#this semester hit me like a TRUCK

[taitavva]

when im in a worst roommate ever competition & my opponent is joker persona 5 royal 🙄

[sofipitch]

My newest fragrance inspired by Interview with the Vampire: Armand

Musky and seductive, meant to match the hypnotic allure of the vampire Armand

🩸Notes: Civet, amber, ylang-ylang, pink peppercorns

I also have scents inspired by Louis, Lestat and Claudia on my Etsy shop

[idlingsomewhere]

think i might be logging off for the next little while. realized today i do not have the bandwidth to be on social media all that much so i’m gonna spend some time off the net as my second semester of school starts - the winter months have never been that good to me and it’s starting to take a toll, and i think i gotta take a step back and prioritize my mental health and the other responsibilities in my life. i will be back here soon, trust (read: for ghostholding hype)! y’all stay safe and take care of yourselves. i don’t know who the fuck you are but you all mean a lot to me for some reason. the internet is odd. ily

[hunsa-jars]

Dread be dreading

[astral-catastrophe]

me and the generic extra strong Tylenol and the pure rage in my system

[canibalistic-brownie]

.

[pervertwhore]

i have yet to make an academic comeback and my last day to turn in all of my work is on the 29th…and…i’m missing basically all my assignments for all of my courses….🥸

[unstoppable-fish]

So many ideas for fusehound fluff but so little time

[mokie-bleh]

My apologies everyone!!!

SO SO SORRY for leaving for another many months! I did not mean to be gone again after telling everyone I was back. I thought that after 1st semester ended I would make time for thins blog but 2nd semester hit me like a truck😭😭

But good news however summer is almost here and I would love to be back here again to do more request and doodles!

I feel awful for leaving you guys like that, but the sweet notes left in my inbox during my disappearance was so sweet, so thank you so much <3

really caught me by surprise the amount of attention my last post got which does give me motivation to make more sso thank you again!

glad to be back again hopefully for good!

[mw00nie]

extra credit

you first see him on a tuesday.

10 a.m. political science. long, cold, fluorescent-lit misery. you only took it because the professor was rumored to be easy. except, twist, he now isn’t, and your attendance is locked in for the semester. brutal.

you always sit in the back. fake typing on your laptop, tabs full of shit you’ll never afford, pretending you’re gonna relisten to the lectures on your phone. spoiler: you won’t.

so, naturally, you start people-watching. it becomes your sport.

guy in front of you sexting someone at 10 a.m. on a tuesday? disturbing. girl next to you writing color-coded notes on an ipad that costs more than your rent? pretentious. two girls giggling over tinder and ranking guys like they’re judging cattle at a state fair? iconic.

then you see him.

front row. every single class. white hair, slightly too long, messy like he cut it himself or forgot to. hoodie with a bleach stain on the sleeve. glasses he keeps pushing up with his middle finger. backpack covered in pins that look suspiciously like anime.

the kind of guy who probably owns a sword. the kind of guy who turns in essays early and apologizes for formatting mistakes. the kind of guy who definitely gets hard when girls yell at him.

you watch him answer a question once, voice so quiet, you can barely hear it from your seat, and it hits you like a truck:

this guy is such a loser. i want him in my bed immediately.

you don’t do anything about it at first. just move closer, row by row, like a predator slowly circling.

he doesn’t notice. he’s too busy actually doing the readings.

every class, he types with those long fingers, hunched over his laptop like he’s coding the next great american novel. he frowns when the professor gets something wrong. he wears wired headphones. wired, for god’s sake.

you can feel it building in you every time he pushes his glasses up. every time he mutters a “yeah, i think that’s actually covered in the assigned paper by—” before trailing off, embarrassed.

you want to climb into his lap and ruin his academic career. you want to know if he’s as nervous with his hands as he is with his voice. you want to see how red his ears can get.

three weeks in, you finally snap.

you catch him right after lecture, halfway to the vending machines, headphones still hanging around his neck. his fingers are tangled in his hoodie strings, backpack slung over one shoulder, like he barely remembered to exist outside of class.

he stops in his tracks when you say his name.

“satoru gojo, right?”

he blinks. once. twice. like you’ve just pulled the fire alarm in his brain.

“…yeah?”

he’s taller than you expected. awkwardly so. broad shoulders slouched like he’s trying to make himself smaller. glasses sliding down his nose. messy white hair that looks like he towel-dried it and called it a day. he smells faintly like clean laundry and caffeine. you hate how much that does to you.

you lean in a little. tilt your head. smile like you know something he doesn’t.

“you’re smart,” you say. “painfully. the kind of smart that corrects the professor mid-lecture and then apologizes for it.”

he flushes, stammers. “i– only if they’re, like, wrong? sometimes?”

adorable.

you step closer. just enough to watch his pupils blow out a little. he’s blinking at you like he’s buffering.

“i need help studying,” you say sweetly. “and you seem.. helpful.”

his mouth opens. closes. “uh– sure?”

“great.” you tilt your head. “library at seven?”

he nods, slow and stunned.

you smile wider. “and if you’re good,” you say, voice low enough to make him swallow, “i might let you kiss me.”

you don’t wait for a response. just turn and walk off, backpack slung lazily over your shoulder.

when you glance back, he’s still standing there. frozen, mouth slightly open, entire brain fried like a cheap motherboard.

you laugh to yourself.

this is going to be so much fun.

he shows up to the library that night. you weren’t sure he would. he seemed like the type to overthink it until he got hives. but there he is 6:57, laptop in hand, adorned in what looked like a bunch of different stickers. the etsy type.

“hey,” you say, flashing a smile as he slides into the seat next to you.

he nearly fumbles his bag off the table. “hey,” he replies, voice quiet. “so… what’re you stuck on?”

you don’t even bother pretending to know. just hand him your notes with a shrug and start watching him instead.

he’s so earnest. brows furrowed. lips pressed together. squinting at your writing like it personally offended him.

you’re supposed to be learning about political theory, but all you can think about is what his mouth would feel like on your neck. how red his ears would get if you sat in his lap right now and pulled on his hoodie strings.

by the end of the night, he’s explained two chapters, drawn a chart, and unconsciously flexed his hands at least a dozen times.

you lean back, stretch, and smile at him sweetly. “you’re a really good teacher.”

he turns a little pink. scratches the back of his neck.

“…thanks?”

“don’t thank me yet,” you murmur. “you’ve got office hours again tomorrow.”

he swallows.

you don’t kiss him. not yet. you let him walk home in a daze, probably questioning whether he imagined the whole thing.

you make him wait.

over the next two weeks, you meet him three more times.

once in the library, once at a coffee shop, and once after class in an empty study room.

every time, he gets a little bolder. not much. just enough for you to notice.

his knees brush yours under the table and he doesn’t pull back. he teases you when you mess up a definition. he looks you in the eye a little longer than he did before, until you’re the one who has to look away.

“you’re learning,” you hum one night.

he just shrugs, smirking softly.

“you said if i was good, i’d get to kiss you.”

his voice is low. deeper now. like he’s starting to realize he has some kind of effect on you.

you smile, sweet and lethal.

“maybe next time.”

you invite him over on a thursday night.

you claim it’s for a “final review session” before the quiz. you text him your address, and tell him to wear something comfortable.

he shows up in another hoodie and sweatpants. his glasses are clean for once. his hair still a mess, but in a way that almost looks intentional.

you pretend to study for fifteen minutes.

fifteen.

after that, you crawl into his lap, straddle his legs, and tilt his chin up.

“still wanna kiss me?”

he doesn’t answer. just leans in and kisses you like he’s been thinking about it for weeks.

and god, he’s so warm. so eager. he kisses like he means it, messy and deep, hands hovering just shy of your waist like he’s scared to hold on too tightly.

you grind down once and he chokes on a moan.

“shit– wait–”

you pull back and grin.

“don’t tell me this is your first time.”

he goes red, but his eyes are sharp now, glinting under the low light of your room.

“…why would you think that?”

you laugh, breathless. “because you’re a loser. you raise your hand in lectures. you wear anime pins. you fumble your phone when i look at you.”

“so?” he murmurs, licking into your mouth, voice rough. “i can still make you cum.”

you blink. stunned.

he grins, slow and devastating. glasses slipping again, hands sliding up your thighs.

“wanna bet?”

you don’t even make it five minutes into the “study” session before he’s got you pinned to the couch.

your laptop’s open on some political science quizlet. long forgotten.

your panties are shoved halfway down your thighs, hoodie thrown on the floor somewhere, one of his hands gripping your jaw while the other is buried deep inside you.

“what happened to all that attitude?” he mutters against your mouth, voice low, breath warm. “thought you said i was a loser.”

you gasp, try to buck your hips, but he holds you still. his fingers curl just right and your entire spine arches.

“fuck– satoru–”

“say it again,” he growls, licking into your mouth like he’s starving. “say i’m a loser.”

you whimper. “you’re– fuck, you’re not–”

“hmm?” his thumb circles your clit, lazy and cruel. “what was that?”

you choke on a moan. it’s disgusting how wet you are. slick dripping down his knuckles, pooling under your ass on the cushions.

he’s still got his glasses on. slightly fogged. his hair’s messier than usual, sleeves shoved up to his elbows. he looks deranged. brilliant. completely in control.

and all you want is more.

“please,” you breathe. “just– fuck me– please–”

he pulls his fingers out and sucks them into his mouth like he’s tasting you.

“you ask so nicely,” he hums, grinning like the devil. “but i think you need a little warm-up first.”

you expect him to drop to his knees.

you don’t expect him to pull you by the hips and throw you over his face.

he lays back on the couch, one arm hooked under your thigh, and drags you down onto his mouth.

“oh– fuck–”

his tongue is obscene. messy. insistent. his nose brushes your clit every time he moves, and he groans like he’s the one getting off.

you’re gasping, grinding against his face, grabbing fistfuls of his hair like a girl possessed.

he pulls back once to breathe and licks his lips, eyes half-lidded, voice wrecked.

“sweetest i’ve ever had in my life,” he mutters. “could stay here all night.”

you cum on his tongue twice.

by the time he lets you down, your legs are jelly. your voice is half-gone. and he’s hard. painfully hard. under his sweatpants.

“c’mere,” he mutters, voice rough. “you owe me something.”

you drop to your knees without hesitation.

he’s thick, flushed, leaking at the tip, and way too big for the loser nerd image he gives off in class.

“god,” you whisper, wrapping a hand around it. “you’ve been hiding this from me?”

“was waiting for you to find out,” he says, pushing his glasses up, totally smug.

you stroke him slow, spit-slick and teasing, then lean in and drag your tongue up the underside.

his breath stutters. “f-fuck–”

you take him in deep, hollow your cheeks. he groans and grabs the back of your head.

“god, you’re good,” he mutters, hips twitching. “knew you’d suck cock like a slut.”

you whimper around him, moan at the taste, the weight, the way his thigh tenses under your hand.

he fucks your mouth slowly. not too deep, not yet.  just enough to make your eyes water.

when he pulls you off, you’re panting, spit dripping down your chin.

“get on the couch,” he says, voice dark. “hands and knees.”

you scramble up, bend over, and he groans.

“fuck– look at that.”

he presses himself up behind you, drags the head of his dick through your folds, and leans forward to whisper against your ear.

“you’re gonna let the virgin loser fuck you like this?” he murmurs, kissing your neck.

“yes,” you whine. “please– satoru, i need it–”

he thrusts in all at once.

you gasp, your eyes rolling back.

he’s so deep it makes your stomach flip, one hand digging into your hip while the other presses between your shoulder blades, pushing you down.

he starts fucking you like he’s been waiting years. filthy, relentless, fast and hard and deep enough you can barely think.

“not such a brat now, huh?” he pants. “still think i’m just some nerd?”

you’re moaning, crying out, face smushed into a pillow as he hits your g-spot with every thrust like a bullseye

he leans down, wraps a hand around your throat, and groans when you clench around him.

“tight little pussy,” he mutters. “knew you’d be like this. couldn’t stop thinking about it. mmph– gonna ruin you–”

he pulls out and flips you over ignoring your whine of protest. pushes your legs up to your chest, and drills into you.

you cum again, shaking, sobbing into his mouth as he kisses you through it.

he pulls back just enough to look at you, sweat on his brow, pupils blown.

“you want it inside?” he grunts, hips stuttering. “want me to fill you up?”

“yesyes– fuck, please–”

“god, you’re filthy,” he groans. 

he cums hard. deep, slow thrusts, hips grinding into yours, breath hot against your throat as he empties inside you.

you’re both panting. ruined. bodies tangled on your shitty dorm couch.

he pulls out slow, watches his cum leak out of you, and smirks.

“extra credit,” he says, breathless. “you definitely passed.”

[hoshifighting]

seungkwan sporty college fling?? plss 🤭🫦

a/n: first of all— IUSHDIASUHIUNFIABDIASUDIUBFIUHE the fach that he's exactly my type makes me weak on the kneeeeees!! second: WITH THE PICS ALREADY? LOVE YOU! WARNINGS: smut, fluff, med student!reader who's interning in the university's infirmary, handjob, oral (m. receiving)

sporty college fling!seungkwan who's, like, everywhere on campus. if there’s a sport to play, you bet your ass he’s signed up. volleyball, tennis, soccer, basketball, swimming, god, even frisbee if it means he gets to be out there showing off. and, look, it’s not even about the attention—though he loves that, too. he just loves the energy, the cheers from the sidelines, the way he can walk off the field dripping sweat, grinning like he just won the damn lottery.

so when he catches wind that you’re interning in the college infirmary? oh, he’s already scheming. you had no idea he knew you were there, but seungkwan’s been keeping tabs on you ever since that one history class last semester, where he’d sit behind you just to crack dumb jokes and steal your notes when you weren’t looking. he’s been hovering on the edge of your radar ever since, some mix of a friend and a tease that’s always around, always a little too close, always making you laugh even when you’re trying to focus.

so of course, it’s not a coincidence that today he’s on the field, pulling a stunt in the middle of a perfectly normal soccer game. there’s a loud yelp, and before you know it, seungkwan’s got his ass on the ground, clutching his ankle like he’s been hit by a truck. dramatic doesn’t even cover it. a friend tries to help him up, but he waves them off like he’s gotta handle this himself.

“nah, nah, i need a professional,” he says, wincing like he’s in some world-class pain, all while side-eyeing the infirmary building. eventually, the whole team’s staring at him, and the coach—who’s definitely onto him, by the way—just sighs and gestures toward the infirmary.

“alright, go get checked out,” he grumbles, “and don’t make it a habit, boo.”

so in he limps, or, well, mostly fakes limping. you’re organizing the medicine cabinet when you hear him stumble in, and the second you turn around and see him putting on that pitiful, injured expression, you know something’s up.

