#tho weather alone is probably enough to figure out

[aarcanechaoss]

Fools Rush In

Masterlist

They nearly lost her, he nearly lost her and he'll do whatever he can to keep her closer now.

Warnings: Higuzai being fluffy as fuck + Aku angst

Notes: Was in my feels. & if you haven't watched The Princess Bride, I'm 1. sad 2. quote it in here no big spoilers tho.

Ichiyo Higuchi was a fool.

A tremendously pathetic fool.

She’s sure she would go down in history as the most pathetic woman in history.

Osamu Dazai disagreed.

He was the pathetic fool.

He would go down in history for being the most pathetic man in history.

Fools the both of them for falling in love.

His lips crashed against hers, rain pelting around them like a wicked reminder. He had almost lost her, her sister had almost lost her. He’d been so frantic he’d forgotten where they were, on the docks in the pouring rain where he’d seen a bullet shoot straight through the woman he loved.

She was fine of course, he’d held himself back long enough that Yosano had healed her but that was all he could allow before Osamu had swooped in for a kiss. She’d returned it without hesitation.

She was all consuming, she was everything and he was hers… but they were not alone and any semblance of their private, unknown relationship was shattered the moment he’d kissed her. Honestly knowing Ranpo he’d probably figured it out the moment Dazai’s tune changed- knowing his girlfriend had gone missing was one thing, finding out she’d been kidnapped was another and then when the ransom came he admits he ran out of the building for her.

He thought his heart had stopped when the bullet shot clean through.

“Chiyo.” He breathed against her, lips still ghosting over her.

“Samu.” Her blonde hair stuck to her skin, pale and cold from the weather.

“Don’t scare me like that again.” He held her head in his hands, fingers tangling in the messy soaked locks.

“No promises.” She laughed weakly.

“Not in our line of work.” He replied. Ichiyo’s cold fingers danced across his cheek, moving some hair till it tucked behind his ear and then continued its dance along his jaw. “I was afraid Chiyo.”

“The great Osamu Dazai was afraid?” She meant it in a teasing way, to bring the tension down and ground them both.

“For you the brilliant Ichiyo Higuchi of course I was.” He pressed a soft kiss to her lips. “You’re mine and I am yours.”

“Sappy.”

“I love you.” She blinked at him.

He knew he loved her, she knew they loved one another but that was the first time he’d said it out loud.

His heart, traitorous as it was, began to race. Nerves rattling in his veins as she took her time to reply.

“I love you too Samu.” Ichiyo’s smile was a beam of sunlight on this gloomy day.

Her arms wrapped around his neck, lips crashing against his while his arms wrapped around her waist in a tight hold.

Later that night, back in her apartment with the television on and boxes of takeaway overrunning the coffee table, three people sat snuggled onto the apartment lounge. Ichiyo was in the middle, a long lean arm wrapped around her shoulders to keep her close while a small head of light brown hair lay across her lap.

Her love and her sister were unwilling to separate from her even as the night went on and the city became quieter. The TV flickered before them with The Princess Bride- Ichiyo’s favourite movie- but she was more than happy to be wrapped up in their arms and love as Westley proclaimed his most iconic line and Buttercup in her recognition came tumbling down the hillside.

“As you wish.” Osamu had murmured into her hair and pressed a kiss to the crown of her head.

“Farm boy.” She replied, tilting her head up to capture his lips in a short, sweet kiss.

“Is this a kissing book?” Kuniko grumbled against Ichiyo’s thigh, obviously noting her sister’s movement enough to quote the movie as well. Ichiyo just laughed and moved Kuniko’s hair from her face.

The movie continued on and Ichiyo continued to melt into Osamu’s embrace as her sister’s breathing began to slow- it was late, way later than she should have allowed for the teen to be up during a school week but Ichiyo could excuse it for tonight. It had been a stressful day and Kuniko could afford to miss a day of school, Mori had already given her a day off and considering that Osamu had yet to grumble about paperwork he assumed Fukuzawa had done the same.

Ichiyo laughed as Miracle Max drops Westley’s arm.

“I’ve seen worse.” She says softly, quoting alongside Billy Crystal’s character.

“How many times have you watched this?” Osamu whispered, smiling as he did.

“Enough to quote the whole movie in English and Japanese.” She says with a cheeky grin.

The scenes change and she can feel Kuniko finally fall asleep as Buttercup jumps from the window to Westley, then the grandfather finishes reading and the credits begin to roll.

Osamu sneaks out first, twisting until he’s in front of the youngest Higuchi.

“I’ll get her to bed, you get to yours.”

“Yes sir.” She says, watching him lift the young teen up with easy, careful to not wake her and walk to her room.

Ichiyo smiles as she turns off the movie and TV before making her way into her room. Her bed- a new one because Osamu had insisted on it and actually paid for it at that- was large enough for the couple but did not steal her room’s space. She crawled in, leaving the bedside lamp on so that Osamu wasn’t in the dark and waited only a minute before the tall man was by her side, caging her in his arms and flicking off the light.

“You’re beautiful- you know that?” He said into her hair.

“You are too.” She replied. The same reply every time he called her beautiful without fault. He laughed quietly and kissed her forehead, his arms still tight around her- caging her in his warmth.

“So now that people know we are together…” He began. She tilted her head towards him, urging him to continue. “Can I take you to fancy restaurants now?”

She could imagine the wiggling eyebrows as he said that- in fact if she squinted she could see him doing so in the dark.

“You already have taken me to fancy restaurants?”

“Yeah but now I can do it in Mafia territory where I can piss off Chuuya.” A snort forces its way out as she attempted to suppress her laugh.

“Sure Samu. While you’re at it I’ll bring you lunches to the Agency.” She jokes.

“Ooh work place dates I like how you think. I’ll pop over to the Black Lizard and steal away their commander.”

“You’re going to break Akutagawa if you do that.”

“Oh well, casualties happen.”

They laugh quietly and share one last kiss before snuggling as impossibly close as they can and drifting off to sleep with the promise of tomorrow just on the horizon.

Bonus:

Behind the couple stood members of both sides with slacked jaws and stuttered phrases- trying to comprehend the sight before them.

When had they gotten together? How long had this been happening? What was happening?

“What?” Akutagawa’s voice was soft but not even the rain could hide the shock, the confusion. As far as he was aware… yes the woman had stopped being actively vying for his attention but… he didn’t know she’d stopped entirely. That she’d instead turned to the one man she had once vowed hatred to.

She was kissing him- he had kissed her. It wasn’t a simple heat of the moment or some game… no the way Dazai was looking at Higuchi was anything but conniving, she wasn’t planned, she wasn’t a pawn.

She was looking at him the same way as she tucked his hair behind his ear, as they whispered to one another- some promises that he’d never understand.

“Well that was unexpected.” Atsushi laughed nervously, clearly speaking with the other Agency members and yet Akutagawa still flinched. If the others noticed they said nothing.

“He better not hurt Big Sis.” Tachihara growled somewhere behind him.

Honestly Akutagawa wasn’t paying that much attention, too enraptured by the scene ahead.

Was this jealousy? Who was it aimed at, why did he feel it at all? Why was his chest aching?

Why was his chest aching?

[goopi-e]

Finally got a semblance of free time to play the Recently Released Videogame! No plot discussions happen in this post, I just gush about the little things.

My experience is, uh. Suboptimal. I am grateful my laptop can emulate Switch at all, but when your average FPS is around 5, only gets as high as 12 and has a tendency to go into decimals or freeze, fast-paced combat gets hard.

Despite that, the gameplay is fun! All the abilities are such a blast, and compliment one another nicely: for example, I cheesed one part of a certain shrine by Ultrahanding a platform in one place in the air for a bit, then effectively Stasising it with Recall, then Ascending on top of that still-Recalled platform, and then getting additional height by shield-jumping on a shield fused with a spring. Just for funsies. The intended solution was to essentially shield-surf on a short straight rail.

God I love fusing springs to shields. Revali who. My Bomb Flower count is criminally low, as I haven't figured a way to dupe them w/o exploding, and I don't have consistent source of rockets yet, but the springs are relatively early-game and do their job pretty well!

You know what I love even more than that? Glitches :^). And they're finally easy enough for me, a total noob, to perform. I only duped materials so far, timing a frame-perfect weapon dupe on my suboptimal setup sounds hard... but I wanna try and transfer the legendary MsgNotFound one of these days. I was so lucky to find a diamond in one of the caves tho!

Did you know that the shrine lobby (a tiny area seen through the entry portal) can serve as a cover for your campfire during rainy weather? It made more sense in BоTW, as Shеikah shrines were more material, but beggars can't be choosers.

So far my playthrough fits the "feral Lonk" stereotype. Towns are laggy, so I mostly wander around the wilderness aimlessly. The overall plan is to grind the full second stamina wheel + activate a few towers, then go get the Heart Container from the Great Plateau quest, get the Master Sword, grind shrines for hearts and only then hit a couple of dungeons. After that, joining the Yıga is a must. I'm not even sure I'll be able to fight the dungeon bosses or G-man with how hard even the basic combat currently is, so my only hope is to be able to tank through damage.

I wanted to get the Lobster Tunic so badly, but the guys at Lurеlin keep kicking my ass :^(.

Sadly, it seems you cannot skip the first memory. The puddles just aren't anywhere inside the geoglyphs.

Fujibаyashi-san loves to put the "temporary equipment loss moment" in all of the series entries done under him (except MC), and in TоTK alone there's soooo many. It's a whole shrine subset now, not to mention the dedicated pantsless quest in the gazette storyline. Wonder how's the Еvеntide doing these days - judging by a chasm, it doesn't seem like a similar event will take place here.

Speaking of chasms on the islands... Remember the PH-themed archipelago in the wetlands? There's a chasm on Mercay island. You know. The island where the Temple of The Ocean King is located. Something about the way BоTW/TоTK genuinely appreciates DS games feels very vindicating. First Monster Cake being a chancellor's favourite dessert, then the Phantom armor being one of the most OP sets, and now this chasm.

I saw Flowerblight :з.

Ang got owned by the Floormasters Gloom Hands once. Not touching them with a sturdy-stick-stick before I get s'more hearts, I know what comes after.

The guy with the sign! Such a cute concept, and the rewards are always so generous!

Depths are weird. The flora is super cool, and the landscape is twisted to a degree that merely figuring out how to get from point A to point B becomes a nontrivial challenge. Collecting Poes is fun, and I love getting the uncorrupted weapons from the ghosts of the past. Everything else scares me shitless. Mostly

Catching a Star fragment mid-air feels downright magical. I know they were probably coded with exactly that method of aquisition in mind, but it always feels like such a lucky catch.

Saw Nауdra once. Got the scale. Fused it to a spear. Now the spear looks like a comically large spoon, and I can't keep a straight face when this thing pops across half a screen, so I never equip it, but don't unfuse it either out of respect for the comedy aspect. The only funnier weapon that I've got so far is the honeycomb boomerang I got from a monster camp (the idea is genius, and I have honeycombs to maybe recreate it later), which is currently fused to a surprisingly high-damage Boko arm.

Yeah, I'm not unfusing my comically large Nауdra spon until I get a camera and take a selfie with it.

I always feel bad when fighting the apple-collecting Bokos. They have tiny Boko baskets on their backs :^(. They're just little guys :^(.

PORTABLE COOKING POTS. AND MULTIPLE TRAVEL MEDALLIONS THAT AREN'T LOCKED BY A DLC. YES.

Purаh is the prettiest woman to grace this world.

[sharksa-shivers]

Slash and Burn dialog dump cuz yeah lol, i wannaaaaaaaaaaaaa

If i've already spoiled Sharksty, ima just spoil this too but yeah, Slash and Burn like each other lol... Sooooooooo yeah... Tho they both don't wanna be the first to admit it and thus are waiting on the other to admit it...They're that kinda couple lmaoooooo... ---------- (We see this random seal anthro man sit down outside on a park bench, taking off his backpack, sitting tiredly. We see him relax for a moment…Until-)

Seal guy:(thinking, to himself, him talking outloud)…Man, i'm getting hungry…

Slash:(we move the camera to see him there, grins deviously and scaring the absolute shit out of this seal man)Yeah, me too.

(We see Slash lunge at him, the seal man going into panic mode, thinking Slash is aiming for him but then we cut and see Slash stole his backpack instead, the seal man still in sheer fear from that as he watches Slash fucking take off quickly.)

Slash:(running, satisfied with his loot)Thanks for the free shit man!!!!! Ahahahahaha!!!!!!! Fuckin sucker!!!!!!!!

Seal man:(calming down after a moment, now being alone again, fearful still, to himself)…Fuck it, yeah, you can have that, fuck…Goddamnit…Least he didn't get my wallet…

(We see a shadowy cat figure on the ground behind the bench, pickpocketing him as he says this, it obviously being Burn and her sliding his wallet out and into her hands, slinking away silently with a smirk on her face…) ---------

(Slash basically stealing from a human and it's one of the times he doesn't feel like he needs to intimidate so he tones the assholery down some)

Human rando:(scared shitless, pinned against the wall by Slash who's sitting down, blocking the way and sifting through his backpack, shivering and terrified by the like 8'7 shark man who's stealing his shit and eating it, pleeding)Please for the love of God, don't eat me, please fucking God don't…

Slash:(shuffling through, stopping as he's eating a bag of walnuts the guy had in his bag, Slash just looks over, turns towards the guy, chill as fuck, shrugging as he's munching on walnuts)Why would i ever want to eat a human? Like honestly? Let's be honest, you're mostly all bones, not really alot of meat and ON TOP OF THAT…Do i really look like a murderer to you?

Human rando:(looking at his slashed up face that's covered up by his hood)………Kinda, yeah…

Slash:(groans)Ahhhhhhhhhhhh, nah!!!!! (smirking, chomping on the walnuts still)I'm just a simple thief trying to get by hehehehe…Sorry it happened to be you but i gotta get by somehow…Which speaking of-(picking up the bag, having had enough of scaring this guy)Think i'll be seeing ya. Thanks for the stuff!!! Hopefully there's more useful shit in here!!! (starts walking off, leaving the guy on his own) ------------------ (Random dialog shit but probably earlier on when they start liking each other. Idfk context except they probs playing here…)

Burn:(just smirks, tail flicking as she lets go of Slash's hoodie and lets him drop to the ground, standing above him)You're fucking stupid…I like that in a man…

Slash:(just smirking back)You're kind of a bitch…And i like that in a woman… -------------------------------- (Slash and Burn fluff shit cuz i need it, fuck you lol)

(We see it's storming pretty heavily and Slash and Burn are both stuck in a very small underground area due to the storm. They're both trying to stay warm and keep dry while stuck in this very very small area together…Since it's small, they're pretty compounded together…We see Slash kicking back(him obviously being far more chill and shit with the weather vs Burn who's very much not happy about the storm oof)…Slash is kind of in his own mind whenever we see something moving in his hoodie, getting his attention.)

Slash:(alarmed)What the fuck???

Burn:(the movement was her as she proceeds to worm her way into sharing his hoodie, popping her head out of the neckhole of the hoodie, smirking up at him)Hiya, how ya doin?

Slash:(kind of annoyed)Can you maybe not????

Burn:(annoyed too, tail swishing as she lays on Slash, obviously not fucking moving from his hoodie lmao)Can you stop the storm so i don't have to be freezing sopping wet anymore? No? Then uhhhh…I'm not going anywhere…

Slash:(annoyed as fuck but begrudgingly accepting Burn's not leaving)God, you are a fucking pest…

Burn:(annoyed too)Quit crying, you feel cold too, this has to be fucking better then freezing.

Slash:(questioning)?????? The weather feels fine to me????? (gives up)Whatever, fine, ugh…Just…Don't stretch out the hoodie okay? It's like the best one I've been able to find that actually fucking fits.

Burn:(amused as she nuzzles in, obviously she's comfortable now regardless of if Slash is or not)Yeah yeah, i got it. (sitting quite for a moment before speaking, grinning)You like this though don't you? Annoying or not, i can tell you fucking like this…

Slash:(blushing a bit, annoyed though but more annoyed now, wrapping his arms around her and putting his chin on her head, trying to keep her from seeing the blush)……..Shut up, goddamnit… -------------------------- (Earlier on shiz between them both lol)

Burn:(sits a moment as she processes what happened a few minutes prior with Slash (Basically him threatening to eat somebody) she just sits there anxious now, looking at Slash who just seems content with the shit they both just managed to steal, decides to ask) …….Were you serious? Like…Have you actually ever done that before? Eaten people?

Slash:(he just smirks and says nothing)…….

Burn:(scared kind of now)….IS THAT A YES OR A NO????

Slash:(amused)It's a "i say that to fuck with people and intimidate them into giving me their shit" and a "No i don't fucking want to murder anyone, jesus, what is wrong with you?"

Burn:(just stares, calming down)………Well fuck, it works i guess cuz you scared the shit out of me saying that…

Slash:(laughing)Good!!!! That's the whole fucking point!!!!!!! ------------------------------ (Dirty joke lmao...Also yeahhhh, Slash is like this lmaooooooo)

Slash:(snickering)Nah, i don't eat people…(motions over at Burn who looks over blushing, laughing and loud)BUT I DO EAT PUSS-

Max:(cutting him off, looking at his phone)OKAY, THAT'S ENOUGH OF THIS SHIT!!!!!! Hey!!!! Look!!!!!! I tracked the thing we were looking for!!!!!!! ---------------------------

Slash:(sits a moment before smirking, joking)You know what else i could eat though????

Burn:(annoyed)How about my claws rippin your gillslits open?

Slash:(smirking)Ooooooo, kinky…~~ --------------------- (Early moment shit between em both)

Burn:(curious as she's getting to know Slash)So like…What's like…the craziest thing you've eaten?

Slash:(amused, glances over at her)Like…This week or like…?

Burn:(sits a moment, staring)……Yknow, i dunno if i want an answer to this question anymore…

Slash:(amused still as he empties his backpack)What? You think my answers gonna be a person or something? A corpse maybe? That what your afraid of?

Burn:(a bit anxious)I literally have no clue, i JUST met you like…what? 3, 4 days ago? And i can't fucking tell when your joking or not so????

Slash:(amused)Ahahahahah, see, that's the fun part though! You get to keep guessing, i just keep smiling and fucking with you…Like…Where'd the fun be if i didn't fuck around yknow?

Burn:(she just stares)…….

Slash:(he rolls his eyes, sighing but keeping the smirk)I've never hurt a person and i haven't defiled any corpses…That make ya feel better?

Burn:(raises an eyebrow, seemingly a bit of doubt in her eye)……….

Slash:(groans)Okay, okay………So MAYBEEEEEE i've stolen shit off of corpses…Maybe i've sold some shit i've found off sunken ships where people have died and are still resting, LIKE MAYBEEEEEEE i've done that, ALLEGEDLY…Don't drag my ass to prison for that shit i did like 6 years ago cuz i needed cash for clothes alright?

Burn:(staring)…I don't…Ok, you still didn't answer my first question… ----------------------------

(We see Kristy sitting outside with Slash who's smoking a cigarette)

Kristy:(questioning)Isn't it bad to smoke?

Slash:(lets out smoke, looking over, shrugs)I hear that but i dunno. Something something lung cancer? I've never been to a doctor so…

Kristy:(wide eyed)You've…NEVER BEEN to a doctor???

Slash:(nods)Yeah, that shits expensive, never had cash. See, things like that are…Luxuries that i don't have…BUT…(smirks)Cigarettes are luxuries i can get. And yknow, they help me not feel so stressed, they kill my appetite so i don't have to worry bout that kinda shit so i'm gonna keep doing it…(lets out more smoke)

Kristy:(questioning again)Does it…Actually help with that kinda stuff or…?

Slash:(looking over)I mean…I dunno bout other people but it helps me…Keeps me sane…Only so much of this kinda shit i can take. It's either the cigs and vapes orrrrrrrrr it's me fucking dying so…I got alot to be stressed about and hunger can drive a man fucking mad so i'll take whatever help i can fucking get…

Kristy:(thinking)…Do you ever think about quitting? I…You probably think i am annoying but like…It is bad for you to do that kinda stuff…

Slash:(sighs)I have, i know Burn hates me doing it too but like…I kinda need it so…Maybe if i had some damn stability of some sort i could quit but…I don't so…I dunno…Eh… --------------------- Lol, that's all for now (i adore these 2 lil trash goblins, i adoreeeeeeeee them...They really are cute together but also are just fun in general...) Also, with the last one, fun fact: Slash knows very very well about Burn's deathly awful fear of fire now so he'll do his best to smoke well well away from her and always makes sure to dunk the finshed up cigs in water so he's 100% sure they're out for Burn's paranoia's sake... He's a bit of a dumbass but Slash absolutely has a good heart at the end of the day, especially for Burn...

[minetowalkonglass]

gabriel is 100% dirtbag he has a van not an apartment his gear looks hella worn but is meticulously looked after. he DOES however have the vibes of that old guy why smokes as he solos past a trad team and stops to comfort the leader who's freaking out while placing a cam - does sometimes insane and risky things but trusts himself to be good enough that it will be fine. it's a big part of the reason why kali wants him to scale back

cas is less unhinged than gabriel. enjoys technical climbing a lotttt and is percieved as less strong bc of this preference but is also plenty strong. good planner, high risk tolerance which is why climbing with gabe worked out p good

jo got her first sponsorship and is working on her first film. cassie isn't really a climber but she's studying journalism and media production and she is copiloting the film production. or maybe she's a freelance journalist already? don't know how old they are yet. ash is bouldering dirtbag and camera crew. Eileen is a coworker of Dean's and Jo's primary climbing partner. dean knows fuck all about cameras but he can set up rope systems for charlie and ash

jo and cassie are an item & they are the love of my life if you even care. cassie and dean dated for a while when he was just out of school & looking for jobs but they decided they didn't really work out and half a year later jo and cassie started dating. dean is secretly freaking out about it a little but not really

start of the season jo's working on a route with a crux sequence that is similar to one of the not cruxes but difficult sequence for jo bc it's her anti style on her big scary difficult 5.13a (7c+ french) she's working on the first female ascent of (it's very very ambitious and she's impatient so she wants to get it THIS SEASON). dean is belaying when jo breaks off a hold & the shard hits his head & lands on his foot (he's in sandals) smashing his foot up p good. he faints (he's using a grigri and it cams so jo is fine) briefly and it quickly becomes evident he needs stitches. he's like it's fine the weather window is too good you stay here jo ash will belay you i'll drive myself to the er but gabe & cas are headed back from their route & cas insists on taking him. jo sends the route sans 1 hold the same day & dean feels very validated in forcing his frinds to stay! gabriel ditches them p quickly but cas stays

like ofc it's in the cards that dean will be joining cas on some stuff but this will probs go over like a year ++. (jo's project probably turns into her moby dick.)

One of their first attempts at a multi pitch route on gear they have a miscommunication causing Cas to fall & have a nasty but lucky broken leg

This leads to dean not trusting himself & blaming himself, completely ignoring how he was the sole reason cas got safely back to where paramedics could attend to him Cas is angry as fuck at him for this, not for the fall (he's had worse recoveries and more serious falls w Gabriel) but because Dean blames himself alone and he doesn't want to find another climbing partner and because Dean saved him!!!! Were it not for Dean's knowhow in rescues he would be SO much worse off

Cas talks Dean into letting him coach him on sports and trad to develop his skills as soon as the doctors tells him he can walk on it. Dean isn't happy abt it and insists cas isn't allowed to belay until his leg can actually take a hit Dean improves his climbing and gear placing skills while cas heals up

i'm not great at figuring out conflicts/how to build tension in the story tho so far jo's proj is the most high stakes thing maybe this needs to be a jo-centric thing but then the climbing film which ends up being not only epic climbing film abt persistance and friends cheering you on and believing in yourself even though you fail multiple times, but ALSO with side content of the slow coming together of cas and dean. . Cas has a dream wall he wants to do but he needs a skileld partner? it could be a forbidden love-thing bc of either society or obliviousness or repression? maybe dean struggles a lot with trusting himself and therefore trusting his own gear is difficult for him (among other things) but his journey to start trusting himself more is the thing? idek man

sam is studying/is practicing physiotherapy. As is Pamela.

do you wanna hear abt the destiel climber au i made up in my head

too bad you're gonna hear abt it anyway

cas is a big waller and dean is an arborist who sometimes sport climbs but he's not like. good-good he's a pure hobbyist & he mostly belays jo who is a BEAST

anyway they meet at a point. get aquinted but not like super friendly. attraction but they either don't realise or just is repressed.

fast forwards cas's partner gabriel gets engaged to kali on the ONE condition that he stops big walling. (they strike a compromise that he can sport climb all he wants and as long as he skips the sketchiest routes trad is fine as well.)

so anyway now they start frequenting sport crags more and cas is prowling for a new partner for big walls

and i gotta run for the bus maybe tbc

[hurtthemgently]

All knowing. All undone

Masterlist

Cw: meta aware whumpee, existential crisis, paranoia, non con touching, invisible whumper, heights, falling, creepy whumper

Cato sat on the park bench, the cold wind piercing through his gloves and jacket. He was getting a creeping suspicion that he was being watched. No.. watched isn’t the right word.. it felt like.. something in his mind, listening to his thoughts.

