#twelve times i’ve tried to be friends with a man and he goes “i have something to tell you…. 🥺” | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ficsforeren · 3 years

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The Last Song - Chapter 16

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Eren Jaeger X Female Reader feat. Armin Arlert

Genre: Rockstar AU, Friends with Benefits, Angst, Smut, Fluff, Romance, Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn

Series Summary: Eren Jaeger has two personas, a charismatic lead vocal who has lost himself in fame, and a boy who struggles with depression, seeking for someone to bring him back to where he was twelve years ago. Where he only knew love in the form of your name.

Chapter Summary: Desperate to win you back, Eren tries everything he can to revive whatever is left in your relationship. Meanwhile, you learn a new secret about yourself, one that you don't think you'll ever be ready to tell him anytime soon.

Content Warnings: explicit sex (cunnilingus, blow job, fingering, hand job, car sex, dry humping, drunk sex, public sex, unprotected sex, one night stand, choking, treating women like objects, dub-con, corruption, face-sitting, sex toys, daddy kink, praise kink, slight degradation, etc), substance abuse (use of drugs, alcohol, tobacco), severe abandonment issues, childhood trauma, anxiety attacks, depression, adultery, physical abuse towards men and women, family issues, abusive parents, crude words, dark humor, mention of sexual assault/rape, harassment, car accident and child abuse.

Poster art by the most talented @rainbuniart (follow her on Twitter)

The apartment he’s been staying in for months doesn’t feel the same without you in it.

It has the same scent, the same crack on the ceiling in the corner of your kitchen, the same dent on the floor near the bathroom door, but it doesn’t feel… like home anymore. It’s just like another hotel room to him, vacant and eerie, with loneliness surrounding him like a second skin.

Eren closes the front door behind him, his spine pressed against it as he closes his lids. I can fix this. I’ll just have to find a way.

What do I have to do to win you back?

His phone rings, the vibration reverberates through the fabric of his jeans. “Levi,” he greets in a sigh.

“Where the fuck have you been? I’ve been trying to call you for hours.”

“I’m sorry.” It’s robotic the way he says it, but Levi swallows down his protest, only clicking his tongue in annoyance.

“Is the new single ready yet?”

“No.”

“Your next solo concert is in a month, Jaeger. We need a new song to close the damn show.”

“Give me two weeks. I’ll give you a new single in two weeks.”

“You better not waste my fucking time.”

He throws his head back, his skull meeting the door with a dull thud. “I won’t.”

The weariness in his voice reaches the other line, resting heavily on Levi’s ears. “You okay there, kid?” There’s a slight change in his manager’s voice, a hint of concern.

“Yeah, just…” Eren has two fingers rubbing against the side of his temple, an attempt to soothe the throb in his head. “Tired.”

It’s not just that, Levi can guess it. With an impatient exhale, the older man responds with, “Get some sleep. I’ll see you back at the studio tomorrow at ten.”

“I thought we were supposed to meet at eight.”

“I’m postponing it,” he says. “But if you’re late just by a fucking minute, you can kiss your career goodbye. You got that?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Get some sleep. I mean it.”

When he shuts off his phone, the overwhelming silence follows and he knows he won’t be able to catch a wink of sleep this way. Maybe it’s better if he just goes somewhere else. Maybe he can just crash in the studio, there’s a couch comfortable enough for him to sleep on. At least he can keep his mind distracted over there.

He walks into your bedroom, an anchor chained to his feet as he can smell a whiff of your perfume better in there. He searches through one of the suitcases he left there at your place, trying to find the notebook he always uses to pour his lyrics into. What he finds is something else.

He watches the clear pocket resting on his palm, with white, crystal powder sitting inside it. He’s sure he has thrown it away, but there it is, its package still sealed perfectly, begging to be opened. He can still remember the sudden flood of dopamine in his brain when he took it, giving him a state of euphoria that makes him feel complete. This can help. Just a few snorts of this cocaine can replace the emptiness of your bed. Just a few, and he’ll feel alive again. Even without you.

Just a little…

Eren walks back into the kitchen, one hand gripping at the edge of the counter before he takes a deep breath. He tears open the package, pours the powder into his sink, and turns on the tap.

The water washes everything away in an instant.

He finds his notebook, hurriedly shoves it into his bag, and grabs his hardcase with his Starcaster bass sitting inside. He grabs a pen, tugs the cap off with his teeth, and writes down a note.

“I’m going to stay at the studio from now on to work on a new song,” he writes down on a piece of paper, taken from his notebook. “Please call me when you see this.” No, he corrects himself, scratching the last three words as he doesn’t want to sound demanding. “When you’re ready to talk,” he corrects the sentence. “I’ll be waiting.”

What if she doesn’t? Another thought enters his head. What if she doesn’t call? What if she no longer wants anything to do with you, just like your mother did?

A simple question can morph into something horrifying when the last time he asked that question, his answer was proven wrong. The last time he hoped that things would turn out for the better, everything turned for the worst.

He can feel his anxiety coming alive again and the thought of dousing himself in alcohol has never been this tempting before. But Eren grits his teeth, trying to keep himself focused.

Please… Please come home to me.

With shaky hands, he writes down his last line. “Call me and I’ll come home to you.”

***

You walk back into your apartment the next day, stepping inside your home like you were breaking in into someone else’s house, quiet and nervous. You don’t know you’ve been holding your breath until you see the note Eren left on the counter. You exhale in relief, knowing he wasn’t there and you wonder why do I feel this way? You were sure you were ready to talk to him this morning. You’ve been trying to collect every bit of courage on your way home. But now that you realize he’s not in sight, you feel comforted by the silence.

Am I… still afraid to face him?

Running your eyes from one word to another, your heart jerks at the scratches he made on paper. You can barely make out the words, but it’s enough to let you know how distraught he was when he made it. His handwriting is messy, as if he was in a rush, like something was chasing after him when he wrote down the note. You crumpled the paper in your hand, tossing it to the trash bin as looking at it will only diminish your courage to face him sooner.

You check on your phone. No calls or messages are coming from him, no matter how much he wanted to call. He respected the boundary you set up. He wouldn’t cross the line, not until you’re ready.

When will I be ready?

You don’t call him.

***

It’s only been three days since he last heard from you, but it might as well be an eternity. He’s sitting on the couch inside his studio, his guitar lying still on his lap as he waits for the rest of his teammates to arrive. His thumb hovers over your number for the eighth time that morning, but only now does he have the bravery to call. His patience is running thin and he’s worried to death.

He presses his cellphone to his ear, waiting. Please pick up the phone, he prays with closed eyes, his eyebrows sewn together with his breath stuck in his throat.

“The number you are calling cannot be reached—"

He sighs, pressing the end button before he tosses his phone to the side. He’s lost, not knowing what else to do. If he suddenly barges into your apartment, would it anger you further? Would it make you feel uncomfortable? Worsen the situation?

Why won’t you answer me? Eren rests his elbows on his knees, his fingers clamping tightly against one another. What am I supposed to do to fix this?

His phone’s screen lights up. There’s a message coming to his phone. Eren retrieves it back with his heartrate escalating, expecting it to come from you, but it’s not.

Mikasa…

Eren’s mind starts to churn and before he can think about this further, he lets his heart tell him what to do. He calls her.

“Mikasa,” he says, speaking softly to the phone. “I need to see you.”

***

“Eren!”

He has only taken not more than ten steps inside the lobby of Oberoi—a luxurious five-star hotel, famous for its breathtaking seaside view and majestic open-air theatre—when a pair of arms circle around his neck. His name is spoken in a longing call, accompanied by a giggle and a whiff of coumarin from her perfume as she pulls him down into her embrace, her chest pushing against the thin fabric of his black shirt.

“You don’t know how long I’ve been wanting to see you,” Mikasa Ackerman whispers against his ear, her cherry red lipstick staining the skin of his earlobe. “You’re finally here in my arms again.”

They’re not alone. A small group of people lounging in the couches, exchanging conversations with their eyes on their phones, most likely waiting for their drivers to finish transporting their luggage. Eren slides one hand around her waist, bringing her even closer to him as he speaks lowly in her ear. “Not here,” he says, sending goosebumps breaking on her skin. “Let’s go to your room.”

Her blush blooms vividly on her cheeks, pulling away to give him a shy yet eager nod. She intertwines her hand with his, guiding him toward the main elevator with her high heels clicking against the marbled floor. Eren follows without a word, her skin feels porcelain smooth underneath his palm.

When the elevator stops at her floor, she rushes to her room, sliding her card to unlock her door. She welcomes him inside with her heart about to burst in the same amount of joy and thrill she experienced on the night she invited him to her hotel room.

The second the door is closed, she drops her purse to the floor, turning around to leap back into his arms. She has one hand on his face, standing on her tiptoe as she leans in. His name escapes her curvy lips again, the taste of his bergamot perfume sitting on her tongue, a mere couple inches of gap separating their lips.

But before she can close the distance, Eren grabs a hold of her wrist, pushes her against the wall, and pins it harshly above her head. “Don’t touch me,” he growls, keeping her frozen in her place, her eyes widening in shock.

It feels like a hard slap to the face, searing pain cutting through her heart. “E-Eren?” There’s fear in her voice, her dark eyes shaking as she runs them over his features, puzzled. It’s the first time she’s seeing this side of him. This cold, almost ruthless demeanor, staring at her like she’s the most revolting creature he’s ever landed his eyes on.

“I don’t want your fucking hands near me,” he states, his husky voice turning menacing. “You got that?”

Her stomach somersaults when she gives him a shaky nod, and he lets her go none too gently, expanding the spaces between them at once. Her legs almost crumble underneath her weight, tremors running through her body.

Eren turns around, walking away from her. His vexation radiates off his body no matter how much he tries to suppress it. “I’m gonna say this as clearly as I can,” he says with a sigh, running his hand through his hair. “I want you to stay away from me.”

“W-what?” She’s still lay pressed against the wall, almost sliding down to the floor when she feels her legs giving up on her. “Why?”

Why? He repeats in his head, unable to comprehend the fact that she doesn’t feel any remorse for her obsession with him. He takes a sit on the edge of her bed, taking a deep breath to maintain his calm. “Mikasa, you’ve been invading my privacy,” he says, staring straight into her eyes. “You keep chasing after me, keep asking people about me when I’ve told you so many times that I no longer wanted to have anything to do with you. I’m sick of it.”

She watches him with her lips parted, shocked, and shattered inside. “Why are you…” Her forehead creases, her weak protest turns to whimpers. “Why would you say that? Eren—”

“Look, I don’t feel that way about you.” He doesn’t care if he’s being heartless. She needs to understand. “And I never will.”

It’s like he’s taking every bit of her breath forcefully with his lines. “I… I don’t believe you.”

“Jesus Christ.” It’s just the beginning and his impatience is already running thin. “You need to start taking a fucking hint, Mikasa! Have I ever responded to your messages? Have I ever answered your calls? I blocked your numbers over and over again—hell, I even changed mine several times to avoid you but you still managed to contact me. Please, stop.” He turns weary. “I thought I could put a blind eye on your obsession over me, but you hurt someone—someone that’s very important to me—so I won’t just sit still any longer. Stay. Away. From. Me,” he emphasizes each word. “Honestly, I don’t even know why you like me so much.”

Out of all the spiteful things he uttered, the last line hurts her the most. It breaks her apart to see him act clueless as if he doesn’t remember the things he did to her in the past, the connection they had, the secrets they shared. But Mikasa remembers it all.

She remembers it all too well.

Eren saved her the first time she met. It was at the beginning of her career, a path she courageously took as she had nothing to her name, and no connections to make a living. She left her hometown behind, moving to the capital to try and take her chances.

It was just another night at a local bar, one that she had visited often to let herself surrounded by the sound of strangers cheering for their favorite football teams; their endless glasses of beers clanking against one another. Mikasa hated the silence of her apartment, as the memory of her uncle knocking against her bedroom door echoed more vehemently that way, making her stomach lurch in both disgust and fear. It was a trauma she had been dealing with ever since she was a child, one that she could forget for a moment as long as she had something or someone to distract herself from it.

There was a guy, a familiar face but not a friendly one, whom she noticed had been staring at her whenever he thought she wasn’t looking. That night, instead of watching her movements from afar, he took a seat on the stool beside her at the bar. “Let me buy you a drink,” he said, raising a hand to grab the bartender’s attention.

“No, thank you.” Mikasa raised her glass, still full with her gin and tonic. “I’m all set.”

“I insist.” He ordered another glass for her, sliding it down the table until his fingertips brushed against hers. Without waiting, she moved her hand away but the man was nimble on his feet. He took possession of her wrist, his thumb rubbing sinful strokes against her veins. “You’ve been coming here every night for the last week. Always alone too. No boyfriend?”

She glared at him, trying to retract her hand but he gripped onto it harder. She flinched, pain searing through her veins. “Let me go.”

“You must be lonely.” The man snickered, his fingers crawling on her skin. “I can take care of you.”

Mikasa scanned her surrounding. No one was paying attention to them, the room was too full of laughter that their voices sounded nothing more but whispers in the dark. “Let me go,” she repeats when she feels his hand creeping up her thigh, moving past her skirt. “I said—”

“I think that’s far enough,” Eren, a man whose name she didn’t know at that time, muttered as he slid down his shot glass, out of tequila. He had been sitting alone on her other side, though she didn’t notice his presence until he made a sound. His hair was messily tied up in a bun, with a few silky strands falling over his temple. With a nod of his head, he silently asked the bartender to fill up his glass once more.

“Were you talking to me?” The man said, still not taking his hand off her.

Eren shifted his green eyes toward him. They were heavy, clouded with alcohol and something more that she couldn’t figure out just yet. “I’m telling you to keep your fucking hands off her,” he said. Eren’s voice hadn’t become familiar to her yet, but it offered more comfort and relief than anyone else’s.

The man, albeit a few inches shorter, was much more muscular than him but Eren showed no signs of fear. He gritted his teeth, jumped down his stool, and took two long strides toward him, passing Mikasa who was staring at them with nervous eyes. Eren simply turned around, leaning his back against the counter.

“Wanna say it again, big boy?” The man challenged, his face hovering dangerously close to him.

Eren stayed mute. It would be a waste of energy talking to him, he assumed. Nevertheless, his eyes still pierced deeply into the other man’s dark ones. The bulky male regarded it not just as a taunt but also as an insult, and he grabbed Eren by his collar, hissing out his threat between a string of expletives.

Mikasa didn’t know that Eren was making any movements until she saw the man turn pale. Slowly, he dragged his face down, his eyes landing on the silver glint of Eren’s pocket knife pressing against his stomach. The tip of it was seeping through his shirt, grazing perilously against his skin.

“Walk away,” Eren said, his voice unexpectedly soothing though the threat that lied behind it was anything but. He was in his worst mood that night, his thoughts in disarray and disrupted. Combined with the amount of alcohol sitting in his system, Eren was nothing but dangerous.

The man swallowed thickly, his eyes were still filled with rage but they were quickly overcome by terror once he saw the look in his eyes. It wasn’t merely an empty threat, he quickly realized as he removed his fist from Eren’s collar. Carefully, he backed away from him, taking a couple of steps before he rushed his way to the door.

Eren spun around in his seat, taking another shot of his drink. His body was relaxed, acting as if nothing happened.

“Thank you,” Mikasa said, still perplexed by the situation. Eren only spared her a glance before he stood up and threw some cash on the counter to pay for his drink.

“Don’t mention it,” he said as he strolled past her, never turning his head around to see her again. He exited the room, leaving no trace of him behind, just like a ghost.

But it was okay. She remembered him.

His face was still fresh on her mind when they were reunited once again eight months later. She had been scouted as a model, all thanks to her beauty and tall stature, and she was making steadfast progress on making her name known in the industry. She was lucky that she got scouted by a well-known agency, but most of it was because of her effort and talent.

A fashion show was held that night in Paris, and both Mikasa and Eren were invited to watch the live event first hand. Eren didn’t remember her, not in the slightest, but she did. She caught a glimpse of him during the opening ceremony, dressed impeccably handsome in a white shirt and a black blazer. He looked unimpressed, sitting at the front row with boredom written on his face as models walked down the runway. Mikasa couldn’t tear her eyes away from him. What were the chances of them being in the same industry?

She tried to figure out who he was, asking her manager as many questions as she could without raising suspicions. “Well, seeing how that’s Levi Ackerman sitting beside him,” she answered her with a revolted snort. “I’m sure that’s Magath’s new doll. Eren Jaeger, I think his name is. I think he’s in a band—I forget what it’s called. I’m amazed that he could be invited here. Must have good connections.”

Eren Jaeger… Even his name sounded perfect.

It must be fate, she repeated in her head. She had spent months trying to know the identity of the man who saved her at that bar, even revisiting the place more times than necessary within a week in hopes to see him again. Eight months. It took her eight months for fate to walk in and tie the red strings that attached their fingers.

Eren was always accompanied closely by his manager, she learned. The shorter male always did all the talking for him, while Eren just smiled once in a while, looking pretty and giving a polite nod if necessary. She didn’t have the chance to say hello, nor the bravery to do it. She was unsure, worried that he might have forgotten about her. She didn’t know how to introduce herself either.

Later that night, she saw him walking out of the elevator by himself when she was about to do the opposite. It was quite late, probably a couple of hours before midnight, and he was dressed casually in a band tee and jeans, his leather jacket keeping him warm from the autumn breeze. His bun wasn’t styled perfectly like it was ten hours ago when she saw him. She thought he was already resting in his room as she didn’t see him at the after-party. But now that she did, she couldn’t help but be curious about it. So instead of returning to her room, she tightened her coat around her body and trailed after him.

He exited the hotel and walked to the nearest pub. He took a seat at the bar, like usual, muttering a simple, “Thanks,” with no smile when the bartender handed him a glass full of whiskey. He took a big gulp, eyebrows knitting in reaction when the taste of alcohol stained his tongue, but he didn’t let three seconds to waste before he took another sip.

Eren drank his alcohol like he wanted to forget, Mikasa thought, as if he wanted to escape reality. And she understood perfectly how that felt.

She braced herself to take the empty stool right next to him. She wanted to introduce herself, wanted to thank him again, perhaps even exchange a friendly conversation. “Ere—”

“Hey, I know you.” Two foreigners, most likely in their mid-twenties, stopped her before she could get close enough. “Aren’t you that lingerie model from Chantelle?”

She staggered on her feet but she tried to break past them. “Excuse me—“

“Dude, wait, I think she is.” One of those males grabbed her wrist, holding it mid-air to stop her from taking a step further. He snickered, the smell of alcohol filling the little spaces between them. “Meeting a model this late at night? Alone? Must be our luck.”

They were making a ruckus, garnering people’s attention but they were too drunk to notice. Even so, no one stepped in to interrupt. No one stepped in to save her even when it was obvious she was trying to break free from his hold. No one, except him.

Eren Jaeger saved her again, with that unfazed, vacant look in his eyes with zero amount of fear in his veins. It made her believe further in fate, how they must be connected somehow by something invisible. Because this doesn’t just happen without a reason, does it? Especially not twice in a row.

“You saved me again,” Mikasa told him with a sheepish smile, taking a seat beside him. Eren’s focus was still on his glass, wanting to douse himself further in alcohol to forget the call he just received not an hour ago. He ignored her, or maybe he was too preoccupied to hear her, she wasn’t sure. “I’m Mikasa Ackerman.”

“Eren,” he said, ordering another glass for himself. He glanced toward her, his eyes half-opened when he asked her out of courtesy. “Wanna drink?”

She eagerly nodded. “I’ll have what you have.”

“Give us a bottle then,” he told the bartender, and the man handed it over to him.

Eren couldn’t remember much what happened that night, but he listened to her story as it was a bearable option to keep himself distracted from his own thoughts. He kept drinking one glass after another until he started slurring his words. He was a heavy drinker, but even his body couldn’t take it when he started to drink more than he usually did.

“What made you drink?” She asked him. Unlike him, she was still on her first glass, her whiskey only half-finished.

“To forget,” he said, his head hanging low, hazy eyes fixated on his glass.

“Forget what?”

“Life.”

“You look like you’re doing okay with it.”

He snorted. “Yeah.”

“Can I… ask what happened?” She tentatively questioned, not expecting him to agree but Eren sighed, his eyes closed as he rubbed his temple.

“I just got a call from the hospital,” he said, his voice losing strength. “Overdosed on cocaine, they said. That’s the third fucking time in the last two months. He almost didn’t make it this time.”

“Who?”

“My dad.”

Every time she asked him a question, he answered her. The alcohol fogged his thoughts and made him break his facade involuntarily. Under different circumstances, Eren wouldn’t have told a soul about this—he wasn’t even ready to tell you. But he was a different person that night. He wasn’t strong. He needed solace.

And when Mikasa shared her story, he listened to it with droopy eyes, his hand shook a little when he poured her another fill of her whiskey. He learned that her parents died from an accident when she was nine years old. Their car crashed on their way home from their trip, taking both of their lives at the same time. The windshield was shattered, needle-like glass cutting through their skins, and Mikasa was there, sitting on the backseat with a haunting look in her eyes as she watched how the rain washed over the blood on her mother’s face. That night, she lost everything. And with her uncle, Kenny Ackerman, being the only relative she had left, she was sent to his home.

Kenny worked her like a slave in his house. She was unwanted and unloved, and he made sure she knew that for every second of her life. She stayed there for years, unable to break free, afraid that she’d be beaten up to death if she tried. “This is a secret between us, okay?” He would always say. “Keep your mouth closed and I’ll let you stay in my house. Tell anyone else about this and I’ll toss you away. A girl like you wouldn’t survive a day in the streets.”

As a little girl, she had no other choice but to obey.

These talks about their past made them closer, at least on her part. Eren didn’t have any recollection of these conversations, he doesn’t and he won’t. He could barely stand on his feet when the bartender told them that they were closing. With his arm around her shoulders, she walked him back toward the hotel. Eren couldn’t remember his room number so she took him back to hers. He passed out almost immediately on her bed with his boots still intact. Mikasa closed the door behind her.

He woke up about an hour later, his brain thrummed painfully against his skull but not much. Mikasa walked out of the bathroom with her body shrouded in her bathrobe, surprised to see Eren perched on the edge of her bed.

He lifted his face slightly to catch a glimpse of her face, his eyes seem more blue than green under the yellowish light of her bed lamp.

Flustered, she asked, “H-how are you feeling?”

He didn’t answer. Probably couldn’t, which was why she walked closer to him. Going down to her knees before him, Mikasa landed a soft touch on his cheek, framing his face. He’s so handsome, she thought, even in that state. Everything about him was. With a palpitating heart, she leaned up and pressed a gentle kiss on his cheek, close enough to almost bruise the corner of his lips.

She looked up at him, her face reddening and her eyes gleamed with desire. Eren knew that look. She was just like everyone else, perceiving him as an object of their sexual desire.

“Do you want me?” He asked and she blushed harder.

“Umm, I—”

“I’ll do it if you want me.” He was emotionless, peering into her eyes like he was staring into the void. “I’ll be yours for the night if you want me.”

To Mikasa, it sounded like a dream come true. Lord was being generous to bring the man she’d been searching for right into her arms.

“I want you,” she said and that sealed the deal. To her, it was everything. To him, it was a way to fill the crater in his chest. Anyone would do. It didn’t have to be her. She wasn’t special.

Eren let his hands wander, let them move on their own. He didn’t want to think—he couldn’t—and he let his body take over. It reacted like it always did, loving the attention, and that night he needed it more than he ever did. And Mikasa let him. If he needed affection, she would give it to him. If he needed a distraction, she would become one for him. If he needed pleasure, then he could use her as much as he pleased. Even if it was her first time being with a man, she would let him.

The next thing she knew, her bathrobe was on the floor.

Eren fell asleep right after they were finished. His exhaustion consumed him to his every nerve. Mikasa laid right next to him, her lips painted by a tender smile, her body felt new, like she was being reborn, taking a real step into adulthood now that she had lost her virginity. Her fingers danced on his skin, pushing the loose strands of his hair to the back of his ear. She couldn’t sleep. She wanted to memorize every second that passed by. Worried that her mind wouldn’t be able to remember his beauty precisely, she snatched her phone and she took pictures of him—photos of them together, with him looking so blissful in his sleep and her with nothing but happiness written on her face.

“We look like lovers,” she mumbled gleefully to herself as she slid her thumb across the screen, going from one picture to another. At the sound of her voice, Eren stirred in his sleep, his eyelashes fluttering against his cheekbones before he opened his lids.

“H-hi,” she greeted awkwardly. “Sorry, did I wake you?”

It wasn’t Mikasa. In his eyes, in his mind, she wasn’t the stranger he spent hours talking to in a bar earlier. She was you.

And you looked so beautiful.

Eren was trapped between his dream and his reality. He was too intoxicated to notice the difference. It felt like he was living his fantasy, lying next to you on his bed like this, and he chose to stay. He chose to not wake up from whatever it was. He chose to trust his clouded mind, that it was you he was pulling close into his arms. That it was your temple he brushed his lips against. That it was you he shared his honesty with.

“Stay with me,” he murmured, “I don’t know what I’d do without you in my life.”

And a moment before he drifted back to sleep, a whisper flowed from his lips right to her beating heart.

“I need you.”

It was the first time she ever felt wanted by someone else. Needed. Loved. It felt strange at first, but once she accepted it—accepted the fact that she deserved to be loved—she took his words and carved every letter into the deepest part of her brain. “I’ll stay with you,” she promised him in return. “Eren, I’ll stay with you. Always.”

“That night…” Mikasa mumbles out, her sobs threatening to break free. Somehow, seeing the situation she’s in right now, that memory feels nothing more than her imagination. “That night when we slept together, you told me—”

“I was drunk, Mikasa,” Eren sighs, frustrated. “I don’t remember what I said. I don’t remember what I did or why I did it.” Her crestfallen look should have been proof that his words were sinking into her head, but instead of relief, all he felt was guilt. “I’m sorry,” he said, and he meant it. “I’m sorry for being such a fucking asshole for taking advantage of you like that. I’m sorry that you thought something special happened between us, but… It wasn’t like that at all for me.”

She bites her lip, shaking her head. “I don’t—I won’t believe you.”

Even after what she did to his relationship with you, she’s just a girl whose feelings get the best of her. Eren knows that she didn’t mean to cause any harm to your relationship, he gets that, but it’s not enough to wash his agitation away, especially when she’s being this stubborn. “Listen,” he sounds much gentler this time. “I’m sorry that I slept with you. I wish I didn’t but—”

“No!” She shakes her head again, her voice quavers as if her vocal cord is thinning. “Please don’t say that. To me, it was the best night of—”

“It was a mistake,” he corrects her firmly, but she can see remorse flitting across his face. “To me, it was nothing but a mistake, Mikasa. You can hate me for it. No, you should hate me for it. You didn’t deserve to be treated like that. It was my fault and I’m sorry.”

Every word and every line is a dagger slashing through her chest. “You don’t mean it. I know that you don’t mean this.“

“You don’t know me.” His eyes don’t offer any mercy as they lock gazes. “You never did.”

“I do know you.” She regains a bit of strength in her voice, insulted by his perception of her. “That night in Paris. We spent hours talking about ourselves—the things I’m sure you never told anyone else—“

He exhales impatiently, shaking his head. “Mikasa.”

“You told me about your father, and I told you about my past! We went through the same thing, Eren, I understand how it feels to be abandoned—”

“Please, stop.”

