification, Apologies,A word for the community, and Blog Updates..

On 31st of July, around a week ago, A situation involving some users, myself included, happened, causing me to go on a temporary hiatus for a week, as it was handled indelicately and caused a lot of harm to users who never asked to be a part of it.

For the sake of privacy and not stirring the pot again, I will not name any of the users.

I should clarify that English is not my first language, so there might be grammatical mistakes in this.

TLDR: I was careless and I reblogged from NSFW blogs not knowing they were NSFW blogs, causing harassment to other members of the community. I have deleted these reblogs and I decided to not reblog anything on this blog for the safety of everyone.

Elaboration under break:

It started when an user, who I will not name, made a callout post about me. They screenshotted reblogs I made, and while I still believe that that user fully intended to cause drama instead of addressing any real issue, they were right in calling my mistakes out.

Throughout several months, I have reblogged from NSFW accs, even though I have a bold NSFW DNI on the top of my blog. I have also reblogged from an MDNI account multiple times despite having minors on my blog, endangering both parties.

I have since blocked these accounts and deleted these reblogs. However,that doesn't undo the damage I already did.

I know I have problems with many social skills, like social cues and etiquette. I do have Autism and ADHD after all. This led to, when I was reblogging things that I found cool, me accidentally missing many of the signs that most would have seen. I didn't realize what was happening until someone told me.

At the moment of the discourse, this blog had 194 followers (202 as I write this). In any other social media platform, this number means you're basically invisible, and so that's the logic I went with. I thought nobody saw this blog so I was lenient with my content, treating this blog as my personal shitposting place.

However, after this discourse,I realized that I am being seen on Tumblr. That unfortunately was at the cost of accidentally hurting innocent users who never asked to be a part of this, along with ruining my mental health for a while.

There have been kind hearted users who defended me, and users who told me that I am being looked up to and that I am a well respected member of the community, which is something I will remember for the rest of my life.

What I am trying to say is, I fucked up. Badly. Yet despite that, the community has given me a second chance, proven by the fact that I wasn't blocked or unfollowed (Quite the opposite actually)

I now understand the responsibility that I have and that I need to be very careful with what I post, especially since I have made the choice to let minors interact with this blog. I now understand I must look after them because of that.

I apologize so much for everyone that has been hurt by this. I won't ask for forgiveness. I only ask that everyone knows that I have acknowledged my mistakes and I promise to better myself in the future.

I am a human and I make mistakes, please don't ever be afraid to tell me when I do something wrong. (Tell me, by messaging or commenting. Please not by making a call out post on me, since this has proven to hurt more than help others.)

I made this blog to be a safe place to enjoy a certain trope without getting hurt, and I want to live up to that. For the safety of everyone, me included, I will make some changes to this blog.

Changes:

1: No more reblogs

This blog was handled indelicately, and unprofessionally, and I decided that I will change that, I will make this blog into an Art/Writing blog first and foremost, With prompt posts being a second priority.

The only exception to this will be fanworks or fanfics or things that are directly made for me/things I am mentioned in, I will tag them accordingly depending on content.

2: This blog is now +16

Yes, I interacted with users younger than 16 before, Yes,I have followers who are less than 16. I have thought about it deeply and I realized that for the sake of not hurting anyone, and if I wanted to be more comfortable around this blog, then I need to keep people who are slightly closer to my age range, Instead of censoring myself,

that's because I have taken a liking to (Nonsexual) fatal vore and gore, I want to make similar content in the future, as well as other darker topics.

I will not block anyone who is younger than 16, but I will not directly interact with you anymore, even if I'm not responsible for your actions, it's just to be safe.

Now I need to make some things clear:

I am not a minor so I can interact with MDNI blogs and they can interact if they wish to. As long as they're SFW

But, again, I will not reblog from them for the safety of those who are minors following my blog.

Vore is nonsexual for me and I don't want my work to be sexualised, especially because I depict myself in it.

I have absolutely nothing against people who are into it sexually, I just don't want my work in these circles.

I can't control how my work is perceived and where it goes, however my blog is SFW (In the sense that there's nothing graphic or sexual on it), meant for people who are also interested in that content, and so I don't want to see people who think it's “hot” here.

I am not responsible for anyone's actions on this blog, I am not responsible for people who find my content weird or sexual or whatever,I am not responsible for the minors on this blog, I am not responsible for my mutuals, I am only responsible for my own actions.

This community has been extremely supportive of me, and there have been people who comforted me during this whole situation, without them I probably would've deleted my blog from sheer panic.

I owe these people my life, thank you so much for being on my side.

I hope that one day, my blog can be a source of comfort too.

Thank you for reading and I hope you guys have a wonderful day!

[sweetcarrotsandroses97]

His Flower | KTH

Pairing: Yandere! Vampire! Taehyung x Fem! Reader

Summary: You thought you had met your soulmate in the most cute and cliché way you could possible could. But when Taehyung revealed his true identity to you, he did something you couldn't forgive him for. But that didn't stop him from making you stay with him forever.

Word Count: 1.8k

A/N: Hello, everyone! I really hope you will like this small and dark drabble. I'll be posting more content soon, promise! Let me know what you thought of this in the comments, please!

*A/N: I don't own Taehyung's picture on the banner. Credits to the author. I only used it for the banner, that's all.

**A/N: If you'd like to be tagged in my next post, let me know! I will create separate taglists as I post more things in here.

Warnings: yandere! taehyung, angst, manipulation, possessiveness, kidnapping, marking (?), blood, biting (obviously), forced stay, fear, more angst, let me know if I missed anything!

*I do not condone the activities done in this fic to be done in real life nor do I think any of the members would ever do something like this. This is a work of fiction and does not, at any point, have to do with any person in real life, this is just for fun.

Likes, comments & reblogs are really appreciated!!!

Your gaze was locked on the little snowflakes that fell from the dark sky. Your arms were wrapped around yourself, trying to keep the cold away as your eyes were lost in the distance, mind already gone back with memories of your past.

A shiver travelled down your spine when you heard the sound of footsteps approaching from the hallway. You knew it couldn't be good. You hadn't felt at ease with him in the same room as you since you arrived at this place.

His home.

"Flower, you've been here all day. Join me for dinner."

