#warning its a bit wordy

[luvvyouforever]

exclusively yours - sdv harvey x reader!

-> synopsis: harvey realizes some things about himself and one of those is that he can't stand it when other people look at what's his.

-> warning: NSFW MDNI MDNI MDNI SMUT! jealous harvey mhm. a touch of dom harvey what can i say. slight shane slander nothing too mean. a bit wordy. you've been warned.

-> a/n: i hope you all enjoy! i wrote this whenever i had time free over the course of a week when i should be doing homework.

there's a rare fire in his eyes that night at the stardrop saloon. he's not sure what it is that he's feeling in the pit of his stomach, but he knows for certain that he doesn't like the way shane's eyes rake over your flower dance dress that you had been wearing since this morning when you danced with the doctor, and not shane.

he's reminding himself of the ring on your finger, the farm that you live in together, the bouquets you've gifted him, the necklace that took ages to procure because the weather had to be just right. and yet, none of that is easing the jealousy threatening to bubble up over the surface.

the lust in shane's gaze becomes even more apparent as the crowd dwindles. he's talking to you and harvey can barely make out the words coming out of his mouth, but then there's a touch to your elbow that was well-timed to come after a joke you just made, and now harvey is striding over, wrapping a tight arm around your shoulders to stare at shane.

"what was so funny?" he asks and the interested inflection in his tone is entirely fake. "i know my wife has such a keen sense of humor, doesn't she?" you don't miss the emphasis he puts on 'wife.'

shane's grown awkward now, and he shifts hsi weight from one foot to the next. he's been caught and there's nothing much he can do to salvage this situation. "yeah, uh, she just made a joke about summer. nothing serious. sorry," he stumbles out.

"mhm, yeah. so, we'll see you around?" harvey says which effectively ends the conversation and forces shane back into the booth he was originally sitting down in. with a breath of relaxation, he turns to you with a different kind of fire in his eyes. one that makes you shiver with palpable excitement. "ready to go home?"

you nod and his hand moves from your shoulder down to the small of your back to give you just a slight push away from prying eyes and out the door of the saloon.

neither of you speak on the way home and it feels like even the nature around you is holding its breath in anticipation of what will happen when the door to your farmhouse swings open. the farmhouse becomes visible in the distance and there's a sudden weakness in your legs. subconciously, both you and harvey pick up speed until you find yourself speed-walking to the front door.

he wastes no time in pulling keys from his pocket and unlocking the door and, ever the gentleman, letting you go in first.

once he shuts the door behind him, his hand immediately finds the small of your back again and you feel your body inch closer to the bedroom. anticipation grows and grows until your back is leaning against the doorframe of the bedroom and harvey's stature is looming over yours.

this is new, this is unexplored, this is uncharted territory. harvey had never once been anything other than unadulterated sweetness in the bedroom. he cared about your pleasure, your comfort, and your enjoyment more than anything. but now there was something calling to him to give into this urge building in the pit of his stomach.

harvey's hand crawls from its position by his side, up the curves of your stomach, then stops at the base of your head. a soft gesture tilts your chin upwards so you're looking directly into his brown eyes. you feel small underneath his intense gaze, but it's certainly not a bad feeling.

"you know," he begins with a breath, "i've never considered myself a jealous person." you bite your lip in anticipation, feeling warmth grow from your core and radiate outwards. "but...the way shane was looking at you tonight...i think we just need a small reminder about who you belong with."

there was so much intensity behind his words despite them coming out in a soft drawl. you could have buckled right there on the doorframe but his body was caging you in so that there was no way you'd fall.

with a breath and a swallow, your hand travels from your side to his waist. "then remind me," you tease.

harvey's eyes darken and something about this excited you to no end. his strong hands bring you close to his chest and his lips hurriedly meet yours. they intertwine in a mess, teeth clashing, tongues bumping, but it sets your entire body alight. with ease, harvey inches you away from the doorframe and to the bed where you fall down onto the soft mattress. the white dress on your body falls around your waist, revealing the underwear you had on.

then, harvey growled. like truly, really growled as if something had took over him in these few seconds. he had been suppressing this urge to be with you intensely for fear of hurting you or embarrassing himself. but he's spurred on by your moans and the heat he feels radiating from between your legs.

after making out so roughly that your lips are left feeling numb, harvey's hands travel down your body, stopping at the hem of your underwear. with a strong tug, he pulls you to the edge of the bed and sits on his knees in front of you. he'd regret placing so much pressure on his aging knees in the morning, but that didn't matter now. what mattered now was making you cum to the point that you are unable to think of another man but him.

without much warning, harvey's mouth met your core. you threw your head back to the bed, letting out a moan that made you glad you lived so far from any other person. he was like a man possessed, seeking some salvation in the wetness growing and growing in between your legs.

he pulled away, but not for long as his fingers gripped the hem of your underwear and slid them down your thighs, calfs, and off your feet. for a second, he sat on his knees, marveling at your pleasure and whispered, "you must really like this, huh?"

his voice was laced with lust and darkness. before you could even respond, his mouth met your middle again and every part of your body lurched forward, in awe of the pleasure he was giving you. there was a coil in the pit of your stomach that was growing, wounding around itself, tightening with every stroke of harvey's tongue against you.

"harv! fuck!" you managed to choke out. you could feel his lips tilt upward in a smile, and just when you thought there was no possible way it could get better than this, his finger teased at your hole before plunging in. harvey's anatomical knowledge guided his finger upward, curling up to the spot that sends you reeling.

his name was a prayer on your lips as that coil tightened till the point you think it might snap. you could no longer hold it when harvey added in a second finger, curling both upwards and creating a pressure that pulled the coil till it all fell apart. you were a mess, hair sprawled on the comforter, dress halfway up your body, wetness dripping from harvey's fingers.

he leans back on his knees, eyes blown wide with lust. his lips glisten and his carefully groomed hair and mustache are destroyed. he's breathing heavily, but he didn't stop his frenzy there. with rushed movements, he tugs off his tie, his button down, his undershirt till there was nothing adorning his body.

"need this off," he mumbles, pulling at the hem of your dress. you come out of your daze to rise up and slide the dress off your body. "jesus...," he whispers. he rises from his spot on the floor and gestures for you to scoot up to the bed. slowly, his body comes over yours and once again you become caged in his grip and his scent. "do i tell you that you're beautiful enough? because if i don't i need some sense slapped into me."

heat floods in your cheeks at his words. harvey, ever the kind gentleman, was a whole other person entirely. for a second, you wonder if you could tease more possessiveness out of him. he was already delirious with pleasure. what could a little more hurt?

"i'm glad you think so too, dr. harvey. shane really thinks i'm the best looking person in this whole town," you say with a smirk tilting your lips upward.

that fire reignites in his eyes again. in seconds, his hands come to your wrists and you feel pinned against the bed. his chest is rising and falling with intensity.

"if i hear another man's name on your lips tonight, you're getting it," he threatens.

and, because you can, you push him further. "shane. alex. sam. sebastian. lew-"

in a renewed sense of dominance, harvey clamps his hand over your mouth, effectively cutting you off. "i don't think you'll be able to talk when i'm done with you," he says, voice just slightly above a whisper.

"prove it," you whisper back.

harvey smiles with something sinister lurking beneath the service. he stands from the bed, eyes never leaving yours and tugs off his belt, then his pants. with no flourish, his length comes out, irresistibly hard from the night's activities. he climbs back on top of you, settling his center in front of yours. he's barely touching your core but it's sending you arching upwards.

"i don't think shane could manage making you feel this good, you know?" he teases your entrance. "i mean, if you'd like to try, go ahead, but you'll come back to me crying because he can't make you cum like this." slowly, he slides himself in. you let out an unearthly moan that is met with his own grunts. "you're all mine. no one else's." he fully enters you then, hitting as far back as he could manage.

he drags himself out, then slowly enters back in. it's torturous. horrible. so awfully frustrating.

"please, harv. more!" you beg. he kept up his slow pace, barely budging. "need you more." you sound just as pathetic as you feel.

"can shane make you feel this good?" he asks.

so that's what he wanted from you. "no!" you plead.

"are you all mine, then?"

"yes, all yours!"

"exclusively mine?"

"exclusively yours!"

at those final words, harvey fucks into you again with a quicker, rougher pace. this was what you needed more than air. your hands fly to his arms where your nails dig into the skin there. he would wake up with marks that remind him of the night, but maybe that was your purpose in doing so.

harvey is stretching you out in the most perfect of ways and the closeness of his body to yours sends shivers all over you. his hands are desperately clinging to every part of your exposed skin and his chest rises quickly in attempts to catch his breath. nothing could stop him from his actions right now. all he can focus on is the way you feel so tight around him, the way you're moaning his name, and the way he has to hold in his orgasm until you've came all over him.

which isn't too far away. it's building with every deep, powerful thrust he makes. he's hitting spots inside of you that he hadn't before. it's blissful, filthy, and perfect. in the middle of your ecstacy, you make a note to draw out harvey's jealous side more.

"fuck," he grunts out. it's so strange to hear such filthy language coming from your husband who balked any time you said swear words. "you're so fucking tight for me, huh?"

his dirty words pull out a loud moan from you which seemed to spur harvey on even further. his thrusts lost their rhythm and his breath became rapid. he was close and so were you. with urgent moves, you wrap your legs around his waist which sends his length inside of you as deep as it can go. your eyes meet with a silent agreement.

your moans mingle together, filling the room with lewd noises. your name is repeated over and over again until the moment you both feel that release toppling over the edge, filling your bodies head to toe with pure bliss. his body doesn't still, but instead he returns to the slow pace he began with, pumping his cum deep inside you.

after some breaths and stilled movements, he pulls out with a slick noise and falls to your side. his arms open up in a silent request for you to lay on his chest and you oblige. the bed is destroyed, your bodies are sweaty, and there's certainly something leaking out of you onto the sheets. but sheets can be washed, beds can be made, and showers can be had.

all that matters is that you were exclusively his, and shane could never make you feel like that.

[cressidagrey]

Dust off your Highest Hopes - Part 1

Summary:

Eavesdroppers never hear anything good about themselves, goes the idiom. 

When Solana hears an admission from the High Lord of Day, she’s ill-prepared for it. She doesn’t believe in fairytales any longer, but maybe there was a happily ever after for Solana and Helion somewhere.

Warnings:

Mention of Rape, Mention of Domestic Violence. It's all in the past, it's none graphic, but Solana is still dealing with it.

Notes:

This was supposed to be a one shot. One day I will find a way to be less wordy.

(thanks to @tsunami-of-tears for the super pretty dividers!)

When Solana grew up, she believed in fairytales. 

Why shouldn’t she? 

She had been raised as a daughter after two boys…raised to be the perfect lady, the perfect wife…and expected to climb society‘s ranks and find herself a proper husband. 

And Solana had done that. 

She had excelled at it, in fact. 

Solana hadn’t just married any High Fae Male. She had married a High Lord’s son. Her mate. 

And for just one moment…her fairytale had become reality. She had believed that she had found her happily ever after. 

Not much later, she realised that she had been a lamb led to her slaughter. 

Just that…a lamb…a lamb led to its slaughter…it was killed quickly. She wasn’t. It was death by a thousand cuts. 

Solana may was Castor‘s mate, but she was not the female he loved. 

And the mating bond snapping and the arranged marriage that had followed, pleasing both their families but neither of them…well, for the rest of Castor‘s life, that marriage was at fault for everything. Solana was at fault for everything else.

Solana could divide her life into three parts: before her marriage, during her marriage and after her marriage... 

Before she had been a child. 

During…during it she had been a prisoner.  

Caged into her marriage…into her husband's whims. 

Castor had stripped her of everything she held dear, of every bit of dignity she had possessed…he had done unspeakable acts to her, things that she couldn’t and wouldn’t ever talk about to anybody. Solana had been a spectacle for the court to watch, something to gawk at, watching as the years passed and her womb refused to swell with a child. 

Some people had known what went on behind the closed doors of their marital chambers…others hadn’t. Nobody had put a stop to it…to what Castor had done to her in private and in public. 

Nobody. 

Not the servants. Though she didn’t give them the fault for that, because they couldn’t have done anything. They didn’t have the power. 

Not the High Lord or the Lady of the Court. They had known too. And they hadn’t cared. Castor was their son. Solana was just his wife. She was supposed to adapt. 

But how did one adapt to the daily torture he liked to dish out? Solana had tried. Solana had done her best. It had never been enough. 

Regardless of what she had done, Castor had never stopped his torture of hers. Not in their marriage bed… nor out of it. 

And then he had died.

And the After had started. 

After two centuries of living in the hell that was her mating bond and marriage…Her tormenter was dead. Slain. 

The one thing that bitch Amarantha had ever done well in her fucking life was to kill her husband, as far as Solana was concerned. 

Being Castor’s widow was…the third part of her life. And the best. 

She wore widow’s black and pearls for the better part of two decades. She shrouded herself in her grief so that nobody could ever doubt that she had loved him. (He owed her that. Even when hadn’t loved him anymore. Not at the end. Not after what he had done to her for centuries.) 

Castor’s death had pleasant consequences for Solana.  It left her as the only female in the High Lord’s immediate family. 

It left her under Helion Spell-Cleaver‘s personal protection. It made Helion the only male that held any power over her. As long as Solana didn’t remarry, she was part of his family. Any suitor who wanted Solana’s hand in marriage needed to get through him.

(Good Luck with that.) Helion had promised her that as long as he drew breath, nobody would lay a hand on her again. And he had kept that promise. 

In return, her unwavering loyalty laid firmly with him and his court. 

50 years of Under The Mountain…but somehow she had kept that Court running in his absences. She had done that. For him. 

And then Amarantha herself had died…bested by a human girl of all things. 

Another monster slain. 

They had spent 5 years rebuilding. Half a decade. Just a blink in the eyes of a fae.

It wasn’t enough. They weren’t done. They were so far from done. But they had a start. They had made a start. 

Solana had loved every second of it. 

Castor was dead. Her monster had been slain. And Solana…Solana finally had her freedom. 

She could deal with everything else. It didn’t matter what else happened. 

It didn’t matter if Helion admitted to a bastard-born son who ended up being his heir. 

She would deal with it all. Because she was free. 

Lucien turned out to be lovely and his mate Elain grew to be one of Solana’s favourite people.

It didn’t matter what Solana’s mother thought about her lack of interest in suitors… She was never going to put herself at another male's mercy ever again. Her mother’s opinion didn’t matter, because Helion turned down every request of her company without discussion.

She didn’t need to entertain anybody. 

Unless she wanted to. And unless she went to Helion and told him that this was the male she wanted…everybody else got turned away in no uncertain terms. 

It didn’t matter what anybody else in the Day Court thought of her. Thought of her taking on most of the duties of the Lady of the Court. It didn’t matter what kind of gossip they came up with now. She would do her duty to her High Lord. 

And if it made his life even just a little bit easier to have her be the one who selected what courses to serve at the meals…who picked out the porcelain and the cutlery and the drapes…who redecorated, who checked the accounts on every ledger and ran the palace with diligently and carefully…she would do so gladly. 

Until a time when she was no longer needed. (Elain was shaping up to be a worthy replacement soon enough, after all.) 

It had taken her centuries, but Solana had finally found a place where she could be…content. No more worries of what horrid thing the next day would bring. 

In a way…she could simply exist. 

Solana could simply open her eyes when she woke up alone in her four-poster bed…the white sheets pristine and clean…and she could pull on a silk dressing gown over a nightgown that was never ripped apart nowadays, never sprinkled with her own blood. 

There were no bruises on her body as she took a bath…No ripped-out hair or contusions…nothing. 

She no longer needed to shroud herself in widow’s black…she could pick a buttercup yellow dress that bared her shoulders to the sun, not worrying about whatever anybody would see if she didn’t bother with a glamour. 

She could pick long, hanging hearrings, without worrying about having them ripped out of her lobes…with fat pearls from the Summer Court. An indulging solstice gift from Helion himself. 

Solana was content.

Sometimes it startled her how much. How she had somehow carved out that little corner of peace for herself. 

Nia, her handmaiden, fussed with Solana’s curls that morning…pinning them up in her usual style and scattering a handful of pearl-headed pins throughout it to decorate the updo. It was pretty. Beautiful in fact. Solana thanked her with a smile, grabbing her usual lace-trimmed shawl to wrap around her shoulders before she made her way downstairs for breakfast. 

These days, Solana no longer lived in the marital quarters that had been the place of much of her plight and agony…and instead she had her rooms in the main wing, above Helion’s. 

He was her last line of defense, he had told her with a charming smile and she remembered how she had laughed at the pure ridiculousness of that statement. If somebody murdered their way through all the sentries they kept stationed…even a High Lord would have trouble stopping that invasion single-handedly, she imagined. 

Her new rooms did put her up high in the Sunray Palace…named for its many, many spiky towers and the fact that the sun rose right behind it, falling through the many painted glass windows. It had been built into the luscious mountains and hills of the Day Court, with every level seemingly worked right out of the stone.  The only beings that had rooms even higher than Solana were the Pegasi. 

(And they had wings, so Solana supposed it was just fair that they had gotten the uppermost tower and the luscious planes of grass that covered the top of that mountain.) 

Solana nodded a greeting to the few servants that she saw that morning, and then reached the door to the private dining room, where she was supposed to have dinner with Helion, Lucien and Elain. 

 Her hand was already on the doorknob as the voice from within made her hesitate for just a moment. 

“Are you aware that you are in love with her?” Lucien asked, his voice bone dry. 

What? That who was in love with whom? 

Solana’s mind was immediately sent spinning, mentally sorting through the different possibilities. 

If there was one thing that Solana was well versed in, then it would be the Day Court’s gossip.

She knew every bit of it. 

She knew who hated who, who loved who, and who would give her whatever she wanted if she just twirled a strand of hair around her finger. 

She knew who to ask for what. She knew what each noble family strived for, what they were ambitious about. 

She knew about marriage alliances, and who was related to what family and how. She knew who would gladly stab their siblings in the back if that meant that they got a bigger slice of cake in the end. 

Solana knew all of that. 

She had played this game for centuries at this point. 

Still…the last thing she had expected…the last thing she had expected to hear…that was Helion’s voice responding: “What?” 

His voice was hoarse, thick with something that she couldn’t place. 

Helion…Helion was in love with somebody? With whom? Her stomach lurched. 

The late Lady of Autumn had been before her time…Lucien and Solana were just a few years apart in age, not enough for her to have been old enough to be privy to any gossip of that particular affair…

 “Are you still stuck in denial?” Lucien continued, his voice lifting at the end. “Or are you in the *She’s my best friend and she’s the one thing that is keeping this court running and the servants adore her and we attend symphony performances together and we walk in the garden and my Pegasus loves her but it’s all totally platonic* phase?”

…what?

Solana’s heart jumped in her throat, thumping so harshly that it felt like it was going to shatter her ribcage from within. 

No. Lucien couldn’t…Lucien couldn’t mean her. Right? 

That was ridiculous.

She wasn’t the only Female on Helion’s small council after all! 

But Solana was the only one that Helion attended symphony performances together with…with who he walked through the garden…the only one that Meallan liked. Liked well enough to let her brush his silky black coat and braid little golden rings in his mane if it struck her fancy…

This was ridiculous. 

Helion didn’t love her. Helion didn’t…Helion had his myriad of different lovers and the less Solana knew about that, the better. That was the kind of gossip she didn’t want to touch with a ten-foot pole. 

(And even if she did…if she did look at the males and females Helion took to his bed…one thing was obvious: They were all extraordinary in one way or another. And Solana…she didn’t fit that bill. Not at all.)

“Be nice, Lucien,” came the sweet voice of Elain. “We talked about this.” She said it pointedly like Lucien would know exactly what she was talking about. 

“You talked about this,” Helion repeated flatly. 

“Of course, we did,” Elain responded, sounding amused. “I spent nearly a month thinking Solana was your mistress until Lucien told me otherwise.” 

Solana swallowed. Elain wasn’t the first person who had had that particular thought. Granted, that particular rumour had never gained legs because there was nothing to gossip about. 

There had never happened anything between Helion and her that could be constructed as…romantic. Or as him being interested in her. 

Why should he be? 

Solana was…Solana was used goods in a sense. And before Lucien had taken care of Helion’s lack of an heir… it had been more than clear that she hadn’t been blessed with a particularly fruitful fertility either. Solana he was pretty much useful for that purpose.

She hadn’t given Castor a child in 300 years. 

The one blessing of that marriage: no children had come out of it. 

She hardly thought that that would change even if she would ever marry again. 

Which wouldn’t happen, because alone the thought of what had happened in her marriage bed made a shiver work its way over her back. She couldn’t live through that again. Not even for Helion. 

“I would never do that to her,” Helion said quietly, her ears just so managing to pick up the words. “This whole Court has failed her once already. I have failed her once. I will not be part of a second time.”

He thought he had failed her? Why? 

He hadn’t failed her. He had been seemingly the one person who hadn’t failed her…throughout much of her marriage, he had been off in the Day Court’s military…He had never been there to see the day-to-day of what Castor had done to her. He hadn’t borne witness to much of it. 

And she hadn’t expected him to protect her either. She had been her husband’s property, her mate’s… Castor had been supposed to be the one taking care of her…and instead, he had seemingly gotten a sick sense of satisfaction out of hurting her. 

Solana had thought that that should have gone against every instinct of that Mating Bond…she had been wrong. 

A Mating Bond didn’t promise a happily ever after. 

Not for everybody. Some fae…Some fae met the love of their lives and they turned out to be happy…and some…like Solana…they had met…their undoing. 

“Is that why the servants are that protective?” Lucien asked at that moment, thoughtfully.  

“They couldn’t protect her against my brother. But they will protect her against any perceived threat on my part,” Helion answered, something akin to amusement in his voice. “They’ll choose her over me in a heartbeat. The Day Court needs Solana. I can be replaced. She can’t be.”

No. No, that wasn’t true. Any halfway intelligent fae could do what she did. She only tried to make herself useful. Nothing more. She wasn’t a High Lord, not even his right hand, not truly… She was just his…She was just…

She was just Solana. 

“You haven’t answered the question,” Lucien pointed out quietly at that moment and Solana froze in place. 

The question? 

That question? 

She couldn’t help but brace for an impact. She wasn’t sure what kind…She wasn’t even sure what answer would hurt less. 

“Of course, I am in love with Solana,” Helion said. He said something else, but the blood was rushing in her ears and she couldn’t…she couldn’t listen to more. 

Couldn’t stay here…couldn’t…

Not when seemingly every bit of safe, constant ground under her feet had just been ripped away, her breathing coming in sharp gaps as she turned and ran.

She needed…she needed…

She didn’t know what she needed. 

Solana didn’t know what she was doing as she somehow managed to open one of the doors leading outside into one of the gardens…crossing the patio and leaning both of her hands onto the grey stone railing, her fingernails painfully biting into the stone, as she tried…tried. 

Her breathing came in short, painful gasps, her knees buckling as she fought with her own…

She wasn’t sure what she was fighting with. 

Solana didn’t know what to think, her mind swirling nearly painfully with a barrage of thoughts. 

He was in love with her. Helion fancied himself in love with her.

She couldn’t understand why. She couldn’t for the life of her understood what he wanted with her. For every other male who wanted to court her…she was nothing but an…ego boost. Or a choice made out of arrogance or out of a desire to climb the ranks. 

A desire to enforce their own influence onto the Day Court. 

But Helion…none of that…none of that could possibly be the reason. 

He was the High Lord. His word was law. 

He could have anybody in his bed if he wanted to. And he took advantage of that and she had never faulted him for that either. 

Solana had never…

Why? Why her? Why did he…

And if he did…if he truly did…then why had he never said anything to her? Why had he kept it a secret…a secret he admitted to before Elain and Lucien but not to her? 

What was…

The loud neighing that was suddenly in front of her, startled her out of her thoughts and she couldn’t help but flinch as Meallan kicked the grass just feet in front of her, staring at her with dark eyes. 

Half wild, half-tamed…still as much a creature of myth as actually in front of her. (Though right now he was demanding her attention and she knew that he was not going to stop destroying the landscaping until she gave in.) 

She lifted her hands from the stone and stumbled her way down the stone steps to the middle of one of their many, many gardens.  Meallan came trotting forward, lowering his proud head so that she could scratch him behind his ears with shaking hands. 

“Good Morning to you,” Solana whispered, her voice shaking just as much as her hands. 

Meallan gently snuffled over her hand in response and then stomped one of his front hooves down onto the grass, making a massive dent, the size of a dinner plate. She gave him a pointed look, but he was utterly unapologetic, stomping once more before he started to lay down. 

The only way she could actually get on that bloody massive pegasus if she didn’t have a High Lord throwing her up there. 

“You want to fly?” she asked him, surprised. He didn’t often come to her. It was much more likely he showed up on the balcony of Helion’s study and demanded his High Lord’s attention. 

To Solana he only came when Helion wasn’t available for one reason or another. 

It always had been like that. 

If any Pegasus came to visit Solana, it was his mate, Clodagh. That sweet-natured mare that wasn’t so sweet-natured if anybody ever tried to ride her. 

Clodagh came to visit Solana in the gardens and Solana offered her apples and brushed her perfectly white mane and tail and generally spoiled her rotten. In return, Clodagh followed along with her like a dog that turned out to be just a little bit too big. 

Meallan turned his head towards his wings and then stared at her with dark eyes, waiting. 

He was wearing neither a saddle nor a bridle, though Solana had long since thought that the bridle was absolutely useless anyway. Meallan did what Meallan wanted. Anything else was simply a suggestion to him anyway.

“Don’t let me fall,” she warned him, her voice weak as she carefully clambered up between these massive black-feathered wings, making sure that her dress covered her. She patted his neck before she wound that beautiful mane around her hands. 

Meallan huffed in response like even that warning was preposterous from her, before he clambered up, shaking himself and then launched into the sky with one flap of these majestic wings. 

All Solana needed to do, was to cling onto his back. 

She had half expected him to fly the looping circles around the Day Court’s capital of Odeira like he usually did, but nothing of that sort happened. Instead, he turned towards the east side of the Palace, towards the highest tower…towards the Pegasi Stables. 

That was unexpected. 

Solana didn’t try to change his mind, letting him take the course and then land easily just inside that wide gaping door that the Pegasi used to let themselves in and out at all hours of the day. 

Helion allowed them to roam free in Odeira, and while they mostly kept to the green plains of the Sunrise Palace, sometimes some of them went off flying on their own and then came back later. 

Meallan stopped and she slid off his back, only for him to grip the fabric of her dress between his teeth…surprisingly gentle and then pull her with him. 