“Why can’t you see that we need each other?!” She’s not stopping, her voice turning even more desperate to make him see through her perspective. “Eren, I’m the only one who can—”

“Mikasa!” He shouted, loud enough to stop her breathing for a split second. She nibbles on the inside of her cheek, her tears making her eyes glaze under the light and Eren returns to his previous tone. Gentle but just as stern. “Enough.”

“Eren…” she quietly sobs. “You were my first.”

He turns pasty, her words adding more guilt to his conscience. Fuck, he curses in his mind, what have I done? He shifts his gaze away from hers, jaw clenching hard when he murmurs, “I’m sorry. I wouldn’t have done it if I had known.”

“That’s not what I wanted to hear!” She cries out. “I’m in love with you—”

“I’m in love with someone else.” His heart is shredded apart. He did this to her. She wouldn’t have been this attached to him if he didn’t steal something important from her like that. Mikasa doesn’t deserve to be treated this way but he’s tired. Tired of trying to make her see that he doesn’t feel the same way. And if being vicious with his words is the only way to get his point delivered, then so be it. “And I’m planning to ask her to marry me.”

She gasps, her body shuddering with the whimpers she’s trying to contain. “What..?”

“That’s the reason why I came here. I want you to stop calling me.” He walks closer to retrieve her purse from the floor, taking out her phone. “I want you to stop chasing after me, and I want you to erase every picture—every single thing—you have of me from your phone.” He hands it over to her. “Now.”

“No.” She shakes her head, retrieving it back from him only to clutch her fingers tightly around her phone. “It’s the only proof I have left of us. Proof that we were together.”

“Stop being so delusional!” His rage kicks back in. “We were never together! It was a mistake—what part of this don’t you understand?!”

“Because you told me you needed me!” She cried out. “That night after you embraced me, you talked to me in your sleep. You told me to stay with you, that you wouldn’t know what to do without me in your life. You said you needed me, Eren. And I…” She crumbles in front of him. “I need you too…”

“You weren’t supposed to hear that.” He speaks through gritted teeth. “It wasn’t directed at you.”

“I don’t believe you.” She tilts up her chin, her posture defensive. “I think you’re just making excuses.”

“For fuck’s sake!” If his opponent was a man, Eren would’ve used his fist to make his point. “You know what? Fine. Whatever. Think what you want to think, I don’t give a shit anymore. Just delete the goddamn photos and leave me alone.”

She backs away, trying to act fearlessly even when she cowers as she speaks. “I’m—I’m not deleting them.”

“Mikasa.”

“I won’t delete our pictures!”

“Yeah?” Without giving her a chance to react, Eren steps forward and snatches the phone from her hand. He casts it against the wall, smashing it with enough force that can match the anger that burns within him. He’s getting rid of his anger and frustration in one throw, shattering it to pieces at once. The loud noise echoes throughout the room before an eerie silence replaces its spot. The only sounds they can hear are his labored breathing and her muffled whimpers as she clamps both palms over her mouth. She’s terrified to her bones, sliding down to the floor.

“Stay away from me,” Eren says, a moment before he walks out of the room and slams the door shut behind him.

***

“Is that him again?” Pieck leans closer, her dark locks falling on your shoulder as she takes a glimpse at your phone screen.

“Yeah,” you sigh, putting your phone on silent mode before you tuck it back inside your purse. You let it vibrate, not answering the call instead of rejecting it.

“Honey, you can’t keep doing this.” Your co-worker channels her frustration on your behalf, sipping her hot coffee as she walks right next to you. “You’re not being fair to him. Silent treatment is also a form of emotional abuse.”

“I know…” You lower your chin in contrition, the bottom half of your face buried in the warmth of your scarf, protecting you from the chilly wind. “I just… I don’t know what to say to him…”

“You look like you’re dying a little bit inside every time you dismiss his call.” Pieck steps inside your office building, with you following closely behind. “Please don’t do that to yourself, love.”

Truthfully, a large part of you agrees with her and it hurts every time you try to deny it. I’m way in over my head. I’m not being fair to him at all. I have to fix this. “I’m gonna call him tonight,” you speak out loud, hoping that it would give you more courage to do it. “I don’t know what I’m going to say, but I’m going to reach out to him.”

A proud smile rises on her lips. “That’s my girl,” Pieck chuckles, ruffling your hair. "Tell me how it goes later. But if you end up fucking like bunnies, I'll pass."

As you both walk into the lobby, Mina Carolina, your receptionist, greets you with a smile. “Hey, girl, new haircut?” Pieck chirps back with a grin. “Looks cute on you.”

“Thank you,” she smiles bashfully. You send her a friendly wave, not intending to stop and chat as you have piles of work sitting on your desk but Mina gestures you to come closer. “I’ve got a package for you, Pieck.”

“Oh, nice.” She giggles like a child, taking a maroon-colored present box from Mina’s hand, quickly reads the label before she shoves it into her handbag. “It’s a strap-on,” she says only for your ears to hear.

“Don’t need to know that, but okay.”

“Hey, quick question if you guys don’t mind,” Mina says, her body leaning over the counter. “Is it true that you guys are friends with Eren Jaeger? You know, from Empire?”

Even just the mention of his name makes you grow rigid, itching to run away like a criminal being caught in the act. Pieck, noticing that, promptly steers the conversation her way. “Nah, we’re just his fans,” she corrects her. “We got lucky one night so we got to see them backstage but that was it.”

“Oh, I see.” Mina seems a bit disappointed. “I just wanted to ask whether the rumors are true.”

Pieck raises a brow. “What rumors?”

“That he’s dating Mikasa Ackerman? It’s all over the news today.”

You look away, distracting yourself by observing the passersby while sipping your hot chocolate. What a great way to start my morning, you think, feeling like something is raking their fingers against the wall of your stomach.

“That’s not true,” Pieck snorts. “You know what? People need to stop assuming that they’re dating just because they made out once in his MV.”

“It’s not because of that, though.” Mina grabs her phone from her purse, taps her passcode in, and swipes her thumb twice on the screen. “His name’s been trending on Twitter since last night. I thought it was photoshopped at first, but it looks pretty legit to me. Look, even Glamour magazine tweeted about it. Here’s the article.” She slides her phone down the desk for both you and Pieck to see.

Your insides shrivel at once, like the dry leaves you saw scattering along the pavements.

Spotted: Empire’s Eren Jaeger sharing a romantic embrace with Chantelle’s lingerie model Mikasa Ackerman in the lobby of Oberoi Hotel. Are they finally dating?

“Fuck,” Pieck mutters under her breath.

The title is already self-explanatory, but to make it worse, Glamour has attached four pictures with it, and in those photos, you see the man who owns your heart seeking comfort in another woman’s embrace.

He has a hand around her waist, hers around his neck, like a pair of lovers reuniting after years of separating. You can see him whispering closely into her ear, in a way that makes your skin crawl in disgust. She smiles so beautifully on the next one, a perfect amount of being shy and jubilant as if he just told her something she had been wanting to hear for so long. In the third photo, they’re walking together with their hands intertwined. The last one… is the picture of them entering the elevator together, presumably heading to her room.

“Don’t they look so good together?” Mina dreamily says, not familiar with you enough to understand the dejected look on your face. “You know what they call them now? Eremika. Cute, right? I always knew something was going on between them when I saw the behind-the-scenes for their MV. They obviously had a crush on each other. I’ve been—”

“Oh, shut up, Mina,” Pieck bites back, cutting her short and sending her petrified on her feet. “Come on, baby, let’s go.” She guides you away with her hands on your shoulders, forcing your legs to move.

“W-wait, did I say something wrong? Pieck!” You can hear Mina cry out faintly before Pieck pushes you inside the elevator.

“Jesus Christ, she keeps yapping and yapping!” She exhales in aggravation, leaning against the steel wall. She turns to you, watching you with a heavy heart. “Honey, you okay? I’m so sorry you had to see that.”

Pieck’s voice is as soothing as a tranquil melody, her hand is a comforting weight on your back, gently sliding it up and down like a mother trying to lull her child to sleep. But she has no effects on you. Right now, the only thing you can feel is the stinging pain in your chest.

Did they… get back together again?

“Okay, let’s get our head straight and think about this,” she tries to assure you, making up premises to explain the situation. “Maybe it’s not what it looks like. Maybe he’s trying to fix things for you so he went there to see her and talk to her so she’ll stop acting like a fucking delusional bitch that she is.”

You want to believe her. You really do, but it doesn’t look like that. It doesn’t look like that at all.

Did he really need to see her in a hotel room just to cut ties with her? Why couldn’t he just call her and tell her to stay away?

No matter how hard you try to see it differently in your head, all that matters in your head right now is the fact that they were hugging in that pose, smiling at each other like lovers do before they made their way to her room, holding hands.

I feel like I’m gonna throw up.

No. It’s not just a feeling. You can actually feel your stomach rising in your torso, making its way to your throat. You’ve been feeling nauseous since you wake up. Your tongue felt heavy and bitter in your mouth that you could barely eat anything during breakfast. Right now, it’s twice as intense.

The elevator door opens right on time, and you run past Pieck, making your way to the nearest bathroom. Your knees hit the tile flooring as soon as you burst inside a cubicle, leaning over the toilet bowl and holding its sides like a lifeline as you throw up your insides. Your eyes water, tears threatening to fall with each time you cough. Nothing barely comes out as you’re vomiting on an empty stomach, only bile, and it leaves a sour taste in your mouth.

You can hear Pieck’s voice calling after you, filled with nothing but concern. She steps inside the female’s bathroom, chasing after your trail. “Oh, honey,” she says when she finds you crouching on the floor. “What happened?” She holds your hair back for you, waiting until you’re done with a grimace on her face.

“I don’t know,” you cough out, slowly returning to your feet before you flush the toilet. You’re grateful that you didn’t miss the bowl. Now that everything’s out, you can feel your muscles relaxing. You’re a bit lightheaded, your skin glistening with sweat. Afraid that you’d lose your balance, you put the toilet seat down and sit on it. “I’ve been feeling nauseous for a while but it wasn’t this intense before.”

Pieck hands you a bottle of mineral water from her bag. You take a few gulps to erase the bitterness from your mouth before you return it, vocalizing your gratitude.

“What is it, stress?” She asks.

Maybe, but it doesn’t sit right with you.

Is it really just stress?

***

You can’t get him out of your head.

The more you push him away, the more he grows vividly in your mind. It's not the first time you have your thoughts completely snared under Eren’s hands, but it’s the first time you feel like you should stop.

You’ve been losing sleep, you’ve lost your appetite. Every time you lay alone in your bed, your eyes are glued to your phone screen. A part of you wishes for him to call, but when he does, you slide your phone underneath your pillow and you cover your ears with your palms, begging for him to stop calling.

You miss him. You miss his warmth on your bedsheets. You miss his scribblings scattered all over your coffee table. You miss every flavor of his kiss, every spark he made through his touches.

Two weeks have passed since you sent him a message. “Let’s take a break from each other for now,” you wrote down. “You have things you need to focus on and I have mine. I’m no longer angry at you, so you don’t have to worry about it. I just need some time to clear my head. I think this will be good for us. I’ll talk to you soon.” Eren called you not a minute after you sent the text, but you let your phone ring. He left you with six missed calls and a single text.

It wasn’t a text, it was a voice message.

“Can I at least see you?” He vocalized and you wondered why didn’t he just write down his words but you realized that he didn’t want his words to be read. He wanted his feelings to be conveyed. And through his voice, you understood one thing.

He wasn’t asking permission to see you. He was asking for a chance to come home to you.

And “I’m sorry,” was your only answer.

You’re being cruel, and you wish you could stop. But how can you when it still feels like you want to cry every time you hear his name? Why does it feel so painful every time you see the corner of your apartment where he used to sit on the floor with his back leaning against the wall—his guitar sitting on his lap as he serenades you with love songs that he crafted from his heart? Why does it feel like you can barely breathe when he’s not around, but feel even more smothered when you think he’s coming back?

Eren…

Empire is performing tonight, and they’re doing a live broadcast directly to your TV screen. They’ve been invited as a guest in a music show, performing three of their well-known tracks, including “Hero/Heroine.”

“It was about you,” Eren confessed one night when he had your head right next to his heart, your index finger signing his skin with your name. You lift your head as he tucked his chin, catching the blush that bloomed on his cheeks. “I think I’d made it obvious enough when I brought you to the studio during our recording session, but…” He swatted the bangs away from your eyes before he framed your cheek, his thumb tracing over the shape of your lips. “I just want you to know that it was about you.”

The memory was crystal clear in your head as if it was only yesterday when you had your bodies connected under the covers. Eren acclaimed that he was the hero in this love story, and you were his heroine. That you were the one who broke him out of the closet filled with the ghost of his past. That you were the one who brought him back to life again, making his living worthwhile. And yet, every time you heard the song playing on the radio, you could only remember one thing. Not his lyrics. Not his feelings for you. Not his voice.

But hers.

It reminded you of the picture Mikasa Ackerman took on the night they laid in bed together. It reminded you of her voice and the message she left him. It reminded you of how naturally she wrapped her arms around his neck as they shared whispers in the lobby of Oberoi Hotel. It reminded you of their story.

You didn’t want to see him. Didn’t want to hear his songs ever again, now that they didn’t seem as sincere as before. You just want to lock yourself in your apartment, maybe go to bed early since that’s the only time you can truly keep him away from your head. If you could fall asleep in the first place.

And the clock ticks so slowly. Hours feel like years and you’re crumpled up in your blanket, sitting on the middle of your couch, your eyes glued to the TV screen that shows nothing but your reflection. Pit patter of the raindrops hitting your glassy windows no longer serves as a lullaby. It hugs you tight in loneliness and you wish there were two strong arms to wrap around your shoulders, pulling you out of it and bringing you back into his chest, where you can feel his warmth and smell the scent of summer from his skin.

Where you can be with him again. Truly.

***

No message is a message, Eren learns eventually. His texts have all been read, but you responded with nothing. But that’s it, isn’t it? That’s the message. You just don’t want to have anything to do with him anymore. It’s like the world has swallowed you whole and nothing of you remains but the guilt you left in his chest.

“Yo, asswipe!” Jean’s voice snatches Eren out of his stupor, forcing the vocalist to shift his gaze from his phone screen to see the concern in his light brown eyes. It’s not just Jean who’s staring at him like he’s laying still on his deathbed. Reiner is there too, sitting on the other side of the couch with his drum sticks laying on the table and his forehead creasing.

“Sorry,” Eren automatically says, tucking his phone back into the pocket of his jeans. “What is it?”

“Dude, we called you, like, three times already,” Jean says, running a hand through his hair, exasperated. “What, are you sick? What the fuck is going on with you?”

“Nothing.”

Reiner, unlike Jean, shows his worry in a much gentle manner. “You look pale. Do you want to take a break?”

“We only got a month left to compose a new single before the show,” Eren answers. “I’m not gonna take a break.”

“Then get your head back in the game,” Jean mutters harshly, tossing back his music sheets to the songwriter. “Listen, I think it’s better to use ‘Do I Wanna Know’ as our next single.” He taps his index finger against one of the three song titles Eren had written in the last two weeks. “It’s sexy, it’s smart, and the guitar riffs make me stand out more than the rest of you bitches,” he sneers. “Bet Levi would agree with that too. We’ll release the studio version sometime in March, so there’s no need to record it in a hurry. But we only have two weeks to perfect it, and another two weeks to practice before the show so we don’t have much time to waste. Following me so far?”

Eren stays hushed. Do I Wanna Know is, without a doubt, the best choice out there. It’s probably the most well-crafted song Eren has ever written. It’s a cynical love song, driven as much by anxiety as desire—a song about a man who continuously pines for an ex-lover, unsure if they still want him back, but having no power to try and love someone else. He first wrote it a few months ago, just a little after you let him know that you had been spending time together with Armin. The inspiration came flooding in, a spark of jealousy and possessiveness, combined with his neverending yearn for your love. It’s a song about you, like every other love song he wrote. But his heart beats heavily in his chest, unsatisfied by the decision, even if he was the one who wrote it.

Because if he had the choice, he would’ve chosen the other one.

“Only Place I Call Home,” Reiner startles him, reading his thoughts. “Personally, I think it’s a beautiful song. I can feel the feelings you poured into it. Lifeline is also really good—”

“Jesus Christ,” Jean rolls his eyes, crossing his legs as he leans his back against the couch. “Are you hearing yourself right now? Those songs are too sappy, bro. We’re Empire. We’re not the next generation of Nickelback.”

Reiner shrugs. “Nickelback’s pretty good.”

“Don’t talk to me.” Jean returns his attention to his frontman. “You’ve got no complaint about it, right? We’re going with ‘Do I Wanna Know’? Levi wants us to decide right away.”

Whatever protest he has, Eren is forced to swallow it whole. “Sure.”

***

It’s not just stress, you’re certain of it.

Because it doesn’t explain why you’re suddenly triggered by your favorite spicy foods, throwing up not a minute after the flavor hits your tongue. It doesn’t explain the way your body always feels so light like you’re seconds away from floating. You feel faint, your body showing more signs of fatigue than usual.

“Honey, how many times has it been already?” Pieck asks when you return to your work desk, pale and drained. The sour taste of your stomach acid still sits heavily on your tongue and you try to wash everything away with water. “Are you okay? Don’t you think it’s better to see a doctor?”

You sink into your seat, your eyes barely open. “I’m okay.”

“You don’t look okay. What, you’re pregnant?”

You’re turning tense. It’s just a joke—just Pieck being her usual self—but it fits the assumption that you’ve been trying to deny in your mind. Unconsciously, you have a hand pressing against your stomach, fingers slowly curling against the front of your blouse, and Pieck watches with her eyes gradually turning larger. “No,” she says, her jaw turning slack. “Please don’t tell me you are.”

Tears form in your eyes once more, not out of discomfort, not out of sadness, but sheer panic. “I haven’t had my period in weeks,” you tell her with your voice about to break. “Pieck, what am I going to do?”

You’re about to burst and she can see it. She rushes to your spot, gathering you in her arms before you explode to pieces. “Have you taken a pregnancy test?”

You shake your head, sobbing quietly. Your tears are straining the fabric that covers her stomach. “I’m too afraid.”

She spends a good minute stroking your hair, gently shushing you down so you won’t attract attention from your other co-workers. She pulls away when you’re calm enough, bending down to match your eyes with her hands squeezing your shoulders. “There’s a clinic down the street. Why don’t we pay it a visit?”

***

You are six weeks and two days pregnant.

That’s what your ob-gyn told you. She congratulated you on it, throwing wide smiles with her teeth shown as she mentioned how your fetus was now the size of a single sweet pea. “Your baby is starting to look more like, well, a baby,” she tittered. “With cheeks, chin, and jaws beginning to form.” What shocked you the most was when she ran an ultrasound scan to monitor your fetal development. “Can you hear it?” The female doctor, most likely in her late forties, asked in such a motherly way, guiding you to take a look at the ultrasound screen. A rhythmic, thumping sound can be heard, almost matching the one that’s hammering against your ribcages. “That’s your baby’s heartbeat.”

You were speechless. Your mind was unable to process whether you were feeling joy, bewilderment, or anxiety. Perhaps all of them at once. You gripped tightly against the edge of your skirt, perched on your seat as if you were about to fall. “You may experience heartburn, morning sickness, and frequent urination,” your doctor continued to explain. “Fight nausea by eating small snacks that combine protein and complex carbs. I’ll prescribe you some vitamins and doxylamine, just in case.”

“Umm…” You could feel it again. That sensation of having something crawling inside your stomach, flipping your insides. “Yes, thank you.”

“Oh, just for your information, the earliest time we can assess the baby's sex is at twelve weeks, so you’ll have to be patient and wait.” She chuckled softly, mistaking your silence as a sign of being too overwhelmed by the good news. “I know how exciting it is to have your first baby, and I’m sure you can’t wait to find out.”

You swallowed thickly. “I—I’m okay with—” You choked on your words, promptly covering it with a smile. “With not knowing for now,” you said without thinking too much, being hasty so she’d stop looking at you funny.

“I’d expected you’d say that.” She beamed in return, unsuspecting. “Not sure about your husband, though. First-time fathers usually can’t handle the suspense. Have you asked whether he wanted to have a boy or a girl?”

You looked like you were seeing a ghost; your mind was a blank canvas.

The older lady eventually caught on to your reaction, quickly apologizing for prying too much. “Well, whether it’s a boy or a girl, the most important thing right now is to make sure that your baby is born healthy and well.” She slid the prescription down the table, waiting for you to take it. “So take a rest as much as you can, consume healthy foods and drink plenty of water. Also, don’t stress out too much. It’s not good for the baby.”

“I… I understand.” You took the paper, holding it too tightly, it crumpled inside your palm. “Thank you, Doctor.”

That was twenty minutes ago. Now, you’re stepping out of the room, closing the door behind you, and realizing that no matter how much air you sucked into your lungs, you’d still feel like you were asphyxiated.

Pieck stands up as soon as you walk out of the room. “How was it?” You don’t answer her and her shoulders slump forward. She circles her arms around your shoulders, sensing your body tremble lightly as she draws you into a hug. “It’s okay. You’re gonna be okay.”

“What do I say to him?” Your voice is muffled by the fabric of her blazer. “Pieck, I don’t even know how to face him yet.”

“Yeah, talk about bad timing, huh?” She tries to cheer you up with a chuckle. It sounds too forced even to her own ears. “So that means when you pranked him, you were actually pregnant during that time, you just didn’t know it yet. Life certainly knows how to fuck us in the ass, doesn’t it?”

She releases you, gathering your face in her hands. “Hey, look at me.” She squeezes your cheeks. “You’re gonna be okay. Let’s go get Porco and force him to buy us some muffins, how about that?”

You’re grateful, so grateful, that she was here to accompany you through every step. You can’t even imagine what would you have done if she wasn’t there to support you. “Thanks, Pieck.”

***

How do you say hello to someone you’ve been trying to avoid and missing to death at the same time? The answer is: you don’t.

You’re about to take a short trip downstairs to buy some milk for your cereal when you find Eren standing on the other side of your apartment. He has his fist stopping mid-air, struck cold at the sight of you before he can knock on your door.

His eyes widen, your name breaks past his lips in a hushed whisper. But time must have stopped, because you’re both standing on your feet with only your heart beating rapidly, staring at each other’s eyes like seeing your worst nightmare unravel before you.

“I…” You’re the first one who breaks the silence, surprising yourself. “I didn’t expect you’d be here.”

“Umm, yeah…” He tilts his head down, unable to stay unfazed under your gaze. It’s like he has forgotten how to face you, his usual confidence completely stripped off, leaving him standing in nothing but awkwardness and the overwhelming guilt he still feels throbbing inside his chest. Three weeks have passed since you two last saw each other in person, and suddenly, you became strangers. “Sorry for showing up so suddenly. I was…” He has one hand rubbing his nape, the old habit of his that you used to witness a lot but now forgotten. “I was around the neighborhood and I thought… I’d pay you a visit.”

You’re still staring at him, unblinking with a hard, burning lump in your throat.

It breaks him. You haven’t said anything and yet your silence has already torn him apart. “I shouldn’t have come.” Eren grips tightly around the sling of his bag, ready to escape. “I’m sorry.”

“No, wait!” You circle your fingers around his wrist, just at the right time before he takes a step away. Just a touch of your skin meeting his triggers the memories you’ve tried to hide between you. The longing you’ve felt during your separation comes back at once, making your fingertips tremble. You release him, adjoining your hands behind your back so you won’t lose yourself any further than this. “Why don’t you, umm… come in?”

Eren thought that those were the words he wanted to hear. But when they sink into his head, he realizes that they’re not even close to what he yearned to hear.

“Eren..?” You call out when he turns reticent. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he weakly smiles. I just wish you’d say ‘welcome home.’ “Have you eaten your breakfast yet? I bought you some muffins.”

You’re still as beautiful as ever when you smile, Eren praises in silence when he sees your lips curving upwards into a delicate smile. Even when there’s barely joy behind it, it’s still beautiful.

“Funny how muffins seem to be the only thing I’m able to eat these days and you brought me some.“ You retrieve the paper bag from him, the fresh scent of blueberry muffins tickling your nostrils.

Your hand is just a few inches away from his. If he could just reach out a little bit, he would’ve had it. But he won’t do it. Not until he’s sure that you won’t retract it from his hold. But when you turn around from him, walking further inside your apartment with your hand nowhere near his, he’s still gravely disappointed by it.

“Would you like some coffee?”

“Sure.”

***

When the coffee has gone cold and what’s left of your muffins are the tiny crumbs on your plate, tension stretches between you. You’ve both been shying away from addressing the elephant in the room, but you couldn’t do it forever. No more small talks. No more beating around the bush. This is it. This is the moment you’ve been dreading for.

Eren never leads the conversation. Ever since he walked through your door, he’s been awfully quiet, responding with a smile but forgetting how to share its warmth. Knowing how the last time you argued about this, everything he said only worsen the situation. So, he decides to not say anything at all.

“I’m sorry… for not answering your calls.”

Eren, sitting on the other side of the dining table, take a peek at you from behind his bangs. His posture is relaxed. Leaning his back against the chair, he has his legs stretched out, his hands playing with the handle of his cup. “It’s okay,” he replies, not giving you any clue of how wrecked he feels inside. He can already see the way you’re anxiously chewing on your lip, remorse coating your voice. He doesn’t want to make you feel even worse than you already do.

“No, it’s not okay.” Your hands are curling tightly above your lap. Seeing him in person right now, you realize just how cruel you’ve been to him. You’ve seen him on TV before, but his makeup must have concealed them well—the eyebags under his eyes, the weariness in his face. “I’ve been so selfish,” you vocalize with a pair of scissors playing around your vocal cord. “I was too busy thinking about myself, about you and Mikasa, that I forgot to imagine how it would feel like to be in your shoes. To be ignored without having the chance to explain.”

Eren takes a moment, immerses himself in your apology. “It’s… I can understand why you acted that way,” he answers in a toneless, quiet voice. “If the roles were reversed, I would’ve probably acted way worse than you did.”

It would’ve been a lot easier if he was, at least, a little bit upset about it. Seeing him accepting everything with that crestfallen look on his face only doubles the guilt in your chest.

You cast your gaze downward, hoping that it would make it less challenging to convey your words properly when you don’t see his face. But that’s not the problem, is it? Even with your eyes closed, you can still see every emotion playing on his face. “I know that you didn’t mean to hurt me. That you kept your relationship a secret because you didn’t want me to worry. I know that, but… It still hurts.” Admitting it only tighten the knots in your chest, splintering your heart. “And when I saw those photos of you meeting her in Oberoi… My head stopped making sense. I was so jealous, I couldn’t think of any other reason to justify your actions so I—” You took a sharp breath. Talking this fast with this surge of emotions washing over you makes you feel like you’re running a mile. “So I decided to keep myself away from you. Talking to you when I was still upset wouldn’t have done us any good. I’d end up saying things I didn’t mean, and I’d hurt you more than I already did. I don’t want that.” Your tears suddenly emerge at once and you hastily wipe every bit of them away with your fingers. Don’t cry, don’t cry, you repeat to yourself, chanting it like a prayer. It works, but not by much. Your eyes are still glazed, red, and hot as you hold back your tears, but it’s okay. It’s enough.

But he can’t stand it.

You hear a creak of his chair when Eren drags it back. He stands up on his feet, taking a few steps until he’s standing beside you. Slowly sinking to his knees, he lays his hand above yours. “Can I… hug you?” He asks, voice hoarse and afraid and with it, the walls you‘ve built around you, crumble.