He tried to shake it off. It’ll probably go away soon.

Getting up, he decided he’d had enough of the cold weather air. Maybe he’d make some tea when he got back to his apartment.

——

A solid grip around his ankle sent him sprawling. He crashed to the ground, the breath knocked out of him. There wasn’t anything there. At least.. he couldn’t see anything. But the fingers had felt so real. Maybe he was losing it.

As he was getting up, hands pushed down on his shoulders. He crashed back to the ground. How could he not see anything?

“Hello? Who’s there?” An edge of fear in his voice. He looked around frantically for anything to explain what was happened.

“Hello.”

He heard a voice, quiet and calm

“I do hope everyone likes my creation.”

Invisible hands gripped his chin, turning his head to face foward. It looked like empty space in front of him, but something was there, just out of view. He pulled out of the grip, baring a grimace, trying to pinpoint his aggressor.

“He’s a defiant one, but I like them when they’re defiant. Makes things more interesting when they fight.”

“Who are you!” Cato shouted at the empty surroundings. “What kind of sick joke is this?”

“Oh how rude of me not to introduce myself. You can call me Writer. Or Creator. Whichever you think is more accurate.”

“Well writer- or whoever you are, leave me alone! I don’t want any part of whatever’s going on.”

“No that’s not quite right.”

A finger brushed against his jawline, and he jerked to get away from the invisible touch.

“What’s not right?” He spat in the direction the touch had come from.

“It’s Writer. Not writer. But I’ll say again, Creator works too.”

“I don’t know the difference! What? You want me to switch to creator?”

“No. Creator. Or Writer.

“I’ve given you options and already you refuse to cooperate. I might have to take things a little quicker than originally anticipated.. how do you feel about heights? Oh right, you’re terrified of heights, just as I intended.”

Hands wrapped around his arms, pulling him up. The sprawling city disappeared beneath him, and soon he was looking down at clouds. The uneasy feeling rose in his stomach, as he tried to not think about falling.

The hands let go.

He was already screaming, wind rushing past him, limbs flailing uselessly.

Then, he was held up by an invisible force. Not like the hands.. more like a cushion. The clouds swirled around him, forming a cage. It hardened into a light yellow metal. The base was solid, no gaps or holes, and the bars spaced just enough that he could fit tho if he wanted.

He didn’t want to go through the bars.

“Welcome to my workspace. Now, most days you’ll be free to live your own life, normal job, normal classes, normal roommates.

But every once and a while, I’ll come and pick you up, and we’ll have some fun. Well.. I’ll have some fun, and they might as well. You probably won’t.”

He sat sobbing on his hands and knees, breathing heavily. Looking up out of the cage, he saw a blurry figure. Glistening yellow mist, coalescing into the shape of a person. Like how the cage had appeared.

They looked.. not tall. The particulate that made up what should be their hair gave the impression of a bob cut. They walked through the bars, easily dissipating then reappearing.

“Now that we’ve met, I think it would be prudent to send you back, let you have some time to process what you’ve been told.

“I myself am curious to see what you decide to believe. I haven’t gotten that far yet, and you’re still to stressed to figure much of anything.”

They placed their finger over their face, as if adjusting glasses.

“I do hope I get some suggestions as to possible.. ‘activities’ we could do. It’s always more fun with input from others, don’t you think?

“I wish you a nice day, Cato. Or rather.. I’ll create a nice day for you. Better for you to have some time to think on this. I don’t want your daily life getting in the way of what happens here.”

He didn’t so much fall as the ground rose to meet him. One second he was sitting on the floor of the cage, the next he was sitting on the ground where he had fallen just minute ago. Just a lifetime ago.

The figure.. they couldn’t be real. He didn’t know what to think of the interaction. Only that they terrified him.

——

Taglist: @whumpsday

[familyagrestefanblog]

Episode 2 of season 4 is confirmed to be "Lie" and a Kagami episode. I'm not entirely up-to-date with the spoilers but I think it's most likely this episode

I guess the show will take the route that ep. 1 "Truth" will be about the Lukanette break up and in ep. 2 "Lie" so will Adrigami. I won't lay judgment upon this decision yet, I want to see the episodes first. The parallel in the titles is interesting tho and maybe that's how we can identify what Kagamis powers will be!

Going by the parallel, if Luka as "Truth" wants to find out secrets and bring them to light Kagami might be the complete opposite. Maybe she can sense the desire of people, the life they wish they had and what(or who) they wish they had in their lives and use it as bait to lure them in so she can get them.

The reason that lead me to this idea is the one thing everybody screamed about when they saw the trailer, Adriens "sacrifice". Because I'm gonna be honest here, the more I look at it, the less it looks like a sacrifice to me. I know everybody seems to agree on this but what we have seen just doesn't add up to me.

I mean, Ladybug is the one these two who is perfectly SAVE and out of harms way when this happens and Kagamis attack seems to be directly after Chat Noir. HE is the one trying to escape the attack not Ladybug.

(gifs from @dailymlgifs)

Not gonna lie, I'm kinda lost on how the white energy ball works. Ladybug seems to be on a lower level than chat but she isn't in danger of getting swallowed by the energy? The attack really just seems to be after HIM

So how could he sacrifice himself for her when she is not even in any danger?

This is why I think there might be a very different reason for why Chat let's himself fall into the white nothingness (totally not a visual callback to Chat Blanc noooooooo) and with a SMILE on his face non the less!

Every episode has a topic and I think here it'll be "the life we have vs the life we WISHED we had" and we will see how it'll affect at least Ladybug, Chat Noir and Kagami.

Concidering that this is probably going to be the Adrigami break up episode its fair to assume that it could happen because either Tomoe and/or Gabriel do not approve of the relationship between their children (we already saw Gabriel sabotage Adriens relationship in Chat Blanc) and Kagami gets akumatized because of it (also parallel to Chat Blanc where Adrien was able to save Marinette from the akuma). She then "freezes" her mother as we saw in the leak.

There are so many possibilities with Kagami in this scenario when you look at it from an "the life we have vs the life we WISHED we had" angle: Maybe the forced break up happens because of the business contract we saw in "Animaestro" (the episode also included the almost random topic of the possibility of Kagami and Adrien leaving for Japan)

and Tomoe tells Kagami they will go back to Japan but Adrien and Gabriel stay in Paris. Kagami would then loose every friend she tried so hard to make, loose both Adrien and Marinette and go back to being all alone. That is one HELL of a reason to get akumatized!

Continuing this topic with Marinette/Ladybug it would explain why akumatized Kagami seems to ignore Ladybug to go after Chat Noir. As we also know from the trailers Marinette will loose alot of her social life to her duties as Ladybug AND guardian, Marinette is definitely NOT excluded from the longing for other circumstances in her life.

But the thing with Marinette is that while she indeed has the emotional tumult for Kagami to target her, the circumstances in which she losses her social life give her a purpose to NOT give into the longing and it saves her from Kagamis power.

Marinettes social sacrifices are painful but she knows they didn't happen for no reason. This is the complete opposite to Adriens losses in life and in my assumption the reason why Kagami not only goes directly after Chat but why he then lets himself fall with a smile.

(Gif from @valleybone)

When I see this moment from a "the life we have vs the life we wished we had" angle then I realize again just how much Adrien LOST already and how purposeless it must seem from his perspective.

-Emilie got sick out of nowhere and then just vanished from the surface of the earth in Adriens eyes. He has no idea what happened to his mother, she is just GONE.

-Nathalie may start to become his new mother figure now but she is also bedridden with the same "condition" as Emilie. So even that light is dimmed with a certain darkness.

-Chloe officially crossed a line in "Miracle Queen" and from the way she behaved there Chloe will get even worse this season. Oddly we kinda tend to forget it on some levels but Chloe was for a long time the only friend Adrien was allowed to have. And while they definitely drifted apart althrough s1-s3 Adrien still genuinely cares about her and with her going "antagonist to villain" now, it makes Chloe one more person Adrien now losses.

-How much do I have to say about Gabriel? "Stormy weather 2" already forshadowed that Gabriel will loss Adrien when he continues to go down his evil path and Adrien brought up the possibility of moving on with life without his father. And now with Gabriel being ShadowMoth he will distance himself even more from his son. Gabriel is definitely a person who must basically feel almost lost to Adrien.

-Of course Kagami herself which the break up and loosing her after they became such great friends

-and we can even include Marinette and Ladybug on this list. Adrien/Chat in the s3 finale at last accepted that Ladybug doesn't love him and the summary of "Truth" says that Marinette "neglects Chat Noir" because shes so overwhelmed. So the potential for Adrien feeling like she's drifting away from him as well is definitely there. And I think Marinette is reasonably enough to include here because if she has no time or opportunity to see everyone else, then it also means Adrien doesn't get to see his very special friend very often either.

-combine this with how lonely Adriens civil life normally is and how "Chat Blanc" forshadows that Adriens popularity will increase even more now and how that will definitely affect him

Then you know what? I would perfectly understand why Kagami would go after Chat in particular when she feels such a longing in him for a life where things are normal and peaceful and his loved one do not slip right through his fingers for reasons he cannot know. Adriens losses in life and the way he has to accept that a normal life in general just was never meant for him just HAPPEN to him and therefore I completely understand it if Chat letting go with a smile on his face has to do with him not being able to resist the longing he feels within. He already has to fight and suppress it every day in his normal daily life but faced with an Akuma like Kagami might be he would succomb to it. Because unlike Marinette he can not hold onto a purpose that explains his losses and gives him the strength to hold onto reality.

I will stop here because I don't even know if this will actually be the case x3

But can you imagine how heartbreaking it would be if we were to hear Emilies voice talking to Adrien for the first time and it's the reason why he let's go of his staff??

(gif from @dailymlgifs​

Gurl I know I'm going so hyper-specific again that I shouldn't expect to actually see it in the episode, but the sheer possibility makes me so sad and now I'm having FEELINGS

[ji-yaaan]

I feel like ordering something hot for this cold weather, hi, hi, is it okay if I ask for a lemon tea? Extra hot, please, I'm freezing. Leona, Octavinelle x MC, first french kiss because french kisses are good, and perhaps some hands involved, no one can resist french kisses' effects 🤭 Thank youuuuuuuu.

°•°•°•𝓢𝔀𝓮𝓮𝓽 𝓚𝓲𝓼𝓼𝓮𝓼•°•°•°

HC's with: Jade, Floyd, Azul, and Leona

WARNING!!!!!! Suggestive content, French kissing, mild spice ;)

Note: I'm late to requests what's new?😔 I am dying as I write this and the adrenaline in my system is ✨thriving✨ Go and live the horni dream as you read this crappy hc I guess? eHeM sElF iNseRt tiMe- hope you enjoy this hotass tea.����✨

[ 𝙻𝚎𝚖𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚎𝚊: 𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚜𝚞𝚖𝚎 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑 𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚌𝚊𝚞𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗 ]

°•°•°•𝓙𝓪𝓭𝓮 𝓛𝓮𝓮𝓬𝓱 •°•°•°

A kiss with jade was always short and sweet. A peck on the cheek, a peck on the lips..... How delicious...

But those "little kisses" weren't really enough to feed this eel for long. (・////・)

As time passes by, the sweet temptation from a lick of your lips sets his mind to a frenzy. He'd want to pull you for a deep long kiss, but he promised that he'd take it slow... Goodness you were such a tease...

Normally he'd just settle with kissing the back of your hand before a goodbye, or an occasional kiss on the lips when you tug on his blazer... But today, it seems as if this desires has took a hold of himself...

Sitting by the tables at the Mostro Lounge, you tugged on the end of his coat before you said your goodbyes...

Expecting for a sweet peck on the lips, Jade leans down your sitting figure instead... Ohoಠ ͜ʖ ಠ

His tall figure looming over yours with an intensive gaze as if he's ready to devour you any moment.

Let's be real here, You're probably frozen on the spot and you don't know what to do or what to say, thus you just go blushy blushy under Jade's gaze... Same tho ༎ຶ‿༎ຶ

With the awkward silence as the two of you were alone in the lounge, the scarlet tint of your flushed cheeks just fuels Jade's desire more and more... My now, don't you just know how to push his buttons quite well?

In a flash of a second, everything goes black as Jade's lips collides with yours, unlike the usual comforting kisses... This one was... Hot...

Jade's tongue will gladly explore the deep depths of you. The kiss would definitely be long leaving you breathless. Take it or leave it( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

This being your first very very intimate moment, breathing through the messy kisses was difficult... But this eel just has a sadistic side to him enjoying your little squirms and embarrassment under his hold.

After the kiss, he loves admiring your flushed face with trails of saliva running down the corners of your mouth.

"Y/n my love, swallow it."

Maybe it was the dim lights and the slow music that played on the background, but a glint of lust sparkled in Jade's eyes with your reflection...( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

"Let me see... Good girl~"

Just like that with his usual foxy smile, don't be surprised if your knees were to give up later ಠ﹏ಠ

°•°•°•𝓕𝓵𝓸𝔂𝓭 𝓛𝓮𝓮𝓬𝓱•°•°•°

Oh Floyd... Ok, I'll make life easier for you and give you a summary of his Hc: "Pls pin me down and dominate me. Thanks"

Floyd's kisses were always unexpected; A pleasant surprise if you will.

Floyd's mood swings can sometimes go higher than a rollercoaster, or lower than my grades, but by the end of the day, he comes in refuge in your arms asking for all of your love and attention.(´ω｀)

But sometimes, his affection for you maybe goes a little bit too much. From a cute sweet kiss, it quickly escalates to something more...lustful...◕‿◕

From a warm hug and sweet kiss, now you're pinned down on the couch as Floyd attacks your neck with multiple kisses leaving a trail of bruises and saliva.

Now comes the fun part. Floyd being Floyd, his hands may get touchy. Like, a whole lot.

Be it with his hands sliding past your shirt or pants, or him constantly removing parts of your clothes one by one. ಠ‿ಠ

He's the type to hold up your wrists together so you can't move, and watch your pretty little face squirming and struggling until you beg for more kisses.

Down from your neck, moving his way up to your lips, a sudden entrance in your mouth will caught you by surprise as Floyd devours you on the spot. (✿^‿^)

His kisses were deep and long, his tongue explores every inch of your mouth.

You have to admit. Floyd's tongue is quite skilled, in fact very skilled.

With Floyd's deep and long kisses, It surely does get hard to breathe with drools dripping from the corners of you mouth.

But the moment he pulls back, the image of you all messed up and all the darkened hickeys on your neck fills him up with excitement! ಡ ͜ ʖ ಡ

The drools staining your chin as you breathe heavily under his hold does a lot to him.

Both you will definitely be a mess after this.

"Ahh~ Koebi-chan, look what you've done to me~"

Yeah... I'll leave that sentence to your imagination( ╹▽╹ )

•°•𝓐𝔃𝓾𝓵 𝓐𝓼𝓱𝓮𝓷𝓰𝓻𝓸𝓽𝓽𝓸 •°•

oH yEs I'vE bEeN wAiTiNg lOnG fOr oCtObOy- ehem( ͡°ᴥ ͡° )

Azul is not the sweetest person to ask for a kiss, but when he's jealous however... That's a different story... ಠωಠ

He might ask you to sit on his lap while he works, of course who are you to decline the sweet offer of cuddling up to Azul? But it seems as if a cuddle is not something he's asking for...

While his pen glides on the papers at the desk, his face will make it's way in the crook of your neck.

Please remove his glasses for him and stare deeply in his eyes, he finds that very sweet! (´°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥ω°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥｀)

Azul loves to savor your sweet scent that gets him excited everytime. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Azul definitely finds a vocal partner a turn on, hearing your beautiful whimpers are music to his ears after all. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)♡

Trailing butterfly kisses in the nape of your neck, making his way to kissing your jawline.

After all of that hot stuff, he'll carry you to the sofa and sit you on top of him. Oho it's getting fun ಠ ͜ʖ ಠ

One hand supporting your waist, while the other hold unto your cheek. Azul diving for a hungry kiss with you.

Azul will try his best to take the lead and control the situation. He did his research afterall.

A deep kiss closing the gap between you was the best reassurance he has that you're his and his alone.

Please hold unto his shoulders for support and pull on his hair!!! Octoboi finds it hot heh-

With the kiss being deep and long, it will get hard to breathe. So after pulling away from the kiss, the hot breaths and saliva mixed together was quite the hot mess.

You can imagine Azul out of breath as he licks his lips staring directly at you.(•///•)

"Y/N... You're mine."

Eye contact... It's all about the eye contact that melts your insides when you look at Azul... AZUL WITHOUT GLASSES!

If you blush at his remarks, you get bonus points because Azul lovessss seeing you embarrassed~ ಠ﹏ಠ

Say "I love you" and you have Azul as putty under your hold~

Oh! and when you say I love you, Azul will definitely get flushed red to his ears and neck so... Teasing time hehe~ bully the octopie with love!

OCTOSQUID IN MAFIA SUIT I LOVE YOU SM I CAN'T EVEN- ok I'll shut up I'm sorry about that

•°•𝓛𝓮𝓸𝓷𝓪 𝓚𝓲𝓷𝓰𝓼𝓬𝓱𝓸𝓵𝓪𝓻 •°•

First of all, I can guarantee that the first french kiss with Leona will happen after a fight...ಠωಠ

After a fight of pride with Leona, sexual tension is through the roof! Glaring at each other, no signs of giving up as both of you are on each other's neck... Leona finds that hot ಠ‿ಠ

Leona won't admit to it, but having a fiesty partner that challenges him and puts him on edge was hot... In fact, very very hot...

Of course it's annoying at first, but seeing your furrowed eyebrows as you push your hair back in frustration does something to him (. ❛ ᴗ ❛.)

Leona finds attraction in high sexual tension, So let's say you're about to flip and your face goes a little bit too close to his... He'd take that as an open invitation to shut you up.

My, don't be surprised if a pair if lips started to kiss yours desperately. Pulling unto your waist as his other hands hold your chin up to face him, the kisses were messy, but it was exciting.

Ngl Leona's tongue can win a talent show with his top notch skills.

He'll gladly explore every inch of your mouth with pleasure ಡ ͜ ʖ ಡ

Oh, kissing with Leona gets pretty touchy too! His hands will wander under your shirt unto your back, maybe even lower if he feels extra curious today-ಠ◡ಠ

Please pull unto his hair, he finds that really hot too.

Expect low growls to bless your ears here and there... ಠ ͜ʖ ಠ

Oh! Sometimes Leona may get a little too touchy, so I guess you have to have the control to stop him if you don't like that. I doubt it tho( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

But if you're into those freaky stuff, Leona will gladly go on an adventure with you down there( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

After the kiss, don't be surprised if you find love bites here and there, better cover up since it's a lot...

Oh, but it's no use to cover up since this cat boy happens to be an exhibit artist that loves to show off his work staining your neck purple.

What a way to come back with something like this amirite? Heh🤠

ALSO, AZUL BRAIN ROT IS REAL- MALLEUS' SPOT IS THREATENED AS MY LOVE FOR OCTOPIE GROW- send help😭😭😭😭😭

Azul I want your kneecaps🤭

[phantomdecibel]

oh wow-

:D

short answer: I think bows are cool as fuck and want them to exist :p
long answer: yeah, they do use a lot of resources! You’d have to try your best not to lose your arrows bc ur prolly not gonna be able to get them back very easily and it’d be a waste of time digging around for them, but the benefit/necessity of having a long-range weapon to hunt with outweighs how expensive they’d be. The snuffler rangers travel and rotate between a number of villages, so you can’t rely of them for food 100% of the time, especially when weather constrains cause delays or even for them to skip certain villages entirely. As for how they’d make bows/arrows without wood, I haven’t entirely figured out yet. I know that certain plants like hemp and bamboo can be used as a wood substitute in some cases, and there are some similar plants in the Deadzone, so the vague idea is that there are similar plants here that could be used instead – though they’re not exactly abundant, and take quite a few just for one bow and a set of arrows, so its still a pretty big investment

just for the onceler thing im changing the name /j–

The snufflers don’t actively protect the ranchers, no. they’re incredibly docile and not predators – though they could probably startle off certain other creatures by running at them fast enough lol
With the bird cats it’s like. If you’re close enough to the snuffler, like leaned against it close, then the cats will usually leave you alone. The range of how closely they’re willing to hunt around the snufflers is a lot smaller than other predators, though, so yeah, the ranchers who’re following around the bird cats are in a really precarious situation XD

I haven’t quite figured out how sentient I want the bird cats to be yet, but they are pretty intelligent. I’d say not quite warrior cats level of sentience – definitely sentient enough for language/communication with eachother. Probably not quite the same level as human sentience tho

Not exactly – it’s more like a bargain; we wont hurt you and we’ll make ourselves useful, and in return you’ll do the same. The cat birds have a strong sense of community/pack bonding mentality, so things kinda build from mutually beneficial to that one httyd meme lmao. You’re right orphanages aren’t exactly a huge thing/don’t work the same as in our world – but that’s mostly just because communities are so tight knit! When you live somewhere as dangerous as the Deadzone, you’ve got to really trust the people around you, and vice versa. If a child is orphaned, which happens a lot, unfortuanatly, they’re prolly gonna get schlorped by family friends near immediately

Theft of eggs has been such a threat for the murder bird cats that they’ve evolved to lay several unfertilized ‘decoy’ eggs alongside a single fertilized one (no clue how that’d work logically but whatever lmao), so yeah the ranchers are only taking the unfertilized ones! They take them because they’re good food, and good for trading. Since they,re not exactly popular, ranchers who follow the murder friends need…rarer? things for trading, though they’re definitely encouraged to take the eggs, among other things! It’s more often that they just leave rather than actively double cross, since they’ve come to respect and acknowledge the cats intelligence, and wouldn’t want retaliation

Arceli :D! ….I plead the fifth–

The Threshold… now that could be an entirely other post lmao! For now I’ll keep it vague with; the Threshold is part of what keeps the Deadzone so isolated, since it’s landlocked, not an island! Lack of food/water is definitely a factor at times… but mostly Something Else (:

Yeah, most people would report that the air gets… weird, harder to breath, the closer you get to the Threshold, for some reason…

I’d say the snufflers are more like weird cows lmao, they’ve been completely domesticated, and when someone /does/ find one out in the wild, they’re more likely to bring to back to try and develop a breeding colony rather than killing it right away! The ranchers protect and provide for the snufflers, so I’d say that probably outweighs the threat

Children still have stronger stomachs than people outside of the Deadzone – but definitely weaker than adults inside it. It’s an evolutionary advantage, but one that still needs to be strengthened to work properly!

Bioluminescence has a whole bunch of different purposes – I’d say there are animals who use it for all three! A number of smaller prey species glow, as a sort of defence mechanism

Fishing! I’ve fished before, though I usually prefer just hanging out on the boat :]

How do people hunt in your world?

HELL YEAH TIME TO RAMBLE ABOUT WORLDBUILDING-!!!

Prepare yourself for a bunch of information you did not ask for :D!!!!!

Lovely question thank you very much, and very open tho so im just gonna focus on hunting in the Deadzone, since that’s the area in the wcbwe universe that I post about the most :)

…yknow. Im not sure I ever made it really clear so: the Deadzone, with all the oily, acidic water and whatnot, is only a small, small part of the universe. It’s very isolated, so all sorts of wild things go on there :p the rest of the world has normal water. I’m just focusing on developing one part at a time!

Before I really jump into this I’d like to say that the stories I’m writing inside this universe take place over a number of years, like thousands bc immortal ppl exist, so I’m gonna mostly talk about hunting and agriculture around the time that the first instalment of the story ‘Im writing starts (not that that really matters I’m just enjoying rambling lol). So: one-to-two thousand years before the people here started counting the years

oh also bear in mind that at this stage im just making shit up if u want like science behind the shit im making up ur gonna have to get it elsewhere /j :p

Okay so on to the question! How does hunting work in the Deadzone?

There’re a couple things that really shape how things like that work here; the general lack of wood, scarcity of easily accessible drinkable water, the water that can literally melt your skin off, and the fact that open flame here is a Bad Idea (sorry arson mutuals) – but that’s a whole other thing I’m not gonna get into rn lmao

Although – the whole acid rain thing isn’t as big of a problem bc most resources have evolved to be resistant to it, and the people and animals have learned to deal

SO with the dangerous weather/environment, a really popular hunting technique is the use of snares, and herding things into them. They’re reusable, so you get to worry less about the use of resources, you can set them and wait somewhere safe and don’t have to worry about getting caught out in the rain or sandstorms, and assuming you’re setting your traps in an area you know, you don’t have to worry as much about getting lost when visibility is low! Not to mention that setting a trap is less strenuous than than a lot of other forms of hunting, so you need less water, which is a coveted resource, especially at this point in time

Guns don’t exist yet, but if they did, they’d be pretty popular too – and will be when they finally do. I have no clue at what point in time firearms became a thing, but the Deadzone is incredibly isolated anyways, so I can do whatever I want anyways uwu. As it is, archery is definatly a thing instead! Bows and crossbows both are used in hunting, effective long-range weapons :)

Close-range weapons like knives and swords and whatnot do exist and are used, but they’re more so better suited against larger predators, like the murder birb cats. There are these large bug-coyote things I don’t have a solid design for (nightcrawlers; theyre nocturnal. Im so original I know /j) that are really annoying to shoot at. Most people try their best to avoid them and no one’s really out at night – its also really cold so its no big loss – but when people are out at night, you’re gonna want a sword or something. Nightcrawlers are edible, under their tough exoskeleton, but also really dangerous to the people of the Deadzone, so they’re not often hunted for food, more so just to cull their numbers and the fact that they’re edible is just a plus

The murder birb cats are ambush predators mostly, like I mentioned in my other post, and good at avoiding traps – or worse, turning them against the hunter. So they’re rarely hunted specifically (if someone has a chance to kill one though they wil definitely take it), but their eggs are often poached for both food and to get rid of as many threats to a village as possible.