“I am coming! I am coming!” she said with a laugh, letting him lead her to the pen that housed him and Clodagh. 

It was right there in the back and everybody knew better than to try and walk into, unless it was Helion or Solana herself. 

Only a moment later, she suddenly smelled the scent of blood, a gasp leaving her mouth as Meallan pushed her forward with his massive head…right in front of…

Clodagh. 

Clodagh that was standing up, gently nuzzling a pitch-black newborn foal that was greedily nursing from their mother. So fresh, that it was still wet, long legs still shaking. 

It had surprised them all when last year Clodagh had suddenly started to round with a foal and had started to bite at every poor long-suffering stablehand. The only ones allowed to feed her and Meallan were Solana and Helion. Meallan himself had spent months stomping and standing his ground if anybody even looked at his mate wrong. 

After 3000 years…they had decided to have another baby. 

And now it had arrived. 

“Oh sweetheart, you had your baby?” she breathed and Clodagh whinnied softly like she was in agreement. “It’s so beautiful,” Solana said softly, not daring to approach. 

Meallan’s massive head pushed her forward again and she stumbled right next to Clodagh’s head, which turned to nuzzle Solana for a moment. She immediately reached out to rub the mare’s forehead and press a kiss between her ears. “You did such a good job!” she praised her. “You did so well,” Solana cooed, just as the foal seemingly had enough milk and the long legs gave in so it could lay back down again. 

She couldn’t help but stare at it in wonder, even as it mustered her in interest and she crouched down, shooting a hesitant look to Clodagh and Meallan, who seemed content to watch her. “I am Solana,” she introduced herself to the foal softly. “When you are old enough, I’ll bring you all the apples you want…and I’ll probably sneak you some sugar lumps,” she promised the foal, feeling the tears prickling in her eyes as she held out a hand…

Solana held her breath for just a moment, and then Clodagh’s baby pushed his or her head against her hand, nuzzling her softly. So soft. So sweet.

She gently traced her fingertips over the white mark on their forehead, a near-perfect sun…the emblem of the Day Court. 

Somehow that was the thing that sent her over the edge.

She wasn’t sure why. Wasn’t sure why that was the thing that was suddenly making her start crying. 

She didn’t cry. Not anymore. 

Solan had shed so many tears in her life that she didn’t think she had any left. And now, there she was, collapsing into the ground right next to the foal and clinging to the straw as she cried her eyes out. 

Clodagh whinnied, sounding worried but Solana didn’t even have it in herself to reassure her… the white mare leant her head down, and nuzzled her hair, nearly maternal…nearly…

Solana couldn’t remember her own mother ever doing anything like that. And she just cried harder. 

Cried because she didn’t know what she was supposed to do. Didn’t know what she was supposed to even think. What she was supposed to feel?

It was churning deep in her gut. 

What was she supposed to feel? 

Castor had taken a lot from her. Including her ability to love. 

She didn’t love anybody anymore. 

Her brother? Would sell her for a handful of silver coins if that meant that he could climb the ranks.

Her mother? Would do the same, or throw her at another male if that made her look good.

She couldn’t love anymore. Castor had burned that out of her. He had twisted and strangled her with her love for him until nothing was left anymore.

Nothing good at least.

Helion deserved better than that. Helion deserved better than her. 

[cillianhead]

Cillian married to high libido wife

Yes yes yes yes!

Thank you for your request <3

In Your Car, I'm A Star || Cillian Murphy x Reader

warnings: SMUT, unprotected p in v, semi-public sex, vulgar language, sex in a car, unspecified somewhat large age gap between Cillian and reader, general adult content ahead. I'd also like to warn that this is a bit wordy and rambly and probably poorly written but I hope you enjoy it anyways!

18+ Minors DNI

Insatiable little thing, you are, Cillian always said. Ever since you two had first met you couldn't keep your hands off of each other, the mental and emotional connection was there, of course, the love was real, and that made the physical contact so much better. His hands over your body, cock in your mouth, hands in your hair, you sitting in his lap... it didn't matter what you were doing, you just had to be touching him at all times.

You got married after a year spent together, and you'd go wherever he went, Cillian never wanted you to leave his side, he was madly in love with you, you were his muse, his everything. You two were devastatingly in love, two twin flames, you were meant to be together. No matter the age gap or what the public thought about you and how much younger you are than Cillian. Cillian didn't care, he just loved you for you.

Now Cillian being an older man, sometimes he can't handle your high libido. At first in your relationship, it was ridiculous how much sex you two were having, it was a constant. You'd go to work and then you'd see him and your clothes came off within a blink of an eye and you'd milk Cillian dry and then you'd still be begging for more. You've done it in every single room of your home, in his car, in a public park, and in other morally questionable places that you'd rather not discuss with anyone else but him. You've slowed down a bit but you're both at a healthy at least twice-a-day sort of thing. How could you not want to constantly ravish him? You have him all to yourself, completely wrapped around your finger... or maybe you were wrapped around his. He had learned ways to tame you like a wild horse, ways to get you to calm down like stuffing you full of his fingers, letting you ride his thigh while he worked, shoving his cock down your throat to mute your bratty requests. You always got what you wanted though... how could he ever deny you, his sweet little wife, of what she so desperately craved?

Now you were sat in an award ceremony, restless, knee bouncing up and down. A deep maroon gown was your outfit, pearls tightly clasped around your neck, you were dressed elegantly and stood out amongst the crowd, especially when you sat next to the one and only Cillian Murphy. He wore a sheer button-up, in complete black, he looked incredibly mysterious and honestly, you were ready to pounce on him like a jaguar would to its prey. Unfortunately, you were surrounded by hundreds of people, most of whom were some sort of important celebrity figure and you knew Cillian would hate to make a scene.

"Show's almost over, sweet thing," Cillian whispered in your ear, his hand slipped onto your bare thigh, in between the slit of your crimson dress. "Then we'll get outta here..." You knew he could feel your hungry eyes on him all night.

He hadn't touched you all night long- wait that's actually a lie, he'd eaten you out to settle you down a bit before you got to the venue but that wasn't enough. It never was with you. But the feeling of his fingers caressing the skin on your inner thighs made you feel like you could cum right then and there. Cillian continued to suggestively stroke your sensitive skin as the night went on. People would walk over to greet Cillian, but his hand was covered by the cloth of the table so no one could see his hand gripping onto your thigh in annoyance of having to talk to someone who wasn't you. He didn't stand up, he just remained seated, nodding along and smiling as politely as he could to this person just trying to make conversation.

As soon as you got the signal that you could leave, Cillian grabbed your wrist and pulled you protectively into his side, guiding you by your lower back out of the event and towards where he had his car. It was all too swift for you to truly process, having him push you down into the passenger seat before he himself sat in the driver's seat. You watched him as he leaned over to put the car in reverse, the way he looked back out at the road, one hand on the headrest of your seat, so focused and oh so sexy.

"Cillian..." You whined, he was driving way too slow and your home was way too far for your liking. "I need you now."

"I know," He smirked at you briefly before sticking his eyes back on the road. "Trying to get us home as fast as possible, love."

"No," You complained. "Need you. Right now."

Cillian glanced at you with an incredulous look before he swerved over to the side of the road, a bit too reckless and at this point, it didn't matter... you just needed to be fucked. It was a somewhat secluded area, a dimly lit backstreet that only the occasional passerby would walk at this hour. "Get in the back." Cillian hummed cooly, checking himself out in the rearview mirror as you slipped into the backseat, spreading your legs for him with anticipation.

"Cillian... hurry..." You whispered, he was combing through his hair, occasionally making eye contact with you through the mirror before he sighed and stepped out of the car. Casually strolling over to your side of the car. Cillian opened the car door, crawling into the backseat with you and connecting his lips with yours as his fingers trailed up your shaky legs. His touch was like a drug, you couldn't get enough of the feeling of Cillian's skin on yours, no matter how little or how much you got of it.

The kiss was wet and sloppy, tongues thrashing together, teeth biting down on each other's lips. It was like you were racing to see who could consume each other faster... harder... deeper. Cillian's hand reaches up and unzips your dress, the straps falling off your bare shoulders until he tugged it off of you completely. Naked and horny in the back of his car.

"Fucking hell," Cillian gasps out at the sight of you, jaw agape as he eyes you up and down. "What am I to do with you? Hmm? So fucking beautiful." He leans in again, attaching starving lips to the hot skin of your neck, sucking deep bruises into the skin. "I'm the luckiest man in the world." You just smiled bashfully, Cillian was incredibly affectionate, especially verbally. He always told you how he was the luckiest man in the world or how you're a goddess that needs to be worshipped. You felt like it was the other way around.

You grabbed ahold of his coat, pulling it roughly off of him. "I love you in this shirt, Cillian..." You whispered, tenderly rubbing the palm of your hand over his chest. "So pretty." He just looked at you, eyes deeply filled with a wonderful concoction of lust and love. You knew that look, you'd seen it a million times; his lips parted, panting heavily, eyebrows knitted together, eyelids hung heavy, and pupils wide. It was the look of love. A look that said 'Take me, I'm yours'.

By now, you had straddled him, pushing him up against the backseat and unzipping his pants, you wanted to keep him in his shirt, you wanted to admire the view. In the backseat of his car, you slipped his cock out of his dress pants, the dirty act turning you on even further as you stroked him slowly, getting off on teasing him.

"Stop your teasing," Cillian grunted, eyes squeezed shut as he bucked up into your fist. "I know you need me just as badly as I need you, baby."

"Mmm," You caught your lip in between your teeth, rubbing your clit on the head of his dick before slowly sliding down on him. "I wish you could always be inside me, feels so good."

"I know, honey," Cillian leaned his head into the crook of your neck, taking in deep breaths as you began rocking your hips back and forth. "Ride me, baby, that's it... good girl..." He moaned loudly and desperately, hands gripping onto your hips with a sense of urgency, helping guide you back and forth on his hard cock.

You threw your head back, giving Cillian a show, tits bouncing right in front of his face and fingernails digging into the skin of his shoulders. The windows fogged up and the car rocked back and forth with each rough movement you made.

"Fuckin whore," Cillian snarled, growing closer and closer to the edge himself, head hazy and eyes watching you intently. "Can't believe how fucking horny you are all the time, can never get enough of me, can you?" He tapped your cheek with two of his fingers to get you to respond.

"No, just love you so much... I want... you all the time."

"So cute," He chuckled, you hung your head low with embarrassment at him calling you 'cute'. "My pretty girl, hmm.... my angel girl, I love you." He praised. Your hands slid up your waist and groped at your tits, fingers twiddling your nipples, making you moan further. There was no doubt that if anyone were to even just casually walk by they could tell what was going on. There was no point in hiding it now.

"God... fuck..." Your eyes were squeezed shut, mewling at the way his hands held your body and the sounds of his fucked out gasps for air. "Want your cum inside me, please!"

"Y'know I'll give it to ya, sweetheart, you've just gotta go on and take it from me."

You immediately dove in and kissed him, mouths open against each other, not really kissing, just sucking in each other's air. You felt spurts of hot cum shoot up into you as you began unravelling yourself, moaning with satisfaction at the feeling of him filling you up.

"Come on, that's it," Cillian mumbled in your ear. "So good... fuckin' so good to me, baby love."

He coaxed you through your orgasm, knees giving out around him as you fully sank down on his cock that still weakly spat his seed into you. You bit down on his neck, a tear slipping down your face, probably further ruining your makeup as your cum seeped out of you.

You sat there for a little longer, panting, coming down from how hard you came. "Thank you... Cillian."

"No need to thank me," He chuckled, pressing a loving kiss to your temple before pulling you back by your hair to take a look at your tired face. "Look so pretty after you fuck me, my goodness, I'm so bloody lucky." "Oh hush," You shook your head, biting your tongue and grinning at him coyly. "You're so sweet to me."

Cillian kissed you tenderly, hands cradling your head as you showed all your love and devotion to each other in the form of a kiss. "Let's go home and rest, yeah?" Cillian hummed, you nodded as you slid off of him. In unison, you both let out your own whimpers of sensitivity.

By the time you got home, it was around midnight or a little past midnight. You both immediately went up to your shared bedroom and into the lovely en suite connected to it. You found yourself sleepily sitting in the bubble bath, back pressed up against Cillian's bare chest as he hummed a love song softly into your ear.

"Cillian." You whined, clearly drowsy but also whiny about something else.

"Hmmm?" Cillian's hands stroked your waist innocently. You knew it was innocent, he didn't intend to turn you on but it was too much for your little mind to handle... you and your loving husband... naked in the bath together... his hands on you... it couldn't be a better time in your sex-crazed mind to be horny.

"Please touch me," You whispered. "Please."

"'M already touching you, sweet girl." He whispered back to you.

"Hmph!" You whined again, acting like you were giving him the cold shoulder and pulling away from him. You liked playing hard to get. "You know what I mean."

"Such a spoiled brat," He sits up with you this time, pushing your wet hair to the side and pressing kisses to your neck, sending shivers down your spine. "You really need me again? Hmm? Your cunt is so fuckin' greedy, so cock-hungry, aren't you?" He growled, fingers slipping down and pinching your clit harshly.

"Fuck... please..." You moaned in response. "Please... I need you always, Cillian." "Fucking insatiable," Cillian groaned. "That's what you are. How is an old man like me supposed to keep up with you?"

"Not an old man..." You sighed, leaning back and resting your head on his shoulder. "Please... baby... Cillian... just need you to make me cum..."

"I can do that." He sucked a bruise onto your collarbone, slipping two fingers into your pussy.

"You're the only one for me, Cillian," You cried. "Only one who can touch me like this... only one who can make me feel this good."

"I know, love," He said smugly. "All mine, isn't that right?"

"All yours." You agreed. He kissed your jaw happily at your response.

He slipped a third finger into your hole, thumb rubbing pleasing circles on your clit. You writhed around in the hot bath, mewling like you were being murdered. Pleasure shot through you like electricity, Cillian's lips on you were too much, your mind going into overdrive as he whispered dirty things in your ear. And oh fuck, the feeling of his tongue licking up your neck quickly brought you over the edge, you spasmed pathetically, squeezing his fingers that still stroked at your g-spot. You couldn't really tell because you were already submerged in water but you were pretty sure you just squirted all over him.

"Good girl," Cillian nipped at your earlobe playfully, slipping his fingers out from your overstimulated cunt. He licked his fingers clean, moaning like a madman at the taste of your cum on his sticky fingers. "Sweet girl."

"More." You demanded in a whisper. "Want more." "'Course you do," Cillian laughed, kissing your cheek. "Let's dry off, then I'll make sweet love to you in our bed. How's that sound, Mrs. Murphy?"

"Sounds good." You hummed happily.

-

I'm back! I hope you enjoyed!

[heyidkyay]

And I'm petrified of being alone, now |

Part Twenty-Four

Summary: She’s just trying to get by, really. What with being a single parent to her four year old son whilst simultaneously trying to kick start a successful career as a radio presenter. She’s got everything she’s ever wanted though, friends close by, a mum who’s merely a phone call away, and of course her baby boy. What else is there to wish for? But then, it’s not long before her relatively normal life gets upended and turned on its head, and she’s suddenly forced to deal with situations she’s never even thought to imagine.

What happens when one mention of a certain controversial singer on her show sends a flood of unexpected challenges her way?

Authors note: I’m here:) finally. It’s been a while, idk how long, not that long but long enough i guess, sorry for the wait! This one is wordy but also has a lot going on, so hope you enjoy!

Ngl, this can probably be read as a standalone if anyone’s seeing this and not started the series, it’s just a bit angsty and mostly smut? But unsure, I said probably! X

Warnings: Arguing, usual Matty and Mouse thinking (feels like it needs its own warning at this point, they’re saddos), smut, unprotected sex, EMOTIONS (because yeah)

> Last update: look back here if you'd like!

Masterlist

There was something raw in the bitterness that was love. Like the sour skin of an apple that was first thought to be sweet. Love was deceiving in itself really, but it was never alone. It brought life and light. It wrought anger. It stirred both jealousy and pity. It gave and gave, until all you were left with was that tart tang aftertaste. 

Some people revelled in it.

Others, withered away.

Years before, perhaps maybe not even that long ago now, Matty would have belonged to the former. He had enjoyed the strings he found that could tie him to people, sex and money had given him the ability to do it, to keep them there, to pull them alongside him. And he’d indulged in it all, beyond what most would consider extortionate. 

And still, even after everything, when the fun had ended and the games had been discarded, and he’d just been tossed off somewhere to the side… Alone once more. He had continued on. On and on and on, until he ultimately had lost himself completely.

The last few months had shifted something in him though.

And now here he was, still angry and bitter and resentful. But full of actual love. The raw type. The kind that left you marvelling at the most stupid things— insipid little concepts that held no actual value or any real detail worth getting all starry-eyed over.

It had wormed its way into the hollow shell that was his heart and rebuilt some part of him that he believed he had long since destroyed.

He wanted to scoff at the very thought. The very idea that an emotion could be felt so strongly that it differed the world around you; that, singularly, it could change you. The notion was far too complex, too out there to even begin to fathom, but then again, Matty supposed that emotions were exactly that. Complex.

It sent his mind reeling. Had his entire body aching with a fever to expel the feeling completely, if only so that he could think freely again, so it wouldn’t hurt to merely breathe anymore.

You should have told me.

He knew that. He had admitted as much.

And yet, he still hadn’t told her.

He’d lied.

Why didn’t you tell me?

And that was the question, wasn’t it? Why hadn’t he just told her?

Fear, he guessed.

Yet another morbid emotion in which Matty had always been so wary of. Another lost feeling he thought he’d swallowed whole and hidden somewhere deep down. Because there was no fear in a drug induced haze. When you were off partying or chasing some other euphoric high. What the fuck was there to be fearful of? When the chilling buzz which shook you to your very core blanketed over everything else.

When there was always that silence.

That numb quiet he had chased and craved and cherished.

Though, he supposed, it was nothing compared to the fear of losing this.

Of losing her.

Still, Matty could not for the life of him find it in himself to tell her exactly that. Those words lost on him, lodged in the column of his throat and etching themselves a home there.

“Where do we go from here?”

He blinked at the sound of his own voice, looking up at her shadowed expression and at how tired she then seemed. How different she now looked compared to the moment they’d first met. 

She’d been something of a presence even then. Always effortlessly complex. With her soft smile and guarded eyes. Eyes he’d gone and fucking wondered about for hours on end.

Those eyes which were now caught on the far wall stood opposite, the one lined with coloured photo frames and that odd little doodle Teddy had gotten in trouble for only a couple of weeks prior. 

The realisation made Matty mourn the few days they’d spent apart.

After a long moment, she finally shrugged at him and he found himself swallowing tightly at the movement. Startled by her seeming lack of care. 

“I don’t want to lose you, Squeaks.” 

It was honest. As honest as he could be.

She huffed an amused breath in return though, “Not like you’re short on company, Matty.”

He felt his gaze snap up to meet hers then, head shifting with it. 

“What’s that even meant to mean?” He asked her, frowning now, at the way she had crossed her arms over her chest and how her shoulders had hunched on their own accord whilst she casually moved to glance out the window. Matty forced himself up onto his feet, hating the fact she had turned away from him.

“I saw everything, Matty.” Mouse replied tiredly, as though she was fed up, fed up with this, with them. “I saw the articles.”

Matty’s stomach bottomed out at her words, he stepped towards her. “Nothing happened.” He murmured, taking another step closer. “Nothing fucking happened, Squeaks. I swear it.”

She tensed but didn’t quite flinch at his sudden approach, so he kept a little distance between them, even as desperate as he was to hold her. To shake her enough so that she would see sense, that she’d realise how stupid he would have had to have been to have gone near anyone else. That girl was no one, she’d meant nothing. 

“You can swear that, can you?” She mocked him, one corner of her mouth toying with a merciless smile that didn’t quite suit her. “You were gone, Matty. Fucking out of it. That much was clear to see just from the photos alone.”

Matty stared at her helplessly.

She shook her head.

“I’d had a couple drinks. That isn’t a crime!” He stressed, automatically falling onto the defensive, “Didn’t mean I was stupid enough to get with the first person I fucking saw! That girl- she was off her head too. Had mates with her even! But she was just trying to help me, Mouse. That’s all it was.” 

She was shaking her head again now, tongue catching on her incisor; a dead giveaway to how stressed she was, how anxious she was getting. Matty only wished to shoulder it all, that defensiveness of his faltering slightly at the sight of her trying to hide it all. To stay strong. How fucking long had she had to do that?

“I feel like such a fool, Matty.” She finally spoke, her voice trembling with the onslaught of tears that glazed her eyes but she didn’t dare let fall. “A fucking fool. ‘Cause I’d thought that things were okay, that we were okay. That I could finally relax and let you in. But then-“ She paused, a sad huff leaving her, “Then you went and dropped this mess in my lap and somehow expected me to just deal with it. To tell you it’s all fine. That we could make it right.”

Mouse turned then, ever so slowly, looking about as defeated as Matty had ever seen her. He felt his chest burn with the last breath he hadn’t remembered taking let alone hold onto, too afraid to look away, to even move. 

“But you embarrassed me. You’ve made the whole world believe I am that fool. That I was as naive as they’d first made me out to be. As my friends thought me to be.” 

Her smile was shattered and broken, her voice wet and hoarse, but she continued on even as her hands fell limply to her sides and she took a single step closer.

“And to make things worse, you didn’t just hurt me, Matty. You hurt Teddy too.”

–

Hit them where it hurts.

That was the saying, wasn’t it?

But it only left me feeling all the more sour- gutless. As well as a little stupid, I supposed, wondering if Matty even cared for Teddy at all, or how he had felt the last couple days.

Though I shouldn’t have second guessed it, not when the way Matty’s face immediately paled and then fell proved me wrong. 

Deep down, I knew that he cared. In his own odd way he had always cared. But to know it and to see it were two entirely different things.

And although it was true, that Matty had in fact hurt Teddy. It still felt like a shitty thing to say to him then. But he’d hurt me as well, hadn’t he. And even though I’d been hurting most of my life, Matty being the reason for all that hurt pained me in a way I couldn’t even comprehend. 

“I didn’t-”

I scoffed at his attempted reply, but my heart wasn’t in it, breaking all over again. I wondered how long we could drag this out. If we even would.

“Mean to?” I finished for him, shaking my head stupidly. “I know you didn’t mean to, Matty. Doesn’t change the fact that you still did it.”

His eyes slipped closed just as his lips fell apart, and when he opened them again I was stuck staring into his devastated gaze. 

“If I could take it all back, I would.” He breathed, “I promise you I would.”

I swallowed back my own tears, even as they burned and pricked at my throat and eyes. “But you can’t.”

And it was as simple as that, wasn’t it? He couldn’t ever take it back. 

I don’t want to lose you.

He knew just how to get under my skin, past all that rusted armour of mine.

It was what made this all so much harder. 

“Tell me what to do, Squeaks.” Matty croaked pleadingly, hand reaching out towards me before he looked down at it, blinked, and then let it fall. “I’ll do it, just– tell me.”

What was left that he could do? When it felt like things had so suddenly and so horrifically fallen out from under us.

“I don't know.” I told him honestly, in a barely there whisper, “I just don't know, Matty.”

He stepped even closer then, hand moving to capture my jaw in a determined haste, not restraining himself like he had just moments before. I tried to pull away, titling my chin and looking off to the side as I clenched my teeth, but his thumb was there, luring me back in, forcing me to meet his eye.

“I’m not just gonna give up.” His other hand jumped to cradle my face, a cushion to those heated words. 

I was reluctant in my needless wanting, desperate to be held whilst simultaneously wanting to push him away. So I lifted my hands up to cover his own, unsure of the choice they’d make. To stay, or go.

“It’s not about that, Matty.” I heard myself say pathetically, voice wavering with each word, “You can’t just forget this.”

His dark eyes were trained on me, flickering over every square inch of my scarred face. I’d never felt insecure about them when I was around him, but this moment felt too heated, too high strung. And I’d been burning the candle at both ends the last few days, so with him being this close, this intense, every emotion I’d felt was brimming closer and closer to the surface. 

Instead of facing him, I turned away, hiding once more as I worked my jaw and felt my hands slip down to the backs of his forearms.

A shared breath and then,

“Don’t do that.” Matty whispered in the quiet, almost begging. “Don’t hide from me.”

His thumb smoothed over the skin of my cheek and I was all but putty in hands, looking back at him just as a tear escaped me and slid to meet the pad of it. 

Matty brushed the tear away without thought, before he leant in to rest his forehead against my own. The action forced me to cling tighter to his arms, eyes closing to keep from embarrassing myself any further. I wouldn’t cry. 

I wouldn’t cry.

“Look at me.” He demanded, nose so close that I could practically sense its phantom touch. And foolishly, I did as he asked. “You-” His breath stuttered as his eyes pleaded with me, sounding forced as it broke free from him, his fingers making a home for themselves in my hair. 

“You don’t know what you do to me. How much of a mess I’ve made of myself. How much I have missed you.” Matty confessed, his voice quiet in the small space shared between us, in a place where we were both sheltered and unseen. “And I’m sorry. I am so fucking sorry. Enough that I’ll keep on repeating it until you fucking believe me. Enough that I’d do just about anything for you to see how much I want this.”

He sucked in a breath, and I blinked back at him, lips tingling with the sensation of his proximity. 

“I know I messed up. I know.” He repeated, eyes flickering back and forth between my own whilst his thumbs trailed the line of my hair. “But all I’m asking for is a chance to make it right. To be better. Squeaks, I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat if I could.”

His breath was tickling the skin of my cheek as well as the corner of my mouth, it almost made it difficult to think let alone remember how to breathe. I wanted–

Suddenly my eyes were looking down, focused on his parted mouth, on the stubble he’d let grow across the cut of his chin as well as his upper lip. His nose finally brushed past my own, touching ever so carefully as one or both of us pressed nearer, almost there, inching closer but not close enough.

“Tell me no.” 

Instantly, I was thrown back to that first night he kissed me. I hadn’t told him no then, and for some reason I couldn’t find it in me to decline him now. 

So instead I took, all but biting as my hand cradled the back of his neck and closed that short amount of distance between us. My nails dug into the exposed skin of his nape, where the collar of his shirt jumped with each move he made. My teeth nipped at his lower lip, angry in my attempt to swallow him whole, teeth clashing as we both stumbled, moving and moving until Matty’s back hit the nearest wall.

How the roles had reversed, I thought to myself as Matty’s shoulders flexed beneath his shirt and jumped under my ever roaming hands. I hated the desire that it stirred through me, knowing how easily he could take back control with his carefully contained strength. But he didn’t, instead he gave my fury something to latch onto.