You knew he was standing close to the entrance way as his voice didn't sound as close as you expected it to be. You didn't turn around, not wanting to have this conversation, not wanting to speak with him. The man who had selfishly taken you for his own pleasures. The man who kept you trapped, chained to him.

"I'm not hungry."

Was your answer. Voice flat and your eyes remained locked on the falling snowflakes.

At least they are free.

You heard him sigh deeply only for then for him to approach you. You felt him. Felt his gaze trained on your body, his aura surrounding your soul, his scent invading your senses. Like before, where you even brought him a nice perfume.

Don't go there.

You thought. Eyes glossy with the remnants of your memories that now seemed to be so far away from your reach. As if they happened years ago. Perhaps they were.

"You haven't eaten at all today."

"Yet I still am not hungry."

He sighed again. His red eyes running all over your features, trying to decipher your thoughts. As if that was something his kind could do.

"Don't be so stubborn, you need to eat. You live here so that I can take care of you."

Those words were the snapping cord for you. Did he really think you were doing him a favour? Did he think you were here by choice? that you were enjoying it?

"Because you took me here and won't let me go. That's why I'm living here. I never wanted this, Taehyung!"

You raised your voice with the last sentence. He was getting on your nerves. The little spark of chemistry that was going on between you both was extinguished by him when he took you. Stole you from your life.

(e/c) met red in a dancing storm of emotions as you turned to look at him. You saw his gaze changed from his sickening care to a swirling storm of anger, desperation and rage.

"I did it to protect you! To protect us! You know, (y/n), you know better than anyone that to society we are monsters. I am a monster."

Tears began gathering in your eyes. But they weren't because you were sad. They were because of your anger. Of your hate.

"That's not true. And even if it was, you didn't have to trick me like you did. You didn't have to lie to me."

Taehyung let out a dry chuckle, his red irises roaming around the large library before they returned to look at you.

"I was starting to like you, Tae. To really like you."

The nickname flew out of your lips so naturally that it almost gave him a spark of hope. His heart skipped a beat, you hadn't called him "Tae" in a long time. Not since he took you and revealed his true identity. Revealed his secret. His nature to you.

It seemed to have passed ages ago when you met for the first time in that small library where you tried to reach a book on a higher shelf and he had grabbed it for you. Placing it in your hands with a warm smile.

What happened next between the two of you was a muddy concoction of memories and emotions. Of smiles and shared experiences. Of cute dates and future places. You even got to the point of thinking that perhaps he was the one for you.

"Don't you like me anymore?"

His question brought you back from your thoughts. From your sweet memories and your naïve past self who had fallen into his trap without resistance at all.

You looked at him with a straight face. No emotion at all marked your beautiful features as you stared at him with empty eyes.

"I hate you."

Taehyung felt as if someone had stabbed him in the heart. Even a stab wound would have hurt less than your words. Has he not shown you how much you mean to him? Had he not been there for you? Cared for you? Loved you enough?

"I hate you with every ounce of me."

His eyes closed, jaw clenching as the venom of your words dripped into his wounded heart.

"You don't mean that. You are just angry. You are being ungrateful, (y/n)!"

You scoffed, taking a step back. The tears in your eyes began rolling down your cheeks in utter desperation.

"Ungrateful?! I can't leave this place, Taehyung! You are forcing me to be here! You don't have the slightest idea of how much my freedom meant to me and you just took it. I don't belong to you, I don't belong to anyone. So yes, I am angry. I hate you with all my being but don't you dare call me ungrateful for something you took from me!"

You didn't leave room for any more discussions as you turned around and left the large library, going back to the room that Taehyung assigned to you in his mansion. The room you were going to have to call home sooner or later.

Taehyung watched you go. His heart twisted with the remnants of your words yet his mind was proud of himself for taking you, keeping you and protecting you. Even if you didn't see it that way.

In his perspective, you just didn't understand how he and you wouldn't be able to be together where society saw his kind in a lower level.

But he didn't ask for it. He never was given the option of becoming what he was now. How people would refer to him as a vampire. He never wanted to become a monster and even less in your eyes.

He was keeping you safe in a place where you both would be able to be together and happy.

You just couldn't see it that way.

To you, he had taken you, kidnapped you out of selfishness. You didn't care what he was. To you, the uneasiness he felt when he revealed his true persona to you was strange. You didn't care. You wouldn't have cared if he hadn't been selfish, if he had thought about how to solve it out instead of acting on impulse.

That was how you found yourself there. In his big and beautiful mansion. You became an item of decoration to him. A gem he had to preserve. A rose he had to garden. His flower.

You didn't go downstairs for dinner. Taehyung didn't see you again that evening. Now, it was dark outside. A snowstorm racked through the beautiful gardens of his mansion yet inside it was quiet. Only the cracking of the fireplace in the dining hall could be heard, where the handsome vampire sat at the end of the large table, a glass of wine in his hand.

Taehyung knew there wasn't a way he'd be able to convince you that what he did was the right thing. Your mind has been corrupted by society. Or so he thought. There was only one way you wouldn't try to escape from him, run away from his protection and love.

It was the only way to keep you safe.

To keep you with him.

"I'm doing it for you, flower."

Those whispered words got carried by the wind as he set the glass down and stood up, walking towards your bedroom as his shadow enlarged into one of the walls as he stepped further and further into the darkness of the mansion.

His steps were precise. His red eyes looked forward. His jaw clenched. The door to your room opened without a noise. Taehyung was able to walk around your bed until he stood next to your lying position on the comfortable mattress.

The moonlight illuminated his crimson irises as he watched you sleep. A primal instinct setting at the bottom of his chest. Sitting down next to you on the bed, his eyes roamed all over your figure. His large hand caresses your cheek softly as his fangs reveal themselves with his murmured words.

"You will understand why I'm doing this, flower of mine. It is the only way."

The quiet murmur of his deep voice resonated along the tall walls of your room. Taehyung looked down on your exposed neck and before he could think it twice, he bent down to you. The sweet smell of your skin invaded his senses, pupils dilating as his pulse accelerated.

He sunk his fangs in the delicate skin of your neck, the taste of your blood was even better than what he had fantasised about. He became addicted. Addicted to you.