“oh, my god,” you deadpan, crossing your arms. “what happened this time, seungkwan?”

he sighs, laying it on thick. “soccer injury,” he says, wincing as he hobbles over to sit on the infirmary bed. “took a hard hit. they said only the best in here can take care of me.”

you roll your eyes, grabbing the ice pack and tossing it to him. “you know i can see through this bullshit, right?”

he smirks, barely able to keep up the act as he catches the ice pack and shrugs. “hey, i thought i’d at least get a little sympathy. i could be bleeding out, you know?”

“from your ankle? really?” you quip back, unable to stop the grin forming on your face. he shrugs and presses the ice pack to his ankle, looking around like he’s already scouting out what else he can mess with in here. it’s like he doesn’t even have to try—just exists, and it’s annoying but also kind of cute how he always manages to get away with it.

sporty college fling!seungkwan in those thin-ass shorts that they cling in all the right places, showing off his thick thighs, flexing calves, and the outline that has you looking anywhere but his lap whenever he walks into the infirmary. he’s got that sporty glow, a little sweat-slick, hair sticking to his forehead, flushed cheeks from running around, and that cocky smirk that’s always somewhere between friendly and downright dangerous.

so when you’re shrugging off your white coat, your tank top sticking a bit because the damn AC is broken, you catch him watching. his eyes go half-lidded, looking you up and down like you’re not a damn intern who’s just here to patch him up. he can’t even help it, a tiny little gulp as you reach back, trying to hold his knee steady while you clean up the latest scrape. and you lean over him—just a little closer to get a good angle—but the look on his face is downright sinful. he’s flushed deeper than ever, lips parted, eyes blown out like he’s somewhere far away from just a check-up.

and then you see it. oh, he’s really trying to keep it together, but that bulge is so obvious, so tight against the fabric of his shorts, it’s almost painful just looking at it. he’s shifting in place, his thighs pressing together, his hands gripping the edge of the bed, trying so damn hard to play it cool. trying being the keyword. you glance up, arching an eyebrow, giving him a once-over that has his face going from flushed to wrecked.

“you, uh… need help with anything else?” you murmur, voice dropping a bit, glancing between his lap and his face like it’s the most casual thing in the world.

he damn near chokes on his own breath, a helpless moan slipping out before he can stop it, his hips shifting forward as if he’s waiting for permission. and he spreads his legs wider, scooting to the edge of the bed, that smug smile barely peeking through as he bites his lip, knowing exactly what he’s about to ask for without saying a single word.

when you step forward and slip your hand between his legs, fingers skimming over the fabric, he lets out a broken sigh, tipping his head back with this blissed-out look that makes your heart pound.

sporty college fling!seungkwan whos losing his cool right in front of you, his little fantasy about to come true as you start to pull down those shorts, that look of relief as your hand wraps around him.

he’s biting his lip so hard it’s a wonder he doesn’t draw blood, trying to muffle the whimpers spilling out as you give him a few slow strokes, teasing just enough to make him squirm.

“fuck,” he hisses, pressing his palm tighter against his mouth, eyes wide as he glances toward the door like he’s expecting someone to walk in. you can’t help but chuckle softly; the thought of getting caught makes this whole thing even hotter. the university walls are so thin you can practically hear the whispers in the hallway, and seungkwan's face is a so desperate.

“c’mon, be quiet,” you tease, your voice low as you lean in a bit closer, brushing your thumb over the slick tip of his cock. it’s dripping now, and you can feel the pre-cum pooling in your hand, making it so easy to slide your fingers along his length. he whimpers again, muffling the sound with his hand, and it’s the kind of sweet, desperate noise that makes you want to do this forever.

“i can’t help it,” he whispers, trying to keep his voice down but failing miserably, and you can’t tell if he’s more embarrassed by how loud he is or by the way he’s getting even harder under your touch. you pick up the pace a bit, letting your fingers work him as his breath hitches, eyes rolling back just a little.

he clenches his eyes shut, the way he arches his back, trying to chase the pleasure.. his grip on his mouth tightens, and you can see the strain in his muscles, how he’s fighting against the urge to let it all out.

his gaze drops, catching on your fingers wrapped around him, nails perfectly manicured and glinting as they move, slow at first and then faster, like you’re testing just how much he can take. his eyes flick up, and the sight of your chest, bouncing with each stroke, almost sends him over the edge. it’s the kind of view he could lose himself in—is losing himself in—and he can’t look away, no matter how much he wants to keep his cool.

the slick, wet sound fills the small space, louder than his shaky breaths, louder than the little whimpers he’s trying so hard to hold back. his hips buck up, chasing the friction, and you can see him practically falling apart in your hand, his lip pulled between his teeth as he fights to stay quiet. it’s no use, though; his control is slipping, and he knows it.

“fuck—” he chokes out, voice breaking as his hand clamps over his mouth again, but his eyes stay glued to you, watching every single move you make. he swallows, pupils blown wide, his gaze flicking between your hand and your face. he looks like he’s about to burst any second.

the second your lips wrap around just the tip of his cock, seungkwan’s hands fly to his mouth, but it’s useless. the control he’d tried so hard to keep shatters instantly. a loud, ragged moan escapes, so reckless it could probably be heard down the hall, but he doesn’t care anymore.

“oh, fuck—no, wait, wait,” he gasp-whines, hands gripping the edge of the infirmary bed. his hips buck, but he’s melting under your touch, eyes rolling back as you swirl your tongue just around the head. its like his body’s got a mind of its own now, the pleasure overtaking everything else, every little shudder amplified. the quiet whimpers turn to full-on, desperate moans—he’s way past caring if anyone outside hears.

and then—before he can even manage a warning so you could take your mouth off him—his whole body tightens, and he’s coming, spilling over your tongue, a hot, sudden burst that has him gasping. his hand fly up, fingers digging into his own hair, breathless as he watches

he tries to collect himself. his legs feel weak, like he’s just finished sprinting through campus, but it’s way better than any game high. his legs are trembling, knees wobbling as he hops off the bed, trying to look at least half put-together while he straightens his shorts. but one look at your smirk, and he’s got that shy, red-faced grin back, a little embarrassed.

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who keeps sneaking into the infirmary for a “checkup” every chance he gets, especially after practice, because, according to him, “gotta make sure i’m in top shape, right?”

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who starts showing up with snacks for you after practice—sweaty, still in his shorts and jersey, claiming they’re for you so “you don’t have to eat that vending machine crap all day.”

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who eventually works up the courage to pull you into a storage room between rounds, pushing you against a shelf with that smirk of his, whispering, “you didn’t think i forgot about how good you looked last time, did you?”

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who practically has your schedule memorized by now, showing up at the infirmary right when you’re alone, leaning against the doorframe as he says, “miss me yet?” like he’s not been haunting your thoughts all damn day.

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who starts leaving you little notes in your bag with ridiculous messages, like “come to my game, i need my lucky charm,” with a winking face drawn on it. and when you finally show up, he plays like his life depends on it, catching your eye in the crowd every chance he gets, shooting you that smirk as he sprints down the field.

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who gets bolder every time you’re alone, wrapping his arm around your waist in the empty hallway, backing you against the wall, grinning when you shoot him a look. “don’t act so innocent,” he murmurs, tilting his head down to kiss you until you’re breathless, leaving you flushed and slightly disheveled before slipping away like nothing happened.

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who gives you his hoodie on chilly nights after practice, watching with a satisfied grin as you pull it over your head. he’d even say, “looks better on you, anyway,” then stroll off, pretending not to be thrilled seeing you in his clothes.

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who one day catches you in the library and somehow convinces you to sneak into one of the back study rooms, grinning as he shuts the door and pulls you close, whispering, “been dying to get you alone, you know that?” before pressing his lips to yours, hands sliding up your back as if he’s got nowhere else he’d rather be.

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who gives you a hard time for staying late at the infirmary, texting you, “don’t make me come drag you out myself,” and then showing up anyway. he lingers, leaning against the counter, arms crossed, looking at you with a smug smile and saying, “told you i’d come get you.”

sporty college fling!seungkwan, who finally asks you to stay over after a game, all soft and flushed from the adrenaline, looking at you with those bright, honest eyes. he murmurs, “you know, i don’t really want this to just be a fling,” his hand slipping into yours.

[inknopewetrust]

𝐒𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐬 𝐅𝐥𝐲

Summary: Tyler’s always wanted to show you something he loved—it just took some bad weather for it to appear. [Tyler Owens x Reader] [WC:2.6k}

Warnings: language, college-aged Tyler & reader, fluff, romance, this is a comedy? Idk folks. No smut though—sry :/. Just good ole fashion kissin’ in the rain. And what if I said this story was my real life experience, then what?

Quick Links: Masterlist [including other twisters fics]

“Where are we going?”

The tires of the truck were clunking along the rocky path to… well, nowhere. Thick trees surrounded you; the sun barely peeking through them as it began to decline in the sky and yet the truck kept tumbling along.

Shit. You thought for a brief moment as he didn’t reply. He might murder me.

“I told you,” his voice rang through your mind like a pinball machine. “It’s a surprise.”

“What if I said I didn’t like surprises?”

Tyler glanced at you as the truck hit a rough patch. Your hand was white-knuckling the grab handle above the window and your face was torn up in concern for the locale.

“I’d say, ‘honey’,” he put a hand on your clothed thigh. “I ain’t gonna murder you.”

“Well now that makes me think you are gonna murder me.”

Tyler laughed, squeezing your thigh joyously.

He was a maniac—Tyler Owens.

But he was also many things you did not know of yet. The first time you laid eyes on him was around eight months back when he walked in two minutes before the chemistry lecture. Every seat in the room was nearly filled except for the lone seat on the inside of the lecture hall beside you.

And when he sat there, you couldn’t focus on one goddamn thing.

It was silly—being twenty-one and having a crush on a guy in your science class. You weren’t in high school anymore but you sure as hell felt like it. When he asked for an eraser, you were too eager to provide it. One day he forgot his computer so he asked for some paper in the notebook you elected to use.

Each day you’d arrive a minute earlier than before with a childish hope that he would too and you’d be able to talk to him, learn about him. You weren’t in the same lab section so it was growing increasingly difficult to manifest a semblance of potential when it only occurred twice a week for an hour and fifteen minutes.

Fuck college schedules, is what you had concluded when he wouldn’t show up twenty minutes early to class.

Yet fate had a funny way of dictating what happens when.

Three months into class, your roommate suggested getting out and heading to a frat party one Saturday night and it shouldn’t have been a surprise to see him there. And out of some kindness, he went out of his way to say hi to his “lecture buddy” who’d helped him in times of need.

Every class that followed grew something in you. He came early to lecture to talk to you, joking about anything but the subject and going on and on about what he wanted to do when he graduated. His smile was contagious, as with his laugh. Bellowing and loud; Tyler Owens was everyone’s friend and everyone’s crush and you happened to be lucky enough to sit beside him until it was all over.

The semester ended and your interactions with Tyler ceased.

And it made you feel a little crazy for feeling down and out about your luck. Your roommates and friends tried everything to get you on the market: going to parties, joining strange clubs, playing trivia at the bar on Wednesday nights but nothing.

It was all nothing until something caught your eye.

You saw a flier for a meteorology seminar with a guest speaker from your local news. The premise wasn’t overly exciting for any one student at the university but for you, it was interesting enough to attend on a vacant Tuesday evening.

Like fate had promised before, it dealt you a winning hand.

Tyler spotted you as you walked through the door and waved you down. In your dumps, you forgot to think his attendance was a possibility even after he mentioned time and time again that he’d love to be on television, that he’d die to help people protect themselves.

So when he got ready to leave after the lecture, you weren’t going to die without facing a fear. You had to protect yourself from another six weeks of imaginary mourning and asked for his number.

And six weeks later you concluded he was going to murder you in some remote location in the plains of Arkansas.

“I’m not gonna murder you, alright?” He chuckled. His eyes were illuminated with a mischievous glow you couldn’t escape. You saw his eyes in dreams and knew you’d never want to imagine a day without them.

Fuck, you thought. It was way too early to be thinking of that.

“Then tell me!” You looked over at him with reason. “This road is so shitty I can’t imagine what’s on the other end!”

“Paradise, baby!” He smiled. “When I was a kid, my pops used to take me and my brother down here to go fishing. It’s this picnic area that I think,” he glanced at you with raised eyebrows, “no one else knows about. So don’t go runnin’ and tellin all them about this, ok?”

Oh.

It was personal.

“I won’t,” you promised.

“When my grandpa died I was,” he thought back on it as if it were long ago. “Nine and I came here with my mom and just sat. We stared out at the water and watched the ducks and the birds fly over until the sun went down. This was his spot and he passed it on to me.”

You suddenly felt an urge of regret pass over you as the comments from before soured.

“Tyler,” you said solemnly. “I didn’t—“

He brushed the nonverbal apology away.

“It’s alright,” he reassured. “There are plenty of reasons why you could have felt that way.”

It was heartwarming that Tyler didn’t dismiss your fears. There were so many guys, barely men, who would have called you crazy for a lot less. Tyler never made you feel that way.

Being with him was like chasing a high of the greatest strengths. Everything he did revolved around his ability to be free and willing to do what scared him the most and it was enchanting.

You could feel the sparks hit your heart.

“I’ve never taken anyone there before.”

“No?”

“You’d be the first.”

The two of you let that sit in the air as the road became more suitable for driving. The smoothness was welcome as his admission settled between you.

The first. He thought you special enough to be the first person to witness this place. You could have been ten feet tall at that moment. Never had anyone ever made you feel so special.

As the roads improved, the clearings of trees and bushes began to open up to a wider area with a paved lot on a taller hill.

It was beautiful.

Only the fairy tales could conjure a place like that. Billowing pines and lush greens on the bank of a river cut off by a large damn. The rushing water filled your ears amidst the squawking of wildlife uninterrupted by human activity.

It was so peaceful, charming.

The sun’s orange rays twinkled down onto the water and made it sparkle. Flowers in bloom, the buzzing of cicadas at the arrival of a hot and early spring warmed your cheeks as Tyler put the truck into park.

He watched you take in your surroundings of pure nature. A slight awe in your eyes, shallow breath at the sights. You were a vision in his favorite place.

“I thought we could have dinner here,” he tipped his head to the back seat where he had plastic Walmart bags full of food, unprepared and prepared for whatever fit your fancy. “And then, if we’re lucky, maybe it will rain.”

“Rain?” You turned to meet his eyes and they crinkled at the sides. Endearing, charming—just like this place.

Tyler hummed. “You mean to say you’ve never heard of rain?”

His words quickly became a joke. You rolled your eyes, hitting his chest with the back of your hand. It was solid under your touch and you were reminded that he was real. It wasn’t a fairytale and you were very much living it.

