#though whenever he is out and fixing things in his garden he will likely smell a little bit like dirt but. That's normal you know

[lususnatura]

alright, but i don't mean to be blamore's hype woman here (actually... / j nah i'm kidding LOL well, mostly), but it honestly is amazing just how fresh he smells like ALL the time. like you'll never catch this plant-monster slacking whenever it comes to personal hygiene even though its body is, well... different now, for lack of better words. and i say that in neither a good way or a bad way because it's like i said on my other account, he is quite pretty — albeit in an arguably haunting way.

i can just imagine that the flora growing on it makes things harder for him to like take baths and stuff, so he probably just takes short showers and tries to at least partially cover them up in some way so they don't drown. but trust me when i say both his hair and the way he smells in general is HEAVENLY + very much like rain and sort of gives off an herbal scent as well because of the soap it uses tehe

[littleplantfreak]

Down to my level

Headcanons Ft. Umemiya Hajime, and Togame Jo

These guys are 6'2 and I think 6'1 respectively so have some writing about being shorter than them cause I'm 5'7ish and wanna climb them like a tree literally. Some ended up not being about height because i got off track thinking about Ume's arms //shrugs

Umemiya Hajime

Loves ruffling hair and he thinks it's endearing when you try to do it yourself to him. Catch him while hes squatting in the garden for perfect ruffling opportunities. (maybe a smooch or two as well)

He will seat you on things when he's kissing you so he doesn't get a cramp in his neck, or better yet just wrap your legs around his waist and he'll hold you up. Give those big arms of his a workout, he'll be more than happy to hold you.

Can't help but grab things for you if they're too high. If you have a problem with that he makes sure to have a step stool. (Just stop putting things so high? Nah he thinks it's cute when you're on your tip toes)

King of carrying - once again he is a big guy so he can do princess carries, piggybacks, fireman's carry, you name it. He's even tried carrying you under his arm like a football though it's not the cutest carry to be in.

He's easy to pick out in a crowd even if he didn't have white hair so you don't really have to worry about losing him.

Blocks out the sun really well or if you're hiding from someone you can basically disappear behind him.

His height also helps in games of chicken fights when you're in the pool or at the beach. Sturdy af AND tall? Y'all are unstoppable no matter how short you are.

"How's the weather up there?"

"Oh! Wanna find out?" Before you can answer he's wiping his hands off and scooping you up effortlessly, arms looped around your waist. Hands resting on his shoulders, you're a few inches taller than him like this. "What do you think?"

"Crystal clear skies...approximately 76 degrees fahrenheit and," you lick the tip of your pointer finger, sticking it out, "wind is blowing from the west. Not to mention the scenery up here is so much prettier than down there." He puffs out a laugh when you gaze at him a little lovestruck as you say the last part.

"You think I'm pretty?" he whispers, looking up at you for once.

"Illegally so." Your answer is so serious it's got his heartbeat taking off and he couldn't fight the smile if he tried.

"Y'know my normal weather man told me the exact same thing this morning!"

"So he's my competition?" You huff and giving him a pat on the arm signalling for him to put you down. Instead, he lowers you just enough so you're eye level with him, noses brushing lightly. Being this close you can smell the dirt from his gardening and the lingering of his minty shampoo from earlier this morning.

"You win every time sweetheart."

Togame Jo

Uses his height for good - usually. Kisses the top of you're head when you aren't paying attention to him.

If you're a brat he'll hold something you want just high enough for you to start jumping for it (thats the evil). He's impossible to knock down or and weighing his arm down to grab it doesnt work either. If Choji's around you can enlist his help in getting it since his jumps are always impressive. He accepts payment in candy though.

Also a carrier. He likes piggybacking you places the best. Especially in the winter cause you're extra toasty.

He's good at typing hair up and can help whenever you have a bad hair day. He's got a full view so he'll fix it as soon as its messed up.

loves being dragged down by his shirt to be kissed. He wears that gi sometimes though I don't know if thats the correct name for what he wears. In jiu jitsu its really solid and tough near the neck areas so you can pull and maneuver you're partner around? In any case when I see him wearing it I just wanna cross collar grip it and drag him on the floor (lovingly I swear) (I think its a gi?? I know he wears monks clothes so they might just be really similar)

You are not in a good mood. Togame's holding the last strawberry ramune over your head with a small frown and refuses to give it back. If anything you should be the one frowning. Sure you snapped at him because you were a bit grumpy, and it wasn't even his fault but you're tired, it's raining, and thats the last strawberry ramune.

"All ya gotta say is 'sorry' doll. I'll even open it for you if you want." he drawls slow as ever.

"I can get it," the words are punctuated by small hops and desperate grabs at air. You're even more winded than before and Togame's just deciding whether he should give in when Choji rounds the corner. A small gasp as a light bulb goes off in your head seeing Shishitoren's leader. "Choji I CHOOSE YOU!" You yell, pointing straight at the drink being held hostage. He moves before any thought can cross his mind as he makes a high jump between the you and Togame, successfully grabbing your prize. As he's handing you the ramune, you root around your hoodie pocket for the last few candies and trade him.

"Nice doing business with you! That wasn't very nice though Kame-chan" Choji chirps and waves before being lured away by the sounds of the other members laughing and talking about going out for karaoke.

There's a moment of quiet before you peek to the side to stare at your boyfriend. You realize you haven't been nice either and bite the bullet. Roll the ramune over in your hands, you look down at your feet.

"I'm sorry I've been grumpy at you. Think I'm just tired. 's no excuse but-" The drink is gone, being popped open by deft hands before Togame gives it back with a silent nod.

"There's a couch in one of the rooms down the hall. Want me to carry you?"

"You gonna lay with me?"

"That's the plan, yeah." Whether it's from the weather or from fighting with you, you can tell he's tired too.

"Good. And yes please." Your voice is soft as you reach up, wrapping your arms around his shoulders.

"There's my sweet girl," he grunts, hoisting you up in a princess carry and making his way to one of the back rooms further from the noise of the other boys in the theater.

[radio-fmm]

Apple juice

Sanji x gardener!reader

Warnings: just pure fluff, fem reader, two idiots in love but they don’t know

Word count: 1,093 words

Summary: In which Robin got tired of Sanji just watching you and asked for an apple juice

°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･

Sanjis favorite activity? Cooking of course! everyone knew that, but watching you from afar might be up there with it.

He decided to smoke a little before dinner prep, but really it was just an excuse to watch you take care of the Sunny’s garden, your earthly powers had come in handy for the crew, since the food shortage and spending ridiculous amounts of money on food was resolved since you joined.

He watched as you looked at the apples making sure they were ready to pull out of the tree

He loved how you always had beautiful golden jewelry adorning your neck, and how adorable you looked in your gardening overalls, with your locks intertwined in a beautiful braid and leaving trails of flowers and green grass behind you whenever you walked.

You were always unapologetically yourself, which always enchanted Sanji, even though you were just gardening he thought you looked out of this world.

“Beautiful day isn’t?”- Sanji jumped, he immediately looked back to see Robin smiling at him while holding a book, had she noticed what he was actually doing out on deck?- “Oh yes absolutely my dear” he answered stumbling a little bit and dragging his cigarette “Would you like a refreshment to accompany this fine evening, tigress?” Robin giggled between her teeth, she was well aware of the cooks “admiration” if you could call it that towards you, but she just couldn’t understand why he just wouldn’t go and talk to you.

“Actually”-she grinned “I would love an apple juice fresh from the garden” Oh he was caught red handed for sure. Sanji could feel the red creeping from his neck to his ears, but he could never decline a woman’s wishes could he? “O-Of course, on it my dear!” He walked away trying to look as cool and fresh but Robin could see right through him, was he nervous?.

As he went down to the garden, he could hear the birds chirping along with you humming a folky tune, he noticed how golden your skin was for being under the sun, rosy cheeks and the smell of flowers just made you look so heavenly. He hesitated to go in the garden, as if you were a beautiful painting that could get smudged if he step any closer.

Your humming got louder as you approached the end of the garden, Sanji still frozen in place- “Oh! Hi Sanji!” You said smiling brightly glad to see the cook, he fixed his stand, threw his cigarette away and cleared his throat “Evening flower, I hope you don’t mind a little company today?” He walked slowly but steady, also smiling back at you I mean how could he not?- “Need a restock?” Not gonna lie, it hurt him a little that you always thought he wanted to talk to you only when he needed something.

“Just need some fresh apples for an apple juice, want some? Flower” he said while looking at the beautiful trees “ah I love apple juice!” You sighed whipping the sweat that formed in your forehead “I mean if it’s no trouble”

Sanji loved learning stuff about you, he knew how much you loved sweet things how fitting for you, how you always bought golden necklaces at every island you’ll dock, how sea sick you’ll get during strong waves, how easily you’ll flush at his compliments and flirting… and how sometimes you worked twice as hard to feel deserving of being part pf the crew, and how you never wanted to be a trouble for anyone.

He couldn’t understand how someone as bright, fearless and kind as you could feel like a burden hmm where has he heard that before?

“But sunlight, I am the cook that’s my job, besides doing anything for you is no trouble ever” oh that nickname, he only used it whenever you guys were alone, it made your stomach turn and your heart skip a beat. You looked away trying to hide your cheeks that went from dusted pink to bright red from the blonde man.

You cleared your throat and walked to the trees to pick up the apples- “Lucky you these are ready and fresh” you said holding one in your hand a passing it to Sanji, your hands brushing. The cook taking advantage, pressed his hand on yours so you wouldn’t let go, taken aback you glanced at him eyes wide, he whispered “You know I really do mean that, right?” His blue eyes examined every inch of your face, like he had never looked at you before.

As flirty and cool he wanted to seem, he actually was shaking a bit, he had never touched you, in fact he always kept a distance, like you were some fragile rare gem that would shatter in his touch, but seeing you overthinking was a no go for him, Sanji always wanted to make sure you knew how valuable and important you were to the crew… and to him.

You held his gaze for a moment, admiring his features and enjoying how the wind made his golden locks dance, being able to see both of his ocean eyes that pierced you. “Yes, I know.. thank you” your words held so much weight, like you really wanted him to know that his reassurance ment a lot to you. You squished his hand and smiled, sincerely.

Sanji thought his heart would jump out of his chest when you smiled at him, he was almost sure you were the daughter of the sun, because there was no way a human could smile as bright and warm as you did.

“Let me pick some more apples and I’ll help you make that apple juice”- you broke the enchantment you had put that poor man in, turned around and got lost in the dancing trees.

Did you just offered to help him in the kitchen? Oh my Sanji had to stop himself from physically celebrating, he felt like the luckiest man on earth right now.

Usually when anyone would offer to help him on anything in the kitchen he would decline immediately, but this time- “Yes” he sighed absolutely love strucked “I’d actually love that, sunlight”

Robin who has been witnessing the whole thing from afar smiled proudly, “I can’t believe you just managed that” Nami exclaimed beside her “I’ve been playing cupid with those two for months!” The dark haired woman giggled

“Sometimes you just have to be patient”

Let’s just say Robin had to wait a really long while to taste that apple juice.

°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･

Ngl I love this I had so much fun writing it I might post more about them two make it a series idk lmk what you think

[drabblesandimagines]

Little Bird

Jing Yuan x gn reader (consensual bondage) 1,447 words

-

“Are you sure you’d still like to do this, little bird?”

You nod. You’re sat on Jing Yuan’s bed, garbed only in your night clothes - white lace. You’d wanted to look pretty, though he assures you it’s impossible for you not to be. You’d napped together before, of course you had, but the only issue now is he is also in his nightwear, which isn’t a lot. Soft sleeping pants and a shirt which is unbuttoned, revealing his toned chest to where your eyes are currently fixed.

“I need to hear it,” he chastises oh-so-gently, sitting down besides you and taking your hand, stroking across your knuckles with his thumb.

“Yes, I’m sure.”

You’ve always been painfully shy – a result of your sheltered upbringing. It’s a miracle your relationship with the white-haired man has even got this far. The first time you’d been introduced and he pressed a kiss against the back of your hand in greeting, you had heart palpitations for days after at the memory of it. He’d been charmed immediately by your sweet nature and orchestrated chance meetings which led into tea dates, enamoured by how easily flustered you seemed to get from his words only. He’d only ever been a gentleman in your courtship. It was only recently, at your determination, that you’d began a more physical aspect to the relationship.

Jing Yuan was a very patient teacher, always going by your pace of things but therein lied the issue. You’d get so nervous about what you were doing or not meant to be doing whenever the two of you kissed, lost in your own head. He’d organised a private dinner on a blanket in the most beautiful garden, surrounded by candlelight, and it had ended in tears when your nerves got the better of you during a passionate embrace. The sweet man cuddled you close into his chest, assuring you any moment within your company was enough.

This evening was his suggestion, one which he had raised with extreme hesitation, worried he’d frighten you away. Jing Yuan seemed almost flustered as you when he raised it – a very cute sight - stressing he only would dream of suggesting it because you wanted to overcome your hurdle and he’d hated seeing you so upset. When a bird is distressed, covering their eyes calms them down and he wondered if the same would work on his own little bird.

“Would you like to lie down first?”

“Okay,” you nod, already feeling the nerves building. You scoot back on the large bed, until your head comes to rest on the array of pillows at the top. You put your hands down by your side, then clasp them on your stomach, before back by your side. Jing Yuan smiles warmly at you, “Beautiful, as always.”

He has a scarf in his hand now – you’re not sure where it came from – as he clambers onto the bed, crawling up alongside you before looking down, his hair cascading around him, bathed in soft light.

“Ready, my darling?”

“I’m ready.”

“And do you remember the word we agreed on?”

Jing Yuan had suggested a word which meant that the two of you would stop immediately. He said it needed to be a word that wouldn’t come up in the general flow of things and, of course, there was one that jumped out straight at you.

“Mimi.”

“Good.” He nods. “Now, can you lift your head up for me a little?”

You do so and take one last look at his chest before the fabric is placed over your eyes - the world goes black as he gently knots it around the back of your head, careful not to catch any of your hair.

“Can you see me, little bird?”

“No.” You lay your head back down on the pillows, your fingers now fidgeting with the sheet beneath you.

There’s a moment of silence – you wonder if he’s perhaps testing to see if you can’t actually see anything. A hand clasps your own as his weight shifts on the bed. He’s now straddling you between his thighs but not leaning his full weight on you.

“Is this all right?”

You nod, though your heart is now pounding.

“Words, please”. His breath is on your face, it smells of peppermint tea. You wonder how close he is now.

“Yes.”

Soft lips press against yours – cautious, tender, gentle. You try and concentrate on kissing back, matching his rhythm… but still you’re wondering where you should be putting your hands. Yes, he’s holding one, but what do do with the other? Should you be placing it on his shoulder, or his face? But then you might smack him due to the blindfold. You bring it up cautiously, keeping it low to the mattress until it’s by your face and gently intertwine your fingers within his hair, occasionally your fingers finding the silky ribbon he uses to keep it in place. He deepens the kiss then, releasing your other hand, his tongue running along your lips, seeking entrance. Maybe you should put both of your hands on his waist now, his shoulders, flat against his toned chest, or back in his hair… Why is this still so awkward? Maybe this was a bad idea, you’re just all the more conscious of your limbs now. You release his hair slowly, placing your hand back down and hesitate in the kiss, pulling back slightly.