Most animals are pretty difficult to actively… uh. I cant remember the word? Corral? Herd?... farm? and it’s the same with plants bc their main source of hydration is incredibly dangerous to handle – except for these one creatures I first thought up when all I could think about was the people who follow around the murder birds (dw we’re gonna talk abt that im in too deep I’m incapable of not-). The. only visual I have for them is like tall, lanky humpless camels with like. Snouts like those smooth mammal things whos faces look like a mix between anteater and capybara snouts that the only tentative first-draft name ive come up w for them is ‘snufflers’ XD and that sounds way too much like the knew Minecraft mob lmao-

At the point in time where the wcbwe universe begins, snufflers are the only truly domesticated animal in the Deadzone. They’re used as mounts, for food, and, more importantly, they can accurately predict when it’s about to rain, and start barking… maybe screamers or something would be a better name lmao theyre just too soft for that :p

Because they work as a warning system for the other wildlife who aren’t immune to the rain, predators in the Deadzone (with the exception of the nightcrawlers) don’t attack snufflers unless in incredibly dire situations, and, by extension, the people of the Deadzone are mostly safe when close enough! So they’re incredibly popular mounts for travelling the desolation of the Deadzone. Snuffler… ‘rangers’ or ‘ranchers’, this is newer lore so I’m not quite settled on any names/titles yet, have travelling farms that herd their flocks between a rotation of local villages to sell/trade them for various resources. Even just keeping the snufflers in the village deters most predators from hunting there, with the exception of nightcrawlers who will attack snufflers anyways (might be because their exoskeleton protects them from the rain so the warning means nothing to them), and the murder bird cats, who are smart enough to hunt people while leaving the snufflers alone.

THIS IS WHERE I BRING UP THE PEOPLE WHO FOLLOW THE BIRBS AROUND :D

Some ranchers take a snuffler or two and head out either on their own or in small groups no larger than five, to follow the bird cat flocks. When they’re quite literally sat atop the snufflers, the murder friends mostly leave them alone. Of course they also have to be incredibly careful until they build up enough trust within the flock, because they would definitely be considered a threat or food and taken out if they stray too far or close. If the rouge ranchers want to be able to follow and live among the murder friends in relative safety, they’ve got to prove that a) theyre not a threat and b) they’re more useful alive than dead

Ranchers who follow the cats tend to hunt larger prey like the nightcrawlers, and share their kills with the bird cats, among other things, and the murder friends return the favour once the ranchers have been accepted as friends. Its an incredibly important and dangerous job, but also scorned. The murder bird cats are a serious threat to villages and just the people of the Deadzone in general – and the ranchers often become protective and defensive of their flocks, which causes some conflict. Still, these ranchers (who don’t have a separate title yet) are incredibly important for life in the Deadzone. They provide information on where their flocks are so people can avoid them or hide, they have easy access to eggs they can sell or trade as food, and if they have enough respect within the flock can even help provent attacks on villages – not to mention all they learn about the predators, and it always helps to know things about your enemies. One of my ocs, and the pov character of a story I’m writing  named Arceli is one of these ranchers! Though unfortunately that doesn’t last very long and isn’t the focus at all :,)

So those’re two of the most important jobs in the Deadzone and we’ve gone seriously off topic!

Hunting, right-

Well, hunting’s pretty hard without tools lol! I don’t know much about the production of any tools you’d use for hunting n shit so I won’t really talk about that, but I can tell you a bit of what they’re made out of! Though not much sorry ;-;

Metals do exist here and while fire isn’t an option, they do still have the melty water and some forms of bioluminescence that produces heat! I wont go into details I don’t know, but both rock and metal can be heated and molded similar to how they could in our world… just not with fire haha. And also bone! This would work exactly the same as how it does on earth – but the Deadzone has an abundance of bones, particularly around the edges

The Deadzone is surrounded by a barrier called The Threshold – and the Threshold is basically a large ring of the bones of dead things that have tried to cross it. I’m tempted to try and explain but I can’t draw which would really help w the explanation and also this is already really long so I’ll just keep it simple with it’s not a hard line in art terms bc those’re the only words I know rn in art terms it sort of. Ombres and condenses before dispersing out again. and by ‘it’ I mean the bones

So bones are easily accessible, and a pretty abundant resource!

TAPIRS FUCKIGN TAPIRS THAT’S WHAT THEYRE CALLED. SNUFFLER FACES NOSES WHATEVER LOOK LIKE TAPIR FACE NOSES. anyways. moving on now.

Right bones!

Lots of em littered around; they’re used for pretty much everything from tools/weapons to for building to even for food and snacks – things to gnaw and whatnot – especially marrow (in what I’m assuming would be primarily from fresher kills).

(I don’t know why I mentioned agriculture earlier ive barely brought it up whoops. Probably won’t go into it either, unless it comes up naturally, this is just already way to long lmao)

Another thing that plays a large part in hunting is that pretty much everything, people and animal alike, have very strong stomachs, and people, in smaller doses, know how to prepare carrion in a way that wont immediately make you super fucking sick. I haven’t decided how long it takes for things to rot in the Deadzone; the air is super cold there, cold enough to significantly slow down the decomposition process bUT the sands and rocks and shit are really really good at absorbing heat from the sun, like they can get hot enough to burn you. So I guess it depends on how sunny it is but that doesn’t really matter the point is. It’s way less (if at all) necessary now, what with the invention of traps and tools for hunting and farming the snufflers, but the only way you live long enough to evolve in the Deadzone is if you’re a scavenger of some kind.

So back to hunting. I’ve mentioned it once or twice but visibility is Really Shitty most of the time, so when you’re going out, you’ve to plan to be lost for a few days or you’re dead. If you stick close to your village you’re not gonna get as good of results, but at least you’re much more likely to make it home at the end of the day. Stray too far and you could get so turned around it takes you a month to get home – but you’d probably stumble across some really good prey to bring back, when you’re in places people don’t end up in often.

OH

CAN’T BELIEVE I FORGOT-

Bioluminescence! Is a thing here!

Ive already mentioned that in multiple different things, but guess what! It applies here, too!

So like with bioluminescent fish, often predators use their own possible bioluminescent qualities to lure in prey. This was first observed by the rangers following the murder bird cats (I haven’t settled on a specific design but so far they’ve got whiskers that can grown from the chin, crown of the head, and along the spine and base of the tail that have a glowing bubble at the end), and was adapted by people for use in traps and as lures in the same way

Oh also there’s fish in the melty water :)

Fishing isn’t a thing just yet, but they’ll figure it out soon enough

I feel like im forgetting something but *checks wordcount* this is over 2000 words so imma just stop it here lmao-

no art sorry, I tried and failed miserably and then was at my grandma’s writing and not drawing lol

[maneskinrollercoaster]

~ And All That For a Lighter ~

Pairing: Damiano David x Naomi (fictional character)

Word count: 3035

Warnings: none

Summary: Naomi meets Damiano in a café for the first time.

Naomi entered the café all soaked, her cheeks red from running and her hair messy and wet from the rain. It was pouring outside which was the thing she despised the most. Surprisingly tho she felt good. Fresh. She loved walking around Rome in the morning and for the first time in her life she admired this rainy weather. Little drops of water flowed over her cheek. Her life was a big mess and you could say she needed something new.

When a month ago she found her boyfriend cheating with her best friend she felt like her whole life collapsed. That’s when she decided to change something. Start a new life. She started admiring things she’s never liked before, she started dressing differently, she became more confident in her own body. She even started working out which was the most unexpected thing since physical education was her least favorite subject in high school.

Naomi always thought love was the most essential part of everyone’s life, but a sight of Alessandro having fun in their bed with Sofia made her hate love more than anything. She decided to move on and live life completely and only for herself.

- Buongiorno Joey - she said reaching the bartender standing behind the counter.

- Buongiorno piccola, what can I get for you?

- One espresso please, and one brownie - the bartender nodded and started preparing her order.

She decided to sit down since she would probably spend a lot of time working on her laptop and enjoying this rainy morning. The inside of café was warm and welcoming, comfortable couches, puffy pillows and a lot of plants. She visited this café every day for the past two weeks and she found herself enjoying this place maybe even more than her new flat.

Naomi went to sit in the corner on a cozy red couch. She took off her soaked jacket and pulled out her laptop with a couple of notebooks. She was a student of economy and since she had to find herself some more things to do she decided to actually try harder to have a better degree at her college. She wasn’t so fond of the direction she chose but she knew it’s gonna bring her a prosperous life. In fact her favorite thing in the world was art. She started painting when she was 8 years old. Since then she really enjoyed staying all day alone in her room painting everything she could, from beautiful portraits to mesmerizing landscapes. She had a huge talent but she was too afraid to chase her dreams.

When she met Alessandro he quickly bashed her ideas of becoming a professional painter, saying that it’s not something she will build her life on and that she will be only wasting her time. She was mad at him for a couple of days but then she quit her painting dream and chose economy for her main subject.

- Ecco a te, one coffee and one brownie - said Joey bringing her order to the table and putting it right in front of her.

- Grazie mille - Naomi answered and smiled to him.

She took a sip of coffee and smiled. It was delicious. That was another reason why she kept coming back here every day. They made the best coffee she’s ever drunk.

Two hours passed and Naomi was still working on her assignment she was supposed to give in till next Monday. It was about lunch time so she decided she will pack her things in an hour and she will go find a place to eat something. She took the last sip of the coffee and finished her first task when someone pulled her out of her little trans.

- Ah shit! I’m all wet! - she heard someone saying and moment later she saw a guy reaching the bartender.

He was tall and had slightly longer, dark brown hair. She could only see his profile but only that was enough for her to admit that he was really handsome. He was wearing black trousers, black Dr. Martens, white tank top and an oversized black jacket. He looked good and Naomi couldn’t take her eyes off of him.

- Damiano! It’s so good to see you man! - Joey said and shook hands with the new guy.

Damiano. The name really suit him. Naomi didn’t take her eyes off him even once.

- Ciao, ciao, Joey! - his voice was attractive as well. Raspy and deep but really calm.

Naomi didn’t know what was happening. Usually she didn’t pay attention to any guys after Alessandro but he was different. He looked edgy and bold but he seemed nice too. She was staring at him. And not in a polite way. She was literally eyeing him from up and down and she didn’t even realize.

- Give me an espresso man, I’m so tired, I just woke up. Yesterday we had so much fun. Victoria came up with this new idea of the song and we all stayed up late till 4 am trying to figure out how to pull it up together. - Damiano said.

So he’s into music. Nice. Naomi was still staring at him so rudely but she didn’t care at this point. Music is also art - she thought and smiled slightly not letting go of his person.

- Typical you, Dam, you’ve never slept a full night, did you? - Joey said and they both laughed.

- Do you have a lighter maybe? I forgot mine. - Damiano said and started searching his pockets.

- I don’t man, sorry. Let me make your order. Anything else for you?

- No, no that’s all. I’m gonna go search for a lighter and I’ll be back.

He turned around searching for people but at this time the café was empty. Only Naomi sitting in the corner. He started walking towards her. Oh shit, he’s coming here, stop staring, stop staring, stop staring - Naomi thought and looked at her laptop trying to pretend that’s she didn’t just checked him out for 10 minutes straight.

- Scusi, I’m.. - he reached her table and started speaking but stopped when she looked at him. - I’m sorry to interrupt but do you have a lighter maybe? - he said after a second.

- No, I’m sorry. I don’t smoke. - Naomi blushed and smiled lightly.

- Okey, grazie. - he smiled and started walking away.

- But there’s a store at the corner, I think they might have some. - Naomi said

- Grazie, grazie. - he laughed slightly and waved at her.

Naomi went back to her tasks still blushing not knowing why. 15 minutes passed and Damiano entered the café again carrying two bags. He came up to Naomi smiling.

- I uh.. Sorry to interrupt again but.. Do you want to maybe eat lunch with me? I just thought that it’s lunch time and you’re sitting here alone and since you helped me with the lighter.. - he couldn’t stop speaking and Naomi blushed again laughing. He looked a bit nervous.

- Of course, I would love to eat lunch with you. - she said interrupting him.

- I’m Damiano - he said pulling out his hand.

- Naomi - she said and grabbed his hand to shake it but he turned it and kissed the top of her palm.

She felt something weird in her stomach, like butterflies but she pushed them aside and only smiled to him. Damiano sat on the couch opposite Naomi and put two bags on the table.

- I didn’t know what you like, obviously because I don’t know you, yeah very clever Dam, whatever.. - he started speaking and Naomi couldn’t stop but laugh at him loudly

- Don’t worry, I’m not a peaky eater - she said sending him a reassuring smile.

- Alright, well, I ordered pasta with shrimps and some pesto and cherry tomatoes. - he said taking out the box with food from the bag. - I also got you a cherry smoothie but we can switch if you’d like.

- Wow, and that all for a lighter? You really didn’t have to. But thank you so much, I was about to go for lunch anyways. - she said grabbing the box that he handed her.

- Yes well, you’re really beautiful.. I mean, no.. I mean you are beautiful but I just wanted to say that you’re really nice and yeah I don’t know I just thought you might like to eat something.. Not that you look like you’re starving but yeah..

- Heyyy, thank you, really, that’s so nice of you. - she said smiling widely.

Naomi took the first bite of her pasta and it was delicious. She remembered her grandmother cooking shrimps every Saturday and all her family gathering together for a family dinner in the garden. It tasted just the same.

They ate everything and after two hours of talking and laughing and getting to know each other it was time for Joey to close the café. Naomi stood up and packed her things, said goodbye to Joey and together with Damiano they stepped out of the café. It stopped raining and instead there was a full sun and a fresh breeze.

- So what are you gonna do now? - he asked standing in front of her.

- Umm.. I think I’m just gonna go back to my flat, make myself some snacks and watch Netflix till I fall asleep - Naomi laughed.

- Alright well, do you mind if I walk you home? - Damiano asked steeping a bit closer to her.

- Sure, why not, we can take a walk.

That day Damiano walked Naomi to her house and they exchanged numbers, planning to meet again. He kissed her cheek for goodbye and squeezed her hand and Naomi has never felt like that in a long time. She was happy and Damiano, even tho she met him today, made her feel really good. Naomi couldn’t sleep that night still thinking of him and wondering why she felt so different around him.

*3 months later*

- What do you mean you don’t like Star Wars! - Damiano shouted to Naomi while they both walked towards the beach where they were supposed to watch sunset and have a little picnic.

Since the day they met they spent almost every day together. Damiano surprised her with multiple occasions to go out together, either for lunch or dinner or even breakfast when he woke up earlier than usual. He found himself falling for her. In fact he realized he fell for her the day he first laid his eyes on her. He found her funny, spontaneous and really kind and caring. When she told him about her painting dream he was so shocked she gave up, that he argued with her till he convinced her to chase the dream even if she thought it was too late. Naomi really enjoyed his company, he made her feel really happy and safe and most importantly - loved. She knew she developed some feelings and she didn’t want to admit it but at the back of her head she knew she fell in love. He made her laugh and supported her when she was having bad moments. He became her best friend at some point. Both of them were taking things a bit slower tho, they were both afraid, broken-hearted after rough ended relationships.

- I just don’t, I don’t understand how they made so many movies out of such a lame plot. - she said defending herself.

- How can you even say that! The plot is amazing! The space action scenes, come on! - he said offended but smiling.

- Yeah I just don’t see the point of filming it, that’s all.

- I don’t know how Victoria can still be friends with you, we’re both huge fans of Star Wars! You’re lucky I like you - Damiano started laughing and put his arm around Naomi’s shoulders.

She got to meet Victoria, Ethan and Thomas. Bassist, drummer and guitarist of their band Måneskin. Naomi wasn’t really into music so she didn’t really know them and didn’t know they’re pretty known here in Italy. Victoria was the kindest person Naomi could ever see. When her and Damiano stepped into the studio where they were recording, Vic was the first to reach out to her. She hugged her tightly and was clearly really happy to meet her. She then introduced Thomas and Ethan to her. Thomas started joking around that Damiano finally found himself a girlfriend and Ethan was really polite, he kissed Naomi’s hand and hugged her too, smiling really kindly. They were all so nice. They started inviting her over for dinners or just to hang out by the pool. She also listened to them playing and recording their new songs. Damiano told them that she wanted to be a painter and they all started reassuring her even more, that chasing her dream is the best thing for her and that she should never give up. Naomi really felt like she finally found her place.

Naomi and Damiano reached the beach, they put the blanket on the sand, put out all the food from the basket and they sat opposite each other. They were both smiling widely and chatting about everything. They drank some wine, ate some pasta and then they sat next to each other admiring the sunset.

- I really like you, you know? - Damiano said glancing at Naomi. - And I mean, I like you a lot. You’re really an amazing person with so much talent and you’re just so caring and loving. You really make me happy. - he said not taking his eyes off of her.

- Dami.. - Naomi started but she was interrupted.

- What I want to say is.. - he took her hands - I fell in love with you Naomi. I fell for you hard and I’m pretty sure since the day I saw you at that café. I care about you so much and any time with you is my favorite time in the world. So if you want to.. We could try, you know.. Being together, like, in a relationship. - he said in one breathe.

Naomi was speechless, her stomach was squeezing and she felt her cheeks turning red. She never would have though that someone will make her feel like this again. She knew that he cares for her but she didn’t know that he would feel the same way she felt about him.

- Dami.. Of course I do want to try, you make me the happiest, and honestly I didn’t know you feel the same way, that’s why I didn’t say anything. And also because.. - Naomi wanted to tell him about Alessandro but she was scared that Damiano will back off, saying that he will give her time.

- What’s wrong, bella? - he said gently squeezing her hand.

- I was in a relationship before. His name was Alessandro and we met before I started college. We were together for 3 years and everything was going just fine. But then.. One day when I came back home earlier than usual I found him cheating with my best friend, Sofia. Since then I just decided to not get into any relationship and live only for myself because I was too afraid to get hurt again - Naomi said looking down at their intertwined hands.

- Oh bella.. - Damiano pulled her into a tight hug.

He stroked her back and her hair and he was whispering to her ear. A single tear fell down her cheek but not because she was hurt but because of how gentle and caring Damiano was. He hugged her and made her feel better and she couldn’t find herself with anyone else right now than with him. He pulled away, looked into her eyes and smiled slightly.

- I was in a relationship too a while ago. It turned out we didn’t match and our life goals and perspectives were so different that we decided to end things. Maybe it wasn’t as harsh as your breakup but I felt awful for at least a month. I didn’t go out of my room and I lost all will to write music. Victoria brought me food every day but I just didn’t want to eat. But it all passed.. Listen, if you need more time it’s all good, I’ll give you space and I’ll wait till you’re ready.

Naomi was silent for a couple of seconds. In her head there was a battle. She wanted to let go of bad memories and trust Damiano completely, start a relationship with him, but on the other hand she was scared to get hurt again.

- No Dami. I don’t need time, I know what I want and I know how you make me feel and that��s why I want to try. - Naomi said hugging him tightly.

She knew she just overcame her fear and she felt free. Like a huge stone fell off of her heart. She felt amazing and she wanted to live this moment as long as she could. Damiano pulled away and cupped her cheek with his hand. He pulled her closer and she could feel his breath on her face. Slowly, but slightly Damiano leaned in and brushed his lips against hers. Naomi touched his cheek and pulled him even closer. And then they both intertwined their lips in a gentle, yet passionate kiss.

Naomi felt her stomach squeezing when Damiano put his hand on her back. It was their first kiss and the sunset was almost turning into the night. They pulled away after seconds and smiled widely at each other.

- I promise, I’ll always take care of you. - Damiano said leaning his forehead against hers.

- Always. - Naomi said grabbing his hand and intertwining their fingers together.

That’s when they both knew that they found soulmates in each other.

[lunatens]

scaredy cats

-

requested by bea (🌱✨anon) tysm bby!! i’m sorry this took so long, i made it a lil longer to make up for it :> 

prompt: “uh...did the power just go out?”

*part of my 2 years with luna event!

word count: 2.2k

genre: fluff, high school au, childhood friends to lovers 

pairing: lee chan x gn reader

warnings: there’s a thunderstorm and the power goes out!

[you: channieeeee pls come over~]

[chan: y??]

[you: do u rlly need a reason lmao i just wanna see my bestie]

[chan: it’s raining thoooooo]

[you: so? use an umbrella it ain’t a far walk]

[chan: okok i’ll come hang out]

[chan: i’m gonna kick ur ass at super mario party tho]

[you: in your dreams ;) see u soon bby!!]

slipping your phone into your pocket, you roll off your bed and excitedly rush to your front window, pulling the blinds aside so you can have a better view of the street outside. chan wasn’t kidding, it’s raining alright—heavy torrents of rain pour from the sky, and the clouds look a bit too dark for your liking. you bite your lip guiltily, feeling a little bad that chan’s walking here in this weather. at least he only lives a block over, you think to make yourself feel better. 

chan’s been your best friend ever since he accidentally hit you in the face with a frisbee way back when you were just ten years old. your nose started bleeding, and chan panicked and tried to comfort you as he went with you to get cleaned up. even when the school nurse tried to send him back outside, he refused to leave until he knew you were okay. you tease him about this all the time, laughing at how overdramatic he was (”it was just a little nose bleed, chan” “okay but you were crying!!”) but you’re grateful for it, as you probably wouldn’t have become friends otherwise. 

you smile to yourself as you think back fondly on the memories of your childhood with chan; it won’t be long till you’re both graduating high school, and it’s hard to believe it’s been so many years since that fateful frisbee incident. you can’t help but nervously wonder what the future will bring for you and chan, but you push those thoughts aside when you see a figure running down the street trying to cover his head as he sprints through the puddles. he slows down as he reaches your house, jogging up to your front door. not even giving him the chance to knock, you open the door for chan and usher him inside quickly. 

“it’s a little wet out there,” he comments sarcastically, and a distant clap of thunder echoes through the sky as if to emphasize his point. you quickly shut the door and lock it, as if that’ll do something to keep the storm at bay. 

“yeah, no kidding, you’re dripping all over the floor,” you comment. chan pulls of his drenched shoes and opens his mouth to say something but you cut him off before he can start.

“i’ll go get you some dry clothes, stay here so you don’t get the entire house wet,” you tell him as you rush to your room to search for something chan can wear. you find a couple of his sweaters lying around, one he forgot here just last week and the other one from god knows when. you decide to keep the more recent one and give chan the older one along with a pair of your sweatpants and some warm socks.

“here, catch,” you say as you throw the clothes towards chan, who’s now standing in a large puddle in your doorway. he’s caught off guard, and the clothes hit him square in the face. 

“hey!!! i come all the way over here through a thunderstorm to see you just because you’re bored, and this is the thanks i get?” chan complains as he makes his way to your room to get changed.

“oh come on, i know you were just as bored as i was,” you tease, and chan can’t help but smile when you call him out. 

“you got me,” he responds before slipping into your room and closing the door behind him. you proceed to hook up your nintendo switch to the tv, preparing for a night of video games and maybe a movie or two. as you connect the cables, you hear your bedroom door open and chan’s soft footsteps as he goes to throw his clothes in the dryer. he returns to the living room, flopping onto the couch and grabbing a controller.

“what do you want for dinner? my parents are away for the weekend so there’s frozen pizza or….some sort of leftovers i think?” you ask chan, making your way to the kitchen.

“you’re not gonna cook for me?” chan teases, knowing you sometimes struggle to make toast. you give him a look before digging the pizza out of the freezer. you preheat the oven and place the pizza on a tray. 

“don’t forget to take the plastic off!” chan calls from the couch.

“i know, chan,” you say, but you’re glad he reminded you; that was a close one. 

-

two hours and a slightly overcooked frozen pizza later, you and chan are yelling at the screen as your characters pummel each other in a heated round of super smash bros. it’s still heavily raining, but the sounds of the tv drown out the steady drumming on the roof and the increasingly loud and frequent thunder. the two of you hardly notice the flashes of lightning in the now-dark sky as you focus on the tv. you’re just about to smash chan’s character to oblivion when all of a sudden everything is pitch black and a blanket of dead silence washes over the house, save for the rain on the roof.

“uh...did the power just go out?” chan asks, the two of you sitting frozen on the couch. you turn your head to look at him, although there’s really no point--you can’t see anything.