“Ha-ha,” you replied dryly.

“I’ll keep that one as a surprise.”

“I checked the weather before we left and,” you pointed to the sky. “No rain.”

Tyler unbuckled himself and opened his door.

“They just don’t see what I do.”

“And what’s that?” You asked him but he shut the door, moving to the backseat to take out the bags of items he procured, and then as ever the gentleman, opened your own door.

“Magic.”

You laughed but he was being serious. His eyes still gleamed with the same sly nature he was born with, but his touch was comfort. Hands carefully guiding you to a spot that he had meticulously planned out—even if this appeared to be a spur of the moment outing for you.

Everything was planned. Tyler wasn’t going to take just anyone to this spot. He’d be a fool to lie and say he hadn’t spoken to his mother about his plans just to hear her perspective on whether it was creepy, brilliant, or just plain sad.

However, he carried on to face his fears of bringing someone he liked to a place near-sacred to him. Tyler wasn’t a fool of love, he just hadn’t found anyone worth sharing these bits of him. And he also didn’t expect the feeling to come about so quickly.

Those fears he let simmer never truly came about in the reality he lived.

You were smitten. Absolutely fallen into this little spot in this tiny corner of the world with a man who was opening up before you. Tyler made the puzzle pieces of a perfect date fit together wonderfully.

The food, the drinks, the atmosphere—he hit an apex of the paragon of “partner,” “boyfriend,” or “lover.”

And you couldn’t wipe the smile off your face as the sun began to truly fade.

You took a sip of your drink, coming down from a high of laughter at a story Tyler shared at his brother’s detriment. The sky was a shimmering shade of reds and deepening blues now; orange melting away for the sake of night.

“No rain,” you pointed out. He shrugged his shoulders, moving from a lounging position on the worn blanket to a lying one. His arms perched behind his head.

Tyler stared at the stars beginning to form.

He could see the shapes of the clouds, the movement quickening and the air cooling. It was as special as this place, his talent for finding the storms. Whether they brew inside or out, he found them and chased them with a passion—unrelenting and fierce. He sought the thrill.

“The night’s not over yet,” he said coolly. “Don’t count me out.”

“I’m not counting you out,” you defended, moving scraps of discarded food away from you to lay next to him. You shuffled to get comfortable in his vicinity.

“How often do you stargaze?” Tyler asked.

“Not often. I don’t think there’s an opportunity for it when I have nowhere to go.”

He agreed with a grunt. “I think you’re lookin’ in the wrong spots, honey.”

Oh those godforsaken nicknames. The country in him seeped out at their mention.

“Oh?”

“Yeah,” he removed his arms from the back of his head and pointed to the now appearing stars the darker it became. “See here?”

You moved closer. “Not really.”

“There,” he pointed again. “Right there in the middle of those two clouds.”

There were two stories at play here: one of him proving that rain was coming in the guise of stars and the second of you trying to be aloof in order for him to touch you.

You’d spent the last hour with him. Watching him talk, eat, smile, and laugh at anything that brought him joy. Those lips begged you to kiss them. They beckoned you like a ship lost at sea and in the clouds, the water would find it.

You shook your head innocently.

“I don’t know what I’m looking at, Ty.”

“Here,” he took your hand in his and pointed to the stars. “Look.”

In the sky above, a faint outline of the Little Dipper appeared in your vision. You smiled lightly. His hand with his finger pointing was still outstretched and connected to yours which made it grow wider.

You were giddy.

Tyler moved his finger to fully cup your hand but as you kept looking at the sky, he looked at you. You could feel his eyes on you, the turn of his face and the low breaths he released through his nose.

“What else do you see?” He asked lowly.

You breathed in deeply. It was just too beautiful to explain one thing. The clouds grew thicker, dense in the night as light was swallowed up by the moon. The air was now cool enough to send a chill down your spine and wish the blanket was more than a thin excuse for a sheet.

“It’s getting cloudy,” you observed. “There are more stars and it’s cooling off.”

“Anything else?”

“It’s just beautiful.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “It is.”

“I’m can—“

You stopped mid-sentence at the sensation that hit your cheek.

It wasn’t air or breath or a bug or grass but a wetness that could have come from only one place: the sky. You waited for another to fall and it did not a second later. A third and fourth drop followed until it was a hundred drops or more into a steady downpour.

You scoffed in disbelief, sitting up to feel the rain in your palms and Tyler sat up too. His laugh was one of joy that followed yours.

“Oh my god!” You exclaimed as the water began to drench the area around you and your clothes.

“I told you!” Tyler shouted over the rain falling harder and harder. You blinked at him.

“How’d you know!?”

“Just did!”

“And what’s so magical about getting rained on?” You asked him.

He didn’t have a solid plan if it rained. All he knew is that he had seen this in the movies. A downpour catches two people in the rain and it creates one thing: magic. It’s innocent and daring, carefree and transparent. Rain makes lovers fall in love. It binds them to one spot, one moment in time where all the elements line up to craft one singular point that would forever be cemented in their memory.

“I don’t know,” he confessed.

Tyler positioned one hand to lean on behind your back while the other cupped your face. The rain dropped onto his hand but you were warm against the coldness of his hands. Your eyes glistened at him as the movies described.

“I don’t know what’s so magical about it.”

“Me either.”

“Can you kiss me?” You asked him. It wasn’t a question, per se. He was going to kiss you.

Tyler nodded his head, leaning in to meet your lips as the rain fell harder around you both. The sound of the rain disappeared when his lips met yours. Only the beat of your heart, the rush of your blood flooded your ears and body. You lifted a hand to grip his arm as he tilted his head, using his leverage to position you the way he wanted and deepened the kiss.

You could feel the tendrils of a story weaving in your bones. The place, the time, the kiss… it was a fairytale.

You dropped everything and kissed him in the pouring rain in a spot now forever implanted in your history, you felt the sparks fly higher.

A/N: thanks for reading! As always comments, reblog, and likes are always appreciated. I love hearing from all of you and your reactions motivate us greatly!

[exerotica]

The Ice Cream Man

Explicit 18+, Instant Weight gain, Force Feeding, M/M, Sexual Themes

Flipping through the channels Jake passed by the news where he noticed the heat index was 105 right now. Even inside he was feeling it, his AC was barely able to keep his ancient house at 85. Thankfully his parents were gone for the day and he could lay on the couch shirtless without comments about the small flab he’s put on since starting college. He was thinking about cracking open the fridge and freezer to cool himself down when the faint sound of an ice cream truck pricked his ear, “Perfect,” he sighed.

Jake threw on his favorite shirt and hat and stepped out the front door, the wet boiling outside air hitting him like a wave of lava. Squinting, trying to adjust his eyes, he looked down the street and met the met the bright colorful box that called to him like a siren. He met the truck where it stopped, “Hey Connor, thank god you’re here!”

“Hey Jake, figured I’d see you today. How’s it been going?”

“The heat index is 105, I’m not NOT getting ice cream man. Summer has been flying by until this heat wave hit, I can barely move in my own house without breaking a sweat”

“Not too sure that’s all to do with the heat Jake. Freshman 15 is a real thing, and I distinctly remember that shirt not fitting so tight last semester”

“You sound just like my parents, I don’t mind a few pounds, especially in the off-season. I just need something to cool off, I’ve been dying today”

“The usual?” Conner had an ice cream cone ready in a few seconds. They caught up and talked about plans for next semester while some of Jake’s neighbors ordered from the Truck. Connor had clearly been consistent with the gym even during the summer, he was much buffer than Jake remembered from last semester. Jake finished his cone by the time his neighbors dispersed and still wasn’t quite satisfied. “Hey how about another cone?”

“Another one? People are gonna be calling you ‘big guy’ next semester if you keep this big back activity up man haha”

“Listen, you parked almost a block away from my house, this one is so I don’t die of heat stroke on the way back.”

Connor smiled, rolled his eyes, and had another cone in Jake’s hand within a few seconds. Jake enjoyed his second cone but lingered and kept chatting with Connor a bit more. He caught sight of Jake’s underbelly as the wind flipped it up against the soft outline of his belly button pressing against his shirt. He couldn’t help himself, “You know Jake, if you’re really looking to cool off, this was my last stop so I have time to kill, hop in.”

Jake raised an eyebrow and smirked, “If you’re planning on kidnapping me, I’m going to community college, so it should be pretty clear my parents can’t afford a ransom.”

“Get in smart-ass,” Connor closed the side door and let Jake in, watching his pudge ripple as he hopped up the steps into the back of the ice cream truck.

“Oh fuck, it’s so cold, can I live here?” Jake closed his eyes and let the cold wash over him for a bit. Connor showed Jake the freezers, topping buckets, and ice cream machine.

Jake tapped the machine as it emitted a slow consistent hum, “Damn this thing looks old”

“Yeah, most of my work honestly is running and keeping this thing clean. The owner like to take really good care of it, ‘none of that new fake shit’ he says.”

“Can’t say he’s wrong, I love the stuff”

“Clearly. Course, on a day like today, you’re the only fatass who can finish the ice cream before it melts.” Connor chuckled to himself as he tidied up around the truck.

“Who needs to worry about melting when you can get it straight from the source?” Jake quickly kneeled and twisted his body so that his head faced the roof of the truck and locked his mouth to the spout of the machine. Turning the knob and letting the soft freezing cream slither into his mouth and melt down his throat, cooling his entire body.

“Jake! What the fuck man, you’re lucky I have to clean that anyways. I didn’t realize you were THIS much of a pig.” Connor paused as he saw Jake’s body pressed out from kneeling backwards and his shirt riding up past his belly button, exposing his soft pudgy belly. Connor couldn’t help but get hard watching Jake chug the ice cream, his body plump frame getting stretched and rounder.

Jake gave a few final strained gulps and sat upright on both knees, holding onto his gut and wincing. “burrraahhhhh… fuck that was heavier than I thought it was going to be.” Jake’s shirt was practically skintight, his love handles and underbelly finally free from his shirt, acting more as a crop top with two soft breasts still pressed away inside.

He looked over at Connor and from his kneeled position had a direct view of his hard on pressing against his skinny beige slacks. “Looks like I wasn’t the only one who enjoyed that, Connor.” As he nodded to Connor’s waist.

Connor walked over to jake and stood in front of him, still kneeling Jake was inches from Connor’s cock and could clearly see just how big the outline was. “I just knew your fat ass couldn’t resist” Connor said, looking down at Jake’s soft features staring back up at him.

“I could use some help for round two..” Jake had barely finished speaking before Connor knelt next to him supporting his head as he pressed his lips to the machine. Connor flipped the level and cream started flowing again down Jake’s throat. He felt the cold liquid strain in his gut as it kept pumping into him. Connor pressed his buff frame against Jake’s as he rubbed and groped his fat, jiggling his love handles and reaching up his tight shirt to access his man tits.

“That’s it fatass, keep going. Look at how big that fucking gut is getting.” As Connor encouraged Jake, he noticed Jake’s body getting bigger. Not just his belly, but his tits, love handles, ass, everything was growing right in Connor’s hands giving him more and more to squeeze and jiggle. Connor could take it, his cock practically tore its own way out of his pants and started grinding against Jake’s fat blubber.

Jake’s moans muffled by the machine had grown louder and deeper. He felt his body growing and his clothes straining against his new fat which was starting to spill out everywhere. His mind was fluttering barely thinking anything more than just how good it all felt. Connor’s fat cock pressing into his doughy frame with a constant stream of fat flowing straight onto his frame. His belly pressed out from his once skinny frame, freely hanging over his pants and jiggling like jello with every touch of Connor’s hand. He could barely control himself when Connor had freed his cock and started jerking him off, so much sexual input coming from his body was sending his brain into a frenzy.

Ice cream pumping into his fat greedy gut and Connor fucking one of his newly formed fat rolls, Jake struggled to breath trying to moan and tensing up he shot rope after rope of hot cum onto Connor and the floor of the truck. Connor joined in and as he repeatedly forced his cock against Jake’s blubber, causes ripples of Jake’s fat to run across his body. He grit his teeth and groaned as he pumped cum all over Jake’s new fat for what seemed like an eternity.

Jake’s naked obese body collapsed onto the floor of the truck the moment Connor turned the ice cream machine off. Connor got on top of him and pressed his hard muscley frame into Jake as he held his head and kissed his chubby face. Jake’s brain still in its haze, “I can’t believe I’m this fucking big.” Connor slapped his gut causing Jake’s belly to ripple and him to moan, “That sweet tooth of yours just finally caught up to you big guy.”

[birthing1020]

1️⃣or 2️⃣, 🤰🏡(apartment or dorm)🧠🦶(for one)

maybe something like a college aged couple in a coed dorm has been together since the beginning of the semester, and it’s great because they live in the same dorm.

she comes from a rural background and is pretty innocent in things of the world, and doesn’t realize that the “cuddles” she has with her boyfriend are what got her pregnant — she doesn’t even know she is pregnant.

now it’s the end of the semester, and most of the others in the dorm have gone home for summer. But not our favorite couple, they’re staying as long as they can together.

he’s realized she’s pregnant, he’s a pre-med major after all.

she gives birth in the dorm/apartment with only her boyfriend to help her with her “upset stomach” he lets her labor and birth without telling her what’s going on until the baby crowns — feel free to make it breech to give a panic moment

Tags: Female, twins, coed dorm, didn’t know she was pregnant.

~~~~~~~~~~~

It’s your favorite couple! The talk of the college campus, Lucy and Stephen were the couple. Her long blonde hair, she was short but definitely had a figure on her. Stephen, was all the females could talk about, he was the charmer and everyone knew what he was capable of. He might have been a future doctor in the making, but when he wanted you, he got you and he wrapped Lucy right around his finger. They were inseparable and by the time it was summer break, they didn’t want to leave each other’s side, so they decided to stick around the dorm - only to discover some surprises along the way.

~~~~~~~~~~~

“Baby, my tummy hurts!” Lucy groaned and rubbed at her stomach, she looked bloated but nothing out of the ordinary. Stephen came to her aid and rubbed her protruded belly, handing her some ginger ale in the process because it helped with ‘stomach aches’. He wrapped his arms around his girlfriend’s shoulders and unclipped her bra through her shirt, her nipples already erect from the cold air that hit her skin.

“You lie down sweetie, you need to get some rest.” He mumbled into the crook of her neck and kissed at her soft flesh. Only he knew she was beginning the early stages of her labor, only he knew she was pregnant as she just shrugged off the constantly missed periods. Their genitals ‘hugging’ didn’t mean anything to her, if you don’t cum, you can’t get pregnant; condoms are supposed to prevent this, right? Or so she thought. Unfortunately, she was one of the unlucky few that it failed with. She was carrying his twins, but all she looked was bloated and uncomfortable at times.