Suddenly, fingers grip around your wrist and pull it up above your head. Your other hand soon joins it, pinned into place by his large hand and you gasp, allowing his tongue entrance at last. You can feel him smile into the kiss, his tongue trying to dance with your own. His weight shifts a little and the pressure on your captured wrists forces out a moan.

After a moment, Jing Yuan pulls back slightly. “May… May I suggest something, darling?”

You let out a shuddering breath. Why does it sound like he’s flustered? “Of course.”

He places a hand on the side of your face, caressing your cheek with his thumb. “Correct me if I am mistaken, however you seemed to quite enjoy when I pinned your wrists down. I wondered if you’d permit me to bind them.”

You couldn’t argue with his analysis – it was nothing like you’d felt before. “You may.”

“Wonderful. Let me think…” He kisses you again – small, quick pecks – as his mind works. “Ah, yes. Don’t move.” He releases your wrists and you feel his weight shift again, sort of like he’s sitting back. It isn’t long before his weight moves again and you feel something silky wrap around your wrists as he gently knots them together.

“What is it?”

“My hair ribbon. Soft but strong. We’ll just wrap this bit around here…” Your wrists get tugged up a little further and by the tautness of the binds you realise he’s looped the end around the bedframe, tethering you in place.

“How does that feel? Not too tight, I hope.” His fingers caress your wrists, checking it’s not digging in.

“No, it feels nice. Reassuring.” The fingers leave your wrists. “Is that silly?”

“Of course not.” His thumb rubs against your lip. “I like it – very much. My nervous little bird, calm and subdued.” He runs his thumb down to under your chin, tilting it up, and lays light kisses on your neck and you relax into it – almost as if all the pressure that had been building up has been released despite your compromising position.

You feel his hair tickle your shoulders as he continues his exploration of your neck, apparently determined to kiss every inch after being denied of it for so long – if he had dared tried before you’d squirm away, arms up to stop his endeavours. Of course you still try but your hands stay firmly in place and that only increases the pleasurable sensations. It doesn’t take long until he finds a particularly sensitive spot, coaxing another moan out of you.

He trails kisses up your neck and along your jaw, before up to your lips once more, slipping in his tongue with no fight. You can’t think of anything else but his lips, the weight of him upon you, the slight tickle on your collarbones from his hair.

He moves back down to your neck again, nipping ever so lightly at the skin. “I’d call this a success, wouldn’t you?” He murmurs into your neck.

“Very much so.”

“Are you ready for the next stage?” You swear you can feel him smirk into your neck.

“The next…?”

“I’m going to find a spot that makes you moan my name, darling.”

-

Can you tell I'm obsessed with this man and his dang hair ribbon?

Masterlist . Requests welcome . Ko-fi

Details for my event celebrating 200 followers.

[ravendruid]

Hi 👋 I would love to see Vaxleth in number 27 kissing in the rain 💛 I love your writing so much btw

Hii!!! Thank you so much for sending a prompt! :D I hope you like it as much as I do ^_^ (And thank you for the compliment :D :D :D)

A Kiss In The Rain

(Read on AO3)

Rain is fun until it isn’t and, at this point, Vax’ildan is getting fed up of the second day of pouring outside. He wants to get out of this stuffy, snobby, much-too-large castle where he feels like he’s being watched at every moment of the day, which he probably is, considering his stomach can’t growl without a servant immediately coming over with a tray of food.

It doesn’t help that everyone he wants to hang out with is locked in the workshop with Percival, going over sketches, doing calculations, and planning things that are far more complicated than what Vax’s brain can comprehend. It sucks that both his sister and his girlfriend instantly bury themselves with work whenever they visit. 

“Mr. Vax’ildan?” A young maid calls his attention. Vax rolls his eyes at the title and looks over his shoulder, decided to give her a word or two about calling him that, but then he sees she is holding a piece of folded parchment and nods instead. “This is for you,” She says, handing the paper.

“From whom?” Vax asks, politely as he takes hold of it. He recognizes the feel of the parchment from the same in Percival’s sketch book. If this is a summons to that stuffy, smoldering workshop… 

“Miss Keyleth, sir,” The maid replies. The title, again, makes Vax’s stomach roil. Why would Keyleth send him a written note through a maid when she can just call him on the earring?

“Thank you,” Vax nods, then leaves the maid behind. 

The note is simple and effective—Meet me at the Widow’s Garden, right now—but it doesn’t answer any more of Vax’s questions. Nonetheless, Vax still obeys because that’s his super-powerful druid girlfriend who can call lightning, and he’s not sure she won’t do just that if he fails to show up when she summons him.

“Keyleth?” Vax calls as he transposes the unlocked iron gate. The garden has had better days, but Vax knows Keyleth has been working with Percy to fix it. “Is there a reason why you called me to meet you out here? It’s fucking pouring, love.” He calls again, to no response.

Vax wanders around for a minute or two, looking in every nook and cranny for the familiar flaming red hair of his girlfriend or for any out-of-place animals, but he doesn’t see anything. He’s almost determined to head back to the castle when he hears a twig snapping behind him.

“Who’s there?” He holds two daggers out in front of him, ready to face the threat.

“Relax, Vax. You know I could snap you in two before you even flung that thing at me,” Keyleth mocks him. She’s not totally wrong. 

“Hey,” Vax greets her. He allows his shoulders to sag with relief and stores the daggers back in their belt. He sees her now, so beautiful and soaked to the bone, just like he is. Her beautiful teal dress sticks to her skin, hugging all her curves, which makes Vax smirk as he lets his gaze wander to her chest.

“My eyes are up here,” Keyleth hooks her finger under Vax’s jaw to bring his face back up. She’s smiling knowingly, a smile she always gives him when she catches him adoring her—which happens way too often.

“Not my fault you wanted to meet in the rain,” Vax shrugs. He wraps his arms around her waist and laces his fingers at her back. Keyleth does the same around his neck. “Why, though? I’m soaked and miserable, and I’m gonna smell like a wet dog.”

“I’ll dry you up, don’t worry,” She smiles. Vax could get lost in her smile. It’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen—correction, Keyleth is the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. “I figured you were bored up there and you needed to get some air.”

“In the rain?”

Keyleth nods. Vax holds his breath when she leans her forehead down to his and closes her eyes. He feels her breath in deeply, as if she’s trying to commit the scent of him in the rain to memory, then exhale. “I–I wanted to do something,” She mumbles, allowing Vax to hear the sound of insecurity in her voice. It’s only with him that Keyleth lets down the mask and allows herself to feel and talk about her insecurities, which Vax appreciates. He believes in her more than he has ever believed in anyone, so he knows she can be confident and strong, but Keyleth still needs reassurance once in a while, and he’s glad he’s there to give her that when she needs it the most.

“In the Widow’s Garden, in pouring rain?” Vax teases her by wiggling his eyebrows. 

“W–what? No! Vax!” Keyleth scolds him playfully. “It’s not t–that!”

“Alright, then, what is it, love? Should I be worried you’re attempting to kill me, then?” Vax keeps teasing his girlfriend until she gives him a shaky smile. 

“I wanted to do this,” Keyleth ends up saying, more confident, and then she places her hands on the back of Vax’s head and brings him in for a kiss. 

When the shock at the intensity of the kiss passes, Vax fully embraces his half-elf druid girlfriend, raising a hand to steady her back as he responds by deepening the kiss. His blood feels like fire at the feel of Keyleth’s body pressed against him, but not the kind of fire that usually makes them end up tangled in bed. No, this fire is different. This is a fire that makes Vax think about the future with Keyleth, to imagine the days of following her on her work trips; of her coming home to a hot, homemade meal and a nice, relaxing bath; of the tiny freckled, red-haired babies Vax would love to have with her one day. It’s a fire that makes him want to get on his knees and ask Keyleth to be truly, wholly his forever, to take him to be truly, wholly hers forever.

But the kiss ends and Vax regrets having to come back from his reverie. Yet, there is a different shine to Keyleth’s beautiful green eyes, a shine that lights a flame of hope inside of Vax that maybe, just maybe, Keyleth felt the same way he did just now, that one day she will take him by the hand and ask him to stay, because they both know that it is her step to take, not his. 

“Are you still angry at me for making you come out here in the rain?” Keyleth asks, fondly caressing his face.

“I could never be angry at you, Kiki. Never.”

Vax kisses her again, and again, and again. They stand kissing in the pouring rain until the clouds part and Vex’ahlia and Percival find them soaked but happy, with blushing faces, and once Keyleth dries them off with a touch of her magic and they join the other couple in the dining room, Vax thinks that, maybe after all, this castle isn’t that bad. As long as Vax has Keyleth at his side and his twin is happy in the arms of the man she loves, Vax knows they will be alright.

[ghostywriter]

My Extensive List of Backstories + Headcanons for the Devil's Nest Gang part 1: Dolcetto!

Born May 4, 1882

At the time of his death in the autumn of 1914, he was 32 years old.

His height is 5'5"

Dolcetto is his last name. He gave up his first when he joined the Nest.

His father is an Aerugonian immigrant and mechanic. His mother is from the islands surrounding Xing. She was a traveler and swordswoman for hire before settling down in South City.

He has 3 sisters-- Two older twins (born 1877) and one younger sister. (born 1887)

He was born in the southeast side of South City and grew up in a slums apartment.

He's always been short-statured and was often bullied for it as a child and teenager. He gets really annoyed when people comment on his height.

He met Martel in June 1890, when he was age 8. She helped defend him from those bullying him and quickly became his best friend. He liked her for protecting him and teaching him how to be stronger.

Upon Martel leaving for the North when he was 14, he stopped attending school as much during a period of depression. He dropped out when he was 16.

Dolcetto was drafted for the Aerugo border war at 19. In training, he met Martel again and they resumed their friendship.

Dolcetto was the one who rescued Martel after she stepped on a landmine. While he was saving her, he was shot in his spine and nearly died, thus leading to his use as a test subject.

He is trilingual, speaking and reading both of his parents' languages as well as Amestrian. He's distinctly bad at reading in Amestrian.

He has dyscalculia which has led him to dislike solving math problems and handling money.

He's trained in both judo and boxing. He hadn't done much training with swords until he'd joined the gang. He likes swords for their extensive history, the skill required to use them, because his mother was a swordswoman, and because one of his older sisters was a fencer. His current katana was a gift from Greed, though he collects additional antique swords.

Cooking is one of his biggest passions, partially thanks to both of his parents having been fantastic cooks who'd taught him. He's especially invested in Aerugonian cuisine and particularly likes hand-making pasta and noodles.

His favorite smells are lavender, sandalwood, rose, and tomatoes. The former two originate from his mother using lots of lavender incense when he was a child.

Martel cuts his hair. She's the only one that he trusts to do it.

He's prone to depression and anxiety, and the main way to alleviate both for him is to constantly stay working. Unfortunately, all of those contribute to his insomnia.

His favorite drink is espresso and his favorite food is udon.

He's a complete snob about tobacco and refuses to smoke cigarettes unless they're his only choice. The first thing that he bought for himself when he got settled into the Nest was his favorite kiseru.

He takes after his father and is very mechanically minded. Whenever anything needs to be fixed in the Nest, they bring it to him and he can fix it very quickly.

He loves cars and working on them, but he also has developed a significant fear of them that's probably caused by the dog genes.

He likes to help Bido with gardening, work out with Martel, dance with Greed, and play shogi with Roa.

He's an incredibly lightweight drinker. He also gets terrible hangovers and has a tendency to be incredibly emotionally volatile when drunk, often crying or ranting to Martel.

He has lots of scars, most notable of which are the ones from knife training with Martel that line his arms and burn scars on his ribs from torture. He also still has scars from being shot in the spine.

He regularly gets overstimulated from sounds and smells, so he's gotten used to figuring out his sensory limits.

He instinctually reacts happily to having his head and neck scratched, and Greed often makes fun of him for that.

He deals with chronic back and joint pain, so his wrist cuffs are for compression. He's also been known to use a cane on particularly bad days.

[franse1n]

© to the rightful maker of the header.

Grocery shopping with your husband!Miguel O'hara.

"Cariño?" Miguel softly says, opening the door to your bedroom and catching the sight of his beautiful wife getting ready for a Sunday morning.

His hands made it's way to your waist, hugging you from behind and burying his head onto your neck - engulfing the sweet smell of your perfume. "All ready?"

"Mhm, let's go." You smile warmly at him.

The engine starts and Miguel drove an Audi A4, his left hand on the stirring wheel while the other was placed on your thigh.

He sneaked a glace at you, just gazing the way your eyes were fixed on the grocery list you held. Sunday was his favorite day, it was the day where you were both free from work and finally having the time to be with one another.

Miguel didn't mind if he had to push a cart, carry eco bags, wait in line for hours; he didn't mind because it was with you, his lovely wife.

• Miguel once saw a tiktok video of a boyfriend tying a balloon on his partner's wrist to find her easily and he has been considering it to do with you but he resorted to just memorizing the aisles that you go in.

• Would match outfits with you. If he saw you were wearing a yellow dress, he would immediately change out of his favorite blue polo and into a yellow shirt.

• During one of your visits in the grocery, he saw you getting assisted by a male employee and ever since then he has always insisted on himself being the one to get the things you didn't reach.

• The moms on the hygiene aisle would coo at him and help him whenever you sent Miguel there to get pads and hygiene products. Eventually befriended some moms that would give him advice like how to help you during your periods and whatnot.

• He would leave you alone whenever you wait in line to disappear for a while. He'd buy some grocery flowers and your favorite drink to put it at your seat. By the time you finished paying, he'd be there getting the groceries while you open the door to be welcomed by a pair of flowers and drinks.

• Let's you swatch makeup on his wrist and palm because most of the shade compliments his skin colour. He'd stand there patiently, letting you take your time in choosing swatches.

• You sometime catch him smiling while gazing over parents and their children. Though most children find him intimidating, you knew he would make the best father.

• Holds your hands whenever you guys just shop light. Holding it up to his mouth and kissing it from time to time while causally picking out things like spices.

• Received a scolding from a manager once due to being caught in the CCTV spinning your around inside a pushing cart, before also scolding you in the car and you scolding him back.

my first tumblr post that's related to me writing, it's so fun. writing this while going to the bank and a restaurant. i hope you enjoy!

@ 2023copyrights franse1n ; please don't copy, steal, or translate my works.

[amporella]

what do you think stan and kyle’s interests would be like as they get older?

IM SORRY I’M SO LATE TO THIS!!!! But here are some of my thoughts (and my friends’ thoughts, since I consulted them very heavily):

Stan:

I think he stays interested in sports!! That being said, I don’t think he goes pro or anything, so how often he’s able to participate naturally dwindles once he graduates college and stops playing for the team. He definitely keeps up with the Broncos, though, and catches all of the football games he can. I imagine that he’d also coach for his kids’ sports teams as an adult!