“hm, yeah i think it did,” you say. you’re trying to tease him, but you can’t hide the fear wavering in your voice. 

“where are you?” chan asks, voice equally fearful, and you reach out to feel for his outstretched hands in the dark. you find them, and the two of you grab onto each other and pull each other close. the room feels so empty without the bright lights from the tv and the chaotic yelling over the sounds of the game onscreen. now, there’s only the rain, louder than ever, although you swear you can hear your heartbeat out loud. 

“i think we have some candles in the basement,” you whisper.

“noooooope, you’re crazy if you think i’m going down there; it’s scary even when the lights are on,” chan replies and you feel him shake his head. “what about that scented candle i gave you for your birthday?”

“ooh, good call! it’s in my room,” you remember. “let’s go,” you say, pulling out your phone to use as a flashlight. lightning outside lights up the room for a moment, and not too long after there’s a loud clap of thunder. both you and chan let out a small shriek, feeling your grips on each other tighten. now, is your heart beating from fear of the dark and stormy night? or from the way chan holds onto you for dear life? probably a mix of both, but you choose not to think about that right now. 

“ok we’ll go on three, ready?” you say, waiting for chan’s response. you’re met with silence. “chan?”

“oh sorry, i forgot you can’t see me nodding. on three,” he confirms

“okay, one, two...three!” you count. on three, you pull chan off the couch and the two of you race hand in hand to your bedroom, guided by the bright light of your phone flashlight. you hesitantly let go of chan’s hand as you search for your candle and some matches. it doesn’t take too long to find them, and soon enough a flickering orange flame casts a faint flow around your room. you and chan climb onto your bed, you sitting up against the headboard and chan lying with his head in your lap. there’s enough light that you can now see each other’s silhouettes at least, and you look down to watch as the flame casts shadows that seem to dance across chan’s face. when did he grow up so much? you find yourself thinking, feeling like it was just yesterday the two of you were a couple of snot-nosed kids running around at recess. your fingers absentmindedly play with his hair as you’re lost in thought.

“this is kind of spooky, we should tell ghost stories!” chan suggests.

“or we could just talk and not scare ourselves into staying awake all night,” you reply.

“good idea,” he agrees, but neither of you say anything. you lie there in silence for a moment; the rain sounds a bit less violent from inside your room, and now that you can see a bit you find it’s quite a peaceful sound.

“mingyu asked me out today,” you tell chan. you’re not quite sure what possessed you to just tell him that out of the blue; you weren’t even planning on telling chan at all, but now you’ve gone and said it and you can’t take it back.

“really?? that’s great, y/n! when’s the date?”

you’re a bit disheartened at chan’s reaction; he seems genuinely excited for you, unless the shock is just masking his true feelings for now, 

“i said no.”

“what?? why??? i thought you liked him?” chan sits up at this, his head now even with yours as he looks at you in shock.

“not anymore,” you say with a shrug. your voice is quiet, unsure of where this conversation will head. 

“oh,” is all chan says. “is there...any particular reason?” he asks after a beat of silence. there’s something more in his voice now that wasn’t there before.

“i just don’t think he’s really my type,” you explain without elaborating. 

“well, what is your type if not mingyu? he’s kind, smart, beautiful, tall...he’s got it all! i mean, you’ve had a crush on him for like, a year, and he finally asked you out and you said no?” chan says in mild disbelief. 

“don’t get me wrong, mingyu’s a great guy and all, but i just-i think i realized i have feelings for someone else,” you say, voice trailing off to barely a whisper. 

“really?? who is it?” chan asks all-too-eagerly, and you start to feel doubtful he likes you back.

“it’s no one.”

“awe y/n, don’t be like that! at least give me hints?” chan asks. 

“fine,” you sigh, knowing he won’t leave it alone. “first of all, he’s annoying and loud,”

“that doesn’t sound like a crus-”

“do you want me to give you hints or not?”

“...yes please,”

“ok then shh. he’s annoying and loud, but it’s perfect because i am too so we get along really well. he’s also the most caring person i’ve ever met; i know he’d do anything for me if i asked him,” you continue, not sure how much you want to give away.

“wow, he sounds really great!” chan comments. to any other person, he’d sound excited for you, but you know him well enough to pick up on the slight disappointment in his voice, and it’s just the boost you need to keep going.

“he is; he’d even go out in a thunderstorm for me just because i said i’m bored,” you say and you turn to look at chan now. it’s too dark to read his expression, but you can see how he leans ever so closer to you. 

“now that’s some dedication, i mean he sounds flawless,” chan teases. you can hear the smile in his voice, which makes the butterflies in your stomach go wild.

“the only problem is i’m not sure if he likes me back,” you whisper, your nose brushing the tip of chan’s, and before you know it his lips are on yours in a passionate yet gentle kiss. how you’ve gone so long without kissing chan you don’t know; the years of secret feelings all finally set free in this one kiss. 

you didn’t lie about liking mingyu--you had actually thought you might’ve finally gotten over your feelings for chan and found someone else. for a couple of months it worked, and you found yourself distracted with thoughts of the tall boy instead of your best friend. but it all came crashing down when you caught the common cold the other week, and chan looked after you while you were sick--he even skipped class one day to make sure you weren’t lonely. all of your true feelings came rushing back to you, and you knew there were no hopes of losing them.

“what about now?” chan asks as he pulls away just enough to talk.

“i’m still not sure, he might have to kiss me again to convince me,” you say, unable to contain your smile. chan kisses you again, and it’s just as magical as the first time. a loud crack of thunder startles you, and you gasp as you latch onto chan, burying your face in his shoulder.

“you’re such a scaredy-cat,” he says, bringing his arms up to pull you closer.

“shut up so are you, i can hear your heart racing,” your voice is muffled by his sweater.

“maybe that’s just because of you,” he comments, stroking your hair. 

“ew,” you reply, but your heart’s not in it; you can pretend to hate how cheesy chan is all you want, but internally you love it just as much as you love every other aspect of him.

[pinkmingi]

V.I.P // C. San ~ (m)

Description: A wealthy, rising young star stumbles into your camming liveshow one evening and immediately becomes your highest paying client. Needless to say- that role comes with certain added benefits, including private shows that San has every intention of using to his advantage.

word count: 5.3k

Features: San x Camgirl!Reader, mutual masturbation, cum play (light), edging, being paid for sexual services (i.e. camming) etc.

2:04am. You squinted against the harsh light of your phone screen as it vibrated in your hand.

New Message From:

Choi San- Tier 6

You hated the way your heart skipped a beat, even if just for a moment, when you saw his name flash across the screen. You weren’t exactly surprised, between his work schedule (from what little he’d told you about his work) and the time difference he tended to send his requests at all hours of the night, long after you’d finished your regular liveshow and gone to sleep—yet you always seemed to wake up when he messaged. If just 3 months ago you’d been told that you would be willfully getting out of bed to put on your prettiest set of pink lingerie and reapplying your livestream makeup for a single customer at 2 in the morning—you would’ve never believed them. Then again, 3 months ago there was no such thing as a Tier 6.

 *3 months earlier*

 “Thank you again to all my beautiful new viewers, I see some of you guys in the chat, don’t be shy say to say hello! I promise there’s no judgement here…” You smiled sweetly, flashing the camera your undeniably charming face that had so many clients coming back to your liveshows on a regular basis—you fulfilled their wildest fantasies and you did it with seemingly no effort.

“I’ve been feeling so restless lately, I don’t know what’s gotten into me—there must be something in the weather here…everything’s making me feel, hmm..needy I guess?” You laughed at the way you spoke so casually in front of an audience of strangers, though many of them were regulars and in that sense seemed less strange to you.

“How’s everyone been feeling lately? Don’t be afraid to open up, I really wanna know.” You smiled as you leaned towards the camera, casually showing off a bit more of your cleavage in the delicate and intricate lace bra that hugged you perfectly. 9.3k viewers, your streams really were growing fast.

 Kinkydaddyxx76 (Tier 2) has sent you a donation!

Erenda_903 (Tier 1) has sent you a donation!

Justcurious111 (Guest) has sent you a donation!

Lovemeharddom_ (Tier 4) has sent you a donation!

You smiled to yourself as you thanked the members by name for their donations, it was about the personal experience for many of them, and as regulars of your streams you’d always found it important that they be recognized and treated with special care—it was one of the reasons that your streams had become so popular so quickly, despite only camming for a little over a year you’d acquired a large and dedicated group of viewers who you always made sure to treat with great care and respect. That was just part of the job.

“I’m gonna be wrapping up the general admission stream soon you guys, but don’t forget if you want extra access to the after party live show you are always welcome—I have 5 tiers of access available for my very special VIP members, the descriptions of each are listed on my profile. I hope to see as many of you there as possible, my members know how much I love an audience.” You winked playfully, adjusting your seat on the perfectly made bed, giving the camera a killer view of your legs and booty shorts as you read through the chat one last time before getting ready to log off. Just as you were getting ready to wrap up, however, a series of notifications appeared in the chat.

ChoiSinForMe has entered your cam room!

ChoiSinForMe has subscribed!

ChoiSinForMe is now a Tier 5 member!

 You eyes widened as you read the last message again—Tier 5. You could probably count on 2 hands the number of Tier 5 subscribers that you had, it was a pretty expensive and elite level—and those who did purchase that level of subscription had been watching you since practically the beginning. You’d never seen this account on your streams before, he was completely new and already he’d become one of your highest paying clients. Taken aback, you nearly forgot to thank the new account for subscribing, your hands fidgeting slightly as you tucked a strand of hair nervously behind your ear. Who was this person?

“Uhmm, whoa…this is unexpected, thank you @ChoiSinForMe for becoming my newest member, welcome to the Princess Playroom, I hope you’ll enjoy your time here!” You smiled sweetly, still feeling a bit giddy and on edge at the prospect of the new member messaging you—that was a perk of Tier 5 members, they had the ability to private message you, as well as make special requests that lower tiers were not permitted to make.

You had just finished thanking everyone for coming, turning off the stream and sitting back against the headboard of your bed as you started at the computer monitor in front of you. You couldn’t get the strange new account out of your head…you couldn’t pinpoint why exactly, but there was something so sexy to you about the mystery. After what seemed like an eternity of staring at the private message tab of your account, a notification ding sounded through the otherwise quiet solitude of your apartment bedroom. Jumping slightly, you didn’t hesitate to scroll up, unable to contain the intrigued smile that played against your lips as you saw that, in fact, it was from your new subscriber.

New Chat!

ChoiSinForMe (Tier 5):

I’m sorry if I startled you in the live stream earlier

I’ll admit I liked the way your face froze tho

 You wouldn’t like to admit the amount of times you read that message over again, overwhelmed with the butterflies you felt in your stomach, and the way your cheeks flushed at the idea that you were getting so worked up over a client. Sure, you’d heard of people camming and getting turned on by the people watching them, but you’d honestly never really experienced that with any one subscriber in particular—they were mostly just nice, slightly older men with more money and time than they could handle. So why did this feel different?

 PrincessPlayroom (Host):

It’s nothing I can’t handle, welcome though ~ I’ve never had anyone become a member so quickly after entering my stream before J

 His reply was fast, and it sent you into a state of shock almost as quickly.

 ChoiSinForMe (Tier 5):

I know what I like. Figured this was the best way to get your attention

I have a proposal, actually—I don’t wanna waste your time, my tastes are specific and I don’t share.

I’m interested in private video calls, noticed that you don’t have that as a feature…but if you’re down to try something like that let me know. The price is…inconsequential.

My name is San, by the way.

 You weren’t exactly sure what to say. He was right, that wasn’t something you’d ever offered before. No one had ever requested it before—that wasn’t to say you didn’t receive strange requests because your chat room was filled with out of the ordinary things. But for such a high-paying client to make a request for an individual stream…you weren’t sure what to say. For some reason, you weren’t ready to immediately shut down the request—maybe it was the prospect that this guy, at least from his messages, sounded like he was genuinely ready to pay anything for what he wanted. Something about that confidence made you squirm.

 PrincessPlayroom (Host):

 That’s certainly a unique offer, you’re right though—that isn’t a Tier 5 perk.

I’m curious though, indulge me in these “specific tastes” of yours, San

 You couldn’t help but bite your lip at what he might say, subconsciously squeezing your legs together slightly as you waited for his reply. When your computer dinged again, the message was shorter than you’d anticipated, and very much left you wanting more.

 ChoiSinForMe (Tier 5):

 I’m not a big texter. Call me on Skype and we can talk.

(XXX) XXX-XXXX

And in case you thought I wasn’t serious—

Xoxo, San

 ChoiSinForMe has sent you $1000!

 Your heart was pounding in your chest and you could feel heat building in the pit of your stomach—should you call him? Who the hell was this guy, who sent you a grand just for entertaining the idea of calling him? Part of you wondered if something like this was really the smartest decision, but the other half of you couldn’t help but follow the intrigue of it all. This had never happened to you before, sure you had a few higher paying clients but none of them were like this. This man was something new. Without giving your mind time to cloud you with reasons why this probably wasn’t a good idea, you’d logged onto your skype account, connected your camera to the computer monitor and turned it on. Sitting upright on your bed, legs outstretched, you fixed your hair slightly before dialing his number. What the fuck were you doing…was this a mistake? Was he gonna end up being a creep or—the sound of the call being answered interrupted your thoughts.

“You look good like this, Princess.” His voice hit your speakers before his camera came into focus, but you swear if you’d been standing his voice alone would’ve been enough to make your knees a little weak. The instant his camera came into focus, your greatest worry came to life—he was ridiculously handsome. Maybe this was why you’d always preferred streaming to a faceless audience, it didn’t feel real. They were just names in the chat, but him? The man in the black t-shirt and grey sweatpants sitting on a king size bed with his head resting in the palm of his hand as he eyed you with a smirk on his lips…he was doing things to you. He was making you nervous, and you never got nervous over things like this. It’s just work, Y/N…it’s just work. He’s a client, that’s it.

“H-hi, I’m sorry, hah...this is all very new for me. I’ve never had a live conversation with a member before.” You blushed, running a hand through your hair as you watched San’s dark eyes, they never wavered from you as he clearly trailed the length of your body—taking his time as he took in the view.

“I guess I must be special then, hmm?” He smiled softly, leaning back on his hands and giving you an all-too perfect view of how tight his sweatpants already were. For some reason, this gave you a surge of confidence. Sure, he may be wealthy, and he may be getting special treatment, but this was your client. He was paying you, he wanted you—you were in charge. You smiled teasingly as you trailed your hand softly down the expanse of your body, stopping at the hem of your underwear as you casually played with the thin elastic band, biting your lip slightly.

“We’ll see…I’m charging you by the hour, by the way.” San laughed slightly at this, nodding in agreement.

“That’s fair…since you’re on the clock, why don’t you tell me your name?” He wasn’t jumping into any far out requests, even though a twisted little part of you wished he would. If he’d asked to see you undone for him right that instant, however, you might be embarrassed by how wet you’d already become.

“You can call me Princ-“

“Your real name, baby.” He interjected, his face unwavering. You never shared your real name with your clients, even your highest tier members.

“You sure do ask for a lot for a Tier 5, don’t you?” You teased, sliding closer to the camera as you watched his face give way to a sinful smile.

“Maybe I shouldn’t be a Tier 5 then…tell me.” He was breaking down your walls quickly, but the thrill of it all outweighed the reservations and rules you’d made for yourself when you first entered the world of camming—things like not letting a client in too close to your personal life, never blurring the line between customer and relationship, never—

“Y/n.” You blurted out suddenly, trying your best not to get flustered at the way San’s eyes twinkled and his pants grew tighter as he repeated your name aloud, humming in approval at the way it fell from his lips.

“Pretty…” He muttered softly, shifting in his seat on the edge of the bed as he watched your gorgeous frame, how your lace lingerie clung to your body just right and the way your hair framed that perfect face of yours—he was especially entranced by your thighs and the way they spread out perfectly against your plush mattress. God he wanted to watch you in every position imaginable.

“I know this must be a bit strange for you…why don’t you ask me a few questions, it might make you feel more comfortable. I’ll do the same, hmm? Let’s say, 3.” San suggested casually, rubbing his finger thoughtfully against his bottom lip as you blushed at the fact that you were supposed to be the professional, yet he was guiding the conversation. Laughing softly, you nodded.

“Hmm, someone seems to know what they’re doing, do you do this with other content creators here?” You were laughing, but a small part of you hoped he’d say no. San smirked, running a hand through his dark black hair as he shook his head.

“Is that your first question?” You blushed slightly, rolling your eyes as you nodded.

“Yes.” He smiled.

“No. I’ve actually never done this before either, I’ve always wanted to…but I never really found a person I was…interested in like this before.” He paused as you tried to hold some semblance of professionalism together, nodding thoughtfully as you felt your stomach knot.

“My turn…why’d you agree to try this?” You didn’t have to think long on your answer before you replied.

“You intrigued me, I think something about you was just…sexy.” You loved the visibly turned on reaction that San tried to suppress as the last word left your lips, his hand coming to lay across the inseam of his sweatpants in a half-hearted attempt to disguise what was becoming an increasingly noticeable erection. Clearing his throat, he chuckled softly. You knew what you were doing to him and it was driving him wild far more easily than he’d anticipated.

“How old are you?” You asked back, playing absentmindedly with a fluffy throw pillow on your bed, laying down in a more comfortable and relaxed position now as you felt the chemistry begin to unfold between the two of you.

“I’m 21. Younger than you’re used to?” You laughed softly, nodding. How was he so wealthy and still so young?

“So are you a self-made kinda rich boy, or the old family money kind?” A cheeky grin spread across San’s face as you asked your final question.

“I’m fortunate to have a good job, the details aren’t important but…it’s given me a comfortable life. I try to keep my work and private life separate, I’m sure you’re plenty familiar with confidentiality though…” You nodded thoughtfully as you eyed his broad shoulders and veiny arms, even through a computer screen his incredible shape was apparent.

“Last question, y/n…” He murmured softly, causing shivers to run down your spine at cadence of his honey voice.

“Mmm…” You replied, squeezing your thighs tightly together in a feeble attempt to relieve some of the built up tension this almost stranger was causing you feel. What he said next, however, would send you completely over the edge.

“Are you wet for me right now?” Your body froze as you attempted to collect your flustered self, hating the way he was clearly eating it up as his hand slowly palmed at his fully hard cock through the fabric of his pants, not even trying to hide the large bulge that was begging to be released.

“Y-yes.” You muttered softly, entranced by the way he took control of the situation. He hummed lowly in approval, sliding his hand underneath the waistband of his sweatpants as you watched the outline of his fingers stroke himself. He was ridiculously hot, but you figured he already knew that. You blushed, doing your best to bite back the sinful smile that threatened to flicker across your face as you felt your aching needs growing stronger by the minute. This man was really something if his presence alone was enough to make you falter—but you couldn’t forget, this was your show. Pulling your hair back away from your face and sliding yourself closer to the camera, you flashed him a knowing look as you tilted your head slightly. Your confidence was back.

“Did I say you could stroke yourself already?” Your soft voice echoed out against the speakers of his laptop like honey, and there wasn’t a shadow of a doubt in his mind that if you’d been in the room with him this would’ve been the moment where he’d pin you against the wall and dare you to disobey him. Instead, he let out a low chuckle, his gaze low and his hair hanging over his eyes as he slowed the pace of his hand.

“Mmm, it’s cute you think you’re in charge, (Y/N)…Truly.” He wasn’t going to cave easily, you didn’t expect him to. Truthfully, you didn’t want him to. Something about the chase, the push and pull—the rising tensions of the seemingly endless back and forth, it fueled you.

Not backing down so easily, you retorted,

“You can’t even help yourself around me for five minutes—I think that’s proof enough.” San smirked, biting his lip shamelessly as he pushed his hair away from his face. Making eye contact with you through the screen, he watched in enjoyment as your cheeks flushed slightly while his hand tightened around the sizeable bulge in his pants, quickening his movements slightly and raising an eyebrow as though challenging your previous statement.

“I’m paying you to say pretty things and watch me jack off, princess—that doesn’t mean I’m gonna let you have your way with everything…” You could feel your core heating up when he called you princess, it’d always been a favorite pet name of yours. Fiddling with the hem of your panties, you slid a finger just below the waistband as you teased him with the image of what you’ll look like without them. It wasn’t hard to tell his eyes were glued to your body, his eyes dark and filled with lust as you continued to tease him with your words.

“Mmm…my show, my rules. I’m not just gonna sit here and obey your every order, yknow. I’m not that kind of girl, Mr. Choi.” His jaw went slack when you addressed him that way, his mouth hanging just slightly agape as he threw his head back, the prominent veins in his arms showing as he balanced his weight on his free arm that propped him up—his right hand pre-occupied as he continued to quicken the pace of his strokes. You could see the swelling in his sweatpants and you could feel your panties becoming soaked at the mere idea of him finally releasing the beast he was fighting to hold back. When he finally spoke, his voice was lower and more gravelly than it had been before, he was becoming more and more depraved the longer you teased him without touching yourself—without showing him everything he was hungering to see.

“A good girl?” You smirked, you had him exactly where you wanted him. You had to admit though, he may have had you right where he wanted you as well.

“I’m nothing of the sort.” His long strokes slowed slightly as he began to pace himself, not ready to tip himself over the edge without watching you cum all over your fingers. He could tell you were wet for him and, though he couldn’t be sure, he had confidence that that alone made him stand out amidst your other clients. He’d only just met you, but it only took one look in those sinfully pure eyes to know that he desperately wanted—no, needed—to make you cum.

“And what kind of girl are you then, hmm?” The heat and pressure rising in your core was too much to bare at this point, and you’d decided that the poor man had earned what he was so obviously craving—you. Without another thought, you unclasped the back of your bra, letting it fall to the side as your breasts were now fully exposed for him. A low groan sounded from your speakers and you could tell he was more than enjoying the view. Not finished with him just yet, you slipped your fingers under the hemline of your panties, sliding them down until the lace crumpled around your ankles and you were left completely bare on your bedspread. Spreading yourself out for him to see, you leaned back and slowly slid your hand down to relieve the pressure building up inside you. A low “fuck” hissed out between San’s gritted teeth as he edged his stroking along, the slow pace becoming almost excruciating.

“What kind of girl do you want me to be?” You teased, nearly breathless already as a single finger slid between your soaked folds, easing its way inside you with a few pumps as a small moan escaped your lips. San groaned as his grip tightened around his length at the sound of your pretty moans ringing in his ear, licking his lips as he finally couldn’t take the restrictive fabric any longer. Without hesitation, San yanked his sweatpants down until they were around his ankles where he effortlessly discarded them, his throbbing length proudly on display as a small gasp left your mouth. It wasn’t that you weren’t used to men jacking off to you—but you’d never seen it live like this, and something about it was ridiculously sexy. The fact that this particular client was Choi San didn’t hurt, though.

“I want you to be the kind of girl who rides her own pretty, little fingers until she cums to the sound of my voice. I want you to moan my name…my first name, like you’d give anything to be here riding my dick right now. Because I know you would.” This time it was you who was slightly at a loss for words, biting down hard against the insides of your cheeks as you sucked in a deep breath, nodding as you opened your legs to give him an even better view of your sinful touches. He was right, eyeing the long and girthy member pulsating in his hand you couldn’t help but wish that you had something more to get off to instead of just your fingers.

“Can you do that for me, baby…hmm?” He re-focused his strokes to just the tip of his cock, massaging the head with an unrelenting pace as he dragged the pad of his thumb over the tip, swiveling his wrist ever so slightly as he continued the shallowed pumps. You nodded.

“Mmmm, yes, San. Only if you cum for me just as hard…” His eyelids lowered slightly as his gaze became lazy, a small smile playing on his lips as he nodded, speeding up his strokes as he watched you slide another finger inside of your glistening hole, moaning at the added pressure as your thumb drew circles against your clit, pressing down with gradually increasing pressure to help you relieve the pressure you’d lost from opening your legs.

“Oh I plan on it, princess—now turn around for me. I wanna see that ass nice n’ high while you touch yourself.” You turned around easily, pressing your chest against the mattress and arching your back as your ass perked up, sliding your hand up between your thighs and griding your clit down against the palm of your hand as a couple fingers slid back inside your heat. San’s low groans grew louder and more breathless as his strokes became longer and more staggered, enjoying the view of you bent over for him and fantasizing about the way you’d feel if he ever had the opportunity to bend you over and rail you himself.

“Fuuck, just like that—mmmm, you are a good girl for me, aren’t you?” You moaned at the way his once soft, now raspy voice teased you. Propping yourself up with your free arm you turned your head to look at him over your shoulder, smirking.

“A good girl would beg you to stroke yourself slowly…so slow that you’re almost in pain, begging me to let you go faster and finish yourself off.” San smirked, not always liking the idea of submitting in the bedroom but willing to entertain this small idea for you.

“Does that mean you’re a good girl then? I mean, you are begging me…” You turned yourself back around, sitting in your knees with your legs spread as you leaned forward onto your hands as he watched the rise and fall of your breasts keep pace with your heavy breaths.

