#trucker time management

[artisticdivasworld]

Mastering Time Management and Route Planning are Key Strategies for New Truckers

Alright, now we are looking at the fourth part in this series–route planning and time management, a real make-or-break skill for new truckers. When you’re on the road, managing time well can mean the difference between a smooth, stress-free haul and one filled with delays, rushed stops, and unnecessary headaches. Think of route planning as more than just plotting a course; it’s like building a…

[dial]

I feel like I just wanted an excuse to use this image, I love this set of cards. Anyways.

I don’t want to sleep for work but I know I’m off the next two days so it won’t be so bad and I’ll have more time to hang out with my boyfriend. so I’ll live, right. It’s not the end of the world. But I’m starting to hate my job more and more lately, it’s infuriating how the shift that relieves me acts lately like they’re better than me. We finally have extra help on my shift and I’ve actually been able to properly do what needs to be done before the next shift arrives, but she’s new and needs help with a lot plus doesn’t show up until over halfway through my shift right before we get busy. I wish I just had more time for my boyfriend while he’s still here, I would glue myself to his side if I could.

[aphelionwrotes11]

MDNI 18+ (not edited)

Part 2

Trucker!simon, who finds himself a lovely bird at a local truck stop he often runs through on his usual routes.

Sits his massive self at the bar on one of the small stools, glaring at any of the blokes who stare at you a bit too long.

Gives you a blank look when you check up on him, asking if he’d like anything else.

“Just anotha’ cuppa, sweet’art” he always says, sliding his mug towards you, which looks microscopic compared to his massive hand.

You think he doesn’t like you, considering he doesn’t ever talk to you much when you try to make small talk, but he always leaves you a fat tip. You figure he’s just quiet. He can’t dislike you that much considering how many times you’ve glanced over your shoulder to see him gazing appreciatively at your ass.

It’s an especially rowdy night at the truck stop that finally breaks the camels back. A real gentleman decided he wanted a feel of you. So he didn’t hesitate to grab a handful of the fat on your backside, his table and him whooping and hollering as you squealed and slapped his hand away, glowering at him as you scampered away to the bar.

You held back tears as you started up another pot of coffee, never were the confrontational type. This wouldn’t be the first time a man had taken it upon himself to put his hands on you, but it would certainly be the last. Considering how Simon was sat at the end of the bar; shaking with rage, his knuckles white from being clenched tight as he stood.

It all happened so quick you didn’t even catch it, you back had been turned. The restaurant went from ruckus, laughter, and loud voices, to silence after the sound of a sickening crack rung through the room.

You turned just in time to see the asshole’s friends jump from their seats and go for your favorite regular; Simon. The handsy asshole laid flat on the ground, out cold.

It took no time at all for Simon to lay out the other three, he was twice each of their size in pure muscle, and obviously lacked nothing in skill. Once he was done he simply turned to you, pointed to the back room and said,

“Go get yer things.”

You didn’t think twice. Passing your manager who stood in the doorway, face solemn. You asked him quickly if it was okay for you to leave, he took one glance at Simon and nodded his head. You grabbed your things, throwing on your coat and met Simon at the door.

He takes your arm, surprisingly gentle for his huge form, he looked enraged. His shoulders tense, brows furrowed, you’re certain if he didn’t have a mask on the lower half of his face he would have a deep frown on his lips.

You thank him softly, following him as he leads you through the full parking lot. He says nothing, staring ahead. You tell him you don’t live far, you can just walk.

“No, you’re not doin tha’.” He says, and you don’t argue.

Helps you into the cab of his massive semi, getting into the drivers side and turning up the heat.

Offers to get you some food, “haven’t seen’ya eat a bite ol night, bird.”

You refuse, thanking him for the offer, telling him you’ll eat at home. You probably won’t, your stomach is still all twisted from earlier, if he can tell you’re shaken up he doesn’t show it. He just nods.

Takes you to the corner of your street, wouldn’t be able to drive his truck down the narrow road. You thank him again, asking him if there’s anything you can do to repay him.

“I know’a few things you can do for me, bird.” He says lowly, you feel your cheeks warm at the implication. You ask him what he wants. He grunts, glancing to the side as if he’s thinking.

“Gimme a kiss.” He says, tapping his cheek. Your eyes widen, is he serious? Out of all things he could ask for, he asks for just a kiss on the cheek? You shocked to realize you’re disappointed he didn’t ask for more.

He pulls his mask down to his chin, revealing his chiseled jaw and thin, scarred lips. You lay a trembling hand on his giant thigh for support as you lean over, and just as you are about to meet his cheek he tilts his head and has your mouth. Pressing a heated kiss to your lips.

It takes you a moment to catch up, but before you know it you’re in his lap, making out sloppily, mouths open and tongues swirling together. You sigh into his mouth, cupping his jaw as his hand cradles the back of your head.

When you start grinding yourself against him is when he stops.

“Not yet, bird. Gotta take you out first, do it the right way.” He says. The right way? What the hell.

“Take ya for dinner, treat ya real good, take ya home and fuck that sweet pussy halfway to heaven.”

He cups your ass as he whispers that nasty shit in your ear, one hand on your hip as he bucks up once against your wet heat. You let out a whimper and he just chuckles. Asshole.

Jumps out the truck and helps you down with two strong hands on your hips. Walks you all the way to your front door, smiling at your peeved expression. You were definitely gonna have to rub one out once you got inside.

Gives you a sweet peck on the cheek, gripping your chin with his thumb and finger.

“Be here tomorrow a’ seven. Wear something nice.” He says softly before turning and stalking off into the night. Leaving you flabbergasted on your front doorstep.

Note: I dunno if you guys can tell but im incapable of writing anything small. This was supposed to be just a short little thing about how sexy trucker!simon would be but i got so carried away 😭 he’s the ghost that haunts my nights, can’t get him outta my head

Simon Riley master list

[slightly-knot-insane]

Truck and Fuck

[ m!monster x fem!reader ]

You just can't help yourself - you have to help people in need. Or monsters.

You stop your car in front of the broken truck and ask the driver hiding underneath the machine does he need any help. It takes him a full minute to haul his heavy body and stand up in front of you, covered in oil and dirt. Seeing his huge frame adorned with more muscles you've ever seen sends a strong throb of pleasure between your legs.

"What can a small human help me with?" he asks with a smirk.

Turns out with a lot of things. Soon, both of you manage to get his massive truck running again. The impressed trucker looks at you and happily offers you a drink inside his vehicle. And you say yes a bit too eagerly for him not to notice.

His cabin is quite roomy and you can enjoy riding his thick cock with no problems. You bounce up and down the full length, moaning and screaming each time your clit hits his sheath. His hairy chest and stomach rub against your tits and sensitive nipples. He is so big, so dirty and nasty - and you love it. He smacks your ass and kneads your thighs and hips, grunting what a fine human you are. He licks his finger and pushes it between your cheeks and it takes a few seconds of fingerfucking for you to cum. He pushes you down, clutching your hips and he splashes his seed inside your spasming walls.

He starts his truck and honks as he leaves you behind. You enter your car, your legs still shaky and cum sticking between your thighs, hoping he'll drive near your town again.

[powderpinkandsweeet]

Trucker Ellie x Hitchhiker Reader

Sorta fluffy sort of nsfw and long. You shower together and you give Ellie head. TW S/A attempt

The open road was lonely. For days at a time Ellie would only interact with others through the windshield of her big rig. The CB radio was an option, but the truckers weren’t so kind to the only woman on the station. By no means was the job fun, but it paid well and kept her occupied. Three months in and Ellie had been able to send a good chunk of change back home, but she had a long road ahead before she would follow the money. At first, she had enjoyed the time and space to clear her mind, but after the first thousand or so miles it had gotten old.

Ellie was riding a country road past the exit to a dinky town when she laid eyes on your silhouette half a mile up at the onramp. You stood dangerously close to the road with your thumb raised in the air, the other shading your eyes to scope out oncoming cars. You piqued Ellie's interest for a multitude of reasons: you were probably overheating, and the closer she got the prettier you became, but most of all, you were hitchhiking so you must be either desperate or stupid.

Ellie down-shifted gears and pumped the brakes, managing to come to the safest stop she could without flying through the windshield or losing the trailer behind her. She could see the wide grin on your face as you jogged up to her passenger side. She rolled down the window as you hopped up the steps to lean against the door. Arms crossed beneath your breasts, you rested your forearms against the windowsill to make eye contact with her. She saw the blush of sunburn across your cheekbones and nose as you caught your breath and asked her in the sweetest voice "you got room for one more?"

Ellie sneered, "depends, you gonna tell me what the hell you think you're doing risking your ass flagging down truckers on the side of the road?"

You didn't let your smile falter, but this close Ellie could see the twinge of sadness in your eyes. You sighed, "I just wanna get outta here is all."

Ellie's composure wavered as she thought out what she was being confronted with. For months, Ellie hadn't spoken to women save for waitresses, gas station clerks, and the occasional hotel receptionist when her bed at the back of her truck cab felt too cramped or too cold. But these were brief, cold, transactional. She knew that if she didn't take advantage of you/of the situation, someone else would. Ellie's intentions were no better than any other touch-starved pervert sat at the wheel of a big rig, but she figured she was probably your best option. "Yeah, alright, get in. Where ya headed? I can take you close as I can get, but I won't go off my route. I ain't your taxi driver."

You brightened up and yanked open the passenger door, "fuck, anywhere but here, honestly. Thank you so much, you're saving my life here" you cheered as you swung your bag up into the cab and plopped down into the passenger seat.

Ellie smirked, thinking she might be able to keep you around for a while. She shifted gears and revved the engine, pulling back onto the road. "Anywhere but here it is, sweetheart," she affirmed.

Days in Ellie's truck were spent making awkward small talk and singing along to the radio. The open road wasn't so lonely anymore with you sitting next to her. Riding through a desolate plain, the sun was almost fully set when Ellie laid eyes on a rest stop sign. “I think it’s about time we turn in for the night.”

You hummed from where you were slumped in the passenger seat, eyelids heavy. Ellie held back a coo at how cute you looked all sleepy and comfortable next to her. She took the exit and parked the rig at the edge of the parking lot. One other semi was in the parking lot, but Ellie paid it no mind. She reached out to pat your shoulder, to which you awoke with a snort. "Come on, get up. You're gonna get a crick in your neck sleeping like that."

You rubbed your eyes sleepily and hummed in agreement. You accompanied Ellie to the restroom to sleepily brush your teeth and change into your pajamas. You finished before Ellie and made your way out of the putrid smelling restroom for some fresh air. You had nothing to do but wait since Ellie had the keys, so you wandered to the vending machines to pass time. 'Maybe I'll ask Ellie if we can get poptarts tomorrow morning...' you thought, before you heard footsteps approaching. You turned around ready to ask, "All done, Ell...ie?" but it wasn't Ellie. "Oh, sorry..."

He stood two steps from you, close enough that you were struck by the scent of menthol cigarettes and his stale, sour breath. "Ain't no thing, sweetheart," he cooed, "I dunno who this Ellie is, but I can surely keep you company til she gets back." He leaned in closer with a wide grin and you shrunk back against the vending machine, "I can show you a real good time, promise. Don't got much on me to pay ya for your services but I can show you a real good time."

You tried to look everywhere but in his eyes and crossed your arms over your breasts. "N-n-no thank you, sir" you managed to stutter, "I've really got to get going if you don't mind." You attempted to duck under his arm where you were caged, but you were only jostled as he firmly gripped your wrist. With a yank, you were pulled far too close for comfort.

His grin grew impossibly bigger as he huffed out a laugh, "So polite and so cute... but dumb as a rock if you think I was gonna letcha go that easy." You struggled to loosen his grip, pulling with all your might and leaning back with all your weight. Despite your best efforts, you were easily being towed toward a semi across the parking lot.

Still struggling, you cried out for Ellie, or anyone really, to help. Your cries were cut off as your head was whipped to the side by a slap. The man gripped your hair at the roots to force your eyes to meet his, "none of that, now. I coulda treated you real nice ya'know, but now ya did it. Any whore worth a dime woulda given in by now, but you like to play rough now, don't ya?" You sobbed as he leaned closer, the smell of cigarette ash and sour sweat nearly making you gag. From behind the foul-smelling man, you heard the woman you had been crying out for.

"I'm gonna ask you nice one time and one time only, let her go now." Ellie growled.

The man scoffed, "Oh yeah? I found her first, and I expect a whore wandering a truck stop parking lot to do her job."

"Or what, huh? You ain't gonna like what's coming to ya." Ellie adjusted her footing and held her fists up in a defensive pose.

He wheezed out a laugh and you flinched at the spray of spit over your shoulder, "oh I'm so scared of a scrawny little dyke, I oughta put you in your place the way you're talki-" but he was quickly cut off by a fist to the jaw. The man crumpled with a choking noise, and you nearly fell with him as he held his grip firm on your wrist. Tears in your eyes, you wrench at the man's forearm for him to release you. From Ellie's position above you, she reared her leg back and sent it flying in between the man's legs. He released your wrist to curl into a fetal position and cradle his injury, whimpering and choking all the way.

Finally freed, you scramble backward in fear to put some distance between you and the offender. You scratched furiously at your wrist where you could still feel the sweat from his palm and the bite of his fingernails.

With tears blurring your vision, you can see Ellie leering over the man. If it were directed your way, the look on her face would only make you cry harder. How she had reduced the man twice her size to a crying heap on the ground, you had no idea, but you were grateful nonetheless. Ellie sent one more kick into the man's gut before she bent down to pull his wallet out of his back pocket. She pulled out the cash in it and tossed it at the man where he lay whimpering on the ground. Ellie's gaze softened as it landed on you, and she sent one last look to the man on the ground before marching over and offering you her hand. "C'mon, we gotta get outta here before numb-nuts over here gets up." You gingerly accepted her hand and were surprised by the ease with which she pulled you to your feet.

You felt the burn of Ellie's pull in your shoulder as you stumbled behind her. She hastily unlocks the truck before boosting you into the cab with a grip on your hips. You sink into the passenger seat and she pulls herself up into the cab and pulls the door shut behind her. The second it closes, she clicks the lock. The truck revved to life and Ellie shifted it into gear. "We just gotta find some place else to turn in."

An almost inaudible "I'm sorry" was heard from the passenger side. Ellie sent you a confused glance before returning her focus to the road ahead.

"What have you got to be sorry about, honey?"

You looked down to your lap, "I couldn't protect myself so you had to save me, and you're exhausted but we have to find somewhere else to sleep tonight because I fucked up, Ellie. I just don't want to disappoint y-"

"You ain't disappointing me so don't be sorry. Isn't your fault that fucker couldn't keep it in his pants." Ellie interrupted.

You looked down at your hands in your lap, anxiously picking your nails. "Oh... well where are we gonna go now?"

"There's got to be a rest stop or motel in the next thirty or so miles. Just gotta find it."

And so the night went on, and you once again drifted to sleep in the passenger seat. Ellie occasionally glanced over to take in your peaceful expression. She recalled the tears in your eyes as you sat helpless in the dirt before her. When Ellie pulled up to a motel with a flickering neon "vacancy" sign. The brakes squeaked as she pulled to a stop, but you weren't stirred from your slumber. Whispering, Ellie promised you "no one else is gonna make you cry if I've got something to say about it."

She sat back in her seat to contemplate her next move. You wouldn't mind if she touched your face, would you? She wouldn't blame you for feeling averse to touch, but you looked so soft and you snored so cutely. 'Fuck it,' Ellie thought, before reaching out to cup your jaw and stroke her thumb along its length. The warmth of her palm pulled you from your slumber and you unconsciously snuggled into her touch. Your eyes blinked open and made contact with Ellie's intent stare.

You rubbed the sleepiness from your eyes and murmured "are we there yet?"

"Yep, wakey wakey, princess. I'm gonna get us some room and we can get some sleep. It'll be nice to have a proper bed and shower for once." You perked up at bed and struggled to stand from the passenger seat and climb down the steps of the too-high truck. 'How does Ellie get in and out of this thing, she's like 5'2'' you thought.

Ellie was kind enough to pay for a room with a queen bed and a pull out mattress. Ellie sighed and dropped her backpack onto the couch like a sack of bricks. "I'll take the couch."

Surprised, your wide eyes met hers, "you don't have to do that, Ellie. You paid for the room so you should take the bed."

Ellie ignored you, pulling out the sofa bed and plopping onto it with her arms crossed behind her head. "It's not up for discussion."

Your eyebrows furrowed. You were stubborn, but Ellie even more so. "Or we could share the bed?" Ellie suggested with wiggling eyebrows and a poor attempt at a wink.

You were not amused, "I'll take the bed, you take the couch." Ellie pulled out her phone to scroll online until she fell asleep.

It was approaching 11PM, and your skin was still crawling. You needed to scrub it away. "Ellie... I think I'm gonna take a shower. So I'll be right back, kay?" She nodded with eyes on her phone. You stripped from your clothes and turned the water as high as it could go. Turning to face the mirror, you assessed the damage. You had skinned knees from falling and bruises scattered across your arms and legs. In particular, your wrists had purple hand marks across them from where the man had tightly gripped your wrist. You continued to stare blankly until the mirror had fogged up from the steam and you were nothing but a blur in the mirror. You sighed and returned your attention to the shower running behind you. Stepping in, you hissed in pain at the heat but didn't turn it down. The burning pain was a distraction from the itching you felt where he touched you. You unwrapped a bar of hotel soap and scrubbed from head to toe, desperately trying to overcome the feeling.

As the hot water ran down your body, you thought of Ellie. For a moment, you hopes that she liked you, but how could she when all you did was get her into fights and eat away her earnings. Tears lined your eyelids and fell with the spray from the shower. You wallowed in sadness for a few more moments before you could hear a quiet knock at the door and a call of your name. You thought you could be quiet enough, but your crying was too loud and drew her in. You cleared your throat, "I'm alright, don't worry!"

"Well, I thought I heard crying so I wanted to check in on you."

"shit... it's okay, I just needed a second to let it out. I'll be out in just a few minutes."

"Nope, I'm coming in."

"No, wait!" but she had already pulled open that stupid barn door, it didn't hold in any noise.

"Ellie, I'm naked in here, what the fuck?!"

"I figured, usually that's how people shower."

"Ugh, you know that's not what I meant, now can you get out?"

"Not until you tell me why you were crying."

You peeked your head out of the shower curtain. She was serious, not just prying for the joke or the drama. Your eyebrows furrowed and mouth pinched in a frown, you hid back behind the shower curtain. "Thought it'd be obvious by now..."

"Was it the guy at the rest stop?"

You sighed, "yeah... no shit. You figured it out"

"He isn't gonna bother us anymore, you saw him eat shit when I hit him."

"I don't mean that he's going to chase us down, I mean that I can't stop thinking about it, the fucking smell and the way he grabbed me like I was just a piece of meat. I feel disgusting and I can't get the feeling to go away no matter how hard I scrub. We're miles away but I feel like I can't get away from him"

There was a pause for a moment and the ruffling of fabric, and you almost thought she had left the bathroom. What you didn't expect was for Ellie to step into the shower behind you. You squealed and attempted to pull the shower curtain to the side to cover yourself, but the cheap hotel fabric did little to cover your nakedness from her prying eyes.

"First of all," she starts, "you were taking way too long in the shower and I thought maybe you'd slipped and fell." She reached for the shampoo on the shelf behind you, your noses almost touching. "Second, you need to give yourself a little more credit." Ellie started to lather her hair, "you're so much sweeter than him, than me, and than this place. I'll betcha you've got better things at home waiting for you, but you stepped up into my cab instead."

You sighed as you attempted to shield your nakedness with your hands, "no one's waiting for me, Ellie.... and I think of all the creeps out there picking up hitchhikers you're the least creepy."

She snorted out a laugh, "creepy nonetheless, but you're not wrong. I've been creeping on you since I saw you stood on the side of the road."

Your face grew warmer. You couldn't help but like her attention and her closeness. Her eyes darted back and forth across your body as she spoke, but you had put all your effort into maintaining eye contact. "Matter of fact..." Ellie started as she stepped chest-to-chest with you, "don't think I haven't seen you staring at my fingers while I drive. I've seen you stiffen and press your legs together, and don't think I haven't seen the way you squirm in that seat when I'm real sweet on you."

Your cheeks were hot and your eyes were wide as you struggled to form words. Were you really that obvious?

"Don't get shy on me now," Ellie taunted.

Fed up with her teasing, you grabbed her face in your palms and smushed your lips into hers. Ellie stiffened with surprise, but let her lids fall shut and relaxed into the kiss. Your lips were so soft, but they moved against hers with fervor. Ellie surrendered her control, yearning for you to have your way with her.

You held her waist in your palms and stroked up her sides. Ellie shuddered; she hadn't felt the warmth and softness of a woman's touch in months. You cupped her breasts in your hands to give them a teasing squeeze that made Ellie gasp. "So sensitive..." you hum with a smile, circling her nipples with your thumbs. You leaned into her ear to huskily whisper "I wanna taste you, Ellie." You dotted soft kisses along the curve of her ear, "will you let me? Please? I want it so bad. I'm so hungry for your pussy, Ellie"

She nodded quickly and enthusiastically. Ellie could put up a tough facade, but to hell with it when she wants nothing more than to submit to you. You smiled warmly and knelt down onto the shower floor. Ellie backed up into the tiled wall and you situated yourself between her legs.

You took a moment just to admire her. Ellie shivered as you scratched your nails up her lean, prickly legs to grab her by the hips. You pulled them towards you to meet the patch of dark hair at the apex of her thighs. Your fingers slipped on the slick arousal trailing down her inner thighs as you spread her pussy lips. Her swollen clit peeked out from under its hood, and you leaned in to place a soft, sweet kiss to it that made Ellie flinch.

"Come on already, no teasing..." she grumbled.

You had to hold in a laugh at her whining, but you were just as eager as she was. You stuck out your tongue and licked a long, fat line up her pussy. You pulled back briefly to savor her taste with a gulp and a hum of satisfaction. "Tastes so good," you moaned out and licked your lips.

Ellie struggled to keep her eyes on you as you ate her out, rolling back in her head as you licked her sloppily. Her wetness smeared across your cheeks and ran down your chin. "So messy, baby, "you cooed to her as you pulled back for a breath. "Just for me, yeah?"

Ellie groaned and held her bottom lip between her teeth, gritting out a "yes, ffffuck, jus' for you."

"So cute..." you mumbled to yourself before rewarding Ellie with a harsh suck to her clit. Her back arched and a hand reached out to grab you by the hair. The tug at your scalp made you moan against Ellie's lips, only serving to heighten Ellie's pleasure with the vibration. She panted and held both sides of your head to rock her hips into your mouth. You moaned at her taking control, using you like a toy for her to fuck as she pleased. She pressed you closer and clenched her thighs around your head, squishing your cheeks together. You moaned at the pressure and being further engulfed in her smell.

Ellie groaned between heavy breaths, "so good, fuck... fuck me so good, honey." She was so sensitive, squirming despite your arms wrapped around her thighs. The heat between your thighs was becoming unbearably hot. You had somehow reduced this rough and tough truck driver to a whiny mess.

Ellie's thighs clenched tightly around your head, whimpering out a warning of "I'm, fuck I'm gonna-ah, I'm-"

"Gonna cum?" you taunted and gave her pussy a light slap.

"Yes, fuuuuck." A line of drool slipped from her mouth.

A grin stretched across your face, and you pulled one of her legs to sit atop one of your shoulders. You drew three fingers firmly up the length of Ellie's pussy. Rapidly, you stroked your fingers back and forth over Ellie's soaking pussy. Her head fell back with a near shout of "fuck!" Your arm strained where it was wrapped around Ellie's thigh on your shoulder as it tensed and squirmed with the bucking of her hips.

Expletives poured from Ellie's mouth as she endured the assault on her pussy, before words left her and she could only choke and squeal. Her wetness splashed against your hand and the inside of her thighs. Excitedly, you leaned in to taste her cum and feel her arousal splash across your face.

Ellie's hips and legs slowed their squirming, trembling instead. She let out a long breath and ran a hand through her hair. "Fuck."

You giggled as you clambered up onto your feet, "that's all you got to say?"

"Yeah, I guess so. Fucked the thoughts right out of my brain, sweet cheeks."

"Pfft! Sweet cheeks?"

Ellie gave you the biggest grin, "yes ma'am, I could see your ass wiggle and jiggle while you gave me head. A beautiful view."

You pushed her shoulder "oh fuck off, now let me finish my shower."

Reluctantly, Ellie pulled back the curtain and stepped out. "Yeah okay fine, but you got another thing comin when you get your sweet ass outta there."

[pisboy]

the month rdr2 came out was a time of tranquility in the world of warehouse jobs. truckers, dudes from diff depts, high school part-timers, 10 year managers - all they had to do was mumble 'soyouplayreddead?' and breakrooms and smoking zones, loading areas and catwalks were at peace and giddy with cowboy talk

[phillycheesesteakcore]

So there's this famous quote from Trevor Noah:

“The way my mother always explained it, the traditional man wants a woman to be subservient, but he never falls in love with subservient women. He's attracted to independent women. "He's like an exotic bird collector," she said. "He only wants a woman who is free because his dream is to put her in a cage.”

And if that isn't Trucker Trout to a T.

Trudy was studying physical education, she wanted to start women's sports teams. That is not a traditional woman, especially for the time. By their standards she was probably very much a tomboy, maybe even to the extent of being described as mannish. But that's the woman Tucker decided he wanted, the woman he had have, to own. To beat (figuratively, as far as we know) into submission and mold into the perfect housewife. Why? Well to prove he could I suppose.

And when she left him, oh that had to hurt. The woman that he had so meticulously chained to his side deciding he wasn't worth being with and having the nerve to do something about it. Even the son he gave her, the son that, according to her (or at least the part of her that is Rosie), was her crowing achievement, wasn't enough to keep her with him.

She leaves him, and she shouldn't survive. A single woman all on her own with no friends or family to speak of in the 1950's? She should've come crawling back to him within days, throwing herself at his mercy, begging him to take her back. But she doesn't — she flourishes. She makes her way to California, gets a job, starts a relationship, makes a life for herself, leaves him in the dust.

Tucker could have just counted his losses, made the best of the situation and moved on. He's a strong man, strong enough to carry a robot in his arms up a hiking path and into a mine. He's incredibly intelligent and has a steady government job. He's a catch. He could easily find himself a new woman eager to fulfill the role of doting wife and stepmother. But he doesn't want just any woman, he wants Trudy.

So he tracks her down, gets all the way to California. He lures her back to his hotel, not even for him, but with the promise of info on the son she left behind, likely another blow to his ego. And he kidnaps her. Drags her all the way back to Peachyville. Takes her apart. Literally molds her into his perfect bride. Less of a modern day Prometheus and more of a modern day Pygmalion with his Galatea. She is made of steel rather marble, and he calls on science rather than the goddess Aphrodite to bring her to life. But it's the same idea, isn't it?

He didn't need to do that, did he? We've seen Lil' Tuck and Tiffany, he can clearly create near-perfect facsimiles of life. He could have just as easily made himself a new Trudy from scratch, without all the messiness of kidnapping the original and actually using her brain. He could have made a version of her that would never truly gain sentience, never disobey, never step out of line, always love and care and nurture. If anything, he'd at last never have to risk anything as potentially scandalous as being seen dropping his wife down a mineshaft.

But it wouldn't be the same, would it? It wouldn't be the woman he once conquered, the woman he caged, the woman bested him and did in the end manage to escape. She got the last laugh.

And Tucker Trout strikes me as a sore loser.

[timdrakesbussy]

Some of my™ Stardew Valley HCs

TW: mention of miscarriages

Emily listens to all kinds of music but despite not looking like it, she mainly listens to heavy metal. It's one of the thing that brought her and Shane's early friendship together. And because of that, Haley shares a bit of fondness to the genre that she enjoys Sam's band (but don't tell him. this will mess with her rep).