They fell asleep together after watching a movie, entwined in each other’s naked bodies, his chin softly on her head as he gripped her into a tight embrace. She woken up and grunted, taking a few deep breaths before sighing in her boyfriend’s chest. “I..I think there’s something wrong with me, there feels something wrong with me.” She stammered and took deep breaths trying to keep her composure.

She pulled away from his embrace and stood off the bed, pacing around before grunting and groaning every couple minutes. He slipped his boxers on before coming back to her aid — he knew he had to tell her, but right now was not the time. “Calm down, Lucy. Take some breaths with me.” He mimicked breaths for her to copy and they proceeded to follow each other in unison. She was getting closer and he knew he had to be at her side consistently now.

Lucy trucked into the bathroom and sat on the toilet, grunting and whining as the cramping in her abdomen had gotten worse — she was thankful he was in premed, so she had a future doctor at her side. “Stephen! What’s going on with me?!” She moaned out and rubbed her belly to try and stop the pain that was aching to her core.

“I feel like I have to…push?!” She hunched over her stomach and grunted; Stephen kneeling on the tiled floor, grabbing her hands for reassurance. “Baby — if you need to push, I want you to push. I’m gonna need you to push hard and long.” He grabbed her pants and panties, pulling them off her body; this’ll be least of her worries. She’s going to birth twins!

She stood up and hovered over the seat, she gripped her knees and groaned loudly as she pushed. “What is happening to me?!” She screeched out and squeezed her eyes shut, pushing slowly and hard. Her cunt expanding and the babies head slowly forming to a crown. “Honey — you are giving birth, we’re going to be parents!” Her eyes shot open in disbelief, she couldn’t tell if she was dying or Stephen was crazy. Baby?! Babies?! What was he talking about.

“What?!” She shouted in denial and pushed harder, grunting and panting from the pain. As liquid spurt out from her opening cunt, she bared down and slowly pushed the first baby out. Stephen quickly caught the first one in a towel and cut the cord. “It’s a boy.” He beamed up at his gorgeous girlfriend who was still in shock from what all was happening between her legs. She groaned and grabbed her stomach again as another pain took over her body.

“I think we’re having twins.” He rubbed her leg to reassure her that everything was okay. “You’re going to need to push again, Lucy.” He grabbed another towel and held it between her legs, watching her cunt slowly turn into another crown. “Okay…honey. We’re going to need you to get on the bed, this one is looking breech.” He stood up and rubbed at her back, gently walking her over to the bed and on her back. “This one will be a lot harder to get out.”

He kneeled in between her legs and stretched out her folds, Lucy panting and groaning from the pain, she tucked her knees in and pushed. “That’s it honey!” Stephen kept trying to encourage her through the uncomfortable motions, he slowly pulled as she pushed and twin finally slid out of her. She panted aggressively, trying to compose herself. “We have a little boy and girl.”

[stevie-petey]

episode five: the flea and the acrobat

“Steve, what-” He pushes past you in a frenzied hurry to get to his car, but you grab his jacket and force him to stop. “Answer me! Is Nancy okay? Was Jonathan with her?” Steve whips around and sneers at you. “Why do you even care about them? About him?” “Because we’re friends,” you say, and for the first time you really mean it. Nancy has become someone you’d call a friend.  Another cruel laugh escapes Steve’s lips. “Friends, huh? Yeah, those two looked real fucking cozy in her bed.”

Summary: you and dustin have a long overdue Sibling Moment, at will's funeral you and jonathan exchange information and surprise ! it's all horrible news ! nancy has awful timing and when you leave her alone with jonathan one damn time you and steve end up trauma bonded on her front porch #bffs.

Rating: general, though there's the use of guns in here for plot point sake, as well as cursing

Warnings: use of guns, cursing, fem!reader, and use of y/n.

Words: 14.4k (whew)

Before you swing in: i'm back gang ! fall semester is almost done and i am in the trenches, so i leave y'all with this monster of a chapter before hell week (i have three finals in one day next week, no i don't want to talk about it). please enjoy this beauty, i had so much fun messing with character relationships in this and it was very ;)

-

With how many times you’ve knocked on the Wheeler’s door this week, you’d think that Mrs. Wheeler would stop looking so surprised when she answers. 

“Y/N?”

You give the woman a small smile. ��Hi, Mrs. Wheeler. Is, uh, Mike home?”

“Yes… he stayed home today because of Will. Is there something you need?” The usually friendly woman seems beaten down from this week’s events as well, which you’re understanding of. 

“I was wondering if I could come in and see how he’s doing? Dustin is really shaken up about it, so I figured…” You shrug, trying to come across as a concerned older sister figure rather than a worried and horrible babysitter who should really retire. 

Mrs. Wheeler places a hand over her heart. “Oh, Y/N. You’ve always been so good with the boys, of course you can check on him. It means a lot that you care.”

Oh, no problem, but if we’re being honest I’m here because I’m scared I accidentally let your son get involved with the supernatural and dangerous monster men thingies that I honestly can’t wrap my head around!

Of course you can’t tell the woman this, so instead you thank her and let yourself in. Immediately you head towards the basement and fling the door open. You like Mrs. Wheeler, but the amount of times her son has snuck out of the house without her noticing honestly concerns you, so you’re a bit unsure if Mike even is home.

You get deja-vu from a few days ago as you head down the basement steps, once again hearing the three boys panicking as they try to hide El. Unlike last time, which had only annoyed you, seeing them scramble to hide the girl makes you relieved. 

They’re here, alive and well. You’d let Steve distract you from your worrying on the drive over, so the relief hits you like a damn truck. 

“Oh god not again!” Dustin groans when he sees you, worried that he’s once again going to get yelled at for being at the Wheeler’s with El. 

You ignore his theatrics and walk over to the girl, who is laying face down on the couch. You notice that she’s dressed in one of Nancy’s old costumes and a blonde wig that suits her well. What the hell did the kids get up to today? 

“Do I want to know why El is dressed like a doll and almost passed out on the couch?” 

“That depends on if you’re going to yell at us again,” Mike says. 

You shoot him a glare, but you guess he has a point. The last few times you’ve been with the kids you’ve ended up yelling at them one way or another. You feel bad about that, but then again: they won’t stop getting into trouble. 

El manages to raise her head from the couch, “Hi, Y/N.”

“Hi, sweetie,” you approach the couch and gently nudge her to the side so that you can sit down and place her head on your lap. She nuzzles into your warmth and lets out a sleepy sigh. “And to answer your question, Mike: I’m not here to yell at you guys. I just… Please tell me what’s been going on. I know I haven’t been here for you guys like I should’ve, but-”

“Your boyfriend needed you more,” Mike quips, though there’s some resentment in his voice that causes you to feel even worse.

Dustin hits his shoulder against the boy. “He isn’t her boyfriend, but she couldn’t just abandon him; he needed her. Besides, we have been sneaking off without telling her anything.” 

You cast an appreciative smile at your brother, thankful that even though he’s a pain in your ass, he always has your back like you do his. It’s something he’s always done with you and Mike; being so similar, you and him are constantly butting heads, yet Dustin has always been the first to defend you against his friend (even if you’ve never needed it in the first place). 

“I’m sorry, okay? I messed up, but I’m here now and I really, really need to know if I’m being paranoid. What mess did you dweebs manage to get into?”

The three boys suddenly can’t look at you. Their heads turn in different directions, Lucas scratches the back of his neck, Mike kicks at a board piece on the ground, and Dustin whistles a tune. 

Your shoulders slump. “Is it that bad?”

“It started this morning,” 

“Lucas!”

“Mike, she could help us! The weirdo clearly likes her,” he gestures over to El practically asleep in your lap, “plus, she’s the only sane one left in this group. I need backup.” 

“Backup?” You ask. 

Mike throws his head back in annoyance and lets out a groan as if he’s dying. Truly, this kid is the most dramatic person you’ve ever met. “Fine, we’ll tell you everything if you agree to stop hounding us for sneaking around. Will is missing, he’s our friend, and no one in the party gets left behind.”

You think this over for a moment, weighing the pros and cons in your head. “I will agree to those terms if you guys agree to keep me updated on everything at all times.” 

The boys try to argue, but you don’t let them. 

“I mean it, another person is missing. Nancy’s friend, Barb, was in the same woods that Will was, the same woods that you guys keep insisting on trekking through without supervision. This is serious, guys. Whatever, or whoever, is out there… it’s dangerous, and I-” You swallow down some tears that claw against your throat. “I can’t lose anyone else, okay?” 

The mood in the room is solemn, the three boys silent as your words hang in the air. Naturally, you try to lighten things up. “I’ll deny this if anyone asks, but unfortunately I love you boys.” 

As expected, they immediately begin to gag and pretend that they’ve been impaled with something as they all scream “ew” and “yuck” at your words. You laugh, which causes El to laugh as well, and for a moment it feels like nothing has changed. 

“So?” You ask after the boys have finished their gross theatrics. 

Dustin is the one who makes the decision for them. “We promise to keep you updated, for real this time.” 

“Good, now again I ask: why is El dressed like a doll and half asleep on my lap as we speak?” 

Lucas, Dustin, and Mike begin to talk all at once. 

“Mike radioed for me to head over, claiming he heard Will on the walkie.”

“Yeah, and then they radioed me to join. Sorry, by the way. I would’ve woken you up, but you and Jonathan looked so cozy in your bed so-”

“I thought you said they weren’t dating?”

“Not now, Mike.”

It continues like this for a while as they explain everything they did today. Sneaking El into the school, having to to talk to Mr. Clark, attending the assembly for Will, Mike fighting some idiotic kids for making fun of him before El made the head bully pee himself. 

You look down at the girl in your lap. “You can really make people pee themselves?”

“Sometimes,” she shrugs. 

“Lovely.” 

“That’s what you focus on, Y/N?” Mike asks you, and you simply shrug your shoulders in response. Sue you for still having doubts about Will being alive, you’ve gotten your hopes up one too many times. 

“Are you suggesting I believe that you heard Will through your cheap little walkies?” 

Dustin puts his head in his hands in defeat while Lucas gestures over to you. “See, she’s the sane backup I need.” 

Mike groans at you once more. “No, that’s why we snuck El into the radio room and used the heathkit that Mr. Clark got us. Keep up!”

“What, did you tell the guy that El was a new student?” 

“Don’t be stupid, we told Mr. Clark that she’s my cousin.” 

“Uhh, Y/N,” Dustin laughs nervously, motioning for you to stop talking. “You promised you’d be cool about everything if we told you.”

Knowing that your brother is right, you deflate a bit against the couch and start playing with El’s hair. “I am being cool, I just have so many questions.”

“Oh, just wait.” Lucas snorts. 

Mike now crosses the room to stand in front of you, as if he’s gearing up to tell you some major news. “We heard Will on the heathkit. El, she managed to use her powers to communicate with him.”

Like always, the seriousness in his voice concerns yet intrigues you. “Lucas, do you really believe that it was Will?”

The boy nods at you, his face grim. You don’t like how scared he looks, because out of the entire group he’s the one who is always the most reasonable. If he’s willingly telling you that he thinks it was Will, then you have to start taking the situation at hand seriously. 

“Okay, tell me exactly what you guys heard.”

And they do. One by one they tell you about Will’s pleading for his mom, telling her that it’s like home but cold and dark, the banging that followed after his words, how El had used so much of her energy trying to maintain the communication before the radio caught fire and she was too exhausted to do much else. 

“So, you believe us now?” Mike asks after you’re silent for a moment. 

You look down at the girl in your lap, in awe that someone so small and shy could hold so much power. This time you believe what the boys tell you without much conviction. Now that you know that Barb is missing as well, lost in the same woods as Will, the same woods where you found El, the photos from Nancy and the figure she claims she saw… It’s all starting to come together. 

You’re not sure exactly what you’re caught up in, but you know it’s too late to back out. Whatever is going on, whatever thing took Will and transported him to some unknown place with possibly the same powers that El has, you know it’s your responsibility to handle it. 

“Yes,” you respond, and the boys all sigh with relief. “Just one question though,”

Dustin sighs. “Yes, Y/N?”

“How did it take you guys so long to set fire to the school? Honestly, Jonathan and I thought it’d happen sooner.” 

“You’re hilarious.” Mike deadpans, which only causes you and El to giggle together again. 

“I hate to ruin the good mood, but we seriously need to figure out what Will meant when he said that wherever he is ‘is like home’.” Your brother interrupts. 

Mike spins to face him. “He said, ‘like home, but dark’, right?”

“And ‘empty’.” Lucas adds. 

“‘Empty’ and ‘cold’. Wait, did he say cold?” Dustin asks the group.

You nod your head. “You mentioned cold earlier.”

Lucas throws his hands up in the air in frustration. “The stupid radio kept going in and out!” 

“It’s like riddles in the dark…” Your brother sighs, which you hum in agreement to. 

Will’s words were pretty vague, but you wish you had been there at the middle school as well. Maybe if you had heard the tone of Will’s voice, you’d be of more help.

Mike continues to mumble about “like home” and “dark” for a few more seconds, now pacing around the room. You watch from the couch, El still resting with her head in your lap, and as you’re playing with her hair she finally speaks up after having been silent for a while. 

“Upside down.”

“What’d she say?” Lucas asks.

“Upside down? I guess?” Is all you can tell him. 

“What?” 

While you, Dustin, and Lucas are confused by El’s words, Mike rushes over to the forgotten board from a few days ago and sits down. He frantically flips it over and motions for you to come and join him. You hesitate for a second, but he only doubles down on his waving you over, so you gently lift El’s head up and walk over. 

“God, took you long enough.”

“I was literally three feet away from you on the couch, why did I have to move?”

Mike ignores your question and begins to explain the thirty million thoughts flying through his head at the moment, “When El showed us where Will was, she flipped the board over, remember?” 

You nod, slowly understanding where he’s going with this. “She flipped it upside down.”

“Exactly! Dark. Empty.” 

Lucas looks over at you and Dustin, unamused. “Do you understand what he’s talking about?”

“No,” your brother says at the same time as you saying “the upside down part? Yes. The dark and empty part? No.”

Mike tries to explain further. “Guys, come on, think about it. When El took us to find Will, she took us to his house, right?” 

“You mean last night when they found Will’s body in the water?” You ask, not really understanding where Mike is going with all this. 

“Like Y/N said, he wasn’t there.” Lucas reminds everyone, but Mike still tries to get his point across.

“But what if he was there? What if we just couldn’t see him, what if he was on the other side?”

You think about Jonathan’s words from earlier today in the car while on the way to the funeral home, trying to calm down from his fight with his mom. He had told you about how Joyce was convinced that Will was in the walls within their home, that the body they saw in the morgue hadn’t been his. 