“I’m not begging you, I’m telling you.” This time, San listened, allowing you to have your way this once as he slowed his long pumps to a painfully slow pace, already feeling his load building and swelling in his balls as he adjusted himself on the bed, his breathing becoming even more ragged than before. You smirked, biting down on your lip as you took in the sight of his slightly sweaty body and the way his hair clung to the sides of his face from the building beads of sweat. He was completely strung out at this point, his gaze filled with pure lust and his lips barely capable of forming sentences as he threw his head back once again, echoing incoherent slurs of curse words and moans. The action alone was enough to send you over the edge, but you held yourself together as you pumped your fingers even faster inside yourself, your needy moans growing in volume.

“Fuck you look so pretty like that, Y/N….tell me how good it feels…” Screwing your eyes shut as you hit that perfect sensitive spot, a breathless moan escaped your lips as you nodded.

“S-so good…Aahhh, fuck you’d feel so much better, though…” A wide smile spread across San’s face as his eyes remained closed, nodding as he hummed in approval. His cock was throbbing even harder than before, hungry for release as he continued to obey you.

“Mmmm, I must be something special if you’re considering riding the dick of a stranger you just met…” His voice vibrating through the speakers made you wish his mouth was around your clit, sucking down hard as he groaned into your tight and aching pussy. You knew it was wrong, and that this kind of attraction to a client was completely foreign to you—but you couldn’t help yourself.

“Mmmff fuck, shut up and cum already.” You breathed out, whining against the sensations of your fingers as San chuckled lowly, breathing a sigh of relief as he finally began to quicken his strokes, feeling the pressures build as he neared his release. You were riding your fingers at this point, your breasts bouncing up and down as you picked up the pace, needy for your own climax as you watched the man you knew hardly anything about turn you on more than anything real you’d encountered in a very long time.

“Shit, Y/N…your body is fucking insane…” San breathed out, his strokes ruthless and sloppy as his hips bucked up to meet his hand, unable to express in words how badly he wished it was you on top of him instead. You moaned, feeling yourself teetering on the edge.

“Aahhh god I’m close.” You whined, curling your fingers up to stroke your pressure points as you arched your back and threw your head back from pleasure. This was all it would take for San to be tipped over the edge, his breathing hitched in his throat as he continued to speed up his needy strokes.

“Cum for me, princess—all over those pretty little fingers. I wanna watch you lick them clean…” With that, you managed a dazed nod before grinding your hips down against your hand one last time, the pressure becoming too much as you finally tipped over the edge and your orgasm ran through your entire body. Your pretty moans were enough to send him hurdling towards his own orgasm as you rode out your high. Breathing slow, you eased your fingers out and made eye contact with the man who’d made you cum with nothing but his voice as he groaned, stroking himself hard. He was ridiculously close, but the moment you bit your lip and slid your soaking wet fingers inside your lips, swirling your tongue around them and licking them clean just as he’d told you to—he couldn’t take it anymore. Thick, creamy white ropes erupted from his cock, covering his thighs and the bedsheet beneath him as he groaned, inhaling sharply and tilting his head back in ecstasy as you moaned yourself at the ridiculously sexy view. Several spurts dripped down his hand as he slowed his strokes, massaging the glistening head of his cock slowly as his eyes shut and he rode out one of the most intense orgasm’s he’d ever felt. Breathing heavily, the two of you were sat in euphoric silence for a moment as you took in the pleasure that was still coursing through your bodies.

‘Fuck…”He muttered out after a moment. You blushed slightly, smiling at the reassurance that he’d enjoyed himself.

“For someone who’s never done that before…you sure knew what you were doing.” He laughed breathlessly, running a hand through his hair as he grabbed a towel from nearby, cleaning himself off lazily as you did the same, smiling.

“Well it is my job…it was definitely something new though.” You teased, winking playfully as San smiled in return.

“So let’s make it a regular thing then.” He blurted decidedly. You gave him a questioning look. Sure a small part of you hoped that you’d get the opportunity to do something like this or more again, but you hadn’t held out hope. You’d assumed he was more of a “one time” client.

“For real?” He smiled, nodding as he slid his sweatpants back on, watching as you sat comfortably bare in front of him, adoring the way you allowed him to watch you.

“Yeah, of course. You had fun, I had fun—well, I had a lot of fun…no one’s made me cum like that in a while.” A small blush threatened to tinge your cheeks, though you crossed your fingers it wasn’t noticeable through the screen as he marveled in the idea that someone as sexy as him was turned on by you. Not sexy enough to get it for free though (at least not yet).

“And the price is…” You teased, taunting him. He smirked, shaking his head as he sat upright, his elbows on his knees.

“Like I said, baby—inconsequential. Get some rest, think it over, ok? Message me when you’re ready to say yes.” His confidence was insatiable, and you’d grown a taste for it. Biting your lip, you nodded slowly.

“And what if I decide a Tier 5 member doesn’t deserve all this special treatment, hmm?” He scoffed lowly as he ran a hand through his hair, leaning closer to the camera despite his voice being barely above a whisper.

“Then make a higher tier. Get some sleep now, ok princess?”

~admin liese

☆Requests Open!☆

[3d-wifey]

The Academy ❧ Part 1

Pairing: Reader x Multiple

Synopsis: Given the chance to rewrite your life for the better, how could you say no? Of course, it helps that the ones presenting this gift are crazy hot.

Word Count: 7.6k

Warnings: Nothing yet.

A/N: If this feels hastily thrown together, that's because it is. It does help that Reader's relationship with the boys is meant to feel rushed tho. So, the lack of relationship building between the three seems intentional 😋. Reader's personality switch-up is also intentional. I promise the quality will get better after this. Happy reading!

You liked coffee shops. One would argue a little too much. You were like an addict and you typically got your fix at Komori's Delights.

You liked coffee shops, solely, because of the people. You would sit at the same corner booth you've been sitting at for the past five years and listen in on their conversations like a creep.

You led a pretty basic life. Once you turned sixteen, the adoption agency helped you get an apartment. And then, when you turned eighteen, a job in customer service. Yet, since it mainly involved doing online chat services from home, you rarely interacted with anyone. With no family that you knew of, you were pretty socially isolated. And you weren't doing too well on the friends front either.

People didn't exactly line up to hang out with quirkless orphans. Loneliness stuck to you like a shadow.

The only thing you honestly looked forward to when you opened your eyes was hearing about other people's lives. You could admit to yourself that it was pathetic.

It was just something about watching "normal" people interacting with each other. Their stories, their conversations, how they responded to and handled everyday situations. All of it, all of them, thrumming with life. A simple passion you dreamed of having, but sadly, didn't possess.

You were able to quench a burning thirst within yourself just by watching them. Living through them. At first, you wondered what that thirst was. What did you gain from being around other people that you couldn't achieve in solitude?

It took you a few years to figure it out. You spent many restless nights in your cold twin bed at the group homes, then in the equally cold queen bed at your apartment, trying to understand what you were missing.

You were around seventeen at the time and a fresh-faced graduate. Instead of going to any of the graduation parties that many of your former classmates were throwing, you were sitting at your booth. The same one that protected you from the cold fall winds and overlooked the entire shop.

Two women were arguing in the corner about something or other. The conversation didn't seem interesting enough to listen in on until the shorter of the two shouted something.

"Nobody had seen you in over ten hours. We were all scared something had happened. I was scared something had happened."

You vaguely remember them hugging and making up after that. It seemed strange to you at the time that someone could be so worried about another person. You never really found yourself worrying about anyone. Especially not to the extent of being scared for their well-being.

It occurred to you later that night. With just three sentences, you had your answer. You wanted some type of connection. To be seen. You wanted to be somewhere where people would know your name, know your face, notice if you weren't there. You wanted to be wanted. Something to tie you to humanity.

Now, here you were three years later. In the same weathered leather booth, working the same reclusive job, still hungering for that connection. Nothing had changed in your life.

You wrapped your hands around the mug and brought it closer to your chest, sighing at the heat it provided. The smell of cocoa and cinnamon wafted under your nose, making you relax further into the booth. You had mainly ordered the hot chocolate to warm your cold fingers, but it did pair well with the sugar cookies that came with it.

The temperature had dropped faster this year with the coming of winter and you were oftentimes reminded of how lucky you were to even have a home to escape the cold in.

With the winter winds, came the mass of people who sought out the café to hide from the chilliness outside. Now, Komori's wasn't what you would call exceedingly popular, so it rarely saw the same person more than once.

But, over the past five days, two people came to the shop roughly around the same time every day. They usually came with four or five others, but it was never the same people. The only constants with the groups were the two men.

And what men they were.

They carried themselves completely differently; the only thing they had in common was being absurdly attractive. The first one was tall and built like a football player, with big blue eyes, bright hair, and an even brighter smile.

It was obvious he had many admirers if the way his friends hung onto his every word was anything to go by. Based on how often he steered the conversation, you could tell he was a natural-born leader with charisma to match. His allure was sunny and encompassing, but carefree.

The shorter male was just as handsome, but his appeal was subtle compared to the blond one. You wouldn't notice if you just glanced at him, but you got the feeling that that was a conscious decision on his part. He didn't seem the type to like attention, going through great efforts not to be seen.

He typically didn't add much to their conversations unless he was reining his partner in. Messy, indigo bangs casted a shadow over his nervous eyes and long, pointed ears twitched whenever his group got too loud. He had a swimmer's body, but, again, you wouldn't notice unless you stared at him long enough. And you've done a lot of staring.

You sighed again, taking a sip from your mug. It was completely on-brand for you to over-analyze some random men. You looked over to one of the circle booths across the room. They were here again. The two men and five more strangers. Well, they were all strangers to you, but for some reason, you felt like you knew them, at least a little.

Maybe because you had been listening in on their conversations for practically a week, but, that was neither here nor there.

You had lost all interest in anybody else that came in; all of your attention was focused on them and them alone. You would wait hours at a time for them to come in with new people and watch as they talked. Their conversations always pulled you in. Especially when they talked about a place called Yuuei.

The blond one would talk animatedly about the place to the others to the point where they got excited too. It happened every time with every group.

You had gone home with your curiosity peeked the first time you heard them mention it. You spent the entire night hunched over your laptop, scrounging the internet—again, like a creep—for anything relating to Yuuei.

You looked everywhere, but it couldn't be found. It wasn't on any maps. There were no Google links about it. As far as you could tell, it wasn't some kind of slang or anything. The only mention of it was on a Reddit conspiracy theory thread about a cult that shared the same name. You tallied your loses and suspected that it was just some type of club and the two of them were probably recruiting new members. And, technically, you were right.

You were brought back to the present when the hairs on your arms and neck stood up. But the shop door hadn't been opened and there was no breeze inside the café. You weren't cold.

Your gaze swept over the expanse of the shop; eyes, not so subtly, hopping from table to table. Finding nothing but people locked in conversation, until you glanced at the circle booth. Narrowed (E/C) eyes met bright blue. Instead of becoming embarrassed at getting caught and looking away, like most people did, the blond held your gaze and grinned.

He smiled at you.

Not a condescending smile; not an angry borderline-sneer; not even a half awkward half fearful kind of smile that you often got from strangers after you stared at them a little too long. Just a warm upturn of lips that felt like open arms welcoming you back home.

You looked away in hopes that it would be the end of the interaction, but not before seeing the blond elbow his friend and gesture over to you. All while still wearing the same smile on his face.

You stared down at the light brown liquid in your mug, telling yourself the steam wafting up from the hot chocolate was the reason your face was so warm. Yeah, that's why. That's the only thing that made sense.

Every other sound blurred in the background until the only thing you could hear were twin footfalls. Confident footsteps leading the way with reluctant ones following close behind. Getting steadily closer and closer. Each step a metronome to your ears. Were they coming towards you?

The muscles in your arms flinched with every sound of shoes hitting the linoleum floor.

Step, step, step, until—

"Hi! I'm Mirio. And this here is my buddy, Tamaki." He introduced, reaching a scarred hand out towards you, probably expecting you to shake it. You stared up at them with wide eyes, dumbfounded at the turn of events. No one in this café had ever approached you before, not even the staff. His voice was accented, which was surprising considering you never heard it when he was talking before. Maybe it was just hard to pick up on from across the room.

You weren't sure what prompted them to come up to you and if you took a glance over their shoulder, you could see that the people they were with seemed just as confused as you. Not wanting to appear rude, you paused before reaching out and shaking his hand. His palm was rough from the buildup of calluses, and It dwarfed your own. It was warm.

"I'm...Y/n." You introduced yourself cautiously, watching them as they moved to sit down in front of you. Tamaki on the inside, Mirio on the outside. You wondered if it was normal for him to just walk up to a person he didn't know and strike up a conversation like an old friend.

"We saw you sitting by yourself—"

Jesus, how sad of a picture did you make that they felt the need to come over just to end your suffering?

"—and came over to see if you wanted to join us." You? Join them? Honestly, you would love to sit with them and finally be included in the conversation instead of just listening to it from the outside. But, something told you that the feeling wasn't mutual.

You glanced back to their booth to find their friends staring at you. Or, at least they were before they noticed you looking at them. Diverting their gaze before you could meet any of their eyes head-on.

You knew if you sat with them, all you would end up with were judgmental glares and badly concealed whispers about you. How fun.

"No pressure, of course!" Mirio was quick to assure, taking your silence as unwillingness. And his assumption would be right.

"I, uh, don't think I'd fit in with your friends." He looked at you with a confused tilt of his head, resembling a puppy who didn't know what you were saying to it.

"Oh, I mean them," You gestured to the group of five people talking amongst themselves and sneaking occasional glances your way, "plus the other people you guys usually come in with."

Although the statement sounded innocent to you, you couldn't help but feel like you fucked up somehow. Their faces didn't change, but there was something about the way Mirio's hands twitched and Tamaki's shoulders tensed that made you feel...uneasy. Paranoia creeping up on you like phantom hands.

"Other people, huh," Mirio paused before giving you a boyish grin, "So, you were watching us." He said not unlike a lawyer who just caught the defendant red-handed. You could feel your heartbeat pick up as he leaned over the table towards you, hands laced together, but your face remained blank. Despite his playful tone, the glint in his eyes made you feel like you were being trialed for murder.

It struck you then just how creepy that might sound to them. You probably seemed like some kind of stalker. A weirdo that's been watching their every move for the past five days, which, of course, you were. He had every right to be suspicious of you.

"Mirio, ease off of her." Tamaki interrupted, face practically buried in the wall. That was the first time you heard him speak, and, God, were you thankful for his timing. It sounded like he had the same accent as Mirio, but, for the life of you, you still couldn't place it.

"Heh, I'm just goofing." He laughed, big blue eyes colored with mirth as he leaned back from you in favor of picking up one of your cookies. But his relaxed posture felt too tense for that to truly be how he felt. It seemed forced.

"Anyway, I wouldn't really call them friends. Just people we've met in passing while we visited. Do you...know any of them?"

You leaned back, unconsciously mirroring him. Your nails tapped against the table to the beat of the music playing softly over the speakers as you took your time quietly examining the two men before you. Your brain ran over the people they brought into the shop. Dozens upon dozens of faces and none of them were familiar.

"No, I can't say I do."

There was a moment of silence before any of you talked.

"Um, I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but you're a pretty intimidating girl." He chuckled, scratching the back of his head. Blond strands falling out of his ponytail to frame his face. You held in a sigh. He wasn't the first person to tell you that and he probably wouldn't be the last.

You weren't sure what it was about your appearance that everyone found so daunting; it could be how hard you stared at people. Or how silent you were. Maybe you had a resting bitch face, but you couldn't be sure, since nobody was ever brave enough to tell you. Whatever it was, it definitely wasn't doing you any favors.

"Is that why he's so quiet?" You joked humorlessly, peeking at the man to your right—Tamaki, you reminded yourself—to find him already looking at you. Piercing purple-blue eyes made the hairs on your neck stand straight as he stared at you without turning away from the white walls. It threw you off to see he was staring at you so intently, considering you didn't think he was even paying attention to the conversation.

"Oh, you mean Tamaki? He's just a little shy around new people. Ain't that right, bud?" He elbowed his friend a little sharply.

"Uh, y-yeah."

"So, where are you guys from?" Your gaze shifted between them, yet again changing the conversation.

You focused on the twinge of pain coming from your finger as you picked at the skin around your nail, a nervous habit you took up when you were a child. It was how you developed such a good poker face. Keeping your emotions off your face and instead directing them to the poor skin of your nail beds.

"Is it that obvious we aren't from around here?" The blond—Mirio—joked, putting his on the back of the booth behind Tamaki's head.

"Your accents kind of gave you away." You joked back. It felt nice to do that. To have someone to joke with.

"Okay, well...It's a little...town called Yuuei," when you perked up, they shared a quick glance before Mirio continued, "It's really small, so you've probably never heard of it. We're actually heading back pretty soon."

"What's it like there? It's still in Japan, right? I assume it is, considering you both speak Japanese like it's your native language," you tried to reign in your excitement, but the prospect of getting some kind of information on this place was too much to pass up, "Do you have any pictures I could se—"

"She's really pretty. Don't you think, Tamaki?" he cut you off, asking the other boy like you weren't just talking, "Sorry if that was random." He laughed. You weren't an expert on social cues, but something about his smile made you think he wasn't really sorry.

You froze and you glanced over at Tamaki with wide eyes, finding he looked more embarrassed than you felt. You kept your face perfectly blank, hopefully not giving away how off-guard that caught you.

"Yeah," he agreed sheepishly, slouching in on himself, "She is." He sounded certain in his answer, which struck you as curious considering how unsure he seemed about literally everything. Almost like it wasn't his first time saying it. For some reason, you couldn't see Tamaki going around complimenting random people like a playboy.

Mirio? Sure.

But, Tamaki? Not so much.

"Oh...thank you." You mumbled, rubbing the tip of your nose and picking at the faded blue fabric of your scarf. You prayed the booth would open up like a Venus flytrap and swallow you whole. You were just rambling a mile a minute to two guys you just met. Was that his way of polity telling you to shut up?

Not only that, but you were at your wits' end here. The conversation kept changing so quickly, touching on topics you had no idea how to navigate. You felt way out of your element.

How sad was it that getting complimented was where your mind drew the line?

"You're welcome, Sunshine." He pointed down to your scarf, cookie still in hand, answering the unasked question in your furrowed brows, "Your scarf. Really cute, by the way." You looked down at the offending cloth wrapped around your neck.

A baby blue woolen scarf with little patterned suns grinning and wearing big green sunglasses. You hadn't really thought much of it when you grabbed it on your way out of the apartment this morning, but here you were wearing a children's scarf in front of two of the hottest guys you've ever seen in your life. They say hindsight was 20/20, but you'd say it was just a bitch.

The fact that they didn't answer your questions didn't go unnoticed, but maybe it was deemed inappropriate in their culture to ask someone about that kind of stuff if you weren't close. You decided to drop it, not wanting to give the impression that you were disrespectful, but kept it at the back of your mind.

___

You still had no clue why it happened, but this...arrangement continued longer than you thought it would. You didn't really know what to call it, but, whatever it was went on every day for the next couple of months. You would wait at your booth, they would come in with new people, talk with them for a little, and then split off to come talk to you.

You know you shouldn't have, but you felt kind of special knowing that they wanted to come spend time with you. You didn't comment on how fast you guys were moving. Choosing to, instead, push the uncertain feeling to the back of your mind.

It was becoming an unwelcome habit.

You didn't bring up the subject of their home again, weary of another awkward conversational lapse on your part. You often felt that creeping uneasiness come up whenever you turned the spotlight on them. You were just trying to make the small talk that you often saw in other people's conversations, but Mirio's eyes would always develop a certain...look and even poor Tamaki would tense up with every question. You decided it was better not to push for information about them at all.

That was your second mistake.

While you didn't ask them much, they seemed to want to know everything about you. They—mainly Mirio—asked you probing question after probing question about your life. About your job, where you lived, who you lived with, if you had any family, etc. The constant stream of questioning seemed odd to you, but you were more than happy to bask in the attention like a lovestruck teenager talking to her crushes.

That's how they made you feel.

Maybe you were just excited to finally partake in those conversations you watched everyone else have. To finally have people want to listen to what you had to say. Frantic to form a connection, no matter how weak the foundation was. The red flags were obvious, but desperation tended to make you colorblind.

You were very hesitant to inform them about your complete lack of quirk at first. You've seen how people react to that and you weren't too eager to lose the only people that could be considered your friends. However, it couldn't be hidden from them forever. Especially, since both of them were so quirk oriented.

They, surprisingly, reacted better than you expected when you told them. In fact, they almost seemed happy.

After you told them that, they wouldn't stop talking about Yuuei. Even Tamaki would jump in on the conversation to tell you things about their home. Alternating between demonstrating their quirks and explaining the wonder that was Yuuei.

It made you apprehensive to be around people with such powerful quirks. It always had, especially in high school. You hadn't known them for long, but you were sure they wouldn't hurt you.

They strived to be pretty accommodating to your anxiousness, which no one had ever done before. And, like a stupid puppy, you were getting attached to their kindness. They and their compassion were like a balm to that scorching thirst that you endured for the past twenty years.

In the short two months you knew them, they had somehow become a solid fixture. They had dug out a divot in your life and laid in it like they've always belonged there. It got to the point where you would call in sick to work just to stay with them a little longer.

Your fall from grace wasn't instantaneous. It happened gradually; inch by beautiful inch. You started falling the moment they came to sit with you. No, the moment they walked into the café was your first step towards oblivion. You were plunging to your demise and you only had yourself to blame. You allowed them a permanent room in your life, despite knowing their stay was temporary.

You're confident they had no idea how important they were to you. Nevertheless, no matter how sorry it sounded, you grew dependent on them. They plagued your thoughts like a disease: that brief period you experience between sleep and consciousness filled with thoughts of them, the moments of long silence at home were spent thinking about your boys, and even when you were with them, ironically, you couldn't stop thinking about them.

How did Mirio get all those scars? I wonder if Tamaki is eating enough? Where were they staying in the city?

You actively worried about them for some reason that was completely lost on you. You were so used to them being there, you weren't even sure how you used to live without them.

"We leave this Sunday."

Turns out you were gonna find out sooner than expected.

"S-so soon?" You choked out, setting your mug down. He had caught you so off guard that you started choking on your hot chocolate. After calming down and assuring them that you weren't dying, you were able to think.

You knew they were just visiting and they'd have to leave eventually. But, for some inane reason, you thought you'd have more time. More time to prepare. More time to...more time with them.

They had walked into the shop by themselves and headed straight for your booth like they had just been drafted for war, which set off emergency lights in your brain. You should have known they were delivering bad news.

"We've actually been here way longer than we were supposed to." Mirio laughed, scratching the back of his head.

"They had to call us back this time," Tamaki's soft-spoken voice imputed, but it seemed like he was talking to himself, "They've never had to call us back before."

"Called back? By who?" You looked between them expectantly.

"Uh, by our leaders. It's a small place, you know? So everyone is basically family. It only makes sense that they'd be worried about us taking too long." The blond explained, rubbing his hands together to get rid of the cold.

So, they were leaving because they were told to? Their leaders had that much sway over their lives?

"Couldn't you guys just...stay a little longer?" Now you were begging them to stay. But what else could you do? By the way they were talking, you could safely assume that they wouldn't be visiting you any time soon.

Mirio frowned, placing his big hand on top of yours. Big blue eyes a lot duller than usual. No matter how hard you looked you couldn't find that spark they typically had.

"I-Sunshine," he sighed, like a man passive to his fate, "it doesn't work like that. We have to go home."

You looked over at Tamaki who was already facing you, a huge improvement from when you first met. His head was down and if his pointed ears could droop like a sad puppy, you're sure they would. They didn't want to leave you just as much as you wanted them to stay.

There was no music playing in the shop to fill the silence between the three of you and the shop lacked the usual chatter. Seems like your earlier comparison had some truth to it. They may not be heading off to war, but they were still saying goodbye like they were. Like you'd never see them again. You felt lucky you even had the luxury of saying goodbye.

The sound of your heart beating against your ribs flooded your ears. Realistically, you knew they couldn't have drastically changed your life in a little over two months.

You could feel saliva collect in your mouth as your stomach gurgled ominously. Before them, every day you would wake up, work, go to the coffee shop, and go home without truly being awake. It felt like you were sleepwalking through your entire life. Living, but never alive. Never really there.

No one to see you. No one to hear you. You were nothing more than a ghost.

Your chest burned and your throat tightened. You couldn't go back to that. You'd be alone again. You couldn't be alone again.

You took a deep breath and schooled your expression, but you were sure that Mirio felt you shaking under his hand.

"What am I—" you swallowed the lump in your throat, "—What am I supposed to do now?" You whispered. But, who were you even asking: them or yourself? They were leaving your life just as fast as they came into it.

Mirio was quick to stand up and the leather booth squeaked under him as he slid into the seat beside you. The weight of his arm was comforting and heavy on your shoulders. His pointer finger and thumb closed in around your chin, turning you to face him.

"I don't..." His voice drifted off when he met your eyes, his lips twitching downwards into a frown. You could see the gears turning in his head before he nodded to himself. An internal conflict coming to an end. Something filled his eyes as he searched your face. It wasn't the spark that you were used to seeing, but a fire.