Sam is pretty educated when it comes to literature, and English was always his favorite subject when he was in school. He's the main songwriter of his band and while Sebastian could also write, Sam manages to be witty and clever with his lyrics. Other than storytelling through song, he loves his double and triple entendres. Suffice to say, he could get along pretty well with Elliott and it's one of the reason why Penny loves hanging out with him.

Ever since she was a child, Maru thinks that Sebastian is really cool and she wants to be like him one way or another. Of course, she still wants to be herself but Sebastian is just so damn cool. During her time at school, she made herself learn how to ride a motorcycle using a friend's bike because she knew Sebastian would never lend her his.

Elliott was from an esteemed family from a foreign land (just Stardew's equivalent of Europe tbh) and was a licensed lawyer until he stopped to be a writer. Needless to say, his family are not happy by this sudden decision. Not that he needs their opinion on the matter, he was pushing thirty when he made this decision.

Harvey was an ER doctor in Zuzu City until the incident™. He knew that with his line of job, he can't save everyone. However, he can't help but feel guilty and terrible afterwards. Which is why he has routine check-ups for the villagers, and if they can't visit him, then he will visit them. You cannot escape him because he will find you (affectionate).

Both Haley and Alex believed that at one point, they actually liked each other romantically. But when they had their first kiss together, they realized that they weren't meant to be. They have this deep platonic connection that even Emily doesn't really understand, but she's happy that her baby sister have someone she can rely on and trust for all her life.

Robin takes pride in her name even if her parents weren't supportive over her work at first. She have Sebastian share her last name, and when she married Demetrius, she hyphenated their surnames instead of just taking his.

Demetrius and Sebastian were close when he was a child. Sebastian was an overly curious and precocious boy and Demetrius was happy that he could share something with his stepson, their interest in biology. Although Sebastian was squeamish and even almost cried when he dissected a frog, he managed to calm him down. And even after their mutual parting as Sebastian grew older, he's the only one who knows what Demetrius' favorite animal is: moonlight jellies.

Jodi and Kent were teenagers when they had Sam. Jodi came from a highly conservative and religious family so they forced them to marry after Jodi gave them the news that she was pregnant. As they were teens, Kent took any odd jobs he could get in the city, from a corner-store clerk to a garbage man. Until he got offered into joining the military.

Pam was a trucker before she became a bus driver. In fact, she met Penny's dad in the business. But in her childhood, she was in multiple beauty pageants and even into her adulthood, she knows how to hairdo. She helped Penny with her hair since she was a child and hope that she could still do Penny's hair in her future wedding, whenever that is.

Alex's mom had multiple miscarriages before she have him, and that was into her ten years of marriage. She was beyond ecstatic with his birth that she immediately called her aging parents who also shared her happiness, they then invited her to the Valley a few days after Alex was born so they could celebrate in the Mullners' house. Lewis heard about the news and asked if they wanted to celebrate in the Saloon in which Evelyn denied because Clara wanted a small celebration with just her family.

Abigail is the only marriageable candidate to be born in the Valley. Sebastian moved in not long after Maru was born so he was close to her as he was the only child her age at that time. Penny moved in when she was seven with her parents until her dad left when she was ten. Haley moved in when she was ten years old while Sam moved in a year after. Alex often visited his grandparents but he officially moved in after Clara's death in his pre-teens. The rest moved in as adults.

Similarly to Alex, Shane only ever visited and stayed for a while in the Valley until he needed to take care of Jas. He wasn't close with his parents and they never tried to be anyways, Marnie is always the mother figure he has. So other than Marnie and Jas, the only people he considered as his family was Jas' parents. Her father, whom he met and befriended in college (as he was his roommate, before they mutually dropped out) and her mother whom he wasn't very close to at first until they both find comradery in bullying (affectionate) Jas' father.

[ohbo-ohno]

run until you feel your lungs bleeding (ghost x reader)

summary: You're on the run after finally escaping from your abusive husband's clutches, hitchhiking south along California highways. A strange man in a black mask picks you up, and it doesn't take you long to realize that not every hand offered should be taken.

word count: 6.5k

cw: dark fic!, noncon somnophilia, referenced abuse from a past partner, ghost does not care about reader's feelings, mentioned drinking while driving but no intoxication

read on ao3 - see the pinterest board

One of your blisters is about to burst. You’d worn through your only pair of clean socks yesterday, leaving the back of your heel vulnerable to your old tennis shoes and their vendetta against your feet. You can feel your skin rubbing thinner and thinner with each step, know it’s only a matter of time before you’ve got blood flowing freely into your shoe. 

You keep your left arm stretched out, thumb held up in the hope that someone will take pity on your limping form and give you a ride.

It’s not likely, you’ve been hitchhiking for days now and not a single person has slowed down. You’ve got no real destination, just a goal of putting as much space between you and your piece of shit ex-husband as possible. Your end goal is Arizona - you’ve got an aunt somewhere in Scottsdale, if you can get to her you can only hope she’ll help you get back on your feet.

A few people honk as they drive by. In the two days you’ve been walking, none have stopped. You take short power naps at night off the side of the road, pray to every god you can think of that you don’t get run over or eaten by something.

You haven’t yet. But you know if you don’t get a good night's sleep soon, don’t start putting actual distance between him and you, then you might not survive your escape.

The sun is at its apex when the semi-truck pulls up beside you. It’s black, the trailer attached is plain white with no logo painted on. You can hardly believe your luck, gape up at the massive thing as it slows. The door pops open a moment after the truck rolls to a stop, but it’s so high up that you can’t see who’s driving past their hand - gloved - before they pull it back.

You don’t have the luxury of asking questions. You just stumble over, flinching back with a little hiss when you place your palm on the metal of the truck and burn your hand. It takes a minute to finagle your way into the truck, but you manage it eventually, huffing and puffing all the way up. 

The first thing you notice about the man in the driver’s seat is his size - he’s big. Bigger than any man you’ve seen before. You just reach his shoulders even with both of you sitting down, his legs are spread so wide his knees nearly rest on his door and the gearshift, his head is close to brushing the roof. He’s just… big.

He’s wearing a black neck gaiter pulled up to cover his mouth and nose, which strikes you as odd considering he’s driving on his own, but you brush the thought off. His hair is blond, greasy and limp on his scalp, you doubt he did more than run his fingers through it getting out of bed. His eyes are blue, a light shade that surprises you for some reason. You don’t know a thing about this man, certainly not enough to be surprised by anything about him, but the blond hair and the blue eyes… it doesn’t quite fit with the black gloves and the mask.

He’s reclined back in his seat, one hand resting on the wheel and the other on his thigh, eyes scanning you like a king his subject. His eyes linger on your tiny shorts (sleep shorts, what you’d been wearing the night of your escape), skip right past the sluggishly bleeding scrapes on your knees and scan your ratty backpack.

You hope he won’t ask you to empty it. You’d like to keep your gun for as long as possible, can’t imagine this trucker would be ok with the hitchhiker he just picked up having a loaded weapon.

He doesn’t speak when he finally makes eye contact with you. You can’t hold it for long at all, only manage a few seconds before you’re glancing around his truck.

He doesn’t speak. Neither do you.

His car reeks of smoke. There’s a beer bottle in his cup holder, open and helf empty. There are more bottles - empty - by your feet. He doesn’t have the radio playing.

When you look back at him, his eyes are already trained on yours. You can’t help but flinch - the intensity of his gaze feels suffocating, even after only a few seconds of being held under it.

You work up the nerve to speak, take a few deep breaths and a few more long looks around the truck, the space this man spends most of his days in.

There are cigarette stubs on the dashboard, which has clearly been used as a makeshift ashtray. The seats are old, the leather peeling and tempting you to pick, and the dash itself is sunbleached.

“I’m trying to go to Arizona,” you finally say, flickering your eyes quickly to his and away again. His jeans are worn - but naturally worn, like he’s had them for months and washed them so many times they’ve lost their color. “Are… are you heading that direction?”

You look at him long enough to see him incline his head a bit. You don’t think he’s blinked since you got in the car.

“Goin’ south,” he affirms. His voice is a low grumble, British accented. Not necessarily unsurprising to hear in California, but a shock from a truck driver. “I’ll drop you somewhere along the way.”

He pulls away from the shoulder with that and turns away from you, apparently finished with the interaction. 

Being dropped somewhere along the way isn’t necessarily your ideal situation, but your feet scream in relief at the lack of pressure, so you’re certainly not going to complain.

You shift a little further back in your seat, tuck the backpack between you and the passenger door. He could reach it if he wanted, but keeping yourself between this stranger and your prized possessions feels like the right choice. You think about propping your feet up on the dashboard, but decide you don’t want to seem too rude to your apparent savior.

You look out the window. You’ve never been in a car this high, and even the flat California highways look more interesting at a new vantage point. It’s easier to focus on the far-off mountains than the giant beside you.

“So,” you cough lightly, awkward in the relative silence of the truck. The engine is loud, but the driver’s radio is dead silent. “What’s your name?”

He grunts, gives no other response. You glance over to him, a little unsure of yourself. Had you made that bad of a first impression somehow?

He doesn’t turn to you, and he doesn’t answer your question.

Alright, you tell yourself. Maybe he does this all the time, maybe he’s tired of making small talk with homeless and desperate hitchhikers. That’s probably it.

You don’t give him your name. Instead, you tuck your feet up to the seat beneath your thighs, turn your body fully to the passenger window, fold your arms on the windowsill and lay your chin on your elbows.

The drive is smooth enough for you to relax, even though you know that logically you shouldn’t. You’re a young woman who’s just gotten into a car with a strange and intimidating man who could very clearly physically overpower you. Nobody knows where you are. You should have a hand on your gun already, ready for anything the driver might try.

But you’ve been walking for days, and hadn't been sleeping well before that either. You haven’t had a good night’s sleep since your wedding night. The low rumble of the engine, the heat of the sun beaming through the glass, the surprisingly gentle motions of the truck…

You don’t quite let yourself fall asleep, but it’s a near thing.

———————————————————————

The two of you stay like that for hours. Your benevolent driver seemingly comfortable in his silence with you drowsy and relaxing in his passenger seat. You don’t stay in the same position for more than an hour or two at once, shifting your legs and always keeping any pressure off your feet.

You’d like to pull your shoes off, to ask if the man has any band-aids. Maybe any food, any water. But you can’t risk pissing him off, not when your other options are nonexistent. So you settle for slow movements, trying to keep your blisters from being irritated.

He finishes his beer before the first hour has passed with you in his vehicle. Waits another two to have a second. You don’t comment on it, but the scent makes your lip curl, and you bury your face in your arms to hide the reaction. You hope he’s not a lightweight. And despite the heavy stench of cigarette smoke sunken into the interior, he hasn’t had one yet. 

He’s the one who speaks next.

It’s a quarter until 6, and the sun has started her slow journey to sleep. You’ve been watching the sight for a while, entranced by the slow process with nothing else to amuse you.

“Pullin’ off,” he grunts.

You can’t help but jerk up straight at the sound, caught off guard. You’d nearly forgotten about his accent, about how deep his voice really is.

“For gas?” You ask, turning in your seat to glance at him for the first time in at least an hour. He only grunts again, a noise you’re just going to assume means yes. 

“Alright,” you nod, letting your feet drop to the floor from where you’d crossed them beneath yourself. “Are you… do you want me to find someone else to ride with?” You cross your fingers where you tuck them beneath your thighs, pray to every god you know of that he doesn’t make that yes grunt again.

He looks over to you this time, and the two of you make eye contact for the first time since you’d gotten into the car nearly six hours ago. His eyes are brighter than you remember, and the impact of them sends a jolt up your spine.

You’re not sure how long he looks at you. You feel stuck under his gaze, a little wide-eyed prey animal spotted by a predator who can only lay still and hope they move on. You’ve never felt quite so pinned before, quite so unable to break eye contact. You don’t think you like it.

He looks away first, shifts in his seat and drops one hand from the steering wheel to lay on his thigh. You swallow at how tight his jeans are, how his thighs seem to nearly bulge from them. 

“No,” he finally answers. It takes a moment for you to remember your own question, but your sigh of relief is loud once you do.

If you’re lucky, he’ll try and drive through the night. Dangerous, since it’ll make for nearly twenty-four hours on the road, but you’d rather take your chances with him than falling asleep at the wheel then spend another night staring into a dark forest and wondering if there are wolves in this part of the country.

He turns off the highway three exits later, pulls his truck into the first reststop. It’s the only structure in the nearby area, a McDonald’s-Subway-Shell mix with ten pumps, less than half with someone using them. It’s the kind of rest stop you’ve seen on countless roadtrips, one that you know exists off half the exits in the States. The familiarity of it makes your lips twitch up in the corners.

There are several other semi-trucks pulled up getting gas, none quite the size of your driver’s. He parks quickly and easily, in one try, and turns the truck completely off. You shift a little in your seat, unsure what he’ll want from you, but he’s hauled himself up and out of the truck before you can open your mouth to ask.

You settle a bit. He’d said he wouldn’t make you leave but you still can’t fully relax for some reason, can’t bring back the looseness to your shoulders you’ve had since he picked you up. You entertain yourself by watching a middle aged couple try and wrangle six kids that look like they’re all under ten, since I’m sympathy when the littlest one’s face goes red and he starts to wail.

The door next to you opens without warning. You manage to catch your bag before it can go tumbling out of the car, can’t hold back the little yelp of surprise. Your eyes are wide, fingers holding tight to the bag, when you look up through your hair.

The driver’s face looks the same as it has for the last six hours - expressionless. Even with the mask, surely his eyebrows should move at least a bit? He looks almost like a corpse above you - pale face and flat features. It unnerves you. 

“Gettin’ food. You got money?”

You hesitate for a moment - you do have money, small bills you’d snuck from your husband’s wallet that you’d planned to use for a bus ticket. You’re not starving yet, the few granola bars you’d taken in your escape will tide you over for a little while longer.

You shake your head.

He nods, like he’d expected that, and glances over your form from head to toe again. “Alright. You want somethin’ to eat, now’s your chance. We’ll be back on the road for another few hours before I stop for the night.”

With that he turns away, jumps down to the parking lot and stalks off toward the McDonald’s. It takes you a minute to follow him, still a little shocked that you’d gotten multiple sentences from him at once.

The thought of free food is far too tempting to let you linger for too long, though, and you’re throwing your bag over your shoulders and scampering after him only a moment later. You have to trot a little awkwardly to keep up with his long strides. He doesn’t hold the door open for you, but you catch him glancing over his shoulder to see if you’re there.

The teenager working the register looks like it’s their first day, and you assume a middle-aged man leaning against the counter beside her is meant to be showing her the ropes. He’s far more occupied with whatever’s on his phone screen, leaving the cashier to stare up at your driver with wide eyes.

You get it. Standing next to him now, you decide he’s not big - he’s huge. Has to be at least six and a half feet tall, and at least a foot taller than you. Combined with his muscular form - another odd thing for a truck driver - and his all black attire, he seems almost like some sort of monster or omen come to warn about the future.

You step up to the counter beside him, give the cashier your best reassuring smile when she glances at you. It gives her enough courage to stumble over, “Welcome to McDonald’s, what can I get you today?” after only a few stuttering starts. You’re quite proud of her.

“Five Big Macs and fries. No drink.” The man rumbles, his mask umoving. He glances down at you, finally cocks an eyebrow (an expression!) for you to order.

“Uh, just… just ten nuggets for me,” you smile at the cashier, glance up at the driver to make sure you haven’t somehow ordered too much. “And, uh, a Coke?”

“Will that be all for you today?”

“Make it a twenty nugget meal,” your partner corrects, then pulls a worn leather from his back pocket and pays with a shiny card. You can’t help but eye the many bills folded neatly in the wallet.

“Thanks for the upgrade,” you say as the two of you slide onto a pair of stools to wait for your food. “I really appreciate it. I, uh, I can’t pay you back, though.”

He glances at you again, holds you pinned under his gaze and kicks your heartbeat up a few notches. It becomes a conscious effort to keep your breathing steady when he spreads his thighs enough to brush against yours. 

“Don’t worry about it.”

Your meal is largely silent. He all but inhales three of his five burgers, leaves the other two wrapped up presumably for later on the drive. You try and eat all of your nuggets and fries, but your granola bar diet of the last few days means your stomach feels stretched to his limit only a few bites into the meal.

After your fifth nugget, you tuck the little box closed. Shift towards your driver and glance up from the window you’d been staring out to see him already looking down at you.

You clear your throat, take a little sip of your Coke. “I’m done.”

He shakes his head once, reaches forward to pop the little box back open. “No, you’re not. We’re not getting back on the road ‘til you eat at least half.”

You can’t help but blink in surprise at him, not moving to take any more food. He won’t tell you his name, won’t make any small talk whatsoever, but he will worry about how much you’re eating?

He grunts when you don’t make a move to listen to him, pushes the little brown box closer to you. “C’mon. Eat.”

You get through another five under his eye. He doesn’t look away from you, and now you know about the stare. It feels heavier now, like every little twitch from you is catalouged by him. It makes every bite difficult to swallow.

He nods when you tuck the little box closed again, glance a bit wearily at him to make sure he’s content now. He picks up your tray, tucks his two sandwiches in one hand, and leaves. You scramble to keep up.

His strides are a little shorter in the parking lot this time, and the slower pace keeps your blisters from further irritation. You’re not sure it’s intentional, but you’re thankful nonetheless.

The truck is still difficult to get into, but the worn leather seats are a familiar comfort now. This time, your driver flicks on the radio as he pulls out of the rest stop.

For some reason, you feel like maybe he likes you. There’s something in the line of his body that feels a little softer now, the tension in the truck feels a little drained. It could be the music, but you prefer to think that he’s taken a bit of a liking to you. It means he’s less likely to end up hurting you, means you're less likely to have to rely on your non-existent shooting skills.

With the sun nearly fully set and the soft music from the radio, it’s much harder to keep yourself awake. You curl up in the seat, lay your head down on folded arms, and try your best to keep your eyes open.

———————————————————————

You don’t know how long it’s been when you wake up.

The truck is silent now, no engine and no radio, and the world outside is pitch black. You jerk up at the realization, quickly lay a hand on your bag and turn to your driver.

He’s staring at you. You nearly yelp in surprise, bite your tongue so harshly to keep the noise back that you taste the tang of iron.

He looks nearly inhuman in just the low light of the truck. Pale skin, blonde hair, blue eyes, a dark black mask obscuring half of his face. His body is turned towards you, black shirt and dark pants making him look almost like the top half of his face is just… floating. 

“I need to sleep,” he rumbles, keeping you held captive in what almost feels like a staring contest - like if you look away now, you’ll lose something. “You can take the bed in the back.”

That gets your heartbeat quickening, the thud of your pulse loud in your own ears. “Oh… I thought…” you swallow, finally tear your eyes from his to look around. You seem to be at another rest stop, this one a small dark building with two bathrooms and a few vending machines. There aren’t any other trucks parked around you. “I thought I might try and find a motel or something.”

“With what money?”

He’s got you there. You work your tongue against the roof of your mouth, clear away the blood and try to make your mouth not so bone-dry. “Yeah,” you nearly whisper, eyes darting back to his before away again. He hasn’t moved. You clear your throat before speaking again. “But, uh, I don’t want to kick you out of your bed. I can sleep up here.”

“You’ll take the bed,” he reaffirms, with no room for argument in his tone. You can’t help but feel like there’s something more here, like you’re missing something. You don’t feel safe anymore, not like you had after the McDonald’s. Why did you let yourself fall asleep? You could have pressured him to pull off somewhere with a motel, tried to finagle or scam yourself into a room with a lock on the door.

Now you’re stuck in this dark truck, no one else but the driver around for miles.

You swallow again, force down a cough.

You don’t want to sleep in his bed. But a glance over at him tells you that’s what’s going to happen. Your driver doesn’t seem the kind of man to take kindly to disobedience.

“What’s your name?” You ask again, voice weak and quiet. For some reason, this feels important. Like a name will make him more human, easier to swallow.

He only tilts his head a little, face still stoic. “Get in bed. We’ll drive again when the sun rises.”

“Please,” you try, a hint of desperation creeping into your voice. You can’t explain it, but you need his name. Need some evidence that he’s more man than he looks. This moment feels pivotal, and there’s a little voice screaming at the back of your head that things are going in the wrong direction.

“Sleep, doll,” is all he says. His voice isn’t softer, but it’s quieter, like maybe he understands the fear coursing through you.

You squeeze your eyes shut a moment before pushing yourself up, both hands holding onto your bag - your literal only possible defense againt this man - like a lifeline. You know they’d shake if your grips was any looser.

It’s too dark to make out much in the back of his cabin. The bed is a decent size for you, but you wonder if he’s able to stretch out fully on it. You think you can see the outline of a minifridge and a few books resting on the floor. 

He’s still watching you as you sit on the bed, his body unmoved but his head turned towards you. You try to keep your breathing steady as you toe your shoes off, tuck your feet up to the bed with you and curl up on your side.

The bag doesn’t leave your arms. His eyes don’t leave your form. He makes no move to stretch out and sleep like he’d said he would.

You force your eyes closed, no matter how wrong it feels. You try and will yourself to sleep, tell yourself everything will be fine. If he tries anything, you’ll shoot him.

You can still feel his gaze on you when you finally slip into unconsciousness.

———————————————————————

You wake slowly to movement behind you. 

You blink heavy eyelids open, let them fall shut again when there’s no difference in what you can see.  You feel cloaked by sleep still, like your brain has been held underwater and everything moves a little slowly, a little muffled.

The bed dips behind you, and there’s a warmth behind you. A hand at your waist. The top of a foot against the sole of yours. A chest against your back.

Your eyes stay closed, but your brows furrow a bit. Your husband has always hated the idea of cuddling, slept like a corpse on his back and berated you if you dared to touch him in your sleep. You nearly roll over, but figure that might set him off. Your arms still ache from the last argument you’d had.

The hand slips beneath your shirt, rough palm against your waist, thumb smoothing in little circles.

That catches your attention, too - your husband’s hands are soft. He’s never done a day of work in his life, the only job he’s had is some fake title made up by his father at his company. The hand on your skin isn’t soft at all, it’s rough with big, thick fingers that rest heavily on you.

The realization comes to you in pieces.

Your master bedroom was never this dark, the large windows always left wide open to allow moonlight into the room. Your ex-husband’s hands are smooth, boney and nearing on frail. The foot brushing against yours triggers a burning sensation in your blisters.

You keep your breathing even - an effort that feels impossible. 

It’s not your husband at your back, it’s the truck driver.

He’s silent as he tucks himself fully to you. His breath is damp against your neck and you fight down a shudder at the sensation. 

Your bag isn’t in your arms, which means you don’t have your gun. Whatever happens, whatever he does to you, you have no way of defending yourself.

The only reason you don’t cry at the thought is because you don’t want him to know you’re awake. It’s pure self-preservation that keeps your breathing even, your limbs loose, and your breathing slow.

He brings his head closer, his breathing loud in your ear. Every part of him is pressed against you, and you can’t help squeezing your eyes shut more tightly at the hardness poking into your back.

He’s silent as he sets his chin over your shoulder. His groin is tucked right beneath your ass, his knees behind yours and his feet benath yours. He’s just… spooning you.

It feels like an eternity passes just like that. Your heartbeat pounding in every bone, the heat of the driver’s body against yours. His breath is the only noise you hear, ghosting over your ear, heavier than your own.

Eventually, he starts to move. You almost whimper when you realize what he’s doing. 

He’s humping you.

His movements are slow at first, just a little rock of his hips against you. But as the minutes pass he becomes more incensed, his thrusts harder against you, his breathing heavier. He grunts at one point, and it takes everything in you not to flinch away.

You want to scream. You want to open your mouth and shout, to roll over and make him stop.

But you don’t have your gun. And he dwarfs you, every inch of your back covered by him and then some. You can’t stop him.

So you let it happen. You keep your eyes screwed shut, try desperately to go anywhere else in your head and pretend you don’t feel how quickly his hips begin to rock.

His hand moves from your hip to your stomach, his pinky resting on the waistband of your sleep shorts. You don’t think you could stay quiet any longer if his fingers slipped beneath the hem, and you let out a near silent breath of relief when his palm continues up instead of down.

He almost rolls you onto your stomach, angles you so your front is closer to the mattress and he can grind more on you than beside you. His hand slips further up your shirt, and you bite your tongue at the feeling of his rough palm against your nipples.

That gets another huff from him, another low sound that could almost be a moan. You feel him shift again, his hips working a little more roughly. You’re not sure how he possibly thinks you’re still asleep, but you pray he doesn’t take it any further as long as he does.

He doesn’t pinch, just softly strokes over one breast. His hand engulfs it fully, fingers wrapping all the way around the little mound of flesh. The calluses on his palm send little sparks down your spine, and you curse your body for the buzzing sensation between your thighs.

His breath gets heavier in your ear, he’s nearly panting over you. If you weren’t wearing shorts and he wasn’t wearing jeans, he’d be fucking you. His thrusting almost feels like he is. The… thing grinding against you is clearly large, even through all the layers of clothing, and you say another prayer that he doesn’t do more than this.

“Fuck,” he grunts, his chin pushing hard into your shoulder. You almost jerk at the sound of his voice, the evidence that this is real and not some horrible nightmare. 

You wish you could fall back asleep.

You don’t know how long the whole thing lasts. The pitch dark, the driver’s oppressive weight against you, it makes time feel liminal. You’re not sure if he lasts for five minutes or five hours.

But eventually his hips slow, give a few harder thrusts before he goes completely still and lets out a loud groan. Again, you wonder how he expects you to have slept through the noise. 

He shifts back a little in the aftermath, rolling you back to your side with a heavy hand on your stomach. You try to keep yourself as limp as possible, try to make your face go slack.

He lays with you for a while, breathing even and slow. You wish he would leave, wish he would let you start pretending this never happened. His hand stays on your stomach, and you can feel the other crossed over his midsection at your back. His feet hold your ankles to the bed. You hope he can’t feel that you’re squeezing your hands into tight fists where they rest against your thighs.

He doesn’t leave. Instead, he shifts his own thick thigh between your own, the rough denim of his jeans irritating the sensitive skin of your inner thighs. He tucks his leg up, settles it right against your core.

You can’t help the way your breath hitches at the sudden pressure. You hold it immediately after, then try to breathe normally again when you realize how obvious the sudden change sounds. He doesn’t react, though, so you think you’re safe. 

The pressure increases a bit more before stopping. You’re almost propped up on his thigh, your pussy pressed against him through your shorts. It’s hard not to open your eyes, to look down and see what’s happening.

His hand slips down from your stomach to the waistband of your shorts. You can’t keep yourself from moving this time, already knowing what he’s going to do. You shift your hips a little, make a tiny noise in your throat that you hope comes off as a normal still-asleep sound. The movement only presses you closer to him.

He hums lowly in your ear, fingers stroking across the waistband of your shorts before dipping inside, then past your little gray panties. You can’t help the little squeak you make, the way your hands twitch before you force them still.

The sound he makes is almost a laugh, too low and quiet to really be one though. He hushes you softly, pushes on the meat of your most vulnerable part to still you. 

You don’t know if he thinks you’re awake. You think he must, there’s no way you could have slept through what he’d just done, and you’ve moved twice now. But he doesn’t speak to you, doesn’t become more aggressive.

You debate putting up a fight when his fingers sink lower, his palm resting heavily over your cunt. But the thought of him becoming rough, of him restraining you… it makes bile churn in your stomach.

You resign yourself to waiting until it’s over, go limp against the bed again.

Another hum, and his free hand moves beneath your body to grasp your hip. He moves you slowly, little grinding motions over his thigh. The hand over your heat uses two fingers to spread the lips of your cunt, tucks the gusset of your underwear and the fabric of your shorts to the side so your clit makes direct contact with his jeans.