My hand lifted to pin one of his wrists somewhere to the left of his head, glare not wavering even as his stubborn gaze met my own. He was as riled up as me.

“You have some nerve.” I all but spat, watching on as his chest rose and fell, questioning how quickly everything had switched.

“Yeah?” Matty bit back, those familiar brown eyes- a colour that had always brought me comfort- were blazing now as they trailed over the flush that I was sure lined my face. “Why’s that? You’re the one with me pinned, darlin’.” 

His heavy gaze traced the bow of my lip, slumping ever slightly in his stance so that his head could fall closer forward. My breath hitched.

That was all he needed apparently, to earn the upper hand here. Because in a moment, the room was spinning and then I was the one being crowded against the wall, fury be damned.

Contrary to my previous endeavour, Matty’s touch was still as careful as ever, making it that much more obvious that I could slip away if I so wanted. But the question was whether or not I did.

“Matty–”

But he just carried on, as though he hadn’t even heard me speak, voice a low breathy murmur. 

“I’ve been stuck in this endless loop. Driving myself mad.” He told me, his knee angled enough so that he could let his head dip towards the juncture of my neck, his mouth pausing by the shell of my ear whilst a finger gently trailed its way up over my hip. “Wonderin’ if I’d lost this for good.”

My heart pounded in my chest as the ghost of his words tickled my skin, tensing when his nose ever so slightly grazed my jaw. 

That finger of his continued to move, working its way up my torso, jumping across my ribs and up to the bone of my collar. My gaze was fixed on the opposing wall, on the mirror that framed my dazed face and the back of his head. My hand worked its way into his unruly curls.

“But you’re as stubborn as me, see.” Matty added, luring me in, “And I’m not the type to give up on a sure thing.” His words held enough bite that I snapped back to meet his stare, he tilted his head at me whilst I scowled.

“Excuse me?”

Matty smiled, lids heavy as his careful hand danced its way back down my front. 

“And this,” He said, almost in a whisper, ignoring my retort as he hooked my leg around his waist, “This is a sure thing.”

A soft breath escaped me even as I batted his hand away, but he simply reached up to grip at my chin, touch tender even with the way his calloused thumb dragged down my lower lip.

I was slowly beginning to imagine that this was all a dream, something my sick mind had gone and conjured up in hopes to ignore all of the hurt he had put me through. Because this couldn’t be right, things couldn’t have fallen back into place this easily. 

“Matty.” I tried again, firmer this time, but was captured by the look his eyes held, probably having understood the expression that must have just crossed my face.

“What did you do, Squeaks?” He asked me almost hurriedly, shaking my chin between his forefinger and thumb, my previous anger and doubt melting slightly as I leaned further into his touch. “Did you want me to hurt, too?”

I blinked, caught off guard by the sudden question, his swift change in topic. Baffled by the fact that he was now trying to pin this back on me. 

Was that really what this was? I wanted to ask.

Matty didn’t give me the opportunity to say a thing though. My surprise had stalled me briefly, but it had evidently been long enough to allow him to simply carry on.

“What did you do, eh? Tell me.” He breathed before he pressed his mouth to my jaw, once and then twice, pulling away just as I tilted my head to accommodate him, “Did you go out, baby? Find somebody else? Or did you just stay here, waiting for me?”

I reeled back, anger spiking again. “Fuck you.”

Matty’s eyes flickered back and forth between mine. 

“I’m trying to get you to.” He said, always so brazen and snarky, even in the moments where I hated him most. The hand I had previously slapped away went back to the leg he still had draped over his hip, snaking up over my knee and to my thigh. 

My glare didn’t waiver, even as my breathing picked up at the pressure his fingertips wrought on my skin. 

“Tell me no.” He finally repeated, eyes failing to meet mine. And how was I supposed to? When having him this close brought back that fire he’d put out in me, when he was kissing my neck so sweetly?

“We’ll regret it.” It was as close to a no as I could get, enough to have him pause. Matty looked to me then, his hold loosening on my body but still holding. Hoping.

“Do you care?”

I marvelled at the question, did I care?

I cared so much it pained me.

But he hadn’t meant it like that. That much I knew.

Do you care if you regret it? Because, what if you don’t? 

With Matty there was always chance– he was the type to play the odds, to push his luck.

What if.

What if, what if, what if?

Shaking my head, I was forced to question if he understood me as much as I did him. If he could see each of my thoughts just as they dawned on me, flashing across my face like a story being told. 

Then I wondered whether or not I even wanted him to understand. This, this thing we were doing would only further complicate things between us, but perhaps this could be a goodbye.

But, if this was a goodbye, why was he looking at me like that? Watching and waiting for me to truly answer.

Tell me no, he’d said.

Matty’s gaze swept over my face, as though trying to read me, maybe in hopes to find what it was he was really searching for. 

Tell me no.

“Please.”

And my resolve broke at the word.

“Okay.” I heard myself say in reply, nodding quickly, and that was seemingly all the permission he needed before Matty was wrapping his arms around my waist and pulling me towards him fully.

My hands floundered momentarily before they were back on his shoulders, his teeth nipping at my neck. 

I moaned, eyes falling shut as he pressed hot, open-mouthed kisses down my skin, teeth scraping before his tongue swirled to soothe their angry ambush. I could smell him everywhere now, the shampoo I was so used to stealing, as well as the only aftershave he’d ever claimed to like.

His hips rolled into mine, pressing himself right against the fabric of my trousers and the underwear which had grown damp during our heated argument. 

I didn’t want to linger too long on the thought of my body’s obvious betrayal, too caught up in him to think about how wrong this should all feel.

“Shit.” Matty groaned, breath catching with it as he continued to grind against me.

I gasped back, grabbing at him harder as he bit down on the curve of my neck. I nipped at his jaw in retaliation, nails digging into the skin of his back, hoping to leave a mark.

“I knew you’d miss me.” He grunted into the base of my throat, the hands which held my waist dipping beneath the hem of my shirt to explore further. “Even when you’re angry you’ll wait. ‘Cause no one else can touch like me.”

A whine bypassed my lips almost involuntarily as he continued to rut against me, I wanted to be angry- no, in fact, I was angry. But all emotion other than want was blurring at the edges of my mind now, being pushed further and further back by each eager kiss he peppered along my jaw.

“You really–” I jerked in surprise, cutting myself off with a short gasp when his hand slipped past the hem of my trousers, fingers pressing against the damp fabric he found there. 

“What was that?” He provoked, and I could hear the smirk in his voice as he trailed over my covered clit, causing me to whimper before I was biting down on my lower lip. Matty didn’t like that much. “Come on, I wanna hear you.” He muttered, pressing a little harder, wanting a reaction. “Tell me.”

“You’re such a bastard.” I panted, head falling against his shoulder as my hips pushed further into his touch, seeking more.

Matty laughed, all breathy and lovely, mouth catching on the lobe of my ear before he hissed, “Yeah, but you like that about me.”

His hand was gone with that and I was almost tempted to ask, to even plead with him for its return, aching all the more now, enough that all I could think about was riding his fingers until I couldn’t think at all. 

But then Matty was grabbing my waist again, his grip hard, firm, and I swallowed when he whispered into my ear once more.

“Jump.”

Without thinking, I jumped. 

We collided, his mouth on mine and the two of us moving as though it was second nature. And in a way, it was. But it shouldn’t have been. I knew that. I tried to remind myself of it. 

He shouldn’t be here.

But he was. Walking his way through my flat with ease, effortlessly missing each sharp corner and the miniscule step which led back into the hallway. He was blind, my hands in his hair as he manoeuvred us into my bedroom, throwing me down onto sheets that he’d never seen, let alone slept in. 

I tugged him down with me, his hands moving to unbutton those fucking jeans he always wore as he worked his way back into my mouth. 

He hovered over me after kicking them off, my head pressed to the pillows as his eyes roamed every inch of my face. “Beautiful.” He whispered, as though he hadn’t really meant to say the word aloud.

My breath hitched anyway but Matty paid it no mind, leaning in closer to kiss me again, slower this time around, though his hands were still quick, tugging at the hem of my top enough so that I got the hint. I lifted myself up, breaking away to take it off and toss it to the side. 

Matty kissed his way down my neck again, following the trail of scars down my torso until his fingers paused to hook around the top of my trousers. I nodded at his silent ask, planting my feet a little firmer on the mattress so that they could follow my tee.

Matty stopped then, kneeling between my parted thighs, eyes caught on the panties I was wearing, and I could swear something in his gaze shifted as he stared down at me. 

“Lace?” He murmured, fingers curling around my thighs tight enough to bruise as he pushed forward, closer to my face. “Really?”

It was a loaded question. Almost felt like an accusation.

I shrugged– I hadn’t meant to end up here, but it hadn’t been subconscious when I’d picked them out of the pile this morning. He liked the way they looked, had told me so one night spent at his when he’d talked me into smoking a couple joints with him sprawled out on his living room floor. 

I opened my mouth to reply but Matty didn’t quite catch the motion, already busying himself with the task of pulling the lace down my thighs. His fingers, calloused from years of playing guitar, dragged alongside the black material rolling down my legs. I tensed at the feeling, zeroing in on the slow motion, then listened to him groan at the sight before they were gone completely.

I watched him pull away, balling the damp fabric up in a fist before leaning over the side of the bed to drop them on top of his jeans. 

“A souvenir?” I couldn’t help but question, mostly out of mirth, but humour helped deflect from the weight I felt at having him here.

Matty hummed, fingers already back on me, trailing the length of my right leg before he was stretching his way back up again, head stopping between my parted thighs and nosing at a crease sat at the very top. He didn’t answer me though, instead choosing to shut me up with another gasp by dragging his thumb across my folds.

“Matty.”

“Hm?” He hummed again, having sat back on his heels to watch me squirm as he continued on. I shot him a rather annoyed glare.

“Take off your shirt and fuck me.” 

His brows rose languidly when he flicked his eyes back up to meet mine, then tilted his head. “But I’m having so much fun.”

With a swift kick to his side, Matty’s hand fell away and he shook his head around the beginnings of a smile. “Always so demanding.” He tutted and before I could spit something back– probably about him being the biggest hypocrite I knew– he was placing his hands either side of my head and leaning forward so that his lips were right beside my ear, his breath fanning the shell of it. “You gonna beg for it?”

My breathing grew heavy as I watched him pull away, dragging a finger up the inside of my thigh before stilling ever so briefly and venturing on, up over my hip and then my ribs. He pressed a slow kiss to my chest, eyes flicking up to find mine as his tongue swirled over the skin, there and then gone.

“Come on–”

He huffed a quiet laugh, the force of it lighting goosebumps over my exposed flesh. “Come on, baby. Beg.”

I rolled my eyes, reaching up to grab at his neck but he was already dancing out of my reach. He jutted his chin. 

“Matty.” I huffed.

“Yeah?”

I really wanted to throttle him, “Fuck me. I’m not asking.”

The corner of his mouth tugged itself up into a small smirk, “Good enough.”

A disbelieving chuckle escaped me, one which was quickly cut short by his wandering hands finding purchase on my hips once more, before he dragged me down the length of the bed, his mouth finding purchase on the swell of my breast.

He pressed fast kisses along the curve of it until his tongue flicked out over the nipple, causing me to gasp. My hands flew out to tangle themselves in his hair when he lapped it into his mouth to suck and I groaned at the weight of his hands cradling the curve of my back. 

“Matty.”

He hummed and the sound sent vibrations rippling out across my skin, I fisted my hands into his curls harder.

Shifting until my hips found his whilst he lavished at my chest, I pressed up into him, both annoyed by the fact he was still clad in his boxers and pleased by the very visible wet patch I could see. I ground against him and the sensation elicited moans from the pair of us, his hands flying down to hold my hips steady.

“Patience.” He murmured, but I was having none of it, lifting a leg against his arse to spur him closer. Matty’s head jerked up at the surprise before he looked down at me and stared. “You’ll be the death of me.”

“You better hope not.” I replied, hands finding the hem of his shirt and dragging it off before he could fight me on it. “I’ll make it painful.”

“Counting on it.” Matty murmured back, hair now a mess, either from the clutch I’d had on it moments before or from the way I’d all but yanked his top over his head. “On all fours,” He said roughly, tapping my outer thigh twice. My already flushed skin heated further at the understanding of how he wanted to take me but– contrary to popular belief– I didn’t argue and rolled onto my stomach.

Palms to the sheets, I pushed myself up onto my hands and knees, eyes trained on the headboard. I grinned to myself when I heard Matty groan at the sight, looking back over my shoulder only briefly to see him palming himself through his boxers.

“Don’t have all day, Healy.” I prompted after a moment passed, just before the mattress shifted beneath his weight. I heard something drop to the floor a second later before he was right up behind me.

I jolted a tad at his sudden touch, then was forced to focus on the way his hands slid over my hips with that same familiarity they’d always done, moving up to the swell of my arse to squeeze it before dropping back down to spread my legs further apart.

A moment passed and I was forced to wait in the silence he then gifted me, waiting and waiting until I finally went to say something. It was then that I felt a finger glide down my spine, dragging ever so slowly over my jumping muscles. 

“Hands,” Matty then reminded and I was forced to blink away the haze I had drifted into, reaching up to grab onto the headboard just as I felt him swipe his dick between my thighs, guiding himself up over my folds, pushing past them so he rested at my entrance. 

I let go of a rush of air, splaying my hands further against the headboard before he slammed into me without any warning at all, all the way up to the hilt whilst I cried out at the sudden fullness. “Fuck.” I hissed, head falling between my shoulders as I winced. 

I breathed through the bit of pain that came with the thrust, acknowledging that Matty didn’t move an inch and instead keeping still, hands holding my hips even as he leaned over to whisper, “You good?”

His voice was surprisingly soft in the quietness that encased the flat, reminding me of other times we’d spent here, both like this and in other odd moments. It made my chest ache.

I took another moment to adjust to him before I nodded, “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”

He hummed in turn but didn’t question it, just waited, thumbs circling the skin on my hips for a moment in a manner so gentle and yet so very Matty, before finally, he moved. 

His thrusts were shallow and slow at first, his thumbs keeping the same steady tempo as they continued to soothe the tops of my hips. I moaned at the feel of him, before I managed to roll my hips back to meet his own, enjoying the sound that escaped him.

“So good.” He said, hand sliding further up my side and towards my ribs before I was titling my head back and Matty was holding a fistful of my hair. He just held it for a bit, forearm pressed against the skin of my back before his thrusts began to grow harder, tugging more and more.

The room was quickly filled with the sounds of our groans along with the bedframe rocking against the wall and I praised all the Gods above for the fact that there were currently no neighbours residing in the flat beyond it, before I was quickly swept up once more in the thick scent of sweat and sex. Matty fucking into me with a desperation I’d never quite experienced from him before.

I panted beneath him, nails digging into the wood of my headboard whilst he picked up the pace.

I couldn’t quite focus on anything but him. His breathy whispers, his fingertips which dotted my skin, the feel of him rocking in and out of me. It was almost as though nothing else existed but this moment, even if I knew it would soon end. His thrusts getting sloppier, his grip tightening, his murmured praises increasing by a tenfold. 

“Come on, baby.”

I liked when he called me that.

Made me feel special. 

But that thought soon soured. Because, was I really? 

How could I be anything special when my whole life I’d been nothing but a doormat for people to walk all over? I couldn’t help but think that Matty would be the same, like he’d gotten too close and finally seen what everybody else already had.

“Squeaks, baby. What do you need?”

I whimpered at his ask, tears collecting in the corners of my eyes. “I–”

What the fuck did I need? It wasn’t meant to feel so loaded, that question. But it felt as though the walls were now closing in. Because was this it? Was this the end?

“I–” I tried, feeling Matty’s fingers slip from the ends of my hair before a gentle palm laid itself flat on the small of my back.

“So good for me.” I heard him say and I moaned at the slight praise, breathing harder as he continued to mumble mostly to himself, “So pretty. So good.”

I was almost there, back arching under his palm as the other moved away from the right grasp it held on my hip, fingers finally finding my clit, knowing exactly what I needed.

“Yes.” I panted as the combination of his hard thrusts and steady hand sent my head into a dizzying pool of water, “God, yes. I–”

I think I screamed as I came, his fingers working deftly whilst mine clung to the headboard, body trembling as I fought to keep myself up. But Matty was there, holding me long enough so that he could reach his high and pull out with a loud grunt, coating my inner thighs. 

We stayed there for, I don’t know how long, until he finally released me, falling away whilst I slumped forward onto the pillows before us. He followed a second later, still catching his breath as he stared up at the ceiling. I watched him, eyes hidden behind my forearm and a sprawl of hair that had fallen over my face, content to soak in what I could of him. What I had left.

Then Matty shifted beside me, I half expected him to get up and leave with some half-arsed excuse on the tip of his tongue, but he paused when he caught my heavy gaze. I let my eyes trail over the side of face, on the tired circles settled beneath his lash line and the slope of his nose.

He looked back towards the ceiling.

“You got your souvenir, remember?” I found myself saying, stupidly, voice just above a croaked murmur, “Don’t let me keep you.”

Quiet. And then, “Do you want me to?”

I knew what he meant, but still I asked, “Want what?”

Matty’s head slowly turned towards me, eyes guarded and peering over at my devastated form. I wondered what he made of me right then, if he thought anything at all. 

When he offered me no words, I refused to add anything either and felt what was left of my heart crumple up into a pitiful bundle when he pushed himself to the edge of a bed with a barely there sigh.

The air in my lungs caught as I watched and waited, eyes trailing after him as he rounded the bed frame to pick up his discarded boxers. I let them slip closed again, not wanting to watch him leave. 

I listened to his feet pad across the hardwood floors and out of the room. My chest ached with every step but I didn’t dare stop him, burying my face further into my pillow. 

I laid in wait for the front door to open, for there to be a clue to his evident departure, but then the footsteps returned. I didn’t dare give myself false hope, knowing he must have forgotten something to have come back. But the padding continued, closer and closer until they were back by the bed and I held my breath as it creaked, my eyes stinging just as I felt a warm damp cloth press against my inner thighs, wiping me clean.

I choked on the sob that wanted to escape me and the cloth paused for a split second before venturing on. I waited, wondering why he was doing this, why he was dragging it out.

Just leave already.

But then the cloth was pulling away again, and the bed was creaking again, and the tears, they wouldn’t stop. 

Stay. 

Please just stay.

I gasped into the pillowcase, stomach tensing with the strength to keep quiet. To let him leave quietly. 

I wouldn’t cry.

And then there was quiet, at least for a moment or two, before the bed dipped once more and there was a hand in my hair, combing the strands from out of my face and tucking them behind my ear.

When I opened my eyes, he was still there. Dressed and ready to go, but still sitting there beside me. Whilst I laid bare, curled up into a ball to better protect myself from his knowing gaze.

Suddenly everything hurt. Suddenly I felt exhausted and was falling apart at the seams.

Matty moved carefully, stretching toward the foot of the bed before returning with the sheet to cover me up, laying it gently over my trembling shoulders. He leaned in to press a slow kiss to my forehead and then went to move away again.

My hand caught his wrist.

And then I was flat out sobbing. Hysterical even. Crying into the pillow almost soundlessly as I gasped to try and catch my breath. Because I wanted him to stay. I needed him to stay.

Not just for me. But for Teddy. And for the life he brought into my dreary flat. To the kindness he never failed to gift me.

I needed him to stay.

I needed him.

I opened my mouth to ask, to let him know. But I could hardly even bear to look at him, blurred as he was through my onslaught of tears, Matty still held the key to all but destroying what little I had left.

His hand returned to my hair, fingers tangling themselves in it, a sudden contrast to the rough grip they’d held there earlier. And then he settled further onto the bed, back pressed against the headboard whilst he continued to run his fingers through my hair.

The tears still flowed but the sobs came less and less, until I was blinking at his shadowed figure in the dark, holding out hope that somehow he’d just know and he’d stay. 

[bridgetotheskyyy]

snapshot.

summary: Deidara meets a superfan

warnings: Smut, 18+, rough sex, choking, pool sex, reader has a bit of a description, reader is complex, mentions of killing

word count: 6.9k

a/n: I had this idea shortly after conceptualizing Apprentice and while I was, like 70 or 80% done with that fic. And now we have this fucking 7k monster. I consider this to be a spiritual successor to Apprentice, maybe a oppositional series of events even? Idk, you decide lol. There are even some similar words and wordy allusions that you may catch haha. Hope you enjoy!

read on ao3 here. (recommended for extra notes)

Kisame’s wicked cackles reverberated across the cavern walls, summoned from the pit of his stomach; Deidara was sure he would pass out sooner rather than later. 

“It seems,” Pain began, eyeing the sculpture in the center of the room, “you have an admirer, Deidara.” 

Deidara’s brow twitched as a blush snuck across his face. His eyes roved over the sculpture ― the naked sculpture.

Tobi threw up his hands in laudation. “It’s so pretty! ”

Kisame laughed harder ― if it was possible. 

“I have taken it upon myself to apologize to (Y/n),” Pain continued over the cackling. “She’s one of our main contributors, after all; we would be amiss to upset her.” 

“When …” Deidara’s brow held a life of its own, “... did she send this?”

“No clue; I had Kisame retrieve it,” Pain explained. “Apparently, we sent the wrong member to entertain her.”

Kisame’s hand hugged the wall. “You’re damn right! ” 

It was as subtle a joke as could be achieved by Pain and it still wasn’t funny. Deidara’s eyes had not once left the sculpture since Pain had signaled for his attendance, saying it was of the utmost importance he appeared. One arm yawned out to the sky while the other snaked around and brushed against the meat of the breasts ― your breasts. One leg stuck out before the other, the fat of the thigh attached concealing the womanhood. 

Your womanhood. 

Both futile attempts to afford the piece some decency. Futile, Deidara guessed, was the point. It was coquetry. A shameless attempt at flirtation on your part. 

And just in case Deidara was too dense to get the message, you’d taken it upon yourself to leave him one, attached to the foot of the sculpture’s dais:

Hello! Please deliver to Deidara. Thank you.  

It even had a smiley face after the period.

Deidara balled his fist. 

What. The. Fuck.

“(Y/n) must be an incredibly beautiful woman!” Tobi admired the piece with fascination, a sparkling heart encasing his eyehole. “Look at the face, and the hips, and the feet ― ”

“Tobi!” Deidara was beet red. “Shut the hell up!” 

“Deidara,” Pain spoke again, unfazed by the cacophony. “I’m sure you’ll be undertaking a journey west? Since (Y/n) has clearly requested you specifically.”

Deidara’s eyes yo-yoed between their leader and the monstrosity of the naked sculpture. He debated it. Of course, all while fantasizing about shoving explosives down the laughing fishman’s throat and turning him into a pile of sardines. 

Tobi can taste one himself, while I’m at it.  

“What?” Irritation bit Deidara’s tone. “We’re fucking prostitutes now?” 

Pain raised holographic brows. “If it ensures peace, then yes.”

Deidara’s mouth dropped. The audacity of it all. How much was he expected to take? 

“We’re waiting, Deidara.”

A pause. He was no fool. This wasn’t a request, it was an expectation. 

“Fine,” Deidara sighed irritably. “I’ll go, all right?”

“You better,” Kisame said, at last recovering from his fit. “Better get those high heels out and start walking the streets, too!”

Deidara was ready to draw blood ― 

“No need to be crude, Kisame,” Pain’s backdropped against another fit of raucous laughter. 

Says the man who puts a naked STATUE in the room.

“ Honestly, ” Kakuzu spat. “Do the rest of us have to be here for this?” 

“I second that!” Hidan said with relief, “Finally, something we can agree on. ”

“Of course,” Pain said. “You were here in the event Deidara tried to refuse.”

Deidara ignored them all. He gave the sculpture one more scan before swallowing dry and awaiting the end of the call. He could not believe your gall. You were so … brazen . A simple love letter couldn’t have sufficed? No? A naked ― What the fuck was the matter with you?

Still, he was … intrigued. Curiosity was a hooking finger, beckoning him forth. Was that really … your body? Your lips? Your thighs? Your …

Deidara swallowed dry again, his tongue sticking to the top of his palate.

He’d go to the village and put an end to your games. 

And maybe …

He wouldn’t let himself go there ― even if his treacherous mind was wandering already.

<<<>>>

You sat in your museum of sculptures, head tilted up against the gods you had crafted.

The door creaked open.

“I just received Pain’s crow,” your assistant’s voice rang. “Deidara should arrive in another day or so.” 

Stars were in your eyes but you kept your back to her. “Great!”

Your grand plan relied on whether or not Pain, mysterious leader of the Akatsuki, was morally bankrupt enough to hoe out his members. At any point you could’ve been rejected with your sculpture returned swiftly to you. But it worked. You were thrilled. The first part of the plan had succeeded. 

You were going to see him again.

Your assistant’s footsteps tapped repeatedly over the polish floors upon which you now sat. 

“Hmm.” Doubt deflated some of your enthusiasm. “Do you think it was effective enough? You know, for him?”

Your assistant huffed incredulously. “What? Just because Deidara’s a shinobi means he’s immune to pussy? C’mon. You’re not one of those types that thinks all shinobi are noble and stone-faced, are you, (Y/n)-sama?”

  As if. You guffawed. Nobility wasn’t the issue; hundreds of people scoured the red light districts for carnal game. You told your assistant as such. 

“At least seventy percent are shinobi searching for quick thrills,” You joked. “If my math’s correct, anyway. It could be higher. And I know any one of them would be more than happy if a girl simply threw herself at them without need for reimbursement. But still …” You trailed, gaze tailing down the hardened clay of a kimono-garbed sculpture. “I only wondered. It’s been a long time since … I don’t know how dedicated he is to his little terrorist group, is all. He might not be as amused.”

“You answered your own question, ma’am,” your assistant said. “And even if he wasn’t a shinobi, he’s a man. It’ll go down without a hitch! You worry too much.”

You nodded. She was right: despite the years, you wanted to speak to Deidara in his language. Art. How could he resist such an enticement? How could any man, but especially Deidara, due to the manner in which you had sent your little gift. “Okay. Part one of the plan: Complete!”

“What’s the rest of the plan exactly?” You heard the pat, pat, pat and knew from your many years with your assistant that she was thumping her clipboard against her head. “Dinner? Walk on the beach? Or just … Fucking?”

Your smile was evil. “Yes.” 

You held Deidara in your mind’s palm. Blonde hair, gorgeous face .. . One of the most admired artists in Iwakagure ― no, the most. For  could rival Deidara? Even your knees wobbled in the face of his raw talent, even years later. He was still revered in the art community. Of course, his name grew to possess more notoriety than reverence when he started blowing up things ― and people. But, hey everyone was flawed. 