You swerve your body around to face him, crying into his chest, your hands fisting the front of his shirt as he winds his arms around your body. You’re crying like it’s your first time, as if you don’t know what else to do but to let all of these feelings out in the form of unstoppable tears and choked-out sobs. “I don’t…” You cry out weakly, body convulsing with every sob. “I don’t want us to fight anymore…”

Eren kisses the spot between your eyebrows. “I know.” He cards his fingers through your strands, his lips still lingering against your temple as he pulls you close and repeats the words. He’s holding you so carefully as if you were about to break. What he doesn’t know is that you’re already broken. Without him in your life, you’re never going to be a whole piece.

You’re vulnerable and he protects you. If he’s the one who tore you to pieces, he’ll also be the one who’ll glue everything back together. If it takes forever for your tears to dry, he’ll wait forever in silence just like this, keeping you warm in your embrace and whispering your name like a lullaby.

Eventually, your violent sobs turn into faint whimpers. Your face is drenched by your tears, your hair sticking to your skin. Eren stands on his knees, delicate fingers brushing the strands away from your face. “I went to Oberoi to talk to her,” he quietly professes, tucking your hair behind your ear. “I tried to avoid her in the past but it wasn’t enough. I needed to tell her properly—that I don’t love her in the way she loves me. That I never did and she just misread my actions.” He rakes his thumb over the skin underneath your eyes, wiping what’s left of your tears. “That I’m in love with someone else, in a way that I could never love another.” His eyes are raking over your features so lovingly, so adoringly, as they’ve always been in these twelve years of loving you. “So, I told her to stay away from me and we got into a fight. I’m sure she doesn’t want to have anything to do with me ever again.”

Even when the memory of him and Mikasa sharing a bed is still glued perfectly at the front of your mind, you still feel a glimmer of sadness swirling in the bottom of your heart when you try to think what’s it like to stand in Mikasa’s place. The message she left him sounded so real. Her feelings for him were real, you’re sure of it.

“I’m sorry that we had to fight about this,” Eren adds, drawing your attention back to him. “I should’ve been honest with you from the start. All I wanted to do was to protect your feelings by not telling you but now I realize that I was wrong. You didn’t deserve to find out about her that way, and I can understand why you thought something was going on between us. But I never dated her. I never dated anyone else. I never fell for anyone else. And I’m sorry for being such a coward…” His voice breaks as if he was on the verge of crying himself. He presses your foreheads together, closing his lids as he whispers, “And I’m sorry for hurting you like this. I just hope you can forgive me…”

You remain still in his arms, being so quiet, he can no longer tell what you’re thinking. He releases his hold from you, softly calling out your name. “What’s wrong?” He observes your expression, trying to figure you out.

When you find your voice, his body tenses. “Since when have you been in love with me?” You ask him, your voice no longer quivers just as much. “You told me before that you didn’t remember the first time you fell for me but was that the truth?” You lift your face to meet his gaze. “Or was it… another lie?”

Eren watches in silence with unblinking eyes, but inside his chest is a chasm filled with uncertainties. Should he tell the truth? How will that make you feel?

No. I won’t lie to her ever again.

“Since the very start,” he confesses, his heartrate picking up pace, hoping that he’s not making any mistake. “It’s maybe hard for you to believe me after what I did, but… I’m not lying. That night, when I told you I had never loved anyone else as much as I loved you, that was the truth.”

“You’ve been in love with me…” You repeat, your eyebrows arching upwards while your jaw hangs slack. “Since twelve years ago?”

“Since twelve years ago,” he confirms, accompanied by a weak smile. “It’s only been you.”

You let out a quivering breath. “Why didn’t you just be honest with me? Why didn’t you tell me about your feelings for me from the start?”

His shirt is a crumpled mess underneath your fingers, and Eren lays his hand above yours, his palm covering your knuckles. “Because I didn’t want you to be with me just because you had to. You’re kind; I know that you’d say yes to me if I confessed to you even when you didn’t feel the same way, because you wouldn’t want to risk our friendship and I don’t want that. I don’t want to force you to make that kind of decision. I want you to fall in love with me on your own. I want you to love me because you love me, not because I love you.”

His voice is soothing, his words speak comfort, but your feelings are a mess. Your throat feels like a burning flame so you stay voiceless.

“Truth is,” Eren quavers. “I always look for you in everything I do, in every woman I’d been with. I always thought of you when I was with them. It’s a shitty thing to do, I know, but… I couldn’t help it.” He’s ashamed of it, you can tell—disgusted at himself, even. He brings his eyes down to where your hands are intertwined, afraid that he’d witness the disappointment in your eyes. “I couldn’t even kiss them, nor did I ever want to. Because if I did, then I’d know for sure that it wasn’t you I was holding in my arms.”

Several things emerge in your head at once. First, you feel sorry for him. You could see the loneliness in his eyes, the shame in his voice, and the regret in his action. You’re not sure why would he still touch someone else when his heart never belonged to them, but knowing his past and how his mother abandoned him, perhaps he’d been seeking some kind of affection—validation—from other people. He craved attention. He wanted to make his existence matter. And since you couldn’t give that to him at that time, he sought from anyone else who would love him back, even when it was purely physical.

But that leads you to the next part. You feel… aggravated. Disappointed that he treated his women in the past as your substitutes, because as flattering as it may have sounded to your ears, no one deserves to be treated as someone else’s replacement.

Third, and it is the most intense feeling you have raging inside you right now, is remorse. You feel guilty for not knowing about his feelings sooner. You regret all the time you spent trying to deny his affection for you, and the feeling you held for him. All the clues were there. Eren had been giving clear signals to you, had been presenting pieces of his heart but you just weren’t brave enough to accept them. You kept thinking that you were just friends, so scared of taking the risks. Just how many times have you broken his heart by having this strictly-physical-no-feelings-involved relationship?

“Please say something,” Eren’s little whisper draws you back from sinking deeper into your thoughts.

You exhale, retracting your hand from his. “None of this would have happened if you had told me sooner about your feelings. Properly. Those girls—Mikasa—they don’t deserve to be treated that way.”

“I—I know,” he panics, swallowing hard. “I know that and I—I feel like an absolute shit about it too, but…” His shoulders sag. “It’s easier for me that way. Because I know I would’ve felt so much worse if I told you how I felt and you said yes just because you had to.”

“Why do you always keep thinking about me?” You cry out, frustration building inside. “What about your feelings?”

The sudden rise in your voice stuns him. “I… I don’t care about myself. I only want you to be happy.”

“No, you can’t do that!” You’re pounding your fist against his chest, your eyes growing hot again. “Eren, you have got to stop doing that to yourself. Be selfish. Think about what you want. It’s okay to prioritize yourself over anyone else—that’s just called being human. And if you had confessed to me back then, I would’ve said yes not because I didn’t want to lose a friend. I would’ve said yes because I wanted to.”

He catches your wrist, his pupils blown. “What..?”

“I just…” The embarrassment follows close after your single rush of confession ended. “I think I realized this when I went with Armin that day. T-that I had been in love with you all along, even before we started sleeping together.” Eren’s eyes widen in disbelief. Is he hearing this right? Are his ears playing tricks on him? “That time when I saw you again in college,” you reveal with your head hanging low. “That was the happiest moment in my life.” You catch yourself, correcting your words. “Well, the second happiest moment in my life. The first one was when you told me you loved me.”

Your confession came as a shock and Eren watches with parting lips and scarlet cheeks, his brain turning into mush.

You look away with a palpitating heart, blood rushes to your face. “I-I think I’ve loved you from the start, I just… didn’t know what it was back then. And just like you, maybe I was too afraid to call it something more than just love between friends. But you’ve never been just a friend to me, Eren. You’ve always been more. And I wish you had the bravery to confess to me sooner. No, I wish I had the courage to tell you I loved you. We wouldn’t have been in this situation if I did. You wouldn’t have hurt Mikasa or anyone else if we had been honest from the start. I guess, in a way, we’re a little too late.”

You look up, providing solace by rubbing your thumb along his cheekbone. ”That’s why it hurt a lot when you left me without any contact for four years. If you're scared of me leaving you, I’m just the same as you are. I’m scared of losing you, Eren. And when I found that picture of you and Mikasa, I felt like I did. No matter how hard you tried to convince me that it meant nothing to you, it meant everything to me.”

His eyes droop once more. “I’m sorry…”

“No, it’s okay,” you convince him with a weak smile. “I’m just trying to let you know how I felt.”

“You don’t… feel like that anymore?” When you take a pause, Eren holds his breath, anxiously waiting for your answer.

“I’ve decided to trust you,” you say. “Whatever it was between you two, it happened in the past. I think I can finally wrap my head around it.”

“Yeah…” Eren breathes out in relief, “Yeah, it’s all in the past.”

“But you have got to tell me everything,” you state out, peering deep into his eyes, stopping him before he can move closer to you. “I want everything out in the open. I want to hear your every thought, I want to know every feeling you have inside, I want to know every single thing about you, even the things that you think aren’t important, I want to know it all. No more keeping secrets, no more hiding feelings from one another. Can you do that for me?”

He gulps, a bit disconcerted by the sudden intensity in your voice. “Okay.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

“Good.” You give him a playful pat on the cheek, smiling with a little bit of mischief. “Because I want my boyfriend back.”

Boyfriend? It’s embarrassing how one word can give so much joy to his heart. The title doesn’t even fit properly, sounding a little too childish to describe what you have. If you were both still in high school, he wouldn’t have any complaints. But you’re both adults. The feelings he holds for you are far more intense than what young lovers share. Eren loves you more than a boyfriend would. He loves you like a—

Oh.

“Hmm?” You tilt your head to the side, frowning. “What’s wrong?”

He blushes. “N-nothing.”

“You look like you’re thinking about something.” You suspiciously narrow your eyes at him. “Did you forget what you promised me literally ten seconds ago?”

Eren breaks into laughter, so soft and warm that you start to wonder maybe happiness does have a form after all.

“I missed hearing you laugh,” you tell him, placing your palm against his cheek.

His chortle morphs into a delicate smile when he leans into your hand, kissing the lines of your palm like he always did. “I missed you,” he says, “Let’s not fight for the rest of our lives ever again. I had two anxiety attacks because of you.”

“Y-you did?”

“No,” he snickers. He takes away your hand from his face, leaning close until you can feel his breath caressing your lips.

“Eren—” His lips find yours, touching so lightly, you can barely feel it. It’s over before your mind can tell you to respond and he cups your cheek with one hand, his fingertips grazing against your strands.

“Was that okay?” He asks and he waits. He needs your permission. He needs to know if you have forgiven him enough for him to touch you in the way he used to.

Your heartrate soars, your head’s fogged with only the thoughts of him. “Kiss me again.”

He starts from your temple and your lips last. He could taste the salt of your tears, as much as you could feel the sweetness of his lips. He kisses you languidly, his lips moving a bit awkward like this is the first he’s kissing you and he’s trying to figure out how to make those butterflies come alive in your stomach.

His kiss is a magic spell. All your longings, all your dreams, and sweet anguish, all the secrets that you’ve tried to conceal within you came awake. Everything was transformed and enchanted, everything made sense. With him in your arms, your world feels complete again.

“Eren,” you sigh against his lips, interrupted by yet another kiss and maybe it’s okay to just let this moment continues for eternity.

But there’s a heavy weight in your chest, one that you can’t erase unless you put it into words. “Eren, wait,” you lay a hand on his chest, gently pushing him away. He looks at you with his eyebrows sewn, worried if he might have hurt you. You press another light kiss to his lips to reassure him. “It’s just… There’s something I need to tell you…” The earlier joy that fills you up to the brim slowly decreases, replaced with restlessness. Now that the worst has come to pass, both the timing and the mood feel right to break the news about your pregnancy.

Eren presses your fingertips against his lips, kissing them one by one until he lands a final kiss on your knuckles. “What is it?”

You take a deep breath. You’re not sure why, but you’re scared to the bones. What if he doesn’t believe you? No, what if he gets upset, thinking that this is just another prank?

Your eyes search his and he returns your gaze with a smile. “You’re beautiful,” he says, just because the words have been sitting on his tongue for quite some time and he’s tired of restraining them.

You’re panicking inside, your lips feel like they’re glued to one another. “Can you… kiss me again?” you say, unable to stand the pressure you’re giving to yourself.

Eren, oblivious to your disturbance, melts a little at your request. “I’ll kiss you as much as you want me to.” He slants your mouths together, slowly regaining his usual confidence.

It can wait, you figure. You can say it another time. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe the day after. Maybe next week, there’s still time. Right now, let me enjoy this moment.

You’re a hypocrite. A fucking huge one at that. You told him to be honest and yet you couldn’t reveal your biggest secret to him—one that he was supposed to know from the first day you had your pregnancy confirmed.

You feel like you’re about to burst, saved at the last second only by the sound of Eren’s phone ringing.

“Ah, fuck,” Eren hisses, letting you go abruptly when he feels his phone reverberating in the pocket of his jeans. “That must be Levi.”

You’re a bit dazed, your lips tingling with delight but left unsatisfied. “Do you have to go?”

“Yeah, I need to head back to the studio to practice,” he replies, checking on his phone. “We’re holding a concert in a week.” Sighing, he rejects the call before he tosses his phone to the carpeted floor. He returns to you, one hand slipping around your waist and another one tangled between your hair.

You’re moaning softly into the kiss. “Levi’s gonna kill you,” you try to speak, your stomach gyrating at the way he expertly moves his lips against yours, “if he knows you rejected his call for this.”

“I can call him later,” he counters, tilting his head to the side, deepening the kiss.

You sigh in rapture, your fingers playing against the baby hair on his nape. “You can kiss me later too, you know.”

“No.”A low grunt erupts from the back of his throat. “I gotta have you now.”

Perhaps it’s because almost a month has passed since you last tasted him on your lips, but every touch that he lays on your body feels like a zap of electricity, pulling more reaction out of you than it usually did.

His phone screen lights up again, Levi’s name written on the screen. “Oh my God,” Eren groans, throwing his head back. “Can’t a guy kiss his girl in peace?!”

You’re giggling, going back to your feet, and pulling him up with you. “Stop pouting, it’s not a good look on you.”

“I thought you said I looked cute when I did.” He smirks before he turns serious. “You said you wanted to tell me something earlier. What was it?”

You go still, your mind running quickly in search of an excuse. “Nothing,” you tell him. “I just… wanted to say I love you.”

Eren blinks before his face glows pink. “Umm…” He glues his eyes to his feet. “I… I love you too.”

Seeing him flustered, make you feel ten times more embarrassed than he is. “Why are you embarrassed?!”

“I’m not!” His cheeks are sizzling hot. “Well, when the girl you love tells you she loves you, this happens!”

“But I’ve said it to you multiple times before.”

“You haven’t said that to me in weeks, babe.”

“We literally just talked about how we’ve been in love with each other for twelve years, you’re acting embarrassed now?!”

“That and this are different!”

“How’s that different?!”

You’re shouting at each other, glaring until the moment breaks and you’re both breaking into laughter. “I guess, we just fought again.”

“I’m okay with that if this is what we fight about,” he titters. “So, like… Are we okay now?”

“We’re more than okay,” you tease him with the same line he once said that to you. “We’re in love.”

“Oh my God, come here.” He steals you back into his arms, pecking the top of your head. “Stop being so cute, it’s bad for my heart.”

“Can’t help it.” You nuzzle your cheek against his chest. “That’s just the way I am.”

He leans back, wanting to see your eyes when he asks, “Promise you’ll never ignore me again?”

You nod, casting a smile. “I promise.”

“Promise you’ll stay with me?”

“I promise.”

“Forever and always?”

“Forever and always.” He plants a sweet kiss on your lips and you deepen the kiss just for a moment before you let him go. “So you better go before Levi kills you. Otherwise, our forever won’t last too long.”

He chuckles. “Yeah.”

You walk him to your door, your fingers laced with his even if it’s only for a few seconds more before you part ways. “Bye, baby,” he says, brushing his lips against your knuckles, like every prince in those fairytales you read when you were younger.

“Bye, Rennie.”

The little nickname paints beautiful colors on his cheeks and farewell has never felt this sweet before. He pivots on his heels, walking away.

“Ren!” You call out and he turns around almost immediately.

“Yeah?”

You have your hand pressing against your chest, feeling your heart’s beating fast. “I… I’ll be waiting for you at home.” Time seems to stop and you wonder if it’s too soon for you to say those things to him.

But Eren runs back to you, forcing you to stand on your toes as he smothers you with another kiss. When your lips are bruised and your head is dizzy, he pulls away and says:

“I can’t wait to be home.”

***

“Levi.”

The thirty-eight years old male drags his ash-grey eyes away from his iPad, lifting his face to see the owner of the distinctive husky voice that has brought more money than any other bands he has managed in his fifteen years of working in the industry. “You’ve got balls rejecting my calls like that, Jaeger.”

“I was driving,” Eren says, stepping further inside the studio with his hardcase carried in one hand.

Levi doesn’t buy his excuse in the slightest, but he’s too distracted with the little smile that’s strapped on the boy’s lips. “Are you high?”

Eren rolls his eyes. “Why is it that every time I’m happy, you always think I’m high?”

“Cause you look like you're high.”

“Well, I’m not.”

“Yeah, you better not. Have a seat.”

Eren does as he’s told, taking a seat on the other side of the couch. Levi glides his music sheet down the table, and the vocalist stops it from sliding off the table with one hand. “I’ve re-read it several times and made a few notes on the refrain,” his manager says. “Try to put that into consideration.”

Eren scans his eyes over the notes, reading each word but not comprehending them. Levi watches from the side, observing his expression. “What is it?”

“I don’t want to do this song,” the boy confesses with a sigh. “At least not in the next concert.”

“Is that so?” Levi leans his back, crossing his legs with his arms folded on his chest. “You’ve got another one in mind?”

He turns pensive, contemplating. No matter how he sees it, Do I Wanna Know is a much better option so there’s a fat chance Levi wouldn’t agree with his offer, but…

I need to try.

“Only Place I Call Home,” Eren suggests. “I think we should release that one as our new single and use Do I Wanna Know as the title track for our next album. It’s more promising, and we can release it sometime during summer next year.”

Levi never takes his eyes off him, causing the other man to sit stiffly on his seat. “Hate to agree with you but I’ve been thinking the same way. It’s just too good to be released as a single,” the man says, baffling him. “Why the sudden change, though? You’ve only got two weeks left before the show.”

“That’s more than necessary.” Eren tightens his jaw. “Levi, I need to ask you a favor.”

“Yeah, figures,” he snorts. “You haven’t contributed much in these last few months to be asking me a favor, Jaeger.”

“I know,” he turns desperate. “But this is very, very important to me. And if you care about me, even just for a little bit, after all I’ve done for you—”

“Stop.” Levi is already impatient and Eren hasn’t even begun. The older man raises a finger in the air. “First, stop talking to me like that. It’s fucking gross. I’m not your friend, kid. We’re business partners.” Eren exhales, keeping his composure. Levi adds another finger. “Second, what merit would it be for me?”

“You want Empire to get more attention, right?” Eren challenges back. “Do this and you’ll be seeing my name in every headline. Do this, and I can guarantee that our live stream video will get more than a million views within a day.”

“Oh?” He raises an eyebrow, eyes glinting with curiosity. “What are you planning to do?”

Taking a deep breath, Eren stands up and faces him properly. His hands are curled into balls of fists, pressed against his sides.

“I’m gonna propose on stage.”

***

“You’re looking a bit nervous tonight, Mr. Jaeger,” a handsome male places both hands on Eren’s shoulders, squeezing them as their eyes meet at the vanity mirror. “What, having a stage fright?”

“Hey, Colt.” Eren hurls back a friendly smile. “Yeah, a bit, I guess.”

“But you’ve done this a million times by now.” The blonde-haired hairstylist grabs the nearest stool and positions himself behind the musician, adjusting the height so he can style Eren’s hair easily. “Is there a special someone standing in the crowd tonight?” Colt teases with a naughty grin.

“Well, she’s not gonna be in the crowd, but… yeah.”

The man gasps, not expecting Eren—who barely responds during small talks—to be honest about his love life. “Oh, shit, this is serious, isn’t it?” Colt asks, gripping a cutting comb in his hand. “What’s her name? Wait, before we get to that. Do you want to let your hair down for the night or should I style it up in a bun like usual?”

Eren watches his reflection, contemplating. As an artist, he no longer has control over his own body. His hair, his voice, even every muscle in his abdomens—they belong to his company. He’s an asset, and no matter how much he tried to convince himself that his talent was the one that got him to this point, his looks contributed just as much, if not more. So if he wants to suddenly change his appearance, he needs to get approval from his manager first.

“Eren?” Colt tilts his head to the side, demanding an answer.

“Cut it off.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Cut my hair short,” Eren repeats, erasing the smile from Colt’s face and replacing it with a nervous frown.

“Umm…” The stylist dithers. “Does Levi know about this?”

“Don’t worry, Colt.” Eren sweetly smiles. “I can be persuasive if I want to.”

***

“What the fuck?” Levi Ackerman promptly rises from his seat, his eyes largening in both shock and horror. “Jaeger, what the actual fuck?!”

Eren scratches his cheek with his fingernail as he looks away, a habit that always shows up whenever he feels nervous or sheepish. His long, silky hair that used to cascade smoothly to his shoulders has been trimmed down, giving him a fresh, undercut hairstyle with bangs that fall over his striking green eyes.

“Why did you cut your hair?!” Levi demands. He never sounds this high-pitched before.

“Fuck,” Eren mutters under his breath, standing awkwardly between the doorframes of his waiting room. Guess talking isn’t going to do any good. He’d expected Levi to be upset, but he wasn’t expecting him to freak out about it. “I just… think it’s about time I try a new hairstyle.”

“Holy shit!” Jean is slapping his hand against his knee, cackling. He’s sitting right next to Reiner on the couch, who’s gawking at Eren with his jaw hanging loose. “Dude, no offense, but try applying for a job at an insurance company. Bet you’ll fit right in!” Jean holds one hand against his stomach, wheezing. “Oh my God, I can’t breathe—”

“You’re laughing too much, Jean,” Reiner says. He turns to face his frontman, casting that signature gentle smile of his that, somehow, always makes Eren feels weirdly uncomfortable. “I think you look good, bro. Fresh.”

Feeling like he’s dying a little bit out of shame, Eren mutters a quick, “Thanks. Can we move on now?”

Jean, realizing something, jumps off the couch. “Wait! Now that he looks like a fucking dork, does that mean I can be the one with the man-bun now? I can rock that hairstyle way better than he did.”

Everyone in the room, even Marco—the staff who’s usually very kind toward anyone—ignores him. Eren focuses his attention back on his manager whose scowl is ten times more menacing than usual. “Can we look past this, Levi? It’s just a hairstyle, no big deal.”

No big deal?

It’s not a big deal. It’s a loss—such a devastating loss, Levi thinks, because his long hair and his messy man-bun are the ones that make him iconic. There are an abundant amount of young adults copying his hairstyle, calling it “The Jaeger” as they post pictures on their Instagrams, tagging Empire’s official accounts to get noticed. And now, Eren has cut it all, his hair is about the same length as Levi’s—probably even shorter. It doesn’t make him look bad—if anything, the short hair only adds more masculinity to his boyish face. Without his strands framing his cheekbones, his jawlines only look stronger. But, still…

“Such a fucking waste.” Levi grouses, his fingers pinching the bridge of his nose. “You know what, I don’t have time to scold you right now,” he snaps. “Take a seat. We’ve only got one hour left before the show starts. We can’t fuck it up.” Levi makes sure to send him a death glare as he grumpily hisses, “Any more than this.”

Sneering, Jean elbows his frontman on his side. “You’re gonna get so fucked after this, bro.”

“Yeah, by my girlfriend.”

“Oh, shut up.”

***

Oh my God, just kill me, you complain in your head as you flush down your toilet. This is the third time you vomited your insides since this afternoon. It’s currently 10.17 pm, marking how three hours have passed with you doing nothing but lying down on your bed with your slippers on and your body bundled in blankets.

I wish I could see the show, you groan, pouting in the same way you did when you kissed Eren goodbye earlier this morning.

“Stop pouting,” Eren chuckled, pulling you tightly in his embrace. “You’ve been to my concerts before. I’ll be playing the same setlist so there’s nothing new about it.”

“But I want to see you.” You jut out your lower lip like a child. “There’s always something different every time you perform. I don’t wanna miss anything.”

“Well, lucky for you, tonight’s concert will be documented and you’ll be able to see me on your screen in about six months from now. If you buy the DVD.”

“I can’t get it for free?” You tease him with a grin.

“Baby, for you? You can get me for free.” He tossed you a wink, only to have your palm slammed against his face in return.

“Gross.” Your laughter mixed with his in the air before it got swallowed by his kiss. He showered you with it, one on your forehead, two on both of your cheeks, and a deeper one on your lips, right after he playfully nuzzled his nose against the crook of your neck. You giggled when it felt ticklish, sighed when he tasted the inside of your mouth. “Good luck with the show, Rennie.”

“Thanks.” He collected your face in his hands, keeping you in place as he locked gazes with yours. “You focus on getting better first, okay? If you still feel nauseous by tomorrow, I’m taking you to the doctor.”

You seductively bit your lower lip, batting your eyelashes at him. “Why don’t you,” your fingers danced around the top buttons of his shirt, unbuttoning one with a naughty twinkle in your eyes. “Just examine me yourself later tonight, Dr. Jaeger?”

“Mmm, tempting.” But to your surprise, he pinched the tip of your nose, making you whine and slap his hand away in protest. “You’re sick and you should rest. I’ll be home after midnight. If I still see you reading another chapter of that Mr. Darcy book by then—”

“You’re going to do what?” You slid your hand down his stomach, hovering dangerously around his belt. “You’re going to punish me, daddy?”

“Oh my fucking God, you’re unbelievable.” He smashed his mouth hard against yours, his fingers tugging against your hair. When he pulled away, he held back his laughter. “You know what could’ve made it sexier, though? If your mouth tasted less like the breakfast you threw up an hour ago.”

“Hey, I brushed my teeth!”

“I’m kidding.” He pecked your nose to stop your protest. “Look, I gotta take off. I’ll see you in a few hours, okay? Love you, baby.”

“Love you too, Ren.”

The memory of the goodbye kiss he left you still feels feverish on your lips. Somehow, being together with him like this after the fight feels a little bit unreal. But when you thought about it again, it wasn’t actually easy to return to this stage.

The first week after you reconciled with him was filled with nothing but awkwardness. You barely knew how to act around him, even having a hard time trying to select a topic just so you can talk to him. Eren was no better. He couldn’t even keep his gaze on yours for too long, and he wouldn’t kiss you unless you initiated it first. It was your first big fight, and none of you had ever dealt with the things that came afterward. It was almost to the point you felt relieved whenever he spent the night at the studio, working on his new song. You felt like you could breathe a little.

You’ve both made good progress this week. You’re no longer walking on eggshells around him, and he seems comfortable enough to make dirty jokes over dinner, settle his hand on your thigh as he talks about his day, or wake you up with a surprise kiss on your forehead and a plate of chocolate pancakes on your nightstand.