He keeps loving animals, ofc. He wants a big dog as an adult, but Kyle turns him down. Were Kyle to actually agree to a dog, it would be a small really annoying one that Kyle puts in little outfits and carries around in a stroller. He spends some time volunteering at shelters during college to get his dog fix in, and maybe ends up getting the big dog of his dreams when Kyle figures that between a husband and two kids, someone’s bound to take care of it other than him.

Stan also likes woodworking! He chops and carves it, and even though he likes intact nature, he also likes making things out of it. He makes little wooden statues of things that he likes (animals, typically) but he always ends up going back to carving Kyle’s face. He gets very, very good at it. It’s very sweet until Kyle has like fifteen statues of his face that stare at him whenever he steps into his room, and he starts feeling less flattered and more creeped out.

Stan is super outdoorsy. He loves camping, fishing, and anything along those lines. He’s not much of a hunter though, mainly because it would make him sad to kill any animals. Kyle likes to keep his time outdoors very limited, so he isn’t super keen on it, but he does it for Stan anyway. He bitches the whole time, but secretly doesn’t mind it so much when Stan’s there.

Stan is also a Bowling Dad. He loves doing typical white dad things. He’s also very good at it because he’s still fairly athletic, while Kyle sucks at it and gets worse when he gets into the bowling alley drinks. They always go bowling for Stan’s birthday and Stan sweeps, followed by his daughter in 2nd place, his son in 3rd, and Kyle in last.

Kyle:

He likes reading! That being said, he likes it less than his room would lead you to believe; his real hobby is buying books that he doesn’t actually read because he likes feeling like an intellectual. He also encourages his kids to get into reading, but he’s terrible at practicing what he preaches. He tells them to get off their phones and read, then immediately goes and posts on Instagram.

I can’t take credit for this one because my perpetually correct friend suggested it, but Kyle would cross stitch. And it would be so cute. He would mostly do cute things like his kids’ names and little images that represent them (which they are naturally embarrassed by), as well as some pretty floral imagery. At times he rage stitches swears and combines them with those ‘basic’ wife imagery embroidery hoops, and hangs things up like ‘BLESS THIS FUCKING MESS’.

Kyle would birdwatch! He likes pretty much anything that he can track, and he keeps a whole journal of birds and marks down the ones that he sees. It’s one of the only outdoorsy things that he’s actually interested in, so Stan is very very supportive. Kyle looks like a total dork with his binoculars and his notebook, but Stan thinks it’s cute.

Kyle also just generally collects things, even beyond books. He collects pretty teapot sets and candles that he never actually lights, and so on and so forth. Stan asks if they can actually use those tea sets for something, and Kyle gets pissed at him for even considering endangering his beloveds. He also cries a little when one of his kids unknowingly lights one of his prized candles. It smells really good, though.

Both:

They’re both into gardening! Stan is more into growing food (so he can try and maintain his vegetarianism, which he never actually sticks to) and Kyle is a flower guy who ends up getting very invested in the language of flowers. They spend a lot of time out in the garden together and it’s very peaceful for both of them.

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THE ASK!! <3

[lannisterdaddyissues]

Ahhh sleepover!! 😆 need to know all your pennymav headcanons and also how was your day?

OMG SLEEPOVER WITH THE BESTIE WHAT WILL WE DO 😝💕🎶

^us rn <3

as for my day, it was really good!!!! i visited my parents today, we went out to dinner at this really nice backwoods restaurant! they had really delicious seafood and it was run on a farm, so they had a whole garden out back with a bunch of farm animals to go look at, plus i got to meet two of the restaurant cats and they were soooo sweet 🥺 one of them jumped up on the railing whenever i walked by because it wanted me to pet it and i just ughrsdghsrgfh kitties 💗

anyway PENNYMAV HEADCANONS !!!! GOD I LOVE THEM SM I WAS SO EXCITED TO SEE THIS IN MY INBOX BC I CANNOT THINK ABOUT THEM ENOUGH <33333 THEY ARE SO IMPORTANT TO ME

so without further ado, the goods:

penny was the first person mav serenaded in a bar when they were younger

penny liked to think she had high standards but mav had her as soon as he opened his mouth

he still sings to her in private but don���t make the mistake of asking him to sing in public. that right belongs to penny and penny alone

penny was actually the one who convinced mav to steal the f-18

she was literally insane back then

mav tells this story to everybody but they never believe him because penny is literally god’s perfect angel

penny thinks this is hilarious and gaslights him about it because she thinks it’s cute when he gets mad

mav is so easy though. all it takes to earn his forgiveness is a kiss on the cheek. #simp

brunch dates are their thing

they do go out for fancy dinners every once in a while, but casual settings are actually preferred because they don’t want to force their relationship, keeping things chill and low-key is fine with them

also, penny is OBSESSED with breakfast food

her go-to order is a stack of buttermilk pancakes with powdered sugar and fruit on it because she loves sweets and fruit

mav just orders something healthy and boring like avocado toast lol. he’s a health nut with terrible taste in food (seriously he would eat a brick if you served it to him on a plate, he tastes no

difference)

penny highlights her hair now because it used to be more naturally auburn when she was younger and she misses the color

her hair was actually the first thing mav noticed about her when they first met, he thought it was so prettyyyy

penny cannot stand roaches and spiders so mav has to play brian pest control in her house once every few months

for real if penny sees a roach it’s game over. she will scream and wail like a banshee until mav finally ambles over to get rid of them for her, she’s so pathetic about them

on the other hand penny LOVES lizards because being a reptile enjoyer is her weird girl trait. there are lots to be found at the hard deck too which is great

more often than not if amelia isn’t sitting at the bar doing homework she’s out back chasing lizards. if mav isn’t inside either then he’s out there with her

aside from de-roaching her house, mav is also penny’s personal handyman

need your lights strung up? he’s your man

need your appliances fixed? he’s your man

need repairs done on your car? he’s your man

need kisses on your forehead? he’s your man

mav gets sleepy when he’s drunk and his favorite place to nap is on penny’s chest

“she’s soft and she smells nice” - mav 2k19 (he’s no thoughts head empty for her when he gets like this)

penny loves it when he naps on her. it’s like having a heated AND weighted blanket rolled into one

however sometimes said blanket will awkwardly grope her on accident (or was it…) in the middle of the night and that’s always fun

the 86 squad jokingly buy mav wife guy t-shirts as gag gifts but he loves them and wears them unironically all the time

examples include:

“PROPERTY OF MY HOT WIFE”

“MY WIFE SAYS I ONLY HAVE TWO FAULTS 🌠 I DON’T LISTEN AND SOMETHING ELSE.” (purchased by hollywood)

“MY WIFE HAS AN AWESOME HUSBAND”

“THIS GUY HAS A 👉 CRUSH 👈 ON HIS WIFE”

mav being an old guy gets really sore sometimes and penny gives the most incredible massages

if she hadn’t opened the hard deck she could’ve been a masseuse fr

she has such soft hands!!! and her nails feel so good when they scratch his back just ufhrsgfhrsghgr

mav is in heaven rn

AAAAA AND THAT’S ALL I HAVE FOR NOW BUT THAT’S ONLY BECAUSE IT’S PAST MIDNIGHT I’M SURE I COULD THINK OF MORE IF I TRIED HARDER

also… ahaha… nsfw headcanons beneath the cut if you want… 😳👉👈

young penny and mav were both shameless harlots and had a pretty sexually open relationship

naturally this means they got into lots of threesomes because hell yeah

they’re pretty private about their sex life now though because they like to keep that part of each other all to themselves… hehehe

BUT if cyclone ever decides to take penny up on her offer he knows where to find them ;)

penny is such a lingerie girl she could be a victoria’s secret model

she likes to surprise mav with new sexy lil pieces she finds online, it keeps things spicy in the bedroom

his face is always a national treasure every time she brings out something new

if you think seeing them on her is good though? imagine how good she looks when he takes them off for her

the only thing better is how good it feels when he takes them off for her

mav is a master of the art of cunnilingus

he’s sucked so much dick between relationships you can’t tell me he doesn’t know how to use his tongue

he gets hard instantly when penny sits on his face (and he’s real for it honestly have you SEEN young jencon!!! she has the sexiest thighs i’ve ever seen in my life i want them to choke me)

if mav is a master of cunnilingus then naturally penny is the mistress of the strap

she definitely pulls mav’s hair when she fucks him

the moans he makes are OBSCENE

they have crossed off every item on their sex bucket list

fuck on a boat

fuck on a beach

fuck on the dock

fuck in a bathroom

fuck in a car

fuck in a plane

fuck in her dad’s bed

fuck in her dad’s office

fuck by a window

i cannot believe i just typed all of this jesus please forgive me

[midncghts]

꒰ ⠀𝗯𝗲𝗮𝘂⠀⠀⎯⎯ ⠀  𝘀𝗲𝗿𝗴𝗵𝗲𝗶⠀꒱      🐇    𝄒         ﹕

the bastard son has no royal title. it is a humiliating truth weaponized against him whenever the king and his queen gather the royal court. serghei is kept on the court simply because half of his blood is worth its weight in gold. the only son of the king born to a whore. the queen spat on his mother’s grave, but wouldn’t dare waste any of her precious fluids on his lot. his father was apathetic. the blind eye stung and annoyed more than the spiteful one. serghei wasn’t sure if it was out of embarrassment or simple convenience for the king to ignore his own son’s existence.

and what does the bastard son have to say? nothing, your majesty.

a tight smile. a tap to the bottom of the heavy mahogany table they dined at. words are exchanged. matters are dealt. it is a slow crawl to the conclusion of their morning meetings, but serghei is used to waiting things out. being patient and listening when it matters. he can count on both hands the amount of people on the court, at this table even now, who have cursed his father to an early grave. drunken or sober, serghei knows where their loyalties lie. and none of them are at his father’s feet. they are at his neck. his tendons. the temples at which the crown rests, uncomfortable. at serghei’s own calloused hands. at his mother’s empty chamber and the memories of her freesia perfume and lavender bread recipe, still scrawled hurriedly in the royal chef’s cookbook. the queen was allergic to lavender.

there is one member of the court that serghei has yet to examine the loyalty of. there is no need for speculation or dissection. it is so easy to see it reflected in his big bright eyes and meadow wide smile. serghei understands why his father is obsessed with beau. he is undeniably beautiful. something worthy of showing off and bragging about. beau follows him around like a pampered puppy, eager to please and wag his tail at whatever the king does.

it makes serghei sick.

beau also presents an opportunity unparalleled. especially when he is alone now, in the gardens waiting for his precious majesty to call for him. luckily one of the royal scholars had called for the king’s ear. luckily– it was no luck at all. no, serghei had captured that pawn and was using it to his advantage. every chess piece mattered.

“the hydrangeas are coming in beautifully,” serghei comments with an easy smile. the beginning of spring was sharp and soft all the same. filtered sunlight with an occasional draft that flushed beau’s cheeks so prettily. he keeps his distance, though his eyes are fixed on the other intently. “do you come to the gardens often?” @midncghts

he   certainly   liked   the   palace   gardens   and   the   sweet,   fresh   smell   of   blooming   flowers   in   spring.   probably   his   favorite   season   because   memories   that   had   been   hidden   in   the   most   remote   places   of   his   head    returned   to   his   mind.   if   he   closed   his   eyes   for �� a   moment,   he   could   see   his   father,   fixing   his   mother's   precious   wooden   dresser   .   .  .   he   could   see   himself   walking   with   him   to   the   meadow   surrounded   by   uncut   grass   along   that   narrow   path   formed   by   their   own   footsteps   whenever   it   was   time   to   gather   strawberries   and   blackberries   to   make   jam.   those   memories,   although   they   returned   from   time   to   time,   had   been   treasured   in   the   depths   of   his   soul,   for   it   reminded   him   that   there   was   a   time   when   his   short   life   belonged   to   himself   and   not   to   the   crown.   of   course,   he   did   it   with   great   dedication,   always   so   consecrated   to   the   king,   to   the   point   of   giving   up   his   life   for   his   protection,   because   in   his   mind   that   was   the   right   thing   to   do;   in   his   eyes   it   was   seen   as   an   honor   or   that   was   what   they   had   made   him   believe.   yet   he   was   there,   leaving   his   life   in   the   hands   of   the   monarchy   without   putting   up   a   fight.

the   spring   breeze   touches   his   velvety   pale   skin,   his   clean   white   linen   shirt   slightly   open   at   the   chest   moves   when   the   wind   hits   his   slim   body   .   .   .   ah,   maybe   he   should   have   kept   his   cloak   .   .  .   no,   he   was   good   like   that.   that   familiar   voice   forces   him   to   turn,   his   face   decorated   with   the   light   rays   of   the   sun,   and   he   nods,   returning   his   gaze   to   the   fragrant   flowers.   “   as   always.   ”   he   responds   with   a   soft   voice   to   the   comment   about   the   hydrangeas.   he   didn't   know   much   about   them,   but   he   thought   they   were   pretty.   serghei's   voice   catches   his   attention   again,   still,   beau   doesn’t   take   his   gaze   from   the   thick   bushes   and   begins   to   walk   slowly   down   the   gravel   path.   “   as   long   as   the   king   doesn't   need   me.   yes,   i   come   often   .   .   .   i   like   flowers.   hydrangeas   are   beautiful,   indeed.   but   i   consider   myself   devoted   to   lilies   of   the   valley.   ”   he   points   out,   reaching   out  his   arm   to   take   out   a   small   twig   of   that   flower.   “   smells   sweet   as   candy,   yet   it   could   kill   you.   it   is   quite   ironic   in   my   opinion.   ”   he   says,   keeping   the   flower   close   to   him,   because   he   liked   to   put   them   between   the   yellowed   pages   of   the   old   books   that   he   had   inherited   from   his   grandfather.   beau   is   silent   for   a   moment   because   he   feels   that   perhaps   he   is   talking   too   much,   and   he   knows   that   he   doesn’t   owe   serghei   much   respect   since   he   doesn’t   have   a   title,   however,   he   finds   himself   turning   his   face   slightly   over   his   shoulder,   whispering   a   soft   ‘i'm   sorry.’   then   continue   slowly   walking,   leaving   the   other   a   little   behind.   “   is   it   a   problem   for   you   that   i   come   to   the   gardens  ?   or   did   you   just   ask   me   that   out    of   simple   curiosity  ?   ”   he   asks   with   a   slight   smile,   even   if   sergei   can't   see   him.

[phoenix-manga]

Diasomnia Arc Team

Mimikyu ♂

“Hey, don’t call him an ugly rag! He’s a precious little baby of this household and I will not tolerate this slander!”

Moves: Baby-Doll Eyes, Play Rough, Shadow Sneak, Thunderbolt

Ability: Disguise

⊖ Phoebe found him being bullied by kids and she taught them a lesson. She asked around if there was any safe place to send the Pokémon too and she was told that a certain trial captain who specializes in Ghost-types can help her out.

⊖ But Mimikyu got too attached to Phoebe and wants to stay with her. Phoebe didn’t mind and kept the little guy.

⊖ Mimikyu is really strong despite his small size, he used it to his advantage and won countless matches. He also enjoys riding in Phoebe’s bag and fiddles with the stuff inside when he’s bored.