"Come with us."

Tamaki's head shot up, anxious indigo eyes looking between you before saying, "M-Mirio, are you sure she should come? She, um," his right hand moved to grip his left arm, "our culture is pretty different. S-she might not be able to...adjust."

"That won't be a problem. I'll look after her."

"That's what I'm worried about." He whispered loud enough for you to still hear, but the blond didn't seem deterred. He never looked away from you.

Mirio called you, pulling your attention back to him. You were pretty sure this was the first time you've heard him say your name.

"Look, Yuuie is...it's filled with people like you—like us," he gestured between the three of you, "A lot of people were looking for the same things you are and they found them in Yuuie." Every thing he said was filled with unwavering certainty, an unavoidable conviction that seeped into your bones. It was clear he honestly believed every word.

The conversation was moving too fast for you to fully understand what he was saying. One second, you're on the verge of a panic attack, and the next, you're being persuaded to run away with them? Crazy enough, you were actually considering it. It seemed like such a simple solution.

"You wanna be seen, right? Admired? Understood?—"

Were you that obvious?

"—Well, there's no better place to be seen than at Yuuie! Our leaders strive to provide a place where every single person is appreciated for their contributions. There's always new people coming along. People who desperately needed a home—a guiding hand. Right, Tamaki?"

"Yeah, I guess." Tamaki agreed with a resigned shrug of his shoulders, eyes downcast.

"See? I'm sure everyone there will love you! What do you have to lose?"

What did you have to lose? Your minimum wage job? Your one-room apartment? Your complete and utter lack of companionship?

If you did go with them, what would happen? You never really believed in all of that mumbo-jumbo about fate, but this seemed destined. Every solution to your problems is wrapped up in one big bow laid out in front of you. How could you say no?

So you didn't.

"Okay," you picked at your fingertips under the table, "I'll go with you." The corners of his lips twitched upwards before spreading into a grin. Thin lips moving to show off pearly whites. Even Tamaki looked happy, if not a little reluctant.

And at that moment, as they gazed at you like you were the only thing lighting their way, you never felt more sure of anything in your life.

"I swear you won't regret it, Sunshine.

___

You regretted agreeing to this. No matter how much you liked them, you never should have said yes. This whole thing had felt off-putting since you left.

If you were being truly honest with yourself, something didn't feel quite right since you met those two. Ever since the first time they walked into Komori's Delights, you knew there was something about them that caught your attention.

You originally thought it was because they were new and exciting...and hot. But, it was clear that from the start, your subconscious could tell something was off. Too bad you didn't listen to it.

The fact that Mirio and Tamaki came to pick you up was more than a little surprising, considering they didn't tell you they were coming beforehand.

Instead of taking an Uber, like you anticipated, they both were very insistent on taking the bus. Not one for needless confrontation, you agreed. You figured they knew more about this kind of thing than you did anyway. And they paid for the bus fare, so you couldn't complain.

The bus drove you about an hour out of the city before Mirio requested to get off; another thing that struck you as weird, but you didn't say anything. The three of you walked to a secluded point in the rode that led to an opening in the tree line. Well, you couldn't really call it secluded considering all the people gathered there.

The sheer amount of people waiting for you had stopped you in your tracks. Logically, you knew it was stupid to think there wouldn't be others coming with you, but a small part of you had hoped that you were the only one they were taking home with them.

Your hands gripped the straps of your backpack, sharp nails digging into taut leather. The weight loosening as you adjusted them on your shoulders. The trek so far had been strenuous. Your right ankle hurt from getting it twisted in a hole and mosquitoes were everywhere. Putting the physical strain traveling like this had on your body aside; the girl next to you had been talking your ear off nonstop.

You were all for making friends, but there should be a time and place to start talking about your fucking life story. And, considering your shoes were wet with mud and the humidity of the forest made your shirt cling to you like a second skin, now definitely wasn't the time. You didn't understand how someone could be so chatty in your current situation.

"—you quirkless too?"

"What?" Your neck snapped towards her so fast that if you were any quicker, you could have given yourself whiplash. What did she say?

"What? Are you deaf or something? I asked if you were quirkless too. As in, do you have a quirk or not?" You let the childish jab slide and focused on digesting the sentence. The grass tickled your throbbing ankle as you worked to keep pace with her long strides.

"You're quirkless?"

"Not just me. Every person I talked to is quirkless and I'm pretty sure I talked to, like, everyone here." Your eyes sharply swept over the group, keeping a headcount as you went.

If one out of one hundred people in Japan are quirkless, what were the odds that over twenty of them were gathered in the same place?

"Hey, it's supposed to be winter, right?"

"Yeah." You agreed absently, more focused on trying to get a glimpse of Mirio's blond hair at the front of the group or Tamaki's indigo hair somewhere at the back. You needed to talk to one of them. You needed to know what the hell was going on.

"So why the hell is it so hot?" She asked, pulling her brown hair into a low hanging ponytail. Her roots soaked with sweat, a true testament to the sweltering heat.

"I don't know." You stopped in your tracks, acutely aware of the people passing you, but remaining still. A rock thrown in the middle of a lake, but the stream still flowing nonetheless.

Too many things were happening for them to be a coincidence. You weren't a mathematician, but even you could see that the parts of this equation did not add up. Mirio and Tamaki showing up at your apartment, the number of people without quirks gathered in one spot, and the muggy heat in the forest combined to form a sizeable pit in your stomach.

It was a mistake to come here.

"Y/n? What are you talking about?"

Tamaki's quiet voice startled you out of your thoughts. You hadn't realized you were talking out loud; you hoped he hadn't heard much. You didn't even hear him approaching. His lithe frame stopped beside you as you readjusted your grip on your backpack.

Perhaps you were overreacting; Just being paranoid. And, if something actually was wrong, it wouldn't be wise to tell him about your concerns. Either of them, a small part of your brain whispered. Probably the logical part. For now, you'll keep your suspicions close to your chest. You started forward with a limp towards everyone else, Tamaki close behind you.

"Y-you shouldn't stray too far from the rest of the group. Are you hurt?"

"Um, my ankle is sore and it's only going to get worse the more I walk on it," you looked over the treetops as you walked by them. No birds. No squirrels. Nothing, "Which brings up a question: How long until we get to Yuuei?"

You watched him stumble over his words before answering.

"I-uh, I'm not really sure. But it...shouldn't take too long now," you watched from the corner of your eye as he pulled a plastic baggy full of small baked balls out of his backpack, "Here, it's takoyaki."

You paused.

"What do you want me to do with it?"

"We've been out here for a while, I-I thought you might have been hungry," a flush settled on the apples of his cheeks as he stared at the ground, "You don't have to eat it, o-of course. I was just worried about you."

Worried about you? You stared down at the small ball of dough and meat he placed in your hand and waited. You half expected him to tell you what he wanted in return for the food, but he didn't. You were quick to accept, alonst forgetting to say thanks in your haste, especially considering he was right about one thing.

You were starving. It felt like you hadn't eaten all day, which couldn't be right since the sun was still where it was when you began to walk. You could just chalk it up to the incredible heat and humidity in the forest. And your job definitely didn't make you the most athletic person, so you got tired easily.

"Why aren't you up front with Mirio?"

"I have to stay back here to make sure nobody gets...lost," his shoulders hunched as he pulled out more takoyaki, "Besides, I-I don't really like being front and center like Mirio. I'm not brave enough to lead people." It was just a hunch, but you got the feeling that this was about more than just your current situation. His words were weighted like they had some type of double meaning behind them.

Sure, Tamaki wasn't the most confident guy you met. And, yeah, he could barely get through a conversation with a little old lady without chickening out. But, you were able to read people; you were so good at it that it was basically your quirk.

"Brave? I think bravery is relative. Each person is brave on their own terms," the group's chatter became louder as you got closer, "You left your hometown for the first time and came to the city, right? Don't you think that's brave?"

"No," his voice was so soft you could barely hear him, "not really."

"Hmm," you finally bit into the ball of bread and octopus, "You shouldn't try to measure yourself based off of other people's limits. I think you're brave enough as you are." You could feel his gaze trail over the side of your face like he was trying to use his eyes to crack you open. You decisively decided to ignore it.

"Thank you, y/n."

___

With the help of Tamaki, you were finally able to find Mirio. Actually, once you pushed through the throng of people it wasn't exactly hard to find his broad figure. That's another thing you noticed about him; just how much he stood out. Even Tamaki, who tried his hardest to blend into the shadows, easily grabbed attention. Demanding the focus of any room they walked into, if not with mere presence alone.

Despite that, they weren't what you were thinking about. The temperature was high and the morale was low. The group's overall excitement had dimmed considerably since you started traveling and there were more than a few people grumbling and whining. But, really, who could blame them?

The sun bore down on all of you with an oppressing heat and it was only getting hotter. The air was heavy with the evaporated rain, making it feel more like you were wading through an impossibly deep pool instead of hiking through a forest. Every step you took felt weighed down as if the air had wrapped itself around every limb like a heavy blanket.

You weren't the only one feeling the effects of the journey. You picked up bits and pieces of conversation as you walked, more like limped, next to Mirio. Protests from the group grew louder the longer you went. Surrounded by heat and with no break in sight, the crowd got antsy.

"It's so hot—"

"...long are we gonna keep walki—"

"All the trees look...same."

"—we're in a forest, dumbass."

"You know what I mean, man! I swear...passed this one before."

You were running on fumes yourself, but they didn't see you complaining. You dragged your eyes over to Mirio. Fluffy, golden hair bounced in its ponytail with every step as he marched forward. The sun set a glow on his peachy skin, but there wasn't a single drop of sweat on him. Considering he lived here his whole life, you assumed he probably was just used to the crazy heat. He kept his eyes forward with a placid smile on his face. If he was bothered by the groups growing grievances, he definitely didn't show it.

You stumbled until your shoulder hit the nearest tree, bark scratching harshly against your sweaty skin, but your ankle throbbed so sharply that you didn't even care. It was so hot. You brought a shaking hand up to wipe at your forehead. You all were walking for so long, but it felt like the sun's rays only got more intense.

"Okay, I think that's enough. You're pushing yourself way too hard. You're practically dead on your feet," he put his backpack on his chest and squatted down in front of you, "Hop on, Sunshine."

Your eyes widened. Was he serious?

"Wouldn't it make more sense to take a break? I'm sure I'm not the only person tired here." You panted, growing conscious of the eyes on you.

"If we stop now, we won't make it before nightfall. Come on. I'm not getting up until you get on. Just think of me as your noble steed." He smiled at you like he had no clue how embarrassing he was.

It was a thoughtful gesture. He had offered to let you get on his back earlier when he saw you stumbling around, but you declined, which proved to be a dumb decision on your part. And the thought of walking on your bum ankle anymore made you queasy, even now it throbbed despite you resting.

You gave a quick glance sideways at the group and, of course, they were all staring, staring, staring with their judgy little eyes. You guys hadn't even been out here that long and they somehow formed a group that you clearly weren't welcomed in.

You sighed.

There was no use being unnecessarily difficult. You were holding up the group as it was, and you had a feeling that he actually wouldn't get up unless you got on his back.

So you buried your pride and hobbled over to him. His big hands grabbed the bottom of your thighs and hoisted you up, wrapping your legs around his waist. You weren't sure where to put your arms and just draped them over his shoulders.

His cool skin worked wonders for the extreme heat you were feeling that you couldn't help but cling to his back further. Was it inappropriate? Probably. And your clammy skin was likely getting sweat all over him. Did you care? Not at all.

However, you couldn't help but think of yourself as an annoyance. Sure, everyone else was complaining, but they were still on their own two feet. And here you were, forcing Mirio to carry you in his back because you couldn't handle the journey when he was probably just as tired as you.

"Hey, you wanna hear a joke?," he suddenly asked, pulling you out of your thoughts, "What did the man with two left eyes and two right eyes tell his doctor? He had double vision! Ha!" He laughed, a little too proud of his joke. Maybe it was because of how he said it completely out of nowhere or because of how utterly stupid it was, but it made you smile.

Then Mirio beamed at you from over his shoulder and his vivid blue eyes seemed like they shined even brighter when you chuckled at his corny joke.

Did he tell you a joke in hopes that you'd relax?

"If you thought that was funny, there's tons more where that came from. Heh, I really have my mentor to thank for this A+ material. Now, what do you call somebody with nobody and no nose?"

But you didn't hear the punchline as the heat and the vibration of Mirio's voice swayed you into a restless sleep.

Voices shouting, shouting all around you. Intense heat. Being carried through a dark purple cloud and then...nothing.

___

When you awoke, you were still on Mirio's back, but you weren't in the forest anymore. Instead, all you saw was a wall. Your eyes lazily swept over the great expanse of cement, muscles straining as your neck craned towards the sky. The sunlight hit your eyes, blurring your vision as you tried to see the top. The wall was taller than any of the buildings you saw in the city.

Was this another dream? Had to be. But it felt so real. Too real.

You tried to climb off of Mirio's back, but your body felt like it was being weighed down by the air alone. And Mirio's tightening grip definitely didn't help. You could barely keep your eyes open as you blearily looked around, but you couldn't make out anything but shapes.

"Don't worry, Sunshine. Just go ahead and rest those pretty, little eyes. I'll take care of you."

"M...irio...wh—" You could hardly keep your eyes open enough to finish your sentence. Darkness seizing your vision as Mirio's movements lulled you back to sleep. Your hearing was the last thing to go.

"How long did this group last, Sir?"

"Two days."

"A whole two days?! Pretty impressive, all things considered. Right, Sir?"

"Yes, Mirio..."

[angelicyoongie]

brick by brick

⤷ 1.2k follower event request: Taehyung x Yoongi + “Are you drunk, stoned, or just stupid?” + Humor ⤷ anon said: Heyy I love this kind of games 🤩 can I ask for taegi + c18 with humor please? Its up to you if you want to write it or not tho, I just love to read your works 😆 ⤷ word count: 1,400 words ⤷ a/n: It was never supposed to take three months for me to start fulfilling these, but uhm .. better late than never? And sorry anon, this story ended up very different from what I had originally planned (so it might have ended up being a little more angsty and less funny than you wanted), but still, I hope you like it!

Yoongi grumbles under his breath as he sinks further down into his coat, the cold wind biting at his pale cheeks. He can’t believe he’s out at two am again, trailing after Taehyung like his own personal guard dog. It isn’t like Yoongi doesn’t have better things to do, because he does, in fact, have many things he’d much rather be doing right now. And one of them could’ve been being asleep in his bed, because well, it’s the middle of the fucking night.

But Taehyung doesn’t seem to care about Yoongi’s protests, not when he consistently drags him out of his warm and cozy bed like clockwork every month. Instead, he just wraps himself around Yoongi like a second skin, whining into his neck about being afraid of the dark and I’m scared of being alone hyung, and well, Yoongi is weak and Taehyung knows it. He knows how to play him just right to get what he wants. And maybe Yoongi pretends to hate it a little more than he actually does, because even though he craves sleep, he also craves Taehyung’s boxy smiles and warm laughter in a way that he shouldn’t. In a way that goes far beyond the safe walls of friendship they’ve built up brick by brick over the last two years.

So here he is, freezing half to death in the biting weather as he follows him around. Yoongi’s sharp eyes never leave Taehyung’s form for even a second, not willing to lose him after what happened last time. Yoongi swears he had only blinked, but in the next second Taehyung had been nowhere to be found on the busy street they had been walking down for Taehyung’s last project. It had been something about capturing the essence of life, but Yoongi swears it felt like the last drops of his youth left him as he realized Taehyung was gone. He had walked through the nearby alleyways and streets for an hour, so close to calling in Seokjin or the police or even his fucking apartment janitor for help when Taehyung had stumbled out of a nearby record store, all pretty smiles and “Look what I found!”

Yoongi has learned from his mistake. At least, so he thought. Yoongi’s gaze flickers down as he stumbles on the uneven path, a puff of air escaping his lips as he tries to steady himself. The moment he looks back up, Taehyung is gone.

Yoongi freezes in his tracks, eyes sweeping frantically over the dark road as he tries to figure out if Taehyung has just crouched down out of his line of sight. But no, he can’t make out Taehyung’s figure against the bushes or trees lining the path, and Yoongi realizes with a disgruntled groan that Taehyung has left him here alone. Again.

“He’s going to kill me some day,” Yoongi groans, straining his ears for any sounds as he follows the path, steps a little more hurried than before. Yoongi just thanks whatever gods are out there that Taehyung chose the university grounds as the place to disappear in. The trail they’re on goes through the middle of the forest surrounding their university, and sure, it’s a forest, but you can reach either side in thirty minutes tops. And the scariest thing hiding out here is probably a rabbit. Or maybe, if they’re really unlucky, a student smoking a joint. And Yoongi is fairly certain he can at least deal with that – if not, he wants all the hours he has spent working out with Jeongguk back. That kid knows how to run him to the ground only to push him even further, and while Yoongi enjoys the results, he’s not sure it’s worth the aching muscles that haunt him for days afterward.

Yoongi is lightly panting by the time he catches the low timbre of Taehyung’s voice. His annoyance level maxed out from having had to follow the path all the way around only to end up where he first lost him. Yoongi huffs as he follows the sound of Taehyung’s voice, the noise taking him of the trail and into the surrounding forest. It’s even more difficult to navigate the grounds in the darkness, but Yoongi just grits his teeth whenever he stumbles, determined not to lose Taehyung a second time before he can even find him.

He lets out a sigh of relief once he spots Taehyung’s freshly bleached hair, the area he’s in entirely unfamiliar. It almost looks like a small park inside the forest, with overgrown benches and a low broken stone fence surrounding it. Taehyung seems to be talking to himself as he circles around a small statue that can’t be much taller than his leg, and as Yoongi gets closer, he notices that it appears to be in pretty bad shape too. He’s never heard of this place before, not even a whisper from the other students has reached his ears about this part of the forest. If judging by how run down and abandoned everything looks, Yoongi guesses their university has likely already forgotten it even existed.

“There you are hyung! Took you long enough,” Taehyung grins as he waves him over.

“Took me long enough? You’re the one who disappeared! We’ve talked about this–“ Yoongi’s rumble is cut off as Taehyung suddenly clap his hands together, an excited smile lighting up his whole face as he gestures up to the statue.

“I think this would be perfect,” He says. Yoongi’s step falters, his eyes flickering back to the cracked stone. “Perfect for what?” Yoongi asks carefully, his eyes narrowing as he glances back at Taehyung.

“My project of course! It’s about the progress of time, remember? Hyung, haven’t you been paying attention to what I’ve been telling you?” Taehyung pouts, and Yoongi swears his heart drops and soars at the same time. What he wants to say is of course I have, I always pay attention to you, I always remember but instead he just scowls, mutters out an “I have too much to keep track off.”

And maybe the worst part is that Taehyung doesn’t even seem fazed. He just brushes off Yoongi’s comment with a smile, his eyes straying back to the statue. Yoongi watches him out of the corner of his eye, his stomach already heavy with guilt. He hates being so indifferent, hates pretending like he doesn’t care, but his lips are too loose, always threatening to let the words on the tip of his tongue slip out. So this is better. It’s better to keep his distance. To stay where it’s safe – with their perfectly crafted wall between them.

“So, what are you going to do with it?” Yoongi says, his voice cracking against the silence between them. Taehyung circles around the statue once, dragging his hand along the grimy stone as he gives it a final once over. He finally turns back to Yoongi, the brilliant smile on his lips making Yoongi’s breath hitch as he says, “I think we should steal it, hyung.”

Yoongi blinks, struggling to make sense of what Taehyung just told him. “Steal what? The statue?” Yoongi hisses.

“Yes! I know I can make this into something really pretty.” And Yoongi knows Taehyung probably can, but this is illegal, this– “Taehyung, are you drunk, stoned, or just stupid? This belongs to the university! If they find out we took it we’re fucked.”

“But they won’t find out hyung! I promise they won’t recognize it,” Taehyung ignores him, pleading as he takes a step closer, his eyes sparkling in the darkness. Dangerous dangerous dangerous, his brain yells but even then, Yoongi is weak.

He takes a deep breath, and the cold air rushing in to nip at his lungs serves as a harsh reminder that this is a bad idea, and that they’ll definitely get caught, but, “Fine. If we get caught I won’t hesitate to pin the blame on you,” Yoongi bites, but they both know he would never.  

It takes them nearly an hour to get back home, the heavy statue balancing on their shoulders serving as a mocking reminder that Yoongi is too easy, too smitten. But then Taehyung sends him one of his trademark boxy grins over his shoulder, and Yoongi is already internally plotting where they can find their next statue if it’ll make Taehyung look at him like that again.  

Click here for the 1.2 follower event masterlist! Please leave a comment/reblog if you enjoyed :)

[emiisanxious]

Rainy Day

Archive of Our Own Link

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: Gen

Fandom: Sanders Sides (Web Series)

Additional Tags:

Sympathetic Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders

Sympathetic Deceit | Janus Sanders

Rain

a LOT of rain

Light Angst

Swearing

Anxiety | Virgil Sanders-centric

Summary: “On a storm day, Virgil was feeling so good that he decided to go for a walk, of course, he didn't say anything to anyone, since he wasn't expecting to be a problem.

Or: Virgil spaces outs, goes for a walk, Roman, Logan, and Patton get sick worried because they can't find him. Remus doesn't care as far he is back, and Janus just wants him to come back or use a dammit umbrella.”

Note: On a rainy day I had this idea, and won't leave me out so... I thought why not? Although this fic isn't perfect in my eyes, it does have a big warm spot in my heart. It can be a messy and unclear text in some parts, but... It truly was warm for me... Really I liked to type this one.

He could hear, other than his music blasting through his headphones, the sound of cars passing in water puddles, the water descending by a pipe, he could hear the small droplets against his window, the wind making the window cause noises because of the speed. Weird enough those were calming sounds.

Obviously, he didn't like the thunder when he wasn't looking, but he could appreciate it if he is sitting at the window looking at the rain. After all, the light of thunder is quicker than the sound, so he won't feel scared when he is watching. A calming feeling, a sense of cold but not the bad one, he could just stay under his blankets hearing those sounds and... Appreciate it.

As he put down his phone and headphone on his bed table. Curling in a small ball under the pile of blankets, maybe he should just go outside? Cold weather isn't something he often can appreciate, and it would be nicer to have rain falling over his body. A small smile, as he got up from his bed; the others were all busy so it's not they would miss him right now. He just needs to make sure to be back before dinner is ready, right?

With that in mind, he put on his boots, skinny distressed jeans, his old black and grey jacket mostly because he didn't want to attract attention, but at the same time, he does worry about the weather damaging his purple patched one. Pulling up his hoodie, he got his phone and went outside. Because of the rain, no one would notice him walking around, heck! If they didn't recognize Remy, why should he care about him?!

The feel of the droplets touching his face, the droplets slowly wetting his clothes, he didn't mind it. He was happy with the overwhelming feeling of the calm and solitude that the rains bring him. The slowly building up weigh as his clothes start to get wet. Looking at the gray sky, the street lights turned on a bit more early so it wouldn't be dark.

Like anytime that it's raining, Virgil felt so... Good. His thoughts for once far back in his mind, nothing to worry about, nothing to be cautious about. He knows that it's his work been anxious about everything, self-aware of everything but... Once in a while... It was good to feel the opposite.

Sadly, his thoughts were back to reality as he picks up his phone. It was vibrating a few minutes ago, but now it was getting more insistent. Insistent from Janus and the same type of messages.

Deceit: Virgil. GET. OUT. OF. THE. RAIN!

"Fuck" He murmured before laughing, he found it funny, how now that Deceit was better accepted between the traits, he was back in mamma mod with him.

Daddy: Virge, I tried to knock on your door? Are you okay? Daddy: Virge, please answer me! Daddy: Oh... You're not in your room... Daddy: Sorry for getting inside your room without consent. Daddy: Wait... Daddy: WHERE ARE YOU?! Daddy: ARE YOU OKAY?! Daddy: VIRGIL WHERE ARE YOU?!

"Why he needed me?" He thought as he sighed at that as he looked at the rest of the messages, it seems he was wrong when he thought that he would just be called at dinner.

Logic: Patton is really worried about you. Where are you? He is yelling and asking everyone. Can you answer me at least? Prince: Hey hot topic, where are you? Padre is yelling and is freaking out... Prince: That is it! We are going to ask De--- Janus. Rat: You know, mama is really worried, can you get out of the fucking rain?! Also, the light trio is here asking where the fucking you're. Dee is lying, although I don't understand why. Rat: Can you just get the fuck back home bitch?

"Thaaaaaaaaaaat is weird." He thought again as he looks at the sky, it has been a lovely walk around, he was feeling a bit cold from his wet clothes, but he didn't mind, not at all. Closing his eyes as he let the rain pour over him before his anxiety kicked in and wash over that feeling of calm he opened his eyes to send a message again.