You keen quietly at the sensation, a little animal noise of fear, of pain. You wish you had your gun, wish you could make this man stop.

But you can’t. So you bear it.

He doesn’t touch your clit with his fingers, doesn’t touch any part of your pussy but to spread you wide. His thigh moves along yours, his hand grinding you against it. You hate the slickness gathering at your hole, hate the way your nipples tighten, the way your breaths become heavier.

You bite your tongue to hold back any other sounds, that tang of blood returning after only a few seconds.

“C’mon,” he says into your neck, his voice a low whisper. “Come f’r me, doll... be good.”

You don’t want to be good, can’t suppress the little whine you make at even the thought. He rumbles low in his chest in response, pushes against you a little harder.

You can’t stay quiet through your orgasm. It’s a slow thing, rolling and deep. You feel it in your toes, in your scalp, and in every vein between. Had you been willing, been with a partner of your choice, you may have thrown your head back and cried out. But here in the truck, with this man you can’t believe you were stupid enough to trust, you squeeze your eyes so tightly shut that tears eek out the corners and bite your cheek until there’s a sore. And still, a moan vibrates in your chest.

He stops grinding you against him when your orgasm is finished. His finges slip from you slowly, tuck your panties back over your mound and give you two little pats before he fully pulls his hand away. 

Both of his hands slip back up your stomach, grab a handful of your chest and massage you there for several moments. Your breathing gradually slows as your body comes down, your limbs going limp again despite the fact that his hands are still on you.

He rolls you to your back when he’s finished. You feel his lips press against each of your eyelids, squeezed shut no matter how hard you try to force your face to relax. Another tear slips down the side of your nose, and he kisses it away before it can reach your lips. You feel his tongue stroke beneath each eye, know that he’s cleaning away your tears. He gives you a final, chaste kiss on your lips before pulling away.

He’s gone a moment later, and you’re left cold and alone in his bed.

———————————————————————

He smokes a cigarette while he watches you sleep. Your nose twitches at the first hint of smoke, and he almost smirks at the expression.

He can’t believe he found you. A perfect little doll of a girl, limping all filthy and sad along the side of a highway, just waiting for someone to scoop you up. God truly does have a sick sense of humor, gifting a bastard like Ghost a gift like you.

He hadn’t planned to keep you at first. He figured he’d ride with you for a while, fuck you a few times to have a warm place to dump his cum before dropping you off at a rest stop for another driver to scoop up. But no, that won’t do now that he’s felt your cunt against his hand, watched you try desperately to hold back every expression because you thought it might keep you safe.

He’ll have to find out where the finger-shaped bruises on your arms are from. After this trip, he’ll find whoever left them and take care of them. He’ll be the only one hurting his little doll, no one else. Might even win him a few brownie points with you, if he’s lucky.

Your feet probably need bandaging, too. He’d seen the redness at the back of your ankles when you tucked your feet up on his seats, felt the blisters against his own feet when he laid with you. He’ll make sure you stay off your feet for a bit, give them time to heal.

That gets another smirk. You won’t be leaving the truck for a long time, there’ll be no need to worry about your blisters after tonight. He’ll keep you off your feet. Maybe have you thank him for taking such good care of you.

He’ll try your mouth next. He bites back a moan imagining your face pressed against his crotch, knows already that the difference in size between the two of you will be absolutely pornographic at that angle. Can’t wait to teach you to deepthroat him, salivating at the image of you holding him in your mouth on the road.

He’d already wasted one load, it’s only right you take the next. You’re his now, which means he shouldn’t have to come in his fucking pants like a teenager ever again. 

But he’d gone easy on you, hadn’t made you take him in any of your holes this first night. Even let you pretend to sleep through the whole thing, though your shifting hips and little scrunched up face gave you away as soon as he pressed himself against you.

It was endearing, really, the way you tried so hard to pretend it wasn’t happening. He can still taste your tears on his tongue, mixing with the acrid taste of nicotine. He can’t wait to learn what your pussy tastes like.

He takes a long pull from the cigarette and considers your little shaking form.

You won’t need much now that you’re with him. Only a few outfits in case he needs to bring you in somewhere, but you’ll be kept naked when in his truck. He’ll have to find a motel sometime soon, get all the grime washed off your skin and the grease out of your hair. He’d like to see it brushed out, see how you might style it for him.

He’ll take good care of you. Feed you when you’re hungry, maybe get some little toys or books if you’re good, fuck you whenever you - or he - needs it. 

It’ll take a while for you to settle, he knows. You’ll spend a bit looking for that girly little gun you’d been keeping tucked away in your bag. But that’s okay. He already knows he’ll enjoy training you, showing you just how to be the perfect little doll for him.

He stubs the cigarette out in an ashtray, climbs back into bed with you and tucks you tight to his chest. Your little sniffling breaths draw another little twitch of the lips from him, and he buries his nose in your hair before shutting his eyes.

Yeah, you're going to be perfect for him.

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Where Will All The Martyrs Go [Chapter 13: The Regrets Are Useless] [Series Finale]

A/N: Below are your final predictions. Let's see how you did... 🥰

Series summary: In the midst of the zombie apocalypse, both you and Aemond (and your respective travel companions) find yourselves headed for the West Coast. It’s the 2024 version of the Oregon Trail, but with less dysentery and more undead antagonists. Watch out for snakes! 😉🐍

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), violence, bodily injury, med school Aemond, character deaths, nature, drinking, smoking, drugs, Adventures With Aegon™️, pregnancy and childbirth, the U.S. Navy, road trip vibes.

Series title is a lyric from: “Letterbomb” by Green Day.

Chapter title is a lyric from: “Whatsername” by Green Day.

Word count: 6.1k

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Rain pours outside the cabin, mist-shrouded pine trees and still dark water, a place in southern Oregon called Lake of the Woods. The twin-sized bed with a thin foam mattress was once used by kids attending summer camp, capture the flag and s’mores, hikes and scary stories, but now the children are ghosts and the monsters are real, stumbling down streets and lurking in dark places, licking blood from what’s left of their lips.

Aemond is here but he’s also not, a castaway on an island where the world never ended, his hands in your hair as you straddle him, your hips moving tentatively, his lips and teeth at your throat, the sharp points of his canines like fangs.

“Am I doing this right?” you murmur doubtfully. “I feel like I’m definitely not doing this right…”

“Shh, you’re great, you’re incredible.”

“I’m sorry I don’t know how to do everything already, I’m sorry you have to teach me—”

“Stop,” Aemond commands, a sharp sigh through your hair. “I love this. I love you. I want to teach you things until the day I die.”

The nervous tension in your muscles unravels—peddles thrown into water, campfire smoke vanishing into indigo night—and now his hands are on your hips, steadying you, guiding you. You link your fingers around the back of his neck and try to find a cadence that isn’t uncomfortable, ungainly, effortful. You wanted to try this. You want to experience everything with him.

“Take your time,” Aemond is saying like it’s difficult for him to keep a train of thought, his eye closed, his cheeks flushed, blood-colored blooms like a dusk sky. “I’m fine down here, don’t worry about me…”

Rain drums against the windows; lightning flashes in the sky and thunder growls. From the front porch of one of the other cabins, you can hear the indistinct droning of conversations and Aegon strumming the acoustic guitar he brought from the beach house. It’s something you’ve overheard him singing before, one of his strange midcentury darlings, a song that should be too old for him to know the words to.

“All you big and burly men who roll the trucks along

Better listen, you’ll be thankful when you hear my song

You have really got it made if you’re haulin’ goods

Any place on earth but those Haynesville Woods…”

Your skin gleams with a cool sheen of sweat; there is a draft through the cabin walls that makes you shiver as you cling to Aemond. You roll your hips a certain way and he moans—suddenly, involuntarily—and you know you’ve found the right rhythm.

“It’s a stretch of road up north in Maine

That’s never ever ever seen a smile

If they’d buried all them truckers lost in them woods

There’d be a tombstone every mile

Count ‘em off, there’d be a tombstone every mile…”

Aemond is kissing you deeply, desperately, trembling hands and gasping shallow breaths. And there is not just euphoria written into the lines of his face; there is disorientation, there is wonder. He barely manages: “Alright…um…if you want me to last longer than about thirty more seconds, you should probably slow down…”

“No,” you tease, grinning as you bite at his full lips.

“When you’re loaded with potatoes and you’re headed down

You’ve got to drive the woods to get to Boston town

When it’s winter up in Maine, better check it over twice

That Haynesville road is just a ribbon of ice…”

Aemond cries out, louder than you’ve ever heard him before—you’ve never had privacy, you’ve never truly been alone—and then again, a helpless ecstatic sound, pleasure so overwhelming it almost starts to feel like pain.

“Quiet!” you whisper, giggling, touching two fingers to his mouth. “Everyone’s going to hear you.”

“Oh my God,” Aemond says. He falls back onto the mattress and brings you with him, his arms wrapped around you, kissing your cheeks and your forehead as the two of you lie there panting and entangled, his blue eye astonished. “Okay, okay, I need a minute. I think I just burst an aneurysm.”

“I killed you?” you purr with feigned distress, basking in your conquest.

“You can kill me whenever you want. You can kill me five times a day.”

“When you’re talking to a trucker that’s been haulin’ goods

Down that stretch of road in Maine they call the Haynesville Woods

He’ll tell you that dying and going down below

Won’t be half as bad as driving on that road of ice and snow…”

Aemond stares up at the ceiling—a steep gable roof, a motionless fan—and now you can tell he’s thinking about his family again, discorporate screams, misplaced trust. Otto Hightower’s bones were found in the shower, meaning he likely died before or not long after their power failed and water would have run out in the municipal system. They were probably killed before you and Aemond ever met, distant galaxies lightyears away, remote long-dead stars. And so all the blood you paid to get to California was wasted.

“Do you ever think about the people you have saved?” you ask gently as your fingertips trace the ridge of his scar. “You stitched yourself back together. You healed Aegon’s burns. You sutured Cregan’s arm. You got me and Rio down from that transmission tower.”

“I guess I did,” Aemond says, but his voice is ambivalent, as if none of these things count. He has not found someplace safe for you yet. His job is not finished; his triumphs may only be temporary.

“Aemond…back in Pennsylvania…why did you decide to help us?”

“Luke spotted you guys, and we all talked it over. If it had just been Rio, honestly, I wouldn’t have taken the chance. A man his size, and possibly armed…could be trouble, you know? But I figured since he was traveling with a woman and you seemed to be with him by choice, he was probably okay. And then when we first met, he was so protective of you…didn’t want me touching you, didn’t leave you alone…I realized he had to be a good guy.”

“He was,” you say solemnly. I was supposed to remind him about the racks. I was supposed to warn him. But you didn’t warn Rio about what was waiting to kill him in that sand-swept grocery store in Winnemucca, just like you didn’t warn Jace about radiation or Baela about the way the rungs of the ladder that ran up the side of the grain bin were rusted and creaking, and maybe there is more than enough blame to go around.

“And then after Battle Mountain, as soon as we found the gasoline and ammo, I knew we had to go back for you. It hit me all at once. I couldn’t protect you by leaving you with Rio and Cregan. And I couldn’t let you go. I’ve never had something like this before. I didn’t know it existed. I told the others we were turning around, and Aegon said: Thank fucking God. Rhaena took off sprinting towards the car.” Then Aemond kisses you again, but tenderly this time, slowly, like you’ll have forever and there’s no need to rush. “I’m going to get you to Odessa. I’m going to take you somewhere safe.”

The rain is stopping; there are still a few hours of daylight left.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Hey, Chip Skylark. Check it out,” Aegon says, grinning at you from where he’s sprawled on the wet dock and smoking a cigarette, wearing his neon green plastic sunglasses, his left leg finally freed from its bandages and on full display. You’re all wearing the same things, stolen t-shirts and shorts, sweatshirts at night when it gets cold, sneakers you can walk hundreds of miles in; but Aegon won’t give up his Sperry Bahamas. “It’s nature’s tattoo.”

You sit down beside him and admire the scar tissue, red knots and white cords, jagged terrain like a mountain range, organic highways and bridges and trails. “It’s a roadmap.”

“That’s appropriate.”

You’ve been traveling on foot for two weeks since Criston’s white Tahoe ran out of gas and was abandoned in the town of Mad River, California. Now you are only about ten miles from Odessa, close enough to reach in half a day but too far to get into town before nightfall. This time tomorrow you’ll be there, and it will either be a haven or a wasteland, and if Rio’s parents’ community in Odessa has disappeared then so has your last idea for where to go. Absentmindedly, you skate your fingerprints over the bumps and grooves of Aegon’s leg like a blind man reading braille. He shifts and clears his throat; you’ve made him uncomfortable somehow. You lift your hand away.

“I’m sorry, does that hurt?”

“Nah. I can’t really feel anything besides pressure. The nerve endings got fried.”

“Oh.” But now you don’t know what you did to upset him. Aegon doesn’t provide an explanation. Down the dock a ways towards the shore, Rhaena is reading The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and listening to the pink Sony Walkman formerly owned by a little girl named Ava. Inside whirls Green Day’s 2004 album American Idiot, which Aegon took from his bedroom at the beach house to add to his CD collection, a cultural archive, a gift for posterity. Cregan is teaching Daeron to fish with poles he found in one of the cabins; Helaena is bringing them worms. Aemond and Luke are gathering things dry enough to burn—books and wooden chairs from inside the cabins—and piling them up so Cregan can cook dinner once it’s caught.

“So,” Aegon says, changing the subject, scrutinizing you as he puffs on a Marlboro Gold. “Everything going okay?”

You know what he means; he must have heard Aemond earlier. “Yup.”

“Got it all figured out?”

“Sure did.”

“Great. I’m happy for you,” Aegon says, and yet there’s a twinge of melancholy he’s trying to hide. It must be hard for him; he and Daeron are the only single ones.

“We’ll find you some suitable candidates for your harem when we get to Odessa.”

He chuckles. “Oh, come on.”

“Guys, girls? Do you have a preference?”

He’s smiling wistfully down into the water, a dark rippling mirror. “I have too specific a preference, that’s the problem.”

“Yacht girls in bikinis. Golf cheerleaders.”

“There are no cheerleaders in golf, you yokel.”

“Okay, well…I’m sure you’ll be very popular with the lonely, traumatized, widowed women of the apocalypse.”

Aegon gazes morosely out over the lake. He pitches the end of his cigarette into the water, and your eyes catch briefly on the black ink of the tattoo on his forearm: It’s not over ‘til you’re underground. “I don’t know. I’ve been sober for two weeks and now everything is annoyingly clear.”

“What’s bothering you?”

He waits a while before he answers, evasive. “I’ve never been good at anything.”

“Everyone feels that way sometimes. Luke thinks he’s not good at anything either.”

“But Luke’s nice. I’m a rat bastard.”

You laugh. “You’re kind of nice, Aegon.”

“Yeah right.”

“No, seriously. I like being around you. You make me feel better. You’re like…” You ponder how to word it. “I feel like I could tell you whatever and not worry about being judged for it.”

He snorts. “As if you’ve ever done anything judgeable.”

You shrug, peering out over the lake. “I abandoned my family. I stopped sending them money, I stopped calling. And when everything happened…the zombies, the world ending…I didn’t even consider going back to Kentucky to try to help them. I went west with Rio instead. And now they’re probably all dead and it’s my fault. That’s evil. I couldn’t have gotten away with that level of betrayal. I must be cursed.”

Aegon is watching you, eyebrows raised. He has never heard this before. “But your family sucked, right?”

“Yeah,” you admit. “I think it would be hard to argue they didn’t.”

“So fuck ‘em,” Aegon says simply.

You smile at him, touched, grateful. “Okay. Fuck ‘em.”

“I’m relieved my family’s gone,” Aegon confesses, something so brutal he’d never tell anyone else. “I mean…I feel kind of bad about my mom and Criston. But as long as they were alive, I’d always be the person they raised. And if I could bring someone back, it wouldn’t be any of them. I’d pick Rio.”

“I would too,” you say softly, staring down at the faint burn marks on your palms from when you were stranded on that transmission tower with him, talking him out of suicide, so adamant that both of you were going to make it to Oregon. And you were wrong.

“So if you’re cursed, Pita Chips, sign me up because I’m right there with you.”

Rhaena pulls out an earbud and says to Aegon: “I don’t get this album.”

“What?!” he exclaims.

“It’s so good!” you concur. On the shore, Cregan is spearing several gutted rainbow trout on sticks so they can be roasted over the fire. Ice is gleefully gulping down fish organs.

Aegon continues: “Whatsername! St. Jimmy! Jesus of Suburbia!”

Rhaena blinks, glancing between you and Aegon. “But neither of you grew up in the suburbs.”

“It’s not about the suburbs, Rhaena!” Aegon replies with frenetic hand gestures. “It’s about being disillusioned and angry and failed by all the adults in your life, and self-medicating, and losing love every time you get a taste of it, and wanting to burn everything down and start over. It’s about hating the world and the world hating you back.”

“Okay, sure. I still don’t get it.”

You say: “You might have had too happy a childhood.” And you and Aegon burst out laughing.

“You guys are so weird,” Rhaena says, but she’s smiling. She stands up, gives Aegon back his Walkman, and walks to the end of the dock where Cregan is cooking the rainbow trout. Aemond and Daeron are gathering up the aluminum buckets found at the campground and set outside earlier today to collect rainwater. There is one five-pound bag of trail mix left to share, and then all the food is gone. If Cregan doesn’t kill something, you won’t eat.

“We should go help them with dinner,” you tell Aegon.

He groans. “Should we really?”

“Yeah. We should.”

“Fine.” He takes your hand when you offer it and struggles to his feet. Then you inhale a lungful of the scent of roasting trout, and startlingly powerful nausea punches through your stomach, so repellant you have to clamp a hand over your mouth to stop yourself from retching.

There has to be something wrong with the fish. It’s never smelled like that before.

Aegon seems baffled. “What? What’s wrong?”

“Does the trout smell right to you?”

Aegon sniffs the air like a labrador. “I guess…? I barely smell anything.”

“Well you probably destroyed your nose cells with all the coke.”

“That’s discriminatory. Addiction is a disease.” But his brow is furrowed with concern. “Seriously, are you okay? You look awful. Not like that. You know what I mean.”

“I’m fine.” You don’t feel fine; but everyone down by the fire is chatting and joking around nonchalantly, and surely if there actually was something wrong they would have noticed. “I’ll be back in a second.”

“Sure,” Aegon says, perplexed.

You hurry past the others and take refuge in the cabin you’re sharing with Aemond. Inside the trout smell isn’t so strong. You sit at the edge of the bed and suck in several deep breaths, trying to calm down, willing the confounding wave of nausea to pass.

Did I eat something bad, did I get bit by a spider or something…?

You are checking your arms and legs for little raised bitemarks when Helaena enters the cabin and shuts the door behind her. When she opens her burlap messenger bag to root around inside, you glimpse photographs she must have taken from the beach house, the frames left empty on the mantle of the fireplace. Then Helaena pulls out a pregnancy test, just one, Clearblue.

You gawk at it. “What are you doing?”

“You look sick,” Helaena says matter-of-factly.

“Yeah, but I don’t think it’s that.”

She is puzzled, wide innocent blue eyes. “Why not?”

“Well…I mean…that would be freakishly quick, wouldn’t it? Like…quick as in immediately. People can’t get pregnant the first time they have sex, right?”

“Huh. They really don’t have sex ed in Kentucky,” Helaena says, and leaves you alone with your pregnancy test. You don’t feel so nauseous anymore, but you sneak around the back of the cabin to take it anyway, because now you’re thinking about the possibility with a vividness you’ve never experienced before: a round blossoming belly and tiny handprints and Aemond cradling his child in his arms. And by the time you get the result, you aren’t even shocked. It feels like something that’s supposed to happen.

You and Aemond don’t have a moment alone together until after dark, sitting on the porch swing outside your cabin for first watch, everyone else asleep, Ice dozing serenely by your feet. The only sounds are the breeze through the pine trees, cool and damp, and the hoots of owls, and the chirping of crickets and cicadas.

“So guess what,” you say casually as moonbeams float rippling and fractured on the surface of the black-glass lake.

Aemond smiles drowsily, not expecting anything. “What?”

“In approximately eight months, I might be having your baby.”

At first, he doesn’t speak; he only studies the test when you hand it to him, and then looks at you like he’s not convinced you aren’t angry, like he can’t quite bring himself to believe that you’d want this with someone like him. “Are you afraid?”

“No,” you answer honestly. Maybe you should be, but you aren’t. “I’m hopeful. I feel like as soon as I realized it, everything got brighter. And now I’m thinking about the future instead of the past.” They’re not going to grow up like I did. They’re never going to think they aren’t loved. “What should we name it?”

“Not Otter.”

You laugh, trying to muffle it so you don’t wake anyone. Ice lifts her head and stares at you curiously, her shaggy grey ears straight up.

“I don’t know, I’m terrible with names,” Aemond says; and now he’s smiling again, a wide radiant smile, and you know he’s thinking about the future too. “Hope or Peace or something. Something happy. Something about starting over.”

You take his hand. “I can’t wait to start over with you.”

“Just one more day,” Aemond says.

One more day.

~~~~~~~~~~

“So what am I going to do in Odessa?” Luke asks as the eight of you—nine, if you count Ice—trek eastbound on Route 140. You are about five miles from Lake of the Woods and halfway to your destination. It’s only 80 degrees and overcast, good walking weather, although there is a looming threat of rain, occasional rogue drops and far-off rumbles of thunder. “Everyone has valuable skills except me. Chips has great aim and can build things, Daeron has his compound bow, Aemond is basically a doctor, Rhaena is learning how to shoot guns and treat injuries…”

“Aegon has skills?” Cregan jokes, casting him a good-natured grin. Aegon acts like he’s going to whack Cregan with his golf club, which he’s spinning around haphazardly. Both his Marlin .22 and acoustic guitar are slung across his back. There aren’t many bullets left, but everyone has a few.

“Aegon can navigate,” Luke says. “And probably impregnate ten women a day. Very useful during a population crisis.”

“We don’t need that in the gene pool,” Rhaena notes.

“You wrote stories in college, right?” you ask Luke.

“Screenplays, yeah,” he says hesitantly. “But I wouldn’t say I was super talented or anything.”

Aegon claps him on the shoulder “Well I’ve got good news for you, kid. A big chunk of the world’s screenwriters are probably dead now. So you’ll look so much better in comparison!”

“Thanks…?” Luke says.

“What I mean is,” you continue. “You could write books for people to read, since there aren’t really libraries or Barnes & Nobles anymore. And you could interview people to get their life stories and then record them so they aren’t lost forever. The next generation should know what the world was like before the zombies.”

“Yeah,” Aegon says as he pets Ice. “Someone has to tell them about blue raspberry Icees, right Blue Raspberry Icee?”

“Maybe,” Luke says thoughtfully, and you notice that he’s smiling a little.

Ice begins whining, and there is a rustling in the woods to the north, low-hanging branches of bigleaf maple and dogwood and Douglas fir trees being forced aside. “Zombie!” Aegon announces, pointing. Immediately, Daeron nocks an arrow and then releases it, and the figure draped in the shifting shadows of foliage drops to the ground.

“Hey Aegon,” Daeron says after a few seconds.

“Yeah?”

“That was actually a zombie, right?”

“Totally,” Aegon replies, but he doesn’t sound certain.

Aemond turns to his older brother accusingly. “How sure are you?”

“Like…50%.”

“Aegon!” Rhaena cries, petrified, and everyone rushes off the road to investigate.

Blessedly, the felled creature is long-dead, a former park ranger whose tan uniform hangs in gore-stained tatters. The nametag reads: Underwood. The arrow pierced its soft rotting skull and remains lodged there until Daeron pulls it out to be used again, giving Aegon an impatient scowl as he does.

“Close call,” Aegon tells him. “Think they would have charged you as an adult?”

“Lord almighty, that gave me a scare,” Cregan says, chuckling. Helaena spies a blackberry bush and begins picking a handful, and Cregan goes over to join her. Rhaena and Luke are telling Aegon that he needs to be more responsible and should have waited for Luke to confirm it was a zombie with his binoculars. You exchange a glance with Aegon: he rolls his eyes, you offer a smirk of commiseration. Ice is already trotting back towards Oregon Route 140.

You haven’t told anyone else that you’re pregnant yet, but eventually they’re going to notice that Aemond won’t leave your side. He sighs and asks you: “Have you had enough of this little field trip?”

“Definitely.” You head for the road. Aemond walks with you, placing you not on his left side but on his right where he can see you. You ask, smiling: “You don’t trust me to watch your blind side anymore, huh?”

“I prefer the view the way it is.”

You are only a few steps from the black artery of pavement that cuts through the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument, a 114,000-acre preserve of wilderness that somehow—although it is 2,500 miles away—reminds you a bit of eastern Kentucky, endless emerald forests, the omnipotent shadows of mountains. And because you are on Aemond’s right side, he can look down and see something just in front of you on the earth strewn with knobby roots and pine needles and dead leaves.

“Don’t!” he shouts, snatching your forearm and yanking you backwards, and he’s never touched you like this before—so forcefully, so violently—and you stumble and almost fall, and your arm burns and aches where he grabbed you, and people are asking what’s going on, and you peer up at Aemond with confusion, fear, mistrust.

“Why…?”

And then you hear it rustling from the same place where you were standing a moment ago. The others yelp and dash out of the way as the snake escapes into the woods, a drab spotted olive green, a rattling tail, an angular skull like an arrowhead.

“Aemond?” you say, because he hasn’t moved, hasn’t made a sound. He looks down, and your gaze follows his. On his right calf, just a few inches above his ankle, are two small puncture wounds from the snake’s fangs, each dribbling a thin river of blood.

“Northern Pacific rattlesnake,” Helaena says, her voice shaking, tears welling up in her horrified eyes. “Venomous.”

~~~~~~~~~~

Aemond has one arm draped across Cregan’s shoulders, the other over Aegon’s. He’s moving slower, or is that just your imagination? His steps are less steady, his breathing more labored. His leg is swelling, a deep blue phantom of a bruise spreading beneath his skin, so tight it looks like it might split open.

“We’re almost there,” you say; you keep saying it, because hopefully that will make it true. “We’re only a few miles from Odessa, and we’ll find people who can help us.”

“Aemond, you’re a doctor,” Luke says.

Aemond’s voice is weak, pained, hazy. “I’m not a doctor.”

“You know what I mean!” Luke yells, frantic. “How do we fix you? What can we do?”

“Nothing,” Aemond says listlessly. “There’s nothing you can do without a hospital. I’ll either get better or I won’t.”

“People in Odessa will know how to help,” you insist. “They’re outside all the time, they hike, they hunt, they fish, they’ve seen snakebites before. They must have. They’ll have treatments.”

“Aemond,” Rhaena breathes, and you turn to see there is blood running from his nostrils. You scream, and Aemond touches his fingers to his face and then watches as they come away bloody.

“Put me down,” he tells Cregan and Aegon.

“No—” you begin, but then his knees buckle and he’s on the pavement anyway, blood pouring from his nose and his lips, blood filling up his right eye. Cregan walks to the shoulder of the highway, his head in his hands. Aegon stays beside Aemond, and you’re kneeling there with him, both of you using anything you have to clean the blood from Aemond’s face: the corners of your shirts, your bare hands.

He’s covered in blood, you think. Just like Jace, Baela, Rio.

“Can’t clot,” Aemond is murmuring. “The venom causes coagulotoxicity. Internal bleeding too. I feel like…like there’s all this pressure inside…”

Rhaena is taking Aemond’s pulse like he taught her to, fingers on the underside of his wrist. “It’s really faint,” she says quietly.

You grab a plastic Gatorade bottle filled with rainwater out of your backpack and tilt it against Aemond’s crimson-stained lips. He manages to swallow some of it. “Aemond, listen to me,” you say as calmly as you can. “You’re so close. We’re almost there. I need you to hang on a little longer.”