⊖ He can get pretty scary, if anyone picks on him or Phoebe then he proceeds to use Shadow Sneak to grab their ankles under their beds.

Slurpuff (SHINY) ♀

“What? Diasomnia wanted to borrow her? I mean, sure… as long as it’s not too late when she returns...”

Moves: Sticky Web, Fairy Wind, Psychic, Flamethrower

Ability: Sweet Veil

⊖ Phoebe's Slurpuff just so happens to be shiny and is quite the gourmet who has an eye for the finest of taste. She and Smeargle work as a team and she is the designated taste tester.

⊖ If someone gets so much as one thing wrong in the recipe, Slurpuff will tie them up in Sticky Web and fix the food herself. Arceus, help her if someone makes a terrible dish, her sensitive nose will pick up that smell and she’ll gag.

⊖ Slurpuff may look cute but she is a strict commander in the kitchen, she will yell at you if you get the wrong ingredients. She and Smeargle will throw hands if you botch the recipe.

Steelix ♂

“I know he looks like a hulking beast but he’s quite a docile Pokémon! You can climb on top of his head if you want, the view is amazing up there!”

Moves: Ice Fang, Smack Down, Gyro Ball, Stone Edge

Ability: Rock Head

⊖ He’s a chill Pokémon who will let people and other Pokémon climb all over him and even take a nap on his back.

⊖ He’s practically a lazy boy outside of battle. If it gets too hot, he will burrow most of his body into the dirt leaving only his head exposed. But in battle, he's fierce and a strong tank.

⊖ Steelix is the biggest Pokémon that she owns, during her travels through Johto she would sometimes just ride on Steelix as he moves through rocky terrain.

Haxorus ♂

“I was wondering why my watering can went missing, you cheeky rascal! Just let me know if you wanted to do some gardening, okay?”

Moves: Dragon Claw, Rain Dance, Psycho Cut, Bulldoze

Ability: Mold Breaker

⊖ Despite looking fierce, he’s a gentle soul who loves to garden. He would often help out whenever Phoebe has gardening chores. He hounded a Rain Dance TM to let him water plants more efficiently.

⊖ He and Aggron are both flower buddies, though, unlike Aggron who doesn’t like confrontation, Haxorus will retaliate if his precious flowers are messed with.

⊖ Haxorus is also fond of Grass-types that provide benefits for the garden. They could climb all over him and he’d let it happen. He is also protective of them.

[ffeynn]

hiya fey =] !! i love your blog a lot , do you mind writing xiao, tetora nagumo, and riddle rosehearts in love with a gn reader?? tysm - you’re doing wonderful and i hope your blog takes off !!!

「 is this how it feels, being in love: xiao, tetora and riddle 」

a/n: heyy!! ahhh yes thanku! and really! thanku again for your words! i think i messed up tetora's one,,, but i hope you enjoy it - even if it's a bit!!

pairing: xiao, nagumo tetora, riddle rosehearts x reader (seperates)

↬ xiao in love huh. he won’t take it well at first, constantly denying the fact that his heart flutters upon your arrival at wengshui inn, the fact that he was glaring at any person a bit too close to you out of jealousy, the fact that he smiled every time he looked at the embroidery you did for him.

☆ he heard your usual footsteps going up the stairs, the adeptus can’t help waiting for your figure to come up to him with a warm smile and a cheerful, “xiao!”

ah, there it is, the name he came to love whenever he heard it in your voice. your voice who has never ran out of patience with his behavior and somehow managed to rinse away any of his present worries. look at that smile you flashed at him, one he has seen all too many times yet the more he sees it, the more xiao craves for it. the yaksha can feel his lips tugging by a bit.

↬ xiao doesn’t know what came to him when he heard you were sick and before he knew it, he was already in front of your house. why’s he even visiting you - xiao has no reason to. but well here the yaksha was, worried sick about you.

☆ he expects for the worse, xiao does when he heard the news of you being sick. when he found out that it's just a normal fever, he felt relief. out of all emotion, xiao was relieved.

he might be protective but now that you're sick, he's more protective. what do you mean you need to go out? you don’t. he’ll get some herbs after his fight against the abyss mage for you. “you’re still sick, don’t move much.”

↬ xiao knows he’s in love with you. but what good will it do to him when you obviously will leave him just like the others do. this love probably won’t even be mutual, you must have someone more deserving of your love and time.

☆ or maybe that’s all only in his mind. the sight of you timidly trying to not avoid his eyes, your face growing deeper shades of red each seconds, your earnest voice confessing your deep feelings of love for him.

he knows you’re sincere, it’s a genuine love. one you have for him and one he has for you. it’s alright to be in love, he won’t trade it with anything nor will he avoid it any longer. if you’re the one he’s with, xiao will be more than glad to be in love.

↬ is he in love? tetora wonders if what he’s feeling toward you is love. yes he did have some fleeting crushes but that only extends to like. not love. though the way he feels around you, the subtle changes in his action around you, it feels so much like love.

☆ tetora was already by your classroom’s door after his class ended early. he was a bit embarrassed at the wondering, teasing stares he received. that all doesn't matter when you joyfully made your way toward him.

“ah tetora, thank you for waiting for me.” you said while dragging him away from the door since people were walking out. “it’s okay! i don’t mind waiting for you.” he ignores the fast beating of his heart when you hold his hand in yours.

↬ he’ll always help you (if he doesn't have something important going on)! tetora is a man, he’s a hero and he’s a person that’ll help you carry boxes down the stairs despite his arms almost giving up.

☆ “this.. no, no, i’m fine you don’t need to help.” or so he said. but thankfully, tetora successfully carried the heavy boxes downstairs. while it may not be so helpful for his practice later — wait it does — most definitely worth it.

you were worried about him, you were in a quick laughter at his stubbornness, you were smiling at him. it made him warm, tetora loves the way you made him feels. and when you cheer him on for his practice later, tetora had an inkling that today he’ll do much more better than before. and yes, he did.

↬ did something happen to you today? he noticed you look a bit down today. tetora will do anything just to see you happy again, you brighten up his day and he wants to do the same to you.

☆ how about cooking your favourite food? that’ll at least cheer you up a bit.. right? as much as he wants to cook for you all by his own, tetora knows it's better if he asks someone else to help. happened so his taishou was free! asking help from kuro about cooking is a splendid choice.

now, now. look at the outcome! with your favourite food neatly packed in a lunch box, tetora nervously, excitedly went to you. various kind of what ifs appearing in his mind. yet when he saw your face brightening up when you saw his figure walking up to you. wait. he still haven't give you his surprise food to you.. why are you already happy..

“tetora!” ah that doesn't matter, what matter is your smile who looks so lovely to him was now here again. and knowing it’s because of him, tetora loves it much more.

↬ just the thought of being in love with you flustered him. the poor boy probably doesn’t know what to name this feeling of his at first. riddle didn't have time to experience romance all his life, just studies and obeying his mother. but at nrc, his mother won't be there to monitor all his actions, he gains the littlest bit of freedom.

☆ riddle was acting suspicious yet the dorm leader himself didn't notice it. except it's ace and deuce, you got caught in trouble a lot of time with them. so when riddle seemed to be more lent toward you, softer.. something was up. what kind of riddle scolds a troublemaker with a smile on his face and with a tone so worried? a riddle who caught feelings.

“right, didn’t you say you want help for next week’s exam?” and just like that, he invited you out on a study date. the two other students almost gasped, even grim noticed the difference in riddle. the said male didn’t thought of it as a date at first but after ace pointed it out, his face grew red. cherry red.

↬ once he realized his feelings for you, riddle will be conscious of the occasional actions. like the hands bumping when they get a bit too close with each other, those times he fixed your tie neatly.

☆ he invited you on an evening tea time and you were surprised when you found out the only one there was him. “oh, you're finally here.” riddle went up to you and like a gentleman he is, the dorm leader pulled out your seat for you. thanking him, you complimented riddle - he looks slightly different today tho you don't know what it is but it's there.

riddle did dressed up today, just a slight change. he used a perfume which smell you said you like, his hair looking more slick and that's all. his dormmates who knows about this were too persistent to help riddle levels up his appearance, in the end he only agreed to two things. but when you took notice of the subtle changes and complimented him, maybe he will undo his unique magic on the poor dormmates.

↬ riddle gives you roses, freshly from heartslabyul's garden.

☆ he will uses his magic to pluck a few bloomed roses, get rid of the thorns and prettily wrapped it up into a bouquet. riddle gave you the bouquet once after the end of your usual tea time. it was so sudden, you were surprised by his abrupt romantic gesture.

despite of that, you love it. the expression you hold tell him you love it. and there isn't any rules telling them that plucking roses is forbidden so perhaps he might just try to be better at making bouquet. teas too, you said you love his teas and riddle - he was so happy (that he blushed!).

[whelvenwings]

Castiel's grace is missing, and Dean's frustrated - instead of looking for it, all Castiel wants to do is grow his flowers. Eventually, the two of them have to talk about it.

Read it below or here on AO3! Tags: Canon Divergent, Gardener!Cas, Cas' Grace

This fic was inspired by this wonderful art by saminzat, and written as part of the @spnreverse-promptchallenge!

It’s not Heaven. It’s not even close. It’s just a garden, where Castiel is growing things.

If it were Heaven, Castiel thinks, then Dean would be looking a lot happier, those wrinkles around his eyes all eased away. If it were Heaven, there would have been a break in the clouds overhead when Dean arrived.

If it were Heaven, the peach rose would be in bloom, not straggling all green and leggy and ungainly through the picket fence that Castiel had put up to help it grow.

Castiel puts down the secateurs he’s been using to prune the forsythia, and takes off his gardening gloves. He walks over to Dean, acutely aware of the fact that he’s wearing enough sunscreen to make his skin shine, the worn-thin, oversized blue t-shirt he found at a Goodwill that says Thyme to Garden, and a very large sunhat to protect the back of his neck.

Sunburn, he reminds himself, is more uncomfortable than the growing look of mixed amusement and judgement in Dean’s eyes. Even on a cloudy day, his skin will burn if he’s outside for a long time. Something he learned the hard way after becoming human.

“I thought you were researching a case,” Castiel says to Dean as he approaches.

“Done. Thought I’d come say hi.” Dean raises an eyebrow and a half-smile at him in greeting. “So, hi.”

Castiel stops a few feet from him and tips his hat a little further back on his head, so that Dean can clearly see his face.

“Hello,” he says. Dean takes in the hat, the t-shirt, the full gardening ensemble, with one sweeping gaze.

“Looking good,” Dean says.

Castiel looks down at himself, and then solemnly back to Dean.

“Thank you,” he says, with just enough irony in his tone to get Dean to smile. Or it would have been, usually, but today Dean’s expression is sinking back into hard lines. The greyish, muted light seems to lie heavy on him, putting a coldness in his eyes.

Castiel searches his face. Just as he’s about to say something more, Dean breaks their stare, glancing around at the plants nearest him as a light breeze ruffles at them.

“They’ve grown since last time you showed me,” Dean says. He’s holding himself strangely, his fists clenched. Castiel tilts his head to one side, and then looks around with Dean at the garden.

He feels the familiar spark of happiness as he surveys his handiwork. Once, the place had been a sad little patch of chalky, lump-filled earth. Now the flowers drip off their stems like dewdrops, and the soil smells rich, and the leaves tremble their creaky little paths to follow the sun each day. Even the blossomless peach rose has strong roots.

Castiel glances back to Dean, and feels the warmth in his chest sputter out. Dean’s eyeing the plantlife with an expression that doesn’t seem impressed.

“It’s been a while since last time,” Castiel says.

“Yeah. Well, you know.” Dean looks distracted, frowning down at a squat little succulent plant. There’s something bothering him, obviously, and Castiel isn’t sure whether Dean wants to be asked about it or have it be left alone.

“You’re always welcome,” Castiel tries quietly. Dean seems to catch himself, shifting his expression to something more neutral as he turns back to Castiel.

“Yeah,” he says, not as though he particularly believes it, and – in a way that almost manages to seem genuine – not as though he particularly cares.

“You can stay,” Castiel says. “If you want. There’s plenty to do. If you’re not busy.”

Dean puts his hands into his pockets and looks around the garden again, this time with his eyes a little less sharp.

“Nah,” he says. “Nah, I don’t wanna spoil the fun.”

Spoil the fun? Castiel gives Dean a look that he hopes is eloquent, and Dean rolls his eyes.

“I dunno, man,” he says. “Anyway, it’s not really me, is it.”

He looks tired, Castiel thinks.

“Didn’t think it was you, either,” Dean adds after a half-beat. He reaches up unselfconsciously, and then seems to realise what he’s doing at the last moment, and awkwardly flicks the brim of Castiel’s hat with the back of one finger before taking a step away. “Didn’t think you’d ever go in for… you know. Whatever this is.”

Castiel can easily read that expression on Dean’s face. He’s seen it before, in other times, other places. The mixture of bravado and hurt and confusion had made sense when lives had been at stake and grand lies had been unfolding, but this – here, today, in among his roses and sunflowers, Castiel hadn’t expected it. Dean looks betrayed.

And Castiel doesn’t know what to say. He reaches up to his hat, just brushing the brim with the tips of his fingers in the same place Dean touched it.

“I need the hat,” he says. “To keep the sun off my neck.”

“Right,” Dean says. “Yeah.” He looks up at the sky, which is still an overcast grey.

“Even through clouds,” Castiel offers.

“Uh huh. Okay.”

Castiel squints at him.

“You seem angry,” he says. No more dancing around it. Predictably, Dean makes a face, as though the suggestion were ridiculous.

“Nah.”

“Dean.” Castiel fixes him with a look, and Dean shrugs.

“Whatever, man.”

“If something is wrong…” Castiel says.

“Listen, if coming out here and growing your little flowers and everything helps, then that’s fine,” he says. “It’s fine.”

There’s a but coming, and Castiel knows enough to wait for it. Dean looks aimlessly around at the burgeoning plants. His eyes trace the tangle of a buddleia, until he glances back to Castiel, who raises an eyebrow.

Dean’s front drops, the stiffness going out of his shoulders, his hands unclenching.

“But your grace, man,” he says. Castiel looks down at the ground. He should have expected this, he knew. But somehow hearing the words still takes him by surprise.

“What about it,” he says, in a tone that doesn’t really want an answer, but knows it’s going to get one.

Dean’s hands come up, palms facing out, asking a question without words at first.

“Seriously,” he manages after a moment. “What about it? It’s your grace, Cas.”

“I know,” Castiel says.

“It’s gone,” Dean says.

“I know.”

“It’s been months.”

“I…” Castiel sighs. “Yes.”

“You told me it was just gone,” Dean says, ducking his chin slightly to catch Castiel’s eyes. “Like it was no big deal. And now all you do is spend time up here, planting flowers. Not even trying to look for it. I don’t get it, man. And whenever I try to bring it up, you just say –”

“It’s taken care of,” Castiel says, at the same time as Dean mouths the words along with him, his expression exasperated with a spiderweb of hurt threaded through.

“It’s your grace.”