Emo: hey rat, can you tell Jan that I will be back in like... 1 hour or so? Rat: WHAT?! NO! Those three are annoying as hell right now! Emo: well... can't care less. im okay. just tell them im okay Rat: They don't believe it. Emo: sucks for them and you. ill be back in 1 hour or so. Emo: oh, says that im fine and when im back i will explain Rat: Uuuuuuurgh... Fine! Only because it's been years since you were this careless. Don't make it a habit! Emo: okay Rat: Enjoy.

With that, he pockets his phone again, starting to walking aimlessly around the street, it's been so long since the last rain, sure it does rain sometimes, but it does need specific things happening to mess with him like that.

Mess up his senses and mind, although he felt angst, sad and even depressed, it did him feel calm, relief and hopeful, he wasn't sure about what or why, but he could care less about it. Also, that was something he doesn't understand, he could care less about everything in that mood.

Like whenever is raining, in that specific mood set, he felt free, free of his anxiety, free of whatever paranoia, free of his thoughts. Just the sound of the rain, the cars passing over the water puddles, the steps on the water, the droplets on the umbrella, the smell of rain. Three of his senses were all around the rain, but it was marvelous and messed up more with him, when his last two senses were as well, sights and hearing since it started thundering around.

He couldn't help, he felt relaxed and he wanted to enjoy it as much as possible, and like all the times that he was that messed up, we went to a park, sitting on a swing, he did lose the passage of time. Although his phone soon was going to start vibrating again.

Deceit: VIRGIL ANXIETY SANDERS! GET BACK TO HOME NOW!

He let out a long laugh, he was alone in the park so he didn't care about it, Janus was back in full mama mod, and honestly? He was going to get scolded a lot about it. But he couldn't seem to care right now.

Prince: Virge, padre is really worried. Can you return? Prince: Like, Remus told us you would be back in 1 hour or so, but it is already dinner. Emo: you can say to Patton, to join with Janus Prince: YOU'RE ALIVE! Prince: What that even mean? Emo sent a picture. Emo: dont tell Janus tho Prince: Okay... WOW! He is like padre! Emo: yeah... he is been sending messages since i left Prince: But really Virge. Come back. Emo: fine... im on my way back... Emo: the catch is... it will take more... 30 minutes or 1 hour Prince: WHAT?!?! Emo: im really... far away right now Prince: Just make your way back! Emo: okay okay... your brother is texting wait a minute

Rat: Mama is mad and angry and worried, you're fucked up if you get sick. Emo: say for him to join with Patton Rat: Oh yeah, that daddy is also worried sick, although less angry and mad. Emo: yeap. im on my home. 30 minutes or 1 hour Rat: Fuck! You got really far, huh? Emo: i would be even far if it wasn't Dee sending so many messages and calling me my full name Rat: Stormcloud, better you hurry up. I can hear Dee and Patton saying they are going to the real world to find you. Emo: okay okay... now NERD is texting... wait a minute

Logic: I presume that Roman, Remus, Janus, and Patton already did their worried text? Emo: yes...? Logic: So I should be more direct. Why are you out in the rain? Emo: rain numbs my anxiety... Logic: That... Doesn't make sense. Emo: no logic can explain it. Emo: just... it numbs, totally, i don't feel anxious, i don't feel bad, i don't care... i feel calm... Logic: Huh. That is curious. Emo: so... i just enjoy it... i thought that you guys won't call me till dinner. Logic: Well... You see Patton went to check on Thomas. And Thomas was really... Really... Calm. Patton panicked and thought you had ducked out, although it was weird because Thomas wasn't like with the symptoms of you disappearing. Logic: The reason for worry was because Thomas was lazy all the time today, to a point where Patton was checking for him to eat and things like that. So Patton called me, to figure out if something was wrong. We couldn't find why. So we tried to summon you but you didn't show up, we went to your room, but you weren't there and it just... Emo: you all jumped to a conclusion Emo: come on... a little faith?! Logic: I apologize. Emo: im on my way back, i will be in 30 minutes or 1 hour Logic: You were far away huh? Emo: yes, please when im back i want you all to be in the real-world okay? Emo: even Janus and Remus Logic: For what? Emo: because i want to discuss this "jumped conclusion" and explain a few things Logic: Sure. I will tell them. Emo: thanks, now im going back.

He took a deep breath, passing his hand over his face, he didn't wear makeup, since he knew it would be pointless, as he gets ups and returns to his home. In the middle of his walk, he got lost in thought and feelings again, to a point that when he got home he had glassy purple eyes, getting inside he could see the six already there, where he just looked to himself, he was wet and dripping from all his time on the rain.

He was also wearing his old jacket, something he didn't do since he was accepted, and that probably freaked out them more than anything as he looks at them. But that was enough to snap him back from his dazed mind.

"Thanks for been here." He said sarcastic, he changed his clothes with a snap, so it wasn't dripping or wet anymore, it was more like his normal clothes for now. His purple patched jacket, his sneakers instead of boots, and now he picked up things to do his make up, while he sat on the stairs as normal. "Let's get over it shall we?" He said while applying his makeup.

"Virgil, why..." Thomas tried to say something but he was lost.

He was totally back in been anxiety when he applied his makeup. "Why you're so calm?" A nod as he looks to his host. "I'm calm now. Normally when it rains my anxiety gets numb when things are like today, that is more a storm with thunder, wind, and the heavy rain I just get... More numb."

"That is true, but since normally doesn't rain that much it is rare for him to do that." Remus said as he looked at Janus who was storming.

"Told you for fucking sake at least use a dammit umbrella!" Janus was angry and mad. "Also you should get a warm bath, take some soup or drink something warm!"

"Why is Janus so...?" Thomas didn't know how to vocalize those thoughts as he looks to the yellow side.

"Janus was and is, the mother figure for most of The Others? Well not all of them, because a few are jerks, the ones who weren't, Dee was the mother. Like Patton is the Daddy for Roman and Logan" Virgil shrugged as he looked between Thomas and Deceit. "Relax, I will do it soon. Also, umbrellas take half of the purpose!"

"Please don't start arguing you both... Jan I know you're worried, but Vee doesn't give you a shit when it's storming. Vee, I know that okay? Just focus on explaining the things?" Remus put his hand between the two sides who were nearly starting to argue.

"Okay." "Fine." Both pouted but did stop as Logan and Patton were still impressed, not used to this new... Thing. Roman on the other hand was the first one to ask. "So... When it's raining your anxiety gets numbs, storms make you more numb if that is possible, and you just... Fall in a sense of calm?"

"Yeah, something like that... I just feel free and can't care about anything... I fell calm, extremely relaxed, and self-aware, but needed to say, Thomas can't have anything on the day that happens. After all, taking care of Thomas is a top priority and thus I won't be able to relax. On that note, since the day Logan calmed me and Thomas with those five sensory exercises, I realized, that in the rain it's like... A real version of that?" Virgil answered while looking at Logan.

"Oh... I guess since you're the mental representation of anxiety, you need something more grounding than just breathing exercises, or other ground exercises to fully calm down and relax. Like the full five senses working on something instead of just exercises. Oh... That is interesting." Logan was truly surprised about it.

"So... Why I never noticed it?" Thomas asked curiously as he looks around.

"Because... I'm normally back in a spawn of time, like 1 hour or 30 minutes. I don't always go that far, like today. But... Today my mind got really blank and numb, and I didn't notice my phone at all. That is why everyone texted me and was worried. Also, when I go for a walk, I normally end up noticing how long I'm out but today was... Off." He felt bad for worrying them but at the same time, he was feeling calm and relaxed, which was really weird for him. "What I'm mean is... I'm sorry for worrying you guys... I will not do that again..."

"No!" Patton surprised everyone when he exclaimed. "No! You don't need to stop doing it! If it's something that does you well then you shouldn't stop it! You were so happy and calm when you got here, that I was surprised. But I can see it does you very well."

"I have to agree. It's not something bad or some type of disease, it does seem that it's good for you to relax and for Thomas to have a nice and relaxed day to self-care. I can rearrange his schedule when it's raining so you both can enjoy it. I also, find it quite enjoyable to read while raining so it can be a day for all of us doing some relaxing. Instead of working." Logan was next in change that. "I apologize for us jumping in a conclusion."

"The reason for us been worried is just because we didn't understand what was happening or where you went. Now that we know, and the effects of it we can work with it. If you want, I can let you know whenever is raining in my side of imagination, so you can go there. Not sure if have the same effect, but we can work on something for at least have half of the effect?" Roman was really happy to know that something other than just breath and grounding exercises could help Virgil to feel calmer, so he was the first to jump thinking of ways to help.

Janus and Remus were quiet while looking at Virgil. "I'm sorry Virgil. I shouldn't let my job interfere and be so... Demanding with you. I knew you felt calm and good, but I really worry when you got outside without an umbrella, or just doesn't pick up messages. If you could just work on one of those?" Janus tried as he wasn't sure. "So at least I could worry a bit lest."

"Hm... Why don't Remus come out with me when it happens? He is someone you can rely on texting you back, he can also stalk me without triggering too much, and he sometimes even let me enjoy my solitude although most of the time he will talk a lot. It would be a win-win for everyone. Although I hate the idea of been stalked..." Anxiety let out a small sigh. "But I can't really do any of those Jan... The feeling of rain falling on me is what makes it special. And I get really distracted so I can't really answer a text."

Everyone fell in silence, they didn't know how to deal with that, but surprisingly it was Remus who spoke. "So, how about it, I don't need to stalk you or whatever. I can configure a GPS thing on your phone, you just click a button when you go out, and it will go to Dee and Patton, and they will know your location. And we will just need to rely on that. It's not too invasive, neither is repressing you or creeping you. I won't need to follow you and all."

"Oooh... That sounds like a nice idea." Thomas said while yawning. "Can I nap... The rain really is making me sleep..."

Virgil looked at them and they nodded. "I need to shower and put on some more... Comfortable clothes. So I will go." Without waiting he was back at commons, and soon he was heading to his room, soon he was in the shower, taking a lot of time on there. Even wishing he had a bathtub like Roman or Patton, but he didn't.

After half an hour he was back at the commons, now using pants and still on his hoodie, more relaxed and calm as he goes to the kitchen, finding Patton and Janus. "Kiddo!" As morality noticed him, he saluted with two fingers before sitting down. "Thought in eat and drink something before going back to bed."

"Good, I did some soup and Patton did the food, and we have hot choco. Is that good?" Deceit asked although he was already separating things for Virgil.

"It's fine. Again, sorry for worrying you, mama." As now Virgil wasn't around Remus and Roman he didn't mind in be a bit more... Open. "And daddy."

Both of them got surprised as he looked at Virgil, who was now fidgeting with his jacket's sleeves and looking down. "It's okay Kiddo. We understand and as we said, it isn't something bad." Patton was the first to answer as he heats the meal in the microwave.

"I thought... I would never hear you call me that again..." Janus was shocked as he looked at the anxious side. "But Patton is right, everything will be alright now and apologizes accepted."

"I told you... I was a jerk because I was scared... And I'm sorry about that, but... I'm trying okay? It's not perfect, I sure will close up if my anxiety gets worse but... I'm trying..." He trails off as he looks anywhere but for them.

"It's fine, we know that, I know that, and Remus, well he is just Remus so... I bet he is happy to have his brother back, just, please... Stop him, instead of helping him." Janus smiled as he teases.

"I can't promise anything... Some of Remus's ideas are too good to just... Stop him." He teased back but soon turned in a more serious. "Thank you, you two. I'm not sure what I would be if I didn't have both of you." He smiled softly at that.

"Well, we still have a lot to work on, arguments will happen but... this can be a good family. We will work together instead of separated." Patton smiled as he places the meal in front of Virgil.

"We are all trying Virgil, and that is what matters. Now eat. Before Remus and Roman find you and want to drag you." Janus pointed as he knows one of the twins, and sure enough that could happen.

"Just to ask... Why were you in your old jacket? That kinda bothered me, Logan and Roman..." Patton asked a bit embarrassed.

"Well... I don't like to wash this jacket too much, I get scared it will be torn out. Purple does get too much attention when you're walking around the city. And last old habits, it's just... Normal for me use that jacket when walking outside in the rain. I did that a lot when I was with The Others. So habits."

"Oh... That is not a problem, I can explain that to them later." Morality was thoughtful for a few minutes before he answered. "Oh, do you like the taste of the rain?"

"Yes. Although I don't walk with my mouth open to get it." Chuckles filled the kitchen as Virgil started to eat, the vague sound of rain, the vague sound of droplets on windows. The weather slowly clearing up, but he was still calm, relaxed, and comfortable. Maybe it does have other things that can calm him down like rain, he just needs to find out, although he has a small suspect that a warm meal done by his two "parents" was one small way of getting that feeling.

Maybe... If he can find more small ways of getting that feeling, he could feel like that more times, but for now? He would just enjoy this little warmth.

[365daysofsasuhina]

[ @sasuhinabigflash2020​​ || Day Six: A Grey Coat ] [ Uchiha Sasuke, Hyūga Hinata ] [ SasuHina ] [ Verse: A Light Amongst Shadows ] [ AO3 Link ]

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This has quickly become one of his favorite places to be.

While the wall around Konoha represents a lot of things he’d rather not think about, it provides a rather unparalleled view of the village as a whole. The Hokage monument may show more at once, but at that height people are little more than specks, and there’s something about watching them at a better distance that Sasuke’s come to enjoy.

Feelings are still mixed about the place he was born. Sasuke knows, now that his anger has cooled and his rationality given time to smother the coals, that there’s still much about Konoha that is innocent of the crimes committed against him and others. Civilians have no part in the politics. Your average shinobi is just trying to get by and protect their home. It’s the roots of the village - literally and figuratively - that contribute most to its rotten core. Those in power that abuse it, and do ugly things to keep their hold on said power.

...but he has a plan for that. It will just take time, and organization. For now, he’s working first on himself before he can confront all that made him the way he is.

It’s been weeks since the war’s end. Much is still in flux. Even reparations from Pein’s attack are still being worked on, supplies still scarce at times as the complete rebuilding of Konoha continues. Ironically, the wall - so useless in keeping out the most potent threat - was one of few things left intact.

It’s here Sasuke sits, and thinks, and watches. While it’s patrolled by Konoha nin and they gave him suspicious looks at first, most have grown accustomed to his harmless perch, and even give him space as he lingers. If anything, they know he’s more than capable of defending it if anything were to happen. Personal opinions aside, he’s still unquestionably strong.

Today, the weather is a bit overcast, threatening rain as thunder rumbles miles in the distance. Even now, the sound brings a strange, tight melancholy to his chest. Flickering pieces of his final battle against his brother are always brought to mind whenever he hears a storm. But as time passes, it fades ever so slightly. He’ll always mourn Itachi, and he still serves as one of the younger brother’s fiercest drives to changing Konoha into something worthy of Itachi’s sacrifice. But Sasuke makes no attempt to find cover as the sky darkens and the winds subtly pick up.

Someone else, however, takes that upon themselves.

With a muffled thwump, something drops across his shoulders, and Sasuke blinks in surprise, caught off-guard enough he doesn’t react violently, instead left a bit stupefied as the figure behind him comes around to a side.

Once he sees them, he manages to relax a hair.

“You’re going to get drenched here in a m-minute,” Hinata offers, lowering herself to sit along the edge with him. Sandaled feet dangle over the several-storey fall to the ground beneath them.

“A little rain never hurt anyone.”

“You still might catch a cold.”

That flattens his expression a few degrees. “I’m not scared of a cold.”

Pale pink lips curl in a smile. “No, but you should fear someone’s reaction if she finds out, right…?”

At that, Sasuke scoffs, a hand pulling at the fabric he’s been cloaked in. A grey coat, seemingly waterproof if the texture tells him anything. Considering it a moment, he then pulls it on completely. “Thanks.”

She doesn’t reply beyond a nod. Her hands grip the edge of the wall, staring out over the village. “...I’ve never actually been up here.”

“Really?”

“No reason to be,” Hinata replies blithely. “But I saw you and thought I’d come up.”

“And bring me a coat?”

That earns a glance, tinged a bit worried. “Well...Naruto-kun let it slip you’re still a bit, um...lacking in supplies.”

“I’m not a charity case,” is his terse counter.

“I know that. It’s called being nice,” is her own rebuke, managing a hint of a smile. “Besides...it’s g-going to be getting cold, soon. They’ll be hard to find.”

He just gives a small sound of indifference, pulling at a cuff. It’s actually pretty nice. “...thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

The pair then fall into companionable silence, which is soon accented with the soft patter of rain upon the stone of the wall. Against his hood, they seem to whisper in his ear.

Hinata draws her own, leaning back slightly on her palms. “At least it’s not cold enough to snow yet…”

“Not a fan?”

“Mm...yes and no.” She goes quiet for a long moment. “...I guess it’s just an odd sign that time is still passing. It’s felt both slow and yet...really fast since the war. I’m not ready for Winter, but...that’s not going to stop it from coming.”

He glances at her, but offers no reply. In a way, he knows what she means. So many things are broken, disjointed, unsettled. The fact that the world itself is offering them no reprieve seems unfair, but that’s an entirely human notion.

“...is it true you might leave?”

The sudden change in conversation pulls his gaze completely. “Who told you that?”

“It’s just the word going around,” Hinata replies softly. “I think...some people are worried about it.”

By ‘some people’, he knows she mostly means his teammates. It’s true, he tossed around the idea of taking time to travel, observe the world, sort out his thoughts. Even now, it feels tempting. “...I don’t think I will.”

“Oh?”

“There’s too much to do here,” he replies, knowing it’s vague. “I don’t want to lose any time.”

It’s then she looks back at him, and Sasuke can’t help but feel ever so slightly unnerved. Even now, Hyūga eyes make him feel looked through rather than looked at. Especially Hinata.

“...I see. Is it...anything to do with the council?”

A slight tick of irritation twinges in his chest. Seems the idea isn’t being made as confidential as he’d have liked. “What makes you think that?”

“Well...given everything that’s come to light -?”

“I don’t know yet. That’s...not exactly a simple situation,” he cuts in, not exactly eager to talk about it...let alone out in the open. “I’ve still got a lot to think about.”

Sensing his spark of temper, Hinata quiets, looking to her lap. “...sorry, I...shouldn’t have assumed.”

“Hn.”

“...but...I-I hope you know that...if you need any help, I’d be happy to give it.”

He gives her a dubious glance. “...why?”

“...a lot of reasons,” she offers, taking her turn to be vague. “Is it n-not enough to want justice to be done?”

“...I’m not exactly someone everyone else is eager to rally around,” he counters. “Just seems odd for anyone to want to do so of their own volition.”

“What Konoha did was a g-gross overstep.” To his surprise, her expression hardens. “Regardless of the politics...killing every single member of a clan - or...nearly - is a horrible way to handle dissatisfaction, and an imbalance of power a-and rights. It just...makes me wonder if something like that could have happened to any of the rest of us. I...I know I don’t have a grasp on the entire history, but...from what I’ve heard, it still seems like the village made the wrong decisions, and for the wrong reasons. I just...want to make sure nothing like it happens again. And that...the ones who did orchestrate it are made to face justice for what they did to you, and...your family.” She turns to him, face still set in stone. “You deserve at least that much.”

For a moment, her vehemence takes him by surprise. “...how much do you know…?”

At that, she hesitates. “...just...bits and pieces, really. I’ve heard some from Naruto-kun, and...others.”

Ah, right...apparently they have their share of overlapped acquaintances. He knows who’s really behind this, now. “...getting involved might get you in serious trouble.”

“Sometimes you need a little trouble to make things right.”

After a short pause, he snorts softly. “...can’t argue that,” he agrees, lips curling just a hair.

By now, the rain is pouring, and despite his coat, the rest of him is quickly growing soaked. And a glance shows her much in the same boat.

“...we should probably get inside. Can’t be catching those colds.”

Hinata lets slip a small laugh. “True...and I should head home.”

To his surprise, Sasuke finds himself disappointed at that. “Yeah, me too. Thanks for the coat.”

“You’re welcome. At least we know it works, ne?” She smiles at him. “Well...for part of you, anyway.”

The pair of them then slip from the wall, each landing safely on the ground below and parting ways. Hinata takes the streets as Sasuke decides to hop to the rooftops, mindful of his chakra to cling to the slick tiles. Once home, he shrugs out of his coat, pleased to find his head and torso completely dry.

Mulling that over, he hangs it outside to finish dripping before deciding to scavenge for some lunch.

     Gonna be brief cuz it’s late, and I have another piece to post right after this :’D As for why I’m late, been having major toothache problems that knocked me on my butt and delayed me, but I managed to grind out two days’ prompts today! Tho as a warning, neither are proofread because I’m in a hurry xD      Anywho, this piece! Mostly just a bit of scene-setting and dialogue between Sasuke and Hinata early on after the war in ALAS. Which, as a matter of fact, is being majorly replotted...not that I’ll ever write it, BUT...yeah. Hence the mention of Itachi still being dead, because in any possible rewrite, he would be.      But yeah! This is mostly just a bit of angst, a bit of fluff, a bit of slice of life. I really love just...writing little moments between them, honestly.      On that note though, I need to work on getting the next part up, so I’ll go for now! Thanks for reading~ (Also, going to get to comments tomorrow, I hope. I'm just too tired atm, apologies for the delays :'D)

[zanesgirlfriend]

History Repeats | Jeff Wittek

2k follower special 💜

A/N: I just wanted to say thank you for all the love and support, I've been working on this for a while and decided to make it a special thing for hitting 2k ahh but thank yall for bearing with me through all my little breaks and late uploads and stuff even tho I'm literally a nobody so thank yall okok I'm done pls enjoy

Word Count: 6.2k

Triggers: Cheating, swearing, stuff like that ya know

Special shout out to @vlouge-squad for helping me edit this!!

_____

The heat of dancing bodies wrapped around Jeff like a blanket. A bead of sweat trickled down the bridge of his nose as he forced himself through the crowd. He nodded to the bartender as he sat on a creaky barstool, wondering if he was suddenly too old to go out to clubs like this.

Y/n was thinking the same thing, no idea that her ex boyfriend was a few seats down from her. She hadn't seen Jeff since the day he left New York. Promising to call her when he landed, only to block her number and never speak to her again. She wasn't mad anymore. They'd had their fair share of fights, breakups and makeups, and they knew long distance wasn't going to work.

She wouldn't've even noticed him if it wasn't for her roommate Katy. They'd played the same game every time they went out, giving people a job and a backstory and a silly name, and it was Katy's turn.

"Oh fuck he's hot." She attempted to subtly point Jeff out to y/n. "Um, Brad, twenty-five, Male model, from Oklahoma. Got his start modeling for billboards."

"Wrong." Her words sounded playful but really they had a lot of meaning. She scanned Jeff's body, his face, his hair, as she corrected Katy. "He's a Jeff, twenty-nine, probably the dead body in the background of Law and Order, cuts hair on the side of his shitty acting career, from New York."

"O-M-G you're right." Katy laughed as she continued to eye the man.

"Did you just say O-M-G out loud? Maybe you should chill on the White Russian's." She took Katy's glass and slid it away from them before guiding her slightly drunk friend away from the bar. Katy was highly buzzed at best, but y/n didn't want Jeff to have the chance to notice her.

She was distracted the rest of the night, busy thinking of the very first time she saw Jeff. It was like history was repeating itself.

It was a cold night in New York. The first snowfall of the year. Y/n wasn't prepared and had nothing but a long-sleeved shirt on. She blamed this on her friends dog, who'd incidentally stolen her phone and chewed through it like candy. She couldn't check the weather, and nobody'd told her it was going to snow.

She shivered, her arms folded over one another, tight to her chest in attempt to keep her torso warm. She was walking home, not willing to spend her rent money on a cab to her apartment six blocks away.

"Do you need a ride?" He pulled up next to her, his head hanging out the window. She wasn't going to take a ride from a stranger, especially at night. She watched his breath form clouds as it hit the cool air.

"No, thank you." She nodded and continued walking. He drove alongside her slowly.

"Look, I'm not gonna kidnap you, I just don't want you to freeze to death."

She took a moment to really look at the guy. She was cold, and didn't really enjoy walking alone. His eyes looked kind and his hair flopped in such a way that made her trust him. But not enough to get in the car. "Even if you were gonna kidnap me, I don't think you'd tell me. Really, I'm fine."

He sighed and she wondered what he was doing as he popped his head back in the window. He took his sweatshirt off and held it out the window.

"Take it."

"No, I can't." She wanted to take it, but she felt bad. "It's yours."

"And now it's yours. Just take it." So she did. It smelled like expensive cologne and it was fairly warm from his body heat.

"Thank you." She smiled. He returned a grin as he drove off.

The memories made her smile. Katy noticed how bubbly she became as they took an Uber home. "What got into you?" She nudged y/n with a teasing tone.

"I just remembered some things that made me happy, that's all."

Later that night, y/n woke up in a cold sweat. She was hugging her pillow and all of her blankets were on the floor. Whispered words tickled her throat as she spoke.

"Jeff."

♤♡◇♧

They say that everybody in L.A. goes to therapy. Whether it be that they actually have a problem needing fixed, or just need someone trustworthy to talk to. In y/n's case, it was the latter. Katy was a blabbermouth, and to be fair, she wasn't very good at solving problems. She had too many problems of her own.