It was only when he went rogue and abandoned the village did you start your own search for him. Years passed and then … reports of a long-haired, blonde shinobi with profound arsonry acuity. Rogue. Affinity for birds.

Bingo. 

Your giggle was shamelessly girlish. “I’d love to woo him.”

Your assistant chuckled. “Aaand you’re not the slightest bit afraid of him? I mean, with all respect, (Y/n)-sama, he’s a criminal. He’s an arsonist. ” 

You licked your lips. “Love me a bad boy.”

“Right,” she said with a chuckle. “Forget I said anything.” 

“I will. Now, let’s get ready.”

<<<>>>

“We’re going to see the girl with the pretty feet, aren’t we, Senpai?” 

“I told you to shut your mouth, Tobi.” 

Deidara’s taller partner buoyed from foot to foot as he tailed behind. Deidara didn’t want to think about your body ― your incredibly artful body, artful in more ways than one … 

The sun crept from the sky as it vivified the color of peachskin. Deidara’s eyes darted hither-thither, collecting information. It was all he could do to not summon one of his explosive birds and fly over this entire, forgotten village. The urge to set it ablaze and go home was immense. A part of him had wanted to make such an entrance, but prudency would never allow it. 

Nor would Leader.

Deidara turned back to Tobi just in time to see him pose, a hand visoring his visible eye while the other landed on his hip. 

“Leader said the pretty naked lady would have someone waiting for us,” Tobi said. 

“Hm,” Deidara said. It was true; they would wait for someone to escort them to you. Until then, they remained lost in one of the village’s districts. The streets were alive with noise and peopled with busy folk. Deidara could tell the amount of businesses actually open were sparse.  Pain had called you one of their main contributors … She must be a big wig to have people doing her dirty work for her. Just who were you? And how were you so familiar with him to send such a thing to the Akatsuki headquarters? 

And if you were so rich, why did you squalor in the dirt with the likes of those in this village?

Thoughts bubbled in the back of Deidara’s mind― 

“Hey …!” 

Outside of a food stall a woman eyed them, holding a curtain back with manicured nails.

Bingo . 

“Tobi,” Deidara gestured. “C’mon.” 

“Okay, senpai!” 

Deidara neared the food stall.

The woman ticked her head to the side with a smile. “Enjoy your gift?”

Pink colored Deidara’s cheeks.

“So, you’re escorting us, right?”

The woman backed away to admit them into the food stall, where the people inside, dining on bowls of ramen and mackerel were too engrossed in their meals to notice the cloaked men enter. 

“You got me,” she winked. “C’mon.”

The woman led them behind the bar, where they slinked through the backdoor into the alley. 

“Don’t need anyone asking questions about the cloaks,” she reasoned. “Surprised you didn’t think of that, Oh Great Deidara of Iwakagure.”

“Of course I did!” Deidara said. “I look stupid to you?”

“No,” the woman’s eyes roamed on Deidara now. “You look cute . My mistress really didn’t lie …” 

Deidara averted his gaze as the woman snickered. Tobi gawked. 

“Does lady think Tobi’s cute, too?” 

“Uh,” she blinked. “Sure.” 

Tobi twirled with a squeal. Deidara rolled his eyes. 

“Whatever,” Deidara said. “Just take us to meet her, all right?”

“Sure …” the woman said. 

They traveled through as street lights blared to life, the sky a bruising purple as evening descended.

“I only wanted us in there to help us blend in a bit,” she guided them through the streets. “I hope it wasn’t too troublesome getting here.” 

“We can care for ourselves,” Deidara said, prickly. 

“You don’t have to be so defensive,” the woman said. “I’m just making conversation.”

“I said don’t worry about it,” Deidara snapped. “So … who is this woman? This mistress of yours?” 

“I’m one of her many assistants, yeah,” the woman said, leading them down a dark street, made darker by the light of day dying faster. “I started working for her years ago. I was so amazed by her art and so intimidated by her talent, I didn’t think she’d accept me. But, surprise surprise.”

“Yeah? So how she so rich? She sell her art?”

“Exactly! People come from all over the world to see her exhibits. She brings so much tourism to this ragtag village. She doesn’t even keep her wealth to herself; she donates so much. She should be much richer than she is! She’s a saint, really.”

So she donates to the Akatsuki, the deadpan of the thought laid flat in his mind. Deidara was silent, tailing shortly behind her. Some saint.

“You called me Deidara of Iwakagure.”

“ … Yes, I suppose I did.”

“So … Your mistress … she knows where I’m from.”

The woman was silent now as she led Deidara and Tobi down street steps to a quieter street, nearly bereft of people beside the occasional deadbeat smoker. 

“She from there, too?” 

Deidara went unanswered. 

Hm, so I’m on to something, Deidara noticed the buildings growing taller, treeing up as the raucous of the village slipped away. They traveled further south. Maybe Pain’s got this wrong; maybe this girl’s a fucking black widow and wants revenge on me for something. Figures, he’s sure he’s broken a few hearts in the past he’d long since forgotten about. But then … Why would she donate so much money to our organization? She clearly believes in it.

“We’re here,” the woman-assistant said.

Deidara raised his head ― and kept raising it. 

Shit . 

The mansion was immaculate, easily the tallest of all of its sisters. Its main building was flanked by towers with onioned tips and was encased in a giant garden, all of it shielded by a surrounding wall. 

Deidara stared, bug-eyed.

The doors to the gate’s entrance burst open and a gaggle of girls filed through. 

“They’re here ―!” 

“Ooh~! there’s two of ‘em!” 

“Mistress will be so pleased!” 

Girls stood star-eyed at Deidara while more hugged themselves to Tobi’s arms. 

“Tobi likes pretty girls!”

“We’ll entertain the other one,” the woman-assistant said with a wink. “You just follow us.”

The woman-assistant led them in where the cult of girls drove Tobi away laughing and giggling. 

“This way,” the woman said. 

Deidara followed her, looking around. From the inside, the mansion opened up like some grand palace from myth, folkloric and mysterious. Columns shouldered the brunt of a ceiling that raised into the darkness. The floors were illustrated scenes from what Deidara recognized as actual myths. Valiant samurais rescued princesses with flaring kimonos, dragons ribboned down hallways. The scenes on the walls diverged from the ones of nobility beneath them, were lavish with depictions of wild courtesans and … 

Deidara blushed. 

Begrudgingly, he had to admit you did have taste; the art was a lot, but wove together into one cohesive masterpiece. The hallways the assistant led him down were flanked by vases winking with sheen and overflowed with bell flowers, roses, sunflowers. The hallway widened into a foyer. Something winked in Deidara’s peripheral and when he looked upward saw that the ceiling domed into a orb of glass, giving way to the first few blink of stars. 

He had entered the lion’s den for sure.

“ Deidara … ” 

The sirenic voice compelled his head to a foyer alcove where a figure shrouded the threshold. 

His eyes widened. 

(E/c) eyes glittered at him. Long legs supported swaying hips. Elegant cleavage sinking into a familiar mound of breasts. Delicate hands, hickey-worthy neck … 

And lovely ― and lovely … 

Inwardly, he sighed, defeated.

Feet.  

The naked sculpture colored Deidara’s memory. 

“Deidara!” You parroted in awe. Your expression shifted as you came to smolder at him. “In the flesh. And just in time for dinner.”

Your kimono waterfalled as you left the alcove. Deidara gulped, speechless as you sauntered to him.

“It ―” Deidara’s cheeks grew hot. “It really is you …” 

“It really is me …” 

Your woman-assistant's eyes tennis-balled between you and Deidara before bowing respectfully. “I’ll give you two some privacy.” 

She hurried away down a different alcove. 

Deidara shook his head in a desperate attempt to reclaim his senses. Fucking hell, Dei, get a grip.

“So,” he cleared his throat. “I ―”

“I still can’t believe you’re actually here,” You began to turn, “Let me show you ―”

“Wait, I think we should discuss monetary terms first,” Deidara said in a futile attempt to hold some ground over the woman. 

“Hm?” You blinked. “Didn’t your leader explain things to you?”

“What do you mean?”

“The money comes after the evening,” you winked at him. “Of course.” 

Pain, you fucking ― 

“Deidara …” You revered, pulling the sleeve of your kimono back over your shoulder. “Before dinner, I would love for you to see the rest of my work.” 

“Your,” Deidara deadpanned, blinking, “work?”

“Yes,” You smirked at him. “You enjoyed the piece I already had you review, I presume?” 

Deidara fought to keep things on the issue at hand, but his eyes grew preoccupied with the twinkle in yours. The sky above the two of you had plunged into a chief darkness. Candles flared to life to douse the hall in tangerine light. 

Deidara turned a blind eye to it. “Your assistant called me Deidara of Iwakagure.” 

You eyed him. “Did she …?” you said coyly. “I’m glad she didn’t try and call you anything else; she’s got a mouth on her.”

“How do you know me?” 

You shied away. Your head dipped. Deidara tried to ignore the cuteness of it all. 

Focus, damnit.

“I’m guessing you’re from Iwagakure, too?” Deidara pressed. “What are you playing at?” 

You took your time. “Yeah, Deidara, we have a village in common.” You began to walk, crossing the columns to circle him. “Do you remember the underground competitions that used to be held there?” 

“Hm,” Deidara recalled and relished in the ego trip it afforded him. Dark rooms. Rowdy spectators circled around art pieces under makeshift stage lights like cavemen around fire. It was before he left the Iwagakure, when he was still itching to engage in the village’s indie art scene before growing bored of the whole thing. “I won most of them.” 

“I used to show up early and wait for you to showcase your things,” You glazed with memory. “You were always my favorite.” 

Deidara smirked. “Hm, naturally. So you’re, what, some kind of superfan Not like I’m surprised, but …”

You thread past a column to scoop up a candle holder. 

“You could say that,” you said. I have something to show you, if you follow me.”

He obliged, curiosity hooking him with a second finger. Candle flame lit like thin clovers to ward off the darkness. The flames illuminated the sway of your hips as he trailed. The sleeve of your kimono slipped past your shoulder again, revealing the skin of your neck and shoulder pad to him …

Why am I even noticing? 

You brought him to a room hidden behind a set of rectangular doors.

“This is where I keep them.” 

You pushed the doors open with a strength Deidara wouldn’t have expected. 

Deidara entered ― and stopped.

It was a museum of art; animal pieces blazed his vision; exotic birds in flight, elegant cranes, all shaded and hued with masterful care and, if Deidara hadn’t been who he was, he wouldn’t have been able to recognize them as pieces done with clay. There were apricot-colored foxes, a dragon head amongst a dragon bust. Deidara recognized a few self sculptures in the forest of pieces. Obscure structures too abstract to be assigned to names dotted space, esoteric symbols eluding even him …

“You inspired me to create my own art,” You explained as he gawked. You inched to him and brazenly took his hand in yours.

Deidara jumped from the sudden contact and found your pretty face in the dim light. Stop … stop. A part of him wanted to summon a tongue to taste the salt on your palm. 

“It’s how I’ve made my money,” you continued as you tugged him along the aisles of work like an excited child.

“So you’re that kind of fan,” Deidara said as he recovered. And, what do you want from me?” he chuckled in disbelief, “My critique?”

“Of course.” 

He wasn’t expecting an honest answer forthright. Sincerely, he roved eyes over your work. 

“Hm, well …” he approached one, taking inventory of it head to foot. “Give me the candle.”

You obeyed.

“You’ve got a great understanding of color, I’ll give you that,” Deidara examined. “Painting can be messy, especially on clay ― and honestly so many artists use colors so … bluntly; it makes the whole thing come off as garish.”

“I’ve noticed.”

He laughed at that. “Hm! … You’ve got a great eye. And I don’t hand out compliments easily.” He raised the candle to illuminate another sculpture. “How long did this one take you?” 

“Five weeks,” You answered before chuckling somewhere behind him. “It’s funny, I sketched and re-sketched this one so many times, it was technically seven weeks.”

“A perfectionist. I like that.” 

Deidara found himself smiling. Rarely did he get to talk to someone about art or its many processes. Deidara thought of Sasori and was touched with a tinge of respect for his fallen partner. But, of course, they’re philosophies so often chafed against one another. But you … An image of him helping you craft one of your pieces came to his mind: his hands guiding yours over unsophisticated clay, paint dashing your collarbone, maybe on your lips … 

“Deidara …?”

Your voice brought him out of his thoughts, only for him to realize you were now in front of him. 

“We could talk about this more over dinner.” 

Your hands grazed his forearms and for some reason he didn’t pull away. The alluring scent of your perfume flirted up his nose. 

Deidara’s cock twitched; he kicked himself inwardly. What was he? A fucking teenage boy? He had half of a mind to shove you away, end this … whatever this was.

But none of that happened. Instead, he agreed. And, taking his hand again with fingers threaded through his, you led him out of your museum. 

<<<>>>

You let him to the roof of one of your buildings, where moonlight bestowed diamonds over the still waters of your pool and the dinner table waited, illuminated by more candles. 

“You’re a real hot shot now, aren’t you?” Deidara said.

You blushed as he surveyed dinner. “Is it too much?” 

“Nah, if anything it’s just the artist in you dying to come out,” he shrugged. “I respect that.”

You moved to take a seat, Deidara following you. He stopped you, pulling out the chair for you. 

You sank to your chair with a mixture of surprise and thrill. “What a gentleman. ”

“Just showing my respect, is all.” 

You snapped your fingers and two waiters appeared to kneel before you, plates of food in hand. 

Deidara did a double-take. “Wow.”

The waiters displayed the food and took their leave. His favorite: bakudan.

“You think of everything, don’t you?” Deidara said.

“Yeah.”

“Hm …” he could not pretend as though he was not impressed, but he could try as he took his seat.

He remembered the art shows in Iwagakure. You were always there? Did he ever see you? Even if he had, you would’ve been little more than a nobody to him, another sycophant he rightfully deserved amongst a herd of fawns and nothing more. You’re telling me all that time … I had a groupie groupie?

“Hey,” he said. “Remember when you said you used to attend my showcases.”

You lowered your fork to raise your brows. “I remember ten minutes ago, yeah.”

Deidara’s own brow twitched. Cheeky cunt . Then kicked himself; he didn’t want to think about your cunt. He watched your tongue swipe your plump lower lip ― then kicked himself again. 

“Why didn’t you ever try to talk to me?” Deidara asked. “I mean,” he leaned back in his chair, dangling his fork, “not like I needed any encouragement, even back then, but what gives? If you were such a fan ―”

“I was shy, back then …” You said. You toyed with your food. You had turned bashful, like a schoolgirl. “Still am, to be honest.”

He scoffed. “Hm! Says the woman who sends naked sculptures of herself to people.” 

You waved your fork. “What can I say? You bring out the wild girl in me,” The glint in your eye turned seductive. “Always have …”

Deidara gulped. What did that mean? You play with yourself with me in mind? Is that it?

Thinking that was another mistake;  images of you sieved into his mind. Sweet, feminine hands sinking in between the softness of your thighs, fingers grazing your wet lips to ... 

What did you smell like? Did you smell as good there as you did everywhere else? 

He shook his head. Fuck . 

“So you’re telling me,” Deidara said just to say something, “you have absolutely no issue with what I do.” 

“I don’t know,” You coquetted. “What do you do?”

“Don’t play coy . You contacted Akatsuki. You know damn well what I mean.” 

You were silent. 

“Killing people,” Deidara said. “Blowing them to smithereens. Kidnapping. The gods know what else. You’re cool with all that?”

Your manicured hand wrapped around your wine glass. You raised it, but before bringing it to your lips: 

“Birds of a feather.” 

You drank. 

What? 

“Come again?” 

You smacked your lips. “You’re not the only one who’s killed a few.” 

A pause. You set aside your drink before challenging his gaze. 

“Care to elaborate?” he asked. 

“I had an assistant once,” you began. “She told me she was desperate for a job, but you wouldn’t know by the run of her mouth. She complained, took off without warning. But then it turned out she had sticky fingers; she tried to steal one of my pieces. I’d had enough.” You leaned over the table as though you feared Deidara wouldn’t hear. “So I killed her. Used her for my piece after the last.”

“And,” Deidara swallowed, “your current girl …”

“You’ve already met her,” you said. “She’s mouthy, too ― but not to me.” 

You had killed, not only that ― encased a girl inside your work. She had wanted your art, and she had gotten her wish. 

“That’s …” Deidara trailed. “... Amazing.”

You smiled. “So, you see, I have no problem with what you do. Who am I to judge, am I right?” 

“Do the villagers judge you?”

“This village has seen enough strife for a lifetime,” You said. “I don’t think they’d mind learning about indiscretion ― especially if they knew why I killed her.”

Deidara raised an eyebrow. “So you donate bundles of cash to clear your conscience?”

“My conscience is clear,” You said. “People shouldn’t have to suffer any more than they already do. I want this village to prospect. I donate because I want to.” You popped a piece of food into your mouth. “You never answered me, by the way.”

“About what?” 

“The sculpture,” Your eyes narrowed with coquetry again, a glint especially bright and beautiful in your eye with aid from the moonlight. “Did you like it?” 

Deidara’s heart beat especially loud in his ears ― and this time he didn’t kick himself for it. 

“... Yeah,” he relented. “Yeah, I liked it.” 

“And it’s been a long time since I’ve seen any of your work, Deidara,” You raised to leave your seat. “Why don’t you show me something?” 

Deidara’s eyes widened. Far was he ever from an opportunity to flex his brilliance, especially on someone so appreciative ― so 

deserving. 

“Sure!”

Enthusiasm straightened your shoulders. “Really? I mean, If you need ―”

“I don’t need anything,” he said, waving you away. “Just stand back!” 

You obeyed, eyes bright from the contagion of his excitement. So aptly memorized did he have the hand signs, Deidara didn’t care to glance at them. Instead, he watched you try to futilely follow his movements. 

<<<>>>

Clay spilled like milk from mouths on Deidara’s hands to form into creatures before your eyes ― you blinked furiously and each time you did another creature was born; small dragons, spherical creatures with eyes, birds, and one, growing piece of clay, raising meters above the ground. It looked like a snowman to you but, knowing Deidara, it was leagues more dangerous. 

You stepped back, overwhelmed by the breadth of Deidara’s creation, Deidara’s artistry . 

One of Deidara’s clay birds flapped its wings, swerved in the air and landed gracefully on the cliff of your shoulder. 

“So,” Deidara’s smirk brightened his face and sent a throb to your nether regions, “what do you think?” 

What do I think? You pet the bird’s clay-made wing. What do I think?  

You took a step. The roof crowded with his creatures to dab white ivory among the encroaching night. 

Surely, it helped being a ninja; Deidara possessed powers you could only dream of understanding. Still. Your mouth hung agape at the amount of things he could spring alive from the literal palms of his hand. Your eyes followed up at his bigger piece, more of a monument to you than a mound of clay. 

He’s a god. A god among men. A god of art.

“Hm!” 

Poof.

You startled. Some of the pieces began disappearing. They left the roof choking with smoke until only his large, snowman-like piece remained. 

“I see you’ve been stunned into silence by my art,” Deidara said. 

You didn’t reply, only began to step forward. 

“Hm!” Deidara looked away, crossed his arms. “It’s only natural, after all, to have your breath taken away by my artiste.” 

Another step. Another. 

“I’m sure our leader didn’t even tell you what I’m capable of.”

Another. 

“It’s a good thing, too ―” 

You were running now. 

“It would’ve spoiled the surprise ―” 

You pounced on Deidara. He cried out but you barely heard it as the force propelled you both backward, falling hard and fast into the swimming pool. 

<<<>>>

Bubbles spilled from Deidara’s mouth. He could feel your hands on him, somewhere, everywhere ― 

He looked to the surface of the water and swam toward it. He could not feel your hands anymore.

He came up for air, looking around for you. 

“(Y/n)!” 

Then you emerged ― but he had no time to register it as your arms came around him. You pulled him down toward you, your lips crashing into his in a wet kiss. 

“Mm …!” 

Your tongue ran over the hard shell of his palate. Your hands held his cheeks. Your legs hooked around his waist to trap him between your thighs.

“That was ― mm ― the most ― mm ― amazing thing I’ve ever ― mm! ― seen!”

Deidara’s hands found you ― and immediately met skin; your kimono, having not been able to withstand the pull of the water, slid dangerously past your shoulders, the folds opened wide so he could feel the full cushion of your breasts against him. 

Oh, fuck.

Just as he began to play with your tongue, you broke away.

You faced him with heavy-lidded eyes, drops of water falling from your abused lips. 

“Let me make good on my promises to Pain,” Your hands hooked behind his neck. 

“Wha ― what?”

“Fuck me, Deidara,” Your voice was thick with lust. “I told him the quantity of my donation was completely dependent on how hard you fucked me. It would be an honor to be fucked by such an amazing artist!” 

That sent something to his dick. 

The surprise dissipated. He smirked. “Really …? Is that so …” 

He gripped your throat and hoisted you above him. He heard you gasp and tightened his grip, feeling the twitch of his cock in response to the  victimized sound. 

“Beg for it,” he ordered.

“ Oh … ” You whimpered. Your head fell back as Deidara’s hand served as a brace. 

He reached downward and tugged at the wet bow of your kimono. He yanked it and reveled in it coming apart to reveal the rest of you.

“ Beg. For me .”

Everything you did and had done was a plea for him, he admitted, but the idea of you begging vocally made him painfully hard. His eyes drank in your naked form still half submerged in the water. Wet tits in his face. A droplet of water fell away from a nipple. 

“Please …” came your breathless voice. “Please, fuck me ― oh … ” 

He thumbed at the tempting nipple, pert and so responsive to his touch. 

“ Nothing underneath, ” he feigned chastisement, pinching the nipple between his fingers. “Fucking slut .” 

He tightened his grip twofold and was pleasantly surprised with the moan you rewarded him with. The strict fit of his pants was becoming too much to bear. You jerked in his hold, tits jiggling in his face. 

“ Please, fuck me, Deidara!” 

Satisfied, He set you down and watched you bounce in the water before yanking you forward. He pressed his mouth against yours once again. You reached for him to no avail; he spun you, your back now pressed hard against the side of the pool. He released your mouth to dabble kisses at your neck, biting at pieces of skin. 

“ Fuck …!” You arched and Deidara fell into the dip of your curve.

You gripped his hand to bring it to your face. He stopped kissing you to look at what you had in mind, his tongue still present at his palm. 

Your lips traced his palm and began to kiss the tongue there. 

“Mmm …”

Deidara laughed as you tongue-kissed his hand. “You really are a fucking weirdo, aren’t you?”

The tongue slithered over your own. You released a moan and closed your mouth over the tongue, a flushed red tainting your cheeks. Your hand pressed behind the back of his hand, forcing it to deepen the kiss, to nibble at his tongue. Deidara hitched a breath. You sucked it further into your mouth. 

“ Ah ― y … you wanna suck on something so badly …” Deidara murmured. “MaybeI should give you something more legit, hm …”

You mewled in approval. His tongue retreated from your mouth and he felt a twinge of triumph when you gasped for air. He approached you. A hand ghosted over your neck before ramming you hard against the wall of the pool, the force with which he’d done it so hard he was sure its cement edge imprinted on your upper back. With his other hand he tugged his trousers down. 

You met his eyes.

“Take a deep breath.” 

And he plunged you into the water.

He looked down, watched the water dance as your squiggly reflection gripped his cock and fit it into your mouth. 

Deidara groaned. His head fell back as you hollowed your cheeks and took him in. The water did nothing to stall your mouth; you bobbed your head, stroking what couldn’t fit into your mouth. 

Deidara steadied himself with a hand at the pool’s edge, entranced by how your tongue rolled back to lick his head each time you pulled away, only to take him deep into the back of your throat when pulling in ― 

“ Nargh …! ” 

A hand palmed at his balls while another tightened around his cock. Deidara reached for your head in the water to thread fingers into your head and force you harder onto his cock. 

“ Aah … shit! ” He wanted you to choke on it. He wanted to own your mouth. 

And apparently you wanted that, too; you popped him from your mouth a few times. You hadn’t come up for air once since he’d submerged you, his cock now your only business. He yanked your head up. He forced a kiss, the taste of himself in your mouth driving him mad.

“Enjoying dinner, I see, hm, hah …” he quipped, eyes heavy on your hand still stroking his cock. “What a pro. ” 

“Only for you, Deidara-senpai. ”

You hand abandoned his cock and you licked him off your palm. Without his help you went under, fitting his cock in your mouth a second time. Deidara kept your hair from your mouth as you sucked him. His cockhead hit the back of your throat and, oh , you didn’t choke, only took more, more. Greedy cunt. 

He imagined you practicing this for him, only for him, your senpai. Your mouth hungering for what wasn’t truly there. Deidara squeezed eyes shut; close, close. You were sucking his cock as though his was the only one in the world, worshiping with your mouth and tongue. He imagined your lungs desperate for air, screaming for them, yet your mouth too transfixed to care. 

A fucking servant for him, obedient to his cock. 

Deidara’s cock twitched. His groan was low and rumbling as he spilled his seed into your willing mouth. You sucked hard, jerked him into your mouth. Your mouth slicked with his cum and grew impossibly warm. Saliva and his own seed coated his cock. 

“Aaah-ha- ahh …! ” 

He scalped you as he emptied into your mouth, cum guzzling down your throat.

At last, you popped him from your mouth and emerged before him, mouth and lips thoroughly abused.

Deidara’s gaze cast down on you. He caught his breath in the seconds absent of words. 

“I could use a girl like you,” Deidara exhaled. 

You popped your lips, eyes dreamy and narrow. “I think you just did,”

“Hm! An apprenticeship, then?”

You recovered immediately. “It’s all I’ve ever wanted.” 

He smirked at his own prospect and pulled you to him. “C’mere.”

He emerged from the pool before helping you follow suit. He removed his black fishnet shirt and flung it away. He drank you in. Naked, in the flesh ― and wet, right when he thought you couldn’t be improved upon.

You settled atop the dinner table and waited for him. Deidara came to you.

“Spread those legs.” 

 You acquiesced. He licked his lips at the sight of your puffy, glistening cunt.

“You wouldn’t be my first,” You said, “but you’ll be my last.”

He slotted into the space you afforded him. He caressed your vulva before giving it a firm slap. You yelped and his lip upturned at the sound. He slid a finger between your folds, encouraged by your appreciative mewls. 

He gripped the fat of your cheeks and forced you to look at him and not his adventurous fingers. 