The pain increased and you woke up. Pushing with all your strength at his shoulders as whimpers left your lips.

"Please, don't. Stop it."

But your cries of desperation fell on deaf ears. He continued to suck your blood while his own poison got into your system and travelled through your veins. You were going to become like him. An eternal being forced to live on this earth. Forever.

By his side.

In that moment, you knew you were never going to escape him. You were chained to him now in a different way. Tangled in a web of time. You became his in that exact moment. His love. His to keep.

Taehyung knew it was the only way of keeping you by his side. You would learn to love him. Learn to live the way he had for centuries. And he was willing to wait for your heart to accept him. He had lived in a dark emptiness for so long, he could endure it again with the promise of your love and devotion as the final reward.

You were his. In more ways than before. Bounded by a created fate in an eternal timeline traced with blood.

You became more to him than he had ever wished. And as the sweet taste of your blood invaded his mouth, he promised to keep you with him. To keep you safe as you were, and would always be, his precious flower to protect in an eternity tainted in crimson blood.

May 20/2023

~Masterlist

Likes, comments & reblogs are really appreciated!!!

☕Caffeinate me so I can keep on writing! ☕

[exorcqism]

❛ THE DESIRE DISEASE — 欲望

choso x f!reader ﾉ MDNI

𑂻𑂴 summary. ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ𓂃ㅤ choso finally has a feeling of want, need, and deep desire..

𑂻𑂴 tags. ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ𓂃ㅤ choso (still a cursed spirit), modern AU, nsfw, female anatomy, mentions of abuse, smoking, possible sexual content, mentions of murder/suicide, canon/modern lore mixes, obsession, etc.

𑂻𑂴 a/n. ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ𓂃ㅤ new layoutttt :) but this story MIGHT be a series. if ya like it i’ll keep going. reblog to support meeee and enjoy :D (if i decide that this should be a series, pls lmk if you wanna be tagged) (and don’t steal this plot or i’ll find you.)

𑂻𑂴 misc. ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ𓂃ㅤ masterlist ,, AO3 — dark mode recommended. WC — 2.23K

humans have a complex mind. they can never make up their minds about anything. their wants and needs consistently change periodically and they go with whatever suits them. they may need food, a drink, new clothes or shoes just to be stylish for the occasion.

they also crave attention, drugs, money, and sex. this is what we would call the desire disease. a compelling disease that plunges you into the dark depths of life, pushing you to do the unimaginable but most important thing in your personal perspective at that moment. your impulses. those odd and horrible thoughts that cross your mind in the middle of the night, suddenly being acted on in broad daylight.

such disease develops in all living beings fairly quickly. they see what they want, they have fantasies of having such thing, they act, and receive. if one does not receive their desire, they will push extremities to have what they desire. there are four stages of this disease.

exposure, isolation, consumption, obsession.

one can jump immediately from stage one to stage four in the matter of months…days…hours…minutes….seconds.

giving in to your desires leads to infection. turning away from your desires means you have been cured. no one is ever cured, unfortunately.

choso never had a want for anything. as long as he was treated well, he didn’t mind the horrors of being so-called human and being accustomed to their ways of life. the boy could never hate anyone, for he feared being hated by everyone.

there was only one person that he had a deep hatred for. the one responsible for giving him such a terrible life. the one that took his mother from him, who he barely knew. no memories existed of this woman…but he loved her.

he’d make a vow to himself to kill his father when he was able to find him after he was left behind to live on his own. his father’s death was brutal…but it was hard to fight against the man that cared nothing for him and his brothers. it drove choso to insanity when he figured out that a young boy named yuji itadori was his brother…and his father tricked him into killing him. the male was lucky to realize this before yuji died.

bloody clothes, bloody shoes, and an apathetic expression. each step he took, there was an unsettling squelching noise while his father lied on the hardwood floor, dead.

but he left a message…signed in his own crimson fluid.

“i’ve made many mistakes growing into this body i was given. though, my words cannot express how grateful i am to be in a vessel like this…my words also cannot express how much hatred i feel for you. i’ve bent to your will before many times, unknowing of who you truly were…then i figured you out. you’ve ruined my life…so i took yours. you’ve made me capable of such power—that is what i am thankful for. but i will never forgive you for the hell i’ve been forced to endure because of your actions. if i should meet you again, i hope you die rougher than you had when i killed you. if i should cry, i cry for my mother. not you. i cannot form an apology or sympathy for you but i shall give you a goodbye and give you the gift of exposure. you wanted the attention, right?”

not that he ever craved the idea of murder, he seemed somewhat relaxed that day when he believed that he was free from the prison he called home once before. it would be considered odd behavior among humans and he’d be accused for the death of someone…but he knew he’d be full on guilty. he should’ve made it look like a suicide. he’s seen murders look like that in movies.

he’d travel to the bathroom, cleaning himself off and changing into some new clothes and shoes to avoid being found out. he’d remove the ponytails from his head, leaving his hair to hang down over his shoulders and reaching the trapezius of his back.

he would wipe the purple eyeshadow from eyes as he stared at the dark purple irises in the mirror, revealing how dead and tired he truly was. it was like his body could shut down at any moment.

now, choso had been wearing a black hoodie and a pair of pants. something so simple. it would last him a while until he would have to steal some clothes or wash them at a laundromat that he could just barely afford.

he sighed, planning his next move as he’d drag the corpse into the backyard and bury it deep down into the soil before walking back inside.

this was where he would remain…and he’d start a new life without the monster that concealed him from the world…from his own life.

PRESENT DAY — AUGUST 13TH

“see ya, kid.” the tattoo artist called after choso. the male silently lifted his hand before exiting the shop. he had gotten a new piercing just above his left eyebrow. the man that done this body art for him was his favorite and probably someone he could consider a friend.

choso had a few piercings now. a tongue piercing that nearly reached the tip of it, two cartilage piercings in his left ear with two regular earrings to accompany them, a side lip piercing, which was a simple silver ring and a nose piercing. he was torn between a septum and a simple diamond stud but he got the stud anyway. he didn’t wanna be too extra.

the male was influenced by what people would call “emo” style. he loves rock music and wearing rings on his fingers. even his clothing style stands out a lot. the band tees that blow lightly in the wind and large combat boots that slam against the floor each time he walked.

choso even cut his hair into a wolf cut. a style that he had been interested in for a while. his hair was fluffy and dyed black. different from his original brown hair. the male would also paint his nails black but the polish was a bit cheap so he was always painting over them.

he looked like the epitome of an emo boy.

knowing that he was a bit ashamed of existence, he would cover his blood mark with a bandage when he went out in public, which raised a lot of questions.