"Something about seeing him was so surreal. It's like I can't unseen him."

"And how did seeing him again make you feel?" Dr. R. asked her, posing her pen near the top of her notepad.

"Angry, and then happy, and then sad." She paused, rethinking her words. "More like I was upset over breaking up, well, the way we broke up, and then I missed him."

"Do you still miss him now?" She asked without looking up from her notepad.

"I could lie and say that I don't, but I dreamt about him last night, so I think I do." Y/n brought her knees up to her chest, sitting in a comfortable ball in the oversized chair. Dr. R. noticed her change in position. She wrote a few more things down, circling something.

"What happened in your dream?" She finally looked up at y/n.

She smiled before answering. "I usually never remember my dreams, but this one was different. It's not that I can't remember it all, it's that everything was a blur. We were just laying together. Cuddling in bed. Then everything was going in slow motion. He kissed me, and it was so comforting. And then it all went blurry again until he got up and left." She sighed. "And that's when I woke up."

Dr. R. flipped a page or two back in her notes, putting a dot next to something y/n mentioned before. "When you two broke up, it wasn't mutual, correct?"

"No, it wasn't." She hugged her knee's a little tighter.

"I think your dream was bringing those feelings back. Cuddling with him was how you felt before he left, and then when he left, you probably woke up upset, didn't you?"

Y/n nodded. "I'm more upset now that I didn't talk to him at the bar." She picked at the loose string on the cuff of her sleeve. "I wonder if he would even recognize me."

"He will."

On the drive home y/n thought about Dr. R., how she was more like a wise old lady sitting on a porch at the end of your street. Of course, she had her therapist moments, but at the end of the day she was just a nice person to talk to.

She then started to think more about Jeff. He's in L.A. Did he finally make it as an actor? She hadn't seen him in anything. Before she got out of her car she whipped out her phone.

Jeff Wittek

Millions of results in seconds. His Instagram, Twitter, YouTube. Millions of followers. A past girlfriend, clips of him on various TV shows. The name David Dobrik seems attached to the most recent things.

She sat in her car for thirty minutes, obsessing over him. Over everything he's involved in.

She finds the Dobrik kid and laughs. His videos are hilarious, and he seems to be one of Jeff's current friends.

If only she could find a way to get in touch.

She didn't want to be creepy, obsessive, or a virtual stalker, but she couldn't help but see what Jeff's been up to.

By the end of her internet search, she couldn't help but feel she was doing something wrong. She felt dirty.

She deleted her search history, and went inside to take a shower.

♤♡◇♧

It'd been weeks. Months even. She'd stopped thinking about him shortly after her session with Dr. R., but he still appeared in her dreams every once in a while. She figured if she ever did see him again, it would be in passing at a party or another bar like it was before. She never expected to see him at the top of a mountain.

Katy was on a new health kick, and that meant dragging y/n along with her. They'd been to a cycling class five times this week, and y/n wanted to do something else.

"Let's go on a hike." She told Katy, reminiscing the days back home where she would hike in Latourette Park.

They found a hiking spot right outside of Los Angeles. "Do you want to go the easy path or the hard one?" Y/n asked, feeling like she could do both.

"I ate cheese fries last night, so let's do the hard one." Katy took a left onto the hard path and y/n rolled her eyes as she followed.

They saw a group of men and a dog up ahead, but didn't pay much attention as they were gossiping about people they knew from work and Katy's recent ex-boyfriend. The path was harder than y/n expected, and she was dripping with sweat by the time they'd gotten halfway up.

"We're never doing this again." Katy panted as she wiped her forehead. Y/n laughed.

"No, we need to do it more often."

"Why? This is torture enough!" Katy pulled on her ponytail, making it a bit tighter.

"The more we do it, the easier it'll get, come on." She pressed forward, dragging Katy up the mountain.

They noticed the guys once again. They were stood at the top of the trail, looking over L.A. and undoubtedly taking a break. It wasn't until the girls drew nearer to them that y/n noticed Jeff.

"Can we go back now? I'm tired." Y/n asked Katy, not wanting to see Jeff ever again.

"What? No! We're so close to the top, and there's cute guys up there." Katy grabbed y/n's wrist forcefully, dragging her towards the top.

"Ow, Katy!" She screamed. "Fine, we'll go." Y/n trudged up to the top of the trail, rubbing her wrist the whole time. She'd never thought of Katy as someone to use force, but she couldn't expect less based on the sexual stories they'd shared in the past.

The closer they got, the more attention they got. Jeff was the last one to turn around.

"It's you." He whispered, smiling. He'd forgotten all of the negative feelings of their past relationship. The familiarity of y/n's face brought an intense emotion to Jeff's chest.

Y/n, on the other hand, didn't feel the same, but something about the way he said "It's you." reminded her of how they found eachother the first time.

She was doing a typical walk of shame. It was six in the morning. Her heels hanging loosely from her fingers as she tugged on her cocktail dress. She should've planned a bit better, or at least stored emergency cash in her bra for a cab. The party she went to wasn't far from her apartment, but walking two miles with a hangover isn't ideal. She was halfway there. Ignoring the stares and mutterings from strangers was harder the more she woke up, and she just wanted to be home.

"Hey! It's you!" The familiar man rolled down his window once again. This time he was laughing.

"Hey." She smiled a bit and her head hung loosely from her neck. "Did you want your sweatshirt back?"

"No, you keep it. Did you want a ride this time?" The way he smiled made her trust him. If he was going to kidnap her, he would've done it the first time.

"Yeah, sure." She hopped in the passengers seat and told him where she lived.

"Have a long night?" He asked her as he pressed his foot lightly on the gas. He would usually speed down this road, but he wanted as much time with her as possible.

"You could say that." She looked down at her lap, not sure of his intentions, before she realized she didn't even know his name. "I'm y/n." She introduced herself, studying his brown hair and clean shaven beard.

"Jeff." He nodded slightly as he turned into the apartment complex.

"Y/n." His voice snapped her back into reality.

"Jeff." She said, as if she hadn't been thinking about him for the past month.

"You know him?" Katy asked, remembering his face from the bar that night.

"Yeah, she knows me." Jeff walked a bit closer to them, a small dog waddling after him. "This is Nerf." He introduced his dog to Katy, already seeing that he'd need to distract her to be able to talk to y/n. It worked, Katy bent down and baby talked the little guy as Jeff pulled y/n into a hug.

"Jeff." She repeated. She didn't know if she wanted to hug him, or wanted to be as far away from him as possible.

"What're you doin' out here?" His accent was still as strong as ever. Y/n's seemed to fade for the most part as soon as she was out of Staten Island, but Katy still made fun of her for the way she pronounced 'coffee.'

"I have a job out here, production assistant." Her smile seemed hard and uninviting, but she was starting to warm up to him again.

"Hey, give me your number, maybe we can catch up sometime?" He noticed his friends were itching to leave so he rushed things along.

"It's the same as it's been for years. You probably still have it memorized." She waved him off with towards his friends, wondering if he actually still remembered it.

"Who was that?" Todd asked Jeff as he fell back into the group.

"Just an ex-girlfriend." He said, attempting to remember her number.

"Can I get your number? So if you need a ride again you can just call." Jeff was smooth as she held a hand on the door to his car.

"My phone's broken." She said. Jeff thought it was a lie at first, but something in her eyes told him that it was true.

"That's okay, we'll be seeing eachother again." He laughed a bit as her brows knitted together.

"How do you know that?" Her hand landed on her hip, heels still dangling from her fingers. She watched as Jeff turned off his car and got out.

"This is my apartment building too."

And so they saw eachother again. And again. And again. And one day she got a new phone.

"I don't have a pen, can you memorize it?" She asked Jeff on their third date. He'd left his phone at a friends house, but didn't want to forget to grab her number.

"I can try." He flashed his famous smile as she repeated the numbers. He made up a little song to remember it.

"What are you humming?" Todd asked Jeff as they continued down the trail back to their car.

"Just an old song I know."

♤♡◇♧

Dr. R. didn't think seeing Jeff again was a good idea, but she didn't explicitly state that y/n shouldn't go. So they met for coffee.

Jeff was a few minutes early, already sipping on an Americano when y/n walked into the small café. The smell of fresh coffee tickled her nose as she walked over to Jeff.

"I got you your favorite." He pushed a cup towards her as he studied her face. She looked a lot different than when they used to date. She was more mature, and you could see it in her eyes. There'd been a big change in her life, maybe it was Jeff leaving her, but he wanted to find out.

Her lips spread into a small smile as she tasted her favorite drink. It had the right amount of sugar and flavor and cream, and she made a mental note of that.

Her chair was a bit uncomfortable, the metal back cold on her shoulder blades, so she sat up straight, probably looking like she was trying too hard to present herself as perfect.

"I'm sorry." He admitted, it was the right thing to say.

"I'd hope so." Her voice was quiet, she felt small compared to him.

Awkward silence ensued, but neither of them had much to say. She looked down at her lap, but he bore his eyes into her. He missed her, and he wanted her to be his once again.

Just like that they were back. It was as if something clicked into place and they picked up right where they left off.

♤♡◇♧

He was so familiar. Everything about him was exactly the same, but also extraordinarily different. They fell in love all over again, spending nights just studying eachother, and taking pop quizzes on how much they remembered from the first time around.

It was 2am, they stayed up a little late, smoking some weed and playing cards.

"Why do you have all the puppy toes?" Jeff slammed his cards on the bed, frustrated that he was losing by a mile.

"Oh my God, I haven't heard that in years." She glanced over her straight. Every card was in the suit of clubs, and she smiled as she looked back up at Jeff.

"Probably because I'm the only person that calls clubs 'puppy toes'."

I remember when you first said it, I couldn't stop laughing.

"My grandma taught me how to play cards, but I could never remember the suits." Jeff started as y/n dealt. They power went out and they had nothing better to do, so why not play cards?

"What'd she make up a song or something?" She laughed, placing the deck to her left and flipping a card over before picking up her hand.

"Well the diamonds and hearts were easy, but she called the spades 'spearheads' and the clubs 'puppy toes,' you know, 'cause they look like little paw prints."

Y/n burst out into a fit of laughter, the words 'puppy toes' exiting her mouth between wheezes.

"Why is that so funny?" Jeff couldn't help but laugh, her happiness was contagious.

"Because she could've called them 'paws' or 'paw prints' but instead she called them 'puppy toes!'"

She was wheezing all over again at the memory. "I still dont understand why it's so funny." Jeff felt comfortable, like they were reliving old times, sitting forever in a happy memory.

Her laughter died down and they were stuck for a moment, staring at eachother.

"I love you, all over again, more than the first time." Jeff's stare bore into her eyes. His words usually sounded flat, perfect to go along with his dry, deadpan sense of humor, but he sounded real this time. He sounded more human.

"I don't think I ever stopped loving you." Y/n replied, dropping the cards, a pile of puppy toes laying between them as she kissed him. Soon she moved, climbing into his lap, sloppy yet fulfilling kisses occupied their faces. Jeff's hands did most of the work, tickling her lightly as they slid up her thighs, around the curves of her ass. His long fingers hooked onto her shirt as his hands continued upward. They disconnected for a moment as her shirt passed over her head.

Jeff leaned back, bringing her with him. Her shorts rode up as she grinded on him, feeling him grow beneath her.

She missed the feeling of his skin on hers, so much that she was glued to him. Bare. Skin on Skin. No protection as her chest stuck to his. He felt her breasts bouncing as he moved her hips up and down on his own.

They both felt cloudy, a nice fog through their brains, the weed channeling all focus to the sensations shared between them.

They were loud. Screaming, moaning, happy, euphoric.

She'd later tell her therapist that it was the best sex she'd ever had, hell the best sex they'd ever had. Her therapist would congratulate her, not really knowing what else to say.

They finished together. Ending up as a heaping pile of skin and juices. They breathed for a moment.

Holding onto eachother like they'd never been held before.

Ten minutes later they were holding hands, naked, and staring at the ceiling. They felt so vulnerable, yet so comfortable with eachother.

"I'm sober now." Jeff confessed. "I know we just smoked weed, but I haven't drank alcohol in months." He was already looking at her when she turned to him.

"Really?"

"Really."

It wasn't the pillow talk she expected, but it was something she needed to hear. She immediately trusted him, and felt like her choice in getting back together with him was justified.

But she couldn't help but think of the first time they broke up.

He blamed it on being drunk. A picture from some anonymous number depicted Jeff face fucking some random chick. Y/n was furious. She felt her heart shatter for the first time when she saw the picture. She knew it was real, and it was recent. He'd just gotten that new tattoo, it was still scabbed over in the picture. She'd put ointment on it for him just a few minutes prior to recieving the horrid image.

She was speechless. Having nothing yet everything to say to him.

Still, he blamed it on being drunk.

They were apart for three weeks. She hoped he had enough time to get it out of his system before he begged for her forgiveness. She missed him, and reluctantly took him back.

That was the first time.

"Thank you for telling me that." She squeezed his hand lightly before getting up to pee.

Laying on his chest, she realized why she'd missed him all this time. It was the tiny little things that made her happy. She made some stupid joke, referencing an old inside joke that only they knew about. The way she could feel his laughter through his chest. She wouldn't even mind being deaf as long as she could still feel his laughter, feel him. Everything was how it was supposed to be.

♤♡◇♧

Things were perfect for a while.

Katy had her own minor crush on Jeff, but y/n trusted her, and knew she just thought he was hot, nothing more. Y/n loved Jeff's friends. They were hilarious and they made her feel like she'd been friends with them for years.

They welcomed her to the group with open arms, as did Jeff's fans. His fans didn't know what to think of her at first, and she'd seen her name tossed around on a few gossip sites, but overall everything was good.

Things were perfect until they weren't.

♤♡◇♧

She always had a deep-seated feeling of unease when she wasn't with Jeff. She trusted him, and his soberness, but there was still that fear. Fear, sitting inside of her chest, like a child hiding from its mom in the coat racks of a department store.

She knew the kid was there, and that it would come out eventually.

The fear always dissipated when she was with Jeff, when they were just hanging out alone. She had nothing to worry about.

They'd been back together for three months. Three wonderful months of laughter and learning and loving and sex.

Jeff surprised her, a bouquet of flowers and a loving note telling her to be ready by seven.

She got dressed up, smiling to herself in the mirror before answering the door. Jeff kissed her and took her out to dinner.

It was lovely, a cute little date at a fancy restaurant, and time alone with her boyfriend. Jeff was expecting sex after their date. Y/n was too, but their plans got thrown off after dinner. The new guy at the restaurant hadn't cleaned her protein properly, leaving her and a handful of other patrons to take off work for the next week. Food poisoning was a bitch.

"I don't feel good." She told Jeff. He took her home, promising to stay with her and make sure she was okay.

She puked her guts out, drank the juice he gave her, and passed out in her bed. He could feel her sickness in the air, and did not want to sleep next to her, but he promised he would stay, so he grabbed a pillow and a blanket and headed out onto the couch in the living room.

"Hey." He sat next to Katy who was watching some girly movie on the TV.

"Did you get in a fight?" She pointed at the pillow and chuckled.

"No, she just doesn't feel good." He smiled. He'd never spent much time with Katy, but he did know she was a simple creature. She lived and breathed Starbucks and glitter, and he couldn't handle too much of her at once. She was gorgeous, though, he couldn't deny that.

It was late, and something about the hours between morning and night when the world is quiet just changes people. They get sloppy, don't think straight. They feel free, almost a little too free, like anything the do could be done without consequences.

It was almost like being drunk on freedom.

Y/n woke up to her stomach grumbling once again. Not in the 'Hey! I'm hungry!' kind of way, but as if her stomach was mad at her. She sat up and pulled her sweat-soaked shirt from her body. She felt horrible.

She wandered out into the living room and towards the kitchen of their small apartment, wondering if there was any Pepto Bismol laying around. She opened the fridge, the light inside causing her to squint.

The three-sided bottle was lodged in the door and she grabbed it, quickly chugging the small amount of pink liquid left. As she closed the fridge she heard something. Giggling.

Her head whipped around towards the couch, noticing Jeff's absence. She wondered for a moment if he left, but his phone was on the table.

She'd forgotten all about her food poisoning as she creeped up to the door of Katy's room.

Her breathing stopped as she attempted to be as quiet as possible.

"Jeff!" She heard Katy giggle, a little moan following it.

"Shh, you're gonna wake her up!"

Y/n stood there for a long time. Hearing every skin slap and giggle and moan. Random word seemed to stick in her head as she listened.

Condom. Jeff. She never has to know. I'm gonna cum.

She didn't know how long she'd been there, or when she started crying, but eventually she was back in her bed, pretending to sleep as Jeff peeked in to check on her.

Her heart was broken. It had already been hastily taped back together the other three times Jeff broke her heart, but now it was gone. There was no more tape.

She felt like she died. Like her soul was gone. She was wretching for air like a fish out of water. Suffocating in her own tears. The only thing she could do was cry.

"You knew this would happen." She told herself as she sat up. She couldn't sleep, between puking and heartbreak, she was the most exhausted yet awake she'd ever been. Her sadness had turned into anger and a fuck-it attitude.

"Once a cheater always a cheater. Fucking fuck!" Her whispers to herself were harsh as she opened her laptop, finding the first flight home. She needed to be home, where it all started. Where she was before she even met him. She'd forgotten about him once, and she could do it again.

She booked the flight. She had two suitcases and a duffle bag, each filled to the brim with things she wanted and needed. All the stupid movie tickets from her and Jeff's dates were left on her dresser. Pictures of her and Katy long abandoned were thrown into a drawer. She left what she could live without, and left what would remind her of them.

She had her things and her uber was arriving soon. She quickly wrote a check, this months rent, tossing it on the messy bed. She had an idea right as she was leaving and grabbed a post-it note. She couldn't decide which cliche was better, but eventually she settled on one.

They always said that history repeats itself, and I never believed them.

Now I do. ♡

She moved her bags to the front door and placed the sticky note on Jeff's phone. He was passed out on the couch, the rising sunlight just starting to hit his face.

She stared at him for a few moments. He was beautiful. She loved so many things about him. She wondered if she was making a mistake, but then she remembered what he did. She'd given him a second chance, hell, a hundred second chances, and he still fucked it up.

She'd blamed it on the alcohol before, but she knew full well he was completely sober last night.

♤♡◇♧

The driver put her bags in the trunk and started towards the airport. She figured her mom wouldn't mind a surprise and the opportunity to have her around for a few weeks until she got her shit together. And sometimes you just need your mom. You need her to hold you like you're still little, like you scraped your knee up real bad and she was the only thing that would make you feel better.

The sun was fully up now. Jeff would be awake soon, and she couldn't tell if he would call or not. Would he call to try and stop her? Or would he simply not care?

She checked her phone, simply for the time, or maybe a text, and noticed her wallpaper. A picture of her and Jeff. She was kissing his cheek. She hated the way her faced looked in that picture, but the way Jeff looked was more important than that at the time. He was smiling. Dimples poking through his beard. His eyes looked kind and filled with love. She couldn't even stand to look at him anymore, but she didn't have the heart to change the picutre.

She decided that she was the one who didn't care and turned her phone off. The only two people she talked to had betrayed her and she didn't want to hear from them.

The farther she got from Jeff, the more the sadness set in. She stared out the window dramatically, thinking about him and how this whole situation seemed like a cheesy music video.

A thought crossed her mind as they drove past a car dealership. All the cars seemed so shiny, so perfect as they sat there, but once you buy it, once it's yours, things change. It's no longer a perfect new car. It's nice for a while, sure, but eventually theres a spider nest under the back seat, a few stray fries in the cupholder, some bird shit on the roof that nobody would notice for months.

Everything seemed perfect until it was yours. You ruin it. You don't take care of it the way you should. Even if the inside is impeccable, there's always the bird shit on the roof.

♤♡◇♧

She was forced to turn on her phone and see his face when the flight landed. She was in the back of a cab as she cancelled her therapy sessions for the next month. Of course, it seemed logical that now would be the time for therapy, and Dr. R. offered to host video sessions, but y/n wasn't thinking logically. She was thinking about getting home, crying into her mom's arms, and crawling into a cave of blankets and pillows for a few weeks.

Tears were already flowing as she walked up to the door. "Y/n!" She opened the door, excited at first to see her, but her tone changing as soon as she saw the state her daughter was in. "Baby." She opened her arms and y/n jumped right into the hug, wailing as she cried.

"I thought he was different." Her words were muffled by her mother's sweater.

"Let's run you a bath."

♤♡◇♧

It'd been a few days back home, and the news had spread that y/n was back and sad, and the kitchen was filled with casserole dishes full of lasagna and baked ziti from her mother's friends. The food was delicious, but she couldn't help but be reminded of Jeff every time she took a bite. The abundance of food was meant as condolences, as it always was in an Italian, New York neighborhood, and y/n knew this. It made her even more sad, sad that everyone knew and everything was going to shit.

"Can you go through your old clothes today? Geanie's daughter. . ." Y/n stopped listening and agreed, not really interested in the backstory of someone she'd met once when she was eighteen, or her supposed daughter.

The thing about heartbreak is that it's all you can think about, all you can feel, but the hardest part is forgetting, letting go, and getting over it. She attempted to remember how she got through it the first time.

"You have to accomplish one thing at a time." Her mom plopped down on her bed. Jeff was gone and he wouldn't talk to her. He'd blocked her number. He abandoned her. Left her in the dust as he went off to L.A. to get rich. She did feel abandoned, like everything she'd done the past few years was for nothing. The second chance she'd given him before was now worthless, and she wondered why she did it in the first place.

"Do you hear me? One thing a day. One thing at a time until you're okay again." Y/n looked up at her mother and nodded. "Today you're taking a shower."

Her one thing today would be sorting through clothes. Maybe finding some tshirt from college that would make her smile. So she spent the day on her bed, three tubs of clothes poured out in front of her, and a comedy special playing on the TV. She chuckled a bit every now and then, actually enjoying herself until she found something at the bottom of the pile.

Jeff's sweatshirt. The one that started it all.

"Take it." Jeff held the sweatshirt out of his window.

"No, I can't, it's yours." but she took it anyway.

It was a plain sweatshirt, nothing exciting, but she knew it was his by the stain on the hem. She'd always wondered what it was from, but never really found the time to ask. She held the cotton against her face, the scent climbing up into her nose. Of course it just smelled like her other old clothes, it'd been years, but she swore that if she sniffed hard enough, she could smell him. Not the Jeff she knew now, but the one that pulled up next to her on the street. The sweet guy that didn't want her to freeze to death. The shiny new car she was yet to buy.

She was crying now, holding the sweatshirt to her chest. A faint knock on the door downstairs was heard, but she paid no attention. It was probably just another baked ziti being delivered from her mom's card playing partner.

"Y/n!" Her mom called, alarming her. It wasn't another ziti. She wiped her eyes and headed down stairs, stopping when she saw who it was.

"I just wanna talk." Jeff pleaded. The anger and sadness filled her chest again and she continued down the stairs.

"Talk about how you cheated on me with my best friend?" The sharpness of her words made his heart hurt. He stepped inside, her mother closing the door before disappearing into the kitchen.

"You don't understand-" He started, but y/n wasn't having it.

"Don't understand what? That you slept with her while I was fucking sick? You couldn't fucking wait until I felt better?" She was screaming in his face, tears rolling down her cheeks, traveling the familiar path.

"Y/n-"

"No, let me fucking talk." She took a deep breath. "You told me you were sober. I fucking loved you for that. I thought that you wouldn't hurt me anymore. I fucking trusted you. A lot.

"Do you know how many second chances I've given you? because I've lost count. I'm over it. I'm done with you. Don't even try to tell me that she forced you into it because I know that's not true. I know you. I know what goes on in your brain. You fucking piece of shit."

Jeff was stunned. He didn't know what to say, or why he wanted her back. He knew he fucked up. He knew that he loved her. He knew what he felt for her, even still after all these years.

"You have to understand my feelings for you, and-" His words had no meaning to her, she wanted him gone, out of sight.

"Fuck you, and your feelings. Get out." She pointed towards the door. He stood still so she started pushing him. "Get out, just get the fuck out!" She screamed, barely moving his body.

"I love you!" He screamed back, now holding her shoulders in place. Her eyes locked with his. Hers were full of emotion, depth, deep sadness. His were nothing of the sort. They looked hollow, empty, only a tiny spark of emotion barely flickering through them. That was enough for her to know his true feelings.

"If you loved me we never would've broken up in the first place." She pushed him off of her, her voice quivering as she crossed him to open the door.

"You said in your note that history repeats, but it doesn't have to. We can change history. We can forget it all." He attempted to use her own words as a way to get through to her, but she was smarter than that.

"I already have forgotten it all, a million times over. I've let you back in only for the same shit to happen again. You can't change the past, Jeff." She turned and ran upstairs, grabbing his sweatshirt off her bed. He was walking down the driveway when she called his name. He thought for a moment that she'd changed her mind, that she did still want him.

"I don't need you to keep me warm anymore." She threw it at him, hitting him in the face. He let it fall to the ground, a tear falling from his eye as he looked back at her.

She slammed the door shut and there he was.

Left alone, back right where it all started.