“Hold on,” you interrupt Mike, “you guys said that there was some, like, banging where Will was, right? And that he had been begging his mom to come get him?” 

“Yeah, it was like some sick sci-fi movie!” 

You glare at your brother. “Ignoring you. Anyways, did you guys hear Mrs. Byers on the radio as well?” 

Mike shakes his head. “No, all we could hear was the banging and something... Growling, I guess.”

Knowing Joyce, you’d bet money that the banging had been her. You know that the next time you go over to their house, the walls might actually be destroyed, but she’d been right all along. Will is alive, he has to be. The pieces that you’ve slowly been collecting this past week fall together one by one. 

“That explains the walls and the weird monster thing in Jonathan’s picture,” you mumble to yourself, but Lucas hears you. 

“Do I wanna know?”

You purse your lips. “Let’s focus on figuring out where Will is, then I’ll tell you guys what I’ve been up to this week.” 

“Okay, so,” Mike begins again, now grabbing the board game and flipping it onto its normal, light side. “What if this is Hawkins,” he flips it upside down onto its dark side, “and this is where Will is?” 

“The Upside Down.” You finish for him. 

“The Upside Down.” Mike confirms. 

Slowly Dustin follows along. “Like the Vale of Shadows.”

Somehow you always end up the one confused when it comes to these damn kids. “The Vale of Shadows? What the hell is that?”

Dustin runs over to the bookshelf and pulls out a thick binder full of paper, but as he flips through it you realize it’s a rulebook for Dungeons and Dragons. He lands on the page he’s looking for, and you feel your shoulders drop. Great. More confusing terminology ahead. 

“‘The Vale of Shadows’,” he begins to read, “‘is a dimension that is a dark reflection or echo of our world. It is a place of decay and death. A plane out of phase. A place of monsters’.”

“Wait, didn’t you say something about a monster, Y/N?” Lucas asks, but you shush him so you don't miss whatever else Dustin will say next. 

“‘It is right next to you, and you don’t even see it’.” He finishes. 

His words hang in the air for a moment, but Mike, always somehow three steps ahead, pieces it together. “An alternate dimension.” 

Lucas finally accepts what’s happening. “But how do we get there?” 

“I’m sorry, we?” You look between all three boys, their faces still young and holding the childish innocence that you once had yourself. “No, there’s no ‘we’ in this. I may not know much about alternate dimensions, but there’s no way I’m letting you guys try to find and go to one.”

Mike rolls his eyes at you. “Well what choice do we have? Do you want to tell that mean police chief about this?”

“I…well… I mean-no.” You sink down in the seat, annoyed that Mike is right. No way Hopper believes any of this, you hardly believe any of it. 

“Can we cast shadow walk?” Dustin focuses back on the conversation at hand.

You don’t bother to ask what that means. 

“In real life, dummy.” Lucas reminds him. 

“We can’t shadow walk, but…” Your brother’s eyes land on El, who is still laying on the couch, silent and unmoving. “Maybe she can.”

The four of you turn towards the girl, and Mike voices his own question. “Do you know how we get there? To the Upside Down?”

El meets your eyes, and you can see that she’s hesitant about something. She’s been quieter than usual, almost suspiciously so, and you know that the more Mike figures things out, the more hesitant she becomes. She shakes her head at you, and you give her a sad smile. 

Lucas flings his head back and groans. “Oh my god!”

Mike and Dustin seem to be thinking the same thing, disappointed by El’s lack of help. You don’t blame them, also frustrated by the fact that it feels like you guys are so close to discovering something big. You can feel hope reignite in your chest; you haven’t been this close to an explanation about Will all week. This has to be it. It’s the only way you can explain everything that’s been happening lately. 

Speaking of which:

“Remember how I mentioned Barb and a possible monster?” 

You tell them everything, about Jonathan’s worry for his mom, how their phone got charred by lightning, Hopper’s theory that Will had been running from something, Nancy and Barb attending Steve’s party and how Barb had been on her own near the woods. You tell them about how Barb has been missing ever since and the photos Jonathan took (leaving out the horrible ones of Nancy) that Nancy brought to your attention at the funeral home. The figure in the background, looming over Barb, how it didn’t seem to have a face.

Then you tell them about Joyce and her spiral, though now you know she actually wasn’t crazy. You tell them about the Christmas lights and Will communicating with her through them. How she claimed that she could hear him through the wall and that the body in the quarry hadn’t been him. 

When you’re finally done catching them up, they stare at you with their jaws open. 

“Dustin,” Mike says, “remind me to never leave your sister out ever again.”

“Noted.” 

– 

The events from the day had left El exhausted and she refuses to say anything else after you explain everything to the boys. Her eyes droop while Mike interrogates you for answers you can’t give him, so finally you take pity on the poor girl and tell him that you’ll talk more in the morning. 

Mike isn’t too happy about being shut down, but when you point towards a half asleep El he reluctantly gives in. “Fine, but as soon as the funeral is over we’re discussing this further.”

Right. Will’s funeral is tomorrow. 

“Yeah, sure,” you tuck your hair behind your ears and motion over to Dustin. “We need to go, it’s late and mom will be wondering where we are.” 

He tries to argue with you but you just gather your things and head for the stairs. There’s still a lot you need to think about and a million things you need to sort before the funeral tomorrow. Did Jonathan even buy the coffin? Who had made the arrangements after you and him left the funeral home with Nancy?

There’s a lot you need to talk about when you call him tonight. 

The bike ride home with Lucas and Dustin is a quiet one, both boys understanding that you need some time to think about everything you learned tonight. 

You make a list in your head of what you do know, but it’s a frustratingly short list. 

1) El, one way or another, has powers that enable her to communicate with Will in some weird upside down universe that you can’t actually get to (can you even count this as something you know?)

2) Hopper was right: Will went missing because he was running from something (probably the same faceless thing that’s in Jonathan’s photo). 

3) Whatever took Will also took Barb, bringing Nancy into this wonderfully confusing mess (you still don’t know if her involvement is a good or bad thing). 

Everything else? You have no fucking clue what’s going on. 

When you get home with Dustin, it’s late; the two of you have to sneak past your mom, who fell asleep with Mews on her lap in the living room. Dustin heads straight for his room but you stop him, motioning for him to come into yours for a second. 

“What-”

“Shh!” You quickly shut your door to ensure that your mom won’t hear anything. 

Dustin groans. “I thought you said you weren’t gonna yell at me?”

You roll your eyes at him. “I yell at you guys twice after years of patience, now suddenly I’m a screaming monster,” he doesn’t say anything and flings himself onto the bean bag by your bed. “Anyways, we’re long overdue for a code blue.” 

Your brother shoots up from the bean bag, eyes wide. “No.”

“Yes,” you join him on the bean bag. “Code blue time, we’re going to talk about our feelings after the hellish week we’ve had. C’mon, you know the drill.” 

Code blue was something the two of you came up with when your dad left. You had been twelve when it happened, Dustin had been nine. It’d been a really rough few months for you guys, dealing with the betrayal of your dad while also moving away from your hometown in Virginia all within a year. Neither of you had adjusted well to the sudden changes, and though you were angry and bitter about what had happened, the moment you saw that it was affecting your brother you decided to implement code blue. 

It’s simple, really. Whoever calls for a code blue gets to talk about or ask whatever they want while the other is required to answer. Originally it was so that you could force Dustin into telling you his feelings, but over the years it’s become a way to bond with each other and know that no matter what you’ll be there for one another. No half truths or a vague “I’m fine”; it’s a time for you guys to be vulnerable with one another without using it as leverage against the other. 

Dustin plops his head back down. “Fine, but I’m tired so can this be quick?”

“Hey, no complaining during code blue. That’s like, rule number one.” 

“Y/N.” His tone is one of annoyance and you know that if you don’t start talking soon then you’ll lose his interest.

“Right, sorry. Okay,” you clear your throat and face your brother. “Today’s code blue topic is this: I’m worried about you getting your hopes up about Will. We don’t know that he’s alive just yet.” 

As expected, Dustin is unhappy with what you’ve said. “We do know that he’s alive, I heard him on the heathkit. He’s alive, Y/N.” He sees the uncertainty on your face and doubles down on what he’s saying. “He is.”

You bite your lip, scared that you’ll say the wrong thing. “Dustin, nothing is certain. Even though we’re definitely onto something, and while I believe that you heard Will on the radio, that doesn’t change the fact that there’s something else out there that wants to hurt him. I mean, he’s trapped in some weird alternate dimension that we have no idea how to even get into. I just… I don’t want to see you get hurt again.”

You think about the way your brother’s face fell when they pulled Will’s body out of the water. How the hope that had been in his eyes immediately died alongside his childhood naivety. He had built all of his hope upon a shaky foundation; the moment it collapsed he fell apart. 

“Look I know you’re trying to look out for me, but Will is a part of the party. He’s our friend, we can’t just lose hope and leave him behind. He needs us.” Dustin speaks with so much certainty and an aura of maturity that almost makes you forget that he’s twelve. 

“I’m not saying it’s dangerous to have hope, but I need you to promise me that you’ll protect yourself from whatever happens next. How’s that sound?”

Dustin thinks for a moment, tapping a finger against his chin. “Hmm, I think I can make that deal if you promise the same thing. I mean, c’mon, it’s obvious that you’re the sensitive one out of the two of us. You and hope? Doomed.” 

You laugh, knowing he’s right. You’ve always been branded by hope; hopeful for love, for dreams, and for those who may not always deserve it. You and hope haven’t always gotten along, but she’s become a familiar friend. 

“I think you’ve got yourself a deal. Now, it’s late and I have to call Jonathan and catch him up on everything, so let’s conclude code blue with its mandatory hug.” 

“Woah woah woah, I don’t think we gotta-”

Dustin’s words become muffled as you throw yourself on top of him and squish him into a hug. He squirms against you for a second, claiming he can’t breathe, but you shush him and force him to accept the hug. Though you won’t ever tell him this, losing Will has only made you more appreciative of having a wonderfully annoying little brother. 

After code blue, Dustin goes to his room claiming that “alternate dimensions are super draining”, and before he leaves you tell him to be ready tomorrow by nine for the funeral and that your mom will take him. You’ll be at the Byers’ helping Jonathan. 

Once he’s gone you give yourself a few moments to sit in silence, letting the events from today settle over you. It seems like all you’ve felt this week is exhaustion and hurt and at the rate everything is going, there’s no telling how long you’ll feel this way. 

The moment you’re done wallowing you roll off the bean bag and walk over to your desk to call Jonathan. You’re honestly not sure what you’ll even tell him tonight, there’s no way you’ll be able to cover everything before the night ends. The two of you have a long day tomorrow, so you figure you’ll have to make do with the limited time you have and summarize. 

Jonathan answers after a few rings. “How’d your little secret mission go?”

You make a face. “Is it even a secret mission if I told you I was going on it?”

“It is if you refuse to tell me what you did during it.” 

“Touché, bee.” 

He laughs, which sends a cascading warmth throughout your body. You can envision him perfectly on the other end of the line, leaning against his kitchen wall with the phone wire wrapped around his finger as he absent mindedly fiddles with it while he talks to you. 

You clear your throat and shake the thought from your mind, you called him for a reason. “Anyways… we need to talk.”

Jonathan is silent for a moment and you can feel the playfulness fade away. “Yeah, you first though. You already know what Nance and I were up to.” 

Nance?

Awesome. Cool. Totally not going to be consumed by that later. 

“Right. Uh, well. I went looking for Dustin because the other night when I was with the boys we stumbled upon this, well, this little girl.” 

“A girl?”

“Yeah, she’s bald.”

“Okay… is that important or…?”

“Unsure, but it felt important to tell you. Sorry,” you take a deep breath, “I’m not sure why I’m so nervous right now.”

“It’s okay, bug. It’s me, you can tell me anything.” 

No I can’t.

“Sure, yeah, totally. Um, so anyways we found her, her name is El, and she’s our only connection to Will right now.”

A beat of silence. “What do you mean?”

“Well, she kinda has… powers?”

“Powers,”

“Powers.”

You hear Jonathan sigh on the other end of the call. “Bug, you’re not seriously telling me that the boys have somehow dragged you into one of their little schemes, right?”

Yeah, he’s reacting exactly how you figured he would. 

“I know what it sounds like, but Jonathan… How else would you explain everything going on? Will disappeared, Barb did too, your mom and her lights. Now that thing Nancy saw in the woods, which I know you definitely have an update that will only further prove how weird this all is.”

Again Jonathan is quiet, and this time you envision him pacing little circles in the kitchen as he carefully thinks through your words, trying to piece it all together. “We developed the photo again and you’re right, there’s something behind Barb in it.” 

You close your eyes and exhale. “So, you believe me now?”

“Guess I don’t really have a choice.”

“You don’t.” 

“Then we’ll talk about it after the funeral tomorrow.” He concedes. 

“Yeah,” you let out a shaky breath, “the funeral. I’ll make my way over the second I wake up tomorrow to help with everything.” 

“You don’t have to-”

“I know.” 

More silence settles over the two of you. It’s still hard to wrap your head around the fact that it was only a week ago where everything was normal. No disappearances, no weird feelings, no heartbreak and confusion. 

“Bug?” Jonathan is practically whispering. 

“Yeah?”

“Lonnie is here.”

The words hit you hard. Why the fuck is Lonnie back in Hawkins? “Do you need to spend the night? I can finally bake those cookies for your mom and we can watch whatever you want.” 

“No,” he sounds exhausted. “He hasn’t been a problem yet, and I can’t…” 

“Leave your mom with him?” You finish. 

“He thinks she’s crazy and her axing down one of our walls doesn’t help-”

So you were right, Joyce did indeed break down her wall to try and get to Will.

“Jonathan, it’s okay. I understand, stay with her and get some rest. Sleep, that’s an order.”

He lets out a weak laugh. “I love you, bug.” 

Like how I love you?

“I love you too, bee.” The words burn your tongue. 

“Goodnight,”

“Sleep well.”

– 

You’re up before the sun this morning.

You spent hours tossing and turning last night, hardly getting any sleep. No matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t seem to turn your mind off. All you could think about was Jonathan, his smile and his voice and the way he kisses your forehead whenever you’ve done something especially endearing to him. You were surrounded by him last night. 

Now you stand outside his front door holding a tin of cookies, dressed in a simple knitted black dress and tights with mary janes that used to belong to your mom for Will’s funeral. The shoes are your favorite, but now you’re afraid they’re tainted by the occasion you’re wearing them for. 

It’s Lonnie who opens the door. “Well if it isn’t little miss Henderson. I missed ya, sweetheart.” 

You haven’t seen the man in two years, having been fourteen when he left Joyce and the kids. Since then he’s only aged horribly, his eyes slightly yellowed and his beer gut now more prominent. Clearly he still prefers alcohol over human company. Figures. 