“ah, it’s just a scratch i got. it’s just healing.” he’d say simply.

pulling his hood over his head, he’d make his way to the liquor store, buying himself a pack of cigarettes, a few tv dinners, and a new lighter. the second he left, he’d immediately open the pack and take out a cigarette, the chain jingling from his jeans as he walked.

the male didn’t have any source of income at the moment, so finding money was crucial. even if it meant stealing it. inside, he usually felt bad but he would remind himself that he needed it more than the entitled humans that walked with their chins up and their chests out while he stood on the sidelines. silent and slumped over.

he knew stealing was morally wrong but something in his mind just told him to take what he needed and to never hesitate…but he always hesitated.

back at home, he would clean each of his piercings, playing with the one above his eyebrow and wincing a bit, followed by a couple of swears.

the house was quite peaceful now that there wasn’t anyone nagging at him or telling him that he was a waste of time. he was happy that he wasn’t being attacked all the time, having to physically fight back in order to avoid being seriously hurt.

this kind of behavior sent him into a state of emptiness rather than trauma or fear. it explains his dull expression. the bandages that covered his bloodied and bruised skin only reminded him of how bad he wanted to get away.

choso made his way to the backyard. it was a serene area with a tiny stony waterfall, which pooled into a small body of water. there was a large japanese maple tree in the middle of the yard…this was where he buried his father. but he entirely ignored that aspect.

instead of being locked away in his room, like he had been for most of his existence, he would come outside and sit near the miniature waterfall to find peace.

on his phone, scrolling through instagram is where he would find a beautiful picture of a girl taking a simple photo of her in her room. that girl was you. choso was instantly captivated by your soft smile and the shape and color of your eyes.

he was about to like the photo but he decided that he’d look on your account some more. you had an interesting style that heavily matched you. something that would stand out among others. if there was a large crowd in public, he’d probably notice you first.

bookmarking a few of your photos, he decided that he would save them for later to admire the new love of his life. there was one thing that held him back a bit…you were human. he was terrified, thinking that you wouldn’t like him.

‘you’d probably hate me..’ he thought. ‘i’m not like you.’

then again, how would you know? he looks just like everyone else. how would you be able to tell that he was a cursed spirit until he told you so or if he revealed his abilities to you? you won’t know. you’ll never know.

a faint smile appeared on his face as he would type a comment on your recent photo, simply complimenting you then quickly turning his phone off, worrying about how you’d react. the adrenaline was speeding through his veins.

his phone vibrates and he quickly drops it, now going into a panic about what the alert might’ve been. having a phone was always scary to him because it was always making noise.

slowly, he’d reach for the phone and turn it over, frowning a bit when he saw the small crack on the screen protector. that frown quickly turned into a smile when he seen the notification from you, replying to his comment and liking it. he also noticed that it was a pinned comment.

he didn’t know if he should be excited or horrified that he was noticed by you so quickly. he was tempted to text you now but again, he was scared…but he fell in love so quickly.

he spent his next few days on a burner account, watching your story and screenshotting the photos on you posted, smiling excitedly each time he would randomly check your account just to see that you posted a new picture or a video.

he swore up and down that you were simply a crush and that he’d move on fairly quickly once he loses interest. but deep down, he could never get rid of you. you were always on his mind. he wanted you. he needed you. he craved you.

this is the first stage of the desire disease—exposure.

it was an amazing coincidence when he saw you in public in the store he went to consistently for cigarettes. a blush settled across his cheeks as he noticed you with your friend buying some snacks for yourselves.

listening to your voice was like a song that he couldn’t get out of his head. it was memorable. but the second he realized that he was staring, he would blink and try to focus on what he was originally trying to do.

“you know her?” he heard yuji ask, making him jump.

“oh…no. she just looks familiar, that’s it.” he lied. the pink haired boy smirked before throwing his arm around choso. he was up to something.

“why don’t you go say something to her? i mean, that’s how you make friends,” yuji said. “maybe you’ll even get a partner out of it.”

“oh..uh, i don’t really want that. i don’t even like how it sounds.” choso mumbled. even though he was lying straight in yuji’s face about wanting a partner, he wasn’t completely lying.

“you obviously do, man. look, you fit most girls type. you’re tall, got cool hair, and you got a good personality. you can figure out the rest. and if they don’t like your style, they could definitely get used to you.”

‘i look too depressed to even be likable..’

“nope. i highly doubt it.” he replied. “i like being alone anyway. what’s the point of being with someone that’ll eventually leave you?”

“hey, good question.” yuji put his finger on his chin. “listen, it doesn’t hurt to try. unless you like window shopping.”

“do i look like the kind of guy to talk to women?”

yuji waved his hand, “you’ll get used to it. hey let’s go outside, i wanna show you something.”

this is how choso was introduced to porn. yuji would tell him how it was a way to ‘relieve himself’. the male was clearly confused and he didn’t understand the excitement of watching others perform such activities.

that same evening he spent watching in his room, just to see why yuji wanted to expose him to this footage so badly.

and that’s when he felt a tightness in his sweats.