“Your best. ” 

You hooked your legs behind him as he geared his cock grazed your folds ― 

And thought he might cum just from the sound of your drawn out moan when he slid inside you. 

He bucked from instinct, the firm grip of your twat clouding his senses. Again he went for your throat, the appendage becoming its permanent resting place. 

“This is what you wanted, right?” Deidara breathed out, thrusting hard. “Leader’s gonna get his fucking money’s worth …” 

Hands gripped his wrists tight as he began to fuck you, the table wobbling slightly underneath your mewling body. 

“Yes …! Ye―Yes, oh!” You clung to him, Deidara’s hands upholding you. “ Fuc ― oh, Yes! I owe Pain my life ― oh! ” 

He released your throat just to bite at it. He sunk his teeth into your skin while his hands committed to making scarlet red prints against your ass.

“ Fuck, you’re ―” Deidara stammered. The feel of your cunt swallowing him was too much. He recalled Kisame’s threat to fuck you himself. Not on your life, sharkman . And he felt himself thrust hard just to affirm you were his. He’d set the entire world ablaze before anyone else could experience the wonderful grip of your cunt. “You’re mine. ”

You tugged him to your lips again and kissed him. A moan from you vibrated against his lips. He reached downward to tease your clit and your legs trembled at his sides.

“ Fuck, Deida ―” You flung your head back. “ I’m ― ”

He knocked you onto the table and lifted your legs over his shoulders. He began to pound you, relishing in the bounce of your tits. Plates fell to the floor and shattered as he wrecked your cunt. 

He choked you again, sure there would be a greater hand-shaped bruise once he was through. He flicked your clit, thumbed it. Your scream rumbled under his grip as his balls slapped your ass. 

Your moans grew shrill, and you clenched ―

“ Fuck …! ” Deidara lost himself in your tight cunt. He slapped your clit, grip dangerously tight at your neck―

“Yes, please!” You called out as you came, “Dei― Deidara!”

Spurts of cum left his cock and sucked into your cunt. You convulsed and convulsed. You showed him the whites of your eyes as you came. Deidara held you to him by your thighs. A few more weak thrusts and he gave out on top of you, his chin hiding in the crook of your shoulder.

A few moments passed. Deidara raised his head, caught you over the corner of his eye. “So … everything you wanted?”

“And more, ” You sang.

He maneuvered to place a kiss at the heart of your collarbone, still so fascinated with it. He removed himself from you before assisting you as best as he could. 

“Did you mean it?” You inquired after a few moments more.

“Hm?” 

“About me being your apprentice?” 

“... Hm,” Deidara shrugged. “Well, I’ll have to check my schedule. But, if it all adds up, I wouldn’t mind having you by my side.” 

You squealed, engulfed him in a hug. 

“Ah, ah!” Deidara fought you off. “Okay, okay, whatever!”

“Oh, I’m so excited! ” You bounced. “So, so ― wait!” 

You pulled back, smirked up at him.

“I almost forgot,” You said. “Your payment … ”

<<<>>>

“Two million yen,” Pain said. “All in a single donation ― our highest to date. I assume it went well?” 

“Hm!” Deidara said. “Very!”

“And Miss (Y/n) tells me she’ll be requesting you monthly from now on,” Pain continued. “Each time with the same donation or higher.” 

“Are you telling me Deidara’s dick is going to fund all our expeditions from now on?” Kisame mocked. 

“And the rest of our lives,” Kakuzu’s voice tipped in interest, “if this goes on …”

“Don’t get any ideas, Kakuzu!” Hidan barked. “We’re not whoring ourselves out.”

“Shut up,” Kakuzu bit back. “I’ve never even thought about it. Unless …”

“What girl would wanna fuck you? ” 

“A satisfied and wealthy client means less worry over how we secure our money,” Pain said, ignoring the bickering, “so, in a manner of speaking, yes. Deidara will aid in contributions― as we all should.” 

“Well, then, we’re all set!” Deidara said. 

“There’s just one thing that irks me about this whole endeavor,” Pain said. “... Where is Tobi?” 

“...”

“... He didn’t come back with you, did he?” 

“... No.”

“...” 

Pain sighed.

“... Go back and get him, Deidara.”

[xxkissesforchanniexx]

Hi! sorry if this is wordy but could you make a story of the reader being an fbi agent undercover as skz personal bodyguard? Skz are having a concert soon and this evil organization wants to harm them. It is the readers mission to keep the members safe. But with the distraction of a specific loud and short muscular guy of the group, she gains feelings and struggles to do her task.

As long as this is the main point of the story, I don't mind with what you add. Be as creative as you like with action, romance, or anything.

ihfvnirhfnjnfoernfrihbgt jhebfrherkjfnkrjtgng hehehe

Thank you!

𝐒𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐌𝐨𝐫𝐞

Pairing: Changbin x FBI Agent!fem!reader Genre: action? >.> Angst (im so bad at writing that) Fluff >.> Word Count: 6.5k Warnings: Cringe T_T, not proofread (they never are.), parent death, REVENGE, reader is shorter than changbin >.>, guns, bombs, someone gets shot (not reader or stray kids.), brief horny reader, i think thats it? tell me i missed anything

A/N: AHHH THIS TOOK SO LONG AND I FEEL LIKE ITS SO BAD AND CRINGE IM SO SORRY UH if you do like it (i really hope you do) please consider reblogging and following ALSO TAGLIST APPLICATIONS >.>

December 19th 2005 "Several bombs were set off at the University of Music last night, there is a total of 59 casualties and counting as authorities work through the rubble. 80 more are critically injured and 127 are in stable condition or have minor injuries."

Janurary 17th 2008 "This is your new home."

"Guys this is Y/N.. She's going to be your sister from now on."

August 3rd 2010 "What do you want to be when you grow up?"

"I want to be a police woman so I can find the person who hurt people a long time ago..

You stared at the case, "So they fled to Seoul?"

"Not just that." Your boss said, "We found this." he set a phone on your desk and pressed the play button on an audio recording.

"How should we go about it?"

"The security is tight, if we put the bombs on the little drones and get the crowd scared, we have an opening to get the people on the stage."

You sucked in a breath. "A bomb threat for-"

"A concert." Your boss sighed deeply, "I trust you to handle it. Without being reckless."

"Sir-"

"It would be best if you did it, considering your experience with these types of events." He motioned to the posters and merchandise littering your office walls and shelves.

You pursed your lips. "Where and when?"

"We're flying you out to the US embassy in Seoul tomorrow , you'll meet someone there." He said with a big smile, "Pack your bags, Special Agent L/N, you're going to Korea."

You had arrived at the US embassy in Seoul at 4:30 am, you learned from the person you met up with you were going to be protecting a k-pop boy group under JYP Entertainment.

"So, this terrorist group wants to attack a boy band?" You looked at the embassy worker.

She nodded, "But it's not about them, for the most part... they want to prove something apparently, did they not attack several concerts in the US?"

"They did." You nodded.

"Then it's not too crazy to assume they want to get some point across world wide." The woman shook her head, "It's alright though, you're going to meet them later in the morning."

"Meet who?" You tilted your head.

The woman blinked slowly at you. "Stray Kids.."

"Who?" You had to hold back your laughter.

"The boy band under JYPE."

"Ah." You cleared your throat. "Alright."

"It must have been a long flight." She smiled, "You can go to your hotel now."

When you got to your hotel room you sat on the bed, laptop open, looking for "Stray Kids". You made a face as you saw their pictures, a particular image caught your attention and you burst out laughing at the sight. He was a short, muscular man, with unruly dark hair under a hat with floppy bunny ears, You copied the image into google image search and said the name softly. "Seo Changbin."

Felix looked like he was going to cry, Hyunjin bit his bottom lip looking at the ground.

"They want to bomb our concert..." I.N asked quietly.

"Hurt our STAY..." Lee Know twiddled his fingers.

"Safest option is to cancel." Chan sighed.

"We can't cancel a concert a month before it's supposed to happen," their manager said, "The company hasn't got the time or money to return everything. Besides, boss said he has it handled."

Changbin looked up, "JYP handled it?"

"No," the manager made a face.

"Then why would you say that?" Seungmin pursed his lips.

"He found someone who can handle it." the manger explained. "That's why we're here for breakfast, she arrived in Seoul earlier."

"Who?" Han asked.

"She should be on the way here." the manager said as a waitress arrived with coffee.

"She?" The boys all asked at the same time.

It was at that time you walked in, you were dressed fairly professionally, a white button up shirt tucked into black pleated slacks and pretty black heels.

"I'm Y/N L/N," You smiled at the men.

"Hi, thanks for coming. Coffee?" The manager offered.

You shook your head.

"Please sit," he motioned to the last seat.

You sat beside a man you remembered as Hyunjin, his long hair pulled back with his bangs on either side of his face. He eyed you incredulously for a moment before you shifted slightly, making the taser you'd carefully tucked into your pants visible. He bristled.

"This is the person who's going to handle it?" Felix asked the manager. "We take STAY very seriously, if something happens-"

"I assure you nothing will go wrong, though, I doubt the people i'm looking for are really aiming for.. STAY..." You put your phone on the table and let the audio recording your boss gave you play.

The leader of the group, Chan, looked scared. Felix put his head in his hands and Minho hugged him.

"So..." Seungmin said quietly. "What happens now?"

"She's going to live with you until she figures out the threat. Please boys, I hope your dorm is clean." The manager said, sipping his coffee.

Chan turned slowly to Han.

Han huffed a small laugh. "Of course.."

"TADA!" Changbin shouted as he opened the door to the dorm.

You walked in looking around, the place was fairly secure. Changbin smiled brightly, shouting "Your room!"

He opened the door to a room that looked like it was cleaned rather hastily. You nodded, going into the room the boys had cleared out for you, you chuckled as you recalled how you'd seen Changbin and Han playing rock paper scissors for who would give away their room, Han lost.

You had sat in your room most of the rest of the day, then you got hungry, only then did you notice how dark it was outside. You considered ordering food but then dismissed the idea, what if these people found out where the boys lived. That was a big no.

You sighed, dragging yourself out of bed and into the kitchen, you opened the fridge making a face and grabbing eggs. You got noodles from the cabinet and got to work making something easy.

It was late, almost midnight, so you hadn't expected any one to be awake. So it scared you when the loud, boisterous Changbin spoke quietly next to you.

"Is there enough to share?" He whispered.

You almost jumped out of your skin. "What the fuck?!" You whisper-shouted, clutching your heart.

"Sorry, I smelled food.." he laughed lightly, watching as you worked. "You know how to cook?"

You hummed. "I know how to not get food poisoning."

He laughed. "Let me help?"

You opened your mouth to protest, but the man was already moving around the kitchen grabbing things. You couldn't stop staring at the way his muscles strained against his shirt.

Get your head in the game. You shook off the thoughts that were invading your head as you stared at his arms.. My head could be in a headlock there... WHAT ARE YOU THINKING????!!!

You left the noodles aside and started frying the eggs, semi-watching as Changbin made instant tteokbokki.

When you both finished, he sat with you and ate.

"Y'know I expected cops to be more serious." he said, before putting some noodles in his mouth and jumping at the taste.

You made a face. "I'm serious."

He looked at you. "Let's be real here."

"I'm so serious." You pouted before popping a rice cake into your mouth.

"Uh huh." He teased.

You rolled your eyes. "I was under the impression that a dark rapper should be moody and brooding."

He made a face. "They call me baby Changbin as well."

You smiled to yourself as you remembered the picture. "Of course," a smirk came to your face. "I should invest in Dwaekki."

Changbin looked up from his tteokbokki. "Have you even listened to our music?"

"I can start." You said proudly.

Changbin stared at you for a moment. "Whatever you say, Princess."

It wasn't even two weeks after you had met the boys something happened. You were on the couch in dorm 1, writing an email on your laptop.

Chan poked your head, "We're going to practice choreo."

You shoved your computer into your backpack and followed the boys out. You got to the dance studio and looked around curiously at the big room, a mirror covered the full length of the wall opposite the door.

It was the mirror that let you see it.

You whipped around just as the person at the door fled.

Changbin stared at you in confusion as you blitzed past, running after the person. It didn't take you too long to catch up, tackling the man to the floor of the hall just before the lobby and grabbing his badge.

You remembered what the manager had told you, all the badges were recently issued in an off white color...

You held the man down, pulling his arm in an awkward position. "Try me and I'll break it. Who the fuck are you?"

The man stuttered before shouting.

Your brows furrowed. "That's not going to wo-" You stared in confusion as a firework looking object rolled towards you.

Then it popped.

A loud bang resounded through the lobby and you instinctively covered your ears, stunned. Your ears were ringing.

The man pushed you off and ran for it. You were about to get up and run after him but that Changbin...

He grabbed your shoulders and shouted at you a few times, then Chan pushed him looking at you with wide eyes for a moment.

Changbin sat with Chan, listening to what the doctor said about your ears, you'd be fine, it was just a very loud sound, the doctor recommended quiet for a few days to stop the background ringing.

Licing with Changbin, Chan, and Han let you know that they really couldn't be quiet, in the dorm, only Hyunjin was ever not shouting. But the moment you walked in, that changed. Changbin and Han were quiet, the others from dorm 2 were all staring at you.

"What?" You asked, raising a brow.

"Are you okay?" I.N asked.

"Oh, of course." You smiled. "I just almost lost my ability to hear."

Lee Know sighed and looked at you. "We're sorry to put you through this."

"Put me through what." You raised a brow before sitting down. "You guys didn't put me through anything. This is what I do."

The boys all stared at you for a moment.

"Is it okay if I hug you?" Han broke the silence.

You smiled slightly. "Hey hey hey. We just met. Back up chipmunk."

"Squirrel." Seungmin corrected, laughing.

"It's a quokka!" Han groaned.

You spent almost two weeks researching the group that had threatened the concert. Most of the time the dorm was quiet, Changbin was usually the only one awake when you were up. He would usually eat late night snacks with you or hover over your shoulder as you worked. In most cases it would make you uncomfortable, but with Changbin it was different.

You watched as the group prepared for the concert, weeks dwindling into days. It was two days before the concert, you were sitting on the couch, it was almost 3 in the morning but you were making calls and asking about security and establishing that no bags would be allowed into the concert.

Changbin watched you for a moment, leaning against the wall.

"No bags of any kind." You sounded so professional.

He smiled and walked over to the couch standing over you as you continued talking to the person on the phone.

"Clear diaper bags?" You sucked in a breath. "Why would a baby be at a- Never mind, leave it on hold for now."

Changbin tapped your head. He looked down at you, dark glasses framing his eyes, his hair looking unruly.

You leaned your head back and looked up at him with a raised eyebrow as if you were already aware of his presence. "No, backstage should be secure. I'll be there myself."

Changbin huffed a small laugh. "You're going to protect me princess?"

Despite your blank expression you felt the blush creeping to your face.

Changbin smiled at you muttering, "I want to take you out."

You stared at him as the person on the other end of the line said something to you. "Uh- Repeat that...?" You asked both the people you spoke to.

"Are we still doing the drones?"

"So will you go out with me after the concert?" Changbin leaned down, his face was so close.

"Yes." You answered.

"Alright ma'am." The person on the other end said. "Will that be all?"

"Yeah..." You hung up the phone and looked at Changbin.

He smiled and leaned down, closing the distance between you and pressing his lips against your forehead gently. "It's late, go to sleep."

He pulled away and walked back to his room, you sucked in a breath and exhaled slowly.

Focus...

You were almost as busy as the manager the day of the concert, running back and forth making sure metal detectors were working and security was extra tight.

"You're taking this very personally." A security guard said behind you.

You looked at you the man. "These are terrorists we're talking about. Of course I'm taking it personally."

One of the staff walked past you with coffees in his hand.

You stopped them. "Where to?"

"Hyunjin, Han and Chan asked for coffee." the man said, looking at you, you noted the mole beside his eyebrow.

"I'll take it." You moved to take the coffee.

"No ma'am. You're very busy-"

You tried to grab the coffee and he turned away quickly. You managed to knock it out of his hand. The cups scattered, empty.

He turned and elbowed the security guard hard as he lunged for him and the man started running. You barely caught the stumbling guard, settling him down before started chasing him, pulling up your walkie talkie you said into it, "Gate 4 check?"

"Good check," Came a flurry of voices through the walkie talkie.

"Lock down on gate 4, all security personnel on west wing on alert."

"Copy."

"Backstage security, do you copy?" You said barely dodging someone pushing a huge sound system.

"Loud and clear."

You cursed as people pulling a big screen moved between you and the man. "FUCK MOVE!" You snapped and they scurried out of your way. Much to your utter horror and dismay, the man was gone. The door to the outside of the backstage area wide open, leading into th lines of people waiting to enter the conert.

You kicked a trashcan, "All units do you copy?"

"Copy."

"Keep your eyes open, goldilocks."

"10-4." they all said and your eyes narrowed as you stared at the door.

You sat outside the dressing rooms twiddling your thumbs. Was it really safe... were you just stupid...? You bit your lip, feeling tears brimming in your eyes at the thought of letting these people bomb this concert full of innocent people.

You looked up as you the sound of footsteps. It was just Changbin, he looked much different, more like those pictures you'd seen online, with his tight, shiny, black leather pants and dress shirt that hugged his arms so perfectly, the black vest and fingerless gloves giving him a scary edge. You quickly wiped your eyes and sucked in a breath. "What?"

"What's wrong?" He kneeled in front of you, being more able to move in the pants that you'd thought originally.

"It's nothing." You lied.

His eyes narrowed at you. "You're going to make my perform badly, I can't perform if I feel bad. I'll mess up rapping, Seungmin might do better than me."

You giggled and looked down as he took your hands in his. "I'm scared." You whispered.

"Of?" he prodded quietly.

"There are really dangerous people here, and I fucked up and lost one." You muttered.

"It's okay." He squeezed your hands gently, moving to sit next to you. "If you can't protect all these people, Chan will protect them all himself."

You smiled gently.

"Hug?" Changbin opened his arms and you leaned into him. You relaxed as he hugged you.

"And I said 'There's no way! It's ok YOU EAT~' " Jisung and Jeongin came around the corner and paused.

Jeongin tried to grab Jisung and turn him around but the man smirked and cleared his throat.

You pulled away from Changbin and stood. "Good luck. Uh, get down if something happens."

You sat there off to the backside of the stage hearing the loud music and screams as boys got on stage. In all your time watching the boys practice there was something about actually seeing them on stage as Hyunjin had told you in the dorm.

"Being in the practice room is one thing. Actually being on stage is another thing, there's an energy we get in front of our STAY."

You were particularly amazed at the volume of the girls who shrieked when Felix started singing, his deep voice reverberating through the dome. You couldn't help but marvel at Changbin for a moment, the way his muscles strained against his clothes as he danced, his hips moving so seductively... FOCUS!...But it's fine isn't it... nothing has happened yet..

The stage lights reddened and you looked up as the drones filled the air, flashing lights everywhere. You exhaled slowly, realizing everything was fine with the drones. After finishing off S-Class Chan calmed down the crows and stared to say a few words.

A scream ripped through the soft buzz of the crowd. You looked in the direction of the scream, Chan raised a brow, opening his mouth to say something and then...

"HE HAS A GUN!" On the opposite side of the huge hall.

You jumped over the railing.

All your time studying these people.

Fear.

Ease.

You ran up the stairs to the stage.

Unrest.

And a big boom..

You grabbed the mic from Chan and shouted, "GET DOWN!"

And the first bomb exploded.

You had your ears covered, head down. There was someone there shielding you, you heard him shouting and knew.

"We have to go!" Changbin shouted.

Chan was staring at the crowd, which was frantic after the series of explosions, many of them were running for the exits. "We should've cancelled..."

You saw a red light flashing on a wall, and a man moving away quickly.

You got from under Changbin, who tried pulling you back but you were already sprinting off the stage. You ran into the crowd, pulling out your gun as you shoved past the scared fans.

The man was so close to the exit, you were going to lose him. Lose another, because you lost focus.

You heard a deep voice, it sounded like it was crying.

"STAY! LISTEN TO ME!" Felix shouted into the mic.

The crowd was still moving.

"THE BOMBS WILL KEEP GOING OFF IF YOU'RE RUNNING AROUND SO STOP!"

The crowd stopped and you looked at the stage, your eyes meeting Felix's as he dropped the mic.

You ran through the crowd toward the red light and grabbed it tossing it out of the open door far from the crowd. The police were already gathering and you turned to see the man moving through the crowd for the door.

You pushed past the people and tackled him gun to the back of his head. "Don't move. I'll shoot." You said.

You sat on your bed, staring at your hands. What type of shit was this...?

"Who gives you orders?" You and a police man had interrogated the man yu had caught for almost two hours but he refused to speak.

"My boss isn't afraid of my death." he huffed.

You grit your teeth, "Who is your damn boss?"

"I won't say anything."

and maybe you punched him a little too hard.

A knock on your door made you look up. "Come in."

Hyunjin entered and closed the door quietly, behind himself, walking over to you. "You did well." he said quietly.

You saw the tears filling his eyes. "Hyunjin..."

He got on knees beside your bed and took your hands in his muttering. "You're doing well... Thank you."

You touched his head and whispered, "It's what I do.. It's okay... I'd do it again without hesitation.."

He shook his head. "You fit in so perfectly, you fill the cracks that we haven't been able to fill," He looked up at you and smiled, "Thank you for being our sister... Thank you for saving our STAY.."

You hugged Hyunjin. "Don't cry, you idiot..."

He sniffled and nodded. "But really.. thank you."

You smiled, "Of course."

Following Hyunjin out you stared at the other members who also looked like they had been crying.

"You caught someone.." Seungmin said quietly. "Does that mean you're leaving us?"

You stared at the boys for a moment, your gaze lingering on Changbin.

"I caught someone." You said quietly. "But my job isn't finished until you're safe.."

Felix was the first to hug you. and then suddenly you were attacked by all of them in a big bearhug.

"You're one of us." Chan smiled, "Don't go back."

You looked at all the boys and for the first time since you got here, you let the tears fall.

Changbin ended up not taking you out due to the lockdown placed on the group by their boss, it didn't stop him from spoiling you, in the building, he came to your room with flowers and (fav candy). He would bring you food and bought you a few clothes he thought you'd look good in.

Everytime he'd surprise you while you were working, Jisung would give you a look. The kind of look that said, "I KNOW WHAT YOU TWO ARE", but was completely wrong, because even you didn't know what you and Changbin were.

You were sitting in at the kitchen table staring at your laptop, it wasn't too late, just around 10pm, but the noise that met your ears made you flinch. Han and Hyunjin came in shaking you wildly as Han shoved his phone in your face.

You grabbed it and made a face. "ARE YOU DONE?"

"LOOK!" They shouted back.

You looked at the screen and your eyes widened. "Is that me?"

There was a video, of the events from a few days ago.

"GET DOWN!"

there was a series of loud bangs and a fast forward, of you grabbing the bomb and throwing it out. Then another fast forward to you tackling the man.

You stared at the comments.

"such a strong woman"

"Our savior."

"why did binnie grab for her like that 😭"

"are we gonna ignore how felix calmed the crowd.?"

You pursed your lips, "I was doing my job."

"You saved them though." Han smiled. "You should come with us later when we can go out as a treat. Chan will pay."

Hyunjin cackled.

You rolled your eyes and shook your head, "Alright."

You sat in your room, when your phone rang, you answered.

"We've got a name and a face. We've sent you the necessary info. When you close the case contact us, we'll book you the next flight back to the US."

and the line cut.

You stared out blankly for a while.. so soon?

And when you opened the email you were sent your ear throbbed at the memory of nearly going deaf... That man... you'd tackled that man and he set off the firework that nearly took your hearing.

"Ah Changbin." Minho sighed. "Look at you. I never thought I'd see the day."

"Seriously." Chan smiled. "Just, tell her how you feel. She's Fiona and you're Shrek."

"You need to hit her with the immature swag." Jisung snickered.

"You-" Changbin raised his hand like he was going to punch the man.

Jisung ducked behind Chan.

"What am i supposed to say hm? 'I think you're strong and really pretty and I want to go out with you.' Seems a little eh?"

Chan cringed.

Han just stared at him.

"I like the Shrek and Fiona thing better." Minho shrugged.

"Changbin just wing it." Chan gave him a thumbs up.

You opened your door in the morning and almost stumbled over a box. "What in the world?"

You picked it up and examined it for a moment. You took it into your room and set it on the bed, carefully you lifted off the lid and stared at (fav color) dress. You took it out and smiled at it a little. You noticed the card at the bottom of the box and picked it up.

Your smile grew as you recognized the writing as Changbin's,

I think this dress fits you just right, wait for me outside at 7 tonight.

You rolled your eyes at his poetic nonsense and stared at the dress.

Hyunjin and Jisung were all over you at 6 pm, pampering you and making you look as pretty as they could.

"You look so gorgeous! I'm a master!" Hyunjin said proudly.

Han gasped exaggeratedly, "Are you saying she only looks good because you did her makeup?!"

You gasped with Jisung. "I thought you were my friend Hyunjinnie!"

"Oh- Oh MY GOD!" Hyunjin groaned before giving Han a side eye.

You giggled and looked at yourself in the mirror, you were really pretty.

"It's 6:45." Han sighed smiling at you, "Our Y/N is all grown up."

hyunjin wiped fake tears. "I'm so proud."

You made a face and rolled your eyes, standing and smoothing your dress, you hummed as you patted down the area where your gun sat on your thigh, just in case, and you grabbed your bag and went to the door.

You only waited about five minutes before Changbin pulled up in front of the building with a sleek, black company car.

"You look pretty." he said as he stepped out of the vehicle and came around to open the door for you.

You smiled. "Thank you, you good too." You stepped into the car and giggled, "Such a gentleman."

Changbin took you to a fancy restaurant and after you ordered, the conversation flowed so smoothly. Even the silence was comfortable, but you noticed it from the corner of your eye.

Two men, sitting at a table a few back from yours, eyeing you... no. eyeing Changbin. When the server came and poured your wine you paid close attention..

Using his right hand he turned the bottle to the left when he poured the wine for your but to the right Changbin.

You swallowed and looked at your wine, something was going to happen.

The thought left your mind when Changbin took your hand in his and smiled. "Y'know during my last stream, STAY kept asking if you were my girlfriend. I couldn't exactly say."

You blushed slightly, "What did you want to tell them?"

"Yes, I'm dating her." He laughed slightly, "Though, since it's jsut me and you," he squeezed your hand gently, "I can say you're only mine."

You blushed even more and laughed. "You're so stupid."