“Can’t say the same about you.” Your shoulder hits his as you walk in and he lets out an annoyed huff. 

The man follows you but you pay him no attention. Instead you head straight towards Joyce and the second she sees you she runs into your arms; you only have a few seconds to place down the cookies before she’s in your arms. 

“Y/N! You’re here!” She squeezes you tight and you melt into her embrace. She’s always given the best hugs whenever you’ve needed the comfort, but now it’s your turn to be the one offering the support. 

“Of course, Mrs. Byers. Who else will make sure Jonathan is ready on time?” You mean for it to be a joke, but the way that Joyce’s eyes harden tells you that the funeral is a sore topic for her. She still doesn’t believe that Will is dead and it breaks your fucking heart that you can’t tell her she’s right. 

Joyce wipes away a tear before pulling away. She goes to say something before seeing the tin of cookies on the counter; she immediately pulls you into another hug. “Oatmeal raisin,” 

“They’re your favorite.”

“And Will’s.”

“And Will’s favorite. You know I gotta take care of my Byers.” You whisper into her ear, feeling Lonnie’s eyes on you during the exchange. You have to bite back your tongue, though his presence always makes you feel a type of anger that’s normally foreign to you. 

Joyce pulls away and you know it’s taking everything in her to give you a smile. “You’re too good, sweetie,” she tucks a loose strand of hair that came out of its braid. “Jonathan’s in his room.” 

You grab her hand and give it a squeeze, trying to convey just how much you love and admire her into a simple gesture, before letting go and walking over to Jonathan’s door. 

He’s struggling with his tie when you let yourself in. He’s dressed in the only nice white button down he owns, something he bought for his aunt’s funeral a few years ago that now hardly fits. You can tell that he’s getting frustrated with the tie, so you walk over and help. 

“Here, let me,” you wrap your fingers around the piece of cloth and quickly fashion it into a tie. The two of you don’t talk while you fix the clothing and you know that today will be a wordless day with Jonathan. 

When you’ve finished, you begin to pull away before he places his hands around yours. He cups your hands at the base of his neck as they rest against his collarbones; your fingers are still wrapped around his tie. He squeezes your hands and brings them to his lips and kisses your knuckles so softly that you feel all the love within you simmer.

You know he’s only trying to express his gratitude for you but the butterflies in your stomach make you feel faint. 

You’d do anything for him. 

– 

The funeral has a surprising turnout, not because you ever doubted Will’s incredible ability to be loved by anyone he meets, but because you see faces in the crowd who you’ve never seen before. 

You stand behind Jonathan during the funeral with your hand on his shoulder as he sits with his family in a weak attempt to provide comfort during the service. It’s really fucking bleak. Your other hand is on Dustin’s shoulder as he stands next to you while Mike and Lucas are to the right of him.

Your mother is in the back of the crowd having known she’d cry the entire service, and faintly you can hear her blow her nose into a tissue and sniffle. 

The pastor drones on for a while about how a tragedy like this won’t separate everyone from God’s love, but if attending the funeral for a twelve year old boy is how God shows his love then you want no part in it. Joyce sits stoic alongside Lonnie, Jonathan hasn’t moved at all since the service began; they’re a family brought together by grief. This isn’t love. 

“Just wait until we tell Will that Jennifer Hayes was crying at his funeral,” Dustin snickers, effectively breaking you from your thoughts. You hit his shoulder and shush him as Mrs. Wheeler reminds the boys to be quiet. You flash her an apologetic smile for your brother’s actions. 

You know how firmly the boys believe Will is alive and you honestly can’t say you don’t think so as well, but nothing is certain. Even if he’s alive there’s no way you guys can get to wherever he is; you wish the boys would use some caution with how quickly they’re building their hopes up. 

After the service you walk up to Will’s grave and bend down. You bring one of the yellow roses from the funeral director up to your lips and whisper, “If you’re out there little bee, please, come home.”

Before dropping the rose in you give it a gentle kiss, inhaling its sweet scent and watching as it falls down onto his coffin. Jonathan finds you there crouched down and sees the rose right as it lands. He doesn’t say anything, he just grabs your hand and helps you stand up to bring you over to where Nancy is waiting a couple yards away. 

“Hey, Y/N.” 

You don’t have it in you to do anything other than wave at the girl, but she seems to understand and gives you a sympathetic smile. 

Soon the three of you are settled on the ground with your backs against an old rickety fence behind some tombstones. Jonathan is in the middle of you and Nancy and you rest your head against his shoulder, already exhausted from the day. It’s not the coziest spot to be sitting, but at least you’re away from prying eyes. 

Once you’re seated, Jonathan finally talks for the first time today. “Alright, I already told you this over the phone last night bug, but Nancy was right. After we redeveloped the photo there’s definitely some kind of figure behind Barb, and we thought maybe if my mom has been right all along about some monster-”

“Then she’s right about Will being alive.” You finish for him, having already come to the same conclusion yourself.

“And Barb has to be alive if Will is.” Nancy says, and there’s a spark of hope in her voice that surprises you. You’re ashamed to admit that you didn’t think her and Barb were that close, but seeing how worried she’s been for the girl makes you realize that you’d been a fool not to have seen it sooner. Barb was Nancy’s closest friend. You don’t know what you’d do if Jonathan ever disappeared like Barb did. 

Jonathan pushes your head with his shoulder. “Anything you want to share with the class?”

You look between him and Nancy and try to decide how much you should tell them. While you’ve already told Jonathan a little bit about El, you’re not sure if you can trust the information with Nancy. However, seeing her urgency to find her friend leaves you feeling a bit safer disclosing the information to her. 

“It started the night after Will disappeared…”

It takes a while to tell them everything, and while Jonathan butts in a few times to ask questions, Nancy remains silent and eagerly listens. She nods when she’s supposed to, engages with the story as if her life depends on it. You’re incredibly impressed by her intelligence and openness to the situation at hand. Had it been anyone else they would’ve scoffed at you and called you insane. But Nancy? She holds onto every word and trusts that what you’re saying is true. 

You’re starting to admire her, as painful as it is to admit. But Nancy Wheeler is fucking brilliant, there’s no denying that. 

When you’re finally done explaining El and the Upside Down, Nancy finally speaks. “Let me make sure I’m understanding correctly, you’ve been helping my brother harbor a girl with superpowers in my basement?”

Huh. 

You hadn’t thought of it that way. 

“Ya know, you make a good point.”

Thankfully she laughs and doesn’t seem too upset, which relieves you. You reassure her that they’re fine and that El is someone you trust, and Nancy seems to take comfort in your words. It’s not that you purposely hid the situation from her, but looking back you definitely could’ve used her help now that you know how cool she is. 

As the two of you are laughing, Jonathan pulls out a piece of paper. 

“What’s that?” You ask. 

He shows you. “I printed out a map of Hawkins and drew x’s on every place we know for sure the monster has been.” 

“Two questions: one, so we’re officially calling it the monster now? And two, why don’t you ever put in this much effort for school projects we do together?” 

Jonathan flicks the paper in your face. “Funny. And yes, we’re calling it the monster now. Can you pay attention please?”

“Sorry,”

Nancy shuffles in closer and her head is practically on Jonathan’s shoulder as well (you’re choosing to ignore that) and she studies the paper and points to one of the x’s. “So that’s-”

“Steve’s house,” Jonathan points to another x, “and that’s the woods where they found Will’s bike and where Y/N last saw him,” the familiar feeling of guilt washes over you, “and that’s my house.” 

Nancy reaches over Jonathan and grabs your hand, surprising you both. “You saw Will last?”

“Yeah,” you swallow, your mouth now suddenly dry. 

“I’m sorry,” her tone is sincere.

“We should get back to the map…” You dodge, highly uncomfortable with Nancy’s comfort. You appreciate it, but you’ve never been good at accepting help from others. 

“Right, sorry,” Nancy clears her throat. “The x’s, they’re all so close.”

Jonathan observes the interaction with slight confusion but decides not to say anything besides, “Yeah, exactly. I mean, it’s all within a mile or something. Whatever this thing is, it’s not traveling far.”

There’s a look in his eyes as he speaks, one of determination and disdain for whatever that thing is, and before you can tell him no, it’s Nancy who voices your concern first. “You want to go out there.”

Jonathan nods and you feel uneasy. “I trust you won’t try going alone again, right?” It’s a question, but he hears the underlying try and I’ll kill you hidden beneath your words.

“No, not this time… but we might not find anything.” 

“I found something,” Nancy reminds him, which you nod at. She’s the only one out of the three of you who has seen the monster in person, and if you had to place any bets, she’s the one who will be able to figure out what the fuck to do with it. 

Actually, what are you guys going to do?

“Do we, like, have a plan for after we’re done monster sightseeing? Or are we just going to take a look at it and call it a night?” You ask the two of them. 

Nancy bites her lip and looks down, also unsure what exactly the three of you are supposed to do. It’s Jonathan who remains stone faced, and there’s a newfound sense of confidence within him that you’ve never seen when he boldly states, “We kill it.”

“Alright there tough guy,” you hit his chest with your hand and snort. “Sure, we kill it. Obviously.”

“Well, do you have any other ideas? For all we know, Mike and the others will be out there in those woods later looking for Will.”

“We don’t know that-”

“Bug, humor me, how did they find El again?”

You’re silent. He’s right, if you guys don’t go and find this monster before tonight then there’s a high chance the boys and El will find it themselves. Fuck. 

“Nancy,” you say to the girl, “it seems like we’re now officially monster hunters.”

– 

Of course Lonnie has a goddamn handgun just casually stored in his glove box.

You’re not entirely on board with this whole gun situation and apparently Nancy isn’t either, immediately questioning Jonathan when he picks the lock to get the gun.

“What, you want to find this thing and take another photo? Yell at it? Better yet, why doesn’t Y/N just round up the boys and El and have them take it down.”  

“Okay, hey,” you point at Jonathan. “Out of line.” 

He mumbles an apology under his breath while Nancy claims that this is all a terrible idea. You’re not sure where you fall in regards to what’s happening, but you’d say at the moment you’re a solid mix between Jonathan’s no time for nonsense mood and Nancy’s hey let’s slow down hesitation. 

You kick a rock and watch as it dings against Lonnie’s car, which pleases you. “Oh it’s definitely a terrible idea, Nancy. Unfortunately it’s all we have going for us at the moment.” 

Jonathan nods at your words. “She’s right, no one’s going to believe us if we tell them. You know that.” 

“Your mom would.” Nancy responds, jutting her jaw out in defiance. 

You cringe, unsure how Jonathan will respond to what she’s said. Joyce is a sore topic for him, he’s always been so protective of her.

“She’s been through enough,” he sighs, and you hum in agreement. 

Nancy grows more frustrated. “She deserves to know!”

You step in between them. “Look, you’re right. Mrs. Byers deserves to know, but right now she isn’t well enough to handle the idea of her only remaining son actively seeking out a monster that may have taken her other son who could possibly be alive. If we’re wrong or Jonathan gets hurt, it might actually kill her.”

“Yeah, we’ll tell her when this thing is dead.” You note Jonathan’s word choice, saying “when” instead of “if”. In the four years you’ve been his friend, you’ve never seen him so self-assured before. You’d be proud of him if the circumstances weren’t so damn grim. 

“What about the kids?” Nancy finally says after a few seconds of silence. 

“They can’t get involved, I won’t let them.” You tell her and she nods as if expecting you’d say that. 

She gestures over to the funeral home where the crowd of attendees are now gathered for the post burial service. “I know my brother, so you better go and tell him that they need to stay at our house while we deal with the monster. They like you better than they like me, they’ll listen to you if you explain what we’re doing.” 

You’re flattered by her words, honestly. Mike, Dustin, and Lucas listening to you about staying put while you guys go monster hunting? They’d be out the door before you’d be even able to finish saying the phrase “monster hunting”. No way they’ll listen, and you’re about to say exactly that before catching the look Jonathan is giving you. 

You groan at him. “You don’t actually believe they’ll listen to me, right? C’mon, you know those boys as well as I do. This is just a giant DnD game for them at this point.” 

He shrugs, “It doesn’t hurt to try?”

Nancy gives you a hopeful look and bats her eyelashes at you, which, okay, shouldn’t work on you but does. Jonathan does the same, except instead of batting his eyelashes he winks at you and suddenly you’re very confused by the onslaught of emotions that wash over you.

“Ugh, fine. But when they show up in the woods later you guys are on your own!” 

– 

When you step inside the service hall, everyone is gathered into small groups talking amongst themselves. You scan the room for the kids and spot them across the room sitting at a table with Mr. Clark. He’s talking to them about something while holding a paper plate up. You’re not sure what exactly he’s saying to the boys, but they’re leaning in close to him and are listening intently. 

This worries you. 

You try to make your way over as quickly as you can, but being Jonathan’s best friend has some challenges. Every few steps you take you’re stopped by an extended family member of the Byers to ask how you are or a stranger stops to offer you their condolences because you’re close with the family. You do your best to make small talk and thank the people, but you don’t have time to say much else besides, “thank you” or “you were Will’s favorite great aunt”.

By the time you finally get to the table with Mr. Clark and the boys, the man has folded up the paper plate and stabs it with a pen. You really, really don’t want to know whatever the hell this man is explaining to the kids. 

“You create a doorway,” he explains, holding up the plate and smiling at the boys. 

Dustin looks enthralled. “Like a gate?”

“Sure, like a gate. But again, this is all-”

“Theoretical.” Lucas says, nodding his head.

A gate?

What are the odds the boys are talking about a gate to Disneyland?

You sigh, not liking the odds at all.

You slide yourself into Dustin’s chair and force your brother to share with you. He squeaks in surprise and you flash him a tight lipped smile, which causes him to gulp. He knows he’s been busted. 

Mike scoffs at your arrival. “Gee, wonder why you’re here Y/N.”

“Go on, continue this conversation with Mr. Clark here. I wanna hear it.” 

Mr. Clark looks at you uncertainly but Mike simply carries on with the conversation as if you aren’t even here. “But what if this gate already existed?”

“Well, if it did I think we’d know.”

You snort. “Wanna bet?”

Again the man looks at you uncertainly and clears his throat, uncomfortable by your presence. “What I mean to say is that it would disrupt gravity, the magnetic field, our environment.”

“So if there is a gate, it’d be really bad?” You ask, but you already know the answer. 

“Oh, definitely. It might even swallow us up whole!” 

You and the boys look around the table at one another, not at all liking what Mr. Clark is saying. Swallow you guys up whole? That’s not really something you’re interested in. 

Mr. Clark sees your nervousness and shrugs. “Science is neat, but it’s not very forgiving.”

Silence falls upon the table. 

Mr. Clark is such a peachy person.