© EXORSIIAN | © ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

[cubeshapedlemon]

hii !!!! I think this is where we request! so I have some ideas for norm (ofc)

first!

yk when vault 32 got attacked ?

what if YOU survived,and hid,trying to defend yourself and surviving by stealing in vault 33 (stole a pip boy to access it) food and other stuff,because u think that every vault got attacked (no communications) so u are always undercover for bad guys,

and even if sometimes rations were low nobody ever suspected a thing or saw you,until norm got charged with giving the prisoners food,and one day in the kitchen he caught u stealin,and he was like « i’ve never seen you around » so you’re scared obv but you open up when u realise he wouldn’t hurt a fly,and because lucy and his dad’s gone,he keeps u in his appartement in secret,stealing supplies for you,letting you use the shower,till you’re ready enough to wander in the vault because it’s safeee! (hes def in love with u)

that’s it bye :3

i finally finished this apologies for the wait🫶 i tweaked the plot a bit and this might be more angsty and smutty than originally expected but in my opinion its pretty good so enjoy and ty again for the request<3

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Two Slow Dancers

When the raiders first attacked 32, your life was forever changed. Going to 33 gave some insight, thanks to one sad-eyed Maclean

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Norm Maclean x f!reader

5.1k words

cw and tags: fluff, angst, hurt/comfort, smut, piv, oral sex (f receiving), light biting, hair pulling, hickeys, love confessions, non-sexual intimacy, blink an you'll miss it lewd sexual harassment-esque comments (not by norm), brief description of panic attack, brief hospitalization from said panic attack, cannon typical descriptions of violence, parental death, the quickest slow burn you will ever read, gratuitous use of song lyrics in a narratively appropriate way ( i snuck a lyric in from two slow dancers by mitski in there so brownie points to you if you find it)

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authors note: hey! sorry this took so fucking long! so much stuff was happening plus laziness plus forgetfulness plus life in general so please forgive me! i really enjoyed writing this request and even though i tweaked your original request a bit i hope you still enjoy it! if i missed any misspellings or i missed something in the tags please lmk! anywho if you enjoy this please send me more requests! (info in pinned post) reblogs are greatly appreciated but please don't translate or repost this anywhere without my permission!

I will never forget that day. The sounds of shots ring out, followed by the useless fizz of tranq guns, skulls shattering against the walls with a now all too familiar crack. I lead my life holding onto aspirations and hope, the thought of a husband, children, of reclamation day. How stupid was I truly, to hold out hope for something like that. Gods, I never thought I would have to worry about anything else.

Until that day dawned, I could have fought and died honorably, my mother did, my father did. I never thought I would ever see my father cry. Nothing could have prepared me for the rageful sob that he let out once they got to my mother–the grief that beat through him with gnashing teeth and blood red rage. I could do nothing but follow my father's orders, dragging my mother and hoping somehow, somewhere, we could be safe.

The boiling hot tears in my eyes made it nearly impossible to see. My hands were occupied, trying to stop the bleeding. Nothing was working, every movement and bit of pressure lathering my hands in crimson. I never thought I would know what death looks like; that day I learned several versions of his ugly face. The endless, malice filled stare of my father, the desperate simpering expression of the children. The most memorable of them being the one that covered my mother.

Pity. A pitiful expression, a soft, challenging smile. She wiped my tears, her dying breath a word of comfort to me. “It's ok, you did what you could baby. It's my time, you need to promise me one thing though. Can you do that?” Anything I nod, slipping my fingers between hers. “Save yourself, make me proud.”

So I ran. I hid. I moved quickly when I needed to, stealing whatever I could from them, breaking into whatever room that had what I needed. I started hearing the footsteps less and less. After a day or two they ceased all together. I could wander freely, the click of my boots the only sound.

☆ ☆ ☆

The next few days pass in unimportant washes, each day I discover another body, another busted up apartment, another tragedy. I force myself to move on.

Resources are sparse. The raiders took anything that wasn't directly bolted down it seems. Even that didn't entirely stop them. It quickly became clear that I had no communication with the other vaults, the overseer's computer now a busted hunk of scrap.

Seemingly the only piece of tech they didn't destroy was the control panel to the door connecting us and 33. Oh gods, that means-

They've surely invaded them now too. Against my better judgment, I need to see the proof for myself. With shaking hands I press the button, the door slowly groaning open. A dark hall greets me, the deafening silence of my vault giving the air an eerie tinge that infests every corner of the room. Taking a deep breath, I step inside.

At first, I only hear my own steps. The same sound I have heard for weeks on end. Trudging forward, I start to hear more. Muffled speech, walking, the soundtrack of normalcy. It's not long before I see the creators of this sound. They seem to be true vault dwellers, though I have no evidence that they are. Sure they are wearing the suits of 33, but who knows? Maybe the raiders infiltrated them and decided to take over?

Either way I need to stay vigilant. I'll just do a quick scan for supplies then leave. It'll be ok. I can do this. Following the oddly familiar path I make my way to the pantry. Quickly checking the small glass panel in the door, I see that it's empty. Taking my chance I make my way inside, closing the door behind me silently.

I look at the labels for each of the cabinets. There are plenty of rations, much more than 32 ever had. Certainly more than we have now. Poking around a bit more I decide it's probably a good idea to only grab small amounts. I don't need someone finding me out. Distracted, I don't notice the door click open. That is until I hear the loud rumble of a cart. Drawing my tranq gun, I turn and point it at the unfortunate soul who found me.

Surprise befalls his face, hands going up. The man is rather small. Shorter than me with a slight build. Dark hair plastered into an unnaturally perfect styling. “Who are you?” I demand, my voice deepening as I attempt to intimidate him. He gapes pathetically at me for a few seconds, looking back towards the glass panel in the door, seeing no one in the surrounding halls.

“Norm- Norman Maclean.” he manages to get out, his eyes searching over my expression, looking for something.

“Maclean?” I question, why does that name sound so familiar? “As in overseer Maclean?” That seems to give him some relief, he lets out a held breath, arms sagging slightly.

“Yes! Please don't shoot me,” he says, his voice high pitched, as if he expected me to shoot him then and there.

“Fine,” I say, holstering the gun again. He's probably not dangerous.

Seeing that he lowers his arms, taking a step away from me. His eyes scan me more intensely now, gaze falling on the vault-identifying pin on my collar. Clearly not believing what he was seeing, he backs himself into a wall. “You're- from 32?” he asks, voice quivering slightly, though he was clearly trying to cover it up.

“Shhh,” I chastise, walking towards him, a hand smacking over his mouth in the process. “What's it to you?” He attempts to speak something into my hand, which obviously gets muffled. Moving my hand away he speaks again, in a now quieter tone.

“I thought all of you had died, because of the-” he looks to the side, as if looking at the walls would help sugarcoat his statement. “Raiders,” he completes his statement, crossing his arms defensively.

So he does know about them

“No,” a bitter laugh forces itself out, guarding whatever I had left in me. “I wasn't fortunate enough to.” My face is adorned by a tight-lipped grimace. Looking down I feel tears start to well up again. I force them away.