He shakes his head, slow dizzy motions. “It doesn’t matter.”

“They might have doctors in Odessa.” This is a fantasy, but you can’t resist it.

“Even if they do, there won’t be any antivenom. And it’s too late anyway.”

“No,” you say savagely, a sob ripping through your throat. “We didn’t cross 3,000 miles so you could die here. I won’t let you. It doesn’t make any sense. It’s not fair.”

“Aegon,” Aemond says, reaching for him, drained and fumbling.

Aegon catches his hand. “I’m here.”

His eye—crystalline blue corrupted with red, blood in clear water—drifts to his brother. “You have to get her to Odessa. You have to help take care of everyone.”

Aegon is weeping. “Man, it’s supposed to be you. How can I still be here if you aren’t?”

“You can do this,” Aemond says.

“I’ll try.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, Aemond,” Aegon says, then crawls away on his hands and knees and collapses on the pavement, gutted, inconsolable, hemorrhaging grief instead of gore.

Everyone is crying and touching Aemond—his face, his hands—saying goodbye, accepting tasks, and they come away stained with red, and rain has begun to fall from a dark sky growling with thunder. Rhaena takes his medical kit. Helaena takes his Glock and stows it away in her messenger mag. Then Aemond looks for you, and now you are alone with him here in the middle of the highway, two golden lines on black asphalt, and with your thumbprint you whisk away the rivulet of blood that is spilling from his eye.

“You’re going to be okay,” he whispers as his heart fails, as his lungs fill with blood instead of air, as his pores leak rust and ruin. “Odessa will be everything we hoped for. I just won’t be there with you.”

“You can’t leave me,” you’re saying as rain patters against the road. I left my family and now my family is leaving me.

“Love,” he sighs, almost too softly to hear. “I don’t want to.”

You lie down on the pavement with him and rest your head on his chest, feel it rise and fall beneath you as the rain descends in sheets. And then Aemond exhales, deep and rattling, and he never tastes oxygen again, never speaks, never touches you. You don’t move from where you’re lying. You’re there until you’re drenched to the bones with rain and the world is a cold mist of pine trees, of wilderness, and you can never go back to any of the places you’ve been before, you can never get back the people you’ve left there.

Aegon is shaking you. “We have to keep moving,” he chokes out through tears.

You reply without looking at him. “I’m giving up now.”

“No you’re fucking not. We have to walk to Odessa.”

“Everyone’s dead in Odessa. Everyone’s dead everywhere. I don’t want to be here anymore. I don’t want to stay in a world like this.”

On the periphery of your vision, you can see Aegon glancing at the others, standing just off the highway and under the canopy of the pine trees. He seems defeated, he seems lost.

Then suddenly Aegon turns back to you. “Hey!” he screams, so loudly you jolt upright, your palms on wet pavement, rain dripping from your hair. “I’m still alive. You’re still alive. This isn’t over yet. I said I would get you to Odessa, so that’s where we’re going. Stand up. Right now.”

Aegon holds out his hand. Thunder booms, lightning strobes, and then you take it. He pulls you to your feet and hesitates, as if he didn’t think he would get this far. Then he throws his arms around you, a crushing desperate embrace, a wordless devotion, a silent vow, sobbing into the curve of your neck, tasting the copper and iron of his brother’s blood on your skin.

“We have to keep moving,” he says again, like an apology, like he understands how impossible it feels. “The storm’s getting worse. It’ll be too dark to see soon.”

“We can’t leave him alone like this.”

“That’s not Aemond anymore,” Aegon pleads. “Aemond’s gone. And he would want us to live.”

Now the others are here on the road too: Daeron, Helaena, Cregan, Rhaena, Luke, Ice whimpering and licking scarlet stains of blood off your hands. You’re all holding each other; you’re all any of you have left. Cregan carries Aemond off the pavement and on a patch of grass alongside Route 140, the seven of you cover his body with branches of pine needles and white petals from dogwood trees. Rhaena is the first person to begin walking again, heading east. One by one you follow her. The downpour is torrential; if you are attacked now, you are nearly blind. Aegon stays beside you no matter how slow your steps are. You think if he disappears, you will too; the strings that tie you to the earth will fray and unweave and your bones will turn to mist, your voice will only be the wind howling down mountainsides. You have no way of knowing how long you’ve been walking or how many miles are left. You wonder what will happen to Aemond’s child if there is nothing for you in Odessa.

The rain is stopping. Now you can hear crows, woodpeckers, formations of geese honking in a foggy sky and squirrels scrabbling up tree trunks. Falcons perch watchfully on dead power lines. Rare aisles of sunlight are breaking through dissipating clouds.

They rise up out of the verdant jungle, a tangle of Pacific ninebark and blue elderberry: four figures in green camouflage, two men and two women, all wearing tactical sunglasses and wielding assault rifles, M16s you’re fairly sure, automatic and with 20-round magazines. Daeron moves to nock an arrow and then stops when he sees you’ve put up your hands. The others follow your lead: palms empty, willingly surrendering.

It’s them, you think dazedly. The people in Odessa. They’re alive, they’re real.

“Please cooperate and hand over all your weapons,” one of the women says, fifties, muscular, alert hawkish eyes.

No one moves. Then you unholster your Beretta M9—received from the U.S. Navy almost exactly five years ago, a different lifetime, a different world—and hold it out to the woman in your open palm. And now everybody else is giving their weapons over too: Aegon and Luke’s .22s, Rhaena’s Ruger, the spare Ruger and Aemond’s Glock hidden in Helaena’s burlap messenger bag, Daeron’s compound bow, Cregan’s axe. Ice peers up at Cregan anxiously, her yellowish eyes wide, but she wags her tail when he runs one of his large, calloused hands over her rain-soaked fur.

Aegon is still clutching his golf club. One of the men stares at him, incredulous. “You can keep that, son,” he says.

The woman nods to the men. “Nick and Glen will escort you five miles up the road, and then return your weapons. We ask that you keep moving and do not turn around. We don’t want trouble, but we can defend ourselves. Don’t think you can double back tomorrow and try to loot us or anything. This is your only warning. Do you understand?”

Aegon nudges your hand with his knuckles, then taps you harder when at first you’re too shellshocked to notice. You have to explain. You have to tell them why you’re here.

“I…I…” You begin, unable to make the words leave your lips, rats from a sinking ship, plummeting bodies from a burning building. Here you stand on a precipice, and with so many other people to save. “I served in the Navy with Bryan Osorio. We left Saratoga Springs together. He told me it would be safe here.”

Now they are interested. Slowly, the woman lowers her M16. “You know the Osorios?”

“I do.” I’ve known them for half a decade.

“Could any of them identify you and verify what you’re saying?”

“His wife, Sophie. She’s blonde, and she likes elephants, and she had a baby recently.”

The woman is scanning the faces behind you. “And where’s Bryan?”

“He’s not here anymore,” you say, and now you’re sobbing again. Aegon is squeezing your shoulder, his head bowed. “I’m sorry. I wanted to help him get home. I was supposed to warn him, I was supposed to stop it from biting him, but I didn’t and now he’s gone—”

“Okay, okay.” The woman motions for you to calm down, but her voice is kind. “Who are these guys? Your colleagues, your friends?”

“They’re my family.”

“You can vouch for them?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll all submit to searches for bitemarks?”

“Yes.”

The woman turns to the men she called Nick and Glen. “Take them inside, will you? Get the ID verified and then we’ll process everyone.”

“Got it,” the older man says. And then, to you and your companions: “Follow me.”

Nick and Glen lead you into the forest, the canopy of pine needles so thick the daylight turns to dusk, and you think of lightning bugs, of firelight, of drinking Guinness on the beach with Rio on Diego Garcia. There are several patrols, groups of four or five, that approach to stop you until they see Nick and Glen and wave you through. Then the trees open into a meadow of buttercups and daisies and pink fawn lilies, and beyond that an immense village, some houses decades old, others currently being constructed with logs from pine trees. There are hundreds of people tending to livestock, hanging up laundry to dry on clotheslines, digging in gardens, making candles and soap and butter. There are children playing without fear, giggling as they chase after scampering dogs, challenging each other to games of kickball and Uno.

In front of one of the houses that predates the apocalypse, brick with a screened-in porch, there is a small blonde woman standing in a garden, smiling and chatting with a middle-aged couple. The baby she carries against her chest in a blue sling has dark curly hair like Rio’s.

Sophie and the baby are here. They’ve been alive the whole time.

You rest a palm on your belly without realizing you’re doing it. “What happens now?” you ask Aegon.

“The rest of our lives.”

It is unimaginable, it is impossible, it is so full of luminous potential you feel like the light will spill out of your pores like blood, it’s an oasis, it’s a second chance, it’s an island in the vast lethal untamed blue of the Indian Ocean.

“Let’s go,” Aegon says softly, taking your hand and leading you across the field of wildflowers, kaleidoscopic blooms in the last days of summer.

[artisticdivasworld]

Navigating Technology in Trucking

Technology has changed just about every industry out there, and trucking is no exception. For new truckers, the amount of tech involved can feel like a lot to take in at first. From electronic logging devices (ELDs) to load boards and route-planning apps, technology has become an essential part of how the modern trucking industry works. The good news? Once you learn the basics, this tech can make…

[sil-te-plait-tue-moi]

My heart is a bloodhound!

PART 1 ★ PART 2

Quick summary: It happens again, when the year festers into August again and leaves the two of you raw and vulnerable like open wounds.

Word count: 15K… 🤓

Warnings: canon-typical mentions of death, violence and injury (there is mention of like eating people but idk); grief; misogyny; Rust's personality; semi-public SMUTT T-T (MINORS DNI); same level of pretentiousness, maybe a little more, as the first part.

A/N: Holy fuck this sucked the soul out of me (wish Rust Cohle would suck the soul out of I MEAN WHAT), i am super proud of this though!! Went through many iterations and this was the least shit! 🎀🎀🎀 This is technically part two to The idler wheel but can be read by itself too. May or may not write other things for this guy but for the time being, I need a cleanse 😭 BUT please please enjoy and please please interact, i love reading comments and so many lovely people commented on the first part, im gonna do my best to respond to any/all this time 🤘MWAH MWAH

***

It’s difficult to differentiate between the thrill of being left alone here with him and the slow-sinking dread of the implications of that.

With the return of the musk of the summer, those three ruthless, windless, unrelenting months that would seem to drag on for several lifetimes when I was a kid, the memory of where I was last year—and the year before that, and the one before that—hangs brightly in my mind. Stale, not quite dead – so bright. Crawling with mildew.

Stepping into the bar had felt like entering another dimension. Maybe it was the suits that gave it away – every single God-haunted patron—the truckers, the farmers, even the old dog lying at a man’s feet—had turned, sensing foreigners as acutely as the immune system registers a bodily threat. I knew Johansson felt it: that dark pull over the back of the neck. But under Marty’s overconfident, swaggering lead, that winning smile, we soon assimilated. Skin swallowing a bullet.

God forbid you ever leave the town you grew up in. Shame on you if you don’t, though. How sanctimonious of me to change my mind and return after earning a spot amongst the lucky few escapees.

Something in this place still irks me.

At least, in Brooklyn, there was always noise: cries of a baby in the apartment over, the discord of traffic bursting through the streets below, the rush of a crowd, the overlap and slur of private conversations. At least the badness would stare you right in the face; at least people were evil to be evil. At least there were corners where things could hide, where it made sense for shadows to exist: all to explain the paranoia that stalked me.

But here?—it seems so open. Like, if a rare, hot wind would blow through a Louisiana town, it could do so in one straight path, through walls, through people, without ever getting disrupted. Everything is so light in the blazing sun, you can practically hear it: the hum of rays passing over every surface. Nothing should be able to hide. And, at night, with no sun, no rays, there is no noise. Maybe a dog. And ghosts. But perhaps it’s just the area in which I live. 

When Marty started drinking, flirting with the twenty-one-year-old barkeep, Johansson’s face had stiffened. He himself had never even touched a bottle of beer – devil stuff. We shared a look once the blond detective started gabbin’ like an idiot.

“Know what Maggie thinks?” he had laughed, slumping over the sticky table of the booth, big, sweaty palm choking out his drink. “She thinks you might be pissed at me.”

Johansson blinked hard to keep his nose from wrinkling, but, even then, he couldn’t keep from physically cringing away. “Who?” he asked, confused by those hazy, unfocused eyes.

Marty cracked a toothy grin – there was that slight gap between those front two, which had been charming at first and only managed to thoroughly disgust me now in moments like these – and pointed his finger right at me, accusing. “You.”

My stomach churned dangerously at the sight of him.

“Marty,” his partner had drawled, a low warning.

Waved away like a fly.

“Naw, it’s like—you’re on your high fuckin’ horse or somethin’.”

The words were spoken through a laugh, but I knew there was meat behind that so-called good mood. He was one of those people that tended to overcompensate. A mistake, an ill feeling. He liked to point out how I was alone, and often, too, poorly disguised as a passing joke, complete with one of those shit-eating grins that seemed to come so easy to him.

Shouldn’t he have been happy? Not only had he gotten our case, by then, but we’d handed it over with smiles on our damn faces. Nice enough to walk them through the original crime scene, introduce them to the key witnesses. Complicated. We didn’t have to do shit for ‘em, but we did. Hell, even that beer he was clutching to his chest was paid for out of the goodness of my own fuckin’ heart. Who was he to moan about the situation? He was the one who insisted on staying in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere, brushing off any and all pointed questions on whether his family would be missing him at dinner.

“You know, I’d rather you were pissed,” he continued, where, really, I should have just smothered him into silence.

Rust was staring into the side of his flushed face, iron-grey eyes like a drill, like he was thinking the same thing.

“Look, you’re smilin’ at me now, but I sure as hell don’t trust it, buck. You wanna bite my head off, don’t ye?”

Like I ever could have done that.

Though the familiar weight of rage curdled in my chest, I would never admit it to the likes of Martin Hart. When he got like this—jealous, insecure, whiny—I wondered whether it was just a temporary lapse, or if this him, this true him, just lay under the surface all the time.

It wasn’t that fucking hard to plaster on a smile and take what you fucking got – I did it all the time. He could dream of a different life, but this was the one we were dealt. Fact that his grown ass hadn’t accepted that by now twisted violently in my gut. Between the two of us, I was the one that knew this – so why did he get myfucking case?

In my head, I’d let Salter have it, too. How could I ever admit I had an ego? How could I ever admit I had a mind to wrench the teeth out of the sheriff’s fucking gums? 

But I have plenty of practice acting like things don’t bother me, which is why it was so easy to plaster on my amiable smile and laugh, “C’mon, man, you know it’s only ‘cause o’ the workload.” Not that you could comprehend that, lazy fuck. To Marty, my kind’s natural state was amiable—anything otherwise would be a defect—so I’d expected to convince him. “You’ll do right by it, ‘m sure.” 

If he were sober, I know he would’ve bought it – he could convince himself that the way of the world was right and I was only being sweet to be sweet, because he deserved it. 

But Marty was drunk. Piss-drunk, loud drunk. His mind was clumsier than usual, unable to muster the energy to jump points, ignore the evidence, like he did daily. I hoped I had the power—if I had to let the case go, I wanted to at least retain an into its goings-on—but there was only one way to really have power over men like Marty when they were drunk, and I had had no interest in being one of his girls. 

My partner twitched beside me, picking at some spongy, yellow fluff protruding from a thin split in the chocolate-brown fake leather of the booth. He was just as furious as I was beneath his fort of calm.

Marty took a swig of his beer. “She wants you over soon. Maggie. Barbecue or some shit.”

“Maybe you should go home,” Johansson interjected, sharper than intended. If I were him, with his body, with his life, I’d have hit the fucker—long time ago, too. I couldn’t, but Johansson wouldn’t. He didn’t lack the temperament for brutality—I’m not sure anybody does—but, rather, couldn’t justify it to a necessary degree in his head. “I’m going home,” he’d reasoned kindly – he made it sound so easy. “Just let me take you. It’s on my way.”

Itching to leave, to return to the comfort of his wife and his little daughter. Marty had always found Johansson’s fondness of them disingenuous, had disliked my partner as long as they’d worked in the same office. He complained to me once that none of his stories seemed complete. When I asked him what he meant by that, he couldn’t answer—but I knew.

Breath short in my chest, I had half-expected Marty to lunge over the table, scratch Johansson’s eyes out. Only, Rust leaned over, dipping his head down to mutter something quietly into his partner’s ear, which was all flushed red. 

And then he went willingly into Johansson’s car, stumbling through the still, open night into the backseat.

My partner had squeezed my shoulder goodbye – I’m not sure why I didn’t leave with him. Now, I was doomed to leave with Rust. 

There, he sits across from me, smearing the ashy tar of his half-smoked, flaking cigarette over the mottled glass ashtray dragged over to his side of the table, little circles, waves, absent-minded art. Has me transfixed, some hypnotist.

If I look down like this, if I sacrifice the opportunity to look at him, I earn his careful attention: this sits in the back of my idle mind. I’ve been taking advantage of it more and more since summer broke through the sweetness of spring, which has since curdled like milk, sour. His stare drags over my face like fingers – I can almost feel his touch pressing into the softness of my cheek, dragging over the ridge of the orbital bone. 

“You’re okay?” he asks after a couple slowed heartbeats, pulling me out of the honey-pit of my thoughts.

I dart my eyes up, breaking the spell – his observation retreats, clouds, and drifts away to fix on the broken clock on the wall, the one that reads one forty-five at eleven o’ clock.

Primarily, his question irritates me. Nobody asks “are you alright?” imploringly, not unless it concerns themselves and their own wants. Salter had asked me that, right after telling me he was pulling me from my case, and, then, I had thought about crying, just to unsettle him. But what good would that have done? He’d only asked “are you alright?” to test the waters, to see if there was a future possibility of letting him pull the rug out from under me with zero consequences. Again. I couldn’t win. 

But Rust doesn’t want much from me. He doesn’t even want the case, really, which just twists the knife even further. 

“You—you know I’m good in there, right? In the box.” I carve a jagged thumbnail into this message in the table, twisting the characters wider, or taller, risking splinters.

Why should I have to give it up? And to a fucking idiot? Marty wasn’t the one who stayed all those late nights alone at the office, wasn’t the one scoured over heaps of files under low light, wasn’t the one who took the fucking beating when the suspect fought against arrest. Marty was not the one who conducted an interview like that.

My mouth thins into a hard line, but I know the words will come out whether I let them voluntarily or not. Around Rust, it’s that way. I should’ve left when I could. 

“It’s just that—it was so weird,” I continue, my head pulsing with the unwanted memory of that cabin. Marty didn’t have to experience it, Rust didn’t have to experience it—but I did. “Not jus’ wrong, or sad. Makes me feel strange, thinking about it.” 

Often, the suspects underestimate me. Johansson’s broad shoulders and tough-set jaw come off as offensive—nothing like my voice, low and gentle, and my eyes, sympathetic and warm. I’m the mother who will never judge, who is spilling over with unconditional love.

Beneath this, though, I am good at the maths of the job, the connections. Though all detectives technically develop the same constituent skills—close attention to body language tells and other biological betrayals—I ain’t sure most understand the sensitivity and strength required to confront shit like this head-on. To not avert your eyes at the mutilated woman on the bed. To inspect her eunuched boyfriend’s severed appendage, to have steady hands when photographing the scene—with flash, of course, to highlight every detail with sufficient clarity—for evidence, which must be returned to and examined again and again, each time with greater fervour still. 

I could name a few who’d joke about a thing like that, to ease the burn of that image in their heads, to sleep better at night, to leave behind the uninvited, vicarious sensation of a knife teasing over the meat of their dick. 

But the boyfriend’s corpse, we eventually located separately in a cabin in the woods, laid into the basement freezer, so peaceful, such a brutal image. Pretty parts of him preserved for mauling.

And Salter has the fucking audacity to take it away. He wasn’t the one to see something like that, to feel sick to his very stomach, to gag and have to turn away, to cringe and writhe like his skin suddenly wasn’t his, like he ought to pick himself out. I’ve been reeling with that image for weeks, living with motion sickness, and have been denied the relief of vomiting. 

“So, you need me to get that confession.”

Rust comes back into focus, perfectly still.

I nod, the back of my neck prickling with mean goosebumps. “Campbell, his DNA was all over the bodies. He was proud of it, even.” My ribs still glow with the phantom-sensation of his brutal kick there when we located him. Stomach clenching, I struggle to remain level. “But there ain’t no way in hell she wasn’t involved. He denies it, but the house is registered under her name. Maiden name, Phelps.”

“I read,” he confirms. 

I tremble in frustration – I almost wish he hadn’t. 

“It’s just—this lady’s tough.”

Eyes darting over to the dim-lit bar, scouring the scuffed hardwood floor, I can feel my face growing hot with indignation. Christ, it sounds pathetic, like a whiny kid insisting on continuing a task all wrong in order to protect their damaged pride. 

“You know Johansson: once she starts with the tears, he can’t see past ‘em. Southern manners ‘n’ all: a crying woman is a delicate thing not for a man to understand but to comfort. But, with me, it ain’t the same. She doesn’t respect me.”

“What d’you mean ‘respect ’? Don’t need respect in this game.”

I scoff, which would’ve been a dire mistake with anyone else. “Y’wouldn’t know what I’m on about,” I tease through an easy smile, though I’m not feeling so funny at the moment.

He inclines his head down to me, an invitation to elaborate.

My boot feverishly taps against the floor, thrumming light like a jackrabbit on the run. 

I sigh, mouth twisting. “She keeps asking me if I’ve slept,” I confess. “Says I look like her daughter.”

For all my mothering, here comes a perp who’s desperate to play me at my own game.

I can see how intelligent she is: some hollow glint in her eyes with nothing behind; past that gleaming screen of kindness, something black, like a cherry pit.

Sitting across from her, it felt like looking into a mirror. Not just physically—though her skin is a similar shade to mine, her nails bitten and splitting like mine, and she looks close to what I imagine my own mother could’ve grown into. It was in the way that, when I smiled, she smiled. When I took a sip of my coffee, she would drink some tea. At times, it would even seem like she would speak in my voice: the pitch, the intonations, the phrasing all far too similar. I was reluctant to tell her my name. It reminded me of this folk tale, of these tall, dark creatures who only required your name to speak like you, to look like you, to replace you in your own life. Its victim would die—in some way or another. Wander the woods, eaten alive.

A harrowing feeling had crept over me, winter pressing against the two-way mirror – I was sure Johansson, on the other side, would pick up on it. Only, when I confessed my worries to him, he’d given me this doubtful look, and I really wasalone then.

“She’s playin’ you,” Rust states simply, tracing his fingers over his mouth like some pseudo-cigarette. 

“Yeah.” I grind my teeth together. Under the table, where he cannot see, my fingers curl into a tight fist, trembling with my secret violence. “And now Salter wants Marty to have it? Bull.” 

I should’ve socked him right in his dumb, slack fuckin’ jaw. One day, I will. 

“He don’t want Marty to have it,” Rust retorts smartly, a half-smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. His eyes are warm in the dark – I should’ve taken my chances, raced to meet ‘em, but I’m too late. “He wants me to have it.” 

Yeah, well, I wish what was mine would stay mine.

Even if I’m inclined to be pissed off at Rust by proxy, I just can’t be. The difference between him and Marty is that he actually pays attention, real attention, not the selfish kind. Just by watching, I can tell he knows exactly what he could say, how he could act, in order to appeal to somebody—which is why I find it so odd that he chooses not to. I sacrifice my damn dignity to keep myself palatable. He does not. As a result, he is not well-liked at the office – people tend to feel caught out by him; they don’t like to feel observed, known.

When did being seen become a threat? I thought it was intimate. Though, I suppose, a piece of shit never wants to believe they’re a piece of shit.

Everyone’s the hero of their own story. 

Rust slides Marty’s half-empty beer across the table to me, which I receive with a crooked smile and a quick hand.

“Sure I won’t catch whatever he had?” 

He shrugs. “Y’ain’t as deadbeat as the rest of ’em. Oughta drag you down to their level.” 

I snort. “What, you don’t think you’re deadbeat?”

He huffs. “I’m worse.” 

Bitter, the beer washes over my tongue, leaves that funny aftertaste I never really liked, not the first time, not the last. I don’t suppose I’ll ever turn one down though, not if it was offered to me: I’d accept it if only to win points with whoever it was, points I could spend at a later date. 

“Maybe,” I start, “if you were a little more deadbeat, you’d be popular. Go out with the boys.”

When he meets my eyes momentarily, smirking, I have to grip my hand over my knee, fingertips digging into bone, and consciously remind myself via mantra not to let my face freeze. He hums, voice smooth and low like liquor, “What, like youdo?”

I should be pissed off, really. Maybe I will be. Instead, though, I choke on the smart retort I had meticulously configured in my head, some quip that would’ve maybe interested him based on what caught him before. 

I don’t know whether it would have been worse pretending like it never happened. That’s my strong point: pretending. It’s his, too, when he wants it to be. Maybe we could’ve outlasted it – all we needed was stamina.

But, instead, it’s this. Looking across at each other and knowing exactly what’s going on in the other’s head. I can see exactly how he thinks of me, what he wants to do. When he tilts his head ever so slightly, my neck glows with a promise, like the movement was mine in the first place. When I would bite at the pendant of my necklace, he used to narrow his eyes, like he ought to yank the chain off my neck. But now, he looks on softly, so unlike him, his own fingers at his own lips. I know what it feels like – I’ve kissed him there, too. 

“Don’t give me that. At least Geraci would stop shit-talkin’ ye,” I manage, tearing myself away. “Swear he’s stuck at sixteen or somethin’. But—you don’t mind it, do you?”

He shakes his head. “‘f he was smarter, maybe I would. Jus’ likes the sound of his own voice.” 

The clock has replaced me as his focal point – I can’t help but feel jealous. 

“S’why I like you,” I mumble from behind my beer. “First time I met you, I thought you’d make me feel stupid.

That seems to get him. 

He blinks, a barely noticeable twitch. “Do I? I don’t mean to.”

Can I spin this? I’m sure, if I were a little more awake, I’d be able to spin this. 

Some evil part of me hopes to make him feel guilty, to trick him into feeling tenderness for me, though I know the pursuit of that would be in vain. The type of men I know how to work—creatures of habit that take the exact path you want them to, to believe that they’re the real seducers—Rust seems entirely separate from that. He can sniff out rehearsal and practice, that robotism, like a dog – he sees it enough in criminals, doesn’t he? That’s why he’s called in for favours across state police departments.

When I met him the first time, I shook his hand, smiled, friendly-like, only to be met with rigidity and stoicism. No trouble, of course: some people just are that way. Wild horses on the highway. But his quietness?—now, that had set alarm bells off in my head. Boys at the precinct were loud – you couldn’t pay ‘em to shut up about their weekends, their football, their college years, their fuckin’ yards. When I was first exposed to it, I thought I’d gain a lot of friends. But then I realised they weren’t so much talking with me as they were talking at me. It’s why they’re so easy to read: they just tell you everything you want to know right off the bat. Even their secrets are bursting at the seams of their fat mouths, begging to be released. 

But Rust?—doesn’t talk until he finds it necessary. It’s impressive. Before that, though, the trait was enviable. I had—have—no comparable method. Even though, at first, it can seem blunt, even cold, his eloquence is refreshing. Never running in circles – only determinedly forward. So intimidating, almost like a freight train – I have to consciously keep myself from jerking back and out of the way. 

How low he must really think of me then, to see me like this. And I know he does: he sees. Everything I might have done to prevent it perhaps even had the opposite effect. I hate, I burn, I curse: it’s ugly. I cry over cases I would’ve left behind in two months tops, anyways, onto the next. I obsess over just another woman in the box. I think about him almost constantly. 

“You don’t,” I mumble, wondering if I ought to be wishing myself far away. “Make me feel dumb, that is. Not me. Others, I can’t speak for.”