“Well!” You throw your hands upon the table and the loud noise causes everyone to flinch. “Thank you so much for that lovely information, Mr. Clark. It was truly riveting, but would you mind giving me and the boys a second alone? I just, I want to make sure they’re doing okay after today.” 

You bat your eyes at the man, something you never do, and he clears his throat and excuses himself. The second he’s gone you snap your finger in the boys’ faces. “Hey, listen up. Whatever you guys are planning? Don’t.”

As usual, Mike is the one who argues. “But-”

“No.”

“You don’t even know what we’re-”

“No.”

“Can you at least let me-”

“Sure,”

“Really?”

“No.”

Lucas and Dustin watch the interaction with slight pleasure, amused by your ability to shut Mike up, but when he turns to them for help they reluctantly give in. 

“Y/N,” Dustin sighs, “honestly, how many times are we gonna do this whole ‘we’re not allowed but we’re going to do it anyways’ bit?” 

You glare at your brother. “However many times it takes for you guys to finally listen.”

“Cool. Then we’ll expect you to bust down Mike’s door later tonight.”

“I’m not kidding,” you face all the kids and make sure they’re listening. “Whatever you’re trying to do, don’t. Jonathan and I-”

“You told Jonathan?” Mike exclaims but Lucas shushes him. 

“We’re going to handle it, we already have a plan but whatever you do: stay out of the woods from here on out. We think… We think there’s a monster out there hiding. I just want to make sure you guys are safe.”

“Monster hunting?” Dustin’s eyes light up and you silently curse Jonathan and Nancy for even suggesting you do this in the first place.

“Technically… yes, but you guys absolutely have to stay put.”

They stare at you as if you’re insane.

“You do realize who you’re talking to, right?” Dustin asks. 

You flick his head. “Yes, and I’m putting a lot of trust in you guys right now. I’ll let you guys do whatever you want so long as it doesn’t include the woods. Until you get an all clear from me, it’s off limits.” 

Mike thinks this over. “Can we look for the gate then?”

You sigh. There’s no other way to appease them. “If you don’t go near the woods… then fine.”

The boys begin to cheer, which causes several funeral guests to stare at you with judgment. You realize now that this probably hadn’t been the right setting to have this conversation in. Oh well.

You don’t let the boys cheer for long. “However-”

“There she goes,” Lucas sinks into his seat and squeezes his eyes shut. 

“I get full updates whenever I please. I don’t care if I have to track you guys down from the gates of hell itself, but I will find you and you will tell me everything. Deal?”

Lucas, Dustin, and Mike gather close together and duck their heads down so whisper to one another. You roll your eyes but wait for them to finish. When they’ve reached a decision, Mike interlocks his fingers and places his hands on the table. “You’ve got yourself a deal.” 

– 

As soon as you’ve changed out of your funeral clothes and into a simple pair of jeans and a sweater, Jonathan arrives at your house. You kiss your mom’s cheek before leaving and shout over your shoulder, “Remember the deal, Dustin!” 

You don’t quite catch what your brother responds with but you honestly don’t care enough as you run over to Jonathan’s car and hop into the passenger seat. 

“You certainly didn’t waste any time getting here,” you say in lieu of a hello. 

Jonathan shrugs. “No time to waste when it comes to monster hunting.”

“You do realize that we’re only scouting out the woods tonight, right?” 

You, Jonathan, and Nancy had decided earlier to simply go and explore the woods for any clues of the monster and then figure out how, or even if, you can kill it. 

“I know, but monster hunting sounds cooler.”

“Bless you, bee.” 

The two of you get to the field in no time. Jonathan had been the one to suggest the spot a few yards behind his house for target practice and Nancy had agreed to bring a bat just in case you needed more protection. 

And you?

You’re bringing the cans to serve as targets for shooting. Your family has never owned a gun and last time you checked, Dustin doesn’t play any sports, so all you can offer is your emptied recycling bin contents. 

It doesn’t take long for you and Jonathan to set up the cans on top of the tree trunks before he begins shooting. Jonathan takes a deep breath and holds the gun up so it’s eye level and looks over at you. “Ready?”

You take a deep breath as well and prepare yourself, knowing it’s about to become loud. “Yeah, start shootin' cowboy.” 

The first shot hits a tree behind the can, nowhere near its intended target, and you wince. It’s looking like the monster might actually win at the rate Jonathan’s aim is going. 

“It’s okay,” you tell your friend. “The tree looked at me funny, he had it coming.” 

Jonathan snorts. “You’re laughing now, but I can’t exactly hunt a monster if I can’t even shoot it.” 

“Maybe you could talk nicely to it?”

“And say what, exactly? ‘Hey, Mr. Monster, where are you hiding my brother?’”

You step closer to him so that you’re now side by side and you nudge his shoulder. “Hey, you never know. It could work.”

Jonathan readjusts his grip on the gun and aims it once more. He takes another shot, this time it lands a bit closer to the can, but not by much. He lets out an agitated, “Fuck!”

He tries shooting again and again but each shot is as unpredictable as the last. After his sixth round of firing you can see how tense his shoulders are and the way he’s clenching his fists against the weapon. You remember how he acted earlier today, the newfound anger and resentment within Jonathan that had originally impressed you. Now it only frightens you. 

When he goes to re-aim the gun for the seventh time, you grab at his hand and stop him. 

“Bug, what are you-”

“Let’s go for a walk.” 

Jonathan looks at you like you’re crazy but you simply take the gun from his hands, click the safety back on, and then walk over to the tree stumps to rest it against one of them. When you’re done you walk back over to the boy and interlock your fingers with his to drag him along. 

There’s not a whole bunch of room in the clearing for a walk per say, but there’s enough to go a few laps around for Jonathan to take a breather. You’re not sure exactly what’s going on with him but a walk has never hurt anyone. 

Jonathan’s silent the first lap around. You’re content with this and you admire the fall weather and enjoy the slight warmth from the sun as it kisses your face. When you’re on the third lap you decide to ask a question that’s been on your mind since yesterday when Nancy showed up at the funeral home. 

“Do you really believe Will is alive?”

Jonathan thinks the question over for a moment, and as he’s lost in thought you notice that he begins gently swinging your hands back and forth absentmindedly. “I can still feel him.”

“Feel him?”

“Yeah, I know it sounds crazy but…”

“No, I think I get it. I mean, I’d be able to feel if something bad happened to Dustin. I know I’d be able to, even if there’s not necessarily a science behind it. It’s like there’s a lifeline connecting us, like some unspoken sibling thread that neither one of us can sever.”

“A sibling thread?” Jonathan asks, a slight laugh accompanying his question. 

“Oh, you know what I mean, bee.” 

“No, no. I wanna hear all about this thread theory of yours.” 

Jonathan’s bright mood is back, reminiscent of the boy you once believed you knew better than you knew yourself, so you entertain his teasing if only to sustain his light a little longer. “If I explain this theory you have to promise not to laugh at me.”

“I promise,” he says and he gives your hand a light squeeze. 

“Alright, but if you decide I’m insane after this, just know that you legally cannot leave me. You signed a contract.” 

“Oh, did I?”

“You sure did, bee. Anyways, back to me,” a slight breeze surrounds you for a moment and you let the crisp air fill your lungs. “I have this theory that we’re all connected to each other in some way by different threads. Some threads are older than others, stronger, or maybe even more rigid, but they’re there. Whether it’s a thread between you and your family, the love of your life, or a stranger you happen to pass on the street one day, none of it happens by accident.” 

“The threads are the reason it all happens?”

“Not necessarily, but yeah. To put it simply, I guess you could say that.” 

“So, for our thread,” Jonathan stops walking and tugs at you to stop as well. “After everything we’ve been through, all that we’ve done for one another, what thread would you say ours is?”

His question catches you off guard; you can hear your heart beating within your chest. There’s so many things you wish you could tell him.

Our thread is one of romance, of lovers, of soulmates, even. 

The feelings build within you and the words threaten to spill out. The November sun is beginning to set and everything is golden in its light and Jonathan is a part of it all. His brown eyes are like warm honey on a cold winter morning and his hair is slightly ruffled from the wind that leaves his cheeks flushed and rosy. 

“Our thread,” your voice catches in your throat for a moment. “You know what our thread is, bee.”

He pulls you closer to him and in this moment all you can focus on are the slight freckles that dot across his face and neck. “Do I?”

Jonathan has never, ever looked at you like this before. There’s an intensity within his eyes that frightens you and leaves you feeling bare before him. Does he know? Has he figured it all out?

“I…” You can’t form the words you want to say; the three words that have been weighing upon you feel even heavier than before. They’re thick on your tongue, syrupy and dense and you feel as if you can’t breathe.

“Y/N?” He whispers, but you can only shake your head. 

It’s too much. It’s all too much. 

And then suddenly Jonathan leans in. 

Maybe you’re imagining it. 

Maybe you’re delirious after almost a week of sleepless nights and exhausting encounters. 

Or maybe, just maybe, he feels the same way about you. 

You lean in as well and allow yourself to close your eyes; you believe that just this once you can be selfish and accept more than you may deserve.

“Hey! Guys!”

Nancy’s shout causes you and Jonathan to spring apart. 

You want to scream. 

Of course it’s Nancy fucking Wheeler. 

Jonathan drops your hand and waves the girl over while you stand there, trying to collect yourself. As she walks over, you have just enough pride left over to say, “You know I’d do anything for you, right?”

The question is one Jonathan isn’t expecting. He steps back a bit, now even more aware of the close proximity the two of you had only seconds ago. “Of course I do, bug. You’re my best friend.”

Best friend. 

The words hurt more than they should, really. 

“Right. Best friend, ha.” You step even further away from Jonathan, which he raises his eyebrows at. 

“Did I miss something or…?”

If you had the time, you’d ask him why he wanted to know about the thread between the two of you. Why he looks at you like you’re the most precious thing in the entire room. Why, just minutes ago, he leaned in as if to kiss you. 

But Nancy is now only a couple feet away and it wouldn’t be fair to ask her to give the two of you some privacy. You spot the bat in her hand and it serves as a reminder of what the three of you are here for in the first place. 

Will, Barb, the monster. 

“No, of course not,” you clear your throat and greet Nancy as she arrives. “Hey, Nancy.”

She smiles at you and then says hello to Jonathan. “Hey, where’s the gun?”

You point over to the cans and the tree stumps. “Over there, we just wanted to go for a little walk after shooting a few rounds.”

Nancy nods and walks over to inspect the undamaged cans. “You said you already shot a few rounds?”

Jonathan ducks his head down. “Yeah, well. It’s not as easy as it looks in the movies.” 

“Y/N, did you try shooting?” 

“Pfft, I’m definitely not a weapons kind of girl. I prefer to use my crippling good looks instead.”

While you and Nancy talk, Jonathan walks back over to the gun and reloads it. He motions for the two of you to step back and he shoots a few more times. Not once does he hit the can. You pinch the bridge of your nose and sigh. 

“You’re awful at this, bee.”

“Yeah,” Nancy agrees.

Jonathan looks over at her. “Have you ever shot a gun before?”

She scoffs. “Have you met my parents?”

“I don’t know, Mrs. Wheeler seems like the type to have a hidden gun.” You say, and Nancy waves you off. 

“Well, I haven’t shot one since I was ten. My dad took me hunting on my birthday and made me kill a rabbit.” Jonathan’s words make you frown. Every day he gives you another reason to hate Lonnie. 

Nancy sympathizes with Jonathan and the two of them fall into an easy banter that you’ve never seen before with him. He’s comfortable around her in a way that makes your stomach twist. He tells her about his parents and how they may have loved each other at one point but now no longer do. He’s opening up to her after only a few days of really knowing her. 

Lovely. 

Nancy shares some details about her own family and how she believes her parents never loved each other, which you can relate to. You watch as Jonathan hands her the gun as she explains how her mom had been younger than her father. “He had a cushy job, money, came from a good family. So, they bought a nice house at the end of a cul-de-sac and started their nuclear family.”

“Isn’t it funny how the fathers never seem to suffer the same fate as the mothers?” You ask, and Nancy looks over at you in confusion, so you explain further. “My own parents, they were like yours except the moment my mom was no longer young, my dad left. Found a newer and cheaper model back home in Virginia.” 

“I didn’t know that, I’m sorry Y/N.” 

You shrug. “It’s not like I go and advertise it. Besides, he was an asshole anyways and my mom is better off without him. She’s the sweetest woman in the world who was forced to run back to her family in Hawkins. Nuclear families aren’t all they’re cracked out to be.”

Jonathan ruffles your hair to get you to laugh, which he succeeds in doing. “Screw that.”

 Nancy raises the gun to eye level and closes one of her eyes, her beautiful face now scrunched in concentration. “Yeah, screw that.”

And with that, she shoots a perfectly aimed shot and knocks the can off the stump. You and Jonathan look at her, stunned, but she can only laugh. 

“Damn, Jonathan. Remind me to never piss Nancy off.” You say, still staring at the fallen can. 

Only he doesn’t hear what you’ve said because he’s too busy staring at Nancy. You can tell he’s impressed by her hidden shooting talent and the way she holds herself with such confidence. His eyes shine as he stares at her and he almost seems to come to life whenever she looks back at him. 

Jonathan looks at Nancy and you know he sees what everyone in Hawkins sees: a beautiful, fierce, and incredible girl. 

Nancy Wheeler, the perfect enigma.

Suddenly it clicks. 

Jonathan is in love with her, or at least he’s beginning to fall in love with her. 

You want to hate her. Afterall, she already has Harrington head over heels for her, and yet you can’t blame either one of the boys. She’s perfect and brilliant and everything you’re not. You’d fall in love with her too if you weren’t already in love with someone else. 

You watch as Nancy and Jonathan become lost in their own little world, him helping her reload the gun as she flashes him a shy smile, and you no longer exist near their presence. It feels like a fucking stab to your already open wound of a heart. You watch the way he ducks his head down whenever she looks at him and the way she stares at him when he isn’t looking. 

Nancy shoots a few more rounds and each shot feels like a hammer coming down onto your own coffin. Each time Jonathan looks at her you feel another nail enter. 

Clearly there’s no room for you here. 

Which is fucking ironic given that you’re in a giant field outside. 

You reach for Jonathan’s hand and tug him forward. He gives you a look as if asking is everything okay? and you wish more than ever that things were different between the two of you. You give him a soft shake of the head. “I can feel a headache coming on and I just remembered that I have a shift tonight, so I should get going.” 

He frowns. “But what about the monster? We can’t look for him without you.”

“You’ll be fine without me,” to your horror you can feel tears forming, which you quickly wipe away before Jonathan can notice. “I doubt I’d be any help, anyways. I suck with guns. Nancy’s the professional here.” 