I look back up. The man's face is no longer defensive, it's almost solemn. His arms now at his side, “I-” he goes to speak, tone sympathetic but whatever pity he had prepared dying on his tongue. “Follow me,” is what he decides on. Wait, follow me? What the hell is he talking about? My internal reaction must have played out on my face, he goes to speak again.

“You need to get some rest, you look like you haven't slept in days.” Wow, rude, although true. “You can stay in my apartment for the time being, I need to tell our council that you're here.” Oh, gods no, what if they kick me out? I broke in! I'm not supposed to be here! My worry kicks up again, the energy filling the room.

“It will be ok, they just need to know, so you don't have to hide.” He places what is probably meant to be a comforting hand on my arm, though he removes it swiftly. Deciding to bite the bullet, I follow him.

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The door opens with a thunk, a home identical to mine in 32 stands before me, identical to what was in 32. “This is it.” He leads me inside with a hand hovering at the small of my back. Not touching, but just enough of a beckoning presence that I instinctively go. It's so clean. It's practically sterile compared to what 32 has been reduced to at this point.

“Make yourself at home, I'll be back soon.” With his last word, he promptly excuses himself. The home is eerily empty, like something is missing. Typical aspects of a lived-in home are present, dirty dishes, a half finished board game on the living room floor. Something distinct is off about it still.

Though, that is not something that is particularly important right now. Following his instructions, I make myself at home. It's been an unfortunate amount of time that I have been forced to go without the typical luxuries that the vaults provide. The luxuries I will not go without for any longer.

A shower being the first thing on that list. Unfortunately I don't have anything different to change into after, my once perfect blue suit now tinted with memories and rusty red stains. But, it will have to do.

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About half an hour later, I hear the distinct thunk of the door opening once more. Stepping out of the bathroom I see him waiting for me, what looks to be some folded regulation pj's and a fresh suit in his hands. “They uh, said you could stay with me for now,” he begins, tone nervous, as if I would turn him down in some way. “I grabbed you some clean clothes. I just took a guess for your size.” Letting out a sigh of relief, I walk forward grabbing the carefully stacked clothes from his arms. Our hands brushing briefly as he hands them over.

“Thank you, really.” My tone is much lighter than earlier today, though still firm, hoping that he would understand the honesty in my statement through it. If he believes me he doesn't show it, his eye contact breaking as he gives me a cordial nod. I return it, walking back into the bathroom to change. The smooth cotton of the t-shirt and the slightly loose sleep shorts give a simple level of comfort. He seems to have guessed correctly, almost impossibly so, when it comes to sizing. The basic outfit somehow looking vaguely flattering on my figure.

Stepping out of the bathroom once again I see that he has busied himself in the kitchen, something popping and sizzling in the pan in front of him. He acknowledges me with a slight turn of his head before going back to his task. Walking around a bit more, I find a collection of holotapes. Every genre you could think of, labeled and organized alphabetically.

Choosing a random one I click it into place on the player. With a press of the button a familiar tune fills the air.

…Everybody loves somebody sometime…

“So,” he says, voice raising over the soft playing of the music. “They want to meet you, the council,” he informs, tone conversational yet careful.

“Oh?” I question, walking over to him.

“Yeah, they uh- want to help you acclimate to the new environment and all.” The stove clicks off, turning around he brandishes two plates with a simple meal, handing one to me before walking over to the table.

“I-” he pauses, rethinking whatever he was about to say. “I think they might, make you talk to them. See them at least,” he says, tone careful. Pushing the food around his plate a bit, he takes a small bite. Them.

“You captured them? The raiders?” There is a bite to my words, accusatory and harsh. “You kept them alive? After all they have done?”

“Unfortunately.” His tone has a similar bitterness. At least he understands where I'm coming from. Walking to the table, I sit across from him, taking a few bites from my meal. Each of our frustrations and anger sizzling out slowly in favor of a comfortable silence. Every once and a while he would attempt to make polite conversation. I of course return it, continuing the conversation when I can. He really is quite nice, funny too. Really is a shame I had to meet him under such harsh circumstances.

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After the meal I offer to clean up out of politeness, he gives a grateful smile when he accepts. The picture was almost domestic, the scent of the sweetpea dish soap and the sound of some old Cooper Howard film in the background. This picture soon became part of a routine. Many would probably question how quickly Norm and I got along, though I don't. After what we have both gone through recently, normalcy is what we crave, and this is about as close as we could get to it.

Days pass, weeks along with them. The comfortable relationship we have formed only continues to get better. The council calls me in every once and a while, trying to figure out what to do with me. Placing me in a job for a while, moving me to another. While my number of attempted jobs aren't quite as impressive as Norm's they're still worth noting. He makes sure to mention this when I start a new one, adding a tally to the board he made on a whim one day.

Eventually they do make me see them. They assured me it would be ok, that I was safe, that nothing could hurt me. They know nothing about hurt. About that pain. Norm, of course, insisted on coming with me. Neither of us knew how much I would need that support.

The walk to the cell was silent. A deafening silence. Far away from the comfortable, peaceful, loving silence I had grown accustomed to with Norm. Getting closer the sounds of fists against metal walls and reinforced glass make themselves known. Peering in, I see them. Not many of them recognize me, nor do I recognize them. Except one.

I will never forget the expression on his face. The pure giddy delight at seeing me again, knowing what he had done. The beady eyes staring me down now, the very same ones that rolled back in almost orgasmic pleasure as he slashed down everyone I had ever known. His face still splattered with specks of the now crusted over blood of my mother. A scar on his neck now healing over, gifted to him by my father.

He walks slowly over to the window, holding eye contact with me as a sneer covers his face. Licking his rotted teeth he looks me up and down leisurely. Assessing me like I'm a piece of meat. I feel Norm tense beside me, his jaw clenching in anger. The raider looks to him and laughs, a loud, hacking laugh. “Come to visit me? Well ain't that just sweet. Your little lapdog there looks like he's ‘bout to burst a blood vessel.”