Despite you being comfortable enough to spout innuendos during your conversation, You both haven’t touched each other in that way, yet. You’ve been giving hints that it’s okay for him to take you to the bedroom, but you’re always too diffident to actually start. Eren, on the other hand, is too afraid that his touches would remind you about the night he spent with Mikasa. The last thing he wants you to do is to compare yourself with her when he touches you.

None of you have talked about it. There hasn’t been a great time, and you couldn’t muster the courage you need.

The same goes for your pregnancy news.

Oh, God. You toss your book to the side, burying your face in your pillow. How am I supposed to tell him about this?

Your ringtone breaks the silence, disrupting your thoughts and surprising you to your bones. You stiffen once you see the caller ID. Levi Ackerman. Eren has given you his contact for emergency purposes, just in case his number is out of reach, but you’re unaware that Eren has given him yours. Is there something wrong? Your heart thrashes wildly, the worst scenario playing in your head.

Swallowing your breath, you answer the call. “H-hello?” You clear your throat. “Mr. Ackerman?”

“Where are you right now?” His tone is as cold as ever. This is your first phone call with him and he doesn’t even waste a second to offer a friendly greeting.

“I’m—I’m in my apartment.”

“Good.” You can hear loud music blasting in the background. It’s one of Empire’s old songs—Little Monster. “Turn your TV on.”

“My TV?”

“Now.”

His tone is irrefutable, leaving no room for you to argue. Obediently, you climb down the bed and make your way to the living room. With your blanket still covering your body, you grab your remote and you turn your TV on.

At the sound of a female lady broadcasting the news, Levi says, “We’re on Channel 16.”

“Wait, is the show being broadcasted live? Eren didn’t tell me about this.”

“Just stop asking questions and do as I say.”

Geez. You almost roll your eyes. You tap your thumb against the button, going from one channel to another, until—

There he is. Eren Jaeger of Empire, standing magnificently inside your screen with his Fender Starcaster in his hands, his charisma like a powerful magnet drawing the attention of every person in the room. He’s wearing a fitted black buttoned-up shirt with his sleeves pushed to his elbows. His top buttons are loose, showing just enough amount of his skin to tease his admirers. The lone wolf tattoo on his inner forearm can be seen whenever the camera does a close-up of his fingers plucking on the strings. The silver necklace he wears around his neck falls between his toned chest, dangling from side to side whenever he shakes his head in rhythm with his music. The sight of him is breathtaking as always but one that truly steals the air away from your lungs is his hair.

“He… He cut it off…” you mumble out in astonishment, entranced eyes stay glued to the screen, unblinking. You’ve completely forgotten that Levi is still on the other side of the phone.

Hearing your comment, he snorts. “Yeah, the fucking brat didn’t even ask for my permission,” he bitterly says. “Keep your eyes on the screen and watch until the end.”

“W-why?”

There’s a pause where you hold your breath, anticipating his words. Then, “Because you love him, don’t you?” It feels more like a statement than a question and your heart twitches. You did not expect him to use your feelings for Eren as a reason. “He has something important to say so you better listen.”

“What—”

“Just listen,” Levi firmly says. “Listen so you won’t have any regrets.”

There’s something heavy sitting underneath his words and you can’t tell what it is. You nod once before you put a word to your gesture. “Okay.”

“Good.” Levi ends the call.

That was weird. Settling your phone down on the coffee table before you, you tighten your blanket around your body. And you watch.

“This last song,” Eren says to the microphone as they head toward the finale, “is special. And I’m not saying that just because it’s a new single that we’re planning to release in a few months and you bastards get to hear it first tonight.” His face is glistening with sweat, his bangs sticking to his temple. But that’s what makes him attractive. He looks so different in his rockstar persona; a stark contrast to how he was around you, dressed in a hoodie and sweatpants, hugging you from behind with his toothbrush sticking out of his mouth. His lips are now forming a cheeky grin—boyish, slightly impish, and filled with excitement from being admired by a thousand people cheering before him. He seems out of breath. Granted, he’s just finished playing his nineteenth song that night. But it’s more than that. He’s not breathless because of exhaustion. He’s breathless because he’s nervous.

“Dude, you okay there?” Jean snickers to his mic. “You look like you’re about to shit yourself.”

“Fuck you, Jean,” he mutters back, but his tone lacks malice. “I’m just… You know, happy.”

“Well, apparently happy is not a good color on you, bro.”

“Again, fuck you, Jean,” he jeers, making a few people laugh among the crowds. Eren raises out a hand, screaming into his microphone, “Who wants to hear a story tonight?” The audience cheers at once, their voices melding into one, booming across the arena. “Good, I appreciate the enthusiasm.” He chuckles, radiant and light but when he speaks to his mic again, his tone gradually loses its jest.

Eren closes his eyes, basking in the brilliance of the stage lights. He lays both hands on his standing microphone, taking a few deep breaths as he waits for the cheers to shimmer down into silence. Reiner crosses his drum sticks in the air, instructing his fans to lower their voices. Once they grow quiet, Eren opens his eyes and they never look greener than this.

“So, there’s this girl,” he starts out slowly, steadying his breathing. The atmosphere is so silent, it almost feels eerie. His smile has vanished without a trace; his face pensive as he stares into the night before him. “This weird, spoiled, childish little girl whom I met twelve years ago in the spring.”

Your heart throbs, your fingers have stopped shaking but you know if you speak, your voice will break.

“This girl,” Eren says, chortling a little bit at the memory. “Man, she was so annoying. She read Harry Potter fan-fictions in her spare time and called them contemporary literature. She watched Romeo and Juliet—the crappy version of it, mind you—and bawled her eyes out at the end, even when we all knew that they were gonna die from the start. And,” he dramatically raises one finger in the air, “She told everybody at school that I was the one who cried watching it. Can you believe her?”

Eren is quite a storyteller, turning an embarrassing experience of his into an anecdote. You still remember that story, still can recall the way he was fuming for the whole day, not wanting to talk to you until you had to apologize and buy him ice cream for two weeks straight to make up for your joke. But even so, you wouldn’t be able to tell the story as funny and charming as he is doing right now.

“She couldn’t tell the difference between classic rock and alternative,” Eren continues, “And yet, she insisted that she had the knowledge to give me feedback for my music. I had to teach her about Kurt Cobain. Had to make her a mixtape so she could listen to actual rock music. She was hopeless.”

Jean and Reiner stand still in their positions, staring at their lead vocal, sometimes smiling to themselves at the way he reenacts the story. “But this girl,” Eren erases the mirth in his voice. “She came into my life uninvited, but I was the one who begged her to stay. I wouldn’t be standing here if it wasn’t because of her. And I know I would’ve lost myself to drugs—lost the battle against my depression months ago, if it wasn’t for her. She was the one who told me to chase after my dream, back when nobody believed I had what it takes to be an artist. Whenever I felt like giving up, she was like a shot of adrenaline, pumping through my veins and she kept me alive. She kept me breathing. She kept me standing. And because of her, I am still here, singing the songs that I love. Singing the songs that you love. And I can only hope that she will hear me too.

“You might be wondering why I cut my hair,” he titters. “And no, it’s not because Jean stuck a gum on my head, though it did happen once.” The crowd laughs when the screen shows a close-up shot of Jean’s face, mouthing ‘he deserved it’ to the camera. “My hair was this short when I first met her. I want her to remember that even after all these years, even after everything that happened in our lives, I’m still the same. I’m still the same boy who loved her twelve years ago. Who accidentally stole her first kiss and let her take mine. Who wrote her a love song for her graduation gift, and performed it in front of her five years later, as promised. Even though I’m sure, she still hasn’t noticed it till this day.”

You gasp, realizing what he meant. That song! You remembered the way he sang it during your college days, in the warmth of your bedroom. You had a hunch that he wrote it, but Eren continuously said that it was someone else’s song, and his words were convincing. So he lied to me again, you shake your head, but there’s no anger in your chest, no disappointment, only elation.

“I was the boy who loved her before anyone else,” Eren professes. “Who still loves her after everyone else. I’m not Eren Jaeger of Empire. I’m just… me. A shallow, good-for-nothing boy who just loves her so much with all his heart but is never brave enough to say it out loud. But not tonight. Tonight, I want to shout it to the world. Tonight, I want to open a new chapter of my life, and I want it to start with her.”

You don’t think your heart would survive a minute longer hearing him say these words but you stay perched on your seat, your heart swelling with his every line.

“I’ve given up many times in my life,” Eren confesses. “I’ve hurt people in the past, in the same way that they hurt me. And I’ve hurt people that have been nothing but kind to me. You see, once you know how it feels like to be abandoned, it’s hard for you to trust anyone else besides yourself. Heart…” He exhales, taking a moment. “Our hearts are such fragile things, aren’t they? Once they got broken, it would take us years to glue all the pieces back together. I’ve glued mine back but the wound—it never closed. Not until she came back into my life.” He breaks into a soft smile, his gaze turning tender.

“You see, that girl with that annoying grin, that childish giggle, and that little stubborn head of her. She came back and she took me home with her. I was so lost before I met her again. She became my lifeline. My compass. She’s the path that leads me home. In her arms, I feel safe. In her arms, I feel like I could sleep without being strangled by my nightmares. In her arms, I feel like I belong. In her, I find my home. And whenever we’re apart, I feel it stronger than ever. I want to go back. I want to come home.”

Eren brings one hand down to his bass. “This song I’m about to sing—this last song,” he says, running a hand through his hair, pushing back his sweat-drenched bangs, “is about love and separation. People don’t always stay in our lives, do they? You’re holding their hands right this minute, but you don’t know whether you’ll still be able to hold them tomorrow. Anything can happen in a flash. Maybe distance will set you apart. Maybe your future job, your education, your family. Some lovers are even separated by war. It always hurts when they leave, but the thing is, people that do matter to you—people that you truly care about—they will find their way back to you, in one way or another. And when you see them again, when you hold them in your arms, you’ll truly feel like you’ve finally come home.

“To me, home is never a place. It’s a person. And that’s what I’m trying to convey in this song. Every love song I’ve written has always been about her, but this one… This one is different. When I wrote songs like Hero/Heroine or Intoxicated, I was filled with all these feelings for her, you know? It might sound cheesy but whenever I tried to write a new song, I just had to think about her and all these words—all these lyrics—they just came out naturally. I could write a thousand songs for her, and they still wouldn’t be enough. So I poured everything I felt for her—every joy, every warmth, every yearn—into my songs.

“But this one, I wrote it with guilt. With regret. I thought about the times I hurt her, about the times I’ve made her cry. I’ve promised myself that I wouldn’t hurt her but in the end, I still did, just like how I hurt everybody else. And maybe that’s just me. Maybe I’m just so fucked-up, that I can’t help but bring sadness to the people around me. And there’s a part of me that thinks it would be better if I stay away from her. That maybe she’d be happy with someone else. Maybe it’s better if we keep living our separate lives but I—” He stops, catching his breath. His chest feels so full, it almost feels suffocating. “I really couldn’t have it any other way. There could be a million girls in the world and it won’t matter. They never mattered. She’s irreplaceable.

“When we fought, I thought she gave up on me. When she didn’t return my calls, I thought that was it. Thought she left me for good, but she came back. She didn’t give up on me and I wouldn’t give up on her. I won’t give up on us. From now on, I promise that I’ll share every thought, every secret, everything with you. I’ll be brave because I know you’ll accept me no matter what, even the part that I, myself, can’t accept. My feelings, my fear, my love, and my doubts, I will tell you all of them, and I hope you can tell me yours too.”

The word ‘you’ is accompanied by his jade green eyes staring straight into the camera, passing your screen and right into your glassy ones. “This song is my promise,” Eren says, so gently with the softest smile you’ve ever seen on his lips. “I hope you can listen to it and know that every word I sing, I sing it for you and no one else.”

Your breath catches in your throat. Suddenly, everything no longer matters. There’s no crowd, no stage lights, no personas; there’s only him, standing before you in all his vulnerabilities, asking for your hand as the world fades away. Just like two childhood friends from twelve years ago, sharing earphones after school with closed eyes and your shoulders grazing against one another. Nothing matters, but you and him.

Eren takes a step back from the microphone, looking to his side to catch Jean’s eyes. With a nod, Jean goes back to placing his hands on his instrument, and under Reiner’s count, they start to play.

(Click here if you want to listen to Eren's music as you read)

The sound of Jean’s electric guitar steals the show as they play their intro. Compared to their other songs, the instruments remain soft and steady, painting a picture of a band on the brink of maturity. “Leaving,” Eren closes in to his microphone, his fingers dancing around the strings of his bass as he looks far ahead. “your tears on my shoulder. Your eyes beg me to stay.” The camera takes a close-up shot of him from the side. His eyes are hooded, gleaming in sadness as the memory of your last fight resurfaces. “We were finally changing. It’s our luck, we're a little too late.” When he wrote this song, there were a thousand apologies he wishes you’d allow him to make, with a thousand confessions to follow. Had you been there, if you had been breathing the same air as he did, maybe he could tell you that even when, “We're falling apart if you think so. But I’m holding on even if you let go.”

“Take all of your doubts,

You can throw 'em out.

You may be unsure, but I know.

I'm always coming back.

You can bet on that,

You're the only place I call home.

Near or far, where you are is where I want to be.”

There’s only you, Eren promises. There’s only been you.

“Every lonely night,

Every drunken fight,

Couldn't make it right, I know.

If it hurts you bad,

Put it on my tab,

I can pay it back tenfold.

You're the only place I've ever called my home.”

Just by hearing the lyrics itself already paints tears in your eyes. You hug yourself tightly, sniffling as the saltiness of your tears coat the corner of your lips. You close your eyes and you perk up your ears, listening to the second verse and imagining him singing it directly to you with his acoustic guitar on his lap. But when he enters the chorus for the second time, a few strings of fireworks blast in the sky and the audience screams. You snap your eyes open, fixating your gaze back to the screen and feeling your heart drop in the next second.

The LED screen behind him changes from the close-up shot of his face to a slideshow of pictures—your pictures, ones that he took of you during the years you spent together. There are some that you haven’t seen, and some that tug on your heartstrings as you see them again.

Most of these shots were taken in secret. Pictures of you pouting at your iPad screen when you saw your favorite TV show ended horribly. Pictures of you laughing at the editorial shots of him being showcased on the cover of a music magazine. Pictures of you walking down the street in front of him with your head facing the sky, eyes closed as you reveled in the soft caress of the autumn breeze on your cheeks. You look beautiful. In all of these pictures, you look beautiful. And this is how you look through his eyes.

Your vision is blurred heavily by the tears, that you could barely see anything else. You let them stain your cheeks, sobbing until you have to fight for your breath. When he asked the crowd to sing happy birthday to you, it felt like the sweetest dream. Even right now, it still does. So when you have your lover baring his soul in front of everyone, professing his love to you, displaying every beautiful moment you shared to let the world know that you own his heart just as much as he owns yours, how would you feel?

You cry hard with your knees being pulled to your chest, your hands covering your mouth, and your sobs muffled by your palm. You don’t deserve this, that’s how you feel. This moment, this song, those speeches he made. You don’t deserve any of these beautiful things he gave you. You don’t deserve him.

Eren…

“If I had my way

You'd fill these empty beds.

Someday I'll come back for you

And never leave again.”

During his final chorus, the music quiets down until the only thing that resonates through the air is Jean’s soft strums. Eren releases his bass, lets it dangle on his side as he holds his microphone with both hands. “Every lonely night, every drunken fight, couldn't make it right, I know.” You can hear the passion in his lyrics, in the way he sings it. Without the sound of Reiner’s heavy drums, Eren’s voice stands out vividly, as clear as the stars above, sending goosebumps cascading down your body. He sings with his eyes closed and his eyebrows knitted together. The vein in his neck shows as he hits each high note perfectly. “If it hurts you bad, put it on my tab, I can pay it back tenfold.” Slowly, he opens his eyes, his smile breaking upon his lips as he stares straight into the camera—so soft, so beautiful, smiling like his heart’s been broken and you’re the missing piece he’s been searching for to make it whole again. “You're the only place I've ever called my home.”

Because that’s it, isn’t it? You’re his missing puzzle piece. And he is yours.

Once the song reaches the end, he’s breathless, his throat parched. The adrenaline that once coursed through his veins and made him feel more alive than ever is slowly leaving him. He uses his microphone stand to support himself, both hands clasped against one another, his mic resting between his palms.

It’s done, he states internally. His head hangs low, sweat dripping off his chin. The first step is done. The only thing I have to do now is…

His heart’s beating fast, it almost feels like another anxiety attack. But maybe that’s it? He’s panicking inside. Growing restless and uncertain, his thoughts begin to speak on their own.

What if this is all too much and she hates it?

What if she says no?

What if—

Jean’s hand on his shoulder stops his train of thoughts. Still caught up in a frenzy, Eren lifts his face, seeing the other man toss an impish grin at him before he ruffles his hair, and messes up his bangs. “Come on, man, I thought you had the balls to do this,” Jean says, taunting him. “If you’re calling it quit right now, I’m gonna have to castrate you and sell your tiny dick in an auction.”

It helps. Even not by much, Jean’s terrible, terrible joke serves as a distraction. “Shut up,” Eren spits back with a grin. He looks to the side of the stage, catching Marco’s eyes and with a nod, the freckled male comes out running to the stage. “I’ve mirrored your phone to the screen,” he says, handing Eren’s phone back to its owner. “You can call her now.”

“Okay. Thanks, Marco.”

His palms are slicked with sweat and he grips onto his phone with a quivering hand. With your name in his mind and a prayer sitting heavily on his tongue, he goes through his emergency contact list and taps the screen.

Your phone rings.

Your arms are still wrapped around your knees when you lift your head, sniffling as you retrieve it from the table. Right when the song ended, you spent a good minute trying to calm yourself down, not noticing that something was happening on the stage.

Your eyes are moving back and forth from your phone to your TV, widening in horror once you realized what he’s doing.

Oh my God, your heart’s racing again, beating a thousand miles per hour. Oh my God, this is not happening.

Eren fidgets, anxiously waiting for you to pick up the video call with his bottom lip tucked between his teeth. He has his gaze down, glued to his phone screen, his knees almost wobble underneath his weight. Please pick up the call, baby.

You’re a mess, you’ve got no make-up on, and you’re dressed in nothing but Eren’s grey hoodie and your blanket. Your face is drenched with your tears, your eyes are puffy and swollen. Oh my God, okay, you’re panicking, just answer the call. Your phone slips off your hand, clattering against the floor. “Fuck.” You almost knock your head against the coffee table when you pick it up. Calm down, calm down. Quickly wiping off the rest of your tears away as best as you can, you slide your thumb along the screen. “H-hello?”

Your voice, quavering and unsteady, echoes from your TV. The LED screen behind him mirrors his phone, and you can see your name written on it. “Hey, baby,” Eren breathes in relief, his heart almost plummets to his stomach. “Can you turn the camera on for me?”

“N-no,” you’re crying again, overwhelmed by the feeling of joy, embarrassment, and consternation at the same time.

Eren titters. “Why not?”

“‘C-cause I have s-snots all over my face.”

The crowd laughs, startling you with the sound. They find your honesty to be adorable and genuine, just like how Eren perceives you. “Baby,” he coos, trying to both tease you and reassure you with his smile. “There’s something I wanna do but I can’t do it if I don’t see your face.”

“No.”

“Baby,” he pleads, staring straight into the camera. “Please? Let me see your pretty face.”

“Y-you’re so stubborn.” But you don’t have the heart to decline, not when he’s giving you his best puppy eyes. Your whole body seems to shake every time you take a breath deeper than usual. You switch on your camera, Eren’s face showing up on your screen almost at the same time yours appears on the giant LED screen. You look even more terrible than you expected so you hastily cover the bottom half of your face with your cushion, hiding behind it.

The audience cheers, some of them clap their hands, greeting you with warmth.

“There’s my baby girl,” Eren says, chuckling. He turns his body around, rising his phone high in the air so you can get a clear view of the crowd. “Say hi to everyone, baby.”

You’re choking on your tears, trying to smile but it comes out more like a grimace than anything else. “H-hi everyone.”

You can faintly make out the word “Hi,” from the voices that are all shouting at once. Eren didn’t expect their reaction to be this enthusiastic and welcoming. It’s a nice surprise, one that puts him at ease. “Baby,” Eren draws your attention back to him. “I don’t have much time left so I gotta ask you the question real quick. Is that okay?”

You shake your head, still hiding most of your face behind the cushion.

“Why not?”

“Because I think I know w-what you’re going to say.” Your words are unclear, muffled by the fabric and the mucus that clogs your nose. “A-and I don’t think my heart can handle it.”

Ah, fuck, why is she so cute? “You can.”

“Eren, if you’re proposing to me just because we had a fight—”

“I’m proposing to you because I want to marry you,” he corrects you. “It’s… It’s something I’ve been wanting to do for years, actually. I just never had the bravery to do it.”

More tears well from deep inside and course down your cheeks. Because I always thought you deserved someone better, his eyes seem to say and you want to tell him that he’s wrong, that nothing could be further away from the truth because there is no one, no one in this world that has loved you better than he did. That he has cared about you, protected you, brought you so much joy—joy that you thought you wouldn’t have the chance to experience even just a glimpse of it. But he did that. He kept breaking past the limits, making you happier and happier each day and you wish—

I wish I could make you feel as happy as you made me feel.

“I want to spend the rest of my life with you,” Eren’s voice softens, speaking like you’re both standing in the same room, your quivering hand intertwined with his. “I want to wake up next to you every day. I want you to yell at me when I don’t put the toilet seat down. I want to hug you from behind when you do your make-up. I want to make you breakfast in bed every morning, dance with you to your favorite songs.” His smile is so gentle, almost prince-like, his eyes turning into a beautiful pair of crescents. “I want to be your home too, a place where you can feel safe. A place where you feel like you belong.”

It feels like you’re running out of oxygen. Your eyes sting from how much you cry.

“If you were here I would go down to my knees and I’ll take you by the hand,” Eren says, “But since you’re not here, I’ve got no other choice but to ask it like this.” He closes his eyes and he catches his breath. Okay, here goes nothing. No matter how much he prays, he can’t stop his heart from thrashing so wildly inside his chest. Reiner and Jean raise their hands in the air, telling the audience to keep quiet. When Eren blinks open his eyes, the softest color of rose paints his cheekbones. A delicate appears, and your name breaks past his lips.

“Will you marry me?”

***

“Why are you still crying?” Eren asks you with amusement on his face. He has one hand holding his phone against his ear and another one handing his bass to the nearest staff. The show has ended twelve minutes ago, with the audience clapping their hands, congratulating him with whistles and neverending cheers. The show was a huge success, with thousands of crowd exiting the venue with pleasant memories to reminiscence, and a thousand of people more commenting on their YouTube’s live stream.

Eren steps off the stage with the heavy loads off his chest, walking his way to the waiting room with the brightest smile—one that could match the sun itself.

“Now that this jackass is officially off the market,” Jean says, trailing after him with a cheeky grin. “I’m gonna get more pussies coming my way.”

“Jesus Christ.” Reiner sighs, matching his steps. “I am this close at dousing you with holy water.”

You’re still weeping, though instead of breaking into violent sobs, you’re whimpering quietly into your hands. “I can’t… believe you did that for me.”

Eren smiles sheepishly to himself. “I can’t believe you said yes.”

“Of course, I’d say yes.” He may not be able to see the smile that almost splits your face in half, but he can hear it in your voice. “Eren, you could’ve proposed to me during dinner like how normal people do and I’d still say yes. You didn’t have to go this far.”

“But did you like it?”

“I love it.”

He nibbles on his lip, his heart flutters. “Do you love me?”

You giggle once between soft sobs. “More than anyone else in the world.”

“Even your parents?”

“Yes, but don’t tell them that.” You both exchange small peals of laughter. “Oh God, you’re right, my parents. What am I going to tell them?”

“Oh, you don’t have to. They already knew.”

“What?”

Eren pushes the door open, stepping inside the waiting room. “I visited their house a couple of days ago.” He slides his leather jacket off his shoulders. “I wanted to ask them properly that I’d love to take their daughter’s hand in marriage, so… Yeah.”

You gape, your jaw nearly dislocating from your face. “You did not.”

He grins. “I totally did.”

“Oh my God. I don’t know if I want to scold you for not telling me about it or love you harder.”

“Let’s just love me harder, I like that.” He chuckles but you’re not laughing with him. Noticing the sudden change in your reaction, he asks with furrowed brows. “Baby? Is there something wrong?”

“No, it’s just…” You lay a hand above your stomach, wetting your lip. “There’s something I need to tell you too. Something really important.”

“Please don’t say you’re planning to divorce me.”

“No,” your laugh sounds a bit tense. “It’s good news.” I hope you’ll think so. “But I want to say it to you in person. So, come home quickly, okay? I’ll wait for you.”

His chest is filled with anticipation. But even without it, he already feels that way. He has never felt like he wanted to see you this badly before. “Okay,” he says, his gaze softens. “I promise I’ll come home to you soon.”

And then we’ll stay. Just you and me. Together.

Forever and always.

***

Next chapter

A/N - PLEASE READ

The next chapter will be the final chapter of The Last Song! The epilogue will have a bittersweet ending, so if you don't think you're up to that, you can read the alternate ending here. I encourage you to read the epilogue though if you want to find the answers to all the things that haven't been addressed in this story (especially about Armin).

Please be a dear and fill out this feedback form for me so I'll know which one of my WIPs I need to prioritize first 😉thank you so much in advance!

Super, super massive thanks to my beta reader @justasketch for being an ABSOLUTE blessing!!! I know this chapter isn't perfect. Honestly, I think this is one of the worst chapters I've written but I thank you for your patient during our brainstorming sessions lol. Your feedback helped me a lot and honestly bro? I wouldn't have been able to finish this if it wasn't because of you. SO THANK YOU.