“I know,” Castiel says. “I know it is. But it’s taken care of, Dean. I don’t want…”

He cuts himself off before he says too much, pressing his lips together.

Dean shakes his head. Castiel can see him battling with himself, trying to decide whether he wants to push harder. Castiel keeps his face neutral, hoping Dean will drop it.

“Don’t want what?” Dean says, though, and Castiel feels his heart sink. “You’re human, now. And you’re stuck that way until you get your grace back, but you won’t even…” Dean seems to run out of words. Castiel tries to think of something to say to divert the conversation, take them down a different track.

“I’m doing better at shaving,” he says. “And I’ve learned not to brush my teeth before drinking orange juice.”

Castiel can see the slight smile on Dean’s face, but it’s almost completely buried under the worry and the anger.

“Right,” Dean says.

“Dean…”

“I just don’t get it. The grace… if it’s lost, I can help with that. If it’s destroyed, I can try to help too, or… we’ll figure something out. Or if it’s safe, why won’t you tell me what happened with it?” The strain in Dean’s voice tells Castiel that they’re at the heart of it now, at the reason for the tight shoulders and the clipped answers and the judgemental eyes on his catmint and cosmos. “Why won’t you just tell me?”

Castiel stares at him helplessly. The answers are in the back of his throat, ready to be said, but he can’t open his mouth – can’t get them out. He feels his heart thudding, his human heart. He doesn’t know if he likes that feeling, if he wants it – perhaps not, no more than he wants sunburn, or the taste of orange juice after toothpaste, or blood on his palms when he catches himself on that peach rose’s thorns.

But there’s something he does want. And any chance at – at that – any chance at all, it’s worth the weight of being human. He made a choice and he knows he’d make it, the same one, over and over again.

He thinks it all, but he can’t say it. Dean watches him, angry and confused. Overhead, the clouds lumber their heavy bellies across the sky.

“There’s something you’re not telling me,” Dean says. Castiel looks away, and Dean takes a step closer. “Cas,” he says. “I swear to god.”

Castiel looks up at him, knowing his own tiredness is right there to be seen on his face – and his sadness, his hurt. Dean’s expression shifts, and he comes even closer.

“What did you do, man? Is it that bad?”

It’s easy to see Dean’s mind working, trying to piece everything together. He’s probably thinking demons, and deals, and treachery, all the things that they’ve been through before. Castiel doesn’t know how to explain to him that he’s wrong without telling him the whole truth. And he can’t tell the whole truth.

“Look,” Dean says, “we’ll figure it out. If you just tell me – tell me where it is, or what happened. Did someone do this? And what… what does all of this have to do with it…” He looks around again at the garden. Castiel closes his eyes for a second, lets the familiar feeling of being here fill him as much as he can let it – the warmth in his chest, the spark.

He knows he should try to talk about it, but he can’t. He can’t.

When he opens his eyes, Dean’s waiting, watching him. Castiel opens his mouth – but nothing comes out.

Dean’s face tightens again.

“Okay,” he says. “So it’s like that. Great, Cas.”

“Dean, it’s –”

“No, it’s fine,” Dean says, his tone taut with bitterness, but his face carefully unbothered. “That’s fine. Deal with it by yourself. That’s always gone so well. And meanwhile, me, I’ll just, what? Wait for you to give me the bad news, I guess. That’s great, Cas. Really. You know, you –”

“Stop,” Castiel asks.

And a little of the fight leaves Dean again. He looks as though he wants to say something else, but doesn’t know what. His face is half apology and half anger.

“It just…” he says. And then waves his hand, like it doesn’t matter anyway.

And it’s the simplicity of the hurt in that gesture that has Castiel throwing all his caution to the wind and saying,

“I don’t want it back.”

Dean stops moving. His eyes fix on Castiel.

“What?” Dean asks.

Castiel’s jaw is tight, but he manages to say again,

“I don’t want it back. My grace. I know where it is. But I don’t want it back.”

All of Dean’s carefully placed anger is gone, suddenly, in his shock. There’s no performance, no strategy, in the way that he steps closer and looks utterly bewildered.

“You don’t?” he says.

“No. I…” Castiel hesitates, and then says, “I took it out myself.”

“You what?”

Castiel lifts one shoulder, a little diffidently. It had been necessary, so he’d done it. As simple as that.

“Cas,” Dean says, and then seems to be at a loss. Castiel doesn’t say anything. There isn’t anything to say, so far as he can see.

He’s made his choice. And if he ever regrets it, if he ever wishes things could be different, all he has to do is look at Dean and it pales to nothing.

“Cas… why?” Dean manages eventually, and Castiel breathes out.

He looks at Dean.

Dean stares right back at him, not understanding.

“Did someone make you?” Dean demands. “We can go and look for them, we can –”

“No,” Castiel says. “No. I chose to do it.”

“But Cas…”

“It’s –” Castiel presses his lips together again, trying not to let the expression look pained, even though there’s a flash of hurt through his chest at the thought of trying to say any of it aloud. Saying it would push the two of them, Dean and Castiel, towards a tipping point. A no-takebacks, no room for misunderstanding point. Sharp as a thorn.

And it’s the last thing Castiel wants.

Until they talk about it, anything seems possible. It almost feels real enough. But if they talk, it’ll all be over. Dean will tell him to take back his grace, and Castiel will have to leave. It’ll be over.

“You took it out. What would you do that for,” Dean says. When Castiel doesn’t reply, he reaches out and puts a hand on Castiel’s shoulder. “Hey,” he says, the word harsh enough to compensate for the touch.

“It’s nothing,” Castiel says.

“Cas.”

“Really, it’s…” Castiel stops. The denial dies in his mouth. He swallows, his eyes on Dean, before he looked down. “I just want to be able to stay with you.”

The last two words are too much – all of it is too much – but they’re out his mouth before he can stop them. Castiel breathes out and waits to feel Dean’s hand loosen its grip, drop away in shock at the unwanted intensity. It’s too much. Castiel knows it’s too much.

But Dean’s hand is still on his shoulder.

“You want to be able to stay?” Dean says.

“Yes.” Castiel says it bluntly, to try to shave off the emotion, make it easier to talk about. Dean’s hand still doesn’t move. Castiel can feel each place Dean’s fingers are digging in slightly through the thin material of his t-shirt. His heart is pounding and he wants to be able to turn it off, quiet it down, hear Dean’s heart instead in the way he could when he had his grace. He wants it with a sudden acuteness, a pang of loss.

“But – you can,” Dean says. “Why would you think you needed to do this?”

Castiel can’t look back up at him.

“Cas,” Dean says.

There’s a band of pain squeezing tightly around Castiel’s chest. He can’t quite seem to get his breath, suddenly.

“I just thought I’d fit better this way,” he says.

“Fit better?” Now Dean moves his hand, pulls back, though he doesn’t go far. “What do you mean?”

“You’re human,” Castiel says. He looks up, meets Dean’s eyes. “Now I am too. I thought, maybe…”

He trails off. He can’t say more. He can’t talk about what he hopes for, what he wants. He can’t.

Dean’s hand is back on his shoulder and the touch is different, now, less insistent. Softer. Castiel can see the gentleness in Dean’s eyes, shy and uncertain, allowed to show just for a few moments.

“We don’t have to be the same,” Dean says.

Castiel doesn’t know how to answer.

“We’ve never been the same,” Dean says. “But we’re still good. Right?”

There are no words in Castiel’s mind, or none that make sense – or none that he can say aloud. He wishes he could give Dean the way that he feels, just drop it into Dean’s mind, show him without having to explain it. The feeling is yes, good, of course we’re good, but there’s more – there’s different things, things I want to be to you, ways I want to be with you. And not telling you feels more and more like lying with every passing day but I don’t know how to tell you without you being suddenly aware that I’ve been wanting you in a different way to how you want me for a very long time, and will you hate me for that? Will you think I’m a liar? Will you send me away? Could I bear that? Could I bear it? If you hated me, how could I bear it?

“I just,” Castiel says, “I just want to be able to stay.” It’s the only part of it that will come out of his mouth.

“You can,” Dean says. “You don’t need… damnit, Cas, you didn’t have to take your own grace out just to be able to stay.”

Castiel nods mutely. Dean’s hand squeezes Castiel’s shoulder.

“So you can put it back, right?” he says. “The grace. You can go get it and put it back?”

“I could.” It comes out more direct and harsh than Castiel intended, and Dean’s grip tightens.

“So…?” he says.

Castiel can’t meet his eyes. He looks to the side, around the garden that he’s created. The flowers that have unfurled for him, trusting, unfussy about what deep love and secrets he’s hiding. The leaves and shoots that grow steadily under the care of his hands, no matter who else those hands wish they could hold.

“Cas,” Dean says again, and gives another squeeze, and then lets go. “Your grace is you, man. All these months, it’s not like you’ve had a good time being human, is it?”

“It’s worth it.”

“Worth it?” Dean echoes.

“If it means we’re the same,” Castiel says. And his reasoning isn’t even clear to Castiel himself, now. It just feels as though if they’re both human, if they both are the same thing, there’s a chance they could both feel the same way, too – it makes no sense, and yet Castiel can’t imagine letting go of the thought.

“We don’t need to be the same,” Dean says, repeating himself with a look that’s crossed between confusion and concern.

“But I…”

Castiel stops talking, cuts himself off. Dean’s eyes search his face.

“You want to be?” Dean says, cautious, hazarding a guess. And when Castiel’s expression tells Dean he’s right, his face goes even more soft with surprise. “Why?”

There isn’t anything that Castiel can say in answer. No explanations he can give that will make sense outside his own mind. All he finds himself doing is looking at Dean – looking at him more openly than he has done in a long time, half tight-lipped and wanting the conversation to end, half hoping that Dean will finally piece it all together. He allows himself to stare, frankly and directly, pushing away the guilt and shame that push at him and tell him to look down, step away, move back, leave. He stares like he once used to all the time, letting down the walls.

There’s Dean, he thinks. There he is. Sometimes the feelings in Castiel grow so big and overwhelming that he forgets the shape of the man at the heart of them. The way Dean cares. The way Dean looks at him right back, matches him – when it comes down to it, never pretends it doesn’t matter to him when it does.

Dean’s mouth opens to form words, but he seems to stop himself. Castiel watches Dean swallow, and feels the familiar swoop and ache in his chest as all his crushing sky-sized love focuses into the smallness of the place on Dean’s throat that he wants to touch.

Dean goes to say something, and then stops.

Castiel looks down at Dean’s lips, and then back up again.

Is it wrong, how much he wants to kiss Dean? The feeling is pressing, immediate, alive. It’s in Castiel’s blood, in his bones. If Dean doesn’t want him too, in the same way, does that make the feeling wrong? Or would it just be acting on it, making Dean aware of it, that would be wrong? But the feeling is a background hum in everything Castiel does. He acts on it even when Dean isn’t with him. He acts on it all the time.

Every passing moment changes the gaze between them. Dean’s waiting for him to talk, not filling in the space with any words this time, but his face keeps sinking further into something that looks dangerously like realisation.

“I don’t know,” Castiel says. If how he feels, or what he’s doing, is wrong, then he should look away. He should go away, leave Dean alone, find somewhere else to be. But he couldn’t, he can’t, not until he knows for sure that Dean doesn’t feel even slightly the same way – and he can’t ask, because as soon as he knows Dean doesn’t feel the same way, he’ll have to leave. The thoughts chase their tails in Castiel’s head and he stares and he stares at Dean and he hurts so much that he wants to hit his own chest just for the distraction of a simpler pain.

“You don’t know what?”

“I just don’t know, Dean.”

Dean is watching him carefully, his mouth slightly open, as though trying to figure out how to phrase something he wants to say. There’s a slight tinge of colour to his cheeks, too, Castiel notices.

“Uh,” Dean says. His mouth shapes a ‘w’ like the start of a question, and then closes again, and he frowns – but he doesn’t look away.

He almost knows, Castiel thinks. He’s almost understood. And as soon as Dean understands, it’s over. Unless he feels the same way, which he doesn’t. He can’t. We’re not the same. No matter how hard I try and how much I change, we’re not ever the same.

He needs to cauterise this conversation like a wound, stop all this from happening, but he can’t find the words. Dean’s still watching him. Castiel’s heart is thunder in his head, drowning out his thoughts.

“You look like the whole world’s falling apart,” Dean says eventually. “Not an exaggeration. ‘Cause I’ve seen your face when the world was actually falling apart.” Dean points vaguely with one finger towards Castiel’s face. “And it looked like that.”

Castiel nods mutely, and Dean sighs and glances sharply away, and then back again.

“Come on, Cas, jesus. Something’s up, so whatever it is, just tell me.” He looks at Castiel for a long time, and then he says it again. In a different voice, quieter, with a little rise at the end as though of hope or something equally as stupid for Castiel to consider. “Tell me.”

It’s said in a way that makes Castiel want to believe he’s asking for all the things Castiel wants to give.

Dean’s eyes are wide, too. Like he can’t quite believe what he’s asking.

And Castiel’s human heart is pounding at that tone in his voice, that look on his face, because it feels as though – tentatively – they could be talking about the same thing. The longer Castiel watches Dean’s face, the more he sees it. There are the little flickers of denial, uncertainty, in the way Dean’s eyes narrow for a half-moment. And then there again is the rise of hope in the depth of Dean’s gaze, the openness.

It’s so small and barely-there that Castiel can’t trust it. He can’t know how this ends. It’s a rope thrown into down into his well, though, and with no idea what waits for him at the top, he still puts his hand on it and wonders if he’s strong enough to begin to climb.

“I, um.” He starts to speak, and his voice is low and rough. When he pauses almost immediately, Dean shifts his weight from one foot to the other, licks his lips. Castiel searches for the words. “I tried staking that peach rose. But it didn’t do any good.”

Dean looks confused. He doesn’t even bother to look down at the rose, just keeps his eyes on Castiel.

“What…” he says.

“It just grew that way,” Castiel says. He can feel a lump in his throat. “Naturally. It wanted to grow that way.”

“Okay,” Dean says, as though slightly concerned for Castiel’s sanity.

“I think sometimes it’s just like that,” Castiel says. He meets Dean’s eyes. “You can try planting them in the place you want them. Cut them back. Put a stake through them.” He resists the sudden, unexpected urge to reach up and touch the place on his chest where, years ago, Dean buried a knife in his heart. He swallows. “But sometimes there are things you can’t control. And even if it’s not… not healthy, or pretty, or the way it’s supposed to go… that’s how they’ll grow. Just towards the place they want to be.”

Dean’s listening intently, but his eyes are clouded with confusion. He looks like he wants to say something, and then stops himself. Castiel can’t blame him for not understanding, when half the point is that he’s talking without getting to the point. He doesn’t want to get to that sharp-split point when his life takes one of two courses, when Dean says one of two things.

“Dean, I…” Castiel says, and his hand reaches out. Unconsciously, awkwardly, the straggling limb of a plant that has never grown the way it should have done. And Castiel goes to catch himself, to stop letting his fingers trail through the air reaching for a place they can’t go – but then Dean takes his hand.

Dean takes his hand, and holds onto it. Not sweetly, not softly. Hard. Like they’re at the top of a cliff and Dean’s afraid of losing his grip and having to watch Castiel fall alone.