Truly he did, but he continued to hold his tongue. The piece of shit in the cell just turned his attention back to me anyway. “You know you look just like your mama? Pretty thing she was, your daddy didn't let me take a bite outta’ her but he's not here to keep you safe now is he?” That strikes a nerve, as hard as I might try to suppress it, I can't stop it. My eye twitches as I attempt to force back an onslaught of tears.

Noticing this, Norm places a comforting hand on my back, “We're done here.” His tone is firm, about as close to threatening as he can get. With a small push he leads me back down the hall. Though of course that fucker had to have the last word, lewd comments and insinuations of violence following us. As soon as they dissipated everything came crashing down. My legs crumble beneath me, heart thumping in my chest like I had just run a marathon. My diaphragm crushes my chest from the inside, constricting my breathing further. I hear blood rush to my ears, vision spotting. The last thing I see is Norm, his panicked expression as he holds the back of my head. It all goes black.

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“Please wake up please.” My eyes slowly flutter open, the familiar voice catching my attention. My back is stiff, the bed beneath me having only a thin mat-like excuse for a mattress. Bright fluorescents blind me, forcing me to turn my head to the side. Then I see him, sitting in a regulation chair, half bent over. Perfectly quaffed hair now rumpled, natural waves making their presence known. A few lone tear tracks are left on his face. His eyes are slightly bloodshot, ever-present bags under them deeper than usual.

“You look awful,” I say, voice still laced with a cotton-mouthed raspiness. That catches his attention, Looking up to meet my eyes, he lets out a breathy laugh. Pulling his chair closer to the bed he clasps his hand in mine, using the other to push his mess of hair off of his face.

“I feel it, good to know I'm giving off the right image.” A small smile works its way onto my face. He mirrors it, squeezing my hand. As much as I enjoyed the peaceful joy of the moment, there is a nagging question hanging in the air.

“What happened?” While my question did dampen the mood, he nods, giving me my answer.

“They said you probably had a panic attack, you passed out and I brought you here.” The memories of what transpired flood back, if not for the comforting weight of his hand in mine, I would have been swallowed whole by them. “They cleared you to leave, if you want to go home.”

Home. I want nothing more.

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The weeks following my hospital stay, Norm became more doteing than ever. I was not allowed to cook a single meal, make a pot of coffee, or clean up around the house. Really anything he could reasonably convince me of. Not that I was complaining. Something about the recent events must have struck him in some way. While he was always open about his past and the unfortunate things that had happened since the raiders, he truly started to bare his heart to me.

It just makes me wish I had known him longer. It would be a hundred times easier if we were young again. Starting fresh. Though, I could not be happier with how we have gotten to grow together. It's funny how long it took for us to realize our affections for each other. To identify the source of the pang in my heart when he smiled, the swell in his when I laughed.

This all culminated one night. Dinner had been cooked, eaten, and cleaned up. The credits of A Man and His Dog scrolling on the Tv. With a small sigh I get off the couch, turning off the Tv, and waltzing over to the holotape player, putting on one of my favorites.

… I don't want to set the world on fire…

Humming along with the music I walk over to Norm, grabbing at his hands and attempting to haul him up from the couch. “Come on dance with me,” I coo, putting on my best guilt-tripping doe eyes. With a huff, and a sarcastic eye roll he gets up, allowing me to drag him to the open space near the player. “You know,” I begin, grabbing his hand, “to dance you actually have to move.”

“Do I really?” he jokes back, his free hand going to the small of my back.

“Mm-hmm,” I hum, my other hand going to the back of his neck, cradling it as we begin to sway to the music.

… In my heart I have but one desire…

Sighing, I lean closer into him. A familiar ache finding itself in my chest. The lyrics of the song spell it out perfectly to an almost cliché level. Mirroring my own actions, he pulls me farther into him, delicately leaning his head across my shoulder. “Thank you,” I say, my tone is soft, almost unsure.

“For what?”

… I just want to be the one you love…

“For everything, for giving me a place that feels like home.” He makes a small sound of acknowledgement, squeezing me just a little tighter. “For being a person that feels like home,” I tack on, leaning my head against his.

“You don't have to thank me,” he says, almost absentmindedly. “I don't know what I would do without you at this point,” he says, a half laugh poorly covering the honesty in his statement.

And with your admission that you feel the same…

Letting out a hum of agreement, I throw caution to the wind. Placing a gentle kiss to his temple, I allow myself more. More of him, more of what I need. Raising his head from my shoulder in surprise he looks up to me, desire swirling in his eyes. “Please,” he whines, with a laugh I bring my lips to his, pausing just before they meet.

“Don't have to ask me twice,” I joke, finally locking our lips together.

… I don't want to set the world on fire, honey. I love you too much…

He returns my kiss straight away, whining something unintelligible into it. The saccharin sweet taste of Nuka Cola invades my senses. Deepening the kiss I run my tongue along the seam of his lips, asking for permission. Allowing me in, the kiss becomes mostly tongue and teeth. Removing my hand from his I place it on his hip, squeezing I begin to lead him back. My subconscious bringing us down the path to his bedroom.

… Darlin’ I have only one desire. And that one desire is you…

As soon as we are over the threshold of the doorway, both of us are in a rush to feel eachother skin to skin. Boots and socks toed off before either of us could get a breath in. He quickly unzips my suit, forcing the material down and off of me. My hands soon do the same. With a lonesome whine he breaks our kiss, running his hand across my waist he looks up at me with an expression of pure need. “Gods, you are gorgeous,” he professed, placing a languid trail of kisses along my neck and collarbone.

Taking hold of me, he turns us, pushing me back onto the bed. After a moment, in which he looks to be mostly admiring, he joins me on the bed. Scooting back, I lay against the pillows positioned at his headboard. Grabbing his wrist, I pull him up to meet me. One of my hands goes to the back of his neck, pulling his lips to mine once again.

The kiss is slow, passion dripping from the soft pillows of his lips. His hands work their way behind my back, undoing the clasps of my bra. Bringing his hands to my front again, he guides the straps off my arms, returning them to their original position after. Tossing the bra away, his hands busy themselves. Palms run across my stomach, moving up my torso to cup my breasts.