Tagging: @tasteless @l6ffys @vivi-et @halparkebitch @fwess @littlemochi @thebeardedmoon @luvtaromilktea @didiyogo @xximthefoolxx-blog @coyloves @erenbean @tehehebri @justasketch @infnteen @naiomiwinchester @spiderlingh @doyochii @ahornyenby @jeagersruletheworld @sakurashell @indiecursor @the-princess-button @resonancesoul @link-avalon @blrqt @sukunasrealgf @cacapeepee @persyhange @jaegersdiary @missyasma @cknf69 @dazzlingnights @nothingtoseehereeee @fuckyourchickenstrips666 @trashgremlin36 @meed18 @j0livi0ni @snowflake-201 thanks so much for reading, lovelies! Let me know what you think ❤️

#eren smut #eren jaeger smut #eren yeager smut #eren jaeger x reader #eren fluff #eren jaeger x reader smut #eren yeager x reader #aot smut #snk smut #eren yeager x reader smut #eren jaeger #eren x reader #eren #eren x reader angst #eren angst #eren x reader fluff

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bucky-hues · 3 years

Text

bucky barnes fic recs

here are some bucky fics i loved reading!

many of these are 18+ and there are some dark fics in here, so please read the warnings for each fic! if any of the writers i’ve included want anything removed/edited, please let me know!

one shots

jack pendleton | @roger-that-cap

author!bucky x reader

moving into an apartment to get away from your last relationship was fun all fun and games until you met your extremely attractive across-the-hall neighbor, who makes awesome cookies and even better novels.

grip | @pellucid-constellations

bucky x reader

You knew Bucky didn’t like his arm. You just didn’t know how much until he accidentally hurt you with it.

voicemails to an unmanned inbox | @pellucid-constellations

bucky x reader

When Bucky takes an argument a little too far, you take off. All he wants is for you to come back home.

can’t get the words out | @pellucid-constellations

bucky x avenger!reader

Bucky’s been awfully distant lately. You don’t think your heart can take what you know he’s about to say.

his everything | @likeahorribledream

bucky x avenger!reader

Bucky has trouble talking about his feelings and he ends up pushing away the one person he needs the most.

eavesdrop | @bestofbucky

bucky x avenger!reader

things spies don't notice | @starrysebastians

bucky x avenger!reader

don't you worry (your pretty little head) | @babyboibucky

guitarist!bucky x reader

You agree to spend twelve hours with Bucky whom you just met.

suburbia | @wkemeup

bucky x avenger!reader

Posing as husband and wife, you and Bucky infiltrate a quaint suburban neighborhood in search of a Hydra hacker. Perhaps if you weren’t so in love with him and he hadn’t broken your heart, the act of pretending wouldn’t hurt so much.

sparklin' eyes | @19ana45

roommate!bucky x reader

Prompt: Character A’s current boyfriend/girlfriend/partner mocks Character B for their crush on their best friend, [A]. [B], feeling humiliated, withdraws from the friendship with [A], who is completely oblivious [B] has feelings for them.

reoccurring face | @swtbbybarnes

bucky x reader

he’s been around a lot lately, sometimes multiple times a day, and you’re starting to wonder how much coffee one man can actually drink.

falling for you | @comfortbucky

roommate!bucky

moving on | @bucky-bucket-barnes

bucky x reader

After Bucky had been missing for a year, you had presumed him dead. Time passed, yet you seemed unable to move on from his death. That was until a familiar face came to your doorstep one winter night.

bucky bitchass barnes to the rescue | @bucky-bucket-barnes

bucky x avenger!reader

In an attempt to escape from hectic life as an Avenger, you decided to go out on a date. Unfortunately, you got stood up. While Bucky hates you, he hates seeing you embarrassed more and decides to fill in for your M.I.A. date.

pansies, pain, and other things about bucky | @bucky-bucket-barnes

bucky x avenger!reader

You and Bucky are begrudgingly paired on a mission together. This is less than ideal considering neither of you are too keen on the other tagging along. All goes as normal until a surprise attack severely hurts both of you. Feeling incredibly guilty, Bucky helps you tend to your wounds. He has trouble admitting it, but he wants to make sure you’re safe.

the lost converse | @firefly-in-darkness

bucky x reader

Last nights party was a bit of a mad one, what do you do when you wake up in someone else’s bed?

nervous | @dailyreverie

bucky x reader

A nervous Bucky introduces you to his fellow Avengers during game night

fever | @dailyreverie

bucky x reader

a little old fashioned | @gogolucky13

bucky x reader

Bucky is a bit subtle in telling you he likes you.

sweetart | @onlyjamesbarnes

soft!bucky x baker!reader

your best friend bucky tries to stay platonic with you, letting you live out your dreams, but his instincts soon get the better of him.

the things you've done | @divine-mistake

bucky x reader

what if the world ended tomorrow and all he did was spend his last day with you thinking about how you never hold his metal hand and you never walk on his left side and you constantly reach out for his right arm?

do you still love me? | @thatfangirl42

bucky x reader

2:00am | @thatfangirl42

bucky x avenger!reader

miscommunications | @empyreanwritings

bucky x avenger!reader

cookies, kisses, and such | @sweetbucky

neighbour!bucky

pretending | @multifandomwriter

bucky x reader

Bucky notices you at a party and is instantly attracted to you. Steve instantly notices the lovestruck look in his eyes, but also his nerves that are stopping him from talking to you. So Steve plays on Bucky’s jealousy to get him to make a move.

good together | @irndad

bucky barnes x avenger!reader

bucky and his girlfriend are in secret, and they think they are absolutely perfect for each other. literally everyone else in the compound thinks bucky and nat are made for each other.

l-o-v-e | @irndad

college!bucky x reader

college!bucky meets reader in a library and it’s all downhill from there. He’s desperately in love and pining and it’s all ridiculous and he doesn’t think she could like him back.

tell me the truth | @bwhitewolfbarnes

bucky x avenger!reader

Bucky finds himself overhearing your conversation with his younger self, and he hates the way it makes him ache. He needs to know what is real.

the staring contest | @jobean12-blog

bucky x avenger!reader

Bucky has a staring/glaring problem and you can’t figure out why!

lavender | @wkemeup

bucky x reader

Not every nightmare is the same and Bucky doesn’t always wake up as the man you know.

little lion man | @wkemeup

bucky x avenger!reader

Sent on an assignment back to 1943, you encounter a drastically different version of the man you know

purgatory | @wkemeup

bucky x avenger!reader

While on a mission, Bucky becomes dissociated into the Winter Soldier. But instead of becoming a threat, his instinct is to protect.

i love you, you idiot | @chrisevansjellybeans

bucky x reader

all the good things | @houseravenclaws

bucky x avenger!reader

bucky’s been more than a little happy recently. sam thinks it has something to do with the pretty girl on the team.

tap | @houseravenclaws

bucky x avenger!reader

bucky never talked much. he fell in love anyway.

shaking | @clintbartonswife

bucky x avengers!reader

after you get injured on a mission, the usually stoic Bucky breaks, and you see a side to him that he’s kept hidden ever since his acceptance into the Avengers.

deserving | @hanoella

bucky x healer!reader

When someone bad mouths Bucky in your presence, you set things straight.

keep me cool | @chouettedubois

bucky x avenger!reader

You and Bucky are on your third undercover mission acting as a couple. Things go awry when you fall ill. Cue caretaker!Bucky to the rescue.

on, off and repeat | @avasparks

neighbour!bucky x reader

i wished on the moon for you | @sunmoonandbucky

bucky x reader

After losing Bucky, you were devastated. So when Howard Stark asks for volunteers for an experiment, you’re the first in line.

the hottest avenger | @watchmegetobsessed

bucky x avenger!reader

Being locked together with Sam and Bucky brings the worst out of you, picking on each other constantly. Following an arguement Bucky accidentally calls you his girlfriend in front of Sam when your relationship was supposed to be a secret.

hey daddy | @watchmegetobsessed

bucky x avenger!reader

You join Peter and his friends for a game of Truth Or Dare but you wish you stayed in your room when MJ challenges you to do a task that will definitely out your secret relationship with Bucky.

crash course | @watchmegetobsessed

bucky x reader

Bucky is a regular at the café where you work at and seeing him struggling with technology, you offer to help him, teaching him the basics while you are both thinking about taking it a little further than just a crash course.

little things | @watchmegetobsessed

bucky x avenger!reader

missed chances | @soap-bubble-nebula

bucky x avenger!reader

Bucky is about to ask out the reader, but right before she could answer him her ex calls her up and she answers happily as she always wanted a second chance with said ex

truth or dare? | @soap-bubble-nebula

bucky x avenger!reader

the experiment | @soap-bubble-nebula

bucky x reader

make believe on christmas eve | @green-eyeddragonfanfiction

bucky x reader

When your family insists you bring your [nonexistent] long-term boyfriend over for Christmas, you panic. You hadn’t expected to be put in this situation; you never thought you’d actually have to bring “him” over.

sick day | @nastybuckybarnes

bucky x avenger!reader

you tell a little white lie to escape Avenging for a day, and Bucky finds out. He’s hurt and upset, until he finds out your reason why.

spies and secrets | @barnesandco

bucky x reader

Bucky buys a new jacket that is… uncharacteristically bright. Sam ribs him for it, and you- you don’t know what to do with yourself.

the bar rules | @buckyhoney (18+)

bartender!bucky x reader

the family lunch | @buckyhoney (18+)

dad'sbestfriend!bucky x reader

forbidden fruit | @bucksfucks (18+)

dad'sbestfriend!bucky x reader

you attempt to set your ex’s things on fire. bucky has a better idea.

mr. brightside | @bucksfucks (18+)

ex'sdad!bucky x reader

the one where you fuck your ex's dad

left gasping for air | @bucksfucks (18+)

bucky x reader

doused with sex pollen, you & bucky are met with a difficult decision.

love me harder | @celestialbarnes (18+)

bucky x avenger!reader

you and bucky have been flirting and screwing around for months now, after seeing him getting frisky with someone else, you decide to do the same and bucky’s just about had enough.

sweeter than sugar | @angrythingstarlight (18+)

chubbybaker!bucky x reader

look my way | @sableseb (18+)

neighbour!bucky x reader

boyfriend upgrade | @multifandomwriter (18+)

roommate!bucky x reader

You have always been close with your roommate, Bucky, but tensions start to rise when your boyfriend begins to stay over at your apartment. You feel like you’re drifting apart until Bucky accidentally sees you almost naked.

lure | @bccky (18+) dark

bucky x reader

it’s all about the perfect lure

plan | @sergeantxrogers (18+)

bucky x reader

“I was supposed to forget about you, and you were supposed to forget about me, but damn it if I could ever forget about you because since the day I saw you, you never left my mind and you were all I thought about,” he rambled, focusing on anything his eyes could land on that wasn’t you. “You’re… you’re still all I think about,” he whispered, voice tired and beaten, like the very sentence had been waiting in his throat for years just to get a chance to come out into the open.

play pretend | @wkemeup (18+)

bucky x avenger!reader

When Bucky is injected with a substance that leaves him desperate for release, you offer your help.

you’re mine | @marveicinematics (18+)

bucky x reader

Having a secret relationship with a man as insecure and complex as James Buchanan Barnes may not have been the best idea you had, but one thing was certain: you knew how to make him feel better about the things that bothered him.

white lies and truth serum | @mariessecretfantasies (18+) dark

dark!bucky x avenger!reader

You and Bucky share a dance, a few too many drinks, and a night in bed together. Unfortunately, he neglects to tell you that he can’t get drunk.

bitter fruit | @divine-mistake (18+)

bucky x avenger!reader

“The mission was already a success!” you say and you can feel tears burning the back of your eyes. You will yourself to blink them back. “You had the files, the base was set to detonate, I don’t understand why you didn’t just stay on the fucking jet.”

“Because you were going to die.”

always here | @simsadventures (18+)

bucky x avenger!reader

You have an obvious crush on Bucky, and kind of hope he feels the same. But when you overhear agents talking about you, and then even Bucky, you realise there is no hope for you. At least you think there isn’t.

your captain | @onlyjamesbarnes (18+)

dark!bucky x reader, husband!steve x reader

a perfect anniversary night gets interrupted by his best friend, who happens to be your boss.

series/multi-chap

graveyard , sacrifice | @wkemeup

bucky x healer!reader

As the unofficial healer for the Avengers, you pride yourself on the ability to mend heroes with the touch of your hand. Only, your gift comes at a heavy price — one you keep secret from your friends —and when Bucky asks you to do the impossible, they’ll discover why your gift is called a sacrifice, too.

sunrise | @wkemeup (18+)

veteran!bucky x librarian!reader

After an explosion takes his arm and his only sense of belonging, Bucky is discharged from active duty and sent back to civilian life. Left with a storm of unchecked guilt, Bucky is content to live out the rest of his days in the hollow comfort of the dark. This is, until Sam drags him down to the local VA and he meets you.

TiMER | @xbuchananbarnes (ongoing) (18+)

bartender!bucky x reader (soulmate au)

“If a clock could count down to the exact moment you’ll meet your soulmate, would you want to know?”

the match | @babyboibucky (ongoing) (18+)

ceo!bucky x reader

You come across your boss’ Tinder profile.

the holiday hack | @gogolucky13

bucky x reader (modern au)

You ask Bucky to be your stand-in boyfriend for your family’s Christmas party.

sexual healing , medicine | @gogolucky13 (18+)

bucky x avenger!reader

You ask a touch-starved Bucky if he wants to try something new in an attempt to take your minds off work.

vacant mirrors | @whirlybirbs (18+)

bucky x reader

shit's been rough. shit was rough even before the blip. dr. hart shares an office with dr. raynor, and you share with waiting room with bucky barnes. set before tfatws; a friends-to-lovers, slowburn, eventual smut.

salvatore | @nsfwsebbie (18+) dark

dark!bucky x reader

Bucky Barnes doesn’t believe in love anymore. Especially after the tragic, unknown death of his wife, Natasha. He thinks it’s stupid and a waste of time and- oh my. Hello there, you. There you were, with your notebooks and your novels, writing your heart away. He’s hellbent on saving you from this nasty world, his elusive neighbor that has him under the stupid spell of love. You soon find yourself trapped in a tragic love story with Bluebeard, not Prince Charming.

polyonymous | @bubblebuckys

bucky x reader (social media au)

You met James on Twitter three months ago, and you’ve talked everyday since. You really like him, and you don’t think you’ve met anyone like him. That is, until the fateful night that brings the Avengers to you. You meet Bucky Barnes, and then you’re stuck choosing between two guys so alike you find yourself asking why they couldn’t be the same person.

going live , offline | @ritesofreverie (18+)

camboy!bucky x reader

your new neighbour looks so familiar, where had you seen him before?

heavy metal lover | @mypoisonedvine (ongoing) (18+)

sub!bucky x dominatrix!reader

working as a dominatrix is never exactly easy, but a new client brings challenges you never expected.

fake boyfriend real orgasms | @bucksfucks (ongoing) (18+)

roommate!bucky x reader

when bucky needs a date to sam’s wedding, he makes a deal with you. when it starts to turn into something a little more real, you realize how deep you’re in.

almost had me believing it | @tuiccim (18+)

bucky x avenger!reader

An undercover operation playing Bucky Barnes’ wife is a dream come true. Playing house in the suburbs while trying to take down a drug ring brings you and Bucky closer but a nosy neighbor causes trouble in paradise.

it's brooklyn, baby | @my-divine-death (ongoing) (18+)

college!bucky x reader

hush 1 2 | @starbuckie (ongoing)

bucky x reader

in quiet corners and selfish moments, y/n and bucky have kept their relationship a secret, one love that was pure and untouched by the darkness that surrounded them. but after bucky is able to walk the streets a free man once again, will their love be able to survive?

misconceptions | @firefly-in-darkness (18+)

bucky x avenger!reader

Bucky Barnes overhears a conversation that he shouldn’t have…

what a night | @jurassicbarnes

bucky x reader

Bucky Barnes is out in the new world, navigating through everyday life and it’s trials and tribulations. His therapist insists he tries new things. He has collected a few new hobbies. But when it comes to making new acquaintances, what’s a better way to meet new people than a little dating site called Tinder.

hey, professor | @balenciagabucky (ongoing) (18+) dark

professor!bucky x reader

professor barnes always had his eye on you, you noticed it, your girlfriend noticed it, even his friends and after one raunchy photo sent to him, a joke, nothing more, in his world you become more than just a student

missing piece 1 2 3 4 | @likeahorribledream

bucky x avenger!reader

seeing red | @mypoisonedvine (18+)

bodyguard!bucky x actress!reader

bucky used to brag that he didn’t have a celebrity crush, or really care about famous people at all, which is what made him the perfect person to start working for a celebrity like yourself. except, of course, it’s just his luck that he’d fall for you.

flight risk , no control | @wkemeup

bucky barnes x avenger!reader

Bucky becomes a flight risk after a failed mission and is put in lockup under Steve’s orders. Even though Bucky won’t say a word of what happened, you camp outside the door to his cell so he knows he isn’t alone.

bad match | @justreadingfics (18+)

bucky x reader

Bucky and the Reader are set up on a date, but things don’t go as well as expected.

unbroken | @constantwriter85 (18+)

bucky x hacker!reader

Bucky isn’t happy about being paired with a snarky, untested hacker on a stealth mission to infiltrate Hammer Industries. But when the mission spirals out of control and they’re both captured, he finds out just how much heart his hacker has–and how far she’s willing to go to protect the lives of others.

if i only had a heart 1 2 | @chouettedubois (18+)

bucky x reader

Team Cap is back at the compound after being pardoned. Bucky is suffering from the shoddy work HYDRA did with his prosthetic. Tony brings reader in to fix it—and maybe help him find his heart in the process.

text me | @soap-bubble-nebula

bucky x reader

Tony and the other’s are off on a mission, and it’s up to you to help Bucky get comfortable and assimilate into normal life. He texts you because Tony told him he could.

#bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x female reader #bucky barnes imagine #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes fic #fic rec

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musicfeedsmysoul12 · 3 years

Text

Okay so!

Izuku has a crush on Present Mic. It was one of his first crushes and like as baby bisexual, he saw a poster with Mic's hair down and that REALLY awakened it.

Of course he doesn't tell ANYONE about it, but like people crush on heroes all the damn time. He's heard the gossip from classmates. Kacchan has a thing for Hawks (Not that Kacchan knows Izuku knows, but Izuku is scarily observant cause he needs to be to avoid a beating, and totally saw that look on Kacchan's face...)

But anyway, crush.

Izuku didn't know Present Mic would be at AU. He didn't, okay? Present Mic is in his thirties, and he thought he'd have forty year old teachers who are retired! Other hero schools do it to!

Jokes on him. Izuku has to stare down Present Mic and think about the fact he's read 'Teen Sidekick Present Mic xY/N' Fic.

(Izuku is an unsupervised teen with access to the internet so he read spicy stuff in other fandombs, but be something about it being Real People had him noping from that so THANK GOD FOR THAT)

Izuku would swear to take it to his grave but he's friends with Uraraka and Iida, and Uraraka is an enabler while Iida tried to kill a man.

Truth or Dare night, most of the class is in on it. Other then Bakugou who went to bed early and Mineta (who most of the class has shunned now, and are annoyed that due to to many explusions, Aizawa is forced to keep him for a year), they're all there.

Uraraka eggs everyone on, and Iida is so firmly: WE WILL TELL THE TRUTH about some of the truths (as long as they're appropriate ASHIDO) that when Izuku is asked: Hey, are you crushing on anyone- Izuku blurts out.

"I've been lowkey crushing on Present Mic since I was twelve and seeing him every day is both a blessing and a curse." and then he goes red.

BONUS THOUGH- behind him he hears cackles and a choked sound. Slowly Izuku turns to find not only Aizawa, but Midnight AND PRESENT MIC HIMSELF.

Izuku:... okay, I'm jumping from the roof.

Uraraka: *WHEEZE*

Present Mic avoids looking at him for a month. Izuku does to.

Aizawa is amused and Midnight will NOT let Mic forget this one!

Bonus Bonus- some drama with Izuku's type being loud blondes so we go some matchmaking going on... and three blondes. Backugo, Kaminari or Monoma.

#bnha #bnha au #izuku has a crush #look- most crushed on actors #baby izuku crushing on a pro isn't weird #it's just it's his teacher now to

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blizzardfluffykpop · 3 years

Text

Gift Exchange

Summary: The anniversary of meeting Jeonghan two Decembers ago.

Oneshot

Fluff, Friends to Lovers au

Word Count: 1,127

Jeonghan X Reader [Best friends! Jun and Hao]

Not Requested

Prompt: 1. “It was the last thing I wrapped”

------

Two years ago, my friend Minghao invited me over, to meet his brothers, otherwise known as his best friends. The ones who he’s been making music with for the past four years. I walked in attached to the hip with Minghao. The two of us catching up on everything we’ve missed out on from each other’s lives for the past few years. Twelve pairs of eyes were on us, and Minghao grins, “This is my close friend, (Y/n). I’ve known them since we were little.” I try to mumble, “I thought you said there were only three?” He laughs, “Three in my unit.” I quickly close my mouth, “I see.” He giggles and goes around introducing me to his bandmates, as he introduces me to Chan, also known as Dino. I caught sight of a blond man, and my breath got lodged in my throat. I tried to pay attention to the next two people he introduced me to, but my mind was somewhere else or on someone. I can’t seem to stop looking over at him, and I see him smirk at me, and I know I got caught. I focus on Junhui, his closest friend, as he makes a joke in our native tongue. And we chat for a bit as I feel Minghao nudge me as we go over to him. Not only did the one I was staring at catch me but so did Minghao. “And last but not least, (Y/n), this is Jeonghan. Jeonghan, this is (Y/n).” Instead of exchanging hellos or a handshake, he just smiles. And Minghao gave me a look that told me either, you get to know him, or I’ll make this awkward for the both of us.

While I made idle conversation in the room with everyone that night. Especially, Minghao and Junhui, I spent the most time chatting with Jeonghan. Getting to know him and as many questions as I asked him, he’d answer and fire as many back. Junhui makes his way over to us and asks me in Mandarin, “Do you like him?” And with a blush, I ask, “How did you know?” He smirks, “It’s plain as day,...” I roll my eyes, and with that, Jun leaves, and Jeonghan has his brow raised as if asking what we discussed. I tell him a little white lie of Jun asking if I knew Cantonese. He understands, and we pick up our conversation from where we left off. And spend the whole night talking. We exchanged numbers before Minghao took me home.

------

And I was immediately enraptured by him. He was good-looking, funny, and kind? A whole package deal? Not that anyone else I met in the group wasn’t, but to me, Jeonghan is above and beyond. Minghao told me that night, Jeonghan felt the same way about me. And I couldn’t bring myself to believe that, so I just settled on being friends with him. Although, that didn’t stop me from texting him daily and flirting back and forth with him whenever we met up. While he does flirt back, I know that to be his personality. So, I didn’t think much more of it, even if Minghao looked at me like I was delusional for not listening to my heart.

Today is the anniversary of our meeting two years ago, and Christmas is right around the corner. We decided on exchanging gifts today at his dorm for that reason. I went with a simple design. So, it wouldn't overpower the Seventeen ring on his hand. A silver band with a small, engraved flower with a diamond in the middle of the flower.

Before I walk up the steps, I receive a text from Jun, “Are you going to confess, finally?” I text him back, “You’re like Hao but worse, but maybe. If the vibes are right.” He texts back, “First of that’s our best friend, you’re speaking of, and second off, you better or Hao and I are telling him.” I glare but realize he can’t see that as I text back, “You wouldn’t dare.” He sends a smirking emoji, and I groan. Hao introducing me to the group was the best worst thing I have ever had, happen to me. I ended up with another best friend, ten close friends, and a massive crush.

With a gulp, I walk up the stairs to his dorm. I shake out my nerves and knock on the door. No more than two seconds later, the door opens. And Jeonghan stands in an ugly Christmas sweater. I laugh after I enter, and he shuts the door. I unbutton my coat to show him my ugly Christmas sweater, and he laughs.

He leads us over to the couch when we sit down. I hand Jeonghan his gift as he hands me mine. It feels rather light but looks fairly heavy, so I undo the tape and begin unwrapping. After the gift time of unrolling it, I give him a look, “How much wrapping paper did you use?” He laughs, “It was the last thing I wrapped.” I roll my eyes and keep unrolling the paper, just to find a piece of paper inside the massive amount of wrapping paper. I flip it over, and it reads, “Be mine?” My cheeks burn red hot, and I look at him again to see him tilting his head at me. I nod, “I would love to be yours if you’ll be mine in return, Hannie.” With a grin and a nod of his head, he throws his arms around me and says, “Of course.” I wrap my arms tightly around him, and after a minute, we pull away. He reaches behind himself and holds out a small, wrapped box, and goes, “This is your real gift.” I laugh, “After all that? I don’t know if this can top that one though,…” He grins, “I can live with that.” And he finally goes to open mine as I open his ‘real’ gift to me. Untying the ribbon wrapped around the box, I find a thin gold chain necklace. I smile over at him and quickly put it on and see him sliding the silver ring onto his middle finger. We turn to each other before showing the other what the jewelry looks like on us. While he still has his hand out showing me the ring, I slot my fingers between his. His ears turn red, and he closes his fingers over mine, and we just stare at our intertwined hands; finally, grasping that this is real and we’re together after years of skirting around our feelings. Now, Jun and Hao will finally be off my back for confessing but will be teasing me relentlessly about the two of us.

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earnestly-endlessly · 3 years

Note

kind of an odd request — do you have fics where erik is grumpy with everyone else but a ray of sunshine with charles?

Hi anon, thank you for the ask. First and foremost, I'm so sorry for how long this took me but I've been searching for all the fics that come to mind that fit your request. Second, this is not an odd request because I love this trope so much. I mean, it's basically canon that he's grumpy with everyone except for his Charles, right? Anyway, I might add to this list later on, but I can't sit on this any longer and hope that you have found some fics that you enjoy!!

Fic Recs Where Erik is grumpy with everyone but a ray of sunshine with Charles

Twice as Blind – Darksknight

Summary: Erik is probably the biggest asshole on the face of the earth, and because of this, he'll probably die alone. Charles is a complete flirt and playboy and, probably, will never commit to anyone ever.

(The lesson here is that when you have two friends who are BOTH secretly seeing someone, well, it's probable that they're seeing each other.)

In the moonlight, on a joy ride – scarlettblush

Summary: Librarian AU. Charles is the young librarian and Erik is the college student who is completely besotted with him.

The Proper Care of Actors – Clear_Liqueur, Clocks, Etherei, afrocurl

Summary: Erik is an A-list action star who is notoriously difficult to work with, until the day he gets cast alongside Charles Xavier, rom-com darling who can charm the pants off movie audiences the world over and apparently even one Erik Lehnsherr. The paparazzi catch them out and about soon enough, and their real-life Hollywood movie romance becomes instant tabloid fodder.

Rumor Mill – ikeracity

Summary: Erik is the grumpiest, most foul tempered worker at Stark industries. His grumpiness is the stuff of legends.

So it's obviously the talk of the office when Erik is being made to go to the company party and he's bringing his husband. There's rumors flying round about how much of a masochist or equally antisocial bastard Erik's husband must be to put up with him. Others think he must be a meek mouse perhaps bullied by Erik.

What they weren't expecting was the confident, charming, adorable and unbelievably nice Charles that turns up on Erik's arm. What they certainly weren't expecting was how much Erik obviously adores his husband and how happy he is to let others see this.

Work/Life Balance – pocky_slash

Summary: Alex is pretty sure his weird, anti-social boss is a robot. Right up until the guy's adorable husband shows up. His adorable husband who happens to be a famous actor. His adorable husband who happens to be the very same famous actor who was the source of many of Alex's teenage fantasies.

Terrifying Domesticity – ishipitsobad

Summary: Erik is the most dangerous and notorious mafia boss around for miles, and yet the strangest things terrify him.

For example: his children, and his very pregnant mate.

Of kittens and teacups and love – Ren

Summary: Modern AU in which Charles and Erik are flatmates. Charles studies psychology and likes tea and chess and keeps bringing home stray kittens, and Erik lets him because he's maybe perhaps a little bit sort of in love with him.

Fools Rush In – LoveSupreme

Summary: Erik owns a cafe on the edge of campus and accidentally starts maybe-stalking a Biology Professor there.

Growing Pains – ikeracity

Summary: Twelve-year-old Erik Lehnsherr is an angry, closed-off foster kid with trust issues and a bad temper. Ten-year-old Charles Xavier is a lonely kid in boarding school who just wants a friend.

Logan pretends he doesn't think they're both fucking adorable.

Series

Home Together (The Finding Our Way Remix) – significantowl

Summary: Erik is not the sort of person other students strike up conversations with. His expression, his posture, every part of his manner say: Don’t talk to me. I don’t want to talk to you. But none of that stops the boy ahead of him in line with the collapsible white cane, and nothing can stop Erik from falling for him, like it or not.

Melted Ice Cream and Macaroni Art – pocky_slash

Summary: Everybody likes Charles. Nobody likes Erik. And that's really the source of Erik's doubts. Also, there's ice cream and a baby. Part of ‘the Daycare’ verse.