We’ll have to leave soon – no doubt, this local bar is used to slow days and early nights, a blissful routine rudely disrupted by two outsiders who haven’t even really shown them good business. I glance over at the barkeep, slumped over the scuffed wooden counter and flatly watching the football up on the boxy TV set, and I recall my first job. Then, too, I’d let men twice my age buy me drinks, flirted with them. Was worth the tip money. 

Rust hums, though I really wish he wouldn’t speak at all. “Don’t pay mind to what Marty said.”

My neck prickles. 

He’s not trying to console me, is he? No, that’s not like him. Besides, it’s not like any amount of coddling could reverse the merciless truths I’m constantly reminded of in this line of work – if I’ve learned anything about sympathy, it’s that it doesn’t fix shit. If anything, it’s just another complication. It can seem beautiful, but, really, it isn’t. I can miss it, miss its warmth, miss the kind, sweet nothings my husband would whisper into my hair on the hardest nights, but it never changed the fact that I would have to get up in the morning and do it again. Rust knows this, has maybe lived this, so he’s not trying to console me. 

Maybe he’s trying to defend Marty.

Sharp and sure, that anger comes lurching up in my throat, slashing and snarling. 

The sensible part of me—what I hope is the larger part of me—knows this is not possible. Rust understands Marty’s faults better than anyone, even himself, even his wife. 

“Thing is,” I mumble bitterly, “he really means it, don’t he? He just don’t show it.” I trace the warm, smooth rim of the bottle with a light finger, though my mind is currently toying with the idea of jamming it violently down the opening. “Maybe it means more that he does keep it hidden – at least some part of him knows it’s wrong.”

Placid in the periphery of my vision, Rust shrugs. “‘s what separates us from our killers. Feelin’ it ain’t the problem. Resistance is where strength is tested.” 

“Ego,” I chuckle darkly. 

He hums. “Fragile ego.”

Underneath my smile lies an uneasiness stirred by his criticism.

Rust is not gentle with his opinions – I don’t suppose that’ll ever change. Resistance is a losing game – not even he is immune to the impermanence of these things. I’m sure he said that to me once, on a night like this. 

I’ve never been very good at refraining from things. Even from an early age, I just couldn’t say no. Teenage years: alcohol, drugs, sex. If it was tossed my way, I’d take it, anything I could get, hungry to experience something. 

Ha!—maybe I actually am more like Marty Hart than I’d like to admit. He’s trying to be an adult, albeit really, really poorly. As long as he believes he’s a good, family man, then his reality is protected. But I know I’m rotten, really. One of the boys at the precinct will call me pretty—in that sick way somewhere between the unchecked lust of a man and his paternal right to claim—but, below, I know I’ve got sickness swimming through my veins. Not blood. Something accumulated over the years, maybe from pretending all the time. 

I feel like I want to cut things, break them. Told myself to hang on until I retire, but I don’t see that happening any time soon. I’ll break. What will Rust think of me then? 

Maybe I was his low point: that fault in resistance. 

Some awful, gnawing feeling collects at the pit of my stomach, like black tar. Must be all those cigarettes. 

“Wha’s in that head?” he probes suddenly, stealing razor-sharp, fleeting glances.

I shrug, swallowing down a bout of nausea. “I dunno.” And I really don’t. Behind the surface tension, I don’t know what I feel, only that I do, and it’s so, so much. “It kinda—makes me happy to see him like that: jealous. ‘Cause he knows I’m good, and he’s wondering why he’s finishing what I started. He knows he don’t deserve it. Not like I do.” 

My confession lingers in the air like smoke – I have mind to reach a hand up and wave it all away, or suck it down, deep, erasing reality. Fuck. I’ve always been a little off when reading into Rust’s quiet – with that tightrope he seems to have mastered, I know I should avoid any step at all—it could just as easily miss its mark—but I can never seem to help myself. 

I stare at him—and I think it makes him uncomfortable, though there’s nothing there, not any normal human reaction, in his face for me to draw from. That’s fine. In my gut, I’m pretty sure I’ve got it down.

“You want to be seen as competent,” he finally says, a simple-enough statement. 

I scrunch my nose up distastefully. “No, I want to be competent.”

“Well, what good is bein’ somethin’ if there’s no-one there to witness it?” 

Unable to press down an exasperated sigh, I close my eyes, roll them with all the subtlety I can manage.

Foul words push under my tongue, like vomit. 

I don’t know if I’m in the mood for this tonight: smart conversation. What feels like debate. Maybe if he hadn’t been given my case, I’d take him up on the challenge, but I’ve already lost. 

I eye him, try to figure out his game. 

“I dunno, Rust,” I tell him flatly. “I think that’s called having an identity issue.”

He cocks an eyebrow. “Most people do.”

My chest burns. “This isn’t a go at me, is it?”

Slow, he draws the ashtray towards him from across the table, as if the grind of the glass against the wood is a noise that ought to be savoured. 

I could be deaf, but reading his lips would be easy: “And how’d this be about you exactly?” 

I’m able to fight off the initial instinct to wince, the way in which he delivers the words, calm and deliberate, stinging like a slap to the face. What’s worse is the growing impression that he’s as bored of me as I am. 

With a furrowed brow, I watch him, heartbeat thrumming in my ears. 

“I ain’t out to get you, s’you can quit lookin’ at me like I kicked you or somethin’.”

Frowning shallowly and trying to pretend like I’m not, I glance away and commit to rearranging my face—but at the glimpse of that twitch at the corner of his mouth in my periphery, I know I’m only digging a deeper grave for myself. The noticeable heat of my embarrassment must please him.

Playing with the food. 

And I’ve got nothing to say to him—not a single word or phrase up to par, nothing to measure up to Rust’s clinical detachment, let alone destabilise him. He might’ve been reciting the coroner’s report. There’s nothing I can say to scathe him—and fuck, I want to leave a mark, prove to him that I can. I scan him for weakness, but either I’m still too stunned to see it or there is none. I have no plan of attack and no line of defence. 

Rust seems to soften in the knowledge of this. 

“I mean,” he begins, knowing now that I’m really listening, “identity ain’t fixed – it’s not permanent. I don’t scrutinise my appearance. I don’t mind my body, and my body don’t mind me. My personality hardly feels under my control – ‘s just somethin’ that is and will be—‘n’, I guess, will change, but only against my will, never because of it. Feels pointless to feel insecure about that.”

Is this supposed to be some fucked-up attempt at advice?

My priorities changed, but this place never has, never does, never will. So, it’s all dumb and the people are dumb and this bar is dumb and the boys at the precinct are dumb and, fuck, I wish Rust were dumb, too. I feel pathetic, and he does not alleviate that feeling at all. If he were dumb, I could laugh at him and make myself feel better. I could laugh at myself for sleeping with a dumb man. Instead, I think of him religiously and crave his approval. Afflicted with the knowledge that he needs to be corrupted to want me, that I’m awful enough to want it enough to corrupt him again. Tainted waters. It would be so much more comfortable if I could look down on him.

My skin writhes and ripples, and I know the only thing that would soothe it is if he touched me. Jesus and the sick man—or some polluted version of that.

My world swings under a bout of nausea as it begins to spiral – the beer does not help. 

Maybe he’s waiting it out, like I’m trying to. Forgetting is the wisest decision anyone could make, the most fortunate outcome. Though, my efforts are paradoxical: I think so, so much about not thinking about it all. 

“Sure seems like y’think about yourself a good deal, too, s’don’t you criticise me,” I mumble, clumsy. It’s a mistake to even open my mouth again – he’ll use it all against me eventually. 

Rust hums again, low, some muscle twitching in his jaw, like his body has no clue what to do when not blindly occupied with a cigarette. “Never said I don’t think about myself,” he rectifies, staring at the sweaty palms I’m wringing together tightly against the lip of the table. 

I allow my mouth to pool with saliva, trying to combat the increasing dryness of my mouth. 

“Guess the thinkin’ part is where insecurity comes from in the first place,” I add after swallowing.

When my eyes dart up to look at him, his are on my throat.

Immediately, I look away.

Maybe this is the bad kind of intimacy.

The intensity of his attention is looming, sifting through my thoughts like sand.

Sometimes, I think he has me figured out but just couldn’t care less about what he’s found. He’s feeling the power of my burning desire for him – maybe it amuses him. Maybe he’s waiting to mechanise it, letting me sit idle while a use for me finds him (if ever). Maybe I know things. Maybe I can break things open. Maybe he can take my cases from me. Maybe I can tire him out, put him to sleep. 

It’s almost worse that he hasn’t put me to work yet. 

Maybe it really was just something in the water. Maybe all I need is to visit somebody close to me. 

“Ever heard o’ that theory? ‘bout internal monologue?” Rust asks softly, leaning in and tipping his head down like only I’m worthy of hearing this here. 

My leg jerks and I can’t place why. I nod, face hot. 

“I think ‘s bullshit—‘bout some not having one. Think everybody’s got that voice in their heads.” He pauses, squints. “Mm, maybe that’s a little generous.” 

I laugh – I hope it makes him feel good. In truth, I know he couldn’t care less. 

“What d’you think it’d be like? No voice.”

The world seems so close right now, wrapping its fuzzy arms tight around us, buzzing in my ears, shadows fur-soft over my face. What does he want me to say? I wish he’d tell me, offer me respite. 

I shrug, and it’s honest, my resignation. “No voice don’t mean no thought.”

“Alrigh’. Then, what about no thought?”

I shrug again. “I like thinking.”

He huffs, angling himself back away from me. Have I disappointed him? Somewhere deep in the pit of my tummy, there’s that fleck of worry, something that tastes an awful lot like vomit. 

I expect him to finally stop talking. 

But “I get tired of it,” is what he says instead. “In between cases, or these—moments where I feel like I could burn a hole through myself ‘f I spent ’nough thought on it. ‘s heavy, like they weigh me down.” He pushes the ashtray away, his fingers the only part of him moving. 

Swept up in the rising tide of your own life, hurting around you in some never-ending circle or spiral of which you happen to be the centre. Swimming with black-eyed angels. I know how he feels – I used to feel that way. Maybe I still do, sometimes. Clinging on to the tenderness my husband used to have for me like it could save me from the guilt I would feel when I moved on. No-one would pull me out: that much was true enough. That memory of stability, of the good times, only depressed me, moving from Brooklyn back to Louisiana. Feeling small in my own life, like a piece on a chessboard, with no semblance of control, only duty, chasing this idea of who I used to be. Hunting down the bad men, wondering what upper hand is driving them across the squares, contemplating the carpenter that fashioned the pieces. Too big of a big picture can be detrimental. The fact that I know this to be true doesn’t make me an exception. 

“I think you’re tired of the things you think about,” I muse, a headache beginning to expand between my temples – perhaps the heat has finally gotten to my head. “Space better occupied by other shit.” 

I’m careful not to pay attention to Rust’s reaction, if there even is one, since the weight of his interest is pressing over my face where I really wish his lips would.

“Like what?” he challenges. 

His eyes glint with curiosity, a blade’s sharp edge. 

I bite my tongue. 

“You think you know me?” It’s more a statement than a question.

I shrug. “You think you know me, don’t ye?”

Though, he kinda does. I think he’s proud that he can read me, but maybe that’s me overcomplicating things. Maybe I’m just another person to him. I wonder if he thinks I’m predictable. Boring, negligible, painfully average. Good for one thing, and that one thing was a mistake, anyway. 

Look at him, now: his eyes have dropped to elsewhere, but there’s a soft smirk that curls up on his face, the hint of a pink tongue that traces lightly over his teeth. 

Geraci always talks shit about that look whenever Rust closes yet another case, securing a tough confession. “So fuckin’ up ‘imself, ain’t he? Jesus.” Sure, he pisses me off—for different reasons. I’ve long since come to the conclusion that he’s worthy of admiration. 

He smiles to himself – I don’t trust it. “You’re calling me arrogant.”

“Are you?” I press, gnawing at the inside of my cheek. I’m surprised at the tepidity of my voice, considering how I’m covered in boils and burns in my head. 

He doesn’t have anything to say to that, only hums in response, seemingly amused. 

“Doesn’t have to be a bad thing,” I murmur. “People are scared of bein’ known, so nobody really tries no more.”

“I don’t observe people for intimacy purposes.”

Then why does he fucking look at me like that? 

A year ago, I’d have put it down to my own desires warping my perception of reality. Really, he wasn’t interested; he was only paying me my due amount of scrutiny in order to keep his mental file of me up to date. Really, he didn’t want to touch me; really, he was just someone who fiddled with his own hands, maybe to remind himself that he could be his own from time to time. Lust is such a dangerous thing – any deeper than surface level, and it has the very strong potential to kill you. If you want something against your better judgement, do you really even want it? The haze of having Rust come so close to me is dampened by such doubts.

But at this point, he either wants me, or I’m crazy. Shit, maybe I’d rather be just that. I’ve seen his eyes like this—dark and bottomless—when hands were unzipping my skirt, or dragging over my skin. To deny intimacy? Now that’s arrogance. Anddelusion. Shit, and I thought he was so above all that stuff. Does he think I can’t figure him out?

Surely his opinion of me can’t be that poor. 

My hand cramps up as I punch down the instinct to pinch the bridge of my nose. 

“Sure you do,” I press. And I’m right. I hope I’m right. 

His stare thickens into something different, what I think might be a black, molten form of gratification. Then, it hardens, cools in a split second into these tough, jaw-breaker pellets. I’d say it was confrontational, but then his eyes flutter just as he happens to swallow thickly. Is that his pulse in his throat? 

I rub at my puffy eyes with a stiff set of fingers.

Rust drops his eyes, brushes his hand over the side of his blazer where his cigarettes are sitting warm and ready beneath. 

“What, you—lonely again or some shit?” he asks. 

I almost recoil at the sudden bitterness of his tone. 

I snort good-heartedly, but, really, the comment stings just right—he knows where to press—all the breath knocked out of my chest. “O-kay, Rust. That an accusation?”

“No. ’S an observation. Thought you jus’ loved those,” he combats flatly.

Chest burning, I have to save myself, jump ship, and look away. My mouth tastes like grainy bile. 

“You were lonely last summer. That’s why you came to me.”

The dim light above us flickers, his face phasing in and out of shadow before me like a candle in the wind. 

I roll my jaw. 

Does he look back on it with disdain? 

“No,” I snap instinctively, instantly burned by the satisfaction that crosses his eyes. 

My breath hitches plaintively. Every fibre of my body trembles and burns to defend myself. There’s not a single word that could repair his opinion of me.

“Or—yeah.” Shut up. 

I rub at my temple, desperate for relief – do they have pills for this shit? – which does not come. If he feels any pity for me, it certainly doesn’t show. 

The harsh line of my mouth trembles. “I just thought you understood me. Or made an attempt to, at least, but maybe that part was self-projection. ‘Cause nobody ‘round here’s like you. I know you think that’s stupid and I was being naïve or—” I swallow though my throat is dry as ever, “—or dumb, or somethin’, but that’s what I felt. At the time.”

His gaze is fixed on my neck.

“At the time,” he echoes. It’s a question, I realise after a couple moments.

“Yeah. Fuck y'want me to say, asshole? 'm not—I’m not gonna embarrass myself with you, Rust. That what you want me to do? Show you just how dumb I can get—?”

“Sure like to speak for me, hm?” he bites back quietly, making it so damn easy to run right over him, to feverishly stamp out that insufferable fucking softness to his voice. Shit, I wish he’d just raise it and yell at me already.

“—Yeah, whatever. You like this shit, don’t you? Y’think you deserve a fight?—well, I’ll give you one. That what you want? ‘Cause what?—what, you get to ignore me, pretend I don’t exist, act like you’re above fuckin’ me—” his eyes flit away, bringing my roiling frustration to a crest, “—No, don’t you fuckin’ look away,” I scold, a bite, jutting a crooked finger into his space. 

He obeys, but that look in his pale eyes is so hollow, it almost makes me feel bad for saying anything at all. Almost. 

I try to press down my anger, but it’s spilling over, now, far beyond things so trivial as control. I clasp my hands together in a prayer that they will finally listen to me and not move again. 

“Fact that you feel anything at all makes you feel like shit, huh?”

His expression has glazed over, cool and smooth.

Half-expecting him to walk out and rightfully abandon me here, I stare hard at him, like I might chip into that exterior. If I managed it, I’d slip it in my pockets as proof. Silently, I beg him to prove me right. 

“Sorry,” I snap. No, I’m not. I hope it cuts at him. “You do what you want, I don’t fuckin’ care. But, please, do not patronise me like that again, Rust.” 

God offers no help with the silent plea I send Him. He does not care, so I shouldn’t care, and that’s the end of things. I’ve survived worse natural disasters than him. He’s just a man, and this is just what happens with them. Still, the disappointment floods like poison under my skin. I’m a stupid girl, really. 

“I understand if you regret things, but you don’t have to say it out loud. It’s mean. But, fuck, I dunno, maybe you mean to be.” 

I take a moment to untangle the knot in my throat. He watches it all, quiet again, his eyeline sitting heavy over where the skin shifts and stretches over my neck. 

I adjust the collar of my shirt, fiddle with the gold necklace that sits hot over the contour of bone. Rust stares as I wedge the small pendant tightly in the vice of my thumb and forefinger. 

“Feels like you don’t even fuckin’ like me half the time. All the time.”

Christ, I should’ve left with Johansson. 

My heart is racing like a wild mustang – it’s a surprise, really, that that old hunting dog lying over by the bar hasn’t noticed, singled me out as something to chase, to kill. My belly’s exposed, soft and ripe and asking for it. I forget, sometimes, that there are things out there that kill things that kill, too. 

He doesn’t plan on giving me a break; I wouldn’t deserve it, anyway. “Wha's it matter to you if I like you or not?”

My cheeks burn furiously. 

I stare at that bone-bird tattoo that fledges from the nest of his sleeve. With the way my head’s spinning, it almost looks like its skeleton wings are actually moving, unfurling and ready for pilgrimage. 

“It don’t.” It’s a disgrace to myself to answer that god-awful question, but what’s more pathetic is the way I shrink into myself when Rust’s attention crowds in over my face. “I jus’ thought you knew me almost as well as I did.” 

“And currently?” he asks.

The moment hangs. 

“Just answer. I already know – just wanna see if you’ll lie again.” 

I close my eyes a second—mistake—and breathe, breathe in and then breathe out, shaky but slow. It’s no use. 

“Same.”

He nods. “Not better?”

I shake my head. “No, never better.”

Furrowing his brow, Rust tilts his head down slightly, a soft curl falling gentle over his tense forehead. “But you wanted intimacy.”

So it is intimacy to him? 

Maybe this should count as a win for me, but it certainly don’t feel like it. This isn’t the slow slip and slide of last summer’s end – though the heat had swallowed whole everything from here to the other side of the Mississippi, there was something so clipped about the words that left me, left him. I’m sure I was more drunk then than now, but, even so, my mind had been so level, like I’d done it all in my sleep. Now, here, I have done it in my sleep. I’ve revisited him a hundred times in my daydreams, but all that practice has left me for dead. I would’ve killed for an opportunity like this a month ago – it’s like he’s taunting me. It should be easy. 

Rust is smart enough to make me wonder if he wants me to feel this way. 

Intimacy is planned and eventual, whether that’s due to his power or some cosmic fate. Everyone knows the decision they’re going to make, somewhere in their brains, deep inside. People only ask for advice to condone their decisions, to spread out the responsibility, which, at the end of the day, still remains solely with them. Shit, he’s rubbing off on me: I sound like a fuckin’ asshole. 

No, all this thinking won’t save him from the sensation of human feeling, emotions. No amount of planning prepares you for skin-to-skin touch. No time spent evaluating can undo it either, and I’ve tried so hard. His way doesn’t work. 

“Everyone wants intimacy,” I end up rambling, voice thin and dry and brittle. “Even folks that don’t want intimacy want intimacy. ’s not love or sex, really, I don’t think, though those are good, too. It’s not a way to find yourself. It’s jus’ trust. Or companionship—”

“And that’s what you want?”

Carefully, I rake my eyes over his face. Does he ever flush from the heat? 

Hopeless and too muddled to bother with concealing it, I try to assess whether he’s displeased with me. I try to memorise this moment, so I’ll be able to turn it over in my head later, just another one of my crime scene photographs. 

“Dunno yet,” I confess quietly. “I’ve had partners. And partners. When I was younger, I thought I’d have this life packed chock full of amazing relationships, and these—connections.”

The soft, disappointed eyes of my husband come to mind, which haunt all my relationships. I’m so hungry for another body, for connection. Why does it seem so easy for other people? 

“Truth is, it don’t happen all that much. To me, at least. You?”

Surly and bone-tired, Rust shakes his head. “Didn’t have much hope for it growin’ up,” he admits. 

“But you wanted it,” I press, clumsy and clinging to the sag of his voice. Of course, he’ll pick up on the trace of hopeful, aimless, false victory that undercuts my words; he’s the only one who ever could. 

For a moment, though, I second-guess myself. 

It’s pathetic, really: I’d give almost anything to walk as him for a day, though, even then, I’m not sure I’d understand him any better.

Sometimes, my imagination runs away from me: in my dreams, I do. I wake under the impression that we’re one and the same, that, just maybe, he, similarly, is dreaming as me. It’s a pulsing obsession, difficult to conceal. Whenever a moment becomes still, I think about it: at night, he is transported; in his dreams, he touches with my hands, sighs with my voice, tastes with my mouth. Then, at least, that would explain these funny sensations I get in the morning: so weathered and worn, a strange ache in my muscles, like I’ve been sleepwalking.

How else could he know me so well? 

Or maybe I’ve really fucking lost it. Somewhere along the way – maybe after seeing that half-eaten body swaddled in thin cotton in its freezer cradle – I think something else took the wheel. Why that thing is racing towards him, I have no idea. It’s laughable, really.

Rust blinks calmly down at his hands. “Reckon the deniers are dumb?” he murmurs. 

Squeezing the bridge of my nose, I do my best to press back against the foul memory of dismembered limbs. Whoever had eaten the man—who was now beyond recognition—did they feel satisfied? Comforted with how forever close he was to them now? When I was small, I used to think sex was crawling into another person's body, like a cave, and letting all of their insides warm you, love you, wrap you tight. 

I swallow thickly. 

“Your words, not mine,” I reply through a tight smile. “Reckon it’s easy to find a distraction.”

"Have you given up?" he asks. “Finding a distraction?”

I don’t entertain him with a proper answer to that – I merely shrug and scratch at my scalp, tucking loose strands of sweaty hair back into the loops of my braid. Rust must be frustrated with me. To want a companion, to want the good life. Rivalling Marty in my delusion. 

He slides his hands into his lap, continuing: “Distraction is the way to peace?”

I shrug again – I think it’s starting to piss him off. “For a time, I guess.” 

“So, ‘s that how you’re takin’ quittin’? Think about other stuff whenever you want a smoke? Occupy yourself?”

Once I realise my leg is going dead, fuzzy from sitting still so long in this dark booth, I flex my thigh, flex my hands under the table, wide-open and then tight-shut, processing the blank slate of his gaunt face. I press my fingers into the sticky vinyl, delight in the interrupted drag of them up, up, up as they curl to fists, my shoulders up to my ears. 

When he says things like that, it makes it so hard to dislike him. I almost wish he’d ignore me, like he did the first couple weeks before it became clear to the both of us that it couldn’t be undone: his back constantly to me, sending messages only through Marty, refusing to look in my direction, like I might tempt him again into being a version of him he hated. At least, before, his coldness hadn’t been directed at me specifically. Then, it was a retaliation, a wall meant to keep me out. Where were his books on philosophy then?—to tell him that attachment leads to desire leads to suffering? That kind of suffering would be better than this kind. 

This is worse. This is so much worse. I’d rather not have something at all than have it toy with me like this. 

It takes a considerable amount of co-ordination to fabricate the apathy in my posture, my eyes, my expression, to compensate for the unease that pulses like a new artery in my throat – though, at the silvery glint that flickers in his eyes, I know it’s all for nothing. He’s already seen the hurt that, really, I can’t pin on anyone but myself. He’s raking his eyes slowly over my face. It’s fucking mean. Do me the favour of a mercy-killing, God.

I never even told him I was trying to quit.

“What,” I begin, concentrating very hard on keeping myself from stammering and from slurring, from crying and from grasping at his hand, “like that association thing?” 

I’ve heard of it, obviously. I know every trick at this point: old wives’ tales to the latest research papers at the state university library. It’s psychological: whenever you want something, instead, think of awful, gross, repulsive things, and make yourself hate it. I’ve tried it before, but it doesn’t always work. How can you convince yourself that one thing is disgusting when it’s undeniable how good it really was?

Rust nods.

“I mean, I tried it,” I tell him lowly. 

Overstatement: I tried it for approximately three days and two nights before I caved, unlocking the drawer in my study with shaky, desperate hands, hungry.

“But I’m always thinkin’ about it.”

Shit. He seems to have regained a nerve: Rust stares calmly ahead at me—not through me or just past me; at me. This is what I wanted, isn’t it?

He leans his weight over his forearms upon the table, on offence. Is this how he works his suspects? Well, shit, I’ve studied his methods from the privacy of the other side of the false mirror enough times to be able to answer that, actually: this is how he works his suspects. Initially, at least, to gauge their personality, their wants, their fears, what they need him to be. 

Thing is, I can’t pin down his intention with me. Is it just the satisfaction of the kill? Or maybe revenge for what I did to him last August. I broke down his walls: an unforgivable sin. I condemned him to the effort of building them back up, of shoving me out—if I ever managed to intrude in the first place. Maybe I deserve this. 

With his sleeves folded back, the dark lines of Rust’s tattoo jut out, growing along his tawny, leather-tan skin like lichen. I try not to stare.

His eyes complete a pre-emptive scan of my face, and, really, I know I should not let him see any change there in my expression, though my mouth twitches to frown. I try to gather my forces. I try to prepare myself for it, for that inevitable intrusion.

“‘f you’re so desperate for it, why’re you fightin’ back?” he asks, unblinking and cruel. 

My mouth twists, and I let it fall into the frown it wants. “‘Cause I wanted to feel better.”

It sounds dumb because it is dumb, even though it’s true. 

Low, he hums. He straightens, softens, and finally leans away. It’s like the vacuum around me leaves with him, and, there, now, it’s easier to breathe. 

He must note the way my chest rises and falls so stiffly, like there’s a weight resting over my heart. 

“Withdrawal’s a breeze, ain’t it?”

“You’re not fuckin’ funny,” I scoff, digging my nails punishingly into my palm. He smokes and drinks like he welcomes cancer, or hopes for it, so I don’t think we’re on a level playing field.

He quirks his head. “Well, do you?”

“Do I what, Rusty?” 

Amused, he rolls his jaw. Good – I hope I’ve provoked him. 

“Do you feel better?” 

I run my tongue over my teeth. “Sometimes,” I reply truthfully. “Not right now.”

He searches my face. 

“I can give you a ride home,” he offers. 

Fuck, and what will that be like? Ten times worse than this. I’ll come away the husk of a woman, worn down by his disapproval. My own fault for wanting anything from him in the first place, really. 

Teeth gritted together, I shake my head, ready to pull a muscle in my damn neck. “Didn’t mean anythin’ by it. Sorry.” 

No, I’m not. I ought to slap him, and then run away, back home, or back to my house, or to a brand new city. Or he could finally cuss me out, save me the wondering. Then, I could lick my wounds and they would finally stop reopening. 

I scratch at my scalp. 

Rust eyes my hand like he’d like to rip the bad habit away from my body. For a moment, I think he will—the tendons in his hand flex and writhe under the skin—but, no, he only brushes a thumb against the valley between his nose and cheek, and he holds his tongue for once. 

“Wasn’t offended,” he corrects firmly. “I’ll take you home.”  