Squeezing softly, a thumb rubs across one of my nipples, the bud hardening to a peak. Breaking the kiss, he moves down my body, leaving light nips in his path until his face is even with my chest. Looking up to me he gives me a pleading expression, clearly asking for permission. With my nod, he quickly gets to work. His warm mouth envelopes one of my nipples, his tongue flicking at it. The sensation causing pleasure to spark, the feeling traveling downwards.

My hips buck up, independent from my body. Though, he pushes them back down with one of his hands. He releases from my breast with a pop, leaving a soft kiss on the side before swapping to the other. Sucking desperately, his hips begin to grind against mine, his hardness pressing against me with the subtlety of a freight train.

The hand that was currently occupied on my hip leisurely trails itself to my core. Middle and ring fingers pressing into the fabric. Finding the thin cotton to already be soaked through, he lets out a hum of surprise, pulling off my breast. He looks up, eyes filled with excitement, the silent question present as well.

“All for you, pretty boy,” I inform, letting out a giggle at how quickly he moves to remove my underwear, tossing it somewhere in the room. With an air of urgency, his hands venture down my body. Though, they stop every inch or so to give an appreciative squeeze. His lips follow the path, leaving a soft kiss or a teasing bite. Once his face is even with my core, he lets out a sigh of contentment.

Pulling my thighs apart, he settles between them, tossing my legs to rest on his shoulders. “All for me huh?” he asks, a teasing tone interwoven into his speech. Looking up to me, he begins his path down my inner thigh, his eyes stay locked on mine the whole way down. Though, he breaks once he finally gets to where I need him most. Breathing deeply, his eyes roll back. Placing a delicate kiss on my pubic bone, at long last, he indulges.

Two fingers move to separate my folds, the wetness there coating them. A satisfied groan racks itself through his body, fulfilling his ultimate need, he finally places his mouth on me. Flattening his tongue, he releases a whine, arms wrapping around my thighs, pulling me even closer.

“Fuck- just like that.” The firm strokes of his tongue start to push me towards the familiar edge. Waves crashing deep inside of me, another round of wetness releasing. His hips stutter into the mattress, his desperation becoming painfully obvious. With a well-timed grind of my hips, he slips his tongue inside of me. The bridge of his nose presses against my clit, the sensation causing me to clench around him.

The waves begin crashing harder, forcing me closer and closer to the precipice. His pace doesn't falter once, edging me closer and closer by the second. My hands tighten, fisting the sheets below me. It isn't enough, bringing one to his head, my nails scratch his scalp lightly before grasping firmly at the roots of his hair. The moan that he lets out against me is sensual, like nothing pleases him more than the light, stinging pain I'm currently inflicting on him.

With a new found ferocity, he moves to suction his lips around my clit, suckling lightly as his middle finger prods at my entrance. It slides in without a lick of resistance, which he seems quite pleased by. He thrusts the single finger in a few times, his ring finger joining it soon after. Curling his fingers in a ‘come hither’ motion, the gradual crashing of the waves begins to spark into more.

The tips of his fingers press diligently against the spongy spot inside of me, forcing me to the edge. Sooner than I ever imagined, I was forced off of it. My eyes drag themselves closed, stars exploding behind them. My grip on his hair only gets firmer, which he seems all too pleased about. The consistent thrusts of his fingers and flicks of his tongue working me through it, only stopping once I pull his face away.

The entire lower half of his face is covered in my essence, his expression is divine. Lips reddened and plump, eyes dazed and pupils blown out. “Fuck, I love you,” he confesses, voice thick with both lust and honesty. I don't know if it was his confession, or the pure need for him deep within me, but I pull him up to me. Crashing my lips onto his I taste myself, grabbing at him urgently wherever I can reach.

“I love you too,” I breathe out, breaking the kiss briefly. My wandering hand makes its way down his body, finding the heavy tent in his pants. He whines, hips pressing forward into where my hand is cradled. I pull his head back, forcing him to look me in the eye. “Now fuck me like you need to prove it.”

Taking that as an order, he gives me a quick peck before kicking off his boxers. Reaching forward towards my head, he grabs a pillow, lifting my hips to place it under. Using his already slick fingers, he grabs hold of himself, rubbing the tip against me lightly before easing it in. Inch by inch my core swallows him down until he is buried to the hilt.

He pulses inside me, though Norm is clearly holding himself back. He nearly chokes on his own spit as he steadies himself with my hips. With an impatient mewl and circle of my hips, he gets the message to get on with it. His pelvis smacks into mine, the pace he set being slow, but intentionally firm. His fingers curl into the fat of my upper thighs, the pressure enough to leave bruises. Something that neither of us seem to mind.

He makes a small adjustment in his posture, sliding my hips up just slightly. The small change creates an ocean of impact. The slight upward curve of him now hitting perfectly inside of me on every stroke. My moans uptick, getting louder as they mingle with his own. The exquisite sensation reawakens the crashing of waves. Noticing this change in my demeanor, he moves one of his hands to my center, his thumb rubbing short circles on my clit.

His eyes are half lidded now, glazed over with lust, though his gaze could not be more loving. Giving him a lopsided smile I pull him close to me again, his head now cradled to my shoulder. The proximity gives me delicious access to his neck. Placing a few sloppy kisses, I latch on, my teeth sinking carefully into the flesh.

He lets out a guttural moan, a trail of mindless whimpers and mewls following. Breaking away for a moment I softly lick, soothing the now irritated skin. “P-Please, more- please,” he manages to whine out. His hips stutter for a moment before picking up again, his pace faster now. Smiling against him, I fulfill his wish.

Latching on again I suck a deep bruise into his skin. Moving down, I place another on his collar bone. The stimulation motivating him to pick up his pace even more. Reluctantly he leans back, allowing himself to reach deeper. This new deeper angle forces me to recognize the sparks deep in my stomach, the intensity of them catching up quicker than before.

I go to tell him, though he shakes his head, silencing me. “I know, I am too,” he establishes through a groan. The circles on my clit get faster and sloppier, shoving me closer and closer to the edge as every moment passes. I whine out his name, falling off the edge again.

He follows just behind me, thrusts deep and sure as he pulses inside of me, releasing himself, the pleasurable warmth of it consuming my being. He falls forward, catching himself, he falls to my side. An arm wraps around my waist, pulling me against him, he cuddles into the crook of my neck. A sigh of contentment is shared between us.

I can definitely get used to this.