Walling in or Walling Out – stlkrchck

Summary: Erik stifles a sigh. Of course this is Mr. C. F. Xavier. Of course.

For the prompt: Charles and Raven are throwing a holiday party. Erik is the grumpy neighbor who is annoyed by how loud they are being. So he goes to complain, and Charles makes it up to him.

(Wise Men Say) Only Fools Rush In – wildelybroken

Summary: After reading a fic where Erik and Charles are super sluts, meet at what is presumably Raven and Emma's engagement party, and end up sleeping together, I made the following comment and just inspired myself.

"They start casually texting each other throughout the day, maybe while they’re bored or frustrated at work, and start out meeting up and sleeping together semi-frequently. And eventually they accidentally start dating without noticing it at first, not until Raven and Emma get them alone and are like “wtf you two super sluts are actually dating??” And at first they deny, but then they’re both like “holy shit, we are!” And they meet back at one of their places and they don’t have to say anything, they just look at each other and come together immediately, kissing passionately and ~making love~. In the middle of it they realise that’s what they’ve been doing for a long time now and they confess their love to each other and they live happily ever after because they deserve all the good in the world."

For Charles – Shigai

Summary: Tired of being told he has to find his 'heart', classical piano graduate Erik Lehnsherr decides to travel to Italy and drink from the famous Italian passion for music. While searching for it, he meets Charles Xavier, a graduate in Fine Arts who is basically travelling around the world perfectioning his technique, and who will turn his world upside down.

Together they will discover that, sometimes, what you thought you didn't need is what you needed the most.

Erik Hates People – Anonymous

Summary: Erik hates people- it's his rule, a way of living.

Sugar – humanitys_cutest

Summary: Erik glances at the clock for what feels like the tenth time in less than half the minutes. It feels like he's been in some meeting or other since the day started almost 10 hours ago, and he's had just about enough of listening to these pompous old men discuss what would be the best design for his building like they know anything about it. He tries as subtly as possible to massage his temples to assuage the building migraine, but he knows it's no use.

He just wants to go home.

Everyone Likes Charles – Rosawyn

Summary: '“Everyone who's met him likes him.” Cain's grin was even stupider than before. “Once you meet him, you'll see.”

It was almost like a challenge then. And damn. Erik hated saying no to a challenge.'

Still Going Strong – JackyJango

Summary: Speaking of forty-eight, Erik hates it. Hates it even more that others are aware of it. While he’s pragmatic enough to know and accept that aging is inexorable, the increase in number gives the people around him the freedom to pounce at him with questions, opinions and advice he'd fought to keep at bay all year.

Besides, Erik believes that youth is a state of mind, not a phase in one’s life.

You have a child’s mind in a man’s body, Charles constantly tells him.

But despite his age, Erik is healthy. He works out daily. His muscles are steel and he can dead-lift four hundred pounds. He can break bones without breaking a sweat. Most importantly, he can still carry Charles to the bedroom and fuck him senseless. And as long as Erik can do that, he’s perfectly happy.

All I know is pouring rain and everything has changed – hllfire

Summary: Charles meets Erik, the man he had heard about many times from his sister and some friends, on a rainy Sunday morning. The stories about Erik paint him as a distant and intimidating man, but Charles finds out that maybe the stories had been wrong.

How to Successfully Ruin Your Life – humanveil

Summary: Seventeen-year-old Charles Xavier accepts a job at his local café, expecting nothing more than a fun, new pastime. What he gets is a mysterious customer and a schoolboy crush.

Stolen – ishipitsobad

Summary: Erik is a miserable, grumpy, cantankerous bastard, and he has every fucking right to be. He drew the short end of the stick when he got the Underworld as his domain, and there isn't very much fun to be had in judging and governing dead souls who would rather be anywhere else but with Erik in the depths of Hell.

So when he meets Charles, brilliant and lovely Charles who is more popularly known amongst the mortals as Persephone, and feels the promise of something wonderful that could make his eternally doomed existence infinitely more bearable... you can bet all your drachmas Erik's not going to let Charles go any fucking time soon.

Erik Lehnsherr's Guide to Saving the Universe By Meeting Your Soul-Mate and Falling in Love in Less than 72 Hours – magneto, pangea

Summary:Army Pilot Erik Lehnsherr is just trying to enjoy his day off when a mostly naked person crashes through the roof of his car. Even more alarming, the strange falling naked person—who goes by Charles Xavier when he's not speaking an ancient dead language—brings tidings of the apparent potential end of the world, and begs Erik to help him put a stop to it.

Well. His mother has been nagging at him to go out and meet new people.

The Theory of Partnership Dynamics – Pangea

Summary: “Detective Lehnsherr, how wonderful to see you out on the job!” The fed in the front greets him as they draw nearer. He’s shorter than the other two by a full head, and he’s beaming at Lehnsherr as if completely undeterred by Lehnsherr’s paint-peeling scowl.

“What do the feds want?” Lehnsherr asks bluntly.

“You know I can’t tell you that,” the fed answers cheerfully. Then his gaze lands on Alex, and, impossibly, his grin gets even brighter. “Did you get a new partner?"

“No,” Lehnsherr says through his teeth while at the same time Alex says, “Yes.”

#fic recs #cherik fic recs #cherik #asks #earnestly answers #I'm sure there are waaaay more fics out there #might add more later

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spencers-renaissance · 3 years

Text

you know that a boy who likes boys is a dead boy

Summary: Spencer's gay. He joins the BAU and befriends the team, but it is 2003. It's a secret he has to keep. He just didn't expect it to be this hard.

Tags: gay!spencer, coming out, hurt/comfort, insecure!spencer, misunderstandings, angst with a happy ending, dad hotch, protective!hotch, protective!derek, childhood trauma TW: one instance of explicit homophobia, but it is referenced a lot, as is Spencer's internalised homophobia at the start of this fic. A shit ton of heteronormativity but tbh that's just canon lol

Pairing: Spencer Reid/OMC, Spencer Reid & Derek Morgan, Spencer Reid & Aaron Hotchner, The BAU Team & Spencer Reid

Word Count: 6k

Masterlist // Read on AO3

Consider this my contribution to pride month 😌 I've waited so long to post it and I'm so glad I'm finally doing it because it's definitely one of my all time favourites <3 Gideon is here somewhere but just like with all my early season fics he's not really part of the plot I combined my moreid and gen taglists bc it was hard to know the audience for this, but just ignore it if you're not interested!

you know that a boy who likes boys is a dead boy, unless he keeps his mouth shut, which is what you didn’t do, because you are weak and hollow and it doesn’t matter anymore. — richard siken, a primer for the small weird loves

Spencer has only told one person in his whole life.

His mother guessed. For as long as he can remember, she’s used gender neutral pronouns when talking about his future partner, read him all the gay literature she could find, promised him that he’s perfect just the way he is.

The trouble is that Spencer only believes her until the first grade, when Ryan Sampson shoves him over in the playground and calls him gay. His mom had only ever used that term in a sweet, loving way, taking care to associate such words with positivity, as long as his dad wasn’t around to hear. When that word comes out of Ryan Sampson’s mouth, it is not said with sweetness and love; it is said with venom, and Spencer learns quickly that his mom is wrong. He is not perfect just the way he is.

And so, he keeps it a secret. When his mom notices him getting uncomfortable at the mention of future partners, she stops bringing it up, though she refuses to give up the diverse education she provides for him outside of school. His dad tells him that one day he’ll be a strapping young man and marry a nice girl in a church, and Spencer nods along. He ignores the way his stomach turns with anxiety at the thought. Ignores the screaming match his parents have that night. Ignores the fact that it started because Diana chipped in with ‘or boy’.

He’s in high school by the time he’s twelve, and the only part he’s grateful for is the absence of pressure to get a girlfriend. His dad’s out of the picture now, and Spencer tries not to let himself think that maybe if he wasn’t like this he might have stayed. Diana’s so out of it most days that she doesn’t remember what she noticed about him when he was a child, only recalling the last few years of shoving himself so far back in the closet he can hardly see the door anymore.

It feels like he’s lost his last ally.

(He hates that a small part of him feels relieved she doesn’t remember; that he almost feels assured by the fact that the last person to know who he really is has forgotten. There is only this version of Spencer Reid now. No other exists.)

He makes the mistake during his second undergraduate degree. He’s just turned eighteen but he is already a doctor and, fortunately, this alienates him from most of his peers, but someone manages to slide past his defences. Ethan Miller is twenty, in the second year of his (first) undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering, and he’s nice. Spencer doesn’t have a lot of experience with friendship, but they get on well and Ethan makes him laugh. For the first time, he feels comfortable in the presence of anyone other than his mother.

They slip into an easy friendship: waiting for each other after class — Spencer back in the undergraduate buildings now he has his first PhD under his belt — and going out for ice cream and pizza and Thai food. Ethan goes to parties while Spencer studies, and then they reconvene to watch Doctor Who and play cards.

For almost a year, Spencer keeps his secret carefully locked up, hidden behind the mask he’s perfected after so many years. Even though he’s eighteen, nearly nineteen now, he doesn’t try and explore that side of himself. No, that’s far too risky. He doesn’t try and pretend any other way either, he just stays silent and lets people’s assumptions lie for him, but he can’t help the longing that claws up his throat when he locks eyes with a passing guy on campus. One time, he’d seen two men kiss on a bench in the city, and he’d run back to his dorm and had a panic attack. Why couldn’t he have that?

The feelings don’t stop, and he doesn’t know how to make them. He hates that he isn’t normal, but still longs for the touch of a man, the feeling of being wrapped up in strong arms, of being kissed by dry, chapped lips, and falling asleep to a heartbeat approximately 11% slower than that of a woman’s.

It’s a constant battle inside him, emotions raging, and he struggles to control it, suppress it, tame it.

He pays a sorry price.

Ethan makes him feel comfortable, and that turns out to be a detriment. He relaxes around the other boy: he tells him about growing up as a pre-teen in a high school, about how a child feels living 260 miles away from home, even about his mother’s illness.

And one day, it slips out. They’re on the beach, lying on towels as they look up at the blue sky, talking about what their futures will look like: Ethan will be a successful chemical engineer in Berlin, and Spencer will work for the FBI, profiling serial killers.

“You’ll have to marry a German girl,” he tells Ethan. “It’ll be tough to convince an American girl to move all the way to Germany as soon as you graduate.”

“Yeah, and what about you? You’ll be off fighting crime around the country, not much of a life for a family.”

“Oh, I imagine my husband will be the type to—”

“Husband?”

Spencer freezes. It shocks him as much as it shocks Ethan. He doesn’t even pay much attention to Ethan’s disgusted face and his outraged tirade. He hears slurs and insults, hears him say that he can’t believe Spencer tricked him like this, that he was probably waiting to make a move on him, that he was never to look in Ethan’s direction again, but Spencer is frozen in time.

He’s never allowed him to think much about what his personal life might look like in the future, but he’d said ‘husband’ on instinct, without thinking, and it’s clearly something he actually wants. Ethan’s words sting, but the moment brings about a realisation Spencer is thankful for; it instigates a journey of self-discovery and self-expression, of the joy of living as your true self.

He loses his first and only friend, but he gains something much more valuable. He visits gay bars — nervously sipping a non-alcoholic drink in the corner at first, before soon becoming confident enough to respond to the men who sidle up to him and ask for his name. He lets go and dances the night away, sometimes going home with one of the many dance partners he acquires during the night, sometimes heading back to his own dorm happily alone.

Makeup and dresses and skirts and heels make their way into his wardrobe, and he befriends girls and drag queens and other gay men who encourage him to be exactly the way he is. And the best part is, he never has to come out to any of them. All of them know, and that’s good enough for everyone.

The fun comes to a sad sort of slow, however, when he joins the BAU. Everyone knows law enforcement’s relationship with the LGBT community is less than adequate — Spencer’s seen it with his own eyes: butch lesbians and men in dresses getting roughed up by angry police officers for ‘lewd behaviour’ or ‘drunkenness’ when they’re just being themselves. It’s not safe for him to tell anyone, so he doesn’t.

He still goes out with his friends when he’s in town and wears makeup and dresses and crop tops when he’s at home, but presents as rigidly straight Dr Spencer Reid to his team at the BAU.

The hardest part about it is that he loves his team. He’s known Gideon for years — and he wouldn’t be surprised if he suspects something after coming over to his house unannounced one night, only to have a man other than Spencer open the door — but he settles into a comforting dynamic with Hotch. He can’t help but see him as something of a father figure, and he knows Hotch has a soft spot for him, always looking out for him and taking him under his wing without a moment’s hesitation.

Elle, JJ, and Penelope all take a shine to him, too, teasing him without a hint of malice in their tones, only the kind of playful kindness that reminds him of his mother. He forms a special bond with Penelope and they spend hours watching Doctor Who together and geeking out on all the areas their interests overlap, and the comfort he feels with her matches the comfort he’s found with his new group of queer friends.

(She doesn’t hold a candle to Ethan, he decides one night, after he’d cried at a movie she’d made him watch and she felt so bad she made him hot chocolate and jam toast and cuddled him until he felt better.)

Derek becomes a brother to him. He puts him in a headlock at least once a day — which Spencer has been reliably informed by multiple sources is a very brotherly thing to do — and teases him relentlessly, while simultaneously being fiercely protective of him. Enough so, that Spencer sometimes wonders if he even has Hotch beat in that department.

He loves his team and his team loves him. It should be simple. It is still 2003.

He comes in one morning late for a briefing, his shirt buttoned wrong and his hair is a mess, and he’s fairly sure that his attempt to cover the hickey at the base of his neck with concealer has been ultimately unsuccessful. It’s obvious why he’s late. Gideon is too engrossed in the case file to notice, but Hotch raises an eyebrow, an amused look on his face as everyone else immediately takes to teasing him.

“Who’s the lucky lady, pretty boy?”

Elle raises an eyebrow to match Derek’s shit-eating grin, “Someone definitely got some strange last night.”

“When do we get to meet her, Spence?” JJ asks, smirking as he takes a seat.

He’s bright red — as if he needed to look any more debauched — and Spencer tries to ignore the hurt that seizes his chest at the reminder of his need to stay quiet. This team respects him, and he can’t throw that away just because Spencer gets too comfortable.

God, he wishes Penelope was here.

“None of your business,” he mutters, trying to keep his tone light. He fails.

Naturally, Hotch notices and swiftly moves the briefing on, and Spencer keeps his gaze locked on the case file, not missing the absence of a reprimand from his superior. He’s constantly thankful for the older man, but in this moment, he wishes he could hug him.

(A voice that sounds dangerously close to Ethan’s rises up and taunts him in his ear: he wouldn’t want a dirty homo like you anywhere near him—)

Derek doesn’t let up on the case, continuing to bug him about the special lady in his life. He does concede that it could’ve been a one night stand, which is one front he’s right on, but a couple more concessions are necessary before Derek comes close to the truth of last night.

Eventually, Derek stops, and Spencer notes that the cessation of comments comes suspiciously close to the last time Derek and Hotch were alone together. He doesn’t have it in him to feel angry at Hotch for stepping in when he had it handled; doesn’t have the energy to act as though his pride is wounded, because really, neither of those things are true, and he doesn’t need to add another item to ‘Spencer Reid’s List of Things He Pretends to Be.’

The situation is forgotten, and time moves on.

Things change when he finds his first proper boyfriend. He doesn’t know what he was expecting, but it certainly wasn’t the giddying rush of emotions it turns out to be, and Spencer spends his days smiling as he daydreams his time away.

His name is Oscar Wilkins, a History professor at Georgetown University, and Spencer falls quickly in love with him. Ever since their mutual friend had introduced them at a gay bar one evening, they’d spent all their free time together. He’s kind and gentle and understanding of Spencer’s hectic and unpredictable job, and he finally has the chance to experience everything he quietly and shamefully longed for as a teenager.

The only downside is the silent breaking of Spencer’s heart that the most important people in his life can’t meet his boyfriend. He longs to show Oscar off, to hold hands in front of his team, lean up to press a tender kiss to Oscar’s lips. He wants to put a framed picture of the two of them at the Washington Monument on his desk to remind him of why he needs to get through the hard days; he doesn’t want to have to sneak out of the hotel room he shares with Derek to whisper hushed, loving goodnights over the phone.

But he’s too scared. Too cowardly.

It’s different being who he is with his gay group of friends littered with wlws and drag queens and other gay and bisexual guys. They understand.

But Derek and Hotch are two extremely masculine, alpha men: Derek’s a ladies’ man and Hotch is married to a woman he met in college with a baby on the way and both have a strong and dominant energy that still sometimes manages to intimidate Spencer even after all these years. And Elle and JJ are lovely — some of his closest friends, really — but sometimes they remind him a little too much of the mean girls he went to high school with.

The hardest person to keep his secret from, though, is Penelope. She’s his best friend and he desperately wants to give her all of him, but he’s so scared. He’s lost a best friend to this secret before, and even though he’s certain she’d be fine with it, what if she accidentally let it slip to Derek? What if Hotch found out and didn’t see him in the same light anymore? What if the girls started teasing him? What if Gideon didn’t want to mentor him anymore?

The fear paralyses him. And it’s a cycle he doesn’t know how to break.

Fear, though, doesn't stop everyone from noticing his daydreaming, his dopey smile when he checks his messages, his urgency to get home where he would’ve stayed until the small hours of the morning before. As excellent as he is at hiding his sexuality, he’s fucking terrible at hiding the fact that he’s in love: it was easy enough to pretend he was straight, but hiding something this all-consuming is an impossible ask.

Derek comes over to perch on the edge of his desk one afternoon, sighing as he sits down. “Pretty boy, this is getting ridiculous,” he says, snatching Spencer’s attention away from his phone. “You’ve been grinning like an idiot for the last twenty minutes as you’ve texted Future Mrs Reid. When are we going to meet her?”

(He hates the new nickname the team has given his mystery significant other, although Oscar had found it hilarious. “It’s funny because when we get married, we’ll hardly be able to tell,” he’d argued through his laughter. “Neither of us will change our name because of our academic profiles, and we’ll both still be ‘Dr’. Our wedding rings will be the only indicator.”

Spencer hadn’t argued back, because he’d been too tongue-tied and flushed pink at Oscar’s use of ‘when’ in regards to their hypothetical nuptials. It was only made bearable by Oscar kissing him gently and tucking him under his arm, not embarrassing him any further as Spencer had sort of anticipated, warmth settling over his chest at the thought of their future together.)

“You won’t,” he replies, perhaps a little too curtly.

Derek starts at that, clearly not expecting it. He definitely should’ve tried to play it off as a joke. “What— should I be offended, pretty boy?”

You wouldn’t call me that if you knew who I really am.

“That’s up to you, Derek,” he says calmly, although he still can’t meet his eyes, “but you won’t meet the ‘Future Mrs Reid, so I think it would probably be best if you left it alone.”

“Damn,” Derek mutters under his breath, clearly pissed off and probably more hurt than Spencer ever intended. “Suit yourself.”

And with that, he gets up and leaves his desk. Spencer’s only solace is the text message he sees on his phone when he picks it back up: I love you so much. You know that, right?

The light-hearted ridicule comes to an abrupt halt after the incident with Derek, and it’s clear that he had been the biggest contributor to the teasing. He’s thankful that the jokes have stopped, but he wishes desperately that it didn’t come with the growing distance between him and his team. Loneliness takes the place of his previous irritated anxiety, and he isn’t sure what’s worse.

It all comes to a head at the end of a case in Michigan. They’re stuck in the lounge of the small inn they’d stayed in the last few days, a snowstorm having blocked them in and grounded the jet, although Gideon had long since retreated to his room. The fire’s going and they’re the only guests around, so it’s cosy enough, but Spencer can’t help but feel sick at the idea of another night away from home.

It’s only been two weeks since he’d snapped at Derek, but the chasm between him and the team is only widening with each passing day. He knows it’s not a case of ‘pick a side’, but the team’s morale relies on light-hearted banter and teasing, and him not being a part of that anymore has only brewed awkwardness. Everyone’s trying to give him space when space is the last thing he wants.

Oscar’s keeping him company over the phone at least, but it’s not quite enough to quell the loneliness swimming around his stomach, and the 'discrete' sideways looks he gets from the team only make him feel worse.

“At least it’s nice and toasty in here,” JJ sighs as she takes a sip of the hot chocolate the kindly inn owner had made for them all.

Elle hums in agreement. “There are worse places to be grounded.”

“I dunno, man, I just wanna get home,” Derek says, not taking his eyes off the fire. Spencer can’t help but agree.

“Oh, come on,” Hotch muses, considerably more jovial now the case is over, “we’re here, and that’s not going to change any time soon. We should make the most of it.”

“It’s at least nice to be somewhere sort-of Christmassy now it’s December,” Elle points out. “We could be stuck in a dingy police station like we probably will be next week.”

“Ooh, I noticed that Jemimah and Kiran started planning the Christmas party last week,” JJ says, smiling at them. “I offered my help, but they seem to have it covered.”

Hotch raises an eyebrow“That’s probably a good thing. You don’t need more work on your plate.”

“Not gonna argue with that,” she murmurs, smiling as she brings her mug to her lips again.

Spencer doesn’t miss that Derek is still stewing on the opposite side of the room.

“Are you looking forward to the Christmas party, Spencer? Will you come?” Hotch asks, clearly trying to rope him into the conversation, which he appreciates. He’s been making a lot of effort with him the past few weeks, and it’s just about the only thing that’s getting him through each day.

Before he can reply, though, Derek erupts from the other side of the room; an already pissed-off man being pushed over the edge. “He won’t even let us meet his fucking girlfriend, Hotch, he’s not gonna want to come to the Christmas party!” he yells, throwing his hands in the air as he glares at Spencer with a stormy expression raging across his face.

Suddenly, Spencer can’t stay silent anymore, and his retort shocks himself just as much as it does everyone else. “I don’t have a girlfriend!”

It might be the loudest he’s ever shouted in his whole life. He’s always been quiet and restrained, the type to state his feelings as calmly as possible no matter how he’s feeling on the inside. Even in the biggest fight he’s had with Oscar, his voice was barely loud enough to qualify as a shout.

There’s a brief stunned silence, but Derek quickly slices his way through it, voice raising to meet Spencer’s fiery emotion, fierce and loud. “Oh, don’t even go there, Reid, you’re really gonna try and argue that? You’re gonna lie about her as well as not let us meet her? What a boyfriend you are.”

“I don’t! I don’t have a girlfriend!” he repeats, voice catching this time as tears rise unbidden to the backs of his eyes and all the emotions of the journey he’s taken with his sexuality over the years flood him in a wave of intensity he’s not prepared for.

“You’re fucking lying—!”

“I have a boyfriend!” he yells. “Alright? I have a boyfriend. I’m gay.”

The anger and emotion quickly dissipates, and he’s left standing alone in front of the team he’s put so much effort into hiding this from, watching shock spell out across everyone’s expressions. He’s never felt smaller than he does in that moment, and he quickly grabs his phone before running upstairs to his room, locking the door behind him.

“Oh God, Oscar, I fucked up so bad,” he cries over the phone as soon as his boyfriend picks up.

“Hey, hey, breathe, baby,” Oscar says gently, but Spencer can hear the anxious concern in his voice, “it’s gonna be okay, I promise. I’m here. Do you want to tell me what happened?”

“I just— Oh God, I just told the team.” A new wave of horror rolls over him as he realises what he’s done. Times might be changing, but it’s still only 2006, and he doesn’t know each and every nuance of his team members’ political positions and, fuck, he hates that his existence is a fucking political position.

Oscar’s been so understanding of his reluctance to not tell the team, even though Spencer’s met pretty much everyone in his life. He isn’t sure what he’s done to earn such a gracious and understanding boyfriend, but he’s not about to question it.

“Baby, I know it’s scary, and I know you’re really worked up right now,” he counsels, voice soft and reassuring, using the nickname he knows Spencer loves the most to make him feel as safe as he can from 700 miles away, “but it’s probably not as bad as you think. From what you’ve told me about the team, they love you so much, and even in the case that in the past they've had some issue with gay people, I can't imagine they’d ever actually think of you any differently when it comes down to it, Spencer.”

He’s crying too hard to reply, and Oscar understands immediately, gently transitioning into a story about his day that slowly starts to calm him down, and by the time he’s wrapping it up, his tears are starting to subside.

“Thank you, Ozzy,” he whispers into the phone, lifting himself up off the floor and making his way to sit on the bed instead.

“You know I’d do anything for you, sweetheart,” he murmurs warmly. “Do you want me to stay on the phone for a bit?”

“Yes please,” he whispers again, holding it as close to himself as possible, drawing all the comfort he can from his boyfriend’s voice.

He lies there listening to Oscar’s voice and trying not to think about the disaster downstairs for a good ten minutes before there’s a tap at the door.

“Oz, there’s someone here,” he says, voice panicked.

“I think you should probably speak to them, baby,” he urges. “I’ll stay on the phone with you while you do, if you like?”

“Please.” He gets up from the bed gingerly, keeping his phone tightly gripped in his right hand as he slowly unlocks the door with his left, revealing Hotch on the other side.

“Hey, Spencer. Do you mind if I come in?”

He’s riddled with nerves, but Hotch is smiling warmly, and he’s never said a harsh word to Spencer, so he steps aside and lets him into his room.

Hotch quickly notices the phone in his hand, visibly still on a call. “Is that your boyfriend?”

Spencer nods.

“Do you mind if I talk to him?”

His brows knit in confusion and his lips part slightly in surprise, but it’s all he can do to hand the phone over, watching Hotch carefully.

“Hi, Spencer tells me this is his boyfriend?” Hotch inquires politely into the phone, his tone still warm. “I’m Hotch, Spencer’s boss.”

He can vaguely hear Oscar speaking on the other end of the line, and he worries slightly that Oscar will somehow give away the familial feelings he holds for Hotch, but the conversation doesn’t last long enough for the anxiety to really take over.

“Everything’s fine here, I just want to have a conversation with Spencer, so is it alright if we hang up and I talk to him alone for a minute? He can call you straight back afterwards.” After a brief pause in which Oscar says something, Hotch looks back up at him. “Are you okay with that, Spencer?”

He nods hesitantly, and Hotch says a quick goodbye to Oscar before surging forwards and wrapping Spencer in a hug. It catches him off guard, but he doesn’t waste any time in burying his face into Hotch’s neck and soaking in the comfort and warmth that always radiates from his father figure.

“Come on,” Hotch says softly as they pull away a good minute or so later, “let’s sit down, shall we?”

“You’re not mad?” Spencer can’t help but ask, the question burning his tongue as anxiety — however quietened from Hotch’s hug — still swims around in his stomach.

“There are many things that could make me mad, Spencer,” he says earnestly, “but this is not one of them. I would never be angry at you for being who you are, okay? I might… I might be overstepping here, and if I am, then tell me and I’ll back off, but I’ve always seen you as a mentee, and over the years that’s developed— well, I see you more as a son these days. And part of that is wanting to protect and support you no matter what you do or say or who you are.”

Spencer wastes no time in diving back in for a hug, clinging onto Hotch for dear life as he hugs back, rubbing his back gently.

“I’m so sorry you didn’t feel like you could tell us sooner, Spencer,” he says in a voice soft with affection and regret. “But I’m so glad you’ve told us now.”

He only presses closer at that, tears springing back to his eyes. “I didn’t want to lose you.” He knows what he’s implying, and even in a roundabout way, he’s glad he’s telling Hotch.