"I think you'd really like only belonging to me, I wouldn't let any guy touch you, I'd buy you food and spoil you."

"You do that anyway, Binnie." You smiled slightly.

He leaned close and whispered, "I guess that makes you mine."

Your heart skipped a beat.

Changbin stared into your eyes and leaned in close, his lips gently brushing against yours. All thought left your mind, it was just Changbin.. but..

You heard the dull click, and whipped around, pulling your gun from the holster under your dress, just as one of the men from the other table, cocked his gun.

You were faster and fired. The man fell back and Changbin grabbed you, pulling you back as the other man sprang up, he pointed a gun at you and it was a intense stare down.

You held your breath. Changbin remain unmoving behind you.

Your heart stopped as a white car pulled up in front of the restaurant. "Changbin get down!"

Changbin kicked the tabled over and grabbed you pulling you back with him as bullets flew through the dining room.

It was a long moment before they stopped, and as you peeked over the table, you locked eyes with the man from the picture, pulling his gun back into the car and smiling at you before they drove away. (Insert evil villain name cus I couldnt think of one)..

The boys were on lockdown again and you were busy, searching everything, everywhere for that man.. for (villain name).

You'd moved to the other dorm, much to the dismay of Hyunjin, who moped about being surrounded by gym freaks.

You took Seungmin's room, which was tidier than Han's. You hadn't moved because you needed quiet, in fact they boys had been quite good at being silent while you worked. It was because you didn't trust yourself, you were scared you wouldn't react as fast as you had at the restaurant with Changbin, you were scared he'd become a worse distraction... you were scared he'd get hurt because of you.

After a month, your informant intercepted another message saying that the man you were looking for was going to a shopping mall to put things up with a bang.

You discussed with the manager, he increased security to compensate for you not being present in the dorms and allowed you to go.

So there you were, sitting in your car outside the mall, staring at the entrance for anything suspicious. You remembered how Changbin had asked you what was wrong when you left, and where you were going...

"You're going alone?" His brows furrowed. "Y/N, be serious, things could happen-"

"What do you want me to do? I'm dragging anymore people into this."

"I'm not asking you to, I just want you to be safe."

"I'm here to protect you and the guys. It's not my choice what I do anymore, this has gotten too out of hand. You can't even go outside without the fear that someone might try to kill you! That's my fault."

"Take me with you then, I'm not afraid of it, I just don't trust the idea of you being alone!"

"Seo Changbin. I'm doing my job. It's not just about you and them anymore."

You pursed your lips and looked at your phone, tempted to say you were sorry..

but your phone rang before you could even take action.

Your brows furrowed, it was an unknown number.

You answered and lifted the phone to your ear. "Hello?"

"I'm glad we could lure you out. I like this game we're playing. Cat and mouse is fun no? It's a two party game. I have to eliminate the extra players, they're taking away my fun. If you involve the police... well that won't be fun."

"What?" You sat up straight.

"I'm not that cruel anyway... I'll give you 30 minutes."

Your heart dropped into your stomach. "WAIT!"

"Starting now."

The man hung up and you stared at your phone for a moment. "Changbin..."

Yongbok stepped out of the bathroom, drying his hair and he tilted his head as Chan sat down with a box on the floor. "What's that?"

"I was going to ask you." Chan said.

Seungmin stared at it. "It has a bad aura about it."

"Since when did you care about that?" Hyunjin looked up from his phone.

"We should open it." Jisung sat beside Chan.

"But-" Jeongin started.

"Didn't Y/N say don't be stupid while she's gone." Changbin said, glaring at the others.

They all nodded.

Minho sat on Chan's other side. "Opening a box isn't stupid."

"I agree." Hyunjin said.

"Guys-" Felix started.

"It's fine Yongbok." Minho said and pulled the lid of the box off.

Chan's brows furrowed, every one sucked in a breath.

"Fuck." Changbin said.

A timer sat in the box on top of a black thing bound with plastic straps, it read 15:50...

Changbin's phone rang. Everyone jumped in fear. His eyes widened as he saw you name. "Y/N- Calm down I can't understand-"

"PUT HER ON SPEAKER!" Felix shouted.

Changbin did as he was told.

You sounded on the verge of tears. "Did you get it?"

Chan looked at the box. "Yeah... We got it."

"I won't make it." You sniffed, "I need you to get scissors and listen carefully."

Jeongin ran to get scissors.

"Someone with steady hands. Listen close. There's no mistakes right now. This isn't acting."

Chan took the scissors from Jeongin and nodded, "I'm listening."

"Remove the timer by cutting the plastic straps. Be careful not to cut the wire surrounding them."

"Are we diffusing a bomb right now?!" Hyunjin shrieked.

"I CAN'T MAKE IT THERE IN TIME THERE'S TOO MUCH TRAFFIC! I CAN'T CALL THE POLICE AND NEITHER CAN ANY OF YOU!"

Chan cut the plastic binding, exposing the explosive and a few more wires.

"There should be a blue wire leading into the bomb directly."

"I see it."

"Cut it."

The boys watched in fear as their leader cut the blue wire.

"Black then grey."

"ok..."

"What's left?"

"Green, red, orange, and purple."

"Purple."

Another cut.

"Orange."

"Now what...?"

"Someone needs to push the button on the back of the timer for 5 seconds. It will give you a 20 second window to cut the last wire."

"What's the last one?" Minho asked.

"Whichever leads to the center of the explosive."

You met silence on the other end of the line before Jisung's voice said, "They both lead to the center..."

You sucked in a breath. "Wait for me."

"We don't have time to wait!" Seungmin shouted.

"How much time is left?!"

"2 minutes!" Felix said.

You slammed the steering wheel and cursed loudly.

Changbin stared at the bomb for a long moment as the members began freaking out.

Hyunjin pulled out his phone and opened instagram starting a stream. "Stay, I love you, we love you!"

"Tell my parents I love them." Jeongin sobbed.

"Chan push the button." Changbin grabbed the scissors.

"Changbin!" You shouted.

"Green means go." Changbin said as Chan pushed the button. "STAY, we love you. Y/N, I love you."

And he cut the green wire.

You heard a loud bang and the line went dead, your heart plummeted. You finally pulled off the highway and into the parking around the dorms. You ran to the dorm and-

Changbin hugged you tightly as you opened the door.

Your hands trembled before you hugged him back. "I thought you died."

"You were that worried about me." He muttered into your hair.

"Yes.."

Jisung coughed loudly, earning a punch from Minho.

You laughed and pulled away from Changbin, arms open.

You shrieked as Chan bear hugged you and then everyone was on you.

As you laughed you saw someone in the hall shaking their head. You pulled away as the man started running.

And you took off running after him. Not this time. You wouldn't let him get away again. You jumped onto him just as he got to the stairs, he stumbled and fell with you. You felt the cold metal of a gun barrel brush your arm and bit down on his arm hard.

The gun fell away and skidded away. You hit the landing platform hard, your shoulder taking the brunt of the force before you rolled for the gun.

You thought about a statement you'd heard from your boss months ago. I trust you to handle it. Without being reckless.

Why were you reckless? Why did you never give a shit what happened as long as you caught the criminal..? Because you didn't care then. Because it was your job... your obligation.

What was it now?

The man grabbed your leg and dragged you towards him and you kicked his face hard.

You scrambled with your opportunity for the gun.

Your fingers wrapped around the grip, as the man dragged you back towards him..

and it all seemed to go in slow motion as the boys came down after you. And the man's hands wrapped around your throat. You held the gun to his head and shouted with the last of your breath as he squeezed your windpipe, "BANG!"

and you pulled the trigger.

17 years ago December 19th 2005..

"Shh, she might hear."

"The gifts are better down by the college anyway."

"Honey. You're being loud."

"Fine fine."

You heard them giggling before you poked your head outside your room. You watched your parents leaving the house. You smiled to yourself knowing they were going to buy Christmas gifts.

When the morning came and your parents weren't in their room, you became confused. In the snow, dressed in your pajamas and bunny slippers you went to your neighbors house to ask if they'd seen your parents.

The little old lady next door stared at you before the tears welled in her eyes, "You poor thing.."

You were only 5 when your parents died. You were only 5 when you learned what it meant to yearn for revenge. You'd spent all your years in the force since you were 17 trying to find the organization behind the bombs...

And you were today many years old when you learned revenge wasn't a liberating feeling.

"BANG!"

BANG!

The boys stared in shock as you pushed the man's body off of you and sat there. Changbin didn't hesitate to run and wrap his arms around you, examining your face before looking into your eyes.

"Y/n... y/nnie?"

And you passed out.

The past week had been a blur of appointments with press and a million other things.

It was Friday you finally got to lie down and breathe.

You were lying in bed staring at the ceiling when you got a call. You rolled over and answered the phone. Your boss's voice came to your ears.

"Good job, L/N. We're glad you could do it. We're booking your flight back to the US already."

"Sir-"

"You'll be receiving a promotion to a less risky position as a token of our gratitude."

Changbin entered your room and stared at you.

"I can't-" you tried.

"I have to admit I myself am shocked, L/N you've proved your reckless behavior is productive and I owe you-"

"SIR I QUIT!"

The other end of the line went quiet.

Changbin sat beside you and pulled you against him.

"I- I accomplished what I wanted. I'm pretty young still. I'll go to college. It's time I change careers."

Your boss was quiet on the other end of the line.

"Consider this my resignation letter. It was an honor. But i can't be reckless anymore."

The boys were poking their heads into your room now.

You looked at them all and smiled.

"I have something... some people..." You leaned against Changbin. "Someone... I want to keep living for."

"We'll send your pay for the case..." Your boss said softly. "I'm glad I met you L/N, it was an honor to have you in the force."

You lowered the phone and hung up.

"Soo....?" Minho said, looking at the others. "She's NOT going back to the US?"

"No Minho. I'm here to stay."

The boys cheered and jumped. You smiled slightly and looked at Changbin.

He leaned in and kissed you.

You blinked. Stunned.

Jisung jumped and held his hands out to Hyunjin "5000 PUT EM IN MY HAND! ALL OF YOU!"

You stared at them for a moment, "You were-"

"Green is green!" Jisung ran away cackling.

You laughed and shook your head. "I love you guys."

"I think you love me most." Changbin said and kissed your cheek.

"I love you just a little bit more than them."

He rolled his eyes as the others ran shouting about their money. "I love you."

You hadn't gotten the feeling you dreamed for in revenge but in them... in Changbin you found something more.

"STOP BEING LOVE BIRDS AND MAKE THEM GIVE ME MY MONEY!" Jisung shouted.

[thecapricunt1616]

The Bear & His Honey - Chapter 9

♡ Chapter Inspo: Lyrics; Awkward (SZA) “You look at me different, so I let you see my body - now we don't seem to get along, now I regret it all.” ♡♡》》𝟙𝟠+ 𝕆ℕ𝕃𝕐 𝔽𝕀ℂ! ℕ𝕆 𝕄𝕀ℕ𝕆ℝ𝕊 𝔸𝕃𝕃𝕆𝕎𝔼𝔻《《♡♡ ♡ Summary: Carm closes his day off w/ Winnie. Winnie, Syd, & Sadie shoot the shit, and disconnect Winnies mushy heart from her hook-up antics. Carm feels rejected by Winnie not knowing the whole story, and lands himself back in a support group (by choice). Sugar wins Big Sissy of the year award. ♡ W/C: 9,444 (angel #’s purr!) ♡ Posted Date: 02/23/24 ♡ A/N: Hayoooo! I hope y’all love this chap. - Next one will be long and juicy since its the 10th… hm.. Not feelin’ very wordy for some reason. Oh!! I saw the new ep. Of The Good Doctor- I MISSED MY SHAUN MURPHY!!!! I <3 MY GOOD DOCTOR!!! Anyhoot- ennjoooy this chap frayndss :D ♡ Warnings for BTC: MAJOR talks of Suicide, grief talk, sad / insecure Carm, swearing, smoking, drinking(cant remember so just in case?), mentions of chronic pain, think that’s all.

➵ 𝐂𝐡𝐞𝐜𝐤 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐦𝐲 𝐌𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭 ♡

➵ 𝐂𝐚𝐭𝐜𝐡 𝐮𝐩 𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐋𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 ♡

.·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·..·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·..·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·..·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈

Winnie’s P.O.V. -

I came back to the bedroom, teeth freshly brushed and glasses on. “Ready for some Drag education?” I joke, getting our fluffy blankets from the foot of the bed and draping them over us. “Mm drag education. Sounds fun” he opened his arm so I could lay on his chest. I laid down comfortably and he chuckled a bit. 

“What?” I asked and he curled his arm around me, gently rubbing my side. “Nothin’ just didn’t realize you wear glasses” he said and I look up at him with a small smile on my lips “mmhmm just another one of my faults, eyes that don’t work” I joke and he snorts, “you have no faults” he said brushing my bangs out of my eyes gently. 

“Okay enough flirting, mister” I poked his nose and leaned over him, grabbing the remote from my nightstand and turning on the tv. I went to Paramount and typed in the title, scrolling to drag race season 15 “okay…so this is last season, a lot of the queens are from Connecticut, but you’ll get the gist of it- and learn all the phrases that Sadie and I use” I said and hit play on the first episode. 

“Oh! Yeah that’s why my stomach hurts” I sit up and he scrunches his eyebrows “What?” He asks “forgot I was hungry. Watch! I’ll go make the rest of the pizza” I went out to the kitchen before he could reply, and preheat the oven putting the rest of our pizza from last night on a tray and popping it in, not bothering to wait for it to beep before coming back. “Okay so, I like the cute one, the little one” he points and I giggle, “Marcia Marcia Marcia?” I ask and he scrunches his eyebrows. 

“See they have weird names” he said his eyes flicking back to the tv as Rupaul came out and he raised his eyebrows ``wow” he muttered “thought he was a drag queen?” He questioned. “Not in the workroom babe, just watch” I settled back into his chest and played with his fingers, finding it adorable how he was so engrossed in it. I watched along with him for the mini photoshoot challenge and he scoffs softly “see…I hate her makeup it looks- it looks weird.” He muttered and I giggled. 

“See! I told you you’d love this show” I look up at him and he rolls his eyes “you tell no one at work we watched this, I’ll never hear the end” he said and I laugh, looking back at the screen “mm well…I guess another reason to behave yourself” I said smugly and he pinches my bum playfully. After a while I started to smell the pizza and sat up “be back, lovey” I said softly, shuffling off to the kitchen. I divided up the remaining 4 slices on my plastic strawberry shortcake plates and opened my fridge. 

“Carm, do you want cherry coke?” I called “Sure” he replied. I grabbed 2 cans, a few pieces of paper towel, and our plates, before heading back to the bedroom. “Irene somethin’ won the challenge-thing” he sits up, leaning against the headboard. “Got 2,500 bucks just for that. Good money” he took the plate and I handed him the can of soda and I smiled a bit. 

“Mmhmm, they win like 200,000 at the end” I said and his eyebrows raised “wow, hmm. High stakes then” he continues watching along with me as we eat our pizza. We were snuggled up, at the end of the third episode and he sighs softly, rubbing my side to get my attention. “Honey” he mumbled gently and I looked up at him. 

“I gotta…Y'know '' he said with a slight frown and lifted his hand to motion to the door. “Got work in the mornin’..” he said and I pout a bit, “I know…I know” I sighed and sat up, “it was nice, y’know- spending time with you..” I said and pulled on my bear paw slippers as he slipped his hoodie over his head. 

“It was really nice, Win, I’ll call you, yeah?” He comes over opens his arms for a hug. I nuzzle into his chest, closing my eyes. “Mmhmm, I’ll leave my ringer on for you” I said softly, breathing in the scent of his cologne, subconsciously trying to memorize it. “Y’gonna try and come down for lunch sometime this week? Mm? I can make y’somethin’” he said and kissed the top of my head sweetly. I smiled a bit, resting my chin on his chest as I looked up at him. 

“Now that I have two friends there, I’ll be sure to stop by more often” I said softly, and puckered my lips for a kiss. He leans down, kissing my lips tenderly, lingering for a moment before pulling away. “I look forward to seein’ you more, then.” He said and rubbed my back gently before pulling away. I walked him to the door, handing him his backpack after he slipped on his sneakers and once he put it on I pulled him by the straps, kissing him passionately, running my fingers through his curls, and gently tugging. 

He hummed into my mouth, his hands trailing beneath my shirt and squeezing my bum in his palms before stroking my thighs with the tips of his fingers gently as he leans against the wall in our heated make out. After a minute or two he pulls away, our lips only mere inches apart. “Baby, I gotta go, yeah?” He said softly and kissed my nose. I jetted out a pout with my bottom lip and looked at him up through my lashes. “Yeah” I mumbled, and pulled him into one last hug before opening the door. 

“Be free” I shooed with my hand playfully and he chuckled. “Until next Saturday yeah? I’ll be waiting to see what happens to our bunny friend” he pecks my lips on the way out the door and I smiled. “Mmhmm, don’t work too hard this week” I said and he rolled his eyes jokingly. “Mm- ye’ I’ll try” he said and I shook my head with a grin, shutting the door. I leaned against it with my full weight, and sighed deeply when I knew he was well out of earshot, sliding to the floor pathetically in a heap, covering my face in my hands. 

I need to process this. 

I hastily got up off of the floor, padding heavily into my bedroom, and picking up my phone off the charger. It smells like him in here - and I’m unsure how I felt about it. I grabbed my bong and a lighter, as well as my little lavender tin of pre-ground flower, and went to sit out on the balcony outside my bedroom, FaceTiming Sadie. She answers by the end of the second ring.

“Biiiitch - ok wait, you didn’t call last night so before you start- Say hey Syddd! We’re wine drunkkk” She giggled, already gone- and turned her phone on it’s side, leaning it up against god only knows what so I could see them both together and I bit my lip, trying to appear happy. Shit. 

I just wanted to air out everything to Sadie but of course she and Syd are hanging out- when she isn’t with me she was with her. This was going to be harder to navigate then I thought. 

I stuffed my bowl full of flower with my fingers, “hey!” I said trying to sound enthusiastic and I lit it, taking a deep inhale. 

“Dude did you fuck him I need all the details like - S-O-U Winnie!!!” Sydney said and I nearly choked out a lung laughing, completely not expecting her to be so open about me being with him knowing how she’d ranted about her frustrations about him before. Sadie busts out laughing and I try to catch my breath, drool pooling in my mouth. I dashed inside, grabbing my water bottle and taking a few big chugs before returning. 

“Sydney” I said once I caught my breath and looked at her, we all went silent for a few short moments, and before I knew it we were all giggling together again over nothing. “Stop! Stop stoppp we need details Winnie!” Sadie said when she caught her breath and I shook my head, unsure where to even start. “Well…Syd do you still want to fuck him?” I ask and she snorts loudly. “No absolutely not. Not anymore. I just stand that asshole at this point.” She rolled her eyes, taking another sip of her wine. 

“How do you mean?” I asked, lighting my bowl again to take a proper hit. She shakes her head, playing with the end of one of her braids. “Dude,  Where do I even start?” she sighed deeply, thinking for a moment. “Okay, well let’s start with the fact that he’s so fucking selfish. Winnie- the only thing, and you’ll learn this sooo fast- the only thing he cares about, is easing his own fucking- his inadequacy!!” She said, talking with her hands as she usually did when she got passionate, just like Sadie and I. 

“Expand” I said after I exhaled, crossing my legs and Sadie took a big gulp of her wine, knowing she was about to listen to the following complaints for the third or fourth time over now. “Well, firstly, for starters- I’ll tell you the real reason he fucked around with that girl Claire. Because it’s what Mikey would’ve wanted him to do. Same reason he opened the new restaurant. Because he only cares about proving to himself that his brother would be proud of him. But- but he doesn’t even want to be happy! When that is really what Mikey would have wanted, I mean- right?” She asked and I swallowed thickly, nodding a bit. 

“N-no. No you’re right and - yeah that’s his biggest issue so far” I said and she laughed, covering her mouth. “Sorry sorry it’s not funny it’s just…wow he hasn’t even behaved himself? Hid it? Like…” she took a deep breath to steady herself. “Winnie-  I love you. You know tha, right, really. ” she said, I nodded quickly, my chest tightening. “He’s not a person to get involved with. Even for the dick. Even if it’s good which- I can’t say I haven’t thought about it - but you’re a sweet person Winnie. And as much as you want to think he deserves you - despite him being a little bitch. he does not deserve someone like you - period. Because he will forever push you away. We know how you are, and we know better than you know how he is. So, this will be my one and only warning about him - do not get involved.” She said and I bit my lip, nodding quickly. 

Don’t get involved further, Syd wouldn’t lie just because she wanted him for herself. She really, truly loves me, she’s one of my best friends.

I stare off into the distance, that thought bouncing around in my thoughts and the entirety of the day suddenly feeling…wrong. “Ok so now that we got that out of the way- how was it. Like is it big? Also how…like good is he?” she asked and I sat back, sighing softly. “That was another…downfall…even though it’s not even really a downfall!” I shake my hands for emphasis. “It’s literally- he’s so good like…well- he’s not pussy eating champion 2024 but” I said, earning a giggle out of them. 

“I was riding his face while we were 69 so it wasn’t like bound to be the best for me - but anyway he is huge! Like not long, but thick” I said, lighting my bowl and taking another hit. “Cut or uncut?” Sadie asked, causing me to snort, smoke coming out of my nose and I coughed a bit. “Guys - Italian Catholic? Cut” I said matter-of-factly and Syd laughed. “Okay but - please don’t tell me he has all that rage and doesn’t take it out in the bed?” She questioned and I shook my head. 

“He's actually like…shy? Even in bed! But he’s so hot you’ve seen him shirtless, right Syd?” I asked and she nods “oh- yeah. Of course. So…what like virgin shy?” She asked and I bit my lip slightly as I thought. “Kinda but like- he’s done it - but it’s been once or twice and that’s it like he got all his bases covered, practiced everything a few times - and that’s it, but when he commits he commits and he listens oh my goddd!” I close my eyes thinking about it and Sadie laughed. 

“At least he knows how to follow directions in bed if anywhere good” Sydney said while taking a sip of wine and I laughed. “Ohhh my god! Oh my god. He’s like- low key a sub but I’d neverrr tell him because he’d never let me touch him again, I know it.” I went inside, closing the balcony door and setting my bong on my dresser before sitting on my bed. “Well yeah but I mean- wow” Syd blinks in surprise, taking in what I’d said. “Wow.” She hummed in thought and I laughed. 

“What?” I asked “well- I mean like I said multiple times he’s an asshole at work, so with how brute and bossy he is, I like assumed he’d be like ‘get on your knees slut’ kinda guy? That was my fantasy anyways“ she mocked Carmen and I burst out laughing, “oh my god I wish” I said gasping in laughter. This is exactly what I needed. I needed to rip the bandaid off, because I knew Carmen wasn’t going to keep his promise, how he acted before we took a nap solidified it. He hates being with someone more than once.

“I wish. I had to beg him practically to tell me that he liked what I was doing. Like, isn't praise the first thing in porn?” I roll my eyes, petting Persephone as she jumps up. “Wait- wait- you had to tell Carmen Berzatto how to do something” she laughed, her head falling back. “Dude- oh my god! You are my saving grace. I am so glad I never slept with him. I'd have been so disappointed!” she said and I snorted. “That’s what I was gonna tell Sadie when I called actually… I mean- like I said he follows directions sooo well, but I wanted him to throw me around a little and he didn’t” I shrugged, picking at my nails. 

“So if he asks, will you see him again?” She asked and I nibbled the inside of my lip nervously. “We had like…. We cuddled and stuff I’m never-“ swallowed thickly, my heart beginning to ache- remembering how attached I’d really felt to the day we’d had together, underneath all the anger I was feeling that he was so emotionally guarded. “I’m not doing that again- ever with him. But he has a really nice dick- we fucked in the shower?” I laughed and Sadie and Syd burst out laughing again. 

“And ohh my god. The most dominant thing he did was like spank me- I don’t know what came over him! I was like oop!” I giggled and Sadie snorted, Syd leaning over the table in laughter. “Sooo he made you finish?!” Sadie asks and I nod “oh yeah- I mean. Like I said. He listens really well he just needs to be told what to do.” I said. “So he fucks like a puppy?” Syd teased and I rolled my eyes, laughing a bit. “In a way. But it’s like- he can learn. That’s why I’m kinda like…” I sighed softly, looking away. 

“I dunno..I dunno” I shook my head and sighed a bit. “The Carmen Berzatto effect, welcome.” Syd said sarcastically and I rolled my eyes. “But he- he’s…so sweet” I sighed, playing with the ends of my hair. “And…like- I dunno. I’m slipping back into my old ways. I want to fix him” I rolled my eyes at the realization and rubbed my face. 

“Wooooow!” Sadie drawls “holy shit! Well maybe you aren’t slipping because I’ve never heard you come to that realization before you run yourself to the bone for someone who can’t be fixed.” Sadie said and I sighed deeply, knowing deep down she was right. “What if he does the work?” I asked hopefully, “he won’t. He like- I dunno I don’t wanna say he hates himself, but he hates himself. Like any sense of good in life he crushes it for himself because he thinks he works better if he has nothing and he’s always chasing something.” Syd said and shrugged, her voice even and calm. 

It was about an hour and a half of me divulging nearly every detail of the night to them other than the intimate details of Carmen telling me how many people he’d had sex with before we were all talked out. 

 I swallow thickly. “I’m just- I’m gonna shower guys. I love you Syd, thanks for not being mad at me. And…I’m- I’m sorry. I’m sorry for doing that.” I said honestly and she shakes her head. 

“Honestly, he may be happy this week cause he got his dick wet for once- so he might not be such a terror at work. Just…sleep it off. It was once, Winnie, but I promise- If you let yourself get involved further, he is going to hurt you. We didn’t even get anywhere and when he cut me off cold emotionally after Claire? I felt like a fucking nutcase. It’s for your own good, just - forget him, okay?” She said and I nodded softly. 

“Love you” I replied before hanging up 

.·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·..·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·.

Carmy’s P.O.V. -

After my night with Winnie, I slept peacefully- the first night. I had a nightmare, and I only threw up once opposed to the 2 or 3 times a night it usually occurred. But by around 8 am when everyone started showing up, all of the questions were making me anxious, and it was generally pissing me off that Richie, Tina, Fak, Sugar, it felt like everyone except for Syd was up my ass. 

I stood at one of the stations, chopping up onions and garlic for a stew that Tina was working on, doing absolutely everything in my power to not think of her. This was why. This. The fact that her face was the first thing I thought of when I got up. The fact that every fleeting thought is somehow weaving back to her. I could not do that again. Just the simple fact that I was sleeping better after seeing her once gave me unending anxiety. 