Castiel can barely breathe. Against the odds his hand is being held by Dean. Against the way that his words desert him, against the thousands of reasons that the two of them shouldn’t have ever even met, let alone be standing here together in a garden. Against all of it, Castiel’s hand is squeezed tight in Dean’s.

There’s a part of Castiel that’s trying to pinch itself, that’s shaking its head in denial, but Dean’s grip is warm and real.

“Cas,” Dean says. “Do you…”

The question has no ending, but it’s Dean, so the answer is yes. Castiel nods.

Dean’s expression seems, with just the smallest of looks in his eyes, to break apart. He holds onto Castiel’s hand and says nothing, doesn’t move.

“And…” Castiel says, but his throat goes dry. He can do this. He has to do this. If he doesn’t now, he never will. He tries again. “And… you?”

Dean looks momentarily bewildered.

“Yeah, Cas,” he says.

Castiel feels himself go light, so suddenly his stomach flips.

Yeah, Cas, he hears in his head. Yeah, Cas.

On another day, when Castiel hadn’t just told Dean how he feels through a series of oblique angles – when Castiel’s hand wasn’t still being held in the rough warmth of Dean’s – Castiel might have been indignant at that tone in Dean’s voice. As though it had been obvious, when yes, half the time Dean was staring at him like he actually mattered, was ready to die for him – but the rest of the time Dean couldn’t look at him, was ready to die for anything.

Their hands swing a little between them. Just their arm muscles getting a little tired, and their hands moving together. Such a very little thing to happen, Castiel thinks. So very small. After all this time it’s just one hand in another, and it means absolutely crushingly everything, in the way that he’d known it would.

It’s happening, he thinks. It’s happening. We’re the same. We’re the same.

A little clutch of fear that he might change, one day. Wake up and be something else, unexpectedly. Grow again, in a direction Dean doesn’t –

Castiel breathes. It’s alright. He’s torn out his grace for this. He can be the person Dean needs. He can change himself again. Over and over, if needs be.

He holds Dean’s hand. Tight. He can always change again. He can make them the same again. Whatever it takes. For this, for the feeling of Dean's hand in his, it would be worth it, anything would be worth it. But –

Dean’s grip goes slack in his own.

“Wait,” Dean says. “Wait. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Castiel says. He holds tighter. “Nothing.”

Dean’s hand drops Castiel’s. The loosening of his grip is a slow-motion whip crack across Castiel’s chest.

“No?” Dean says, looking at Castiel, asking with the single word whether Castiel doesn’t want anything that just happened. He puts his hands up just a little way, maybe a surrender, maybe just a gesture to show he isn’t touching.

“Wait,” Castiel says, his hand still in place, still reaching. It shows, then, he thinks to himself. That sickle-curve sharpness in his chest, the fear in him that he won’t always be able to fit himself to what Dean wants, it must show. Dean can see it. Castiel lifts his chin, tries to look as though he’s feeling incredibly happy, instead of just incredibly much. “Dean, why are you –”

“Cas…” Dean’s eyes are searching his face, looking for the place where something is wrong. Castiel wants to cut in, insist that nothing is wrong. Take Dean’s hand again, reach for more – he could reach for more, he thinks, and his heart twists, and his head feels light. He could reach for more. Dean might let him. Dean was holding his hand for a moment, there, by choice, as though it really meant something. Castiel’s mouth is dry.

“What’s wrong?” Castiel tries. But his stomach is sinking, even as he’s aching with the terrifying joy of the sudden opening of all the doors he’d always thought were closed for him.

Dean can see that he’s scared. Dean is going to figure it all out. And then those doors will close again.

“I mean…” Dean says. He blinks, shakes his head just slightly. Seems to remember where exactly he is, glancing around at Castiel’s garden. It’s all slipping out of Castiel’s grasp. They’re going to pretend as though the last two minutes never happened, Castiel can feel it.

It’s unbearable. It’s unbearable. The idea of having had it for barely a few seconds, and then losing it. Castiel reaches for words, for anything – something that will show Dean how much it all means to him, how far he’ll go to make it work.

“We’re both human,” he says, almost blurts. “I took out my grace. So we can be… so I can stay.”

Took out, he thinks to himself. What a clinical way to talk about the tearing, the self-destruction, the loss.

Dean just looks at him, mouth slightly open.

This is supposed to be the part where Dean argues, Castiel realises only when it doesn’t come. This is the part where Dean asks me what the hell I was thinking. Tells me to put the grace damn well back where it came from, and to stop making terrible decisions. And then I argue back, and tell him I’ll do what I want to do with my own grace, and I made this choice for him, and I’d do it again.

But Dean isn’t saying anything. He’s just staring. And Castiel stares, too. He can’t argue back when Dean hasn’t started the fight. He can’t push back if Dean never pushed forward. So they stand in silence. The clouds overhead roll on, oblivious to the hearts frantically pounding so far beneath them.

“Cas,” Dean says, and he says it differently to how he’s supposed to – quietly, carefully, handling the name like it’s made of something delicate. “I don’t know what you want me to say, man.”

“You don’t have to say anything,” Castiel says.

“But you… you did that…”

Castiel watches him mutely.

“Why?” Dean asks.

So many answers. To be like you. To be near you. To show you I can change for you. Castiel opens his mouth and tries not to say too much.

“For – this,” Castiel says, managing to stop himself saying, for you.

“This?”

“This,” Castiel says, holding Dean’s gaze.

Dean holds his gaze.

“But it – ah. Jesus, Cas, this is hard to talk about.”

Castiel nods. He doesn’t want to let it go – feels sick at the idea of Dean just dropping the subject, and heading back inside, leaving the garden and forgetting all about what they’d said to each other. Chalking it up as somewhere he’d never go again. Too much baggage, too heavy, not worth it.

Dean puffs out his cheeks, though, and breathes out sharply, and says,

“It’s just that, hell, man, you never had to take the grace out to have… you know… anything you wanted out of me.” Dean looks uncertain as he says the last part, as though a little disbelieving that Castiel could want anything from him in particular. “You know that. Right?”

His voice is so different. So gentle in a way that Castiel only barely recognises from the most private of moments they’ve shared. Castiel is suddenly so intensely aware that they’re the only two in the garden, alone with each other. No one else to see them or hear them or judge what they say to each other. It’s a thought that gives him courage.

“I’ve changed for you since the beginning,” Castiel says. Dean opens his mouth, and then closes it, his eyes troubled. Castiel watches him, thinking. “Or –” he starts, as a new thought occurs to him. “Or, changed because of you, at least.”

Dean still looks confused, as though he doesn’t really see the difference. To Castiel, though, it feels clear as day. He changed because he met Dean – without that meeting, he would still be the angel he’d always been. But when he thought about it, the person he changed for was himself. Because it had felt right. Because it felt, period, and that was what he’d wanted.

It loops round and round perfectly in Castiel’s mind. Meeting Dean, the push Castiel needed to start running. And knowing Dean, now, the pull Castiel needs to keep changing, stay with him, stay together.

“I just thought,” Castiel says, when Dean stays silent, “if I could be human like you, then maybe you’d… maybe we could be the same. And stay that way.”

“And you want that,” Dean says.

“Yes.”

“Because…”

“Because,” Castiel says, a little taken aback, “I want… this.”

“But why’d we have to be the same for that? I mean – this?” Dean frowns, as though almost losing track of what he’s trying to say. They’re trying to talk all around it without using any words that are too big.

“Why…” Castiel trails off as he considers the question.

Dean shrugs, in a way that battles to look uncaring and ends up looking heartfelt.

“But… we need to be the same,” Castiel says. He wants them to be close like two leaves on a tree. Closer, two petals on a flower. No, closer still, not even two things. Just one, one plant, growing strong. He wants them that close, that inseparable, after so long being forced apart by fate and circumstance. No would-be gods or divine powers could set them apart if they were one thing. The same.

“But we aren’t the same, Cas,” Dean says, so quietly that Castiel only just hears it over the little burst of breeze that briefly ruffles over them.

Castiel feels his chest clench.

“I’m trying…” he says.

“No, I mean – I mean we can’t be,” Dean says. “I mean, we aren’t, ‘cause we’re… you know… two different people. There it is, you know? Different people. We can’t be exactly the same.”

“But…” Castiel starts, and the word comes out sounding almost angry, so he checks himself and looks down. “But,” he starts again, “if I can just…”

“C’mon,” Dean says, the smallest of smiles softening one side of his mouth. “You wouldn’t really want two of me running around the place, would you?”

“That’s not how I meant it,” Castiel answers, his voice serious, but with a lightness in his eyes to acknowledge Dean’s brush with humour.

“Come to think of it, though,” Dean says, “I’d get a lot more work done on the car if there were two of me. And we could harmonise on Zepp tracks. Maybe you are onto something.”

“Dean,” Castiel says, though he can feel his heart lifting just seeing Dean reaching out for him, trying to make him smile.

“I wouldn’t let you share my toothbrush, though, no way.” Dean looks around the garden. “And this would have to go. Hate to break it to you, but no way are you digging around in the dirt for hours if you’re me. Not unless there’s something to salt and burn at the end of it.”

“I know,” Castiel says, and the words sound little and obstinate, but his hands relax. Dean is looking at him like he gets it – like he sees that curling fear inside Castiel, the one that can’t let them be two different and separate things that just happen by the grace of luck to be next to each other. Because luck runs out, and they both know it. The only way to be sure of staying together, the fear says, is to be so much the same as to be one thing.

But it’s impossible. Castiel can’t be Dean. And Dean’s right, too, because Castiel doesn’t really want to be. He doesn’t want to give up gardening. He doesn’t want to work on Dean’s car. He doesn’t want to share a toothbrush.

He wants to spend time growing things. He wants his own hands in the dirt. He wants – he wants Dean, in the way that he has done since meeting Dean. And he wants to keep wanting.

Even if he didn’t want it, it’s what is. They’re two plants next to each other. Hoping not to be uprooted, hoping for sun, hoping for kind hands that stake them upright and water them even when they won’t flower. Always at the mercy of whatever storms might come, however hard Castiel tries to tangle himself together with Dean, camouflage with him, become just the same.

There are plants that do that, Castiel remembers. Plants that tangle and blend with other plants. They’re weeds. They choke out the first plant, cut off all its light and food until it dies. Two things can’t become one thing without loss. And Castiel doesn’t want to lose Dean – and, he realises quite suddenly, he also doesn’t want to lose himself. There’s so much he wants to do.

Things he might be able to do.

He looks at Dean, who’s watching him piece it all together, giving him time in silence, or maybe just struggling to find more words. But either way, Dean is still here. Dean is in front of him. A moment ago, they were hand in hand.

They could be again.

“You good?” Dean asks, seeming to sense Castiel come to a conclusion.

“Yes,” Castiel says. Dean visibly relaxes, shoulders easing under his coat. Castiel wants to put his hands on those shoulders. He wants to reach out. He wants to touch. He wants, wants, wants, and it feels like still growing, it feels like still changing, it feels like being alive. Like being himself.

He wants to hear Dean’s heartbeat. He wants his grace back. With a sudden absolute certainty, Castiel feels how much he wants his grace back.

He meets Dean’s eyes, and says simply,

“It’s here.”

Dean cocks an eyebrow, catching Castiel’s mood without his meaning.

“It’s here?”

“My grace,” Castiel says. “You were asking where it was. It’s here.”

“Here?” Dean looks confused.

Castiel can feel his mood unfurling, the parts of himself that he’s pushed away and hidden – the parts that have known all along he wants his grace back – finally allowed to breathe, finally being given what they need. He turns his attention to his garden, bending down next to the peach rose that has been so wilfully refusing to blossom.

“I didn’t expect anything to grow when I buried it here,” Castiel says to Dean, over his shoulder. “But then the first flowers came, and so I bought more, and then I put in the fence, and – it helped, being able to come here.” He puts out his hand towards the peach rose, speaking meditatively, almost not quite to Dean at all.

His fingertips brush the tightly closed buds, the sharpness of the thorns. Castiel lets that want for his grace rise up in him, unafraid of the feeling now that he knows it can be acted on. He closes his eyes, and feels for his grace.

It’s right there, waiting for him.

Brilliant and electric. Fast, so fast, and all colours, colours so bright they hiss and spit as they rocket up the stem of the peach rose and through Castiel’s fingers, filling his body with a fierce familiar hum. Castiel breathes in and smells every flower in the garden at once and the breeze and the tang of sap and the rich wetness of the soil and there, behind him, Dean. He breathes out ozone, heady.

He can feel the hat on his head, the way it rests on each hair. He can feel Dean’s closeness, the way the atoms of air jumble between them.

He can feel the sunshine on his face when it finally breaks through the clouds overhead.

The world is turning beneath his feet as it should. The plants around him are creaking as they grow. Dean is breathing a little quicker than usual, and Dean’s heartbeat – there it is. That sound Castiel has missed since the day he tore out his grace. Thud thud, thud thud, thud thud. Castiel closes his eyes more tightly and focuses in on it, loses himself briefly in its rhythm.

“Cas?” Dean says. His voice has all the layers Castiel can hear as an angel. Richer, deeper. He can hear the roughness that comes from the light scarring in Dean’s throat after years of hunting, calling out warnings and yelling in shock. He can hear the exact pitch at which Dean ends the single word, the note that means it’s a question and it’s shy and it’s hopeful and Dean is trying to hide all of it.

The sun is bright when Castiel opens his eyes. There on the peach rose, at the tip of the stem through which he drew out his grace from the earth, is a full-blossom flower. Blushing petals unfurled, just waiting to be looked at, to be touched. Castiel reaches up a finger, and presses it to the velvet centre.

He stands up, and turns to Dean, who’s looking at him with something in his eyes that’s just the same. Newly unfurled, wanting touch.

“Hello, Dean,” Castiel says, and Dean’s face relaxes.

“Here all along, huh.” Dean says. “Damn it, Cas. And there was me, worrying where to find it for no goddamn reason.” The words are irritable but Dean’s tone is a betrayal of them, because it’s so gentle, so serious. Serious enough that Castiel doesn’t feel silly when he takes a step forward, closer to Dean.

He meets Dean’s eyes silently, asking a question.

“You still…?” Dean says.

Still what exactly, Castiel wonders. Still want this? Still want you? Still look at you and think about how anything else I’ve tried to care about felt like trying to follow a script written for a part I was never meant to play, but with you caring grows up without me even trying like a wild rose in good earth?

The answer to all of it is yes. It’s Dean, after all. The answer is yes.

Castiel doesn’t use words to say it. Dean barely used them to ask the question, it was all in his eyes and the way he’s still holding his arms slightly out to the sides as though hoping to have a reason to put them around someone, and so Castiel gives him a reason.

The closeness – Castiel has always thought it might be jarring, if it ever happened, to be in Dean’s space like this. Something he’s wanted for so long and imagined so many times that the reality would be strange. But it’s not strange, it’s – it’s just a little slow, and hushed. It’s so quiet in the garden as they come together. Hand touching hand. Then arms reaching up. Castiel’s eyes tracing the lines of Dean’s face, finally having time to do it in as much time as he chooses, because Dean’s going a pleased shade of red under his gaze.