“I mean, I guess, but…” He looks over at Nancy, who is busy firing the gun and hitting every target she aims for, before pulling you even closer to him. “Are we okay? I feel like, I don’t know… like I’m losing you.”

Your breath catches in your throat. He could never, ever lose you, but if you don’t leave now then you’re afraid that maybe you’ll lose yourself. 

“Don’t be silly, bee. You’re not losing me, no matter how much you may want me to.” You try to tease him, but your heart isn’t in it. 

“You didn’t answer my question, Y/N. Are we okay?” He’s looking at you with so much adoration and concern in his eyes that it almost makes you sick. 

“Of course we are. I promise. I think it’s all just catching up to me, if I’m being honest. Between finding Will and tracking down my own brother, I think this monster hunting business may break me.” 

Jonathan eyes you for a moment as if to try and catch you in a lie, but while you’re only telling him this as an excuse to get away from him and Nancy, it’s not technically a lie. You are exhausted. Plus, you really do have a shift. 

The boy scans your face once more before deciding that you’re telling the truth. You know he suspects there’s something else behind your words, but thankfully he doesn’t pry. “Let me tell Nance that I’m driving you home,” 

And there it is again. 

Nance.

The nickname is like a punch to your gut and only solidifies that you should go. “It’s okay, bee. It’s still nice out, figured I’d walk home and get some sun before winter officially takes over Hawkins.” 

“You can’t expect me to let you walk alone now that we know there’s a monster out there taking people, bug.” 

You kiss his cheek, letting your lips linger for a little longer than necessary. “I’ll be careful, I promise. Stay with Nancy and call me tonight after you guys are done scouting around. We’ll figure out where to go from there. Okay?”

You don’t give Jonathan time to argue because you pull away and inform Nancy of your departure. She also frowns at the idea but has already learned that you’re not one to be told what to do. She understands this aspect of you, and you understand it within her as well, so she wishes you goodbye and tells you to stay safe before going back to shooting.

As you leave, you feel Jonathan’s eyes follow after you. 

– 

The walk ends up being more than enough to clear your head. You haven’t had any time to be alone in god knows how long, so it’s nice to have some time to just think and enjoy the quiet. There’s a lot you need to think about, but at the very forefront of your concerns are Will and El. You still have no idea how they’re connected or how the monster comes into play.

Then there’s Steve, oddly enough. 

You’re not really sure why he’s in the midst of your thoughts, but there he is. Smiling at you and laughing at your jokes and telling you that you’re pretty as he instills a carefree sense within you that feels foreign to enjoy. 

As his words ring through your head, you find your thoughts drifting towards Jonathan and the way he holds your hand every time you’re worried about something and the way he kisses your hair after a particularly hard day.

You’re not sure why the two boys almost seem to clash within your mind, but you don’t have time to look into it. Your shift starts soon and god knows how long your coworker Alex can survive on his own if you’re late. 

Work is slow as usual tonight, but you find the downtime a pleasant relief. It gives you the opportunity to skim some new books that shipped in and catch up on some Spidey storylines. In between stocking books and arranging comic displays you find yourself wondering just how true to his word Dustin stayed earlier. 

Like hell those kids really stayed out of the woods. 

Your question is answered as soon as you get home and find your brother crying in his room. Panic immediately swells within your chest and you run over to him.

“What’s wrong?” You check Dustin’s body for any sign of injury and he lets you as he cries, too upset to wave you away. When you’re assured that he’s okay, you feel your heartbeat calm down again. 

Christ, every time you see this kid he takes ten damn years off of your life. 

You pull a chair from his desk and sit in front of him. “Dustin, do we need to have another code blue?”

“Maybe,” Dustin sniffles, wiping away a few tears. 

“Okay, then code blue. What happened? Is everyone okay? Is it El?” At the mention of the girl’s name, Dustin flinches. Your blood runs cold. “Dustin, what happened with El?” 

“You won’t yell at me?”

You smooth down his always wild hair. “Never during code blue. Please talk to me, bud.”

Dustin explains how he and the group had gone looking for the gate like they told you they would. He explained how they’d followed the train tracks throughout Hawkins for what seemed like hours. 

“The train tracks that go through the same woods I told you not to go in?”

“Like hell we were gonna listen to you.” 

“Yeah, I know.”

This gets Dustin to laugh a bit, which you’re relieved to see, before he continues his story. When he reveals El’s weird behavior and the way she seemed to be hiding something from them, you feel dread creep in. “Did she… Did she do something to prevent you guys from finding the gate?”

“She used her powers to mess with the compass. Lucas found the blood on her jacket.”

You sense that there’s more. “And then?”

“Mike and Lucas… they-they started fighting.” Dustin’s voice breaks, “they started really going at it, and I tried to stop them. I swear I tried, Y/N!”

“Shh,” you reach for his hand to try and calm him down. “I know you did, but I also know how Mike can get when he’s protective of someone and I know that Lucas isn’t El’s biggest fan. It was a recipe for disaster.”

Dustin snorts, “No kidding.” Then his face darkens once more, “but they wouldn’t listen, and that’s when El screamed.” 

“She screamed?”

“I think she was overwhelmed, but she used her powers on Lucas and flung him across the yard and he hit his head pretty hard…”

“She what-”

“She didn’t mean to! She looked really upset after, and Lucas was fine after he woke up-”

“He was knocked unconscious?”

“And then he stormed off and El ran off. We searched for her, but…” 

You stare at your brother in shock. That definitely hadn’t been what you were expecting. El never struck you as a violent girl, but she knocked Lucas out with her mind. Sure, she may have been trying to break up the fight, but you’re willing to bet that she lost control for a moment and Lucas ended up getting hurt as a result.

Maybe you don’t want superpowers. 

“Y/N, have I lost all my friends?” Dustin asks. 

You shush him once more. “No, of course not. You three boys have always been so drastically different from one another, and this week has been one from pure hell. It makes sense that Lucas and Mike finally snapped, but I promise you that they’ll bounce back eventually.” 

“And El?”

“I’m not sure what to make of her,” you admit. “She isn’t violent, I know she’s not. But we also clearly don’t know her as well as we think we do. I just, I need you to be careful around her, okay? Fight for her, defend her like you would for the boys, but be cautious as well.”

“Cautious, got it.” He cocks his head at you, “but what about Lucas and Mike? They’re still friends, right?”

“Of course they are. Just… sometimes friendship can be hard, but it’s almost always worth fighting for. It’s rare to find friends as loyal as Mike or as brave as Lucas or even as sincere as Will. Yet look at you guys, all together; you’re all incredibly lucky to have one another.”

“Lucky like you and Jonathan?” Dustin asks, a sly glint in his eyes. 

You smile, even if he’s teasing you. “Yeah, like me and Jonathan.”

Dustin returns your smile and you squeeze his hand. “Anyways, I say give Lucas some time to calm down. I think he was scared, more than anything. Tomorrow you can try to talk to him again.” 

Your brother nods at your words and he seems better than he did when you first started the conversation, so you open your arms wide and engulf him into a hug. 

“Code blue concluded, I guess.” Dustin mumbles against your chest, which causes the two of you to laugh.

– 

After your talk with Dustin, you head back to your room and wait for Jonathan to call. You glance at the clock and figure that maybe him and Nancy were still out scouting for clues, so you busy yourself with some homework.

When it nears ten at night and the phone still hasn’t rung, you sigh and reach over for the phone on your desk. You dial Jonathan’s number and hope he simply forgot to call, but when no one answers after your fifth time calling: you begin to worry. 

Ya know, maybe it wasn’t your best idea letting him and Nancy go off alone with a monster on the loose. 

You find yourself frantically biking to the Wheeler’s house before you can even think about it. The night blurs past you and as you walk up their driveway and try to rest your bike against their mailbox, a familiar BMW parks next to you. 

“We’ve gotta stop meeting like this, Henderson.” Steve says as he sends you a wink. 

You almost greet the boy before Tommy’s head pops out from the passenger side window. “Hey good lookin.”

You hear Carol berate him and the two begin to bicker as Steve gets out of the car. 

Great. He brought the idiots.

Steve walks over and takes your bike from your hands. After a couple seconds of repositioning and balancing, he finally manages to get the bike to stay upright. “Tada!”

“I almost had it,” you glare at him. 

“Sure ya did.”

Steve’s presence is frustrating as always, but you spot Jonathan’s car parked down the street and Carol’s shrill voice becomes increasingly irritating. You don’t have time for this right now. “What are you doing here, Harrington?”

“I could ask you the same thing.” When you glare at him, he finally says, “Nancy promised she’d call me but hasn’t, so I wanted to check on her.”

His sincerity is why you say, “I’m here for…” You realize you can’t necessarily tell Steve about Jonathan possibly being here. You have a feeling it wouldn’t end well, but you’re also not keen on lying to the boy. You’re already keeping secrets from practically everyone in your life; you don’t want to add Steve to the list. Not when he doesn’t deserve it. 

“I’m looking for Jonathan,” you confess, worried about Steve’s reaction. 

He frowns. “Why would Byers be here?”

“Him and Nancy have this… thing for English. Due tomorrow. A big thing. Like, huge. So they’re working on it together. In the house. Where Nancy lives. Here.” You stumble over your words, more nervous than usual, but you weren’t expecting Steve to be here or that you’d need a cover story. 

“Uh huh,” something almost aggressive flickers across Steve’s face and you silently curse to yourself. You said the wrong thing. 

“Funny, Nancy told me she was only helping Byers for the funeral.” 

Shit.

Tommy and Carol watch from the car, obviously amused by the whole situation. 

“Right! She was, now she’s working on an assignment with him.” Technically not a lie, you’re just omitting the fact that the assignment in question is monster hunting. 

“You’re really bad at lying, Henderson.” Steve walks past you, now over the conversation, and you struggle to keep up. You try to block his path, assuming that he’ll use the front door, but as you near the front step he side steps you and starts heading towards the bushes. 

“What are you doing?” You whisper loudly, trying not to draw too much attention to yourself. 

Steve ignores your whispered yelling and jumps on top of the radiator. Once he’s up, he begins to pull himself over the overhang and up onto the roof. There’s a window just above the ledge with a light on, which you presume to be Nancy’s room due to the practiced ease in which Steve scaled the house. 

You don’t try to climb up after him in fear that you’ll only end up embarrassing yourself. “Ya know, Mrs. Wheeler loves me, I could’ve just knocked on the door.”

Steve peers down at you, an easygoing smile now back on his face. “Relax, this is quicker. Besides, you gotta admit it was impressive to watch.”

Again he winks at you and you feel your cheeks flush. He’s right, it had been impressive to watch; he had made it look so easy. While you struggle to come up with a witty retort, Steve almost knocks on Nancy’s window before his smile drops.

You notice the way his face hardens. “Steve?”

He doesn’t respond, which only concerns you more. You begin to think about the millions of possibilities surrounding Nancy, Jonathan, and monster hunting; fear creeps in. “Is Nancy there? Is she okay?”

“Of course you’d be worried about Nancy right now,” Steve laughs bitterly. You frown at his words, unsure what they mean, but before you can ask anything else Steve angrily climbs back down.

“Steve, what-” He pushes past you in a frenzied hurry to get to his car, but you grab his jacket and force him to stop. “Answer me! Is Nancy okay? Was Jonathan with her?”

Steve whips around and sneers at you. “Why do you even care about them? About him?”

“Because we’re friends,” you say, and for the first time you really mean it. Nancy has become someone you’d call a friend. 

Another cruel laugh escapes Steve’s lips. “Friends, huh? Yeah, those two looked real fucking cozy in her bed.”

A wave of nausea hits you.

“W-what?” You drop your hand and release his jacket. 

“It’s incredible, really. Byers has some fucking nerve.” Steve runs a hand through his hair in agitation and begins to pace. You’re too numb to stop him. “I mean, look at you! He has everything he could possibly want, but he decides to go after my girlfriend.”

“It’s not like that-” 

“Did he tell you they’d be in her room, alone in her bed, underneath her blanket?”

More nausea hits you. “No,”

They were supposed to look for any signs of the monster in the woods. That’s all he told me, you think. 

“So he’s a liar, too.” Steve scoffs, “you deserve better, Y/N.”

And with that, he heads back to his car and drives away, leaving you standing alone once more in the Wheeler’s driveway. You get a sense of deja-vu, watching Steve’s BMW descend down the street, but only this time there’s no warmth fluttering within your stomach as he leaves. 

All you feel is nausea. 

You don’t remember the bike ride home; you’re not sure how you even made it back safely without crashing into anything. All you remember is that you cried the entire way. 

You’ve lost Jonathan, there’s no denying that now. He’s Nancy’s, wholly and truly, he’s hers. 

He was never yours in the first place, you remind yourself. 

But if he was never yours in the first place, then why does it feel like you were almost something?

No. 

You don’t want to think about it that way. 

Yours or not, you can’t afford to lose Jonathan. 

Something or everything, you’ll take whatever you can when it comes to him. 

Everything, anything, nothing. Whatever he gives you, you know you’ll cling onto it with all that’s within you.

But your friendship with Jonathan is too precious to lose, too meaningful to let stupid feelings ruin it. You refuse to let anything come between your friendship with him, and you swear to yourself to shove everything down. Every hurt feeling, all the pain stabbing within your chest, you force it all down to focus on finding Will. 

He’s all that matters right now, even if it feels like the thread connecting you to Jonathan has begun to wither.

Will has to come first. 

You have to find him, something good and lovely has to come from this. You can’t let this all be for nothing.

-

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[yoiurboi]

JRWI GEM AU! PART TWO: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO!

[Part One: Gillion]

After two billion years, it's done. NGL I kinda of lost interest, a lot of school stuff happened and I kinda lost that Steven Universe rush that hit me like a truck in the middle of last semester. But I've pressed on, 'cause I know a lot of people were interested in this stuff. These might be slow coming, but I DO want to finish at least the main three - then their fusions.

Anywho, here's Jay. Not sure why she'd be called that here. I'm thinking the rebel groups in this universe go by code names so that they don't end up with a Rose Quartz situation like in the show. She, and others of her cut, are made to be the perfect marksmen/second in commands for Red Sun Diamond's most important soldiers.

She in particular was made to serve Sun Diamond's highest ranking Admiral; Red Eagle's Eye, alongside another Rhyolite from her Kindergarten. Nowadays, she's found herself undercover in a rebel group not unlike the one that shattered her sister. Despite her mission and her preconceived biases, she's really starting to grow a bond with these defective gems she's been tailing alongside of. Uh Oh! Well, I'm sure the whole "lying about her intentions and using them as a proxy to find out what happened to her sister" thing won't cause some issues in the near future.

Chip will be next! Stay tuned. I've also been workin' on a Riptide Sister Swap AU if anyone wants to hear about that. Lots of sapphics, there be.