“Oh, Spence,” he sighs sadly, “you couldn’t do a single thing to lose me. I’m in it for the long haul.”

“Really?” he asks, hating how insecure he sounds.

“Really,” Hotch promises, pulling away as Spencer does. “Now, you have a whole team of agents downstairs who are feeling very sorry for themselves and really want to see you.”

Nausea rolls in his stomach and panic springs back up as he looks at Hotch, desperate for some sort of grounding. “Are they angry at me? Do they hate me now?”

“No one hates you, Spencer,” he says firmly. “I promise you that. Everyone just wishes that they’d made you feel more welcome and comfortable. We all hate that you felt you had to lock up something so integral to who you are, and we can’t help but feel we played a part in it.”

“No,” he protests — the last thing he wants is family blaming themselves when it has nothing to do with them, “it’s not your fault, it’s just…”

Hotch nods. “I understand, it’s okay. Now, do you want to go down and see them? You don’t have to if you don’t want to, but it might help ease your mind to see that they really don’t hate you.”

Spencer pauses, taking a moment to think. “Can I see Derek first?”

“Of course,” Hotch says understandingly, and the comforting smile that crosses his face makes Spencer feel safe and taken care of. “I’ll send him up?”

Spencer nods and Hotch hugs him once more before leaving the room almost reluctantly. He wastes no time in picking up his phone and sending a text to Oscar. You were right. Hotch is fine. He’s just sending Derek up before I go and see the team but he says that no one’s angry and I think I believe him. Thank you, Oscar. I love you.

Not even half a minute goes past before his phone lights up with a text back. I’m so glad, baby. Call me later, okay? I want to make sure you’re okay before I go to bed. I love you more.

Before Spencer can argue that actually, he is the one more in love with the other, a hesitant knock sounds on his door. Nerves suddenly flip his stomach, and he clenches and unclenches his fists a couple of times before forcing himself to cross the room, revealing a very worried and regretful-looking Derek.

“Oh, pretty boy,” he says sadly, before crushing Spencer in a warm and tender hug. Immediately, he relaxes into the arms of one of his best friends, and relief courses through his blood at Derek’s reaction. “I am so sorry that I ever made you feel like you couldn’t tell me that you were gay or had a boyfriend. That’s completely on me. I don’t care who you love, Spencer, I just want you to be happy, okay? And if this guy makes you happy, then that’s fine by me. But if he ever lays a hand on you or—”

“Derek, Derek,” he laughs, “it’s fine I get it. Thank you, though, I’m… I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you earlier and for snapping at you in the bullpen that time…”

“I understand, Spence,” he promises. “It’s in the past, okay? And I’m sorry for pushing so hard. I mean, I’d love to meet him but if you don’t feel comfortable or you don’t want to, that’s fine, too. It’s your life, man.”

“No, I… I think I want you guys to meet him. It’s been so hard to keep him away from the people I consider my family, you know?”

“Yeah, I know. Maybe after Christmas, we can all have dinner or something.”

Spencer smiles shyly. “Well, Oscar’s a great cook, so I reckon we could work something out.”

Derek grins, throwing an arm around his shoulders as he immediately jumps back into teasing him as they make their way to the door to go downstairs and see the rest of the team. “Ooh, lover boy’s got him a chef, hey? What else does this Oscar have going for him?”

Spencer chatters eagerly about his boyfriend to Derek, barely skipping a beat when he joins everyone downstairs, his friends taking his cues and joining in with the conversation seamlessly. He’s had enough fuss for one night, and the warmth and understanding on everyone’s faces tells him everything he needs to know.

“Do you have any pictures of him?” JJ asks, raising an eyebrow with eager expectancy as they all settle back into their seats by the fire, a warm and unbelievably happy feeling settling in Spencer’s stomach.

He blushes, digging out his phone from his pocket and unlocking it. “More than a few, I think.”

He finds the most recent picture of his boyfriend — a candid shot of him cooking in the kitchen, spatula aloft, and a huge grin on his face — and hands the phone around.

“Oh wow, you like them buff, huh, pretty boy?” Derek teases as soon as he gets his hands on it, and Spencer’s stomach twists in a sudden bout of fear, expecting to see some hesitancy or even disgust on his friend’s face. What if he thinks that Spencer has a crush on him? What if he’s uncomfortable around him now?

But if Derek’s having any of those thoughts, they don’t show on his face. He’s smiling widely and openly, all the pent-up anxiety and frustration borne from hurt gone from his body language, and he looks completely comfortable sat next to Spencer, his arm stretched out behind him on the back of the sofa.

They sit happily around the fire for a couple of hours, settling into a happy, intimate familiarity Spencer hadn’t realised was missing when he was hiding something so integral to his being from his family, and he’s still smiling when they finally part ways to head to bed, the clock ticking closer and closer to 1 am.

He gets ready for bed quickly, brushing his teeth and throwing on the top he’d stolen from Oscar the first time he’d stayed at his place; a welcome change from his worn and wrinkled suit. As soon as his teeth are brushed and the lights are all off except for his bedside lamp, he pulls out his phone, knowing there’s one more thing he has to do before he goes to sleep.

“Spencer?” Penelope’s voice sounds down the line, clearly concerned. “It’s almost 2 am here, are you okay?”

“I’m gay,” he says, getting straight to the point. The main reason he ever kept it from her was because of his fear of it accidentally getting out to the team rather than fear over her reaction. After all, multiple of his drag queen friends are also hers.

“Oh my God,” she says in that small voice she uses when she’s not actually talking to you, before finally actually replying to me. “Spencer, I’m so happy you told me!”

He doesn’t miss her choice of words, or the way she says them and he tilts his head suspiciously. “You already knew, didn’t you?”

She sighs. “Yeah. I’m sorry, a couple of months ago I saw a text from Oscar on your phone when you went to the bathroom during one of our Doctor Who marathons, and it wasn’t hard to figure out the relationship.”

“And… wait, you’re not mad at me for not telling you sooner?”

“Spencer! Of course not. I was waiting for you to be comfortable enough to share it with me. I felt awful that I knew without your consent but I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want to catch you off guard or make you feel uncomfortable. It’s fine that you waited, baby genius, I’m just so happy you told me now. What finally gave you the courage?”

“Well, it might have slipped out in front of the team this evening,” he admits sheepishly, “and the only reason I never told you was because I was scared that it would slip out somehow — accidentally, of course, I didn’t think you’d tell anyone on purpose — and now everyone knows. It’s been killing me not to tell you, Penelope, it really has because I love you so much and you’re my best friend and I trust you with my life, it’s just…”

“Whoa, slow down, Spence,” she laughs fondly, “you don’t have to explain yourself to me, I understand. But I’m glad you finally told everyone and you can be yourself completely with us, now. We all love you no matter what, you know that right?”

“I do now.”

“Good. You should get some sleep, baby boy, it’s late and you’ve had an emotional evening.”

Spencer smiles. “Yeah, I know. You should, too, Pen. I’ll see you when we can finally make it home, okay? Love you.”

“Love you, too, 187,” she says softly, and Spencer can hear the smile in her voice. “Goodnight.”

As soon as he hangs up, he settles down into the bed, turning off the light and pulling the duvet up over his shoulders before dialling one more number.

“Hey, baby,” Oscar says, voice as gentle and caring as it always is, although thicker with tiredness now. “I take it everything went okay?”

“Yeah,” Spencer murmurs, already feeling tired as the safety he always feels at the sound of Oscar’s voice settles into the fibres of his being. “It went so well. I can’t wait for you to meet everyone.”

“I can’t wait either, sweetheart. Are you in bed now?”

“Yeah,” he sighs. “Can you talk to me as I fall asleep?”

“Anything for you, Spence,” he says softly, before transitioning seamlessly into a story about the professors on campus, and his gentle comfort and the knowledge of the unconditional love his family has for him finally lulls Spencer into the best sleep he’s had in weeks.

taglist : @criminalmindsvibez @moreidstrobed @suburban--gothic @strippersenseii @takeyourleap-of-faith @negativefouriq @makaylajadewrites @iamrenstark @livrere-blue @hotchseyebrows @reidology @i-like-buttons @spencerspecifics @bau-gremlin @hotchedyke @tobias-hankel @goobzoop @marsjareau @garcias-bitch @oliverbrnch @physics-magic @sbeno22 @temily @enbyspencer @im-autistic @anxious-enby @kuolonsyoja @reidreids (add yourself to my taglist via this form!!)

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heliosthegriffin · 3 years

Text

Domain Expansion; Nobody’s fool anymore.

In the Emerald Forest various students were fighting for their life, as a sudden surge of Anthro-Grimm have invaded Beacon forcing a unexpected conflict between the Hunters of Light and the Beasts of Darkness.

One student in particular who has been separated from his team struggles the hardest for his life, Jaune Arc.

A shield comes up and blocks a clawed fist, but pushes the boy back wielding it.

Again and again fist after fist slams into his shield, and forces him further and further back till he till his back is slammed against a emerald tree painfully.

Jaune grunts in pain and fatigue as he blocks another blow, the strength behind the blow sending tremors up his arms as he blocked two handedly.

‘Just got to hold on, just got to hold on till someone can save me, no way I can beat this guy on my own.’ Jaune thinks to himself as he can feel his reserves being chipped away further and further.

A roar of annoyance catches his ears, as the twelve foot tall Ursa Master charges again, it Bear like bone mask hardly showing any emotion though, merely raising it’s fists together before dropping them on Jaune.

He barely manages to block it’s hands, as he is sent to his knees in the process. A leg as long as Jaune was tall then struck out into his guts with a powerful clawed foot, Jaune gasping and spitting as he feels the shockwave spread throughout his body before he is flung through the emerald tree flying through five feet of dense wood without his momentum stopping as he flies nearly a mile across the forest destroying any thing in his past till he lands in a heap, in paralyzing pain.

“Aaagh, is this it?” He asks himself, raising his hand in front of himself, shakily, hardly able to keep it from falling down. “Did all my training really mean nothing?”

He is given no chance to answer as a black shadow forms across the .sky that gets bigger and bigger till it falls right on top of him. The Ursa Master dropkicking him into the ground, Jaune gasps in other pain as the worlds starts to go dark as the Ursa Master punchs him again and again with body-shattering hits after body-shattering hits.

His mind drifts away to the day before as his aura drops away to nothing, and the Ursa Master breaks his body into pulp.

*Day Before*

Jaune stares at his mentor nervously, the white-haired headmaster smiling happily. “C’mon Jaune, you need to move first.” Jaune nods and charges forward to tackle Ozpin with his shield, but the white-haired man sidesteps, so Jaune tries to stab at him only for it to be dodged with nonchalant ease, he pulls back and tries to slash at the man’s neck, but it is batted away with Ozpin’s cane.

Jaune jumps back and holds up his shield, and Ozpin unleash a series of devastating jabs with his cane. Jaune holds still enduring the blows and trying to wait out the onslaught. Ozpins smirks and changes the direction of the cane to hit Jaune’s knees.

Jaune twitches as the blow shakes him, his legs starting to give out on him, and then finds himself on the floor as Ozpin knocks him to the ground cane to Jaune’s throat.

Ozpin takes a sip of his coco. “Hmm, still terrible.”

Jaune’s face falls.

“You’re not meant to stay behind a shield, Jaune. This sit and wait will not work out for you.”

Jaune frowns. “I’m not a fighter, I’m a aura-buffer, a team player, Oz. I’m just trying to be as helpful as possible to everyone else.” Ozpin leans down and stares into Jaune’s eyes with his arcane green eyes. “And that is not what I let you into my school for Jaune, despite your severe undertraining.”

“But, my semblance and my aura are meant to lift up other, Oz. I’m meant to be a hero.”

Ozpin lifts the cane up and shakes his head. “Silly boy, who told you that?”

“Everybody.”

“Well, then they’re stupid.” Ozpin says sticking out his tongue. “And, I’m the headmaster so my opinion matters more.”

Jaune grabs his mouth as he starts to laugh, then sits up.

“So what am I then?”

“A huntsman like anyone else here, and remember Jaune, all Huntsmen must hunt alone eventually. There will be a day when you must fight for your, or someone else, life, and you will have to drop your shield and go hog-fucking wild.”

Jaune stares at Ozpin in shock.

“You’re potential is among the highest I’ve ever seen, up there with Ruby or Pyrrha, now lets get you up to par.” Ozpin says raising his cane again.

*Back to Present.*

The Ursa-Master stabs it’s clawed fist through Jaune’s abdomen straight into the ground beneath sending cracks in the earth everywhere, spraying blood through the air, blood flowing freely out of Jaune’s eyes and mouths.

Jaune gags as he comes back to consciousness hacking up a mouth full of blood.

He stares at his hands in the sunlight, he drops his shield. “I-I’mmm not a fucccking fffailure!” He puts his hand on the broken ground and pulls himself forward and headbutts the Ursa-Master so hard the mask shatters and sends it realing back, revealing a human looking face with bear features, shock across it’s face.

Jaune growls and flips off the grounds to face the Ursa, sword in hand, and guts hanging out from his gaping stomach wound. He smiles. “It’s time to go full fucking hog!” He plants his sword point down into the ground and closes his eyes, the Ursa-Master takes a unsteady step back.

A explosion of aura comes off of the Jaune. “I won’t wait around more, I’m sorry Oz, I should have taken you’re lesson closer to heart, hehe, I won’t be anyone’s fool anymore. No one will need to save me now,” Jaune opens his eyes looking at the Ursa-Master with utter serenity, having turned a crystalline blue as light leaked out behind them. “Cause you taught me that-”

Jaune doesn't get to finish as bone spike goes through is head, the Ursa-Master having fired a spike from it’s hand.

Jaune’s head falls back, but snaps back, the spike pushed out, the gaping hole healing in microseconds. “What my semblance actually is.” He holds his hands in prayed above his sword. “Domain Expansion: New Testament - Heaven’s Light.”

Light, soft white light spread across Jaune, the Ursa Master, and then all of the Emerald Forest, cutting it off of real space to form a pseudo-dimension.

The white light touched each Huntsman in the forest, refill their aura reserves and amplifying they’re power by an order of magnitude, everyone who was touched felt the message in their head. “This is Jaune speaking, fuck ‘em up for me.”

Cries of battle sounded off beginning a one-sided massacre.

Four Hunters in particular responded back.

“You got it, Fearless Leader! Break their existences!” Nora said with lightning flying from her eyes, going down her hands and through her hammer, as she was about to fight a Lamia-Master.

Ren gave a proud smile. “I believe in you, Jaune. So, come back safe.” His body fading in and out of light, about to fight a Yeti-Master

Pyrrha stood atop a mountain of dead Grimm, staring down a Dragonis-Master, a myriad of weapons rotating around her. “Hmm,, so that’s what laid dormant in you,” She smiles fondly. “I could get used to it, so make sure to come back Jaune.”

Ruby’s eyes glowed with power, a cloak of petals behind her. “There it is, I knew there was something in you.” She faced a Ancient Beowulf-Master. “We’re going to have so much fun when you get back.”

Jaune’s wounds begin to knit back together with ease, he held his sword up with both hands. “Sorry about the light show, but I don’t know what I just did exactly, so I’m just going to hope it’s enough to beat, and if it’s not, well not like I’m afraid of dying anymore.”

With a step Jaune appeared in front of the Ursa-Master and swung his sword down connecting instantly, the Ursa-Master having only a fleeting moment to show horror before it was erased by a curtain of light that came down for miles behind it, scaring the land deeply by it’s holy power dispersing any Grimm that it touched.

Jaune looked at his work, and then down to his sword. “Woah, I’m a little scary, aren’t I?” The light then evaporated in a shower of rainbows, releasing the pseudo-space. “I’m a little sleepy, now.” He said before falling asleep.

His friends would later find him in crater statured with holy energy and evaporating Grimm corpses, a miles long scar in the earth in front of him.

#Jaune Arc #Jaune Arc appreciation.#Jaune Arc Crack

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eclipsedpascal · 3 years

Text

Lavender Bruises

Older!Duncan x Female reader

A meeting with you and your father’s company’s buyers, leads to the shocking realisation that you had unknowingly slept with it’s new owner, Duncan Shepherd, just the night before. You needed to hide this sinful secret from your father, which left you stuck between wanting to make him proud and the unsatisfied craving you couldn’t ignore for Duncan to claim you as his personal toy. But you could manage both. Right?

Warnings: mentions of work (ew), alcohol, one night stands, large age gap, daddy kink, size kink, unprotected sex, public sex, fingering, oral (female receiving), intercourse, spit kink, slapping, spanking, hickeys, bruising, degrading/teasing, mouth fucking with fingers? is that a thing?, hair pulling and a ring kink ig:)

Notes: I've been writing this for fkn MONTHS now bcs I kept loosing inspiration, so this is actually the first thing I ever properly wrote! it's kinda complicated ig? idk like the parts in bold are a time skip to the night before and the fic goes in-between the meeting the reader is at and the previous night, meaning there’s two separate smut scenes so!!! but yeah i'm a whore lmao. Also ik hickeys don’t show up the same on certain skin tones and i’m sorry for that. i tried my best to be as inclusive as possible nd didn’t mention anything to do with the skin tone. Also!! if you're interested, I was listening to Cherry lips by garbage most the time I was writing this nd I feel like it fits it pretty well😌

Word count: 8.4k

●●●●●●●●

Going over the logistics of a content deal with the conglomerate that had recently bought your fathers newspaper wasn't the most preferable way for you to spend your lunch, but unfortunately it was necessary.

You know how these “lunches” go; business meetings disguised as casual discussions. They’re exactly the same if taken place in a conference room. Disagreeing and having to come to compromises you’d rather not, with the only differences being there's more chatter and cluttered noise of dinnerware coming from the restaurant around you.

You much preferred being in the office for these kind of things, but it was at the request of the new owners that you meet here, meaning you didn’t really have choice.

As you arrived at the restaurant you saw your father inside, waiting for your arrival just past the main entrances oversized, glass doors. You were almost 10 minutes late now and you knew he would be pissed. Honestly, you couldn't blame him.

Having to rush through a traffic riddled DC to get home at 10 in the morning because you had spent the previous night in a strangers hotel bed wasn't your proudest moment. Was it worth it? Yes, but it didn’t exactly leave you with much time to prepare for the lunch only two hours later.

You payed the driver and stepped out of the cab onto the drowning, wet sidewalk, desperately trying to shield yourself from the relentless rain that had been pouring down on the city all morning.

Looking up at the grand building on front of you, you could tell the place was going to be expensive. The entrances steps were 12ft wide and made of a pearly white marble that was now soaked with cascading rain water, making them even harder for you to run up in your heels as you tried escape the cold.

“Y/N, where have you been? You're 10 minutes late and these people don't like to be kept waiting." The people your father was referring to? the owners of Gardner Analytics. they had bought what seemed like hundreds of press company's over the past few years, especially those in the DC area. Their most recent purchase being the Washington herald, of which your father was the Editor-in-chief. You had been working there for a few months as your fathers assistant and helping out at these meetings had become routine.

“I'm so so sorry, my alarm didn't wake me and I-“

"It's fine" He interrupted "It's fine, just please tell me you have the documents I asked you to bring?" You could tell he was stressed out from the way his voice was wavering and how often he was stumbling over his words, so instead of trying to explain yourself any further you stayed quiet and did your best to take in as much of the information he was relaying onto you as you possibly could.

As he led you through the dinning room he explained to you who else was there, telling you that the others from the herald who were attending the lunch had already began talks with Gardener Analytics at the table ten minutes prior.

The closer you got to the table the more your fathers voice faltered, trying to round off the conversation so he could properly introduce himself when the time came. "Now Bill Shepherd had to cancel last minute, said it was something to do with his health unfortunately. But not to worry! I've spoken with him over the phone and he's informed me his nephew is filling in for him, okay?”

Before you even had a chance to reply he turned from you, reaching over the table to shake hands with a man you recognised as Seth Grayson; their director of communications, and an older woman who you assumed was Annette Shepherd. She and her brother Bill were the owner's of Gardner Analytics and your father had said it was important he got on their good side.

As your father greeted the others, you began retrieving the documents out of your bag, knowing they would be needed by Seth right away.

"..So sorry for the delay Mr Shepherd, you know how DC traffic can be" Your father chuckled slightly as he shook the man’s hand, making some light small talk. Mr Shepherd? that must be bill’s nephew, you thought.

You felt even more unprepared now; you didn’t even know the man’s name.

"This is my daughter and assistant, Y/N" Upon hearing your father introduce you to the mystery Shepherd, you slotted the documents under one arm and reached out to shake his hand with your other.

“It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr Shepherd" But as you shifted your gaze up to his own, you realised that there was no need for introductions.

He smiled gently, a kind of smug delight obvious in his eyes as he looked you up and down, taking you all in. "The pleasure is all mine, Miss Y/L/N"

He released your hand from his grasp, moving to clasp his own behind his back. “But please, call me Duncan.”

Duncan fucking Shepherd. how could you be so oblivious? The two of you had spent hours together last night. How hadn't you figured out who he was? As panic ripped through you like a wildfire, you wondered if Duncan was feeling the same way; but from the look on his face, he was enjoying this.

●●●●●●●●

11:34pm previous night

It was getting pretty late now, and meeting someone who could fuck the stress out of you was becoming less and less likely by the minute. so deciding to finish your drink and leave, you took in the room one last time; making sure you hadn’t missed anyone interesting.

The fluorescent red and blue lighting of the expensive hotel bar was just bright enough for you to spot an older man you hadn’t noticed before. He must have been at least 40. He was sat in a booth with five or six others, all drinking, laughing and joking, yet he was staring at you.

Taking the seat next to you, he called out to the bartender. “Bourbon. Neat.”

You'd been waiting for him to come over ever since you saw him. It had been 20 minutes or so of quick glances and smiles to each other before the group of men he had been with dissipated. You had heard one of the men he was with refer to him as ‘Duncan’ when he had said his goodbyes, but other than that all you could assume about the man was that he was rich; judging by the all black LV suit he was wearing.

"Can I buy you a drink?” Turning to face at him when you heard him speak, you were practically stupefied by how attractive he was. His hair was full of shiny grey streaks that aged him. His stubble complimented his cheekbones perfectly and the speckles of grey throughout it helped bring out the brightness of his piercing blue eyes. His lips were full, and you couldn't help but notice how soft they looked.

“Vodka and coke” You smiled, trying your best to be confidant, but they way he was looking at you was giving you butterfly's you couldn’t swat away.

“I.D?” The bartender asked. You grabbed it out of your purse, proving your age to the bartender before watching him walk away to make your drink.

There was a brief silence before the man spoke again. “I hope my staring didn’t bother you, I just couldn’t take my eyes off you.” His flattery almost made you blush, but he wasn’t going to get you with a line that bad.

“Didn’t bother me at all, though i’m sure your friends there must have been envious” You chose to ignore his cheesy line, knowing that as much as you wanted him to take you there and then, you would much prefer making him work for it.

He chuckled slightly, knowing the game you had chosen to play. he looked away from you and down into his glass before taking a swig of the golden-brown liquor that occupied it. “Well I’m known to be quite a busy man, so I’m sure they understood.” He turned to face you slightly, waiting for some kind of reaction from you.

“Busy enough of a man to be drinking on a Tuesday night?” You questioned him teasingly, Ignoring that you yourself had the most important meeting of your young career in just over twelve hours.

“Is that really such a surprise? Most times being so busy is the main reason for drinking” He joked with you as he flirted, making it hard for you to keep eye contact without going red at the thought of such a beautiful man seeking your attention.

Duncan could see how nervous you were under the confident demeanour you had put on, I mean you were practically screaming it out to him at this point. The way you were fidgeting with the chain of your silver earring as you leaned against the bar and the fact you couldn’t even look at him for longer than 3 seconds without blushing was evidence enough for him.

“Well, that’s true.” You giggled a little as you spoke in your anxious state.

Taking a hold of your drink, you wrapped your lips around the paper straw and moved your gaze over to the bartender who was now serving someone a few seats down, attempting to distract and ground yourself from the situation at hand.

You were gripped back into reality quickly when you heard him speak again.

“There’s no need to be so nervous, I’m not going to eat you.” You found his use of the phrase quite ironic, being that’s exactly how it seemed. His eyes were piercing into you in an almost questioning manner, but when he gazed over your body, taking in your satin, black slip dress covered curves, the swipe of his tongue against his plump bottom lip gave you a very different impression; an impression he wanted to devour you. It was as if he thought you were that sweet snack he had been craving all week.

“No? That's a shame” You faked a frown, pouting as you moved to rest your chin on your hand.

“Well I think we should at least be aware of each others names before making such wild propositions, don’t you…?” His smirk never seemed to leave his face as he spoke.

He was good at this game, better than you at least. Of course It was obvious he was going to have had more experience with his age and all, but the way he was charming you so easily with just plain old conversation and confidence was getting harder and harder to match.

“Y/N, my name’s Y/N.” You batted your eyelashes at him a little, for some reason feeling smaller upon revealing your name to him. You felt as if you had lost the upper hand in the conversation suddenly.

“Hm, Y/N. That’s beautiful.” You rolled your eyes. Of course it is. Thats what they all say. You thought.

“Aren't you going to ask mine?” His ego now showing, you decided to make a bolder move.

“You rather fancy yourself, don’t you, Duncan?”

He finished his drink and moved closer to you. “Oh, so you already know my name?”

He was close enough to you now that you could make out the many beauty marks which decorated his cheekbones and hear the rasp of his voice even better than before. It was thick as honey and just as sweet too.

“I heard your friend call you it.” You quickly replied.

He scoffed a little, finding amusement in what he was about to say. He brought his face down closer to yours and began to run his fingers through your hair. “Hm, well he’s an old friend sweetheart. Most people would call me Mr Shepherd.”

You felt yourself grow hot, Duncans words casting a haze of complete lust over your mind.

You did your best to stay confidant, doing everything you could to ensure you didn't loose this game the two of you were playing. “Really? Is that what you like? Mr Shepherd.”

Your faces were so close to each others now that you could smell the bourbon on his breath when he let out a loud chuckle. His pearly whites showing as he did so. You even felt him graze his stubble against your cheek.

“Mhmm.” He ran his finger over your lips as he spoke slowly. "So tell me, what is it that does it for you Y/N? Hm? I mean a girl your age doesn’t decide to stare at a man like me all night just for the hell of it. So what is it? The power? The money? Or is it the age gap so big I could be your father?”

You squeeze your legs together as his sentence finishes, letting out a hushed whimper. Of course you were attracted to older men, that was obvious, but hearing him say it out loud in public whilst being so close to you turned you on even more than you thought previously possible.

He chuckled a little, “So it’s the age then, is it sweetheart? The idea of having a man more.. experienced pleasure you, instead of a man who would leave you to fend for yourself after finishing in less than five minutes. You want someone who can make you cum so hard you’d be begging him to make it stop, don’t you?” Every move Duncan made, every word he spoke was calculated, and it was all in pursuit of teasing you just because he knew he could.

You made a mental note of his nickname for you as you looked up at him. You felt his fingers run across your cheek and then push some stray hairs back behind your ear as you desperately tried to think of something smart to say, anything to say; but he had won. He knew what you wanted and he wanted it just as bad. You didn’t even care anymore. You were more than ready to give what little of a resolve you still had up to him.