Flashing with annoyance, my eyes dart up viciously to penalise him. “And what?” I hiss. 

He sits back, doesn’t answer the question.  

Jaw clenched, I wait to see if he’ll look away, but he doesn’t. 

My irritation soon fizzles through, condenses to a low, simmering understanding, steadily tended to by the intensity of his steadfast gaze. 

Oh. 

My eyes soften. 

Oh – I have him, don’t I?

He shows no signs of the tentativeness he had displayed last time—if Rust could ever be tentative. His eyes do not shift and scuttle around me; they meet mine, challenging my comfort. He does not tuck himself into a corner; he remains leaned over the table, just like that. How could I have known? 

I stare back, brow pinched in confusion. 

In the heat of last August, I’d peeled away from him knowing exactly how I’d convinced him he wanted me. Maybe I was evil for it – a good person wouldn’t use somebody’s faults against them, would they? And maybe that’s what it was: selfish. If he hates me, he’d be right to. 

Which is why I’m so puzzled that he doesn’t. Or rather, indifference was the baseline. Hell. And this? I don’t know. 

Swelling dangerously with the well-loved memory of his delirious mouthings over my skin, I grow rigid.

My temples throb and ache, the threat of tears still very real.

“Mind?” he asks – I watch, wide-eyed, as he pulls a pack of Camels from his pocket. 

Trembling slightly, I shake my head, though saliva is already pooling over the pit of my tongue, warm and soft, just like my desire. Luckily, he’s too preoccupied with his lighter to see it: how my body ripples at the scrape of his voice. 

The promise of nicotine dances like a phantom in the mouth, just from watching him place a cigarette between his lips. When he flicks open his Zippo, the sharp, shuddering candle of it taunts me, and I finally understand what they say about moths and flames.

I watch him take a long drag.

That all-consuming hunger lurches up in me again, and I swallow the warm spit that’s steadily been filling my mouth. 

Oh, Christ. This can’t be real. Desire shouldn’t be this bloody. Desire shouldn’t be the thing with teeth and claws, the ugly thing that tips into violence. Or obsession. With how often my thoughts return to us in the summer, I’ve wondered obsession as a possibility. The difference between myself and those who commit crimes of passion is control. Rust is dangerous for me. What is he thinking? What’s in his head? I ache to pry it open and explore, to swim close to him, for my skin to melt into his, to consume and be consumed. Not a moment’s peace, and that’s what I’m chasing, isn’t it? Peace and quiet?

I don’t have to say anything – he can read it all, mulling over the fine changes in my expression, the softening of my body, some pre-emptive instinct. Will he touch me tonight? 

With a cautious hand, ready to jolt back if met with teeth, I reach out to him and remove the cigarette from his pinched fingers—which he allows—then bringing it to my mouth, taking a drag myself, nice and slow, good and deep, a sigh, like home.

He watches me.  

“Don’t say anything.”  

And he doesn’t. He just watches, watches, watches as I take another drag. He shivers, and I feel it reverberate through my bones.

“What are you thinkin’ about?” I ask him softly, pressing down a quivering breath, smoking his cigarette. I’ve never mustered the courage to ask before.  

For once, though, I really don’t have to: I know exactly where his head is. Where else? He’s back in that room, infected by the drowse and drunken fever of August, with me, living it again. Where I’d coaxed him into the temptation, wicked as the snake in the garden. He should’ve pushed me to leave with Johansson and Marty – of course, I would’ve stayed. I’m a rotten thing, and my heart is a bloodhound. He’s the better of the two of us. I’ll take whatever of him I can get – anything. 

He meets my eyes directly, so hopeless, so raw. Is he asking? He shouldn’t be. 

But what will he have me do? I’m at his disposal, really.

“And?” I ask, throat dry. 

When he moves to speak, the words that leave him are low and slow: “You did something to me,” he manages. 

I scoff. 

“S’that a good or bad thing?” I ask.

Rust huffs like what I said was funny. More likely, though, it’s the way my eyes are so wide, the way my hand is pressed between my thighs, that amuses him. “Can’t decide.”

My mouth trembles as my eyes scrape over his neck, which I know, I remember, to be hot and alive, thick with it over the pulse. I was so high off of it: his warmth, his weight, his press. 

I indulge in one last drag, using the last scraps of my energy to conjure the pungent stench of rotting flesh in the cruel sunshine, the pick of eager flies and their cacophonous buzzing, the churn of vomit in the stomach. I look at Rust and try to do the same: the months of silence, his back decidedly turned to me, him accepting my case, and his arrogance and his apathy and his severity. He is a harrowing connection that I should rather not have made.

The technique doesn’t work. I don’t know why I thought, even for a minute, that this time would be different from the last. 

With him staring calmly at me, like I deserve it—the trap, the squirming sensation over my spine, the hopeless, unavoidable heat that claims my face—it’s just another arrow pointing to the same conclusion. Maybe we should just let August have its way with us again. Twin plagues.

Trembling ever so slightly, blood so warm, so thick, I flick ashes out into the tray between us. 

“I should put this out,” I mumble, though my hand yearns to return it to my mouth. 

“’s my cigarette,” Rust mutters.

“Sorry.” I offer my hand to him. “Want it back?”

I know what I must look like to him, pupils dark, the size of the moon, like a plate. Here, in the darkest part of the dark bar, I open myself to him, warm, molten, inviting. And God, this must be a dream—because I know what he wants, and I know that he’ll accept me. How we got here doesn’t matter anymore. Maybe he’s thought about it for some time, and only now, in a moment of stillness with him, have I even noticed. Too caught up in the fine details of a painting to think of the artist’s intention, which is always more important.

Silent, stare inexorable, he accepts the cigarette, only touching my fingers quick, like I’d burn him. Maybe I will. Serves him right: he was always going to haunt me either way. I ought to get mine while I still can.

The hunger laps at me.

I want to coax him open-wide. I want to peel away his demeanour and wrap myself close to him. Body heat is the best way to keep warm, isn’t it? I’m sure I read about that somewhere. It’s still fresh in my mind, like a cut. I can’t manage a day without playing it over at least once. I want it again: I want to breathe him in and let him sit in my chest and seep into every cell and let him be part of me that way, at least until the next breath.

He can see it in my eyes: the freneticism of my thoughts, racing like a storm, desires like bullets like rain.

“You ever think about what you want?” I try asking him, voice strained tight over my heart in my throat. 

“People only ever think about what they want,” he parries, batting away any trace of diffidence. He secures his cigarette between his lips, shifting. “Let’s leave.”

At his first movement, I slide out of the booth. 

Sometime during our conversation, the place emptied out. It must have been around when I finished Marty’s leftover beer that the weight of the locals’ beady stares—which had already faded to the back of my mind, in the same way that a dark alleyway can still make you uneasy though you know nothing would ever happen to you there—finally left me. There are no witnesses left to see me following after Rust like a dog, my body thrumming like the lone bug zapper out on the porch, which cracks! just as we exit. 

The broken clock reads three o’clock when we leave, but I know that, really, it’s only midnight.

Fortunately, the heat has cracked for once, like old, beat-up, splitting leather. Stepping out onto that night path, the breeze is warm and fragrant, dancing over my cheeks, playing gently with the loose threads of my hair. It’s a clear, blue, never-ending night – the dirt road which accompanies us is a long, winding, indigo river that spills unseen over the far, far horizon. The neighbouring fields—one a rolling stretch of grass; the other of wheat—are alive in the wind, flung one way on exhale, drawn the other upon inhale. 

Thank God for the noise of it: their rustling whispers, in a language we can’t understand; the soft whistle of a passing gust of air; the firm, crisp crunch of dry mud and dust under my boots. Thank God for the sway of things: the cradle of humidity; the press of my arm to Rust’s, which he permits only for a second, with his face angled away. Then, he slows, coming to walk just behind me, still parallel.

Flickering strands of long-grass brush my knuckles – I grab onto one, pull the seeds off it in an easy swipe, and scatter them as we go, one by one. 

Briefly, I glance over my shoulder. Sure enough, his eyes are fixed on me, on my every movement, like he’s making sure I’m actually real. The corner of my mouth twitches up into a smile. 

Rust’s cigarette flares between his lips. 

I scratch gently at my wrist, reminded of the flowing of my blood just beneath the skin, hot and thick.

You get nowhere in life just hoping things will fall into your lap like this—and, anyway, what good is getting something that you didn’t work for? Where’s the gratification? It’s artificial, feeble as plastic. Christ, it was even a struggle to get my head around Johansson and his propensity to dole out favours. I understood a write-up – won’t pretend I’m above ass-kissing – but tidying up the office kitchen and keeping quiet about it? I thought it was stupid: letting people reap the rewards of your own effort, and for what?

So, the buzz of earning Rust’s touch that first time?—shit, nothing compared. No drug, no high; nothing. I really thought I did something. Satisfied some secret ambition I didn’t know I held. To have him like that. To be able to replay that night, swallow it like a pill. To look at him and know what was underneath his clothes and his skin, and perhaps further inside, too. Shit, I took so much from him, but the mental gymnastics of the effort justified it, right? And, now, he’s going to give it all up again. Wants it, even.

Haven’t I played this out a thousand times in my head? I’ve seen the future—a number of futures—where I’m able to argue for his affection. Fight for your love – that’s what my daddy used to tell me whenever he was feeling sentimental after yelling.

I’ve had endless conversations with him in my head, edited accordingly as time passed, as he changed, as I changed, as the air between us changed. Possible flirtation seemed silly, futile, after a week. Sex appeal would go unnoticed by him – wasn’t like he looked, anyway. Not the type to chase tail. I found myself longing for him to please linger uncomfortably in doorways to rooms I was in, to leave things near me and come and collect them just after I was gone so that, maybe, he’d still feel the warmth of my presence and understand it was only ever warm that way for him. The idea of genuine confession always sprung up during the quiet nights alone together in the bullpen, but I was always able to talk myself out of it when he wouldn’t so much as glance at me after two, three hours.

It must be a million threads of conversation up in my head, which is why I guess it’s so hard to untangle the great knot and retrieve just one, because, now, there are no words that come to mind when it matters. Or maybe it doesn’t matter: I don’t think he needs convincing at all.

“What you so quiet for?” he asks faintly. 

When I look back, he’s stark against the brooding sky like some shadow-man. His outline hums like he’s pulling away into his own silhouette. 

I can’t seem to smile. “Nothin’.” 

He won’t push—at least, not on this—and I’m glad for it. 

Rust’s beat-up semi is all lonely sat in a dip up in the road, waiting for us. Same semi he’d driven me home in from work this one week I was getting my car fixed up, in which a series of slow, mutual interrogations would take place along the light-streaked highway. In the office, you were lucky to drag a full sentence out of Rust, but, alone, it wasn’t so hard to get him to talk at all.

Maybe I had just wanted to be better than him, to learn how he worked, how he was such a good interrogator, and bleed him dry. That was why I couldn’t look away: every choice in his demeanour could help me surpass him.

Even then, I learned to be careful with my looks. I had the feeling he’d morph into something else if I stared long enough, the way the shadow in the corner of your bedroom changes shape when you’re bone-tired. Sometimes, he would. And on the Thursday night of that week, when he had pulled over and thrown up, shaking, into the dark thrush, I hadn’t uttered a word as he climbed back into the driver’s seat. But, as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, I’d stared at him with the filmy eyes of a hungry nocturnal animal.

Then, at least, the curiosity wasn’t a burden. Not like it became when I drove myself home come that morning after.

I could tell it was different the moment I shifted awake, feigning a sleep for just a couple more minutes.

Dressed again and putting on a pot of coffee, his back was to me. I had shuffled up, pulled on my clothes, and I knew the stupor of the night had faded. So, really, when I stepped past him and he closed the door behind me without a word, I shouldn’t have been upset. 

When I reach the pick-up first, I twist to look at him. 

Rust has slowed to finish his cigarette at a safe distance, eyeing me warily.

He crushes the stub into the dirt, then glancing out into the long night. 

“Straight home?” he asks. 

I shake my head, and the rigid line of him gives just a little. It’s so dangerous to be seduced by your own influence, but the realisation that I’ve had any at all is fuel enough to the plea in my wide eyes.

Rust advances haltingly. If I move, I’m sure he’ll flinch and bolt. So, I test the theory: better to weed out what’s already decayed.

I angle myself towards him, open like a door. He tosses his jacket into the bed of his pickup, stepping through.

The heat seeps back between us, slow and thick like a flood of molasses, and it becomes very clear, suddenly, that we never should’ve tried to barricade ourselves. Pretty sure Rust’s known this a while, anyways: he’s the one who leans in for me, kisses me slow.

This time, his hands are quick to curl around my body, where the tension in that tight cord all down his spine has snapped. Or just eased up on him—but that’s unlikely. And unimportant. With his firm touch petting up my spine, climbing each rung, it’s all unimportant.

A pulse of arousal strikes me like an electric current as Rust pulls the blouse out of my skirt, his face close to me.

His tongue pushes into my mouth again, and I hum over the husk of nicotine. It’s a haze in the brain, one I’ve missed. My skin tingles and my thoughts warp in this leer, like a nic rush, only I haven’t had one of those in years and years.

I can’t exactly call what I’m feeling satisfaction. There’s no win to this. My teeth sunk into him so sweet last time, and the thrill of getting him, of tripping him up with his own desire, was almost as good as the actual feeling of him inside me. But it’s different now: so obvious, it’s funny. Though my first instinct is to doubt and pry apart, maybe want is the most trustworthy thing a person can feel. It’s animal and instinctive, and it’s inevitable, so it’s always true. Ugly, sometimes, but always there. There’s no room to question his want, because I can taste it on his tongue, I can feel it pressing over my stomach, I can hear it in the way he hums at the sear of my skin. 

It must be a favour to me: the blatancy of it all. For however direct he may be, I’ve always felt that Rust has these plans within plans. Nothing is as it is on the surface: you have to dig to get to the good stuff. It’s disorienting, having it all laid out for me. And I’ll take anything he gives me.

I don’t want to leave any room for doubt in his mind either. 

So, I clutch at him hungrily, so drunk on his warmth, and thump my back against the door he opens for me to close it again.

I don’t ask, and I’m glad that he doesn’t make me, only presses my body flush against the cool surface of his side-door, until the only part of me free to move are the fingers that curl over his arms, as if they could sink through the fabric and then the flesh underneath. There’s only dogs and ghosts out at this hour, anyway; eyes in the long-grass. No-one but them and him to see my hips jerk against the precise hand under my skirt. 

He hadn’t looked at me this much before. Even when my eyes go glassy and I have to blink hard to try and regain my smarts, to not finish too quickly, I know he’s staring at me like a scientist.

When the next needy noise is drawn from me, I bury my face into his neck to save myself the embarrassment of being seen like this, even though it’s pointless. His fingers are dragging aside the damp fabric of my underwear anyway, sliding through my silky desire. When his knee shoves between my legs to keep apart, he changes the pressure of his hand, circles tightly over where shame does not apply. Restraint is a man-made practice that never prevails over biology. I should know this. Still, though, my face is hot as I whine into his shoulder. 

Rust doesn’t ask me to look at him, not yet, and I’m so grateful for it. I bite into the meat of him at the push of one finger, then keen all the way to my toes at the hook of two, rocking against his palm thoughtlessly as he fucks the both of them in deep.

The clink of his belt buckle barely processes through the smoke of sticky eyes and open mouths and the press of his body. But the absence of his hand from my hip, of it working between us?—that’s what ushers normal sensation back into me. I recover from the limp slump against him, but not quickly enough to understand or resist him guiding my hand to wrap around his swollen cock, coated with spit. 

He grunts as he tightens my grip around him, coaxes my hand how he wants it. In the back of my mind, though, of course I remember. Only, his fingers are so far inside that my head is spinning, teetering on the precipice of another thought I know I’ll lose, one that dissolves at the slight scrape of nail, one that would never matter as much as the soft then firm press of him against my cervix. My eyes water, and there licking at me is only a faint, abstract impression of embarrassment when Rust grips over my jaw, calloused heel of his palm heavy on my neck, and hauls me away from the hiding spaces of his body’s crevices.

“What, you fuckin’ shy now? You wanted it, so look,” he mumbles, digging his fingers into the soft parts of my face a little more, like there’s some hidden button beneath the surface that can make my droopy eyes fly back open. There must be because, somehow, it works. He angles my face by the scruff of my neck.

I can only stand to look between us for a few jumpy heartbeats before my eyes settle on the comfort of his even face, which he seems to accept readily, breath hitching. He does not blink. The intensity of his observations hounds me, lights me up like points on a star, even when my vision smears and melts at the dizzying curl of his fingers. Lucky for my weak knees he’s got his hand over the nape of my neck, his thighs pinning my own. I shake against him, some pathetic thing, and tremble when he keeps massaging there deep inside.

“Don’t go dumb on me, girl,” Rust scolds quietly when my hand loosens around him, his own having to leave the heat of my neck and come down to correct the pressure, the pull. My head lolls without the support of his hand. “Ain’t gon’ say nothin’?” 

Words spill uselessly into a pool before me, slipping through my fingers. My pulse slams in my throat, lower, too, against his touch, each beat meeting him as he works me over again. 

What I manage is a choked noise, all clogged up inside. I have little to do with it: just a body, a heartbeat and a compulsion to be near, nearer, nearest to him. Half a mind that’s lagging worse than the computers at work, that realises far too late that the body is curling into itself again, so tight, so wet, and fuck, fuck. 

He removes his fingers, that slow drag, and tells me to turn. When I don’t—completely without, dull and aching—Rust twists and shoves me against the window, which goes cloudy at the breathy moan pushed up from my slack stomach. 

Slow-like, a cold hand snakes under my shirt, smooths up my burning spine, all the way up, all the way down, hooking in the waistband of my skirt, knuckles burrowing into the soft dimples in my back. My whole body shivers as he slides his palm over the back of my neck—a comfort for which I’m desperate to become familiar—and squeezes gently. If I keep my eyes open, all I can see of him is that black silhouette in the window, a reflection. A homogenous mass, humming at the edges, devoid of the detail of things: can’t see the way he drags his thumb up along the line of my spine, traces where it meets the skull; nor the way he steps forward, teases the air out of my lungs, enjoys it, tugs my hips closer to him by the gusset of the underwear webbed between my thighs; nor the way the cool metal buckle presses red lines into flesh. 

The sight of Rust doesn’t matter so much as the understanding that it’s him behind me, that it’s his truck my cheek is being pressed into, that it’s his—fuck—that it’s him sliding through the heat of me, so close. The tip notches and makes it all the easier for my eyes to flutter shut. It helps with the vertigo that follows the rough push of him inside. 

My fingers grasp for the little ridges in the door. Best place for them ends up to be under my mouth, though, to keep my head on my shoulders, to muffle the noises I was sure only animals made. My knee jerks sharply against the truck at the first white-hot pulse of pleasure – I hiss, smearing the drool at the edge of my mouth with the back of my hand, so glad he isn’t in clear enough line of sight to chastise me with his tendency to notice and never forget. 

But he knows—he must fucking know by now—because the heavy hand clasped over my scruff curls around my face, and Rust forces two fingers into my parted mouth, presses over my soft tongue. 

He pulls himself out just to feel the total length of me taking him again, so painfully slow. Feel the initial resistance, the spongy give, the sweet slip, the drag, all of it. So full, I feel sick with it. Overindulgence. Knocks me weak, doesn’t mind it when I bite down on his fingers to take most of the weight out of my sob. What I take from him, he takes from me—we’re even that way—so Rust, already with his nose flirting with the crook of my sweaty neck, nips over my erratic pulse, pushes his tongue over where I’m sure he can see the skin throbbing with the violence of it. Vampire. He could draw blood and I wouldn’t mind: he knows I need bloodletting. 

So fucking dumb to think for a second it could be sated by just one time. I needed it again before it even ended – I knew it in the split second he touched me. The grief of closure was as adamant as a shadow. Stupid. He must think it, too, because, shit, the snap of his hips is mean. Punishment: you should’ve known. 

“We ought’a be in your bed. I should be fuckin’ you through your bed,” he complains gruffly, his mouth dragging over hinge of my jaw.

I moan around the fingers in my mouth, which hook together with his thumb to pinch the fleshy inside of my cheek, challenging my lost focus. No matter. There’s nothing we can do now. 

The seize of my body doesn’t take him by surprise at all, not that I expected it to, and the words that follow are easy, like he’s been thinkin’ of them as loud and clear as day as it would be to speak ‘em: “Shit, that feels good, sweet girl, huh? Tha’s it, just take it. That’s good.” And he lets the warmth gush out before stuffing it back in. “You’ll take one more.”

I stare at the endless field to the side of us, melted over the curve of his door, shivering despite the humidity that always finds you around here. I choke more on my own tongue than his fingers as Rust fucks me slow, like I deserve it.

“Need it s’bad, huh?” he drawls into the shell of my ear. “Why you gone all quiet on me, baby?—thought y’wanted it.” 

He drags his fingers out of my mouth, daring me to speak. He slides his hand between my stomach and the side-door, gliding down between the thighs, smearing my dripping arousal over the skin. 

My toes curl tight again as he pushes deeper than before, sits there like he knows my mind will do the rest of the work. The grate of his zipper as he shifts draws a mangled sound from the pit of me, not hidden by the brace of my trembling arm. 

He zeros in on my clit, all sticky, and circles tight. I shudder. 

“Give in,” he says to me in a voice so low and soft that it barely reaches me above the high frequency splitting through my skull. He rolls that bright pearl between his finger and thumb. “You feel it?” 

Mindless and eyes all milky, I still manage a nod, grateful for the mean pin of his knees against my shaking thighs. 

He hums. “So give in.” 

Fuck, this is absurd. The mind can just about string two and two together when Rust lends a forearm beside my head for me to rest on, to grip over: so he’s pictured this, wanted this, for how long? I knew the stagnancy was a front, swallowed something else, but—my mouth goes wet and slack over his forearm at the languid roll of his hips—but it wasn’t realistic to imagine it was this. Rust struck me as someone incapable of reconciling himself with his wants. Shame over acceptance because he thinks it’s atonement. Should’ve known better than to think Rust believed in redemption. 

The silhouette in the window is looking over the empty road, scanning for cars that won’t ever come—but his hand is warm under the tent of my shirt, easing over my waist, slow, as everything clamps up, trembling, again. Body and a heartbeat, he tugs my hips back to him, again and again, until he’s a hot, shuddering line all through me, face in my neck, crushing the fight out of my lungs. 

His nose presses over my cheek, and his breath is coarse there, too, panting, when he lifts his heavy head. My throat goes so loose and open, greedily drinking in the sweet-sticky scent of him. 

“C’mon, now,” he says to me once he’s pulled my underwear back up, dragging the cool, damp gusset against the mess of me for good measure. He pinches my hip, then over my thigh, like that might get me to quit shuddering. “Time to go.” 

When I don’t move, he smooths a hand gently over my hair. Tucks a loose chunk of it back into the mess of my braid before deciding it’s best if he lets it loose completely. 

Rust winds down the window as he holds open the door for me to clamber onto the bench.

“Y’can sleep ‘f you want,” he mumbles once he’s got me curled up on the seat, leaning through the frame. He tilts his head – the shadows have always hidden his eyes, but I like how the pinch in his brow has melted away at least.

If I had half a mind, I’d use it to shove his face out my goddamn way. Instead, I settle for the narrowing of my eyes and a decided huff. “Won’t.”

Lie. I fall asleep like anything, mellowed by the sweet rush of wind over marshland, the spirit of it weaving inside, and the weight of Rust’s hand tucked in the tight bend of my knee.

[milkteabinniechan]

†Dancing With Shadows - Minho

MINORS DNI 18+ONLY MEMBERSHIP//M.LIST

pairing: vampire! Minho x fem! reader

summary: Loneliness. Isolation. The only place a modern-day vampire can blend in is a dark, crowded nightclub. Minho has learned how to live without temptation, until you ask him to dance...

warnings: angst, mentions of blood, biting, predator/prey dynamic, character d3ath (sorry)

a/n: this one is definitely more scary than romantic. Minho has been a vampire for a long time and unfortunately you weren't able to survive this encounter. Next week will be more fluff I promise!

Did you know that the decibel level that can damage a human ear is 85? That's it. The average decibel level of a night club is 90 decibels. The decibels of a human’s scream is 120. This nightclub is pushing 88.7 at the moment. The bouncer looks annoyed. The bartender looks exhausted. And this is just a Tuesday night. This place gets a lot more out of hand on the weekends. But the weekends get too crowded for me. Crowds of people ask too many questions.

Why are you so pale? How old are you exactly? Why are your hands so cold? When humans drink, they have a tendency to be a bit nosy. But on a Tuesday, the crowd is small. The humans keep to themselves and their friends. That's where I fit in. Alone. Unassuming. Just a guy at the bar.

“Do you want to dance?”

You were very unassuming yourself. Not a particularly remarkable human being. Nothing about you screamed confident or powerful. You actually seemed a bit out of place here. This place of loud music and flashing lights. I knew one thing for certain however. You smelled absolutely incredible. A smell that only my heightened senses could pick up. This wasn't a perfume or a type of shampoo. This was a scent that shot straight through my lifeless body into my cold, unbeating heart. Damn you. You poor little thing. What do I do now?

**************

You liked this dive bar. During the day it was filled with greasy men in trucker hats that teemed around a single pool table or a single girl. But at night, the owner would turn the lights down and the music loud. Everyone blended in when the lights were low. You always enjoyed the night time. The cool air, the stars, the sounds. You even liked the people. That's when he caught your eye. Slumped against the bar, avoiding eye contact with everyone that passed him by. Mr. Cool Guy, huh? We'll see. You quickly made your way over to where he was posted and gave him your best flirtatious tone. How could he resist?

The two of you made your way to the dancefloor as soon as a new song was about to start. The beat started low and began to build. Like the Earth was literally rising around the two of you, Mr. Cool grabbed your waist and pulled you in. He was freezing. You were burning up. As you pressed your body into his, you worried you might melt him like an ice cube in the Sun. But he continued to dance with you. His moves were fluid and ancient. Like he had all the time in the world to learn every dance style ever created. He was talented. He was exotic. And you didn't know it yet, but you were completely under his spell.

You gripped his hand in yours and whispered softly, “come with me.”

He nodded as you pulled him off the dancefloor and into a darkened corner. You backed yourself into where the two walls meet and let his tall, slender frame cage you in. You looked up while he looked down, the two of you lingering in a heated standoff for what felt like an eternity.

“What's your name?” You finally managed to ask, your voice no more than a whisper.

“Does it matter?” He answered. His thumb brushing along your bottom lip.

You thought about the question for a moment. Does it matter? echoed in your head as you melted into the sensation of his thumb pulling and rubbing against your bottom lip and then your top.

“...No, it doesn't.” You responded without warning. Not even you were sure where that answer came from.

“Good girl.” He said, his voice taking on a more sinister tone.

You fluttered your eyes closed as you felt his lips press into yours. The kiss was surprisingly gentle. Almost loving, like the two of you had been lovers in many lives before this. The nightclub seemed to crumble away at your feet and you felt like you were floating. Not floating in the happy, romantic sense. Floating in a way that felt like you could fall at any moment and no one would catch you. That you would fall and you would die. And this handsome, mysterious, terrifying stranger would be the one to blame.

His hands snaked up your sides and tangled into your hair. His tongue pushed its way inside your mouth like it belonged there. Your tongue followed suit and danced around his open mouth. Soon the euphoric feeling of floating gave way to a sharp pain. You snapped your head back and brought your fingers to your tongue to feel a deep cut. Fresh blood coated your fingertips as you looked from your hand to the mystery man. His smile changed from one of flirtation to one of malice. His teeth gleamed in the flickering floodlights above you revealing two impossibly sharp canines dripping with your blood. Your eyes grew large and wet with unshed tears as your brain tried to make sense of what was happening. All of your senses were heightened and your body was trying to protect itself as you tried to break free from the wall. But the handsome stranger was too quick, pinning your wrists against the hard brick. His smile grew more menacing as his lips inches closer and closer to your neck.