“I, uh,” Dean says, his voice a little hoarse. Castiel tilts his head at a slight angle. “I, uh. I don’t know how to do this. When it’s you.”

“What do you mean?”

“I – I don’t know if you want me to…” Dean’s eyes drop to Castiel’s lips. Through angel’s eyes, Castiel can see the slight tremor in him, the way he leans in just a little and then pulls back, the way his muscles are tightening in uncertainty.

“Yes,” says Castiel simply. He reaches up, and tilts his hat back.

“But you… it’s…” Dean looks at him helplessly.

And Castiel thinks perhaps he understands. This thing between them, the way that Castiel feels, it’s – it’s alive, it’s wider and deeper than the sky. It’s everything. And they’re supposed to, what, kiss about it? As though it were the end of a fairy tale? The end of a second date?

But then, they’ve done all the rest of it before. They’ve done blood and big choices. They’ve done hands grasping for each other against every rule, against all the smart money. And now there’s just this.

There’s just Castiel leaning forwards, and seeing relief and happiness break through on Dean’s face like sunshine for a second, before they kiss.

Castiel feels his wings unfurl.

It’s still not Heaven. It’s not even close. But – Castiel pulls back, and sees the expression on Dean’s face, the way his eyes are wide and unbelieving and so, so happy. But it’s a place, where Castiel is growing things.

[thesmokingguns]

Chores

Mick

-After touring with Mick you guys decided to live together. You honestly expected it to be a lot like living on the tour bus. You were very wrong

-Mick is a neat freak

-You threw everything in the closet and woke up to it organized by season and color

-He uses an iron with an ironing board correctly

-Rinses dishes before putting them in the dishwasher

-Reads the tags on the clothes and washes appropriately

-You feel like the messy one in the relationship because his OCD ass is facing can labels in the cabinet

-He takes a lot of pride in having a clean house

-It gives him anxiety to watch you vacuum because he does it in neat strips and you’re just singing along as you go cross cross, circles and whatever you want

-Always has someone come and do the landscaping to make the garden and property outside look nice

-He also always lights a candle when he cleans and gets oddly excited when he has a new one to light.

-“what do you think? Do you like how it smells? It’s orange scented. I think everything smells cleaner.”

-Can clean the oven without just putting the setting on.

- Realizing his love language is providing the clean home for you and giving you a place to be safe and protected.

Vince

-You have to wear the French Maid outfit; when you wear the outfit it motivates him to clean.

-Vince also would hire someone to clean because he thinks you’re already doing too much and wants to help you the only way he knows how: have someone else do it

-He does scrape his plate and put it in the sink for you

-Also he really enjoys Sunday mornings mowing the lawn. Like you’ll wake up and hear the lawn mower at 8am and there is Vince riding it around without a shirt, drinking a beer

-Vince does pick up dry cleaning and is actually really good at handling out of the house errands

-Thinks that by showering the shower is getting clean

-He is surprisingly good at cooking but only things that he wants. Like he makes the best meatballs and he BBQs and it’s so good.

-He does take care of the pets. Like he will clean the fish tank the right way and make sure that the dog poop is picked up in the yard

-Even though he doesn’t really clean he does appreciate what you do and always notices things. Really good about praising a new picture you hung up or saying he likes the way the sheets smell. Just really encouraging.

Tommy

-HAHA , you’re fucked

-Just kidding, kind of.

-Tommy gets hyper fixated on certain tasks which can be super helpful but also you need to understand his brain can’t handle a day of cleaning

-Like telling him to work in the garden. You fucked up with that one. You find him hours later with a whole ass project and half the ground dug up. There is also the 50/50 chance he is going to get bored and forget about it.

-The laundry bin is wherever he leaves his clothes. The redirection to the hamper never sticks with him

-He does do the little things you ask him to do. Like he will take out the trash at night and bring the bins out when it’s collection day

-Also will help you if he sees you doing something because he loves you and wants to make your life easier. So if you’re folding clothes he’ll come in and start folding well he talks about something that’s he’s super into

-He also will get the lawn mowed by the neighborhood kids because he’s not doing it

-if you ever leave him home for a week you come back to mayhem. He has no clean clothes, broken dishes, just a mess that he doesn’t even know where to start with.

-But Tommy is serious about clean sheets. He makes sure they’re changed once or twice a week. He loves a nice made bed.

-He can’t tell the difference between clean or dirty unless they’re his quirky things he likes.

-He knows that you love coffee so he makes sure he does the maintence and cleaning of hour coffee maker. He always stocks up on beans. Whenever he is traveling and you’re not there he brings you back local coffee as a gift

Nikki

-He believes in gender roles for the most part but when it comes to the house he’s honestly willing to do his part

-Nikki checks the fire alarms every other week to make sure the batteries are all set so you’re safe

-When you’re making breakfast he’s wiping down the counters so you can focus on cooking and he can clean the mess

-He is a big about a house feeling like a space for both of you and really has the process of decorating the house involve both of you

-He goes grocery shopping with you and if he doesn’t he meets you at the car to carry them in and help you put them away

-He helps you make the bed in general morning well you talk about your plans for the day

-He also wants you to take days off from worrying and hires someone to come in a few times a week so he can steal you away

-Nikki loves when you cook for him and always does the dishes after

-He is better at doing errands if you go as a team. If you go separate it just takes longer and kind of sucks

-He doesn’t wear shoes in the house and has a no shoe rule for everyone

-Nikki cares about appearances and that’s why he hired someone to organize a his and her closet. Instead of having a walk in closet to yourself you both share a room because he loves helping you get ready and picking out your shoes or jewelry.

-He makes sure that you always have your favorite candles and that there’s flesh flowers for you weekly

-He takes your car for gas and a car wash every Sunday morning well you sleep in

-He is great at making sure things are fixed before they break and keeping up on the maintenance of everything

-Feels like a home is a place two people make and that’s what you have

[delimeful]

to taste your beating heart (4)

warnings: nightmares, flashbacks, mind control/thrall mention, mental breakdown, blood mention, impalement/staking, upsetting thoughts, panic, ptsd responses

-

A plastic-sounding click, like someone pressing a button.

Anx took a breath, staring intently at the person bustling around across from him.

Patton was making tea like someone vying for a professional butler position: setting saucers and cups in front of each of them, managing the teapot with a steady hand, motions smooth and automatic.

“Sorry, I’m just so used to setting up refreshments for guests,” he chuckled nervously. “My sister always insists on tea when she comes by, so—“

Logan shifted next to him, impatient and more than a little irritated after every one of his inquiries had been deflected or outright ignored. Patton had invited them in, though, and he was currently their best lead on one of the most vicious cases they’d ever dealt with.

Even if he seemed utterly incapable of answering any of their actual questions.

That wasn't saying he wasn't willing to talk at all. Roman was chattering with him, their most sociable member easily drawn into discussion and more than willing to natter on in the hopes that Patton would let some vital information slip.

Anx wasn’t the only one who noted the way their host set an extra saucer and cup out, but when he met Logan’s gaze, the hunter only rolled his eyes, more than content to dismiss it as another element of the stranger’s apparent airheaded personality.

Patton was still speaking, discussing the many alleged merits of ignoring allergies for the sake of fulfilling experiences. Roman, who was lactose intolerant, was nodding along wholeheartedly. Logan, who was the one to deal with Roman’s post-dairy consumption whining, looked a lot less agreeable.

His own attention remained pinned on Patton’s movements rather than his words. There was a pattern there, a careful turn of the cup so the handle was facing the right side, lift the teapot from the warmer, and pour. One by one, he went around the table.

Anx was the only one watching when the man finally fumbled. After pouring each of their cups with surprising grace, he reached that final, fifth teacup. He twisted the handle so it was right-aligned, lifted the teapot, poured— and then reached for what looked like a cream pitcher.

A beat late, Patton’s hands suddenly swerved to the side, and he pulled them back as though he’d been burned. His voice didn’t even falter.

Anx reached across the table lightning-quick and seized the pitcher, knocking a few of the porcelain jars over and effectively cutting through the conversion as he did. Roman was asking something, but Patton only stared at him, something both fearful and grateful in his gaze.

Anx pulled the lid off, and the thick smell of blood hit him, like iron and rust.

“Your sister, you said?” Logan asked, and Patton bit his lip hard enough to bleed.

Click.

He was in a different room of the same tiny apartment, though it took him a moment to recognize the interior.

Put bluntly, it looked as though a miniature hurricane had torn through it.

The wallpaper was shredded and splattered. The cute decorative furniture had been thrown askew at best, smashed to bits at worst. Everything was in disarray, the valuable and mundane targeted indiscriminately. An entire life torn to pieces.

In the eye of the storm, Patton stood, hands fisted in his hair and eyes bloodshot.

They’d known the backlash of the bond breaking would be hard on Patton, but they hadn’t been prepared for this. It was entirely possible that they had never run into a thrall this strong, one maintained for so long, in their entire hunting career.

Most aggressive thralls would attack relentlessly to defend their master from harm. Seeing as they’d been the ones to kill his “sister”, if Patton was going to vent his ire on anyone, it would be them. Roman stepped forwards carefully regardless, knowing that they owed it to him to at least try to help him recover. “Patton?”

“I should have helped her,” he replied tonelessly, voice half-ruined from screaming. He picked up a broken chunk of a table leg, and they all went tense, but all he did was slam it against the wall.

“I should have saved her!” he cried, punctuating every word with a swing. “Where is she, where is she, what did I do to her?”

“A better question would be: what did she do to you?” Logan asked, ignoring the sharp look Anx sent his way. They’d all been unsettled at the way the vamp had talked about Patton, like someone possessive over a favored plaything, but that didn’t mean they should be bringing it up now.

They’d finally gotten Patton’s full attention, as he turned to them with angry tears in his eyes. “She did everything for me! And I— I gave her away, I betrayed her…”

“She was hurting people,” Anx cut in, voice firm but not unkind. For all that he’d been through, Patton didn’t deserve unkind.

“I could have fixed it, I thought I was— I was getting through to her,” he pleaded, his voice unsteady and unconvincing even to himself. He dropped the wood, pressing bleeding knuckles against his face to stem the tears.

“It’s not your fault, Patton, okay?” Roman tried, stepping closer until he could reach out and set his hand on a trembling shoulder. Patton only seemed to bow further with the weight of his grief.

“Giving her up was supposed to kill me,” he said softly, the frenzy gone from him. “How am I supposed to live without her?”

“The same way everyone else does,” Roman pulled him in for a hug, his own eyes wetter than they’d been before. “One day at a time.”

Click.

The living room of the house— their house.

Perhaps more importantly, the smell of something burning.

Anx had always been twitchy about things like this-- a thousand potential disasters in mind for every little inconvenience-- so he bolted off the arm of the couch the moment the scent registered.

When he got to the kitchen, he heard the rattle of an active microwave, saw Patton standing and staring blankly at the display as the inside of the microwave clouded up with smoke.

Cringing at the thought of the smoke alarm going off, he turned on the overhead fan and pulled the window up before finally yanking the microwave door open.

A plastic takeout container was halfway to a melted puddle, mixing with whatever leftovers had formerly resided there. He slid on a pair of duck-themed oven mitts and grabbed the most solid-looking parts, quickly lifting and carrying the mess to the balcony where it could cool down without making their house smell like burnt plastic.

When he returned, Patton was still in that same spot, frowning slightly as though just realizing that something might be a little off. Like someone had pressed pause while the world fast-forwarded around him, Patton had described it once.

Anx flitted about for a moment, putting the mitts back and cleaning the leftover residue, and then finally faced his friend with a wry half-smile. Patton’s eyes snapped to him, as though just realizing he was there.

“Hey, Pat.” He reached out and set his hand against Patton’s back, watching as the touch helped ground him slightly. “Can you go sit at the table? I’ll bring us both something to eat.”

Without a word, Patton turned and walked to their little dining table.

Cooking was admittedly harder when he ducked away to check on the other room every few moments, but he managed alright, only singeing the eggs slightly where Roman would have incinerated them.

He set the table for them both, and sat across from Patton, who was motionless and quiet in his chair.

“Can we eat together?” Anx asked, offering Patton a fork so there was a physical prompt as well as a verbal one.

It took a moment, but Patton gripped the fork easily and started to work through the motions of eating, mirroring Anx. Whenever he faltered or seemed to forget what he was in the middle of, Anx would nudge his attention back on track.

Once they were finished, he gathered up his dishes and asked Patton to grab his, carrying them back to the kitchen together.

Patton paused for a moment at the sink, mouth twitching into a frown as he stared at his glass and the lingering layer of orange juice at the bottom.

“Does anyone want tea?” he asked suddenly, a well-practiced line in a cheery tone. “I’m very good at tea service, you know.”

Anx swallowed the lump in his throat. “I’m good, Pat,” he declined instead of pointing out that they didn’t have any tea in the house.

Patton seemed to get a little hazier, his face going sad and then quickly lax again. Anx took the glass from him and offered him a hand to hold instead, squeezing his palm comfortingly when he accepted.

“I need help out in the garden today. Do you think you could lend a hand or two?”

He dipped his head in a nod, and as they made their way to the back door, Anx shot a text off to the group chat.

> nightmare on edge street: out in the garden with pat. bad day protocol, stat

When they came back in hours later, dirt under their nail beds and probably a little sunburned, Roman and Logan had already combined their talents to set up an elaborately decorated but still structurally sound blanket fort spanning the entirety of the living room.

Patton’s face twitched into a tremulous little smile as the others waved them over, and Anx felt him squeeze their joined hands gratefully.

Click.

The sequence rewound, restarted. Ran him through it over and over, the same scenes-- the same memories. Patton pouring tea with a determined, terrified glint to his eye. Patton’s mind struggling under the stress of the snapped bond. Patton working through a difficult day with the help of friends.

The scenery grew brighter and brighter with every repetition, like saturation turned all the way up on a screen, until they were as painful as sunlight on his bare skin. He tried to close his eyes, to move away, to change something, anything, but his body wasn’t his own.

Look at him, it seemed to demand, keeping him frozen in a sensory hell. Pay attention. Look what you did. Understand how you hurt him.

Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.

Clunk.

Silence. The memories vanished, leaving him floating in an impossible, endless black space. Between one blink and the next, he was eye-to-eye with a mirror image, something about it just slightly off.

He didn’t notice the stake in its hand until it was too late.

---

Anx jerked upright, hands jumping to his chest as the phantom sensation of wood between his ribs faded. His breath stuttered painfully, as though he expected to feel ichor welling up in his mouth any minute.

Staking a vampire was an archaic hunter method. It was difficult to manage, it was messy, and it was the slowest and most painful way possible to kill a vampire. He knew this, though he wasn’t sure which life was providing the facts.

Regardless of memories, he couldn’t know how it felt to actually be staked. He’d been injured before, with a coven as temperamental as his, but nothing like that. Nothing even close to that. It was just a bad dream, an imagined pain.