He whispered to you as he moved his spare hand up the small of your back. “Now little one, I have the presidential suite of this hotel under my name tonight. So what do you say we go on up? Since now we're just so well aquatinted."

●●●●●●●●

Having to take part in a meeting with your father and the man double your age that you had fucked for hours the night before was NOT what you had planned for today.

“Mr Shepherd, I apologise that I didn’t make it here on time. I had a pretty hectic morning.” You did your best to keep your chill in your now shocked state, but with everyone watching the two of you it wasn’t easy.

“No don’t worry, I know how DC traffic can be, especially in this weather. As long as you're here now.” A wide smile was planted on his face as he spoke. The same as last night. He never broke eye contact with you, and you found yourself wondering how he could do it so easily.

“Please, sit.” He gestured you over to take a seat as he pulled out the chair next to his own. You thanked him politely and sat down, your mind racing and spiralling out of control at the thought of your father discovering the sinful deeds you and his new boss had taken part in just hours prior.

You felt him tuck you into the table before sitting down next to you. You could hear the voices of the restaurant that surrounded you and the others at the table coming at you. Every noise was muffled, as if your head was suddenly underwater.

“Y/N?” You were quickly brought back to reality when you heard Seth question you.

“From my understating you have the merger documents in your belonging, yes?” He looked at your father for reassurance this was definitely case as he spoke. So with everyone at the table’s eyes on you, you slid the documents over to him.

“Yes! And uhm the specifications for the more politically based content changes are detailed on page 25. I was told that was of high interest today?” You got yourself back on track, trying to stay as professional as possible whilst ignoring Duncan and the predicament you had found yourself in.

“We were briefly discussing the more major changes before you arrived Mr Y/L/N, but I believe you’ve already been made aware of most them?” Duncan addressed your father, kicking the meeting off. But you couldn’t concentrate. You were listening to the conversation, you really were! It was just that you were so wrapped up in Duncan’s voice you couldn’t actually understand what the fuck they were all talking about.

Seeing him so invested in the crucial conversation he was having with your father and the many other associates at the table was just doing something to you.

Observing the way his hands were moving when he spoke, you noticed how he would often clasp them together when he was explaining things, and how he would tilt his head slightly as he listened. His bronzed curls were combed to perfection, resting delicately on the right side of his face and when he licked his bottom lip, it sent a shiver down through your spine all the way to your cunt. You were entirely captivated by him.

Hearing your Father ask for your opinion on the subject being discussed, you shook off the spell Duncan’s attractiveness had casted onto you and responded, giving your perspective on the subject.

Duncan relaxed into his seat a little more as he watched you talking. He knew you had been staring at him, but it was cute, he thought. Almost endearing seeing you get so flustered at just the sight of him. He had seen you squirming around in your seat whilst you watched him and decided the accidental teasing wasn’t enough; he wanted to toy with you more. As much as he possibly could.

“You know, if you’re trying hide what’s happened between us then you might consider making your staring a little less obvious, sweetheart.” He was speaking quietly enough for nobody else to hear and not looking in your direction, pretending to still partake in the tables back-and-forth. Still the fear of your father, who was sat just across the table, overhearing Duncans remarks was petrifying.

You knew you couldn’t let your craving for him and the confusion from not knowing who he was last night effect the meeting, but there he was with that nickname again, stirring your desire even further.

“How are you even here?” You let your frustrations out onto him as you talked back, his cocky attitude getting to you too easily with the stress you were under. “I’m trying so hard not to ruin today and this situation isn’t helping! They’ll fire me if I mess this up and I’ll be fucked! Which surprisingly, I’d prefer not to be!” Your whispering was pretty aggressive, but could you really blame yourself?! This kind of coincidence was rare, so you had every right to be mad at the universe for letting it occur on today of all days.

His ego not faltering for even a second, he chuckled. “Oh you don’t wanna get fucked? Funny, because I remember you saying the exact opposite last night.”

He grazed his hand across your inner thigh, massaging it gently before diving underneath the little black pencil skirt you were wearing to grip onto your flushed skin.

You scoffed at his words and looked up at him, shocked at how bold he was being and expecting some kind of response from him, but he didn’t even look your way. You assumed this was so no attention was brought to the two of you and so you followed his lead, turning away from him just as fast as you had looked.

With the heat of your cunt having grown far too intense to bear, any friction that wasn’t your own thighs pressing up against each other was to be welcomed. So you decided not to stop him. In fact you did the exact opposite, spreading your thighs wider for him, not having the self control or restraint to keep yourself from him any longer.

His hand moved closer to where you needed him most, diving under the crotch of your underwear to swipe his fingers over your slick folds and immediately begin rubbing circles onto your neglected clit.

You stifled a moan, leaning onto the table on front of you to keep yourself steady as he touched you. Finally, he moved his gaze to rest on you, watching you as you struggled to stay silent. He whispered once more, “Always so wet for me, aren't you princess?”

●●●●●●●●

As soon as you entered the suite, Duncan gripped onto your waist, pushing you up against the door and cradling your cheek with his spare hand before smashing his lips into yours.

His tongue slipped past your lips, dancing with yours whilst he moved his hands all over your body, clutching onto your breasts and then moving them down to explore the rest of you.

He lifted your dress up just enough so he could grip your ass. Pulling you closer to him and making you feel his bulge against your hips, you were too short in comparison to him to feel him where you wanted to most.

He spoke to you in kisses, telling you of how ravenous he was for you and that he was going to savour every moment. He moved his lips down, trailing open mouthed kisses from your neck to your collarbones and to the top of your breasts.

“This fucking dress” He took ahold of the bottom of your dress, pulling it up above your head with urgency as you lifted your arms to better help him strip you. Throwing the dress down onto the floor and hearing it land somewhere behind him, he admired your body and it’s curves.

“The perfect wrapping for such an enticing present.” He finished his sentence. Immediately grabbing at your breasts, sucking and kissing them.

You couldn’t speak, too enthralled with the technique of his tongue swirling around your nipple to do anything but moan in response to him.

You threw your head back against the door, staring up that the beautifully patterned ceiling in pure ecstasy. You felt him drag a callused hand down to the waistband of your Lacy white panties, tickling the sensitive skin of your stomach as he traced his fingers over it. His finger tips running across the little white bow that centred the waistband.

He collapsed down to his knees, yanking the delicate lingerie as he fell, leaving it to puddle around your ankles.

He teased your heat, moving from kissing the skin of your thighs to your folds, but not yet reaching the lengths you wanted him to, only adding fuel to the fire in between your legs.

“Please Duncan-” you begged him, desperately needing some kind of release from the binds of lust he had managed to wrap you in over the past 45 minutes.

“Ah ah, don't you remember? You don’t get to call me that.” He spoke.

“I’m sorry, Mr Shepherd.” You corrected yourself, recalling the conversation you had with him prior to coming upstairs.

“Mhmm, now as magnificent as that name sounds coming from you, I know that there’s something else you’d rather call me.” He hummed in disapproval, calmly redirecting your choice of name for him and reassuringly pressing his lips onto your clit.

You let out a stuttered gasp, you did want to call him that, but now you felt nervous due to the build up he had created.

“Com’n, sweetheart. Do you think I don't know why you’re here in the first place? Why else would you be sat all alone in the bar of a hotel you weren’t even staying at? You’re just another slut with daddy issues, sneaking down to an expensive hotel to scavenge for any man good enough to fuck you into submission. Isn’t that right?”

Mildly insulted at his all too accurate observation of you, but enjoying the effect his degrading words have on you none the less, you gave him what he wanted. “Mm yes daddy!” You whimpered out, admitting your ploy to him.

A low rumble emitted from his chest, your words setting off some kind of animal inside him. He dove his face down into your pussy, starting by sucking on your clit gently, flicking his tongue over it and applying more and more pressure as you writhed above him.

His mouth was closed around you now, his grey, speckled stubble scratching your already inflamed skin. You were taken aback by his skills, intwining your fingers through the curls in his hair and tugging on them with every wave of pleasure that hit you.

He snaked his large hand around your thigh, lifting it up to rest on his shoulder while he ate you out. Enjoying the new angle he was utilising, he hummed, sending vibrations through your nerves up to the pit of your stomach, bringing you closer to your climax.

“Mmh.. fuck daddy, i’m gonna cum!” He didn’t let off, his tongue perhaps fucking into you even faster since you told him how close you were. You locked stares as your orgasm took over your body, your lips forming an o as you screwed your eyebrows together in rapture.

He came back up, letting you taste yourself and he placed his lips on yours again. You eased into the kiss, a relaxed haze having taken over your body in your post-orgasm state. Feeling a slight breeze flow up the side of your form, you realised that Duncan still had all his clothes on whilst you had none. Deciding you needed to change this as soon as possible, you began unbuttoning his suit’s matching black blazer and shirt, rushing to feel his skin on yours.

He helped you, shrugging the shirt off his shoulders as you began to unthread his leather belt from the loops of his trousers. “You’re so impatient, little one.” He spoke.

“I think I’ve waited long enough, daddy.” You smirked, dropping the belt at his feet.

As soon as his shirt hit the floor you reached up, gliding your hands across the expanse of his bear chest, taking notice of how small your hands appeared in comparison to him. He watched you, relishing in the glimmer of entrancement that shone through your eyes as you ingested him.

He lifted you, his strong arms carrying you bridal style towards the king sized bed and throwing you down onto its crisp, satin sheets. Grabbing your ankles, he dragged you down the bed towards him and finished taking his pants off. His cock sprung free from the confines of his boxers, smacking against his stomach.

He clambered onto the bed, resting on his knees as he jerked himself in his hand, reluctantly groaning out at the first contact his neglected cock had received all night. His pressing cock had made it unfathomably hard not to just fuck you up against the door when he saw that sweet little way in which your face scrunched up as you came.

You were practically drooling, watching him fuck himself into his fist as his eyes scanned across your naked body. Not being able to wait any longer and wanting to finally feel his cock on your skin, you sat up slightly and reached out to touch him. But before you got the chance, he shoved you back down. leaning over you, he held your wrists down against the pillows with one hand and wrapped his other around your delicate throat.

“So greedy, baby” he stoked his thumb over the skin of your neck as he made his observation, watching you struggle underneath him.

“I just know what I want.” You toyed, your voiced coming out slightly muffled with the pressure of his large hand covering your voice box.

“Such an attitude, too.” His cock brushes over your cunt as he sways his head from side to side in disappointment and disproval. “Now sweetheart, you’re gonna stay exactly where you are and daddy’s gonna fuck you just like this, okay? So he can see that pretty little face of yours.”

You gulp at his words, anticipating the feeling of having him inside you. “Please just fuck me. Please.” You knew you sounded absolutely pathetic, but you didn’t care. Just needing him plummeting in and out of you as soon as possible.

He chuckled at your neediness. Taking his hands back from your wrists and grasping his cock, lining it up with your entrance and slowly pushing in, he let you adjust to his size.

Moaning out, you dug your nails into the bed sheets, watching his head drop down to yours as he closed his eyes in pleasure.

“Fuck, you take me so well.”

●●●●●●●●

He slipped his ringed finger into you, pushing against your spongy walls whilst you made a desperate attempt to suppress your moans. You bite down onto your nails, your elbow resting on the table as you put all your weight onto it for some kind of crutch.

He began with a slow pace, making sure you would feel every little movement he made. You heard him join into the conversation once again, mentioning something about an article he had seen from the Herald last month which had impressed him. You weren't even sure. You couldn't think for the pulsing beat of your own heart that filled your ears.

“You all right there, Y/N?” Your heavy breathing must have been a dead give away for something being up, being your father was now questioning you.

You felt Duncan stop his movements momentarily, joining the rest of the table in their standstill, staring at you as they awaited a reply, but his little act of sincerity didn't last too long.

“Yeah, uhm-“ you felt him slide a 2nd figure in, making you fake a cough as to stop the cry desperately trying to escape your throat from doing so.

“Yeah, I’m uh, just thirsty.” Hoping this would ward off the worried looks you were receiving, you were shocked when you heard Duncan chime in. “Oh don’t worry, we can get you something.”

He called the waiter over, asking him for a pitcher of lemonade and thanking him as he walked away, back towards the kitchen. You would have preferred some water, you thought, but you were far too focused on what was going on underneath the table to say anything.

“Now, where were we?” Seth began talking once more, bringing the attention back to where it should be. But Duncan? No. His attention stayed on you. Even more focused on fucking his fingers into than before, he sped up and began going even deeper now, curling them upwards until you were twitching.

You looked up at him pleadingly. You were getting too close to cumming for your own liking, so you grabbed onto his thigh and dug your nails into his expensive black dress pants, warning him. He shot you a devious grin, scissoring his fingers inside you and pressing his thumb down to rub sweet circles on your hooded clit, letting you know he didn’t intend on stopping.

He looked behind you suddenly. Following his gaze, you snapped your head to the side, trying to get a good look at what had grabbed his attention so abruptly.

It was the waiter. He had arrived with the pitcher of lemonade in hand and yet Duncan was still plummeting his hand into your pussy with such a speed you began to wonder if someone had actually noticed what was truly going on. I mean the waiter must know.

At this point you had let far too many questionable gasps leave your mouth, your breathing had become even more erratic as you grew closer to your orgasm. He knew you were about to break before he swiftly pulled his fingers out of you, wiping the juices that coated them back and front onto your skirt so he could pick up the glass on front of you, leaving you unsatisfied.

You scrambled to collect your thoughts and breath as he picked up the pitcher, pouring the ice cooled lemonade into your glass.

“Here.” He spoke. You lifted a shaky hand up to take the glass from him when the grasp he had on it ‘slipped’, spilling the contents of it the onto your lap.

“Oh!’ You jumped up, making the sweet, sticky liquid run off your skirt to your thighs, dripping down your legs and eventually onto the floor. The now empty glass falling with it.

“I am so sorry, Miss Y/L/N.” He picked up the glass, sitting it on the table before joining you in standing. Now he was stood, you could clearly see the dark tint of his cock straining against the constrictive fabric that was his dress pants. It sent a pulse of lust through your cunt.

“Duncan!” Hearing Annette voice her annoyance at her son for being so clumsy almost made you laugh. It was quite amusing seeing his mother reprimand him, being he was a grown man in his 40s.

“It’s okay, don’t worry. I-I’ll just go clean myself up in the bathroom. I don’t want to distract the meeting anymore than I already have.” You made eye contact with your father as he rubbed his temples.

He was annoyed at the scene you and Duncan had caused. You gave him an apologetic look, feeling bad for stressing him out even more than you already had with being late, but knowing it was technically Duncan’s fault and not yours.

“Please, let me help you clean up.” Duncan pushed his chair in, quickly grabbing some napkins off the table and resting his hand on your back to guide you towards the nearest bathroom, walking as fast as your weak legs would let him.

His hand stayed delicately placed on the small of your back, until you were out of the tables sight, at which point he took hold of your arm, clutching it like a vice as he dragged you through the bathroom door.

He locked the door behind him in preparation for what was to come. He needed to make sure nobody would be walking in on what he was about to do to you.

Looking back towards you, satisfied as ever now he had you alone, he waltzed on over, pinning you up against the counter with force. You could smell him on you again, same cologne from the night before. Dior, you guessed.

“You’re not very good at staying quiet, are you, Sweetheart?” He mused, hoisting you up onto the counter and forcefully cradling your face with both hands as he moved to kiss you deeply. His tongue ravenously re-familiarising itself with your mouth.

“You almost got us caught back there.” He spoke in between kisses. “Your poor, naive father, watching you. He was probably wondering why you kept squirming.” He voiced a dark giggle, moving down to suckle on your neck and push your skirt up your thighs.

“I almost got us caught? No. Y-you almost got us caught when you decided putting a second f-FUCK, finger into me whilst I was talking to him was a good idea!” You choked out, doing your best to fight through the pleasure of his lips finally grazing your skin as you watched him pull your panties down and slot them into his pants pocket.

“Awh poor baby. Did you not want your daddy knowing that you’re a greedy little slut for his new boss? Hm?” He admired the blossoming lavender and cherry bruises now forming on your neck as he teased, marvelling at the idea they could be noticed by your father once you finished.

He quickly opened his fly, pulling his dress pants and boxers down just enough that he could pump his cock in his hand. Gripping onto your hips for purchase, his fingers dug into you so viciously you could feel the marks he had left the night before. You knew after this, there would surely be more.

He thrust himself into you, earning a loud wail to fall from your lips. You arched your spine at the feeling of him pounding into you, making your head fall back against the mirror behind you. His hand shot up to the it as he gathered more speed, his pace growing far faster than you had anticipated.

“Was it too much for you? Taking my fingers in your cunt whilst you were trying oh so hard to concentrate? I almost made you cum on front of everyone.” You moaned out at his grotesque words, pulling your head up to rest your forehead on his shoulder.

“Answer me.” He pulled your chin up back to look at him, still pounding into you. The sound of your skin slapping against one another’s felt even louder in the small, tiled bathroom.

“Yes daddy! It was too much for me - AHH!!” You let yourself go limp against the mirror, giving yourself up to him entirely and wanting nothing more than for him to use you like his personal rag doll.

●●●●●●●●

Your throat was growing hoarser with every squeal you made. Duncan had been fucking you ruthlessly for what felt like hours now, constantly changing his pace from calm to aggressive and back again. His lips were mouthing over your peaked nipples, tongue slathering trails of saliva across your skin and teeth scrapping over dozens of tiny goosebumps.

“Such a filthy, fucking whore for me.” Squeezing down on your neck with one hand he uses his other to slap you. His ringed hand coming down across your fleshy cheek with a loud crack.

You gasped out, shocked at this move and feeling reinvigorated by the suddenness of it. His abuse only made you more attracted to him, causing your cunt to puddle its juices around his cock.

Slowing his thrusts down to an almost complete halt, he grabbed your jaw, yanking your mouth open just enough that when he dripped his spit down you could catch it. You moaned at the filth of his actions, tasting the bourbon he had drank earlier at the bar.

Following the thick thread of salvia that connected the two of you to each other, he brought his face back down to yours, bringing your sloppy lips together. Never giving you the chance to close your mouth before he slid his tongue into it.

Your lips part, foreheads leaning on each other with eyes locked as you scream and moan at his brutal fucking. “Such a good girl.” He praised you.

“Thank you daddy!!” You cry out, feeling tears brimming in your eyes at the deepness of his cock. You knew he was going to be good when he first pushed you up again that door, but this was insane. You had never felt his turned on before. Loving being completely at his mercy, but receiving none.

He pulled out suddenly, wrapping his hands around your stomach and flipping you over to your front. You got the just of what he wanted and clambered onto your hands and knees for him. He pushed his cock back into your folds, hips ricocheting off your ass immediately.

He pulled at your hair, lifting you up to his chest as he gruffed and groaned. He was much larger than you, making it easy for him to pull your head back enough that he could see the expression on your lust enthralled face.

“Tell me what you want, baby.” He demands, spanking your ass cheek and twisting your hair around in his hand. His other hand moved to your gaping mouth, pushing two fingers inside so you taste the metallic bite of his silver band.

You gag as he fucks your mouth, mumbling around his fingers in a desperate attempt at begging him to allow you to cum. You were getting so close now. You guys had been going for so long and your impending release wasn’t going to wait much longer.

“Fuckk, don’t worry sweetheart. Daddy’s close too.” He took his fingers out of your mouth, bringing them down to your clit and swiping at it furiously. You could feel your own spit on his fingers as the coil in your stomach tightened.

“Ohh Daddy’s gonna come so deep inside you, little one.. would you like that?” His breathes were uneven. Thrusts uncontrolled and sloppy.

“Yes!! Fuck, fuck, FUCK Daddy I’m cumming!!” Your cunt pulsated around his shaft, squeezing his own orgasm out of him even sooner than he expected as you screamed. You could taste the saltiness of your own tears, them having run down your cheekbones and into your agape mouth.

His cum flooded your walls, filling you up with his hips pressed against yours as he enveloped you in an embrace from behind. He uttered out a shudder against your temple, his breathe feeling hot and damp on your skin.

He set you back down on the bed and pulled his softening shaft out of you, moving his large hands back to your hips as your own gave out and fell underneath you, pressing your face into the sheets. You eventually rolled over to lay on your back, wanting to let your aftershocks roll through your quivering limbs more comfortably.

He fell down onto the duvet next to you, propping himself up on his side slightly and pulling you closer to him so he could plant a kiss on your swollen lips. “You alright? I didn't hurt too bad now, did I?” He stroked your face, words alluring as ever now your resting bare bodies were tangled up together in a complete stand still.

“Nothing that I didn't enjoy, no.” You joked, lightly drawing intricate shapes on his arm with your fingertips, still harnessing the blemishing sting his ring had left under your cheekbone. “I’d say we're pretty well aquatinted now; wouldn’t you, Daddy?”

●●●●●●●

You could feel cool drips of perspiration slipping down your heated skin from your forehead to your collar bones and all you could do was hope they hadn't taken any of the concealer you had applied earlier this morning with them. You had needed to cover the bruise Duncan’s ring had so easily left on your cheek the night before, since you really didn't want your father or anyone else from work seeing it.

Duncan’s cock was curving in all the right places as he hammered into you. His pace and brutality showing you stars. He seemed even more confident than he did yesterday. Having had experience with you, he knew that you could take his most heinous savagery with delight and didn’t hold off one bit.

His huffs and groans were tantalising, growing louder and more uncontrolled as he fucked you into oblivion. His hand squeaked as it fell down the steamed mirror he leant on, leaving the glass behind you and finding its way to your jaw. He brought your face to his own and kissed you, loudly moaning into your open mouth.

You giggled through your mewls. “Mmm.. I thought I was the loud one, daddy.” You were amused that he had been teasing you so adamantly about the volume of your pleasure, when he was now the one making all the noise.

He paused, quirking an eyebrow at you before slamming his hips into you with a thrust so strong it made you practically scream out. “Oh, my apologises, sweetheart.” He smirked as he picked up his pace once more.

You wrapped your hands in his perfectly styled hair. You no longer cared who knew what was really happening in here, the thought didn’t even cross your mind. All you cared for was chasing your high. You rutted your hips on his and took his length entirely, feeling dangerously close to cumming.

“Fuckkk baby, daddy’s gonna cum okay?. Cum with me princess. Fall apart on my cock.” His unfocused thrusts had you coming undone in seconds. You held onto him tight, digging your nails into his shoulders and pulling at his curls as you cried out in ecstasy.

He shot his seed into you, feeling all his pent up frustrations from earlier at the table leave him as he pushed himself deep into your abused cunt. He didn’t even attempt to stifle his moans, too invested in finally receiving his release to realise just how loud he was being.

He rested his forehead on yours, your sweaty skin pressed against each other as you both attempted to catch your breathes after such a quick, ruthless fuck. You started laughing, finding it utterly ridiculous that you had spent the majority of a meeting you had been terrified for, getting fucked by your new boss (and the man you had fucked the night before) in a restaurant bathroom.

He joined in laughing, clearly finding humour within this strange situation too. Interrupting your laugh, he pushed his lips into yours, kissing you as if your lips were some kind of prize. You felt his cock slip from your cunt, his seed immediately spilling from it as you were left with a sudden, empty sensation.

He made quick work of zipping his pants back up and fastening his belt. You tugged your skirt back down to your thighs, being reminded of how Duncan had snatched your panties and stashed them in his pants pocket. You guessed you wouldn’t be getting them back anytime soon, which you were okay with, you just hoped nobody saw his remnants leaving you left the bathroom.

You flattened out your skirt and felt the wet sticky lemonade that still coated it. You had completely forgotten to clean it. “Fuck, my skirt's still sticky! Why would you order lemonade?” You whined; still mad he hadn’t just ordered some water.

Awaiting a reply, you turned to check your make up in the mirror. Luckily it was pretty light today, so it still looked good other than the bruise on your cheek now being slightly more obvious than before. What really concerned you was your neck. It was covered in every shade of purple and red you were aware existed. If your father and coworkers didn’t know what was going on from how weird you were being at the table before, or how long it had taken the two of you to finish in the bathroom, or the noises that were emitting from it, they would definitely know after seeing all the claims he had left on your skin.

“I’m sorry, I just didn’t think that spilt water would have been a good enough excuse to get you all alone in here.” He chuckled to himself, leaning over to rest his chin on your head and wrapping his arms around your waist as he joked over his mischievousness.

“But we should probably head back out there. I’m sure your father’s going to apprentice the beautiful mosaic I’ve painted across your neck” he kissed the bruises he spoke of as he watched you through the mirror.

You scoffed at him, gifting yourself one last look before completely giving up on finding a way you could make your face and neck appear more presentable for heading back to the table.

Duncan opened the bathroom door, nodding his head towards the hallway and waiting for you to hurry up and join him.

The two of you started walking back, your legs struggling to take your weight with how weak they had become. Your heels clicked along the floor, making you far more aware of how soon you would be sitting back down with everyone from work. Like a clock counting down to all the judgmental stares you would surly be receiving.

You kept your eyes trained on the floor as you took your seat at the table. Seths voice trailed off upon seeing the two of you sit down, leaving you both in the middle of an uncomfortable silence that felt near suffocating.

“What took so long!” You could hear the anger and perhaps embarrassment in Annettes voice as she whispered to Duncan. She looked towards you, glaring and scowling before retiring her vision back to him. She was probably hoping that what she assumed to have occurred hadn’t, but from the marks clearly decorating your neck, she would have known it to be true.

“Oh, we just couldn’t get the lemonade out of her skirt.” He tut as he spoke to his mother, smiling and playing off any obvious suspicions. “I’m sorry, really.” He placed a hand on her shoulder, dripping with a sincerity you knew to be false.

“So what was it we were discussing?” he speaks louder now, addressing the rest of the table.

“Uhh actually, I think we have a deal.” Seth replied, looking over at him and then the rest of the table. You heard your father mutter something in agreement, but it was meek. Quiet. He must have felt the awkward tension too. It was ripe in the air, like a shiver you couldn’t shake off. You didn't even want to look at him, knowing If anyone there felt most uncomfortable, it was him.

Saying their goodbyes and finishing up with any last details, everyone stood to shake hands and bid their farewells. You felt your fathers scowl as he came and stood beside you, but you didn't dare look at him. You were too ashamed to face him whilst still with your coworkers.

Duncan walked over to your father, looking more satisfied than ever with his eyes still focused on you as he thanked him for meeting and shook his hand firmly.

“It’s been a pleasure meeting you, Mr Y/L/N.” He let go of your fathers hand only to take a hold of yours. He grasped it delicately, a touch more gentle than he had ever shown you previously. Assuming he was trying you shake it, you were more than surprised when he raised it to his lips, kissing your rosey knuckles; still red from the tight grip you had, had on his hair earlier.

“I look forward to working with you in the future, Y/N.” He graced you with once last signature smirk as he walked away, leaving you with your father who was waiting for an explanation and apology for your disgusting and foolish behaviour.

Maybe it hadn’t been the worst way to spend lunch.

Tags: @sojournmichael @dark-mei-rose @ntxoza @angelicmichael @jimmason @michaellangdonstanaccount @blakescoven @7-wonders @ghostangels @fernfiction @brattylovee @melodylangdon @brooklinn13 @instincts-baby

#duncan shepherd #duncan shepherd x female reader #duncan shepherd x reader #duncan shepherd smut #house of cards fic #older!duncan #older!duncan shepherd #older!duncan x reader #boss!duncan #boss!duncan shepherd #boss!duncan shepherd x reader #daddy duncan #cody fern #cody fern fic #my writing

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