“Well, I didn't want you to find out this quickly. I wanted to have a little more fun with you first, but here we are. Oh well. At least you'll taste good.”

A deep chuckle pierced your eardrums louder than the music. A laughter that guaranteed that this was going to be your last moment alive. You screamed loud. The loudest you had ever screamed. It was all you could think to do.

But your screams fell on deaf ears as the music around you boomed and blasted. The last sensation you remember is sharp teeth sinking into your flesh like tissue paper. Like your human body was nothing more than a midnight snack for some unholy creature. Some godless abomination that laid its sights on you. It was all a waiting game. A predator that had already found its prey and just enjoyed the sight of it dancing around before he devoured it.

taglist: @simply-trash5 @sugawhaaa @trixiekaulitz @chrizzztopherbang @cassidymb121 @roanns-posts @staysinbloom @yaorzu-blog @cotton-candycloudz @beautyinhypnosis @domicaru @strawberry31 @slxtmeri @newhope8 @tinyelfperson @dandelions-143 @stayyyyyyyyyyyy21 @msauthor @fun-fanfics @ell0thebell @stephanieeeyang @juskz @kimahreummm @readr1221 @kayleefriedchicken @ovulatingrn @hwnglixho @darthmaddie25 @queen-in-the-shadows @itgirlalisaa @miinhoo @greyaia @chanchansgirly @skzleeknowcore @skz-smut-reader @thatisrankharry @hearts4yawnzzn @jchotch726 @cherricola-star

[octuscle]

Road Trip to a new life

Bloody hell, Chuck thought to himself! They can't just forget me here! His football team was on its way home from an away game. A very successful away game. And they all had their star quarterback to thank for that. And that was him, that was Chuck. And now they had all just taken a pee break. At a rest stop in the middle of nowhere. And hey, Chuck had been flirting with the cute waitress at the diner. And yes, he had fucked her in the broom closet. Hehehe, he thought to himself for a brief moment. A map of the state, showing the broom closets where he'd fucked basement girls, cheerleaders, or even teachers from schools he'd usually flunked out of shortly afterward. That would be a cool idea! His grin didn't last long. Shit, the team bus had left. Without him. And now he was standing here in the rain with no idea how he was going to get home.

A truck came to a halt next to him. A horn sounded very loudly. Chuck didn't react yet. The passenger door opened and a bearded guy looked out. "Son, you look lost. Can I give you a ride?" Chuck hesitated for a moment. He was still far too confused, far too angry to think clearly. "Sure, that would be cool," he replied. And climbed into the cab of the monstrous truck. It smelled of cigar smoke and sweat. Chuck looked at the driver. A short, slightly overweight guy. Unkempt. The dirty T-shirt ended just above the large belt buckle and showed a roll of flab. A greasy mullet peeked out from under the trucker's cap. Shit, Chuck thought to himself. Maybe that hadn't been such a good idea. The trucker lit a half-smoked cigar. "My name is Pete. If you want one too, there's one in the compartment right in front of you. Chuck shook his head, tensed his biceps and said, "Chuck! Thanks for the ride. And I don't smoke. I'm an athlete." Pete stretched out his right arm and felt Chuck's biceps. "Hm, feels good. It'd be a shame if you stopped working out." He blew a puff of smoke in Chuck's direction. And his hand moved towards Chuck's chest. "Wait, wait," Chuck moved to the right in a sit. "No homo, dude. I only fuck pussy." The driver just glanced briefly in Chuck's direction and smiled. His teeth were nicotine yellow. "I don't care what YOU fuck." He blew another puff of smoke in Chuck's direction, pulled his hand back and began kneading the bulge in his crotch. "Thanks for the ride, I think I'd better get off now." Another puff of smoke. Chuck went dizzy. "Comrade, the next stop isn't for another six hours. We have a schedule to meet." Chuck tried to keep a clear head. But the smoke was making him tired. His head felt like it was full of absorbent cotton. "All right, Pete," he mumbled. And fell asleep.

It was dark outside when Pete shook him by the shoulder. "Get up, sleepyhead. We'll take a break in fifteen minutes and then change drivers. Chuck yawned and stretched. Driver change? What was Pete talking about? And more important now was his latte. South of his big belt buckle, Chuck made a big tent in his pants. Of course Pete had noticed it long ago. He had long since taken his puny boner out of his pants and was wanking it. As a passenger, you had your duties. And it was still a quarter of an hour's drive. It wasn't the first time Chuck had blown someone in a driver's cab. Driver's cabs, filthy toilets in truck stops, broom closets in cheap diners. He could manage anywhere. How long had he been driving aimlessly on the highways now? Two years? Got there. You had to take what you could get. And Pete was actually out of his league. But he took him a good part of the way. Gratitude was a must.

Chuck walked a little wide-legged towards the restrooms at the service station. Pete must have cum. Chuck hadn't yet. They wouldn't be driving on for another hour at the earliest. It was going to be hell if he didn't find someone to fuck by then. In the light of a lantern, he leaned against the wall, his erection still clearly visible. He took a cigar from his leather vest, lit it and waited. Almost five minutes. Then a greasy business traveler in a cheap suit walked past him. A look that lasted a little too long. A grab in the crotch. A mumbled "20 without a rubber?". And everything was clear. It had been a few days since Chuck had showered, but the guy was still greedily going down on Chuck's greasy, cheesy cock. Premium beef. Yes, that described his cock very well. And this premium beef had just been sucked clean for 20 dollars. And then Chuck sank it into the guy's ass.

Chuck couldn't understand guys like Pete. When you were out on the street, you had to take care of your body. Okay, Chuck more than others, his body was his asset after all. But while Chuck shoveled in lots of chips and a big burger and drank three pitchers of beer, Chuck ate his steak and salad, drank water and used the last few minutes before leaving to do a few pull-ups and push-ups at the fitness station behind the toilets. A few other long-distance drivers loitered around him. If they hadn't had to drive on, Chuck could certainly have earned a few more dollars. But as it was, he climbed into the driver's seat. If he hadn't had to drive, he would certainly have had a few beers. As it was, another cigar would have to do. Pete snored in the back of his bunk. Chuck turned the radio up a little louder to stay awake. And he steered the truck south through the night.

At the next break and before the driver change, Chuck was able to earn a few more dollars. There were many truck stops where he was known as a colorful dog. When you heard his heavy footsteps and the creaking of the leather, it was like a bell on a Pavlovian dog. Chuck had been traveling the country for many years. A mixture of hustler, temporary trucker and casual laborer. He had flunked out of college at some point. Stupid thing to do. He'd had a thing with a woman once. And she'd claimed he'd raped her. That taught him a lesson, since then he only fucked men. They appreciated his mouth, his ass and his cock. And paid well.

Somewhere in New Mexico, Pete threw Chuck out of the truck. He had to be out of the cab before the finish line. Pete would be in big trouble if it came out that he had let someone else drive the truck. He thanked Chuck with a masterful blowjob and a box of Cuban cigars. They would probably never see each other again. The country was big… Chuck rarely got in the same truck twice.

Chuck loved the feeling of the sun on his body. He was able to use the stop for an extensive open-air workout, a good meal, two lucrative fucks and even a shower. Now let's see where he was going. He stood by the road. It wasn't five minutes before a car stopped and the driver asked him if he could give him a lift. Chuck only asked if he could smoke in the car. Only if he didn't just put the cigar in his mouth, was the answer. Chuck got in the car. On the road again!

Pics by @ki-kink

[heesdreamer]

TWO FOR ONE

PAIRING ➩ heeseung x reader x jake

SUMMARY ➩ Don’t let the tiny amount of plot fool you… this is straight up smut lol. Heeseung is a gentle giant who doesn’t talk much and Jake is an absolute menace

WARNINGS ➩ Straight up smut. slight switch heeseung… he just listens well lol, hard dom jake but he’s sweet at times, double penetration, slight degrading… it’s just a mess lol this is definitely getting content blocked. Heejake are NOT together and do not get intimate at all other then slight instruction from the latter! NOT PROOFREAD

WC ➩ 11.1k

AUTHORS NOTE ➩ So.. I’m back lol. Not what I typically write but well… guess I was in a mood so here you go. Hope you enjoy however many of you manage to see this considering tumblr isn’t being so kind to smut writers right now

It wasn’t like you weren’t accustomed to men and their actions, especially in your specific line of work.

Being a waitress meant you were subjected to almost every type of man, ranging from the attractive ones who talked too much about themselves and their accomplishments to the less favorable who seemed to think calling out comments about your uniform would get them a date after your shift ended.

You loved your job on a regular day, working in a hole in the wall diner that managed to get pretty heavy foot traffic between the drunk people wandering too far from the main stretch looking for cheap food and the truckers who were 16 hours into a shift and needing somewhere warm to refuel on coffee and stretch their legs.

The summers were hectic and considering part of your uniform entailed rolling around on a pair of bright pink skates as you delivered hot mugs and stacks of plates, you definitely wouldn’t have liked it as much if it wasn’t for your coworkers and the hefty tips you’d get if you managed to bring yourself to batting your eyelashes at the customers.

You were six hours into a shift now and your ankles were definitely swollen from the tight skate laces around your ankles, hair frizzier than it had been in the morning from the humidity and sweat and you were almost positive some sticky mouthed kid had stuck gum on the back of your apron.

Still your attention was locked on a booth in the corner of the diner, leaning forward on the counter with your elbows holding up your weight to stop you from rolling forward or backwards. Your eyebrow was raised as you looked at the two people seated across from each other and you were running over your mental catalog to see if you’d seen them before. Eventually decided you definitely hadn’t considering the reason for your initial curiosity, that being the fact they were the complete opposite of your usual demographic.

“They screw you out of a solid tip or something?” Your coworkers voice was mumbling from beside you and you glanced over just in time to see him taking off his hairnet and leaning down on the counter next to you.

Riki had actually been one of the skaters a year or two back before he hit a random growth spurt and became to clumsy and accident prone. It had only taken three spilled coffees onto unexpecting patrons before he was being push back onto cook duty in the back kitchen, happy to at least have kept his job even if he was missing out on server tips now.

“They’re Sunoo’s table.” You were explaining to him and shaking your head softly, pausing for a second. “I just haven’t seen them around before.”

He was shrugging and you could feel him glancing at you in confusion before he was looking back at the two boys who were innocently eating their fries and barely paying attention to their surroundings. “So, what’s the big deal? Maybe they’ll be your first regulars who aren’t 60 years old.”

You didn’t directly respond to him but you kept watching the boys curiously for the rest of your shift and four more after that, they kept coming in day after day and sitting in the same booth in the corner.

Eventually you would’ve gotten bored of trying to figure out where they came from or what part of town they lived in, if it wasn’t for the fact they started to notice you too. Especially one of them considering he would continuously poke his head over the booths divider wall and look at you for a few seconds until you made eye contact with him, then he’d shoot back down and sit tight in his seat.

It was funny at first to see how nervous he got whenever you held his gaze for half a second but eventually it started to get on your nerves and distract you from your actual tables, never having served them yet considering they only sat in Sunoo’s section.

A week passed before you were sighing and asking your coworker if it was okay for you to swap sides of the diner for the day, watching his confused expression turn into a meddling one as he glanced over at the boys in the corner knowingly before he was nodding his head enthusiastically.

“Which one are you interested in?” He was whispering in your direction with an excited smile but you ignored his question due to your lack of an answer and skated back over to an awaiting table.

The next day they were coming in again and you watched them patiently for a few minutes before the nervous one was scurrying off to the bathroom, giving you the chance to smoothly skate over and stand in front of the booth. It took the remaining boy a few seconds to look at you and realize you weren’t Sunoo but he was smiling as soon as he trailed up your uniform and stopped on your face, not relenting even when your eyebrow cocked.

“Hey.” He was breathing out and your nose scrunched slightly at the confidence in his voice, glancing behind you for a second before sighing and tucking your pen behind your ear.

“Why does your friend keep staring at me?” You were asking swiftly and his smile faltered for a second at the sound of your annoyed tone, bored expression on your face as you stared down at him and waited for a response.

You could hear the sound of the bathroom door opening behind you but you didn’t turn, already knowing who it was based off context and the fact the boy sitting down was looking around your frame now and smiling again as he saw his friend returning to the table. It took longer than the walk from the bathroom usually did and you imagined he had frozen for a few seconds when he saw you standing there instead of Sunoo.

“He thinks you’re pretty.” Your eyes were shooting back to the boy who was sitting as he spoke and they stayed on him even when the new figure was sliding into the seat across from him and doing his best to avoid touching you, captivated for a moment by the way he was looking at you.

Then you were breaking away from his gaze to take in the boy you kept catching peeking at you, eyes flickering from his red cheeks to the glasses sat on top of his nose. He was both staring at you intensely and avoiding looking at you at all cost, darting from your face to your hands that were touching the table and then back at his friend with a slightly panicked expression.

“That true? You think I’m pretty?” You were asking him with a slight bite to your words, feeling almost suspicious like they were potentially making fun of you.

You knew you were pretty attractive but at work you weren’t exactly at your hottest, normally sweaty from the beating summer sun through the large windows and the effort that skating around in clean lines all day took. You imagined your hair was frizzing out of its ponytail by now and you typically carried a heavy grimace on your face unless you were attempting to butter up the high tipping regulars.

“He does.” The other boy was answering for him and you turned your gaze back towards him in a glare. “He talks about it all the time.”

“He can’t speak for himself?” You were interrupting harshly but your tense demeanor disappeared slightly when he was shaking his head in denial, glancing back towards the boy with glasses to see him looking much more embarrassed now that you were talking about him. “No he can’t or no he can?”

“I-I can.” He was hurrying to rush out in a stutter and your eyes softened slightly at the way his widened, trying his best to address you directly despite the way his friend was laughing softly across the table.

You turned your head to glare at him again for his small chuckles, feeling oddly protective over the other boy even though he’d been getting on your nerves with his constant distractions and staring. The first boy stopped laughing but kept a small smirk on his face as he watched you, eyes flicking down to your chest for a second as he scanned your name tag before meeting your stare again.

“I’m Jake and he’s Heeseung.” He nodded his head across the table at the latter part and you looked back over to the boy with glasses to see him attempt a small friendly smile in your direction.

You tested out their names in your head for a few seconds before you were sighing and taking your pen out from behind your ear, finally getting around to asking them for their orders and ignoring the way your cheeks were heating up as you skated back behind the counter.

——

Heeseung and Jake continued to come into your work regularly and you continued to ask Sunoo for that table even if it wasn’t on your side, every time flushing bright red at the knowing smirk on his face and eventually being overly grateful when he told you that you didn’t need to keep asking him every single time.

You didn’t speak to the boys much and you definitely weren’t friends but Jake tried to make conversation with you every time you took their order, smirking and leaning forward on the table with his elbows so he could stay in your line of vision even when you tried your hardest to ignore him from the corner of your eye. Heeseung stayed quiet for the most part outside of whispering out his orders but you felt him watching the side of your face the entire time you were around them.

So you weren’t exactly sure why you were accepting their invitation to come to their apartment one weekend after your shift had ended, at first ignoring Jake when he explained there was going to be a small party and he wanted to see you there.

He had smiled at you and wrote down their address anyways on one of the napkins from the metal dispenser, sliding it in your direction and not saying anything else when you snatched it off the table without agreeing to show up.

You were definitely overthinking the fact you’d shown up now considering you definitely hadn’t given any hint that you would be, standing outside their door and being hit with the realization they might not even want you here anymore or maybe it really was a small gathering and they only ordered enough food or drinks for a certain amount of people. You pictured having to stand all night because there wasn’t enough seats and your face pulled into a cringed grimace, getting ready to turn around and leave before the door was swinging open.

You froze for a few seconds before realizing it was just Jake but then you were tensing even more. You were used to seeing him in more casual clothes throughout the day but he was definitely dressing up tonight, sleeves rolled up just above his elbows and your eyes stayed locked on the thick veins in his arms for a few seconds before you were snapping back up to his face.

“You’re early.” He was chiming but that familiar sleazy smile was making its way to his face now after he’d seen you briefly checking him out. You rolled your eyes at his comment but you were grateful when he wordlessly stepped aside to let you pass through the front door.

“You didn’t exactly give me specifics.” You were sarcastically responding as you stood in the entryway, eyes scanning over their apartment and being pleasantly surprised by how normal it seemed.

It was almost overly tidy and you had a strong feeling that was more Heeseung’s doing, spotting stacks of video games pressed tightly onto an entertainment center shelf and perfectly dusted coffee tables with no liquid ring stains unlike how your own looked. You could see a hallway leading away from the main living area and there was three doors, one of them closed completely.

You turned your head to glance back at Jake over your shoulder to find him already watching you, his expression slightly darker now but softening again when he noticed you looking. “Where’s Heeseung?”

“He’s in his room getting ready still.” He was answering smoothly and you assumed the closed door must be his, nodding your head softly and pausing awkwardly for a second before kicking off your shoes by the door. “I think he’s nervous.”

Jake was moving towards the kitchen area as he talked and you watched him curiously as he opened the fridge and took out a drink, waiting for him to continue even when he was turning back around and resting his elbows on the counter as he glanced at you. He seemed to take notice of your curious expression and raised eyebrow, laughing in surprise for a second before he was opening his mouth to speak more.

“I meant it when I said he thought you were pretty and, if you haven’t noticed, he’s not the best with talking to girls.” He was shrugging softly as he talked but you could tell it was a deeper issue between the friends, something they’d definitely talked about before.

You were looking down towards the hallway again and then back at Jake.

“So you’re his wingman.” Your tone was flat as it fell from your mouth and you were taken back at your own directness, for some reason finding yourself grateful when he smiled softly instead of getting offended at your almost harsh level of bluntness.

He was shrugging again and you felt a small wave of frustration pass through you, not necessarily at the boy directly but at the fact he never seemed to give you a straight answer to anything and constantly watched you with that smirk he carried so naturally.

If it was any other situation, you would have figured Jake was the one who was interested in you. He was constantly watching you carefully in a way that almost made your skin crawl if it wasn’t for his easygoing demeanor and gentle way of speaking, especially to Heeseung who he seemed to care deeply for. Deep enough that he was constantly mentioning him any time the two of you were alone and solidifying the fact he didn’t like you himself.

You were sighing under your breath before nodding to yourself and turning on your heel, wandering down the hallway and knocking softly on the closed door before you could see Jake’s reaction, already picturing the amused look that must be on his face.

Despite your knocking, you didn’t actually have the patience to wait for him to come and open the door so it was more so a warning as your hand touched the knob and twisted it to reveal Heeseung standing in front of his mirror as he messed with his hair. His eyes flicked up to the reflection to see who it was coming into his room so suddenly and he froze up completely when he realized it was you, hand stood still in his dark hair and eyes widening a touch.

“Hey.” You breathed out and smoothed down your skirt awkwardly, needing something to do with your hands as you glanced around his room.

You figured your assumptions about the cleanliness of the apartment being his doing were right considering the state of his bedroom and you looked back over at him to see him still frozen in place, snapping back out of it slightly when he realized you were waiting for him to say something.

“H-hi, you’re early.” He was rushing out and turning to finally face you, his hands falling back to rest on the desk and then immediately being brought in front of his stomach instead like he wasn’t sure what to do with them.

“Jake said the same thing.” You told him and you tried your best to smile softly at him, trying to find a way to calm his nerves that were obviously increasing. You glanced at his bed and then back at him with a raised eyebrow, feeling thankful he got the memo and nodded his head softly with slightly parted lips. He watched you intensely as you lowered yourself down on his soft bed, glancing around your surroundings again and taking it in.

“It’s..” He trailed off awkwardly after attempting to start a sentence and your gaze went back to him curiously.

Heeseung was definitely attractive even if he lacked any signs of confidence, never really meeting your eye and instead allowing his more extroverted friend to basically speak for him instead of talking to you himself. It almost made him cuter to you despite not necessarily going for guys like that in the past but you were slightly flattered by how nervous he got whenever you approached their table.

He seemed especially on edge now that you were sitting carefully on his perfectly made bed, out of your stained uniform and dressed in a small skirt that was sliding up your thighs every time you slightly shifted. He was fidgeting with his hands still and you could see a soft blush on his face even though he was avoiding looking at you for more than a few seconds at a time.

“It’s what?” You were trying to coax the rest of his sentence out of him but his body stiffened at the soft tone you’d suddenly taken on, something he hadn’t heard before considering you typically were harshly barking a response towards Jake.

“It’s j-just.. not a bad thing that you’re early.” He was eventually forcing the words out and looking at you briefly to check your reaction, swallowing so hard that it almost looked painful. You were smiling softly but not immediately responding, letting his words hands delicately in the air for a few seconds before you were standing up and approaching him slowly.

He didn’t move away from the desk but he was completely tense now that you were close to him, still not near enough to touch but pretty clear in your intentions when you took another small step. He was so stiff that you were almost worried you were making him uncomfortable if it wasn’t for the many times Jake had told you that he liked you, encouraged you to make a move because Heeseung wouldn’t do it himself.

You were hit with a wave of disappointment and then embarrassment however when he was suddenly taking a few quick steps to the side and placing a hand over his face to try and cover the visible redness, staring at the floor to avoid the hurt on your expression considering he’d basically just ran away from you.

A mean scoff was falling from your lips before you could swallow it and Heeseung winced slightly at the sound, eyes squeezing shut for a second like he was preparing himself to be yelled at. You shook your head even though he wasn’t looking at you and swiftly turned to leave the room before you could embarrass yourself further, storming back down the hall and roughly attempting to put your shoes back on so you could go back home.

“Woah woah woah.” Jake’s voice was coming from the living room, sounding panicked and confused as he quickly stood up from the couch and approached you. You felt his hands touching the bare skin of your arm and you flinched softly before glaring at him, watching as he took the hint and held the hand up in surrender. “Hey, what happened?”

His voice was gentle but you could tell he already had a feeling by the way he was glancing towards the hallway with a similar disappointment on his face.

“You said he liked me.” You spat at him and you were even more mortified considering the embarrassed tears that were threatening to spill, bending back down to try and pull on your other shoe but stopping when you felt his hand touching you again.

He was holding your arm softly and not taking it off this time despite the murderous look you were giving him, squeezing your skin just enough to get your attention as he waited for you to stand back to your full height and focus on him before spreading. “He does, I promise you he does Y/N. He just… he’s inexperienced.”

“Oh you don’t say.” Your laugh was mocking and mean and you would’ve felt more guilty if it wasn’t for the anger coursing through you, more convinced now they had been messing with you.

“I’m serious.” His tone was harsher now that you were seemingly making fun of his friend, his touch still gentle despite the slight edge to his gaze. “He’s never even kissed a girl before.”

“What?” You were fully pausing in your attempts to leave now and staring at him with a bewildered expression, eyes shooting to the hallway and for a second you wondered if Heeseung was potentially listening in on your conversation considering you weren’t exactly whispering.

“Just don’t leave yet, okay?” Jake’s voice was soft and reassuring and your eyes dropped down to the way he was holding your arm for a second before you were nodding in confirmation.

He was letting out a relieved sigh and then disappeared down the hallway quickly, leaving you standing there awkwardly before you decided to go and sit on the couch. What he said hadn’t completely shocked you since you figured Heeseung didn’t have much experience due to his demeanor but you didn’t expect him to be at absolutely zero especially since he was definitely attractive and had at least one outgoing person in his social circle.

It was a few minutes before Jake was coming back down the hallway and searching the room for you, stopping for a beat when he saw you sitting uncomfortably on their couch.

Heeseung was trailing behind him and he somehow looked even more awkward than he had back in his bedroom, shoulders tensed and eyes set on the floor in front of him so he didn’t accidentally make eye contact with you. He only got more unnerved when Jake was sitting on one side of you, leaving him no choice but to sit on your right and sandwich you between them.

Neither of them were touching you but the air was heavy and you were feeling slightly anxious considering you didn’t exactly know them that well and you were sure why Jake had asked you to stay.

“Is somebody going to speak or are you just going to stare at me all night?” Your tone was snappy again and you uncomfortably shifted in your spot when Jake let out a small disappointed sigh even though you had a feeling it had more to do with his silent friend than your harshness.

“He really does like you.” His voice sounded more exhausted now like he was sick of having to repeat it and you looked at him for a few seconds before moving your stare towards Heeseung.

“You do?” Your tone was still on the colder side as you addressed him and his eyes widened for a beat before he was nodding in agreement. You were grateful he atleast could admit it even if he couldn’t say it outright but you were losing your patience for the weird game of telephone that was happening between the three of you. “Kissing isn’t that scary, all you had to do was ask.”

He didn’t say anything, not that you expected any different from him, but you couldn’t help but notice the way his eyes slid over your face until he was looking behind you towards his friend.

You sighed softly even though the action spiked your curiosity, shifting so you were facing him on the couch with your back towards Jake, scooting towards the quiet boy so your knee was bumping into the side of his thigh. He swallowed harshly and you spotted a hint of red creeping back up his neck, only worsening when you were leaning closer to him and glancing at his parted lips. “Can I kiss you?”

He seemed startled but not at all by the fact his friend was still in the room, sitting on the same couch as you and watching the two of you intensely as you tried to navigate his silence. He was nodding softly but you could tell he was nervous, even more so when you were leaning forward to press against him and he stayed rigid.

You pecked his lips a few times softly, not able to do much else considering he wasn’t moving at all and you were two seconds from pulling away and abandoning the idea completely before Jake was speaking from behind you.

“Show him properly.” His tone was lower than you’d heard it before and you jumped slightly at the reminder that he was there, his voice closer than you remembered.

“What?” You were turning your body back around to be able to look at him but you paused when you saw the way he was looking at you, close enough now that if you completely turned your head your noses would have bumped into each other.

“That isn’t a kiss.” He was shaking his head just enough for it to be noticeable and his hair fell into his face more, blonde strands covering his eyes and making him look more disheveled than you’d seen him look before. You were offended for half a second and planning to explain to him why kissing Heeseung was almost impossible but you stopped when you realized he was staring down at your lips as they parted to speak.

He seemed to notice you’d stopped because of his gaze and he met your eyes for just a second before he was surging forward to kiss you.

You were only startled for a second before melting against him, leaning forward in his direction when you felt his hand gripping your chin almost harshly and keeping you in place as he moved against you. He was turning your head at an angle and you realized it was to give Heeseung better viewing access, forgetting all about it when Jake was slipping his tongue into your mouth.

He was the complete opposite of Heeseung in general but especially when it came to kissing and you barely had any time to process it, wet and sloppy as he squeezed your face again before pushing your head back so you weren’t touching anymore.

You watched him with a startled expression, slightly dazed from how out of nowhere this all seemed and the lingering feeling of his spit on your chin. You imagined you looked a bit stupid in that moment, eyes wide as you stared at him with slightly squished cheeks between his big hand. He didn’t seem to mind considering he was smiling softly at you for a second before turning your head so you were facing Heeseung again.

You’d almost completely forgotten about him and a wave of embarrassment and guilt washed over you until you realized he looked almost as affected as you did, staring at you intensely with red cheeks and low eyes.

Jake was nudging you in his direction wordlessly and you followed his silent command easily, leaning into Heeseung again and this time finally being able to kiss him properly. He still was amateurish and seemed a bit lost but seeing a direct example must have given him some direction considering he was atleast moving with you now, kissing you much slower and sweeter than how Jake was just a few seconds again.

It felt overly dirty to kiss two people back to back so quickly like this but it strangely sent a fire to your lower stomach instead of disgusting you, feeling the other boys presence and command behind your back even though he wasn’t touching you and hadn’t vocally said anything.

Heeseung was pulling away to take a breath, his glasses sliding down his nose, and you tried to catch your own but you didn’t have a chance considering Jake’s hand was gripping your chin again and turning you back towards him.