If I keep fuckin’ around with her, Shes gonna leave. Or she’s gonna be taken. Or she's gonna realize I'm not good enough. Or she’s gonna find someone better. 

I dropped the knife on the cutting board with a slam. “Goin to smoke.” I mutter to Syd as I pass by and shut the back door a little harder than I meant to. I leaned against the cool brick, trying to catch my breath. I felt over my pockets, finding my cigarettes, but - my fucking light. “Fuck!” I mutter to myself, rubbing over my face roughly. 

This is exactly how it fucking started with her. Me losing my damn lighter. 

I shook my head, squeezing my eyes shut and shaking my hand, trying to ground myself. 

You fucking pussy. Get it together. You hooked up once you are not attached. You aren’t fucking attached. 

I tug at my hair, remembering the feeling of her beneath me, the softness of her sheets, that fucking mug. I leaned against the brick wall, taking a deep breath. I took out my phone, cursing myself for a small part of me hoping she’d texted me, since I was too pussy to say anything to her last night or this morning. I stared at my text messages, my eyes falling on my conversation with sugar. 

She’d sent me some “anonymous group therapy” shit about anxiety and she told me she thought it could help me. I'd brushed it off until now, but talking this shit out like I did with Mikey to people who weren’t allowed to repeat it- it sounded like it would feel good. I clicked on the lick, licking my lips nervously as it opened and took me to the page. 

Anxiety/PTSD ANON: Monday evenings at 6:00PM-9:00PM at St. Anthony’s Presbyterian Church. 

I furrowed my eyebrows a bit, PTSD. I hated when people would tell me I have PTSD. It’s so stupid- I’d never been to fuckin’ war. Or been raped or whatever. Being yelled at for being an idiot doesn’t constitute PTSD. But, considering people with PTSD are probably going through real shit, I’m sure it would feel easier to spill my guts to them then someone perfect like Winnie. 

I sit up off the wall, heading back inside and I look at Syd “yo- c’mere” I nod to the office and she follows, I shut the door. “Goin, on with you?” I asked, putting my hands on my hips. She raises her eyebrows, “nothing? Why…” she questions and I narrowed my eyes slightly. “You’ve avoided me today. So again what’s up.” I asked and she shook her head, rolling her eyes slightly. 

“I don’t have time for this, Chef,” she said and sighed a bit. “You know what I’m talking about. You were on my ass Friday about me wanting to get out early and you were dying to know why- and you come in on Monday it just skips your mind?” I shrug, crossing my arms. 

“Look” she snips, taking her hand off the doorknob. “I don’t know what you think is going on, Chef. But I’ll have you know- I’ve had zero interest in your personal life again, until you started sneaking around here with one of my closest friends- and my cousins, who’s more like my sister- her best friend. So let’s just say, after the conversation she and I had-“ she looks at me pointedly. 

“An honest, open, friend to friend, girl to girl conversation, Carmen- you will have nothing to worry about me, and my interest in your “personal” life - anymore.” She said and left the office with a slam. I felt my heart sink to my stomach, fuck. 

Fuck. Fuck. Fuuuuck. Fuck. 

I could hear a ringing in my ears and my vision blurred slightly. I get the familiar feeling in my chest and sit down, clutching my head in my hands and spiraling into one of my episodes. 

My “personal” life. Ouch. I knew after what happened with Claire things had been…different between us- but I didn’t think she cared. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. 

I tug on my hair, my eyes screwed shut and breathing labored as my thoughts continue racing. 

Fuck. What did - did she tell her? Did she tell them about- oh my god I’m such a fucking moron. Of course she did. Of course. That’s- Winnie’s best friend- oh my god why did I trust her. Fuck. And - and she thinks I’m gonna fucking hurt her. She knows I would hurt her. 

“Sour things give you something to focus on” 

Her voice rings throughout my mind. I took a shaking breath, opening my office drawer and grabbed one of the sour warhead things I’d gotten on the walk home after that night with Winnie, and popped it in my mouth. I cringe at the sensation, but immediately am pulled back, for now. 

I spit the candy in the garbage can after a few grueling moments to be sure I got the full effect, before pulling my phone out of my pocket. Before I knew it with shaking hands, I was calling Winnie. After just 3 short rings the phone clicks and I sit up a bit 

Please leave a message after the tone for - Heyy it’s Winnie, I can’t talk right now, if you wanna leave me a message cool- but I’m better at texts. Ciao! *beep*

I took the phone away from my ear, quickly hanging up. At the sound of her voice I felt like I could breathe again. I bit my lip gently, considering texting her and telling her to call me back- but she would if she wanted. I shook my head, setting an alarm for 5 to remind myself to leave for that group thing, before locking my phone and heading back into the kitchen. 

.·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·..·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·.

Winnie’s P.O.V . -

I went to the back around 5, finally finished cleaning up after a story hour today. It was Sadie’s day off and Mel was out sick so I was running the store alone, I barely got a break to take a piss let alone have a quiet thought to myself from the moment I got here. 

I sighed deeply, rubbing my bad hip that was driving me nuts today. The only thought that had been running through my head was how much I wanted to see Carmen. I was kind of grateful that the store had been so busy today because if it had been dead slow I’d probably have just locked up and gone to find if he was out for a smoke every few hours hoping I’d get lucky. 

It took me a while to finish cleaning up after the littles, and vacuum the whole floor considering the aching pain in my hip that was reverberating through my thigh and knee all the way up to my ribs. By the time I was squatted by the vacuum, in the back of the store, rolling up the cord it finally gave out on me and I collapsed to the floor in a heap, my head landing in my purse under the desk. How convenient. 

“Fuckin shit” I muttered to myself, knowing it would be at least 20 minutes before I would be able to use it again. I huffed, sitting up and banging my head under the desk in the process and groaning “ow” I whined, rubbing my head and leaning on my hip that wasn’t throbbing intensely. After a minute or so I dug through my purse, pulling my phone out. I scroll through the notifications from the day, Tik Toks from Sadie, news reports, a few texting ads when I see it towards the middle of the stack. 

Carm🧸 1 missed call 

I swallowed thickly - why was he calling me in the middle of the day? I checked our conversation to see the last text that was sent was still from when I’d told him my apartment number. I bit my lip gently, going over to Twitter to try and forget about him. I scroll through different posts, liking some of them, until my hip finally feels well enough again to try and stand. 

I slowly shifted my weight on to my good side, gently lifting my hip and letting out a small cry at the shooting pain as I pulled my knee up to get my foot in a standing position. “God fucking damn it” I cried out in pain as I haul myself standing, my arms shaking in pain as I lower myself as gently as I could in to the desk chair. I took a heaving breath, wiping away the tears from the corners of my eyes and swallowing thickly. I was absolutely not going to make it 2 blocks on this hip tonight. 

It had to have been all the exertion of the shower with Carmen, mixed with not sitting down only for 30 minutes today while I read to the kids. I rubbed my forehead in frustration, opening up the Uber app and seeing since it was ‘peak pricing’ it was gonna cost me $40 to get from the store home, and I do not have that kind of money. 

I groaned, sitting back and thinking to myself if trying to wait it out would just get me in a worse position of being stuck here all night because Sadie has no car or not eating dinner for the rest of the week, since my groceries were dwindling and I didn’t get paid until Friday. I huffed, “no, I can fucking make it” I muttered, I pull myself up, nearly screaming at the pain screaming at me to stop, and yank my jacket over my arms. 

With shaking hands, I got my keys out of my purse, flicking lights off as I limped, every step feeling like my leg was about to fall out like a Barbie that had never been properly popped into place. I groan quietly in pain every few steps, barely being able to lock the door from how violently my hands were moving. I looked both ways across the street, knowing it wasn’t long before a car came along. I try to take as big of strides I could into the alley. 

I honestly didn’t give a fuck if I ran in to Carmen right now, I was not walking an extra three blocks in my condition just to avoid him. I lean against the wall, feeling that familiar shaking in my bad hip like it was telling me it was counting down before it gave way and barely got to the steps outside of the bear's kitchen door before collapsing with a grunt, the pain vibrating through my spine at the fall. 

“Fuck” I whine, stretching my leg out in front of me. The faucet behind my eyes gives and my eyes are suddenly blurring with tears and I’m muffling sobs into my hand. The pain, the day I’ve had, and the worst of it- I’m stuck in the one place I don’t want to be. What kind of stupid desperate bitch will I look like if Carmen comes out to see me crying on the fucking steps of his restaurant. 

I swallowed hard, doing my best to pull myself to my feet but my hip had locked and it was no use. With shaking hands I take out my phone, and the door creaks open behind me. I quickly dry my tears as best I can “uh- I'm not here to see you I- I’m going home I’m sorry” I mutter. 

“Winnie the Pooh?” A slightly familiar voice said and I looked up to see Sugar standing there, a confused look on her face and I started to laugh to which she started looking concerned. “Oh!” I sniffle. “It’s you. Don’t tell Carmen I’m h-here” I hiccuped a sob and she furrowed her eyebrows, “no he's- wait” he shuts the door and sits next to me. 

“Why you cryin’?” She asked gently and I shook my head “oh my god it’s- I-“ I wiped my tears again. “My hip…I got in an accident when I was 19 and had to get my hip fused, and they did it wrong so it’s all fucked and it just..hurts” I said and sniffled. “Okay why- why don’t you want Carm to know that?” She asked “did he already fuck up?” She said with a teasing smile and nudged me playfully. 

“No- no he. Carm is…” I look at my feet. “Carm is wonderful. But he- he doesn’t want…what I would want, you know?” I look at her, still a bit teary eyed. She nods a bit “Y’know…Carm…somethin’ ‘bout that kid, he doesn’t allow a lot a’ good things…and” she rubs her hands together in thought, looking down for a moment. 

“I think you’re right, but it’s what he needs.” She said and looked back at me finally. “I won’t…get in the middle of this. But- just know, Carm could really use a girl like you around. He left early today…he told me he was feeling like it was too much and he needed to go think about shit. He’s never done that. That tells me you are getting to him to take care of himself. So if it’s a Carmen thing, pushing you away? Sometimes with that kid you have to force him to see what he’s missin” she got up and extended a hand to me. 

“What’re you doing?” I asked “cmon. Takin you home. Can’t live too far if you’re walkin’, right?” She asked and I smiled a bit. “You seem like a really good sister” I said softly and she smiled big. “Y’know. I always wished I had a sister, I don’t think either of my brothers have ever told me that'' she said, tucking her large purse into the crook of her arm. I crinkle my brows ``ok..well Carm and I will be talking about appreciating you because you give great advice” I grab on to her hand. 

She giggled a bit as she hoisted me up and I quickly balanced myself on the railing, my hip still barely functional. “Woah!” She said, wrapping her arms around my waist tightly. “The car is right there parked in front- think you can walk?” She asked, concerned. I nodded quickly “yeah- yeah. I might need to like…lean on you” I said, my cheeks going pink with embarrassment. 

“Course! C’mere chicky” she wraps her arm around my waist and I smiled a bit to myself as she helped me limp to her car. “You hug like Carmen” I said softly as we approached the passenger side and she laughed, “don’t tell him that. He’s always said I’m too ‘touchy’ since we were kids” she pulled open the door and I slowly got in, the pain in my hip dulling significantly when I sat on the plush seats of her SUV. 

She gently pushed the door closed, coming to the drivers side and hoisting herself into the large vehicle. “Trust me- I totally get it. I have 2 kids, my hips or my bladder haven’t been the same since” she said jokingly as she started the car. 

.·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·..·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·.

Carmy’s P.O.V -

I tried to take a deep breath, staring pointedly at the church in front of me. My dark gray knit sweater was suddenly feeling itchy all over my exposed skin, even though my usual white work shirt was still layered underneath. I pulled at the collar of the offending garment, roughly itching my collarbone at the sensation of a tickle just under my chain. Taking a final drag of my third cigarette just standing there, I throw it to the ground, crushing it with my sneaker. 

You can turn around- you can just get back in your car, and go home. You don’t have to do this. 

The devilish voice bounces around in my head. I’m unsure what got me to drive here, what got me out of my car after sitting there for 15 fuckin’ minutes, but suddenly I was planting my feet up each step into the grand wooden entrance of the church. 

Turn around. Turn around. Turn. around. 

My entire body screams for me to run as I step into the welcome hall. This confidence to change so suddenly has to be the effect of a mostly-full nights sleep- thanks to Winnie of course.

Stop fucking thinking about her. 

I’m met with a folding easel, a plain piece of white printer paper with an arrow that points to the left, reading ‘PTSD/ANXIETY ANON’ in large bold letters. I swallowed hard, staring at it intently. 

Leave. Leave. Leave!!!! 

The voice in my head was so loud that in my rested state, it drove me to push against it. To deprive it.  I headed down the hall, the only sound being my sneakers tapping the tile floor and the loud fluorescent lights buzzing above me. My eyes fixed on a bolded sign at the large honey-stained wooden door just at the end of the hall, taped to the wooden frame. “ANXIETY ANONYMOUS” typed in bold letters on the same 8x11 printer paper and taped to the easel out front. 

I took a deep breath, blinking my eyes shut hard out of habit, thinking about what I was about to do- before swallowing back the anxiety and my hand felt the icy touch of the handle, pulling down and pushing it open. I met the faces of about 4 other tortured souls, staring blankly back at me. “Uh” I mutter, standing in the doorway feeling like a total idiot. 

“I-is this th-the.” I bit my cheek fucking word stumbling moron. “The fuckin’ anxiety anon meeting?” I spit out, trying my best to swallow the nausea rising in my throat from the crippling fear of meeting new people. A woman with a short bleach blonde bob, sitting in the corner at a large desk looks up. 

“Oh!! Joy. A newbie!” She chirps, standing up and walking over, standing a few feet away. “I’m Claire” she said happily, and the protein bar I scarfed down my throat earlier begged to make a grand 

reappearance.

“C-cl-?” I tried to grate out, swallowing thickly and my cheeks feeling so hot I was sure I could light one of my cigarettes on them. 

Run. Run, RUN - Carmen!!! Find the fuckin’ bathroom, slink out like it never happened. Bad idea. Bad idea. Horrible idea.. Moron. Idiot. Stupid. Useless. 

“Claire!” She repeats happily. “Are you alright with handshakes, dear? What's your name honey?” She sticks her right hand out to me confidently. My gaze meets her hand, and I swear my vision went blurry. I stumble back a bit. “Ba- bathroom” I muttered quickly, the feeling of vomit creeping up in my throat.

She gently pushes me into the hallway, grabbing the small trash can with her right hand and shutting the door behind her tightly. I ripped the trash pale out of her hands quickly, hurling my protein bar and whatever bile and water my stomach held for the last 6 hours In to it, squatting pathetically in the hallway against the wall and she stepped a bit closer, charm bracelets jingling as she rubbed my back while I wretch so hard I swore for a second my organs would fly out of my mouth. 

“Christ kid” she muttered, her nails gently grazing the small of my back as she rubbed soothing, small circles. “Know a Claire, mm?” She asked matter-of-factly when I finally stopped heaving, my brain fully empty other then fuckin Winnie reading to me last night. And the story of the stupid fucking bunny.

“Yes- b-b-sh-she“ I tried to get air into my lungs, but instead my chest forced me into a painful gasp. “N-no- used to…” I dry heaved over the garbage can so hard I dropped to my knees on the cold tile, and was sure I'd either pass out, or die of embarrassment at the pathetic sound and sight, feeling fully like a sniveling child. Unfortunately to no avail.. I gasped in a breath so violently, the sudden pressure in my lungs made me feel as if I was really about to pass out. 

I leaned against the cold wall, catching my breath before continuing. “I- I- fuckin” I winced at the pain in my stomach, my face clenching up slightly at the pang reverberating through every muscle in my body due to the intensity of all the emotions I was feeling at once. 

“Fuckin... I crushed on ‘er as a stupid, idiot kid..but fuckin hate ‘er now..“ I sniffle, mucus getting caught in my throat, causing me to choke and cough so hard over the trash can that my lungs burned. 

“Breathe, kid” she said, patting my back. “In through your nose and out through your mouth” she said and demonstrated a calm even breath. I rested my face on my arm, doing as she said, and finally catching my breath. “S-sorry I haven’t eaten much t’day and smoked like half a pack” I said and she nudged me gently. I look over and she’s holding a tissue, “thanks” I said wiping my mouth and nose tossing it in the garbage and leaning against the wall again, sighing deeply. 

“C'mon, you can just listen today if you don’t feel like talking. We have water bottles in there for ya’ “ she said, standing up fully and extending a hand to me. I nodded a bit, taking her hand to steady myself as I got up. She took the trashcan and tied the bag, leaving it in the hall before opening the door. “I’m..sorry” I mutter, shaking my head. 

“No! No happens all the time. Don’t worry” she said and opened the door. “Well gang, it’s us plus one newbie!” She said and handed me water from the counter at the side of the room before going to her seat and I swallowed thickly, sitting down on the furthest chair from everyone else, setting the water bottle on the chair before wiping my clammy hands over my jeans and swallowing thickly. “Alright” she said, sitting down with a clipboard. “Are there any big things this week that we need to start with?” She asked, I kept my gaze fixed on my lap.

“Yes- uh…my nightmares came back..” a small voice said and I looked up to see a girl with mousy brown hair and a deep scar on her right cheek. Claire nodded “did you want to share about them?” She asked her and the girl swallowed thickly. “No- no. I just… it’s about dating again after what happened. I can’t- I can’t. I’m always looking over my shoulder, I feel like a freak. It’s hard enough dating girls- and I- I have a hard time texting. And so when I meet them in person, I always catch them staring at me. And… and like I can hear their thoughts. Like ‘who is she hiding from’ or ‘I bet she has a secret girlfriend.’ And I - I’m so paranoid.” she huffed. 

“I’m sure all of us here have felt paranoid after a trauma, and especially, when experiencing something new, the feeling of…waiting for the other shoe to drop. Is very common. Especially if it relates back to childhood, those wounds linger for a long time. Has anyone else been feeling paranoid?” She asked the group. There was a silence for a moment, I took a deep breath, finding my tongue. 

“Me” I said, rubbing my thighs to soothe my anxiety. There was that familiar tightness in my stomach and my heart was thrumming in my throat. “Oh! Did you want to share more about that…sorry, how should we address you?” She asked and I kept my eyes locked on her, trying to forget there were other people there but still not wanting to sit alone with a shrink in an office. 

“Carmen'' I said and she nodded, “okay, Carmen- did you want to share what you’re feeling paranoid about?” She asked and I sniffled, rubbing my lips together nervously. “Ye’ uh, I met a-a girl. Last week. And I haven’t stopped…thinkin’ about her? Like. I dunno. I have sworn off women quite a while ago.” I rub my chin, eyes gazing to the floor nervously. 

“Okay, so what are you paranoid about?” She asked and my eyes flicker back to her. “So uh- yeah. S-sorry. Sorry. So uh- I work in a-a restaurant. And I run it, with my cousin and my sister. My second in command though, she- she knows this girl. And uh…I don’t know what’s been goin on? With me? And I…I like her. That’s-that’s why I’m paranoid. Cause I don’t…I can’t do girls and she-“ I sigh deeply, clearing my throat. 

“She told me that she wouldn’t pressure me?” My eyes met hers again and she nodded. “Okay, so you’ve felt pressured in relationships in your past, and are worried it will happen again?” She asked and I thought for a moment, rubbing the back of my neck. 

“Yes? Well…no..no not from her. I-I’ve been very pressured to like someone before and it was hell for me. B-but…that’s the thing is I trust she won’t pressure me. And I- when I’m around her, I’m not fuckin- im not fuckin like this? Like I- I can think, and I can breathe and…so-so-so if it’s not” I shake my head. “I feel so different around her? That’s why I’m paranoid.” I said finally. Claire sits back in her chair a bit. 

“Okay, so you’re paranoid she’s going to leave?” She questioned. I shook my head a bit, “no- no that’s the thing is that the shoe always drops for me, I already fucked this up by just being me. My- one of my chefs, Syd. She- she’s friends with this girl and…and I think she told her about all my…fucked upness. She-she warned her that im a fuckin’- a fuckin loser. I just- and I didn’t even want to allow myself to feel this way which is why I’m so scared cause I- I feel like- like.” I shake my head. 

“I feel like she’s good for me though. I-i just know I’m bad. I’m- I’m fuckin selfish. I would be a horrible boyfriend. I’m fucking insane I- I think. I wake up every night fucking throwing up. I- I obsess over things, and I just keep pushing and pushing until I get it how- how I see it in my head. B-but with her it’s like…I want to see? Where things go? Y’know? L-like I. I want her to show me…it’s- it’s stupid never mind” I shook my head looking back at my lap, pushing my bangs off my forehead nervously. 

“Well in here, no one is crazy. I think you’re paranoid of having no control over your emotions, Carmen. Which is perfectly normal. We can’t control anything in this world, other than how we react to our feelings about things. So, let’s delve deeper into your current self image- what comes to mind first when I ask why you’re selfish?” She asked and I shrugged a bit. 

“I fuckin’ shut the beef down, knowing it’s not what Syd wanted, knowing it’s not really what anyone wanted except for me. Because…cause Mikey left it to me. And- and I was like…I am fuckin’ angry at Mikey. And it was like- like a fuck you. Watch me do it better then you ever fuckin could” I said and run another hand through my hair at the realization. “Cause I fuckin’ - I only care about provin’ to myself that - that maybe I’m not a fuckin idiot. That I’m not useless.” 

“You aren’t an idiot, and you are not useless, and it sounds like you feel selfish- because you’ve found yourself in a pattern of catering to others desires. How do you feel about your own desires, Carmen?” She asked and I shook my head a bit. 

“No- no that’s..that’s what I’m saying I’m selfish. I - I’m a fuckin control freak at work everything is done my way, everything is tweaked to my standards, I don’t care what other people have to say about the re-“

She cuts me off “no- not your desires at work, in your life. Outside of work. In your relationships, friendships, personal goals? What do you desire your life to look like when you retire?” She asked and I swallowed thickly, my mind going blank. 

“That is a great topic for today, desires. It is extremely hard, especially after a traumatic event or even years of incurring trauma, and then allowing yourself to desire. We may feel selfish as Carmen does, after we incur tragedy in our lives- to feel joy again, or allow new people in our lives because we are afraid that if we desire while we are unhealed, then we were never really damaged to begin with.” She said and a guy sitting a few chairs away from her clears his throat. 

“I uh- yeah I relate a lot to what Carmen said about feeling selfish..after my brother died I stopped doing…everything I loved.” I look over at him, sitting up in my chair slightly. Cause I felt like if…if I’m happy then I don’t miss him? Or..or like. Like if I think about our good times together and loose the anger I feel about him killing himself for a few seconds- I feel like…like I’ll never stop thinking about what the fuck our lives would have been like if he just talked to me.” He said and crossed his arms. I sit up a little further in my seat. 

“Mikey - he was m-my brother. He killed himself too” I said and he looked over at me, “I’m sorry…older or younger?” He asked “shit- yeah sorry I should have led with that I’m sorry too. He was- he was older…” I replied and he nodded, swallowing thickly and looking away. 

“You couldn’tve done anything. I fuckin failed him though. He was younger” he muttered and I furrowed my brow shaking my head. “Nah. Nah don’t fuckin’ say that shit about yourself dude. Both of our brothers did it to themselves. That's one thing that we’re not responsible for. I’m- I’m angry that he- I needed him. Just like you needed your brother” I said and he nodded a bit. 

Claire cuts in “it is normal to feel angry at a loved one for committing suicide. It’s also completely normal to feel guilt for that anger. Jack, it sounds like the anger you’re harboring for yourself, for not ‘protecting’ your brother from himself- is covering up a guilt you feel for a perceived responsibility to the reasoning behind your brother's passing.” 

“I’m fuckin angry.” I shrug. “I’m fuckin- pissed at Mikey.” I said and she looked at me. “A question for you to ask yourself, Carmen, are you angry at Mikey or are you angry about the choice he made, to end his life, and leave you behind to forever miss him. Because they are 2 separate things. One is your brother, and the other- is a stupid choice he made. A choice that altered the lives of the people closest to him forever. He made the choice to have his legacy be one that ended in pain, and suffering for those who love him most. That choice, or Mikey - your brother that you clearly love very, very dearly.” She asked. 

I felt a lump forming in my throat, blinking back tears and I looked over to the clock. 

“Let’s circle back, yeah we have about 5 minutes left. This week's homework for you all, I want you to do one thing, or speak to one person” she looks to me for a moment “that you desire, and it’s guilt free, because you aren’t giving yourself the permission, I’m giving you the permission, and next week- we’re gonna talk about how it made us feel alright?” She said, 

“Alright. Hopefully I’ll see you all again next week. Same time and place per usual” she got up and went over to the desk grabbing her bag. I got up, grabbing the water bottle and quickly darting out of the room and back down the hall to the front door. I shoved it open taking a deep breath as I went down the steps 2 at a time back to the parking lot. 

I am not fucking going back there ever again. 

I shook my head to myself, but realized that I didn’t feel…like I was gonna have an episode. Er- panic attack like Winnie called it. But rather than everything I’d buried about Mikey felt like a hardened scab to a barely healed wound had been picked at and messed with for a while. It was an extremely uncomfortable feeling. This is why I stopped going to AI-anon. Talking about it hurts more than just focusing on other shit and forgetting about it when I can. 

I dug my cigarettes out of my pocket, taking one out and lighting it, leaning against the car as I smoked. I don’t know why Sugar keeps telling me that it’ll get better if I just talk about it, every time I talk about it I’m fuckin realizing shit. And I don’t like realizing shit. About myself. About Mikey. I’d rather just…fucking work. Just work. But I also hate work. 

I’m brought out of my thoughts to the same blonde that irritated the scab which felt permanently fused to my soul. “Spirits huh?” She said and I looked over at her. “Yup” I mutter, taking another drag. 

“I get it. I get it… if you don’t want to talk to me outside there it’s fine. I just wanted to say, I’m proud of you for opening up, good job. You should be proud of yourself.” She took a pack of Marlboro reds out of her purse and a blue lighter. 

“Thanks…” I said, watching as she took a drag. “No offense… but I kinda feel worse?” I said and she laughed, smoke spilling from her mouth in a cloud. “None taken my friend, none taken.” She said, waving her hand in front of her to clear the thick puff of smoke. “That’s good actually, really good. It hurts before it helps” she shrugged, taking another drag. 