There was a subtle shifting nearby, and his head snapped up, eyes bright and teeth bared. If those assholes thought he was in the mood to have his space invaded--

“Easy, Count Chocula.” Across the room, the sword-wielder-- Roman, that was his name-- settled back into the armchair by the door, watching him with narrowed eyes. “I was simply noticing your… abrupt awakening?”

Right. Because he wasn’t settled into one of the tiny, dark rooms reserved for the newly-turned and those who couldn’t shake off the urge to sleep. He was captured by weird hunters, who trapped him in their weird house, and asked weird invasive leading questions about his weird night terrors.

He was also tucked into a bed, for some reason.

The comforter had already slipped down halfway due to his sudden jolt into wakefulness, and he wasted no time in kicking free of the sheets. The room was surprisingly dark in both theme and lighting, with deep purple walls and heavy spiderweb-patterned curtains blocking out any potential sunlight.

There was also a warding circle of ash carefully smudged in a perimeter around the bed, the burning containment runes strong enough to make him want to sneeze even from this distance. The diameter of the circle was wide enough that he could theoretically keep away from any stabbings if he pissed Roman off enough, but add even one more hunter to the mix and it would take virtually no effort to pincer him.

Nothing he could do about the new cage for now, with the hunter staring at him expectantly from his sentry position. He sent a poisonous glare back and hissed, still crouched on the bed like an exceptionally angry gargoyle.

Roman pressed an offended hand to his chest, but was cut off by an inordinately cheerful knock at the door. His expression flickered to a sort of bitter resignation, and he shot Anx a much more serious warning look before unlocking and cracking the door open.

“Hey, Pat! I thought you were taking a nap?” he asked with impressively feigned lightness to his voice.

“I was, I just— Is he awake?” Another too-familiar voice replied, sounded distracted. “I felt…”

“Yeah, Padre,” Roman admitted after a strained pause. “He’s up. You remember your key?”

“Of course!” Patton said, and neither of them elaborated on what the hell that was supposed to mean. Roman stepped aside, and Patton beelined to the bed like a compass needle to true north.

He stopped just short of the circle, like a determined enough— or cornered enough— vamp couldn’t reach out and drag him in. “Anx! I’ve been so worried about you! You took quite a tumble, are you feeling alright?”

Anx stared at him. The words were bright, but there was a thread of something fervent and barely-controlled in them, something frenetic in the way he shifted from foot to foot. It sent a pervasive feeling of wrongness down his spine, like looking at an old photograph and realizing that something you remembered from it was entirely absent.

Anx didn’t— couldn’t know enough about Patton to recognize when he was acting off, but every piece slotted neatly into place anyways, dragging him to a conclusion he didn’t intend to realize; Patton was pretending, ignoring the parts of him that felt bad to reassure the rest of them. After everything he'd already gone through, he was bearing the stress of being thralled without a word.

He could feel the thrall tether pulled taut between them, already mentally frayed from both the time passed since feeding and the pain that had ricocheted through him at his last order. Looking at Patton like this, it was bizarrely easy to loosen his grip and let that last thread connecting them fall apart.

Patton’s shoulders eased, all of him sagging slightly like a puppet with strings cut. And wasn’t that just an uncomfortably accurate metaphor.

In the next moment, the hunter was stepping neatly over the line of ash and into the circle, arms lifted. Roman shouted something, but his alarmed words were meaningless noise against the roar of anticipatory fear that overcame Anx.

Get away, his instincts screamed, but his body remained stuck, stalled by a resentful whisper in the back of his mind: Doesn’t he deserve to get a few hits in though? Look at what you did to him.

A sudden touch made him curl in on himself, but the arms that folded around him were careful, even gentle. His head jerked up, and sure enough, Patton was hugging him. He froze, struck dumb.

Over Patton’s shoulder, Roman was stopped a few feet away, hand outstretched as though he’d planned to yank Patton back out of the danger zone. Anx met his stare, eyes round as quarters.

“I did not tell him to do this,” he blurted, and Patton’s chest vibrated with a little sniffly chuckle. The human was so warm.

At the door, Logan appeared, glasses slightly askew. “Patton? I heard—“

He paused, taking in the room. His expression grew more and more unimpressed. “... I see. Exactly what happened while I was away?”

[ofstarsandvibranium]

Love Blooming

Fandom: Triple Frontier

Pairing: Frankie "Catfish" Morales x F!Reader

Summary: It started when Frankie walked into a flower shop...

A/N: I'm willing to write a part 2 if someone wants it.

Frankie felt so out of his limit. When Will insisted to set him on a blind date, he uninterestingly agreed, thinking that Will would forget about it. Turns out he didn't. So now Frankie is rushing. He's sweaty, coming straight from work to pick up Mia, paying the babysitter, dropping off Mia. Now he had to grab some flowers, and maybe buy some cologne or body spray from the store nearby so he doesn't smell so bad.

He enters the small flower shop and he's overwhelmed by the different floral aromas and colors.

"Be right out!" you call out from the back. A few seconds pass and you step out holding a tray of small succulents. You set them down on the table and when you look at Frankie, your eyes light up and you smile brightly at him, "Hi there! What can I do for you today?" He thinks you look beautiful with your smile and the flower clips in your hair.

Frankie nervously rubs the back of his neck and walks closer to the counter, "Um...I'd like some flowers."

You giggle, "Well you came to the right place. What's the occasion?"

"A date."

"Do you happen to know what the person likes?" you ask interestingly.

He sighs and shakes his head, "No. This is a first date, blind date. One that don't even want to go on, honestly." he murmurs the last part and winces, "Sorry. I didn't-"

"It's okay. I think we'll go with daffodils. They're simple, pretty, and symbolize new beginnings. I think that fits for first dates. You never know if it's that start of something, ya know?" You move around the counter towards the greenhouse. You don't signal for Frankie to follow, but he does anyway.

When you feel his presence, you glance over your shoulder and give him a polite smile. He doesn't know why, but his stomach flutters whenever you seem to look at him.

"So Mister..."

"Frankie. Call me Frankie."

"Frankie, okay," you stop in front of the daffodils, pulling out your gardening scissors from your apron and you start cutting, "I'm guessing your friend set you up on this blind date against your will?"

Frankie stuffs his hands in his back pockets and sighs, "Sorta. I mean, he offered to set me up with her a few weeks ago and I blindly said yes. I honestly thought he'd forget about it. I was wrong."

"Not looking to date right now?"

"I got a lot on my plate right now, honestly."

You nodded, "I see." you pull out some twine from your other apron pocket and bind the bundle of flowers together. You then hand them to Frankie, "Here ya go! I hope you enjoy your date!"

Frankie took the flowers and looked at you with furrowed brows, "Don't need to pay for these?"

"Free of charge."

"You sure?"

"Definitely. I really hope things go well on your date."

"Um thanks-" you give him your name and he repeats it and you nod in confirmation, "Well thanks. I guess if I'll ever need flowers again, I'll come to you."

"Please do! Bye, Frankie!" you escort him to the door and wave as he hops into his truck, driving away.

Frankie looks at the time and sees that he's running late. Guess he'll have to skip out on the cologne.

___________________

It's two weeks later when Frankie walks back into your shop, this time he has Mia attached to his hip.

You're at the counter already helping another customer, but a minute later, they're walking away and you're giving him a welcoming wave.

"Frankie! It's good to see you again!" He approaches the counter and sets Mia down and you smile softly at her, "And who's this cutie?"

"This is my daughter, Mia. Honey, say hi!"

The three year old looks at you and then hides her face into Frankie's shirt and you giggle, "She's shy, I see. It's okay. Anyway, what can I help you with today? Oh! How was the date?"

He shrugged, "Alright. We didn't really click."

Your shoulders sagged in disappointment, "Oh. I'm sorry."

"It's okay. She liked the flowers though. So I guess there's that. Anyway, um, I'm on my way to a friend's engagement party. Didn't have time to really get them anything."

"Well I'm here at your disposal! Follow me!" you walk towards the greenhouse and Frankie picks up Mia, setting her down. Her small hand goes into his and the two Morales' follow you.

"So yellow tulips symbolize cheerful thoughts, which I suppose you're sending when people get engaged." You pull out your scissors and hold them out to Frankie, "Here."

"What?"

"You and Mia can cut them. Grab as many as you'd like."

"You sure?"

"Yup!"

"Okay," he takes the flowers and kneels beside the flowerbed of yellow tulips, "Honey, you wanna cut some flowers for Uncle Benny?"

You see Frankie's eyes go soft as he guide's his daughters hands across the scissor and cuts one flower off, "Good job, sweetheart!" he kisses her head, "Let's do a few more, okay?"

Mia giggles and says, "'Kay, daddy."

You go back to the counter to sort out a new shipment of seeds. A few minutes later, Frankie appears setting the flowers down. He pulls out his wallet as you wrap the flowers up, "I'm paying for the flowers this time."

You shake your head, "No, you're not."

"Oh come on."

You shake your head again, "Seeing you and Mia have some cute daddy and daughter time was payment enough." Frankie says your name and you stop him, "Nope!" You also slide a card over to him, "And here's a card to go with it. Just scribble your name and you're good to go."

Frankie chuckles in disbelief as he writes his and Mia's name in the card. He then takes it and the flowers in one hand, his other hand preoccupied with Mia's, "You're losing money doing this."

"Hardly. But I hope you guys have a good rest of your day!" you leaned over the counter and waved at Mia, "Bye Mia! It was nice meeting you!"

Mia, feeling a little more comfortable, smiled shyly and waved, making you giggle. Frankie smiles at the sight and sound, then clears his throat, "I don't mean to be forward, but, um, would you like to get some coffee sometime?"

You brightly smile at him again, "I'd love to!" you take a business card and scribble your personal number, "I usually take Fridays and Sundays off."

"Who runs the shop when you're not here?"

"I have other employees. But call or text me sometime and we can hash out the details."

"Alright," he smiles and pockets the card. He gives you a wave, "Thanks again."

"Anytime," you say as you wave back and watch as Frankie and Mia hop into the truck and drive away.

___________________

You and Frankie have been texting back and forth for two weeks. He's been really busy with work lately, hence why you've yet to go on that coffee date.

Frankie: So I know I asked you out for coffee, but do you actually drink coffee? Or are you more of a tea person?

You: I do drink coffee, yes. Usually something sweet with vanilla or cinnamon flavoring.

Frankie: You're one of THOSE people.

You: DON'T KNOCK IT UNTIL YOU TRY IT, FRANKIE!

Frankie: ;)

That's all he sends you and you were going to reply, but a few customers have walked in and you became preoccupied.

You're finishing up and order when you see Frankie walking through the door with two coffees and a paper bag.

You give him another one of those heart stopping smiles and he seems to blush from that, "Hey! You didn't tell me you were coming!"

"That would've ruined the surprise, cherry blossom."

You cocked a brow at him and smiled, "Cherry blossom?"

He shrugged, "I dunno. It fits. You work at a flower shop and...you're as beautiful as a cherry blossom."

You feel your cheeks heat up at the compliment, "Well, aren't you sweet."

"Have you had lunch yet?"

"I haven't."

He gives you a questioning look and you snicker, "Lemme just get Jess to take over the front. If you head through those doors at the back of the greenhouse, it leads to my favorite hiding spot. Meet me there?"

"Yes, ma'am." Frankie replies with a nod and proceeds to head over.

You quickly rush to the back where Jess is, "Quick! Take over the front!"

"What? But why so...rushy?"

"Frankie's here and he brought me coffee and lunch!"

"Frankie, hot dilf, Frankie?"

You groan, "Don't call him that, but yes!" You practically rip off your work apron, dust off any soil left on your clothes and fix your hair to look less messy, "How do I look?"

"Decent."

"Good enough!"

You quickly rush to the back where you told Frankie to met you and let out a deep breath before stepping in, "So, what made you decide to bring me lunch?"

"The fact that I've been so busy that I keep pushing back our date. I figured that I have time now, might as well."

"Eager, hm?" you laugh when he shyly looks away and you place your hand on his arm, "Hey, it's okay. It's cute. You're cute." then you scrunched your face up, "No. That's weird. It's like we're teenagers saying that. We're adults. You're handsome. There. That sounds better."

Frankie chuckles and then looks around the room, "This is a nice area."

"Thanks. It used to be storage, but I wanted to have a place where we can hold classes or little luncheons for guests. It's not finished yet."

"Still looks beautiful," he notes the vines going down the frames of the windows, the soft pastels of different flowers. His eyes go back to you and he sees you softly staring back at him.

Your gaze makes him nervous so he grabs two sandwiches from the paper bag he brought, "I, uh, didn't know if you liked sandwiches, but these are best sellers."

"Thank you, and for future reference, I'm not picky."

"Good to know," he then takes your coffee, handing it to you, "I hope this is to your liking."

You accepted it and took a sip, smacking your lips together to really get a taste, "Mmmm! That's some good stuff right there!" and Frankie let out a breath of relief. You giggled, setting the drink down, "Are you always this nervous when it comes to dates, Frankie?"

"I...Well, to be honest, haven't gone on dates in a long time. Since Mia was born and my ex and I separated, never really had time. It wasn't a priority because my main focus was on my little girl. That blind date was my first date in a few years."

"So what changed?"

Frankie bit his lip and nervously reached out, placing his hand over yours, "You. God, I don't know what it is about you, cherry blossom, but you just seem to pull me in. I want to get to know you, take you out, hold you, kiss you. All of it." his thumb softly rubs against the back of your hand and you smile sweetly at him.

"I get what you're saying, Frankie, because I feel that way about you too. The way you're so sweet and kind, you're a great father to Mia, and you care about your friends. I'd love to continue getting to know you. There's just something about you to that pulls me towards you."

"If we do this, I just...I need to warn you that I'm a little rough around the edges. I've gone through some stuff-"

"-And that's okay. And you don't need to share that with me unless you want to."

Frankie chuckles to himself and shakes his head, "You wanna know something?"

"Hm?"

"I'm glad I went on that blind date, because if I didn't, I wouldn't have met you, cherry blossom."

You giggle and place your other hand on top of Frankie's, "I think that nickname is starting to grow on me. I was a little iffy of it at first but the way you say it...sounds so sweet. You're so sweet, Frankie."

Jess walks into the room with her hand over her eyes, "Are you guys decent?"

You roll your eyes and look over your shoulder, "Quit it, will you?"

Jess drops her hand and smirks at you, then looks at Frankie, "Oh yeah. Definitely a dilf."

"JESS!"

The young woman cackles and dodges a napkin ball you've thrown her way, "Okay! Okay! I'm sorry! Anyway, a delivery arrived. You want me to sign it off?"

"Please do," you reply with a nod.

"I can go if you're busy," Frankie said and you immediately replied, "No no. You're staying. Jess can handle everything."

The young woman saluted, "Yup! I can handle it. Also, remember to use prote-"

"I CAN FIRE YOU, YOU KNOW!"

She proceeds to rush out of there and back to the storefront and you groan, letting your head fall into your hands.

"So....you think I'm a dilf?"

Your head shot up and your eyes widened, "No! I mean, yes, but no! i just told Jess that you're a dad who also happens to be very attractive!"

"So a dilf."

You ball up another napkin and throw it at Frankie, who's just laughing wholeheartedly.