His mouth was on yours again and you let out a soft whine at the feeling of him sitting up slightly so he could push himself deeper against you, licking into your mouth so vulgarly that you couldn’t help the gasp that slipped from your mouth into his. Your chest was rising and falling quickly as you got overwhelmed between them, only getting faster when he was turning you softly so you were facing forward.

You were confused for a second before he was pulling off the kiss and grabbing just underneath your knee, pulling your left leg over his lap so you were spread wide open and facing the TV, head lolling back against the couch in a kiss drunk daze when his mouth was moving down your neck and biting down softly on your skin.

His hand was softly caressing your knee that was on top of his lap and you spread your legs more to try and get him to move it up slightly, not even realizing the movement was causing your other leg to be pushed against Heeseung’s frame until he was hesitantly touching the smooth skin of your thigh. He didn’t hitch it over his lap like his friend did but he was at least touching you finally and you gasped softly as you looked at him with hooded eyes.

He still seemed nervous and awkward but you watched a small wave of confidence come over him from your reaction, his hand large enough to cover a lot of your bare thigh and even accidentally hitch closer to your core once he started to rub it softly. You were letting out another small whine and impatiently lifting your hips to try and scoot further down the couch, purposely causing their hands to slide up your legs and finally touch you where you needed.

Heeseung moved his hand back down to your thigh swiftly but Jake stayed touching you under your skirt, a soft chuckle falling from his lips due to your neediness.

“Look at you.” He was speaking in a low tone against your neck and another shiver ran through you when you felt his breath on the side of your face, turning your head a bit so you could look at him as he spoke. “Spread open so nicely for us.”

The use of the word grouping him and Heeseung together didn’t miss you and neither did the dirty feeling it brought along with it, fully processing by now that you were being touched by two different set of hands and their spit was mixing together on your tongue. Your hips rolled on their own as he spoke so vulgarly, eyes shutting in pleasure when you felt his thumb shift closer to your core.

He didn’t waste any time and didn’t bother teasing you any further thankfully, shifting in his spot on the couch so he could watch your reaction even when he hand was sliding up your stomach and then back down inside of your panties, both of you pausing for a second when he made contact with the wetness dripping down your thighs now.

You let out a soft cry at the feeling of him touching you considering how sensitive you were and you didn’t care enough to be embarrassed of the fact you were seconds away from leaking onto their couch, hitching your legs up further to try and get him keep touching you where you needed him most.

Breath hitching next to you caught your attention and you glanced over lazily to see Heeseung staring down at where Jake’s hand had gone, eyes wide as he caught sight of what was happening and saw how wet you’d gotten just from kissing them both. He must’ve felt you staring because he was making eye contact with you seconds later, freezing up until your eyes were dropping down to his lips and a whine was slipping from your mouth again.

He thankfully got the message and he was taking a deep breath before leaning in to kiss you again, his hand on your thigh stilling as he put all of his focus on kissing you softly.

The contrast between him gently kissing you like you were fragile versus Jake roughly gripping your leg and keeping you spread open wide for him was making your head dizzy and you could barely keep up with Heeseung’s mouth. He didn’t seem to mind considering he continued to keep leaning into you and licking softly against your mouth, letting out small gasps and groans everytime you sucked on his tongue or wrapped it with yours.

“Fuck hyung she’s getting so wet from kissing you.” Jake sounded almost pained next to your ear and you wondered if it was from the feeling of your cunt or the sight of you and Heeseung sloppily kissing just a few inches from his face.

Heeseung ignored him but you felt his hand tighten against your thigh at his friends words, rolling your hips again at the feeling and moaning into the boys mouth when Jake’s fingers started to rub your sensitive clit in slow circles. Your hands were coming up to grip onto one of Heeseung’s shoulders, moaning sharply at the sensation and nearly losing your mind from the amount of pleasure you were receiving between them.

“Please please.” You were suddenly begging but you weren’t exactly sure who you were talking to or what you were asking, overwhelmed with desperation for both of them.

“What baby?” Jake was asking softly in your ear again but his tone was almost mocking, still rubbing you with his fingers and keeping your legs spread almost painfully wide. “Tell me what you want and we’ll give it to you.”

You thought for a few seconds the best you could through the haze, glancing at Heeseung for confirmation and watching as he eagerly nodded in agreement before softly squeezing your thigh again. You were opening your mouth to try and request moving further when you were cut off by the sound of fist pounding on the door.

All at once it hit you, the panic of possibly being caught in such a vulnerable position followed by the embarrassment and self disgust considering you were spread between two men that you didn’t know very well, wet around one of their fingers and practically begging for them to keep touching you. You felt like somebody had thrown a bucket of cold water at you and you were swiftly sitting up on the couch, smacking Jake’s hand away and fixing your skirt after he’d removed it.

He watched you for a second with panic in his eyes before the knocking resumed even louder, annoyance settling over his face as he let out a rough sigh and stood up off the couch to go and answer it.

Your hand was shakily coming up to cover your mouth and you tried your best to ignore the fact Heeseung was still sitting next to you, mouth wet from where you’d been desperately licking into the kiss. You could feel him shifting uncomfortably and you were worried he was planning to speak to you so you stood up and quickly rushed down the hallway towards the bathroom as you heard Jake start to greet the guest for the party you’d completely forgotten about.

——

You stayed in the bathroom for around forty minutes until you felt like it was less noticeable you had just been seconds away from getting fingered, waiting for the music to start playing and the sounds of people drinking and loosening up to overwhelm the loud pounding of your heart.

When you ventured back out into the main area you still felt just as embarrassed, being the only person who wasn’t mutual friends with somebody there. You were barely friends with Jake and Heeseung either and you suddenly felt like an intruder despite how intimate you’d all been together less than an hour ago.

You had a few drinks to try and calm your nerves but avoided making conversation with any of the boys friends, pretending you didn’t feel Jake continuously staring and checking on you throughout the night. Heeseung was nowhere to be found for the first hour but eventually you realized that he was hiding out in the corner by the speaker, taking sips out of a half empty cup and looking just as awkward as you felt despite the fact it was his party and these were his friends.

It must’ve been the past annoyance you felt towards his staring at the diner mixed with the alcohol starting to settle over you that drove you in his direction.

He tensed when he saw you steadily approaching but then his gaze was dropping down to your mouth and staying there.

“Stop staring at my lips.” You were spitting out at him and he flinched back at the tone of your voice, glancing around like he was checking to see if anybody had heard you. “Do you guys do this type of shit all the time?”

“W-what? What are you talking about?” He was speaking louder than normal so you could hear him over the music and leaning forward to hear you before deciding against it and pressing back into the corner. His eyebrows were pulled forward in confusion and another wave of annoyance washed over you, this time at yourself for finding him extra cute considering he was almost pouting down at you.

“Find a girl you like and pretend like you don’t have any experience so she fucks you and your friend.” You delivery was sharp and deadpanned like you were overly confident in your discovery but you knew that wasn’t what was happening here exactly, just saying anything to try and hurt him since you were feeling embarrassed.

“How could you say that?” His tone was still soft like it always was but you could tell he was offended by your accusation, pausing and looking over your shoulder so quickly you didn’t even realize it.

You were forced to in a second however when you could feel somebody approaching from behind you, already knowing who it was despite not realizing how loud and heated your conversation with Heeseung had just gotten until you turned your head to see the concerned expression on Jake’s face as he stopped a few inches away from the two of you. “What happened?”

Nobody said anything for a few beats and your jaw clenched with irritation, crossing your arms and feeling embarrassed again now that the two of them were with you. “She thinks we lied and used her.” Heeseung was butting in to explain awkwardly and you shifted uncomfortably when Jake’s surprised gaze shot over to you.

He didn’t immediately move to deny it but you could tell by his expression that he was taken off guard by the fact you were feeling that way, glancing down at your crossed arms under your chest before his gaze was softening and he started to shake his head in denial. You knew by now that you’d been wrong and they weren’t using you but you were too far into your bratty fit to completely backtrack.

Jake’s big hands were coming back up to your arms again like they had earlier when he was stopping you from leaving and your breath hitched when you looked at his fingers, a heat rolling over you at the lingering feeling of him rubbing you slowly under your skirt.

He had originally planned to defend himself and Heeseung but when he noticed your dazed out expression and wandering gaze, he paused and a smirk built back up on his face.

You let him tug you forward by your arms and spin you around softly, facing you towards Heeseung who looked extremely confused by what was happening considering you’d just been bitching him out harshly only a few seconds ago. He watched as his friends hands wrapped around your stomach and pinned your back against his front, staying still against the wall even when Jake was softly moving the both of you to the music and the tension left your shoulders.

“You feel used?” He was whispering in your ear and a breath escaped you, head falling back to land on his shoulder from the pleasure of him rubbing against you. “We aren’t using you but… something tells me you wouldn’t mind.”

The two of you were facing Heeseung which meant your backs were turned towards the party and other guest but it still felt extremely dangerous to be dancing like this, especially when his hand was sliding down your stomach and pushing under the waistline of your skirt. You faltered in place and would’ve tipped forward and fallen if it wasn’t for Heeseung instinctively stepping off the wall and catching you against him.

He tensed along with you considering he was now flush against your front and his hands were holding your hips softly to help steady you.

He was making the move to take a few steps back towards the wall but stopped when your hands were reaching forward to grab onto his shoulders, keeping him pressed against you and titling back again so you could feel Jake on your back. You were completely sandwiched between them now and a small whine slipped out of you when you felt the bolder boys fingers softly rubbing your clit through your underwear.

“Watch her hyung, so filthy for us even when she’s upset.” Heeseung seemed thrown off by being so directly addressed but he followed orders easily, staring down at you intensely and turning red in the face at the way you struggled to keep your eyes open.

You knew he was a lot bigger than both you and Jake but the difference was especially noticeable now that you were all pressed together, towering over the two of you and completely shielding your body from the view of people passing by as his friend continued to touch you.

“Kiss her Hee, I wanna see how wet she can get.” His voice was low and almost a groan and you felt his hips moving again behind you, rubbing his hardness against your back and impatiently rolling up your skirt more so he could drag himself along your folds without the second layer of fabric in the way.

It took him a second but Heeseung eventually listened, leaning down to kiss you now that you were standing and it felt particularly dirty to be meeting his lips in this position. You gasped into his mouth when Jake harshly pinched your sensitive bud, giving him the opportunity to lick into your open lips and stick his tongue deeper than he had earlier.

You were quickly learning that he was an extremely dirty kisser and he almost seemed feverish the longer he felt you against him, momentarily losing his shy demeanor and becoming completely addicted to kissing you so messily. You were turning your head so you could suck his tongue further into his mouth and a wave of satisfaction hit you when he was whining softly and bucking his hips forward, both sending you further into Jake and letting you feel his own hardness.

Jake’s finger was slipping inside you as you practically let his friend fuck your mouth with his tongue, wetness dripping down your thigh and crying out softly at the feeling of his thick digit finally pushing into you.

You were standing onto your tiptoes and dropping back down to try to get him to fuck you with his fingers but he was roughly groping your chest as a warning to stop, biting against your neck softly and moving his hand under your chin. He wasn’t exactly choking you but the feeling of his large hand completely covering your throat brought out another whine that Heeseung quickly swallowed.

“Fuck Y/N you’d let us take you right here wouldn’t you?” His voice was breathy and he rubbed himself against you again in sync with the assault his fingers continued. “Have you taken two cocks before baby or would we have to force them inside?”

You were shaking your head and clawing at Heeseung’s shoulders absentmindedly, breathy moans falling from your lips and stopping you from being able to kiss properly. He took the hint and pulled back to let you speak clearly but his eyes stayed on your wet lips and chin. “Have to force it Jake, would be so tight you wouldn’t fit.”

“Is that what you want angel? You want both of us inside you, fucking your greedy hole so loose.” He was panting as he spoke and you could feel tears coming to your eyes from the speed of his fingers inside you.

His hand on your neck was squeezing tightly for a second and taking your breath from you before he was moving it up to roughly grip your chin, tugging your head straight so you had no choice but to stare up at Heeseung who was watching the two of you with a wild expression, face completely red and glasses slightly skewed from your intense kissing. “Look at him and say it.”

You shook your head for a second and winced, feeling overwhelmingly shy for some reason now that you were looking at the less forward boy despite the fact you were still pressed against him and could feel that he was also hard against your stomach. You could still taste him in your mouth even but you weren’t able to bring yourself to say it right away, snapping back out of it when Jake lifted his hand to lightly slap your cheek in warning.

“I want you.” You were staring up at him as you rushed it out in an embarrassed mumble, your cheeks heating up more but feeling the familiar twist in your stomach when his eyes flashed with something you hadn’t seen before. “Want you both.”

Heeseung was moving forward before you could even process it and suddenly you were kissing again, his big hands coming up to cup your face softly and keep you against him as he fully soaked you in.

You were getting needy and impatient, Jake’s thick fingers not being enough considering the amount of touching and overstimulation you were getting between the two of them. You almost wanted to cry thinking about the party happening behind you, wanting nothing more than to be alone so you could completely give yourself over to the two boys.

It was beyond dirty and completely unlike you considering you weren’t a big fan of hookups in general, never even considering letting two people share you at once, but you’d never craved something so badly and you felt like you’d nearly die if you didn’t get to feel them soon.

Heeseung was pulling off the kiss and watching you as he took deep breaths, eyes frantic and continuously glancing between the way you were panting against Jake’s shoulder and his friends expression as he pushed his fingers deeper inside you.

“Jake, make them leave.” He was muttering quickly and your eyes widened in surprise for a second hearing him speak so directly, a similar reaction happening behind you considering Jake’s hands were stuttering for a second.

They had some sort of silent communication over your shoulder that didn’t take long for you to understand considering Jake was taking his hand out of your skirt and softly leaning you onto Heeseung’s tall frame. You could feel his lips pressing against the side of your head before he was backing up to presumably tell the guest to leave.

Heeseung was awkwardly holding you for a second and you felt slight whiplash from his change of demeanor again, happy when he at least started to move and take you back down to his bedroom.

He was gently laying you on the bed and sitting back up on his knees to watch you for a second, scanning down your body as your chest continued to roughly rise and fall from your near orgasm just a few seconds ago. He was looking more hesitate now like he had originally and your gaze softened as you looked at him watching you so intensely, remembering this was his first time doing something so intense.

Your hand was coming out to grab onto his and he was freezing from his position beside you, kneeling on the bed and towering over you but not looking the least bit intimidating.

“Please touch me Hee.” Your voice was still coming out in a whine, desperately tugging on his hand to try to get him to fulfill your request. His eyes widened at your tone and he glanced down at your hand over his before shaking his head softly, stuttering out something you couldn’t understand. “Please baby please, I’ll show you how but I can’t wait.”

“F-fuck we should really let Jake come back, I won’t be any good.” He was shaking his head again but not moving his hand away when you were lifting it and placing it against your stomach, your muscles clenching under his warm skin and a heavy breath slipping from your lips.

Heeseung watched you with wide eyes as you pushed his hand under your skirt, struggling a bit and whining softly considering he wasn’t helping at all. You released his hand for a second and thankfully he didn’t remove it from your stomach, giving you the chance to unbutton it and pull it down your legs so he could have more access.

You were holding his wrist softly and moving him back down towards your underwear, back arching up off the bed in a small cry when he was finally touching you over the fabric and you heard his breath catch in his throat when he felt your wetness soaking the material.

“You’re s-so good please Hee please.” You were crying out softly and rocking your hips up against his hand, a handful of tears slipping from your eyes considering you were so overwhelmed and he still wasn’t really touching you. “Fuck you’re so big.”

The last comment slipped out accidentally, completely distracted by the fact his hand almost covered the entirety of your cunt, but it seemed like he liked it considering he was shifting on the bed and finally applying some pressure to you.

A low moan sounded through the room and it took you a second to even realize it was coming from you, his fingers soft and inexperienced as he started rubbing you and you felt him tense when your wet panties were sliding to the side and he was touching your bare cunt for the first time. Your hands were instinctively coming up to hug his arm and try to tug him down towards you, grateful when he shifted so he was laying beside you and not kneeling anymore.

He kept his fingers on you even when you were pulling him in for a messy kiss, gliding your tongue over his lips and moaning into his open mouth when his fingers slipped again and applied more pressure.

You didn’t realize Jake had entered the room even after the bed dipped down under his weight, only snapping out of your haze when Heeseung removed his lips from yours so he could stutter out an apology to his friend. You were sitting up slightly to look at him and a whine left you automatically seeing how dark his gaze was as he watched you desperately moving against his friends hand.

“She’s as much yours as she is mine.” He was dismissing the other boys apology in a curt statement but it made your head spin, the implication of them both owning you together sending another wave of heat through you and another sob hit you. “Hyung, hold her legs open for me.”

Heeseung was pausing like he was trying to figure out how to do that, eventually scooting behind you so he could tug you up between his legs. You were resting against his chest and stomach, elbows on his thighs and you could feel how hard he was pressed tight to your lower back. He moved you easily, like you barely weighed anything and his size made you ten times wetter than you had been before.

You felt extra exposed now that his hands weren’t covering you, embarrassment coming back when he was hitching up your knees so he could spread your legs and completely expose you to Jake who was watching the two of you curiously.

“Look how messy she is. She must really like you hyung.” He was smiling at the two of you but it didn’t meet his eyes fully, something darker and more intense behind his expression and you tried not to feel too intimidated when he was moving closer to you on the bed.

He watched you for a second more before he was pressing a kiss against your knee, moving his lips down your right thigh and pausing for just a second before he was putting his mouth on your wet core. A gasp flew out of you and you would’ve clamped his head in your thighs if it wasn’t for Heeseung’s hand gripping your knee tightly and keeping them spread open.

“Fuck fuck.” Your hips were instinctively moving with Jake’s mouth, practically making out with your dripping pussy and you were once again overwhelmed in a way you’d never experienced before. Heeseung was softly brushing your hair out of your face with his free hand but you barely even noticed, the room filling up with the sounds of Jake’s mouth on you.

His tongue was pushing past your folds and prodding at your entrance, drawing another low whine from you when he was glancing up at you from between your legs. His eyes were mischievous and you could barely hold the eye contact for more than a few seconds, leaning back against Heeseung’s chest and gripping his arm for support.

“Take her top off.” He was pulling off of you to speak to the boy behind you and your eyes locked on your wetness coating his chin, his lips quirking into a smirk when he noticed what you were focusing on before he was softly kissing your thigh again.

Heeseung easily sat you up, almost rough in the way he was moving you so weightlessly if it wasn’t for how gentle his hands were. He was pulling your top off and fixing your hair before pausing and you felt his hips twitch from underneath you, figuring he just be looking at your bare chest. You knew he wouldn’t move on his own so you didn’t bother waiting, taking his free hand that wasn’t on your knee and forcing him to roughly pull at your chest.

Jake was smiling at your neediness before going back between your legs, the pleasure from his mouth paired with Heeseung’s hands on your chest and nipples was almost too much and you only lasted about thirty seconds before you were roughly tugging on the younger boys hair to warn him to stop.

He froze completely and looked up at you, beautiful between your legs and even more so with the concern in his gaze. He quickly realized what you were needing however and he lost the soft expression.

“Sure you can take us both?” He was asking as he sat up on his knees, looping his hands under your thighs and tugging you forward so you were sliding closer to him on the bed. Your head was on Heeseung’s lap now and he let out a soft whine when you were instinctively nuzzling against the hardness in his pants, your cheek pressing on him.

You didn’t bother with verbally answering him considering how dizzy you felt, knowing your voice would just come out slurred and weak, but you spread your legs more in front of him so he could fully get the memo. His eyes were darkening more before he was gesturing something you couldn’t understand to the boy behind you, a cry coming from your lips when he was shifting and moving away from you.

“Be patient sweet girl, he’s just moving down here.” Jake’s voice was coming through again and a pout formed on your face instinctively at his soft tone, getting close to release twice now without finishing and feeling overly sensitive and needy. “She’s pretty isnt she?”

You were confused for a second about who he was talking to until you realized Heeseung was down by the end of the bed now, fully seeing you for the first time since he’d undressed you and staring at your body with widened eyes. They flickered up to yours when he realized you were watching and waiting for a response.

“So pretty, she’s so pretty.” His voice was weak and Jake laughed softly at the taken tone his friend had, nodding in agreement before he was shifting again.

“Gonna fuck you first alright baby? Get you nice and ready for hyung.” His voice was dropping lower and getting more serious, tugging his shirt over his head and barely giving you a second to process anything before he was undoing his belt with one hand, holding your legs open with the other.

“Both I want both.” You were whining out in disagreement, a small sob hitting you again at the thought of not being stretched by both of them together.

Jake paused for a second before he was glancing to his side towards Heeseung, waiting and having some silent communication together until he was turning back towards you and nodding. “You’ll get us both don’t worry, still need to stretch you first.”

You were almost worried he’d go back to using his fingers, as much as you liked them inside you you were starting to think you’d die if you didn’t have something bigger in the next few seconds. Thankfully he seemed to be feeling the same considering he was wasting no time before lining himself up with your entrance, kissing your forehead quickly before pushing inside you.

Your breath caught in your throat and your back arched off the bed instinctively, bunching the sheets up in a tight fist and you wished Heeseung was close enough to hold onto. You didn’t get a chance to look at Jake’s size but he was clearly bigger than you had planned for considering the stretch you were feeling just from his thick tip inside you, a pained cry filling the room at the same time he hissed in pleasure.

“Fuck Y/N, how are you so fucking tight.” He was speaking through clenched teeth and his head dropped down onto your shoulder, shutting his eyes to try and calm down before he came too early. “Baby you’ve got to stop clenching around me or I won’t last.”

“You’re hurting her Jake.” Heeseung’s concerned voice was coming from the right and you glanced over at him, face pulled into a grimace still but softening slightly at the worry on his face.

It made you feel better that he was more concerned with your pleasure than potentially not being able to fuck you but you almost sobbed again at the thought of not getting to feel him tonight and you quickly started to shake your head and reach a hand out towards him.

“Can take it, I can take it I promise.” You didn’t need to say much for Jake to believe you considering he was using your distraction as the perfect time to fully push his length inside you.

Your hands were wrapping around his back to claw at his skin, somehow not noticing how broad he was until he was on top of you like this but you felt the familiar heat of pleasure finally resurfacing below the pain and you practically whimpered at the boy. “Please fuck me, please I need it.”

He was kissing your lips gently before taking a second to adjust his position, meeting your eyes and then pulling himself nearly all the way out of you. The previous stretch did almost nothing to prepare you for the feeling of him slamming back inside you, never feeling so stuffed before and almost getting lightheaded from how full of his cock you were. You couldn’t imagine fitting more inside you but you glanced back at Heeseung and another wave of desperation hit.

Jake let out a low growl before he was aggressively lifting you up off the bed, holding you still in his lap for a moment with a slow buck of his hips to keep you moaning and whining and you vaguely heard him barking an order towards the other boy.

You didn’t fully understand what was happening, rocking your hips and riding Jake lazily with continued cries and begs for him to lay you back down and fuck you properly. When he was finally listening and laying you back down on the bed, this time Heeseung was behind you and a breath of relief escaped you.

Part of you felt guilty that his first time wasn’t necessarily romantic or intimate but it was hard to think about when he started to push his cock into you alongside Jake’s, the stretch almost unbearable and you heard Jake spit out something else you couldn’t make out.

You assumed he was telling the inexperienced boy to stop because he froze up underneath you and laid his forehead on sweaty shoulder, small whimpers vibrating your skin as he tried to stop himself from either pushing all the way inside before you were ready or cumming from the tight and wet squeeze.

“Fuck she’s so wet.” His voice behind you was making you dizzy, taking on a deeper tone you hadn’t heard from him before and you reached a hand back just to feel any part of his skin.

The two boys helped lower you back onto their cocks and you nearly blacked out from how deep they were inside you, the pleasure multiplied by the fact they were both sharing your hole together and you were finally going to be fucked open by them.

“Gonna ruin this pussy for anyone else.” Jake was whispering it into your mouth and you watched him with widened eyes, shivering when he was licking against your tongue sloppily before tugging your head back by your hair so you were resting against Heeseung’s shoulder. “Always gonna need two cocks filling this nasty hole up, never going to be satisfied with just one again.”

“Please.” You were gasping the word out in one breath, repeating it a few times in a slurred fit of begging before trying to gather as much energy as you could to lift yourself up and down on their cocks. You failed and fell back down on shaky thighs, crying softly and rolling your hips slightly. “Fuck me please fuck me, ruin me. I want to be yours.”

That seemed to cause something to snap in the boy in front of you and he wasted no more time, aggressively fucking himself inside you and at the same time lifting you up a bit so you were coming back down onto Heeseung’s cock too, helping the other boy set a steady rhythm considering he was already close just from the foreplay you’d had earlier since he was particularly sensitive.

“You’re ours, gonna fucking ruin you.” Jake was talking continuously into your shoulder but you were barely able to hear him after a few seconds, lost in the feeling of the stretch and how deep they were inside you. Both boys were caging you in and someone’s hands were roughly playing with your nipples, anothers tugging your hair and it was all so much you hardly felt like you were able to breathe.

You were a mess of skin and lust, your whines mixing with a combination of their low moans and you were suddenly very grateful they’d cleared out the apartment so you didn’t have to worry about biting your tongue.

Heeseung was reaching forward to press down on your stomach and you heard a groan slip out of him. “Fuck dude, I can feel us inside her.”

That seemed to be enough for him considering he was sucking in a sharp breath, worrying you for a second before you realized he was cumming inside you. You were upset for half a second before you thought about both of them filling you up with their cum, mixing together and leaking out of your used hole onto Heeseung’s bed.

“Cum inside Jake.” You were begging him and he gave you a bewildered look, almost seeming like he was going to disagree until he leaned back and saw the absolute desperation and need on your face. His jaw clenched and he was fucking you even rougher, barely noticing his friend slipping out of you and helping you rock against Jake since you were both exhausted.

He was rushing forward to kiss you and your teeth clashed, drunk from the taste of his spit in your mouth and his cock slamming into you even after he was coming undone and filling you up even more. Heeseung’s hands were slipping between you and Jake to rub your clit softly and surge of pride hit you, moaning into Jake’s mouth and letting him suck your tongue into it.

The extra stimulation was all you needed to fall apart and both boys held you between them as your hips twitched and your stomach clenched in pleasure, feeling Jake slip out of you so he could watch the way your hole clenched around nothing and started to leak with the mess the three of you had caused.

You were too exhausted to feel awkward even though now that they weren’t stuffing you so full you couldn’t think, you were slightly humiliated and feeling a bit dirty from how sweaty you were between the two friends.

All it took was a hand from behind you gently rubbing your stomach and a soft kiss on your forehead from the other boy to calm your nerves, falling back onto the bed together in a mess of limbs and nervous giggles.

[nightshadedumplings]

Not to yuck anyone's yum, but I do get tired of "pretty boy" this, "cute boy" that. I would love more stuff talking about burly, hairy men. What about a big beefy biker guy, covered in hair and tats with what looks like a huge beer gut, only to find out as the months go on that he's very, very pregnant? Maybe he doesn't even realize it until his belly button has popped out and he can see the kicks from inside his swollen gut jutting out.

How about a broad, fat trucker who spends most of his time on the road, and finds himself gaining weight? He thinks it's just the long hours and days of sitting on his ass, until his water suddenly breaks in the middle of a haul.

For a historical or fantasy setting, maybe a brawny mercenary doesn't really know much about how pregnancy works, or just doesn't believe he can get pregnant anymore. He finds his armor getting tighter, and no matter how much he tries to work it off, his belly just keeps getting bigger and rounder. Maybe he gets a larger set that he can manage to squeeze himself into even in the final months, but it turns out to be a big mistake when he goes into labor and has to struggle to get out of it again, all while a baby is crowning between his legs.