“So- wait the fuck did I do t’you?! You wanna hurt me before you help me?” I questioned, pulling on my own cigarette. “Nothing oh my god!” She laughs. “Nothing Carmen! Oh jeez” she giggled slightly. “You need to come back, shut out the voice shooing you away” she said with a teasing smile and I rolled my eyes. “Sorry, not interested in ripping open old wounds when I’m already not able to process the bullshit I’m facing now.” I look at the ground, taking a long drag. 

“Mmm. Alright.” She shrugged casually, dragging her own and exhaling without a beat. “ what?” I asked her, dropping my cig and crushing it with my sneaker. “I…don’t care?” She laughs a bit. “If you want to stay in the mental prison you’ve created, so be it, Carmen. But- I’m here! Every week for the past 11 years” she retorts, tossing her cigarette into a puddle over the parking lot barrier. 

“Nice meeting you, kid. Word of advice-“ she turns to me as she pulls her driver's side door open. “Do the fuckin’ homework, mm?” She sits in her seat, starting the car. “That girl you mentioned, whatever her name is- I may be a shrink - but I’m also a spouse - the way your eyes sparkle when you talk about her? That's your wife, if I never see you again? I hope you’ve gone and got her.” She pulled her door closed without another word, backed out of her parking spot. 

I felt a vibration against my hip, pulling my phone out of my pocket  in case it was one of the employees and checking who it was. My throat dries out as I listen to the marimba ringtone, staring at my screen, my mind going blank. 

Winnie 🍯 Mobile 

The slide to answer button practically laughed at me. 

.·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·..·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈ *¨¨*:·..·:*¨¨* ≈☆≈

➵ 𝐍𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫

[kiok0r0]

Give me your blorbo thoughts about the westward au that I know you’re super normal about.

Like, thoughts in general. What’s happening in that brain.

Okay so this is going to be long

The Westward AU is a fusion of farmtale, western, pirates, samurai, and a bit of mafia with mixes of steampunk and supernatural stuff all set in a modern world. Really inspired by Gravity Falls, Infinity Train, The Owl House, Oxenfree, and Night in the Woods or anything that's got mystery involved. Like trying to connect the real life struggles you're having to the mystery as well and having the mysteries be the things that help you grow as a person, you know?

Now, I know what you're thinking "that's a lot of AUs mixed together" but here me out: various groups around the world have been trying to find a treasure containing ultimate power and have finally found its location in a sleepy town called Angel's Haven.

Here's what I have so far as like a summary:

The Dreemur family recently adopts Frisk into the family, a quiet but compassionate child whose origins remain unknown. The family consists of divorced parents Toriel and Asgore, and teenage delinquents Chara, Kris and Asriel. Another set of newcomers is skeleton brothers Comic and Pyrus who have just showed up one day and made their presence known. Comic has turned part of a previously abandoned barn into a store of intricacies and mysteries of the world. A sightseeing attraction, really. Pyrus meanwhile is a rancher/cowboy of the farm they own. They own horses, rocks (yes, rocks) and various mystical and mythical creatures. The town is welcoming to these new individuals and warns them that strange things have been occurring around town. Missing people, missing objects and pets, and suddenly, internet and radio signals have periods of being out of sorts. As more visitors from outside enter the town, Frisk, the brothers, and along with several residents and strangers, embark on a quest to find the source of these strange occurrences and see that there's more than just treasure that lies in the town.

The AU combines everything that I love seeing in these sorts of stories: supernatural, adventure, mystery, and tasty worldbuilding. But also comedy because something has to balance out the creepy and suspicious.

As much as I hate like horror, I love mysteries and I love trying to solve it and answering questions that I start out with or soon start having as the mystery unravels. So this is a little love letter to all the mysterious, creepy, thriller adventure stories out there.

This one's gotten long and wordy rn, so I'll maybe write another post with the characters in it and what occupation they have ^^

[arbiterofsecrets]

please don't repost !! unless with credits !! 𖦹 ´ ᯅ ` 𖦹

under the page break will be silly interactions of canon characters, fun facts, and backstory about my oc !! if you dislike this sort of content, please simply move on and scroll. this section will start to be wordy, heed the listed warning/s and proceed with caution !

warning/s: platonic/(hinted) non-platonic oc x character interactions, words a lot, self hc's for characters, did i mention there's a lot of words ?

「。。。first impressions

with the late news of her guaranteed spot at class 1-A, she was practically bolting down the cursed long corridors of the UA hero course building to get to her class. she had already missed the first day, she couldn't afford to be late the second day ! hearing the loud thud of the class 1-A door, the advisory teacher, aizawa, realizes that this must be the student he couldn't introduce yesterday.

with a clear of his throat, he asks this mystery person to come in. and there she goes, amaterasu fujiwara, with a messenger bag in hand, unkept floating hair, and quite the toothy grin on her face.

no wonder there was an extra chair in the classroom ! good thing yaoyorozu told iida not to ask the school staff for an extra chair pick-up.

being absent the first day and late the second was already quite the impression (at least on iida who is set that it is not very UA student behavior !) but the actual person herself was a beaming character.

she introduces herself smoothly with no awkward pauses and with a smile always kept on her glossed lips...well, maybe it did get a bit awkward when it was just everyone staring at the new face. amaterasu swiftly scans the student-filled classroom when she notices a familiar boy with two-toned hair.

it was noticeable when just that quick shift of her eyes lightened up her already bright smile. no one knew the reason though, and no one asked to which she takes her seat.

—

most of her classmates found her to be complex, to say the least. when expressed why or how, the immediate thought occurs of how many things about her are found to be contrasting and contradicting. like with how loud her physical appearance is, she's most of the time silent, and so on.

safe to say that she got along quite quickly with the majority of her classmates. maybe a few mishaps with the rules and regulations of being a UA student (iida insists), being called rapunzel as an insult for the "long-ass hair" (although she cluelessly thanks bakugou for the "compliment"), and being stumped with homework for missing a day and a few 12 minutes was one hell of a first week.

—

「character interactions:

with the girls of class 1-A planning a small get-together for a while on a weekend to get know more about each other, amaterasu's head is already tinkering with a new possible outfit for this. she was in her own little fashion world that she didn't hear about a few of the girls planning the time and whatnot. she'll have to unknowingly hope they send her the details.

it was mina's little squeal of excitement that broke amaterasu out of her little headspace. mina expresses how excited she is with a little more pep to her step on the way to the cafeteria.

so far amaterasu could safely say that she's made a few good friends with yaoyorozu, jirou, and a few of the other girls. she's already taken a quick notice of how shoto has been avoiding her, and with the self-doubt she already has, its resurfaced further which is enough for her to reciprocate.

—

the day of their first little hangout came and it was evident that everyone was quite excited to see their classmates out of their usual uniform. a few of the girls were in long and short skirts, the others in pants or shorts, everyone looked cute ! a few of the boys have already arrived in their graphic tees, some were in dress pants, and others. it was definitely refreshing to see everyone out of their uniform !

amaterasu gave a little wave at the sight of her classmates. it was funny because a few of them didn't realize that she was actually waving at them. that is until they realized it was their newfound friend approaching them who had a little skip to their step.

「yayourozu:

was already apologizing profusely with a nervous chuckle and when realization dawned on her that it was someone she was already quite close to !

she was quick to compliment amaterasu's outfit

「jirou:

the first to realize it was amaterasu

she shyly complimented her and melted further when amaterasu gushed about jirou's grunge-ish aesthetic ("your personality shows through so well !")

「tsuyu:

internally got excited at the sight of the outfit since she herself loves long skirts

asked if amaterasu would like to thrift some time ! (the lavender-haired girl giddily agreed)

「kirishima:

the one who pointed out the not-so matching aesthetic of the messenger bag

amaterasu only giggled at it and explained that it just sticks to any outfit

asked where to get the little star charms on her mary janes since he thought of pinning a few on his clothes

「denki:

adored !!! the mary janes

stealing kirishima's idea of adding star charms on his clothes

might gift some charms to jirou (🥹)

「uraraka:

shyly asked a few tips for make-up and clothing from amaterasu

amaterasu got passionate and started dragging uraraka around the place to get her a few things

"oh no, you are not paying !! i am, think of it as a gift !! because it is !!"

uraraka graciously accepted and took mental notes of how to use them

"we can have a mini sleepover when you want so i can glam you up well !"

「mina:

elated at the mention of a mini sleepover !!!

was quick to suggest it to the girls (they all already agreed)

also suggested to play with each other's hair when that unplanned sleepover will come (she needed an excuse to braid amaterasu, tsuyu, and yayourozu's hair)

[crotchety-old-emu]

olitdp update

the muse has returned - as i mentioned in my post yesterday, i have been working on chapter 26 the past few days and i have been able to write quite a bit. aside from some tinkering, the chapter is nearly finished, so i'm confident to say the update will be sometime this week.

a small warning: anthony is not physically in this chapter. he is, however, always in penelope's thoughts. in my defence, there was supposed to be a scene between the two of them, but i am apparently still too fucking wordy and the chapter is already around 4k. so i had to move it to chapter 27 where i can give it the time and the attention it deserves.

and so i still don't know how many chapters the story will be in its entirety, but i promise this is the home stretch. right now, i am thinking (emphasis on thinking) that it'll be 30 chapters at the max.

for everyone who is still here after another long hiatus, and for everyone who has joined in between my posting of chapter 25 and now, thank you so, so much for your interest in and support for this story.

<3

[alexilulu]

Books I Read in 2024, #8: Moby Dick (Herman Melville, Independent Publisher (originally Harper & Brothers), 1851)

A sprawling narrative of the narrator Ishmael's time on the whaling ship Pequod, Moby Dick is the story of Captain Ahab's obsessive quest for revenge upon the whale that maimed him. Drawing upon elements of contemporary naturalist writing of the world and whaling, Ishmael paints a sharp picture of the whaling culture and industry of the time and it's foibles and the world it brought into being.

You'll be able to tell eventually based on my to read list, but Limbus Company is partly to blame for my reading this one. I'd long thought about going back to classics, and have done so plenty in the past, but the game by one of my favorite developers drawing upon 12 different classics of literature from across the world was a pretty good reason go step it up a bit more.

And in fact, this one was meant to be posted before Wuthering Heights, but I got swept up in how good that book was and posted it first right after finishing it. Which is not to say that this isn't good. Moby Dick is a fucking banger. Truly crazy. May have given me some grist to work with in some other projects, even.

Moby Dick is a sprawling bastard of a novel, at times lapsing into stage direction, epistolary and direct address of the audience by Ishmael, our near-silent and yet deeply wordy narrator. It feels like the production of a hyperfixation (which on some level it is) and a genuine love for the material, a piece of rock carefully sculpted around a vein of gold that gives you glimpses of what lies underneath without simply laying it all bare. Moby Dick is a novel of small, momentous moments.

Famously, Herman Melville made significant changes to the novel after speaking with Nathaniel Hawthorne (author of Mosses from an Old Manse) to deepen it and draw in elements of human nature, more directly drawing a parallel between Ahab and Moby Dick as a war between Man and God. It's probably felt the strongest in the beginning and the end, when faith and circumstance are both questioned the most. Ishmael is warned against the black end that is coming for the Pequod by Elijah but cannot begin to fathom the reason why, but by the time they arrive in the seas of Japan to hunt Moby Dick, Ahab has forged a harpoon quenched in blood in the name of Satan to slay his foe.

Much of the body of the novel is an exhaustive, frankly beautiful description of the circumstances of whaling, oceangoing and the process of whaling across the world. It would be a mistake to say that this is not necessary to the narrative, though I can imagine so many teens being forced to read this in high school english finding the task tedious in the extreme. And yet, it informs the story directly. Without these things, you would not come to an understanding of Ishmael himself, though it would seem superfluous. It's a labor of utmost love for the people who do this frankly insane and borderline suicidal thing, something that was considered necessary for the time by society at large and represented unerringly in its brutality and horror.

And yet, the novel understands that the pervasive whaling is on some level evil. Moby Dick is a punishment by God himself, a brilliant white avenger of humanity's evil. It strikes like the wrath of god when other whalers engage in the act against other shoals, utterly devastating and driving off the virtuous and sinful in equal measure. The other boats that encounter Moby Dick all survive because they fear it, the representative of God upon the ocean. Only Ahab's singular obsession drives him to ruin, even in the face of being offered the opportunity to repent in the form of the Rachel, the opportunity to turn away from ruin in the pursuit of saving a human life imperiled before them.

The fault lied within you all along, Ahab.

[gaysetokaibas]

WAVES i am sending you an ask here because the button is right there o7

this fic is absolutely leaning into like a million things that i love (slaughterhouses / butchering, the concept of deathconsciousness [in reference to the album & booklet], and Cannibalism)

also i need to put the version of clown i'm writing for this into a blender. i've put that guy through the "lets push you to an absolute extreme" press ^_^ i'm probably changing the last bit but there is. a lot here. this fic is getting basically a double warning since i'm not refraining from going in-depth 🙏

OHHHHH MY GOD PYRR that summary is sooo. HOW DO I COPE WITHOUT THIS IN FRONT OF ME RIGHT NOW. the way you use imagery without being overly wordy is soooo........ its actually crazy how excited i am to read this.

"his sacrificial lamb, his greatest prize, is his beautiful cleansed immortal, and he will make a lovely feast yet." <- destroying me

im personally BIG FAN of gore and gross (?) type of like. murder. etc. in stuff (i dont know how to word this) so !!! im excited to hear about it. please do not refrain from dumping thoughts on me if necessary i am sooooo aakjdkl;asdkadj over this concept. also didnt say it in tags properly but using clown as a religious crusader is such a unique and insanely cool fucking idea i'm now mad i've been robbed of this before??? you are singlehandedly saving the clownpierce tags on ao3. dying. death. thats awesome. this is awesome.

[jetiisyandereclones]

out of curiosity, what do you think would happen, or be the reaction of clones, if a jedi successfully committed suicide? I know that this is a rather dark topic, but at some point I think that some of the (more force oriented) jedi would just snap, and lose the will to live. Now I imagine that this might be a bit difficult to pull off, since all the clones are such hover mothers, so I also have to ask, how would the surrounding parties be punished? Not only for the clone themself, but for any involved? This would certainly mean execution for the parties, and death for the clone themself, but how would they interrogate the parties for answers? And what of the jedi or the jedi's body afterwards? Will there be a memorial? Would other clones become disillusioned because they see the suffering the jedi go through? Apologies for this being so wordy, but I was very curious as to the answer of this and all of the fine print, as I haven't seen this explored on your blog yet:)

Never apologize for any questions. No matter how long.

I have literally been so horrible at keeping my blog. I havnt posted any real content in months. I've been busy, burnt out, lifes been crazy as of late.

Its alot.

I wanna say this year may be better, but I dont want to make any promises I cant keep.

Ok, so.

Trigger warning:

Suicide, execution, mourning, torture, death, funerals and all over dark themes.

---------------------------------------------------

- there would absolutely be more force oriented jedi who could not stand to be cut off from their abilities.

Even the slightest blockage causes them discomfort, having a cuff utilized long term that almost completely deprived them of their powers would destroy them.

Being driven mad by having their most precious abilities denied, they would resort to ending their lives.

Like the clones. They were raised with an objective.

Protect the jedi.

Protect the galaxy.

Ensure the future of both.

Gifted with these abilities. What were they, what use would they be. If they couldnt use them? If they couldnt partake in this mission?

No.

Much better to give back to the force, in the Hope's their energy. Their powers would be given, lent even, to another. Hopefully a free person who could put their gifts to use.

They do not fear death. It is just another part of the all over cycle.

The force chose them. The force gifted them with however much of its power it deemed nessesary.

And one day. The force would take it back. And the cycle continues.

It must not be broken.

Their lives. Their energy, their everything, was only ever borrowed. It always was meant to be that they would give it back some day.

And if they had to cut their own lives short in order to free themselves from permanent shackles. As well as ensuring the next generation would be born away from this hell, then so be it.

They would do what must be done.

As for their comrades. Their brothers and sisters, friends and family.

Those who chose not to follow. They would pray, in their final moments, that they would some day see freedom again.

That this crime, this decemation of a culture spanning back thousands of years, would not go unfixed. Or unpunished.

-As for how they would do it?

That would be the tricky part.

The clones just live them so much, are so attentive. Did their families. Their loves, their Vod, really think they wouldnt notice how depressed and just.... vacant they had been?

I would think alot of jedi would throw themselves into the sea. Not the easiest way to go, but as long as they can get topside, it's only a matter of throwing themselves down.

Their clone had taken them up for sum rare sunshine. He thought they had been getting better.

More relaxed. Calm. Accepting.

Not fighting anymore.

And should a clone follow to try and help them, it's likely they would die in the rough swells as well, and that's for the better.

-the most dominant danger after a darling commits suicide, isnt other clones, but himself.

He failed. He failed his love, his family. How could he be allowed to keep going knowing this?!

Hed rather decommission himself.

Other clones would sympathize, taking on the mourning clone.

Bringing him into their homes to mourne under their watchful eye. Usually the elder clones, clones who were in a higher position of command would take care of them.

But the sadness never full goes away.

And should that clone eventually move on, find another darling?

There will be no opportunities, no chances, for that darling to slip through his fingers.

I dont beleive the other clones would become wrathful to the trooper who lost his darling, not really.

He did everything he could to protect them.

- when a jedi commits suicide, if they can recover the body, they burn it, though most jedi throw themselves into kaminos waves because they'd rather forgo their funeral rights than be treated in death by the troopers.

Funerals are often a short, but somber event.

The body is burnt with all the jedis possesions, their ashes scattered to the winds after.

There is no wake.

Not officially. Alot of clones and friends of the jedi will often gather in the main mess.

Uncomfortable lunch benches and tables swapped out for more comfortable chairs and couches.

Comfort food is served, and alcohol is drunk in memory of the fallen.

If the lights of kamino went dim for a week post funeral, no one mentioned it.

Theyed lost a family member.

They need to mourn.

And there are some clones who need to think about what they have been doing to the people they claim to love.

- however. There are certain parties not welcome to mourn.

Clones who knowingly endangered another mans darling are easy enough to weed out.

It's one of the few times jedi are allowed to use their abilities with purpose and direction.

Just a little. Just to weed out intentions and lies.

In this scenario, the jedi would also be furious. Actually willingly helping their captors.

Hadnt the clones taken enough?

Did they think it was some sick joke to aid in the death of one of their own?!

Theyed find whoever dis this, and rip the truth out of their minds one memory, one thought at a time if they had to.

They're taken under the city.

Past the clubs, past the halls reserved for adults at night.

They take them deep, deep down under the water. Under the ocean floor.

And they keep them there.

Given much the same treatment as the jedi, except no ones coming to save them. No ones coming to give them time away from their own minds.

Once answers are found, and punishments are dealt (usually a very harsh beating. Getting brought back from the brink, and then beaten again. Rinse and repeat.) They get carted down to these black cells.

Solitary confinement.

No noise, no distractions, no light. Just a pitch black, dead silent cell and a singular food tube that deposits slimy, watery rations all over the floor once a day

Fed too little to survive long term. But just enough so that their starvation will be long.

Long enough for them to go mad.

Long enough for them to scream, to beg for death.

But the clones will not allow it.

He starves.

Slowly.

Drowning in his own piss, shit, mouldy rations and madness.

Once they're dead, the clones topside, who have been watching. Flip a switch and flood the cells with seawater.

Sometimes the clones get impatient.

The first drops are a welcome noise to the imprisoned clone, who laughs madly, clapping and singing with the 'drip, drip, drip'

But as time goes on, he starts to notice.

The drips are getting louder, longer. Closer together.

Water pools at his feet.

It's not draining.

The clones watch as their disgraced kin panics, realizing hes going to drown. Occasionally comming in to let them know how high the water level was.

How much time they may or may not have.

Watching as they squirm and struggle and drown.

The body and all evidence is washed away as the cell soaked in seawater for a week before being drained, leaving not a singular trace of the previous occupant.

It's ready for the next prisoner.

---------------------------------------------------

Okay, so that got a little sad, and a bit dark, but it is actually something I had thought about briefly before.

Hope this reads well, I'm still getting back into writing.

If you have any more requests or asks though, send them through.

My messages are always open too.

[84reedsy]

What is your opinion of The Montreal Screwjob?

Impeccable timing, anon!

Just finished Bret's autobiography this weekend! So my opinions are fresh in my mind. Putting a cut in because I got WORDY (side effect from reading Bret lololol)

The book didn't change my opinion of how I feel it all went down much. Most controversial events are a little bit of the truth from both sides. Finding that truth can be nearly impossible, throw in the cast of characters who play pretend in an extremely physical sport for a living and it gets even muddier.

I believe Bret was told and believed that he was not dropping the belt to Shawn in Montreal. Now, WHY he believed Vince after a 13 year career of consistent broken promises and straight up lies is beyond me. He had years of precedent, but yet chose to give Vince the benefit of the doubt (mistake #1 of #ERR).

I believe Shawn and Hunter both knew what would happen and perhaps were the ones that worked out the details or took the idea to Vince in the first place. At this point, Shawn was Vince's new shiny pony that he wanted to be the face of the company. He was already pushing Bret towards the door.

I believe the ref knew at least once he was in the ring. Watching the match its obvious that the match wasn't over. The bell was rang because Vince told them to. Its obvious to me that both Bret and Shawn knew this wasn't at least supposed to be the end of the match.

Shawn's behavior backstage did not feel genuine. Trips looked incredibly guilty and nervous. They knew.

I'm glad Bret got a chance to knock the tar out of Vince. From the account in his book. He gave him several warnings and opportunity to leave. Vince might be the boss but I'm sure he was RARELY in the locker room. That was a space for the roster, not the boss. Their presence was infringing.

After years of dishonesty and insincerity, Vince got what was coming to him.

I can only think that this dramatic falling out led to the questionable situations that ultimately caused Owen's death. The more we learn about the real Vince McMahon, the more I lean towards the likelihood that he had at least a partial role in Owen's death. He may have not pushed him, but he used Owen to punish Bret.

[arwenkenobi48]

I’ve decided to make my own rewrite of alternate Gabriel and put him in a new original story, in light of recent events

[Warning: long post]

Basically, Gabe (as he is now called) is the subject of a painting created by an artist who unknowingly has the power to bring his artwork to life. Gabe loved it when his creator called him the most beautiful thing he’d seen and when the artist moved on to other projects, the painted angel basically went mad with jealousy.

Breaking free from his canvas, Gabe began corrupting the artist’s other paintings, turning them into twisted, monstrous images. When the horrified artist saw what was happening, he decried Gabe as a monster. Heartbroken and furious that his creator rejected him, Gabe killed the man and used his blood to create a new painting; a portrait identical to his dead creator, one that would be eternally loyal to him.

Gabe’s second in command, simply known as Edward (an expy of Six/the Intruder), still retains the skills of an artist and the mysterious powers he possessed before his murder. He creates more disturbing minions for his master, all while passing them off as ‘horror art’.

The vast majority of these art pieces fall into the hands of an eccentric rich man named Zekiel Thomson, who adds them to his vast collection. This guy’s so rich he has his own private art gallery that he shows off to all his wealthy socialite friends. After installing the ‘horror art’, however, things begin to take a turn for the worse.

First, mysterious music is heard in the night; the sickly sweet sound of a harp and the operatic voice of an angel. The last person to awaken to its sound is found dead the next day, mutilated and - most disturbingly - with a significant amount of blood missing.

As more and more of these mysterious murders unfold, Zekiel is plagued by nightmares in which Gabe’s demonic underlings are tormenting him. He resorts to hiring a detective named Vincent Truman, who’s something of a theology/occult enthusiast.

The main framing sequence of the story is told through Vincent’s notes on the case, as he goes from being sceptical of Zekiel’s credibility to finding himself in a tangled web of mass murder and blood magic, to standing face to face with the devil himself, The Painted Angel, Gabe.

I haven’t yet decided on a title for this story, but I quite like the sound of The Painted Angel. The Peculiar Case of Zekiel Thomson is another potential title, although it is a little wordy.

Also I decided to set the whole thing in England bc that’s a pretty good place for haunted paintings and unexplained phenomena. Adds a gothic feel to the whole thing too.

Kinda toying with the idea of frequently switching between different POVs between chapters but I don’t want it to get confusing. I guess that once I have the entire story mapped out it should be fine.

There’s going to be recurring themes of facing one’s inner demons, unprocessed trauma and self worth. Elements of the horror game Layers of Fear, an old Victorian story titled The New Mother, Skinamarink and Motion Picture Soundtrack by Radiohead are also going to be worked into the project.

I haven’t yet decided if this is going to be a straight up novel or a comic yet. My ability to draw is…inconsistent at best. I feel like the story might work better with some accompanying visuals, though.

But yeah that’s my thoughts so far. I have had bits and pieces of this project in my drafts for a while but I had no idea what to do with it. I think this could probably tie it all together.

Now I need to get some sleep bc I am exhausted. Lmk what you think of this idea and feel free to suggest any potential titles.

[tolerateit]

Jen's Book Reviews

Edition 1: The Devil In The White City by Erik Larson - Non-Fiction

Hello all! Thank you for voting in my little poll, I will be updating this series as I continue to read lovely (and perhaps not so lovely) pieces of literature! This edition centers around a book that I have read before and wanted to revisit because I loved it so much the first time: The Devil In The White City by Erik Larson.

Mild Spoilers Ahead!

This book goes back and forth between the story of the creation and building of the Chicago World's Fair in 1893 (known as the White City) and the murderous work of one of the first, if not the first, documented serial killers in America, Dr. H. H. Holmes (formerly known as Herman Mudgett). The story is definitely one for lovers of history, for it dives deep into the development and construction of the fair, headed by one Daniel Burnham of Chicago. The hope was to beat and outdo the World's Fair in Paris only years before with the revelation of the Eiffel Tower, and not only did the Chicago Fair do so with attendance, it did so with a feat of its own, which I will not spoil further for readers.

The entrance into the world of Dr. H. H. Holmes was both disturbing and fascinating as a psychology major and lover of history, but I warn that it is not for the faint of heart if you are interested. One can expect that from a story involving a murderer, but the cunning, cleverness, and outstanding ability of Holmes to outwit adversaries and debt collectors among many others was chilling and downright frightening at times.

Overall, I gave the book a 9/10 rating for being a bit wordy at times, though this is expected from a historical account. I'm leaning towards changing my rating to a 10, but that may be my history lover talking. The book is relatively quickly paced with some parts that some readers may find boring or unnecessary, but the bouncing back and forth between the stories keeps the reader engaged and curious. I hope that if any of you decide to check this out that you will let me know what you think of it!

Thank you for reading! Signing off for now. Jen xo